Star Trek fans are a much-maligned species. If you’re a proper fan, though, you’re indifferent to the mockery, the groans and sighs. Part of this may come from the humble realisation that people have their own tastes and leanings for things that are admittedly extremely tempting to deride.

For example, I know several people who recoil in theatrical contempt and start whingeing whenever Star Trek is merely alluded to. Yeah, I get it, you don’t like it. It’s not your cup of tea. You can shut up about it now. Nobody’s forcing you to watch it, after all. Look, I don’t like Mrs. Brown’s Boys either but nor do I watch it. If you enjoy it, then so what? The worst thing I’ll do is make an unwholesome internal judgement about you and leave it at that.

However, what happens when there’s a divide – what you may call a “Star Trek Schism” – among the fans themselves? Can’t we all just get along, live long and prosper and so on? The answer is, of course, no. Not even Jean-Luc’s humanistic zeal can dissuade fans from the reality of what it’s actually like to be a Trekkie.

See, Trekkies come in all sorts of abrasive forms and some of them just really, really hate what J.J. Abrams has ostensibly brought to the franchise. As we’ve clearly seen, his directing sensibilities resonate far more intimately with Star Wars and its suitably simplistic moral universe.

When transferred to Star Trek (2009), however, the result is undeniably entertaining, but utterly superficial. And this isn’t about the over-done lens flares or the dazzling aesthetics but something more fundamental. In Abrams’ hands, it is Star Trek in a technical sense only, made for casuals. And it is staggeringly contrived. Of course, time travel is a largely exhausted plot device anyway, but that doesn’t stop Kirk (Chris Pine) from trying to cutely insulate the film from exasperated fans when he informs Nimoy’s Spock: “You know, coming back in time, changing history…that’s cheating.” Just because it’s aware of how lazy it is, that doesn’t obviate the fact. And the presence of Nimoy is presumably supposed to be a sort of anchor – no, a bridge between the old fans and the new. Instead he stands out more as an anomaly, a derangement in a universe that’s more akin to Star Wars than Star Trek.

And Into Darkness shamelessly parades not only Alice Eve but Abrams’ penchant for the derivative. It is a fun but frequently frustrating watch: it just doesn’t have the import of The Wrath of Khan, which is not an unfair criticism when the film is trying so hard to emulate it. How creative: instead of Spock perishing, it’s Kirk! Only this time it’s even more temporary because it’s been pretty much telegraphed that Khan’s blood will revive him. There’s tasteful homage and then there’s coasting off greatness with the result being an inferior version.

This penchant for the derivative is also on show in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Despite this, his effort at least feels organic – a vague word, but an apt one here, because it really captures the essence of the originals (especially Episode IV), which is admittedly a dubious point when you have the original cast pulling at your nostalgia. However, they’re not just schlepped in artificially like Nimoy is in Abrams’ Star Trek. The point is that it really feels like a Star Wars film. It is, in a word, faithful, something that simply can’t be said of his vision of Star Trek.

Look, J.J. strikes me as a sincere guy who puts his all into things, although it just really, really didn’t work at all with his two Trek efforts, because ultimately they’re films for fans who have a much stronger fidelity to Star Wars. I enjoy both Star Trek and Star Wars immensely, but Abrams’ vision of Trek is dreck. His finger is on the wrong pulse.

Then again, maybe you enjoy Star Trek in all its iterations, no matter how tenuous in spirit and tone they are. Or maybe I should just shut up about it. Nobody’s forcing me to watch them, after all. In fact I’m actually looking forward to Beyond, because it could end up being something that doesn’t feel like an insult when it’s preceded by the words Star Trek. Ya never know.

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