Star Trek Beyond Review: 8 Ups And 2 Downs

The Ups:

8. The Enterprise Crew All Get Their Time To Shine

You already know the youthful recastings of the Enterprise crew are good, but they’ve never worked as well as an ensemble as they have in Beyond.

They're really a team this time, not just support for Spock ‘n’ Kirk’s rocky friendship, and pretty much everyone gets more time to shine here in their own unique way. The idea of this being a group cast runs through the film, plays a big part in key emotional pay-off and is even reflected in the closing credits, where they’re listed in alphabetic order, rather than importance.

Karl Urban in particular gets more to do – Bones and Spock spend a good portion of the movie together, and as a result the doctor’s even more grumpy and sardonic. It's a brilliant double-act, and one I hope gets more screentime in future movies. Also worth noting is Jaylah, an original character who is – gasp – treated with real respect alongside the fifty year old characters, rather than a throwaway one-shot hero.

The only one who’s seriously underserved is Chekov, which obviously a shame as this is one of Anton Yelchin’s final screen roles (although he does get a nice dedication in the ending credits).