Nearly three years into their five-year mission to travel across the stars, and things are starting to feel a little depressing on the USS Enterprise. James T. Kirk (Chris Pine) is struggling to find meaning as Captain and applies for a job as Vice Admiral on one of the Federation's starbases; Spock and Uhura (Zachery Quinto and Zoe Saldana) relationship breaks apart following his concerns with repopulating the now-rare Vulcan race; whilst other members are missing family members and the feel of real gravity. During a pit-stop on the star base Yorktown though, an escape pod carrying a sole surviving crew member of a separate team (Lydia Wilson) arrives and informs the Federation that she needs help saving her ship. Kirk agrees to lead his crew to the whereabouts, only to face a frantic attack which leads the ship crashing down to the planet below and most of the crew captured by the perpetrators, lead by Idris Elba's Krall. With many members of the main crew separated into smaller groups, and Scotty (Pegg) finding an ally in alien scavenger Jaylah (Sofia Boutella), the assortment of teams must find a way to re-group before finding a way to rescue the surviving crew members and stopping Krall's evil scheme.
Whilst sprinkling itself with a lot more humour in comparison to its last entry, the newest Star Trek is still story first in its approach (albeit with a bit more action now that the starship is out of action), and with new writers at the helm, a deep sigh of relief can be made. Whilst it may not be perfect, or even stellar, the tale being told here is back to basics. No majorly big reveals that date back to earlier films; no enforced emotions that are revoked within ten minutes; no overly sexualised characters; just a basic story about our crew needing to work together to save the day, and a bad guy who chews the scenery a little who looks good doing it. Star Trek Beyond instead uses this time to expand upon character dynamics and to explore the vast creativity that the franchise has had in the past, leading to a satisfying finale which plays on gravity despite a last-minute reveal that feels like it should have made an appearance a good 20 minutes earlier. The screenplay is littered with good quips and occasional music beats (the appearance of Beastie Boys now brings about glee rather than confusement with a third act sequence), and the action is well-choreographed, making for a much more appealing experience.
When news came out of Justin Lin's hiring as director, coming off of four Fast and Furious instalments which invigorated the franchise, and saw the action-packed first trailer for this film, there was much outcry from fans and non-fans of the series about how different it was going in its approach. Luckily for those naysayers though, it appears to be a simple case of bad marketing, as the Taiwanese-American director manages to not only bring about some great action beats – especially in the third act – but also delivers on the character beats and simpler moments. He does have a slight over-usage of a couple of angles and tactics, but that doesn't matter when the lens flares which have become a mockery for the reboot series are all but gone.
Leading the crew is Chris Pine as James T. Kirk, and here he's beginning to put a bit more of the William Shatner mannerisms into his performance and less of the misogynist ladies-man act of the past two films to create a fine performance. Whilst there's still something lacking in his overly snarky/serious moments, he can at least work well under the fights and motorcycle sequence and makes for a likeable enough lead character. Zachery Quinto is as delightful as ever in the role of the mostly stoic Spock, and evidently enjoying his extended time with Karl Urban's Bones (who remains a pure delight solely for how much he detests what he has to do); Zoe Saldana, unfortunately, seems to be sidelined and stuck in a damsel in distress role despite proving herself in the past to be able to do such acts; John Cho is mostly there to promote a gay character to the mythos (handled quite well and hardly a reason to be up in arms) but does well; the late Anton Yelchin is great as Chekov, making it all the more sorrowful that he won't be reprising the role, and Simon Pegg's extended role may seem like he's pandering to himself and giving himself more to do, but his moments with Jaylah are some of the best in the film.
The most problematic character in the film is arguably its villain, Krall. Whilst Elba does a great performance within the heavy make-up that surrounds him, he does unfortunately lack in much depth other than 'bad guy', 'has personal army' and 'good intentions'. Likewise, a good chunk of those under latex and make-up struggle to get much out, with Deep Roy remaining mute and Lydia Wilson being used more as a bridge for the lead characters to use to get to the story – with the exception of Sofia Boutella as Jaylah. Having proven herself last year with Kingsman: The Secret Service, her work here makes you wish that she'd stay on for subsequent sequels thanks to her strong performance kick-ass movements.
Star Trek Beyond is probably not going to be celebrated as one of the best instalments of the series over the course of the last 50 years, but it will at least be remarked for how it fixed the problems of the past to make way for a brighter future. Despite a simple and standard premise, it's good performances and bad-ass action beats make for an entertaining episode in the never-ending series of Star Trek movies, and may it live long and prosper. 7/10.
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