[JSnyder4]

Originally Posted by jerhanner

Now, I'm more of a Ringhead than a Trekhead, I admit.

Heya!

There was only one canon source for LotR: 3 books + The Hobbit (& The Silmarillion for the hard-core fans).

And the 12 book History of Middle Earth Series for us crack-heads!
Then there's Bilbo's Last Song, The Adventures of Tom Bombadil, The Road Goes Ever On Songcycle, Unfinished Tales and Letters of JRR Tolkien - oh! and CJ Tolkien re-edited the Turin saga and released it as The Children of Hurin.

Even the most die-hard LotR fan had to admit that the movie would have to make drastic changes.

Normal fans, yes.
Die-hards? Nope.
They start with Frodo not being 33 years of age at the party and not being 50 years old when leaving Bag-End and go on from there... in virtiolic detail on all differences.

Was I happy to see Faramir's character changed so drastically?

LMAO!
Yes, you might as well have placed the entire Enterprise bridge crew into pink tu-tus and had them harmonize to satanic chants as a comparison to how that was accepted by hard-core fans.

If Peter Jackson didn't appeal to a wider audience, the movie would have tanked

And this is the crux of why it did so well at the box office.
Same for Trek.

You can certainly pander to a select audience, but expect even more select results. And the same amount of head-aches either way from the nit-pickers.

[StarTrekXIfan]

Originally Posted by Saquist

Let me come back to this.

STXIFan,
Consider this,
The Villian in every story is just as important as the Hero. It is through the Villian that the the Hero must prove himself. The more difficult the Villian the greater the Hero's ascension. A weak Villian automatic MUST mean a weak hero.

That's a good point, and was Nero a weak villain? No, he has done what many other villains have failed to do, destroy Vulcun a very important civilisation to the Federation and the Star Trek universe and leaving the remnant of Vulcans homeless. He destroyed several Federation star ships, as well as many Klingon warships too. He was able to ascertain the information from Captain Pike to penetrate the Federation's defence system (or something to that effect I've only seen the film once and can't quite remember) to actually get close enough to Earth to begin drilling to our planet's core. He also killed Kirk's father, which is a pivotal turning point in the destiny of Kirk. Taking all this into consideration I wouldn't say Nero is a weak villain, he is very deadly and dangerous; his lust for revenge made him very powerful.

Going back to my original point this film was about how the young crew of the Enterprise came together to save humanity and learning to respect one another in the process: that was the main focus of the film.

[Saquist]

It's true that the strength of a Villian can be measured by his accomplishments in the film. Is that the only rating of a villian in literature?

What made Hitler the greatest villian of the 20th century?
Why was Khan a great villian?
Was it just what they accomplished?

[MrQ1701]

I think it's "check mate" for Saq on this one.

Saq, has the winning point. It is simply NOT just accomplishments that make a great villian, if that were the case then Khan really sucked as a villian.

[kevin]

IMO, Khan made a great villain because although he had a sob story of his own, he didn't dwell on it. He was simply crazy from that isolation and took sheer delight in destroying as much as he could. He was bad, and he was unrepentant.

He had no Grand Plan, just took what opportunity presented to him.

[horatio]

I think that a small tragic (tragic from his perspective) element was there too. With the Genesis device, he could have ruled worlds or sectors or even the entire Quadrant, he could have had more power than on Earth, but he let his desire for revenge stand in his way.
In this context, compare his henchman, I think he was called Joachim, with Nero's 'Number One' Ayel. Joachim tried to remind Khan what he could do now with Genesis, while Ayel just did what his master wanted, another hollow character.

Such details make the difference between a vivid character like Khan and a clichée villain like Nero.

[tomcatjosh]

St Redshirt, move this to the "Spoiler Reviews" Thread. I cant find it.

Anuways, the new warp effect is oh so amazing. Everyone was right on. I love the Enterprise! The story was great, and they moved it to an alternative timeline geniusly!Folks, "Victory" Could be edited a bit

Anyways, I am still taking this in. I can't wait until ST:XII!

EDIT: Thanks ST!

[StarTrekXIfan]

these are all fair points, however I would question comparing Star Trek villains whether they be Khan or Nero to Hitler; Hitler was not just the villain in some story, he was a dictator of a Fascist regime, who committed genocide and filled peoples minds with xenophobic and racist beliefs, who plunged Europe and subsequently the world into another world war.

I guess the debate does boil down to criteria but if you are arguing Nero had no depth as a villain, despite his accomplishments, then I would probably suggest you think about the fact that he was an intensely patriotic Romulan who wanted to alter History for the sake of his world's future prosperity, he knew he could never return to his time or bring back his wife again, so he decided to do his best to change history for sake of his future wife and people.

However I wasn't aware we were debating to win an argument, I just enjoy discussing the film and sharing different viewpoints, if you think what I've had to say in Nero's 'defence' as a strong villain is weak that's fine, I don't really have anything else to say on the subject.

[PatrickGSR94]

hell yes, the new visual effect for going to warp and coming to all stop looks much more believable that the ship was actually traveling FTL, so it just suddenly appears in front of you since you couldn't see the light coming from it as it was approaching. And even though the "flash in the distance" has been there for a long time, it was kinda corny, like the light trails behind the Enterprise in the older movies was kind of corny.

The visual effect around the ship DURING warp travel was kinda iffy, though. I think I like the regular streaking stars better. But who knows what your surroundings would actually look like, if you could even see anything at all, while traveling FTL.

[kevin]

The problem though is that, that story wasn't well communicated in the film. Therefore it got lost along the way.