'Star Trek Into Darkness' Thoroughly Enjoyable

I don't think anybody would ever call me a "Trekkie," but I enjoy a lot about the franchise and the newest two movie iteration, I think, represents the best of them all. I love the young crew, shown at a time when they're developing the personalities we all know, using lines we've come to expect ("I'm a doctor, dammit, Jim, not a mechanic").

The latest movie ("Star Trek: Into Darkness") features Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto as Kirk and Spock and a group of familiars, looking and sounding like the younger versions of characters we know like family. Director J.J. Abrams knows where his bread is buttered with this franchise and it's not with a deep and involving story line that has a high level of sophistication.

Star Trek is about threats to civilization, good sense, kindness, diversity, inter-galactic cooperation and it most often involves a super-villian, Benedict Cumberbatch as Khan Noonien Singh, reprising Ricardo Maltalban's original role in Star Trek II, 1988. Khan is a superman, designed and built 300 years before this episode takes place, but still a force.

I loved the movie, even if there were some time warps with the story line. I appreciate the writing that gives homage to the characters' personalities and shows how they developed. Spock's involvement with Nyota Ohura is a special treat and the source of some of the best--of many--laugh lines in Trek. The FX and staging/sets are simply wonderful (Academy Award stuff) and the people who did the casting know their stuff. "Into Darkness" has some flaws, but they're easy to ignore and I wanted to applaud when was over. It's selling out all over, so get there early.

This one, like so many, benefits little (none in my eyes) from 3D. It's a $3-$4 ticket gimmick that I just don't get. The 2D's quite good for what the 3D is supposed to make exponentially better.