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Star Trek: Section 31 (2025)

BetterButter

By BetterButter
in Movies

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tv echo

tv echo

(edited)

Star Trek: Section 31 Movie ‘Worked Hard’ to Uphold Franchise’s Optimism — Plus, Which Spy Is ‘Beyond Old’?
By Matt Webb Mitovich   January 20, 2025
https://tvline.com/previews/star-trek-section-31-criticism-spy-movie-franchise-optimism-1235400703/ 

Quote

Premiering this Friday, Jan. 24, on Paramount+, Star Trek: Section 31 finds Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh reprising her Star Trek: Discovery role as Philippa Georgiou, the onetime Terran emperor who allies with the titular secret division of Starfleet — and in turn must face the sins of her past. 

The Section 31 team tasked with recruiting Georgiou includes Omari Hardwick (Power) as Alok, Kacey Rohl (Hannibal) as (yes, the) Rachel Garrett, Robert Kazinsky (True Blood) as Zeph, Sam Richardson (Veep) as Quasi, Sven Ruygrok (One Piece) as Fuzz and Humberly Gonzalez (Ginny & Georgia) as Melle. The made-for-streaming movie’s cast also includes James Hiroyuki Liao (Presumed Innocent) as San and Miku Martineau (Honor Society) as a young Georgiou.
*  *  *
Asked to draw a comparison between the movie’s titular organization and a real-life entity, Osunsanmi said, “Section 31 is to Starfleet what the CIA is to the Pentagon, or what the CIA is to the military complex in the United States,” in that “they do all the stuff that Starfleet can’t, won’t, or doesn’t want to admit to having to do.

“But our movie isn’t that dark,” the EP was quick to note. “Our movie is fun and full of life, and inspiration. And that was a delicate balance to have to walk, particularly with a lead character like Philippa Georgiou.”

Osunsanmi knows full well that the idea of a hard-boiled spy organization within the universe that gave us The Original Series, The Next Generation et al “always brings up emotions in Star Trek fans” who are quick to scoff, “Not my Star Trek!” “What we can say is we worked really hard to make sure we kept up the ideals of optimism and ‘What do we want our society to be in the future?'” said Osunsanmi. “In the end, Section 31 is good, it’s fun, and it’s a joy. Hopefully, they’re pleasantly surprised.”
*  *  *
Speaking of which, Alok has seen some things in his long, long life. “I’m, like, super older than 100,” Hardwick revealed. “I said, ‘Tunde [Osunsanmi], I’m going to have makeup?’ ‘No. You’re going to look like you, but you’re beyond old.’ I’ve been augmented, and I have been cryo-chambered…. I am super old.” 
*  *  *
Many eyes, though, may be on Kacey Rohl’s Rachel Garrett, whom the Next Generation episode “Yesterday’s Enterprise” told us one day becomes captain of the USS Enterprise-C (and was played by Tricia O’Neil.)

Edited by tv echo
Stardancer Supreme

Stardancer Supreme

Just watched the movie! I don't understand how folks can just shyt on something sight unseen with only a trailer. But since trailers can't hold their water these days, I don't watch them.

I thought this was a fun little romp in the lives of Section 31 agents brought together by Emperor Georgiou's hubris and regrets. 

Spoiler

Honestly, she should have killed San right along with her family.

I enjoyed the movie; still think they could have pulled 5 episodes out instead. I know Michelle Yeoh is wildly out of budget these days though. I love watching her chew through scenery like her life depends on it. She has great chemistry with Omari Hardwick, too.

  • Like 2
Hanahope

Hanahope

i was surprised this was a movie, I was expecting a series.  I hope it gets picked up as a series.  It was a good "pilot" if so.  Definitely didn't hold back from killing a "group member" off the bat and i liked the mole plot.  A series would develop the other characters better, as they really need it.  I had no real understanding about the other group members other than Omari Hardwick's (given my familiarity with the Eugenics war).  

  • Like 2
thuganomics85

thuganomics85

I had fun with it, but granted, I've been pretty lenient on all of the NuTreks and can usually find enjoyment in them despite being different/not reaching the levels of the original outings.  Of course, I really can't complain about more Philippa Georgiou and Michelle Yeoh being her normal awesome self!  I wonder if her being a big time Oscar winner now means the likely hood of an actual series is off the table, but I'm glad she at least came back here, and maybe we could get another movie or two going forward.

Supporting cast was great as well.  Omari Hardwick more than held his own opposite of Yeoh, Sam Richardson got some decent laughs, and it's always great seeing Kacey Rohl.  Been a big fan ever since I first saw her as Abigail Hobbs on Hannibal.  Bummed that Melle died because the actress played/voiced the lead character on the Star Wars: Outlaw game, and it's always fun when someone I knew from video games/voice work pops up on screen!

The heist/mole stuff was fun, but pretty predictable.  Knew that San was going to be alive because James Hiroyuki Liao has enough credits to not just play a character for one flashback sequences, and I knew Fuzz was going to be the mole due to whole "small alien being inside of a Vulcan android's body" concept.

The Jamie Lee Curtis cameo at the end was unexpected.  I wonder if she did that as a favor for Yeoh?  Either way, mini-Everything Everywhere All at Once reunion!

  • Like 3
Raja

Raja

(edited)
On 1/24/2025 at 8:00 PM, Stardancer Supreme said:

Just watched the movie! I don't understand how folks can just shyt on something sight unseen with only a trailer. But since trailers can't hold their water these days, I don't watch them.

Remember there is a civil war between broadcast TV Trekkies and first the Kelvin and now the Kurtzman Treks. It is little different than the fan conflict between the original trilogy versus Disney Star Wars. That nothing resembles Sloan and Bashir from DS9 but rather a Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare with a couple of Trek specific Easter Eggs like a I'm half black he's half white last survivor brought those howls.

 

Any production will have the first wave of the fans of TOS through Enterprise knocking it down in the hope the Trek that they love will get brought back. Sort of like the MCU fans are seeing a change with Daredevil being pulled and rebooted halfway through its production and hoping that once the current glut of films and series are expended in 2025 they can get their thing back in future years.

Edited by Raja
Stardancer Supreme

Stardancer Supreme

Yeah, that's the thing that puzzles me about "NuTrek". It seems like Kurtzman and others are chasing after new Star Trek viewers and spitting in the eyes of the longtime Trekkers (and rabid Trekkies). It's not like there is a dearth of material! You can pick up any Star Trek novel in any series and you would have a guaranteed hit series.

It's especially sad now that certain folks want to wipe out Black people, people of color and women from all forms of entertainment.  I enjoyed DISCO because there was finally a captain/admiral who looked like me. I will always love Michelle Yeoh as well. I will wait for the future promised by Gene Roddenberry... *stepping off my soapbox*

  • Like 2
jah1986

jah1986

I enjoyed it, but would not have paid money to see it in a theater. I really felt like a 90 minute pilot to a show I'm not I would like. I knew San was the person in the suit. Loved seeing how Phillipa became Emperor. I thought Michelle Yeoh and Omari Hardwick had good chemistry. But nothing about this group suggests it's Section 31. Isn't Section 31 supposed to be a kind of off the books part of Starfleet? Do not try to make this a show without Michelle Yeoh! Completely shallow note: she looked amazing with those gold contacts.

  • Like 2
baldryanr

baldryanr

On 1/28/2025 at 6:53 AM, Raja said:

Any production will have the first wave of the fans of TOS through Enterprise knocking it down in the hope the Trek that they love will get brought back. Sort of like the MCU fans are seeing a change with Daredevil being pulled and rebooted halfway through its production and hoping that once the current glut of films and series are expended in 2025 they can get their thing back in future years.

This happened with the TNG era shows too.  When TNG first came out TOS fans called it a pale, crappy shadow of the original.  You replaced Jim Kirk with this bald dude who is supposed to be French but acts and sounds like a Brit?  God, this show is boring - where's the action?  Then when DS9 came out they were criticized for not being "real" Trek - the idea of Section 31, a Trek series focusing on an extended war, etc. would have had Roddenberry rolling in his grave. Voyager was a dull TNG retread, etc.

  • Like 1
dwmarch

dwmarch

14 hours ago, jah1986 said:

Isn't Section 31 supposed to be a kind of off the books part of Starfleet?

When S31 first appeared in DS9, it was a Federation black ops outfit, entirely separate from Starfleet but able to infiltrate them at will. Enterprise may have retconned some of this in their brief appearances there. Disco made S31 part of Starfleet and even gave them shiny black combadges. But even in this movie they kinda sorta differentiate them by having Garrett there as an outsider. If S31 was just some distant branch of Starfleet, she wouldn't be an outsider. I think this is a problem that has carried over from Disco, which suffered from writers who didn't really understand organizations all that well and who squished a lot of separate structures into interchangeable things (such as the Federation President micromanaging Starfleet).

14 hours ago, jah1986 said:

really felt like a 90 minute pilot to a show

This movie started life as a series but then Michelle Yeoh had to go and win that Oscar. Speaking of which, we could have avoided this whole situation in this movie if San had just told Georgiou that he wanted to do laundry and taxes with her. I am also curious when San had time to watch The Princess Bride which seems to be where he got his "build up immunity to poison by taking tiny amounts of it every day" gambit.

On 1/28/2025 at 4:57 PM, Stardancer Supreme said:

You can pick up any Star Trek novel in any series

Strangely enough, there is a DS9 novel called "Control" about Section 31 and its rogue AI. This was published long before Disco did the exact same story in season 2.

mary2013

mary2013

12 hours ago, dwmarch said:

 

This movie started life as a series but then Michelle Yeoh had to go and win that Oscar. Speaking of which, we could have avoided this whole situation in this movie if San had just told Georgiou that he wanted to do laundry and taxes with her. I am also curious when San had time to watch The Princess Bride which seems to be where he got his "build up immunity to poison by taking tiny amounts of it every day" gambit.

 

I'm pretty sure Agatha Christie came up with that about 100 years ago.

  • Like 1

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