Star Trek Beyond gets an official first trailer (plus breakdown)
Is that music?
The Star Trek Beyond trailer opens with our good friend Scotty popping his head around the corner, quizzically. "Is that music?" he asks. Oh, Scotty. Not only is it music, it's the same tune we heard blaring from theater speakers in 2009, when a young James T. Kirk took his step-father's car for a joyride through Iowa.
We have no ship...
Star Trek Beyond seems to be going for more of an intimate action movie feel, focused on the core characters more than the vastness of space. Unfortunately for the crew of the Enterprise, that means no (or at least not a lot) of flying around space. But what are these jagged lines shredding up the ship?
No crew...
It looks like Kirk has found himself marooned and separated from his friends in wake of the attack on the Enterprise, as he prepares to venture forth into hostile territory. This is also a decent look at the more rugged uniforms that Starfleet has for its personnel - check out those shoulder pads!
How are we gonna get out of this one?
Of course, Kirk isn't the only one to escape the Enterprise's destruction, as we see Scotty recreating the jump and cliffhang from the 2009 Star Trek, which itself was a callback to Shatner's Kirk dangling by his hands in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. Everything old is new again, as they say.
What's up, doc?
Doctor McCoy and Spock have apparently found one another while stranded on this hostile world, but their reunion is short lived. Small fighter-like ships aim their guns at the pair before Spock unexpectedly dematerializes. The sound effect is spot on when compared to the original television show, though the visuals are just a teensy bit nicer. Fun fact: the original TV visuals were created by overlaying a close-up of Alka-Seltzer tablets dissolving in water over the characters!
The Starfleet and the Furious
Star Trek Beyond is directed not by JJ Abrams (he's been a little busy with that other Star thing), but by Justin Lin, who helmed The Fast and the Furious movies. This might be the most overt example of his influence, as we see Kirk ramp a motorcycle into an alien encampment. Where did he get the bike, and why is he suddenly wearing what looks like a leather jacket? Such are the mysteries of Star Trek Beyond.
Hey girl, I like your tattoos
Here's our first look at Star Trek Beyond's new female character, played by Sofia Boutella. Boutella kicked some major butt as the villainous Gazelle in last year's Kingsman: The Secret Service, so look forward to more of that here. Unfortunately, we don't have many clues as to who she is or how she fits into the plot, other than the fact that she doesn't seem to like these scaly-skinned aliens. Do you think those face markings are common among her people, or is she the equivalent of that weird guy with the skull tattoo and subdermal implants?
They came from behind!
It looks like those sharp-shaped ships have found their way to humanity, but it's not clear whether this is Earth or some outer space outpost. Wherever it is, things don't look good - as evidenced by the people running and screaming in fear.
Heimdall, is that you?
Idris Elba will be playing the big bad guy of Star Trek Beyond, but no one has yet seen the foe show his face. Or have we? In the trailer, a gruff voiceover states "This is where the frontier pushes back." Listen closely and it sounds a bit like Elba speaking, albeit through sound filters to make him more threatening. The camera lingers on this particular alien as the threat is spoken - could this be Elba in prosthetics? If so, this would quash rumors that he's playing a Klingon.
Line for tickets starts here
Did more than just the main cast survive the destruction of the Enterprise, or is this a round-up of humans captured during the city attack from earlier? The location seems to be the same one that Kirk is biking around, so it's fairly safe to assume this isn't all some big misunderstanding and the aliens are really just trying to defend themselves.
The rules have changed
In the original Star Trek television show, anyone being beamed up (or down) had to stand still, lest the process rearrange your molecules and turn you into a David Cronenberg-ian nightmare. That's been different since the reboot introduced the idea of transwarp beaming, or "hitting a bullet with a smaller bullet, whilst wearing a blindfold, riding a horse" as Scotty put it. Still, they pulled that trick off back in 2009, so being able to beam someone while they're moving and beaming up a passenger that they grab shouldn't seem like too much of a stretch. Still, Kirk would prefer not to do it again.