With "Star Trek Into Darkness" coming out on Blu-Ray and DVD this Tuesday, we'd like to show you how the shiny blockbuster compares to its 31 year-old counterpart.
"Star Trek Into Darkness" currently boasts an impressive 87 percent on Rotten Tomatoes and an 8.0 on IMDb. Both statistics are definitively absurd, as the film does little but offer spectacular visuals to overcompensate for a significant lack of original material. It’s without a doubt a well-crafted movie, as JJ Abrams is as capable a director as any. He understands pacing and tone, but sometimes gets too caught up in paying homage to past works that he fails to create his own memorable moments.
I had not seen "Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan" before watching "Into Darkness", but I was still able to pick out references in the new film because of how telegraphed they were. While most of the dialogue felt natural, when it came time to make a reference it felt like the actors were told to speak in italics and do everything shy of looking directly into the camera so that people would catch on. This was never more evident than the moment that Benedict Cumberbatch delivered his revelatory line: “My name is Khan.”
For fans of the series, this moment was probably very cool. For people unfamiliar with Khan, this moment is weightless and confusing. I knew that one of the older films was called "Wrath of Khan", but I had no reason to fear Khan for his name alone. "Into Darkness" assumed that you would just take the bait and fear the character on the basis of name recognition. This is evidenced by the flamboyant way in which the reveal is presented. During a long-winded speech by Cumberbatch, the camera is zoomed tight on his face and he spits the lines out from behind clenched teeth: “My name…is…KHAN.” The whole moment feels clunky and foreign. It’s like trying to understand the inside jokes of two best friends when you’ve only known them for a week. So his name is Khan? Big deal.
