I was reasonably entertained while watching the movie, but ultimately I can’t quite figure out what the show was trying to say.

Given that “Section 31” was originally conceived as a series, I think the influences of that are clear. For example, the introduction of a band of misfits that are clearly meant to keep on adverturing and the framing device of “transmissions” with individual titles.

The challenge is that the time we were allowed didn’t give us enough time to really know any of the new characters, which is a shame because they offered an interesting and rare opportunity to see what life is like in the ST universe outside of Starfleet. Those unique perspectives are one reason why DS9 continues to be so well-regarded and why I found season 1 of PIC actually quite compelling.

I think the shorter format would have been better served if it was a story exclusively about Georgiou finding a new place for herself after what she had learned from her DIS experiences, maybe leading up to a final confrontation with San which interrogated the idea of a “good dictator”. Indeed, I found the flashbacks and her interactions with San the most engaging parts of the movie. But because that comprised only a small part of the movie, we didn’t really learn much more about her than we already knew. And the actual bond/conflict between them was never particularly clear, with San’s motivations coming from left field.

The movie also suffered from what I call the “Inception effect” which is that it set up some potentially interesting mysteries but then solved them in the most boring manner. Having Fuzz be the mole was such an obvious choice, given that they had clearly established his ability to control electronics. As I was watching, I actually thought he was a red herring and that Melle was the mole all along, using her masked accomplice to fake her death at the beginning (a la “Gambit”). That would have at least turned Melle into an actual character, but I guess Deltans are cursed to die in the first third of any movie they’re in.

The movie ended up being what I expected from the trailer: a disappointment. This should have been a movie just about Georgiou, and a movie about Section 32 should have been something else a entirely.

The Hunger Games concept was kind of dumb, but I actually liked the San story. It gives Georgiou more depth and complexity, but it could have been a lot more. Unfortunately, it was just sandwiched in between an action-whodunnit with a lot of new characters (who were not adequately developed on their own rights) instead of being a drama with some action scenes, as a story like it should have been.

I love Michelle Yeoh, and I’ll watch her in anything, but this was a poorly written and directed movie that didn’t know what it should have been.

That was the best Syfy-channel-pilot-for-a-show-that-ultimatley-didn’t-get-picked-up-from-2002 that I’ve ever seen.

Worst Star Trek movie so far.

It felt like a movie that was desperately trying to be serious while the cast was thinking it was a comedy.

Tone wise it was a complete mess.

It had some really fun ideas but overall I think the end product was worse than the sum of its parts.

In the end, I can’t say I enjoyed it but I don’t regret watching it.

Annotations for Star Trek: Section 31 up at: https://startrek.website/post/18738476

I hope the prequel film will be better.

There’s a germ of a good idea here. A show following a band of misfits around the edges of the Star Trek universe while they get into and out of trouble could be fun. Several of the characters like Zeph and Fuzz have interesting concepts which we haven’t seen yet in Star Trek.

The bad however out weighs the good. One, it makes no sense for a super-secret spy agency to employ this bunch of marginally competent weirdos and it really doesn’t sell why a team of by the book Starfleet Intelligence officers couldn’t have handled this problem by the end of the opening credits.

Two, a history as a genocidal space dictator isn’t just a quirky character trait. The movie sometimes wants to deal with that seriously and other times treats it as a joke. I don’t know if there is a right way to deal with it, but this movie definitely isn’t it.

Three, this movie definitely inherits many of Discovery’s worst traits of frenetic camera work and inability to slow down long enough for us to get to know the characters.

Despite my negative reaction to the trailer, and hearing all the early spoiler-free reviews validating that reaction, I went into it hoping for a guilty pleasure of some kind, where I can go “yeah that wasn’t great, but I kinda liked it”.

Not so much. (I wrote up a full thing over here. Spoiler: it’s a 1 out of 5 for me.)

But here’s some positives, since this group contains perhaps the most generous comments I’ve ever seen about it so far, and I don’t want to spoil that vibe:

• I think the cast was decent; the guy playing Quasi especially stood out to me. Liked their casting for Rachel Garrett, and the bit of personality they gave her; it doesn’t stomp on her TNG appearance, just adds to it. And she kinda looks like her if you squint.

• The core concept is fine, and with a huge overhaul they could have had something here. Yet by the end of this thing, I could almost see this going forward with more episodes. Few shows hit the ground running before finding the right balance. Unfortunately this will never get that chance.

• The sets and VFX are quite good for a streaming series at times.

• The angry face on the Deltan before she left was amazing? (I’m really struggling here.)

So the Terran empire runs some kinda hunger games for the next evil emperor… and the current evil emperor is just cool with abdicating I guess?

I wish I could enjoy it, but it just feels so dumb to watch a fairy tale transfer of power in the most evil setting.

I actually enjoyed it. For a movie that apparently squeezed a season of ideas into a single feature, it came out pretty… coherent? 😂

Sure, it’s silly and weird, but I’m glad that the powers that be at the Star Trek industrial complex are not afraid to try different things

My only worry is that we’ll be seeing less new different Trek going forward as Paramount don’t seem quite so willing to spend big and greenlight everything these days

I like a goofy team of eccentrics but I have no idea why these people would be hired by an ultra secretive espionage agency. Did Zeph even get to punch anything in the end? Quasi really had very little to do which is a shame.

I’m glad people are finding it tolerably fun, I guess. I’m about 30 minutes in and don’t know if I can keep watching. It’s so bad.

EDIT:

Powered through. Hot garbage. The best thing I can say about it is it was a better movie than Rebel Moon.

Okay, I enjoyed it as a breezy action movie.

I had a goofy grin on my face for much of the first act - it had style, which sort of fell away over time, which was unfortunate.

The Georgiou story is by far the strongest aspect of the movie - long-lost lover seeking revenge isn’t the most original of plots, but it’s executed well enough, and Michelle Yeoh is pretty terrific as expected. I particularly liked her line about a monster with a conscience being useless.

The middle act probably should have been simplified. The mole storyline was a distraction that prevented us from getting to know the new characters, and every single one of them suffers for it. Garrett’s storyline needed more meat, and I would have appreciated more time spent with Alok beyond just the exposition of his backstory. Quasi skates by on Sam Richardson’s considerable charm alone.

All in all, I think the movie is worth the time, even if no one’s going to call it “deep” any time soon. I’d certainly be interested in watching them go to Turkana IV.

RIP Zeph. You were too beautiful for this world.

Lately, we’ve seen a lot of evidence that turning a movie script into a show doesn’t work. Here’s the flipside of the coin, where the story treatment for an entire season’s worth of TV cannot be adequately condensed into a single TV movie.

Certain elements are interesting, and I didn’t hate it by any stretch, but generally speaking this was a poor use of time and talent.