I consider watching Star Trek: Section 31 a public service. In the first 20 minutes, I have just been thinking about Yoda. As you know, Yoda is a big Star Trek fan, to the point where he is reviewing every episode of the original series.
If Yoda were to watch Section 31, I think it might push him to gouge his own eyes out and swear off all movies and TV for the rest of his days. I’m writing this review, as I’m watching it and so far, it makes The Acolyte look like The Godfather.
I gave up on Star Trek a good while back, I mean, back in the time of Deep Space Nine. I have not seen any of the new Trek, apart from Picard Season 3, which was not bad. I know nothing of the new Star Trek from Kurtzman.
The Story
Basically, the story is The Suicide Squad.
In Star Trek: Section 31, Emperor Philippa Georgiou joins a secret division of Starfleet tasked with protecting the United Federation of Planets, and must face the sins of her past.
There’s a gang of misfits that have to find a magical McGuffin that could destroy the universe or something. The misfits are cliched as you could possibly make them. Apparently, they are supposed to be the best of the best of Star Fleet.
There’s a Vulcan with an Irish accent and blonde highlights, that seems to laugh a lot. A mech-guy, that’s basically a ‘good Borg’ and some other people. I wasn’t really paying attention to the others, but it’s OK if you do watch it, they basically described themselves.
It’s literally like they are saying their strengths and weaknesses, like in the remake of Jumanji. Only here, it’s not so meta and just obvious that the script is spelling it out for the stupider members of the audience. Which, if they are watching this, must be most of them.
When they turn up to recruit Georgiou in a her bar, she spots them all in the space of about 30 seconds. They stand out as much as a haystack in a needle factory.
More of the same
It turns out, the McGuffin in Section 31 is a big bomb, from a parallel universe that Georgiou is originally from. Yep, they went down the route of a multi-verse, even though the MCU has proved that this doesn’t work. They also go down the route of ‘big bomb’, like most other Star Trek movies.
There’s a mole inside the ‘elite’ group and they start to pick them off, one by one. I couldn’t have been happier to see, as the characters were more annoying than beach sand in your butt crack when you haven’t been on the beach in weeks.
I would say spoilers, but firstly, there is no chance you’re going to watch this garbage and secondly, it’s stupidly obvious who the bad guy turns out to be. In the opening sequence, Georgiou kills her family, all but one person, and low and behold, it’s that one person that’s the bad guy.
The Action
Very little of the action works as it appears to have been filmed by a near sighted director, calling out to a deaf cameraman, from another room. It’s childish and stupid.
Then there are the details. The McGuffin that Georgiou is after. To steal it she uses a ‘phase disruptor’, which means she can’t be hit or shot and can walk through walls. What about the floor? She’s on a space station, but the phase disruptor isn’t affected by the floors?
It’s an interesting concept but badly thought out. Where have we heard that expression before? Oh yes, in almost every movie made in the past 15 years.
The Tone
The entire tone of Section 31 is all over the place. There are very few moments, where it’s good, but I’m guessing about 2 – 3% of the entire thing. The rest of it goes from a bad TV movie to looking like the original Spy Kids.
Don’t get me wrong, I like Spy Kids, it’s silly, it’s fun and it knows what it is, a kid’s movie. When I see the same standard here, in Section 31, it’s beyond stupid and doesn’t fit the tone at all!
It can never decide what it wants to be, a dark and gritty Star Trek movie or a parody Star Trek movie. For example, Georgiou is talking about the Godsend, the McGuffin. She describes how it can cause planet-wide destruction, possibly killing billions.
She’s interrupted by one of the ‘elite’ who asks if it’s pronounced God Send or God’s End. It’s adding a humour to what was a very serious subject.
There are other moments where they try to add ‘humour’, but it just doesn’t work, at all! I’m talking about as cringe as a fart at a family funeral. I couldn’t roll my eyes, I had to go for the full-on facepalm.
Overall
Section 31 is not just a bad Star Trek movie, it’s just a bad movie. Tbh, I’m not even sure why they called it a Star Trek movie, the only thing that makes it Star Trekkie was one person’s Vulcan ears.
There’s a Borg-looking guy, but there are no phasers, very little star ships or anything else that would make it Star Trek. At least that’s something, it’s not totally sullying the name of one of the greatest sci-fi franchises of all time.
The direction was terrible to the point where I was thinking I could do better. In fact, I have done better! I make crappy videos about trains, but I’ve been able to have more creative shots and direction than this crap!
Star Trek: Section 31 is a new standard of low. It’s now going to be my go-to when watching bad movies: ‘This movie is crap, but nowhere near as bad as Section 31!’.
Stay away from this movie at all costs. I’ve watched it so you don’t have too, to quote Xerxes from 300: ‘I am a generous god.’
I’m still watching it and it’s at the end. Just to put the cherry on this juicy turd, Jamie Lee Curtis makes a cameo.
