Unlike the other Star Trek movies, this eleventh installment based on the science fiction series created by Gene Roddenberry, starts from zero, which eighteen years from the last one featuring these guys opens the beloved characters and themes up to a new audience. And I was kind of hoping new and amazing fiction would present itself here but it doesn’t. That’s not to say I didn’t like it. In fact, I loved this movie but only because I’m a fan of the original series that ran on NBC from 1966 to 1969. So I’m a little more forgiving. The hardest thing to do though is see it through the eyes of someone who knows nothing of these characters. Could it hold its own without referencing the past? I say yes, but slightly.

J.J. Abrams, the director of such movies as Mission Impossible III and creator-writer-director of TV shows Lost and Alias does a decent job creating a Star Trek film from all of its parts and (re)making it contemporary enough that a new generation might grab onto all of these icons of pop culture and perpetuate the franchise. Trekkies will love it, though hard-liners might question some of the nuances of their favorite characters and the intimacy between a few crew members in this version. But if they believe in the old dictum that we’re to boldly go where no man, or in this film, no person, has gone before then they should be okay with it.

The fact that followers will argue over these “changes,” or over bumps in the storyline of the series proves that this is truly a Star Trek event. That the science, too, of the Star Trek world, whether it be Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, or Enterprise, always posed questions and created debates based on hypothetical advancements in technology (now a reality with wireless flip phones and headsets, computer discs and digital recorders) and physics as far as time travel or particle transportation, continues in this movie says something powerful about the fusion of possibilities Roddenberry threw fourth more than forty years ago. Granted, there are no strange new devices here that could be the next new tool , except maybe a weapon of mass destruction, but this Star Trek will be a favorite, regardless, because these characters and story lines are already favorites.

Newbies to Star Trek might miss some of the enjoyment of references to the past. Like going to your high school reunion and discovering those quirks and personality idiosyncrasies of your friends that you almost forgot about. Those not yet within reunion years lose that experience when meeting Kirk, Spock, Bones, Sulu, Uhuru, Scotty and Chekov here for the first time (though their parents might be chuckling in the seat next to them). Surely all will agree that the action and special effects are superb enough, with a sufficient enough story here to get the job done and make it a classic. Classic because the “origins” treatment fits neatly into the canon of Star Trek stories and kick-starts a whole new series for our movie-going pleasure. J.J. Abrams almost goes the teen route with this cast, and therefore gives Paramount Pictures enough youthful energy to go another ten rounds or so. That and the cameo of Star Trek veteran Leonard Nimoy make it memorable. But in coming sequels are we to expect more familiar storylines pieced together from Star Trek’s past? How long can nostalgia be part of the entertainment, and what does it say about our society, or a society in general that it enjoys reliving the past? Is there an inherit danger in focusing too much on the past and not enough on the future? It seems so easy to make a film like this that is fifty percent total nostalgia and fifty percent used parts. But in an age of unemployment and economic uncertainty, post terrorist devastation and continued threats from radical groups maybe re-visiting family from the past is medicine for the soul.

This film was written by Roberto Orci and Alex Kurtzmen who are co-Executive Producers of the TV show Fringe and Alias, and the writers of movies like Mission Impossible III, Transformers I and II, The Legend of Zorro, and The Island. That Orci and Kurtzmen along with Abrams bring a TV show to the big screen seems fitting. These guys know from hour-long television how to shape and plot action and develop character in a short, intense way; bursts of storytelling, maybe at times relying on a set group of types—the mother, the brother, the mother and father; the baby being born while the father is away in battle; girlfriends and boyfriends, the guys at the bar, and, oh yeah, the TV show. Isn’t Star Trek the show already in our psyche, like these other images? So the opening feels like an episode teaser from Alias or Heroes, or 24; the compression of events makes it feel like a TV show emotionally and visually. Then it’s seemingly a little Michael Bay-ish (Transformers, The Island, specifically); then it finds it’s groove and it feels like a Star Trek film: amazing things happening in space, things that threaten whole planets. A rogue Romulan and his band of Neo-Nazis are hell bent on getting revenge for the destruction of their planet. They steal a weapon that destroys planets and seek to destroy Earth. Students from the Star Fleet Academy are pulled out of classes in an emergency effort to man ships and confront the aggressor. Along the way, the cadets discover the strengths and weakness of each other, the individuality regardless of race or species that proves they are the best of the best. That only together as a team aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise can they defeat the enemy.

Elements familiar to us from other Star Trek movies and TV episodes include time travel and talk of disrupting the time continuum; Kirk abandoned on a strange planet, facing alien aggression like he did in the TV episode Arena against the Gorn lizard captain, or in Star Trek VI; battle in space like we have in Wrath of Khan and others; escaping gravitational pull with warp drive that always needs more, having already given all its got (an event many comedians and TV shows have referenced, and which fans love); Spock and his human side; conflicts associated with transportation; a villain from a known galaxy race that is familiar to the Federation; Ceti Eels from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, and also like Khan is Nero (famous Caesar of ancient Rome), his name like Nemo, his ship like a metallic squid from Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. Played by an unrecognizable Eric Bana (Munich, The Hulk, Troy, Black Hawk Down) who has more of a personal vendetta against a single member of the crew like Khan had against Kirk; and like Star Trek III: The Search for Spock we have worlds disintegrating. Whole planets crumbling. It’s almost a best of.

Abrams also worked on the screenplays of movies like Armageddon, Forever Young, and Regarding Henry among others, all of which deal in some aspect or another , amongst the action, with lovers’ relationships, husbands and wives separated, or even families torn apart by spectacular events. So it seems at times Star Trek is heavy with these kinds of conflicts. The only thing he could do differently is screw it up. Abrams does a great job in keeping it steady as she goes. Action builds, characters confront one another and conflicts arise; challenges with the crew and ship are dealt with on a very meticulous manner so as not to sour our expectations or ruin the franchise. All it takes is a director with no vision, a cast full of egos who like to mess with the script; no budget, a studio more concerned with budgets and time; writers who don’t know how to edit their work, that ruin it for the fans. There’s plenty of room to screw up really, but it doesn’t happen. Can it be better? Sure. Entertainment wise, however, I don’t see how, unless your idea of a better Star Trek movie is a better starship Enterprise, or a better Kirk, or a better Spock. And though I’m not really all that familiar with a lot of the TV work of this group of actors, I don’t think you could have casted any better.

Everyone nails their characters, some even going so far as to imitate the actor who portrayed the character in the original(s). Chris Pine, for example, seems to be channeling William Shatner doing James T. Kirk, and in small doses is brilliant. Just enough to recognize, and not enough to ruin the original James T. Kirk. Maybe too because we never really saw DeForest Kelley, Leonard Nimoy, George Takei or the others outside of their Star Trek roles like we did Shatner it’s easy for me to make that assumption.

I would say that the retro look of the Enterprise, faithful to the original is a surprise even. Something I think Abrams did for the fans. The film has several loving portraits of the Starship Enterprise: rising through the rings of Saturn; floating back in space like a hot air balloon across the flora and fauna of Arizona at dawn only it’s space and the dusty rings of Saturn, the planet itself a backdrop. As if it’s posing. No doubt there is a certain anthropomorphic treatment of the Starship Enterprise as if it’s one of the characters, which Scotty will tell you it is. Sometimes it’s as if Abrams is capturing the Starship in the wild, like a safari documentary on birds, camera seemingly a long way off in the distance, photographing the Enterprise at times as if it’s too dangerous to get near. Then there is the slight overexposure of image, hot white bright lights and shallow depth of field softens the bridge of the ship giving the command center a heavenly feel, like images straight out of 2001: A Space Odyssey. On more than a few occasions this Star Trek reminded me of Odyssey, the mother of all Science Fiction movies, especially the silence in space. Which is the way space should be, giving this Star Trek a handful more of credibility through association than the other films. There are even moments of shaky hand-held camera shots of the Enterprise as it struggles through conflict, much the same way Spielberg used hand-held to elicit authenticity in Saving Private Ryan. An amount of realism is given to the Enterprise and battles in space when doing this and that is something new.

Props to Paramount, Spyglass Entertainment, and Bad Robot for not just making a buck on the hype.

Rated PG-13, with a running time of a perfect two hours.

James T. Kirk is played by Chris Pine (Just My Luck, Princess Diaries 2, Smokin’ Aces); Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy is played by Karl Urban (The Bourne Supremacy); Scotty is played by Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz); Sulu is played by John Cho (Harold and Kumar, and finally a role he can be proud of); Uhuru is played by Zoe Saldana (Guess Who); Zachary Quinto as Spock (Heroes, 24); Winona Ryder, Leonard Nimoy, and William Maier also star.

Continuity error in the new Star Trek film: When Kirk jumps from a platform on the Romulan ship there is a gun on the ledge where he lands. That gun is not suppose to be there until about 30 seconds later (filmming the ledge part was probably secondary). But with all the time-warp-black-hole time travel in the film it really doesn't matter.