They Went Through An Awful Lot of Trouble To Kill Winona Ryder

Currently Reading: Our Man In Havana by Graham Greene

I'm sure we've all seen the new Star Trek film by now so I'm not really worried about giving away any spoilers at this point. If you haven't seen it, you probably have no intention of seeing it anyway right? So no worries there. That being said, here's my take on the film . . .

The title says it all. They went through an AWFUL lot of trouble just to kill Winona Ryder. I'm not what you'd call a fan of hers. I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm a Winona HATER but something about that woman just strikes me wrong. On the whole, I can only think of a few movies of hers that I actually liked and in all those cases it had nothing to do with her.

So, on with the Trek. Crazy Romulan ends up going back in time to get revenge on Spock. Not a bad premise for a film. Lots of possibilities there. We've got a new Trek family building up here and, as an added bit of genius, an entirely different time-line to mess with they don't have to worry about upsetting the Trekies.

In this film, Winona plays Spock's mother. Wouldn't have been my first choice but then who really cares right? I mean, she's not a major character or anything and really only shows up a few times in previous Trek outings to mess with Spock and to remind us that he's half human. So no big deal about the casting. I figured I'd just ignore it. I mean hey, who knows, maybe she'll do ok right? But as the plot progresses, I started to think the writers had it in for her.

Ok, Romulan shows up, sticks a big tube into the center of the Vulcan homeworld and starts his machine that creates the mini-black hole in the center of the planet which will make the whole planet implode. Pretty cool actually. Great special effect too. Naturally everyone ON the planet is going to die, including Spock's mom, Winona Ryder. YAY! But wait, a simple, off-camera death isn't good enough. No, they have to send her and several of the Vulcan elders to some secret cave where all these Vulcan relics are being kept.

Enter the Enterprise! Spock and company beam down to the planet in order to save some of these relics so that Vulcan culture can be preserved blah blah blah and wow, what a coincidence, Spock's parents are there. That's just super! Winona is SAVED! Or is she? With the planet imploding around them and things generally going all to hell, they lock onto the coordinates to beam everyone onboard. But wait! What's that happening under Winona's feet? Oh NO! The ledge is collapsing! And . . . wait for it . . . POOF! Winona falls into the gaping chasm thus throwing off the transporting sequence and she dies.

So, in order to kill her off, they don't just shoot her with something or blow her up in a building or even a starship. No, they have to implode an entire PLANET just to get rid of her. But they've got an eye on her, lest she sneak out and somehow survive. Taking refuge in a cave, dodging bolders and stuff falling all over the place, I mean they're TRYING to kill her and still, she won't die. But undaunted, they wait until the last minute before the teleport and BAM that's when they get her.

Just seems like they went through an awful lot of trouble, that's all I'm saying.