This all helped me set expectations when I sat down to watch the movie this past weekend. That was probably a very valuable thing in helping me derive some enjoyment from it. I'm certainly not here to say that Section 31 is "good." It's not. But worst Star Trek ever? Come on, people. I'm old enough to remember Nemesis, a Star Trek movie so bad that it basically caused the entire Star Trek franchise to vanish for nearly a decade. Section 31 at least tries to be a version of a typical blockbuster action movie, rather than a version of prior, better Star Trek movies stitched together like a Frankenstein's monster.
Section 31 picks up the story of Emperor Philippa Georgiou, transported from the Mirror Universe (and most recently, the far future), into mainstream Star Trek. She's set up a minor fiefdom/bar in a distant corner of the galaxy, but is now called into action by a black ops division of Starfleet. Soon, she and the eclectic team she's joined are the only ones who might stop the destruction of the Alpha Quadrant.
This movie is kinda dopey much of the time, but also kinda entertaining some of the time. The heist vibes of the opening act work pretty well (though as I've often noted, I'm a sucker for a heist movie). A madcap fist fight centered on phasing in and out of normal space is fun, and showcases Michelle Yeoh's martial arts skills. Yet not all the action and twists work; a later brawl set on... I want to say hoversleds?... is pretty visually incoherent. And a misdirect to make the audience think that one particular character is a "mole" is unconvincing even if you aren't enough of a Trek fan to know that character's specific franchise destiny.
Georgiou has a rogue's gallery of characters around her, conceived as the cast of a television series. Sweating that down to a single 90-minute movie definitely hurts most of them. One character's intriguing "mecha dysmorphia" is ultimately little more than a punchline. A new microscopic life form poses interesting ramifications for storytelling, but this story has little time to explore them. Other characters with unique threads connecting back to Star Trek lore are left without the time to pull on those threads. All these characters would have gotten their own "all about me" episode in the first season of a television series, but are just grist for the action mill in this format.
Mostly, I found that Section 31 made me better appreciate the best parts of Star Trek: Discovery. Many fans (and "fans") point to the bad excesses of Discovery, which I agree wore more thin with each passing season -- the constant galactic stakes, the out-of-nowhere action sequences, the way characters just came right out to say whatever was on their mind (regardless of whether it was the right time or place). Section 31 has all of these elements.
What it's missing are deep relationships like the ones between Stamets and Culber, or Burnham and Tilly. It's missing the humanist core of Discovery's storytelling, that found wonder in alien races, saw characters change profoundly and permanently, and demonstrated how to keep hope alive in bleak times. Above all, it's missing strong performances from the likes of Jason Isaacs, Anson Mount, or powerhouse (and, I'm increasingly convinced, all-time Star Trek MVP) Sonequa Martin-Green.
Still, is Section 31 really any worse than, say, Transformers One? Or Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire? Or Jack Reacher? Or any of a half-dozen other subpar action movies I've watched over the last several months and found too forgettable to blog about? Not really. Indeed, if I had to fire one up this moment to watch a second time, right now? I'd pick Section 31, no contest.
But yeah, it's a ultimately a "thumbs down." I'd give Star Trek: Section 31 a C-. Maybe it truly is the worst Star Trek that more casual Trek viewers have ever seen. But there is so much worse out there for us completionists.
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