Star Trek: excellent reboot

Just got back from seeing Star Trek. I'm vastly relieved that they didn't screw everything up . . . and on top of that, they did a far better job than I'd hoped.

To be honest, I've been less than thrilled with the idea of "rebooting" the Star Trek universe, but I must admit that they did exactly the right thing. The casting was absolutely brilliant, the characterizations were just about perfect (except, perhaps for Uhura), and the story cracks along at a great pace.

Victor spoke for all of us on the way home from the theatre . . . "I can't wait for the next one!"

Update, 11 May: Now that I've seen the movie, I can actually read some of the reviews I've been carefully ignoring for the last few weeks:

The problem they handed to director J.J. Abrams (Alias, MI3) was to reset Star Trek successfully in the manner Batman had been reworked under Christopher Nolan. Orders don't get much taller than that. The goal was to introduce a whole new generation to the physiological triumvirate of Kirk, Spock and Bones and their world aboard the majestic USS Enterprise.

I therefore came to this eleventh Star Trek movie with a degree of scepticism. Would J.J. trample on my childhood memories or respect them with the deference I so baldy wanted?

But my fear was greater than that. I didn't want my view of the original series sullied in the fashion that the Star Wars prequels did to the original trilogy in my mind.

I'm therefore completely ecstatic to report that this is not the case here. Star Trek manages the astonishingly tricky balancing act of delivering an entirely fresh, yet wholly familiar, slice of Trekdom. But more than that; it's really entertaining on so many different levels.

To achieve that there is, however, a nettle to grasp, and one we're presented early on, and even has some exposition in the middle of the movie to underline. It's this: anything that we previously knew about the fate of any character, race or consequential events is effectively erased. Therefore, from this point onwards these adventures of the USS Enterprise and her crew are not tied in any fashion to those previously presented in the five TV series and ten films (or animated series).

There was one WTF? moment where a particular concept of time travel was introduced as the reason for taking a particular course of action . . . but that was nicely explained later on as being a deliberate misdirection.

At the end of my press screening the 500 or so people attending applauded, which, given the hard-bitten nature of hacks, is the sort of emotional response I've rarely experienced.

There was an outbreak of applause at the end of our showing, as well, although it wasn't the entire audience taking part. The last time I remember that happening was at a fan screening of Serenity.