Written Post“I Will Walk Over Your Cold Corpses” — New Trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness

“I Will Walk Over Your Cold Corpses” — New Trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness

So… ok then!  A new international trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness just dropped this morning, full of new footage.  It’s available in HD here — click on “International Trailer — UK.”

Like all the glimpses we’ve gotten so far of Star Trek Into Darkness, it’s a very solid trailer.  This is big-budget, visually stunning Star Trek.  (For the zillionth time, I wish the “Classic” Trek films I so cherish had had half of the budget that J.J. Abrams and his team have been given by Paramount.)  And while I know that some are tiring of the “grim and gritty” tone prevalent in a lot of our fantasy/super-hero/sci-fi films ever since the success of Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy, I have no objection to my Star Trek being intense and serious.

But, that being said, am I the only one getting a little bit of a worrisome vibe from these Trek trailers?  I am intrigued by the terrorism angle, but a) it seems a little behind the times, as sci-fi/fantasy adventures like the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica and the aforementioned Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight have already so effectively explored terrorist and post 9-11 anxiety, and b) I feel like Star Trek stories should be set primarily in outer space, not on Earth.  Now, obviously, I haven’t seen the movie, so maybe there is plenty of outer-space adventure in this new Trek film.  (I have heard that some of the action will be set on the Klingon homeworld.  So that should be interesting.  Though here again, I have some worries as I have heard rumors that the chase scene — in which we see Kirk piloting a shuttle through a tight spot — is set on Chronos, but neither the ship nor the city architecture looks at all Klingon to me.  But we’ll see.)

Interesting to see Peter Weller finally make an appearance in these trailers.  To this point we’ve had no idea what role he would be playing — guess it’s a Starfleet admiral.  OK then.

Still no confirmation as to whether Benedict Cumberbatch is or isn’t playing Khan.  His character seems from the trailer to have been a Starfleet agent or officer, which doesn’t square with Khan… though he does seem to display some super-heroic powers (possibly consistent with Khan’s genetically-engineered super-strength and endurance).  I don’t get this cat-and-mouse game Mr. Abrams is playing with the fans.  If Khan is indeed in this film, as rumored, wouldn’t you think they’d want to get people excited for the return of this classic Trek villain?

I didn’t need the cheesecake shot of Carol Marcus in her underwear.

Nice visual effects extravaganza at the end.  This could be an example of a trailer giving away a major plot-twist, but I doubt that’s the Enterprise crashing there at the end.  The shape of the ship — especially the nacelles — seems subtly different from the Enterprise.  We’ll see, I guess.

My excitement is building, and though I have my doubts I desperately want this movie to be good.  I thought the first nine minutes of the film, that I saw a few months ago, were pretty terrific.  Don’t let me down. J.J. Abrams!!