I’ve not been having a very good time with these Star Trek films so far. The first was pretty dire, and I couldn’t get more than half an hour into this one. Part of me feels bad that I didn’t give it a good go, but the other part of me just doesn’t want to even think about worm things crawling into people’s ears.

The only highlight of the movie was seeing the familiar faces. It was good to get a glimpse of Starfleet and how that part of things works, but that was overshadowed by literally everything else. Very little characterisation, against a neat mystery to unravel but that could have been told in half the time.

The enforced hibernation that the world is undergoing right now means I’ve managed to whip through the second season of Star Trek: The Original Series is super quick time. After highlighting five of my favourite episodes from the first series, it seems only right to do the same for the second. I enjoyed this season more, mostly because the characters seemed more settled in themselves. The trio of Kirk, Spock and McCoy had more meaningful conversations alongside some fun banter and what appeared to be real, genuine friendships. There were some episodes that didn’t quite live up to my high expectations but mostly, I thought it was a great season, and here are five reasons why:

Everyone has been raving about Picard, the new show on Prime, and I desperately want to watch it. But I realised, although I love Star Trek, my knowledge of the TV shows really isn’t that great. Of course I know the characters and the general idea but I can’t remember ever really watching it. Movies, sure, but TV shows? I don’t recall. So, seeing as it’s all available on Netflix at the moment, I decided to go back to the very start and watch The Original Series. I wasn’t expecting to like it particularly, and thought I’d quite quickly move on to Next Generation. But I love it! I didn’t quite realise how much the show is about ethics and morals and decision-making, rather than just travelling around and looking at aliens. Boldly going where no man has gone before means addressing issues that no one had really addressed before, and that’s fascinating.

This was a bit of a weird one, and I wasn’t sure I was going to like it but in the end it won me over a little bit. I thought it was going to be more like Space Balls, more of an actual farce, but whilst it did poke fun at the sci-fi world, particularly Star Trek, it still had its own original story - and one that I got quite invested in.

I suddenly remembered that we hadn’t watched the latest in the Star Trek reboot series, but having attempted to watch thirty minutes of it, I now wish I hadn’t bothered. I can’t really explain why, but it just didn’t do it for me at all. Aside from the short scene between Bones and Kirk in the bar, the characters didn’t seem to be doing anything or connecting at all.

A new trailer for the third installment of the Star Trek reboot was released recently and it looks quite a lot like the previous two! This time, however, it’s co-written by Simon Pegg and directed by Justin Lin, who played a big part in getting me hooked on the Fast and Furious franchise (something I’m still not totally over!)

The lens flare situation was much improved - it only crept in a little obnoxiously at the end. I liked getting suspicious of the characters and following their twists and turns as they proved to be good/bad/otherwise. I saw some complaints about over-use of CGI, which always baffles me when you’re talking about a film like this. However, I realised that I hadn’t noticed the CGI one way or the other which must surely be a good thing. Enjoyed the various dialogue scenes with Spock, and with Scotty, those two really make the films for me.

Oh it was so good. So, so good. I love the characters, I love the story, I love the twists and turns and the secret nods and winks, and the appearance of ACTUAL SPOCK. There were a few bits I didn’t like but the good outweighed the bad so much that it still gets a top score.