Star Trek
When J.J. Abrams decided to reboot the Star Trek franchise, he wasn't kidding around.
Most restarts of stalwart film and television series like this are done with extreme reverence to the original material—both out of respect for the creators and to keep fanboys' heads from exploding all over the Internet. So it took a big set of brass balls for Abrams to literally blow the whole thing up and start over, while still paying proper homage to Gene Roddenberry's brainchild.
Honestly, it took a few days for me to fully appreciate the exquisite way in which Abrams accomplished this feat. It had nothing to do with a fan's reaction to watching an entire fictional universe rewritten in one dramatic scene; I was never a fan of the original TV show and only moderately fond of some of the movies and the Next Generation series. I think what I took offense to, as a writer, was the sweeping dismissal of all the work done by the hundreds of writers who have labored on this franchise over the years—even the lousy stuff.
But, if you'll forgive a feeble metaphor, you can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs. So Abrams grandly endeavored to make the best damn omelet he could make, even if he had to break a lot of eggs to do it. He knew it would work because he wasn't making an egg-white omelet. He kept all the yoke—every allegorical detail and character reference he could find that didn't impede upon his new story, he kept it. Even though everything from this point forward will be different, it also won't be. His Star Trek is both completely new and completely familiar, and it makes for a hell of an invigorating movie experience.
Time travel plots are hardly new to the Star Trek universe, except in this case the plot was conceived expressly to create something new. When a vengeful Romulan mining ship captain winds up 154 years in the past with an unanticipated opportunity to exact revenge against Ambassador Spock, the tale that starts unfolding feels like a cosmic mess of continuity gaffes when compared to already existing Star Trek stories. That turns out to be exactly the point, however, as Nero's actions in the opening scene irrevocably change the future. From that moment on, the new lives these well-known characters will lead can be told from scratch, eventually resolving brilliantly into a new version of events—a fresh start for a series that can now proceed in any direction Abrams would like to take it.
Of course, none of it would have worked if not for the perfect casting decisions he made at every level (well, maybe not Tyler Perry). Just like the film as a whole, every actor had to be reminiscent of his or her forebear without mimicry, keeping the personality traits established by the actors before them while tossing out their performances almost entirely. Abrams definitely found the right ringleader for this circus in Chris Pine as the enduring James T. Kirk, a brash young man with more charisma and determination in his little finger than anyone else in the galaxy has in their whole body. Karl Urban and Simon Pegg clearly had a good time in their comic relief roles as Dr. McCoy and Scotty, respectively, while Zachary Quinto is solid, if unremarkable, as Spock (he's also the only one with the extra weight of appearing with his older self, if you will).
In this era of increasingly stupid summer entertainment, Star Trek promises to be one of the few bright spots of 2009. White-knuckle, action-packed adventure films with even half a brain are tough to come by these days, so get thee to a theater before it's overrun by more toys turned movies (G.I. Joe), sequels to toys turned movies (another Transformers movie) and Jerry Bruckheimer-produced talking guinea pigs. I kid you not.