Star Trek Review

James T Kirk (Chris Pine) is a farm-boy from Iowa who leaps before he looks; an impetuous adrenalin-junkie slumming it in bars and avoiding the legacy of his father, who died in command of a Federation starship. Spock (Zachary Quinto) is a half-human, half-Vulcan divided by the two paths his mixed parentage offers - should he adhere to the pure logic of his Vulcan upbringing, or admit some of his emotional human side?

Realising he will never be entirely accepted on his home planet, Spock enlists in Starfleet, the military wing of the Federation, an alliance of humans and aliens that aims to keep the peace throughout the galaxy. Wild James T Kirk is also persuaded to enlist by one Captain Pike (Bruce Greenwood), who catches Kirk in action in a bar brawl and decides he has exactly the qualities a peace-keeping federation requires.

After three years in Starfleet, these new graduates are thrown into the fray when Spock's homeworld of Vulcan comes under attack. The villain is Nemo, an aggrieved Romulan from the future (Eric Bana) out for revenge, with an enormous tooled-up Venus fly trap of a spaceship and a ball of "red matter" with which to wreak galactic destruction.

This rebooting of Star Trek does itself a favour putting Kirk and Spock's character conflict onto the bridge of the USS Enterprise. They are literally at one another's throats. The franchise collapsed under the double dose of the 'Enterprise' TV series and Star Trek X: Nemesis, which this reviewer described as "a lesson in diminishing returns". The whole enterprise buckled under the dead weight of consensus - consensus between the characters, consensus between fans and creatives toward the sanctity of continuity. With four long-running TV series, 10 films, numerous novels, cartoon shows and comic-books, Star Trek's continuity had become like one of those chapters in the Bible that details the begetting of the sons of Abraham; useful for a keeping track of who was related to who, but lacking in dramatic dynamism.

Continuity locks fans in, but keeps new audiences out. Continuity turns fans into believers, into a sect that no-one wants to join. Inspired by Russell T Davies' destruction of Gallifrey to free 'Doctor Who' from the tedium of other timelords, director JJ Abrams and his scriptwriters wipe out a crucial aspect of the Star Trek universe. By doing so they stop the film from being a prequel - a useless form that runs counter to the basic "we don't want to know what is going to happen" appeal of storytelling - and leap out of continuity. Now he can play with what made Star Trek appealing without having to worry if his Klingon is grammatically correct.