Few series can claim to have inspired more people to become scientists and engineers than . During its Space Race heyday, the showâs emphasis on knowledge, discovery and invention touched the imaginations of millions.
But while the Enterpriseâs official mission statement begins âto explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizationsâ, its unofficial ending is âand blow them upâ.
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In practice, the show has often focused on crowd-pleasing action, relegating science to expository technobabble â a tendency thatâs grown more pronounced as the franchise has grown more tired.
So does â fresh take on the series redress the balance?
Reboot happy
has pulled off the tricky feat of enlivening a scenario that many had dismissed as clapped-out, in a way that will satisfy all but the grouchiest of Trekkies. The casting and characterisation is immaculate; the plot and direction are engaging and fast-moving; and fans will be pleased that many familiar motifs are present and correct â itâs still , for example.
But whatâs missing is a big idea. The new movie is about an epic but conceptually mundane conflict, driven by the baddyâs thirst for revenge, not the goodiesâ hunger for knowledge. Thereâs only one new world and very little new life; in a telling scene, Spock rejects the Vulcan Science Academy in favour of Starfleet, which is more explicitly militaristic than in previous incarnations.
Rather, the new Star Trek continues the seriesâ habit of using the scientific trappings to dress up its fantasies. Sometimes this is dubious: a supernova endangers the entire galaxy and a black hole that, like most in fiction, behaves much like a cosmic vacuum cleaner. Another sci-fi favourite â the concept of parallel worlds â is used to cunning effect.
At other times, itâs old hat â while teleportation and time travel are still making headlines in the real world, thereâs little new about their use as fictional devices in this movie.
Future tech
The technology is more plausible. The mysterious âred matterâ that the villainous Nero uses to wreak mass destruction closely parallels the (possibly equally fictional) red mercury that occasionally spooks arms-control experts.
The brain-controlling parasites that ensure his prisonersâ compliance have real-life counterparts, too. And weâve written before about how a stunning sequence, in which Kirk and company parachute to a planetâs surface from orbit, might soon be the ultimate extreme sport.
Ultimately, however, Star Trek was rarely at its best when it was trying to be inspirational. On the contrary, some of its clunkiest and most preachy episodes were those where it tried to address such heavyweight issues as environmentalism, technocracy and genetic inheritance.
Boldly going where many directors have gone before, Abrams manages to give this much-beloved franchise the reboot it needed.
