First off let me preface this review by saying that I really loved Star Trek 2009, but I was not a huge fan of Star Trek Into Darkness. I thought it played too much on the iconic imagery of ‘Wrath of Khan’ and overall felt like a very flat, unfinished, and bloated film.

Now with that all being said ‘Star Trek Beyond’ is a fantastic film! Well-written, well-edited, well-paced and well-directed! Simon Pegg and the writing team did an amazing job of capturing the essence of classic ‘Trek’ while still maintaining the action-packed feeling of the Kelvin timeline films.

The villain character played by Idris Elba was phenomenal! Idris did an amazing job! His villain character was well written, fleshed out, and had clearly described motives…he was truly terrifying when he was on screen.

The rest of the Trek cast did an amazing job; everyone got equal screen presence this time around (as opposed to Star Trek Into Darkness were really only Kirk and Spock were the focus) and really had the opportunity to flourish and be apart of the overall mission at hand. If you felt that Chekov and McCoy didnt get their fair shake in the rebooted timelines; then this is the film you need to see.

-SPOILERS-

I’m not going to do a shot by shot breakdown of the entire film (that will be my commentary track for later on) but I just wanted to touch on a few ‘spoiler’ subjects.

KRALL- This is the villain character played by Idris Elba…his first appearance on screen is brutal, terrifying and intense. You as the viewer begin to hate him from the get. But the film actually allows for this character to flourish and you realize that hes much more of a tragic hero then straight up villain. It is revealed towards the end of the movie that KRALL was originally the captain of the USS Franklin, an old pre-federation NX series ship (think ST: Enterprise) and after being stranded in deep space for decades he and his crew found a way to sustain their lives, but ultimately change their physiological structure. He vowed revenge against the Federation and set out to destroy it. Very powerful and emotional scenes towards the end of the film for this character.

USS FRANKLIN- I loved every single scene this old NX-series ship was in. I really enjoyed how this reboot timeline has fully embraced the history behind ‘Trek’ and has gone to some great lengths to include the much debated ST: Enterprise series into its films. (ST:2009 referenced Adm. Archer and Into Darkness showed a model of an NX-series ship). The old school ship technology, uniform items, shuttles and even boombox where a great way to tie in old Trek imagery with the Kelvin Timeline films. This, to me, only helps to root this rebooted series into the Trek lore.

VFX-The visuals on this movie are top-notch. The way the enemy ‘hive’ fleet moves around and destroys the Enterprise is breathtaking and brutal. Several times during the film I was tensed up and flinching with how hard hitting this film was…even when it was just 2 special effects on screen you could still feel the intensity. The design/look of the Yorktown space station was beyond impressive! Seeing the Enterprise being flow under a city heading towards space-dock is an image I will not easily forget! The makeup on KRALL and JAYLAH where amazingly done and mesmerizing. I love their hard work and inclusion of practical effects in this film.

Overall I felt this movie really captured what trek means to me, while still layering it in the fun-action packed summer blockbuster format of the rebooted series. Not an easy task to complete but they pulled it off.

I will most likely be watching this movie again in theaters because once, for me, wasn’t enough!