Super 8

[Alan Zarnegar]

Yeah ST made perfect sense. It's a mining ship, of course it's heavily armed. It's just a drill bit. There's no reason anyone ON EARTH could manage to shoot at it. It's unshielded, no way some phasers couldn't break it since evidently a HAND PHASER managed to blow it up. But it was moving... no wait, it was completely stationary, so it would have been ... hard to hit?

Why did they need to drill into a planet anyway? Just drop it next to a planet and evidently it creates a black hole anyway. Sure it'll take 5 minutes longer, but you don't need to drill anything.

Explain the logic of this scenario. You have a bomb. That you need to detonate. Do you A) Put it on a torpedo and fire it at the target or B) give it to a foot soldier jumping out of an airplane? Bonus question: Why only bring one bomb.

Bonus Bonus Question: Explain the logic of this scenario:

1) We can't beam you off until you blow up the rig.
2) We can't beam you out if you're flying/falling.
3) We need you to blow up the rig.

Where precisely were they supposed to go after blowing up the rig and before being beamed up? The only time they could get beamed up was when they were getting blown up. No wonder he sent an idiot, the guy who snuck on board and the guy who forgot the parking break. It was a suicide mission!

You're Spock. You're hundreds of years old and very wise. You have a ship full of an incredibly dangerous compound enough to wipe out everything you love. You're about to be boarded. Do you A) Blow up your ship to keep the material safe or B) Let them board your ship and take it for themselves? Keep in mind this is the person who already gave up his life with the quote "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."

You're on a frozen planet what's the probability that your friend from the future is within walking distance? IF you're marooning your nemesis on a planet, why put them within walking distance of a place that has a communication array?

Why did they "Build the fastest ship in the galaxy" instead of just flying straight there? It seems like it would have been a lot more efficient to just send any old fast ship which was ready then and there.

Why did spock have evidently 10,000,000x more red matter than he needed?

1) I doubt any phaser would have done damage to the drill where the beam was coming out, and considering how the drill was being lowered in from space, you could only really shoot the bottom.

2) Dramatic Effect. They had to spend some of their Special FX money on imploding planets.

3)The drill causes signal interference, so firing a torpedo would miss, unless it flew completely straight, which it wouldn't given the fact that it would need to self stabilize (using jammed electronics).

4)"The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few."

5)An explosive doesn't need to blow up the drill. Simply disabling it would do.

6)He's Leonard Nimoy.

7)He's Leonard Nimoy.

8)He's Leonard Nimoy.

9)He's fooken Leonard Nimoy!!! :laugh:

Sure you right in many cases, but if you are going to question each aspect of the story, it wouldn't hurt to think of things that can explain more minor plot points. The strength of books, is that they can take their time and explain as much as they want. If you do that with a film, it would be unwatchable.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

so many insults ... and i wonder u have a magical eyes ...

I like to think my eyes are magical, yes.

how does the CGI in the teaser is unfinished, rushed or low budget? which part? i don't see any sign of low quality stuff in that.

I look at CGI all the time, I know what I'm looking at. The terribly phony looking flames. The super-clean texturing and lack of detail shaders on much of the CG. It looks to me like it could use another couple render passes for detail and dirt, probably another lighting pass or two. Which leads me to believe it's not finished. Then again, I've seen many trailers over the years that leave this impression only to have the same unfinished feel to all of the CG in the final film. To someone who looks at CG 3 or 4 days a week, much of it they create themselves, it's pretty obvious. When I look at CG elements in a teaser/trailer and I see stock procedural textures where I know exactly which algorithm is producing them or which Maya library to pull them from, I feel the CG is unfinished.

Then there's the absurd chain-reaction of the crash, the hap-hazardly modeled collisions, the bending steel of the box car paneling that behaves nothing like the side panel of a steel boxcar, but more like generic waxy CG presets. Of course, that's another peeve of mine. I grew up surrounded by heavy construction and demolition and have been welding, bending, grinding and breaking steel beams and plates (and yes, even panels of steel and aluminum railroad cars and containers) since I was a kid. It's rare that movies and CG artists get this stuff right.

the star trek story was impressive and it had quite a amount of logic in it ... it didn't change any universe. it just created another one.. if you want to know more about the new Star Trek story u should listen to the writers commentaries in creative screenwriting podcast ...

I've been a Trek fan all my life. I've listened to most of those podcasts. I'm a sci-fi buff myself. I'm a published sci-fi author and technical writer (I have a pen name, don't ask). That said, I actually liked the new Star Trek movie. But I'm sick of time travel being over-used in Trek and in Sci-Fi in general, not just films, but in pop literature as well. When I said time travel has ruined the Star Trek universe, I did not mean the finite universe contained within the latest JJ Abrams film. I meant as a whole of everything Star Trek.

For me, the real issues with the new Trek film are not directly related to the story or plot. It's all the little things. Gavin sums up a bunch of them nicely. I'm sorry, I'm very analytical. I can only throw so much popcorn at a film before I lose interest and start thinking about how stupid a scenario or situation is. Don't get me started on how weapons are handled in most films, not just Trek films, especially current high-tech weaponry or even hypothesized future weapons or alien weaponry.

That said, I am looking forward to the next Star Trek film. I love the casting and art direction of the latest one. It was entertaining, despite its flaws.

 

[Erik Franzén]

I hope JJ takes us all in with a more interesting story next time and less action flicky. I mean, I liked it - great, fun, action movie. But as someone who loves sci-fi and knows a thing or two about how sci-fi films are nowadays vs. sci-fi books...they seriously need to take a long turn on this one and churn out a story that does not degrade into a "Me vs. The Big Bad Villain".
Sci-fi was never about that. It's about exploring some wild concept in some imaginary strangeness (future, past, present, unknown). Add to that action, great performances, beautiful imagery and an impressive score and you got a real blockbuster!

 

[Mark Collins]

This teaser makes me not want to see the film. The CGI in the teaser is either unfinished, rushed or low budget, possibly even a sequence that isn't even in the film.. I agree with Gavin's comments on absurdities. But this is part of what is wrong with sci-fi and or tech-themed films more so today than ever before, it's not just a J.J. Abrams thing.

Abrams and his crew are truly is the masters of the anamorphic flare... At times I think that alone is how he landed the Star Trek directorial gig. Heh. Anyway, I liked his Star Trek, even though the story was lame, the villain was weak and time travel has pretty much ruined the Star Trek universe now. I don't think J.J. had a whole lot to do with the story itself on Star Trek though. I thought the casting and art direction were perfect. Definitely looking forward to the sequel. But those in the privileged position of writing for the Star Trek films need to take another look at their choices for villains in these films... That and I don't think I can ever forgive Berman and Pillar for derailing the TNG films so badly. But that's another thread altogether.

They haven't shot anything for Super 8 yet beyond this teaser trailer. Apparently they just finished the script and are looking to shoot towards the end of summer.

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

I hope JJ takes us all in with a more interesting story next time and less action flicky. I mean, I liked it - great, fun, action movie. But as someone who loves sci-fi and knows a thing or two about how sci-fi films are nowadays vs. sci-fi books...they seriously need to take a long turn on this one and churn out a story that does not degrade into a "Me vs. The Big Bad Villain".
Sci-fi was never about that. It's about exploring some wild concept in some imaginary strangeness (future, past, present, unknown). Add to that action, great performances, beautiful imagery and an impressive score and you got a real blockbuster!

Exactly!

But just in case it does degenerate into "Me vs. The Big Bad Villain", I sure hope they come up with something better than the big, bad, mining crew from the future.

 

[Steven Caesare]

I have to agree that the CGI in the trailer looked sub-par.

In Cloverfield, it looked JUST LIKE the Statue of Liberty's head came crashing down the street.

In trailer, the train elements: a) looked animated, and b) didn't obey physics well enough.

Looking forward to the movie tho. And already suckered in to one of the viral sites. (scariestthingieversaw.com).

-sc

 

[Ken Waller]

Remember the CGI got better in each new AVATAR trailer, this post is going over the same road. It's just a teaser people. For all you know they will crash a real train into a real truck when they shoot this movie.

 

[Zach Zoller]

There will never be a new Spielberg, just new names known for there own greatness.

 

[Ryan Sims]

Okay, thanks to Jeff, I see the flaws he points out now.
But what is real (anything?) and what is CGI in this trailer?