Star Trek: 8 Things The Kelvin Timeline Movies Got Wrong

Would it have killed them to make one of the villains a woman?

Star Trek (2009) clearly attempted to elevate Uhura into the "Holy Trinity" that originally consisted of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy. But Karl Urban's McCoy still has better lines and a clearer persona than Uhura does in these films. Zoe Saldana is a badass, but Uhura gets to reflect that in approximately one film (everyone's favorite, Star Trek Into Darkness).

The choice to make Uhura and Spock an item in these films was... well a choice... but when it came time to pay that relationship off, the producers instead chose to pair Spock and McCoy up for their subplot in Star Trek Beyond. And they sidelined Uhura to go through the motions in a fairly stock prison break sequence. Uhura plays a pivotal function in each of these films and that's great, but she gets so little screen time and so little development, it's a shame.

Alice Eve's Carol Marcus is treated even worse. Look, Star Trek has always been horny and women have been objectified all through its history. Zoe Saldana didn't even get a uniform with sleeves until the third film, to say nothing of, you know, pants. But Eve's bizarre strip down in the shuttlecraft (to show what a lech Kelvin Kirk can be?) was jarring.

What's worse, it didn't even make sense in-film. The costume she changes into has little clear windows to show the Starfleet duty uniform underneath, so why was she taking that duty uniform off only to put it and the flight suit back on? Was she being a tease? Is that the only trait we can identify of this character in Star Trek Into Darkness?

And what happened to her after Into Darkness? It's not like Carol Marcus was a compelling enough character that audiences were begging for her return in Star Trek Beyond, but the previous film made it a point to say she was joining the "family". Good, more female characters with more than one line on the bridge of the Enteprise. No wait, she's gone.