The Trailer Into Darkness

"You think your world is safe? It's an illusion. A comforting lie told to protect you. Enjoy these final moments of peace for I have returned to have my vengeance."

The narrative rolls and so the questions begin as Paramount Pictures and JJ Abrams Bad Robot unveil the brand new teaser trailer for Star Trek Into Darkness and my god does it whet the appetite for Summer 2013. It only seems like a couple of days since we were treated to the poster for STID (well actually it was only a couple of days) and while we're still reeling from that those cheeky monkeys have leaned in and slammed home a heavy right hook with 1 minute and 19 seconds worth of Trek ecstasy.

Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Simon Pegg, Zoe Saldana, John Cho, Keith Urban all feature within the trailer so the crew is back (although I had a hard job spotting Anton Yelchin) along with Mystery Guest Number One in the form of Sherlock's Benedict Cumberbatch and Mystery Guest Number Two - who exactly is the blonde Starfleet character we see twice during the trailer?  

Suspicions on the latter have suggested it be some long lost Kirk flame or could it be Dr Elizabeth Dehner from "Where No Man Has Gone Before" which would mean - shock, horror, gasp - that Cumberbatch ISN'T playing Khan Noonien Singh after all but Gary Mitchell?! How about this - perhaps this is the one and only Carol Marcus?  How 'bout that one? Or if we are seriously still thinking about the Khan possibility is it therefore Lt Marla McGivers, the future Mrs KNS?

So what does this trailer really tell us about the sequel to the 2009 reboot?  Well if we're honest not a bloody lot.  There are lots of short snaps to action shots through the film and I doubt they are in any sort of order.  Here's what I managed to pick out from a few viewings:

Some sort of award or induction ceremony I'm guessing at Starfleet and therefore pretty early on in the film.  Could this actually be where Kirk and "Mitchell" first meet? and act as more of a prologue to the rest of the film?  That's my guess at this point.

Then there's Kirk and possibly Sulu/McCoy running through some sort of red alien-type plant life.  What this is about is anyone's to theorise at this point.  I'm thinking it's at the end of some kind of action sequence as they both end up jumping off a cliff into the sea but why???? Aside from that apparently offworld activity there's also some more shots of the "fire world" hinted at in previous images with Kirk in one of the revamped spacesuits.  How this fits is yet another mystery to solve - is this where they find Cumberbatch's character?  Can't wait to find out!!!

Then we get the arrival of the villain - who might not be as villainous as we first believed if we go by Cumberbatch's description of the character a few weeks ago? For starters that's a very big gun he's toting and how we get to this point is all still to be revealed and there won't be many Trekkers who will want to wait. Judging from the surroundings it looks like this could be from the layer stages of the feature in the buildup to the final and no doubt epic confrontation and fight scene. Now the big thing we all want to know is WHO the hell is he supposed to be?  

Khan was always the favourite but that would mean Star Trek 2 would be a rehash of Star Trek II which I find unlikely and would turn all of Trekdom against the reboot series forevermore.  Montalban was Khan, is Khan and will always be Khan.  Here endeth the lesson.  I firmly believe that this rumour was spread to take fans off the scent from Day One.  A good move and one that meant our fandom eye was taken off the ball.  Adding Mystery Guest Two into the trailer does open up a lot of possibilities - it might even mean that this is a totally new character although his few lines of speech over the trailer suggest it's someone we know.  The theatrical nature of the words might hint at a Khan-like villain but I now think this seems unlikely.  I'll be gutted if it is Khan because I have a bet with a colleague of mine for a £1 that it isn't. Game On.

Could the shot with Cumberbatch in black with the arrow head symbol visible more likely be from the aforementioned prologue section than from the main piece of the film OR does it indicate he infiltrates the Enterprise and have more than a little too do with the ship ending up in the drink that nicely caps off this epic teaser? The eagle-eyed will have spotted that in between all the nice bits there are one or two explosions and clear signs of Starfleet equipment and personnel flying about (on the ship?) so that would fit with the crash sequence at least.

Now - that really sent a chill down my spine, seeing the warp nacelles emerging from the swirl and even more when there's a brief clip of her heading the other way into the waters. Wow -a starship operating within a planet's atmosphere and not a blue alert in sight? That's surely a massive contravention of Roddenberry's reason for having the transporters!!! However, it does fit snugly with JJ's vision of the creation of the Enterprise as we saw in the first movie so a nice bit of (probably not 100% intentional) continuity that spits in the face of the Prime Trek universe.

Also spotted were some clear indications that most of the action will be Earth-centric with Spock in science blue sprinting through the streets.  The other shots of McCoy Scotty, Spock and Uhura oddly have them in alternative attire suggesting a lot of off-ship activity and not in the familiar Starfleet shades as we might have expected.  With Uhura in tears here comforted by Scotty do we get the prospect of a certain pointy-eared one in mortal peril?  Echoes of another Trek II???  Let's see....

What we can be absolutely concrete on is that Earth is going to Hell in a handbasket and the crew of the Enterprise are going with it as we witness the beginnings of the destruction of a city at the very least.  Most likely to my mind is that this is Starfleet HQ/the United Federation of Planets building crashing down.

Let's be honest these teaser trailers do exactly that - tease - and with music not dissimilar to that which you would find in promos for Prometheus (that horn/trumpet note repeat is very distinctive) or The Dark Knight Rises, this brings the hairs on the back of your neck straight to attention. The clever bit is just trying to work out what order these bits SHOULD be in and the relevance of the bits we see. Hopefully here I've opened your eyes to a few suggestions and it might just spark one or two conversations off!

Just to finish this off with a flourish it's also come to my attention that the Japanese have managed to get a slightly better and longer trailer. Stick around for the final scene...does it remind you of anything in particular? I'm not saying a THING ok, ok, maybe apart something to do with the radiation leak that Scotty can't get in to fix, the mains coming back on line and...I'll stop there....Good shot there JJ, that wasn't hammered in to make the fans all scream out for just a little more....

 

As Benedict Cumberbatch rumbles as the trailer draws to its conclusion and the months of speculation start to snowball....

"So shall we begin?"

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