Star Trek 2 “Perdition’s Flames”

Review by tranzor — September 28, 2010 @ 1:08 am

I really enjoyed this edit and it was a great send off for me since I just finished watching all of the episodes from the original series.

I have not seen Khan in years, but the creative editing take to keep it the focal point from Kirk’s view as much as possible worked pretty darn well.
Though I do believe (as well as many others) Khan as the best of the Star trek film’s I really need to watch it again in whole with consideration to the vast jump in age since I had previously seen it.

I think many will find your edit very interesting.

Review by TMBTM — September 21, 2010 @ 10:41 pm\

I agree with most of Rogue-theX review.
I never was a Trek fan but this edit did it to me. I can understand that less Khan can be a letdown to some but to me it was nice. I prefer the story to reveal bit by bit what happened. Hitchcock said that suspens is when the audience knows more than the protagonists, but sometime I just prefer to be in the characters shoes and discovering things along with them. That was the point of view of most of the original series episodes IIRC and I think it is well done here.
(and to be frank, even if Ricardo Montalban is an awesome actor and plays Khan in a very “high in color” way, I never took his character too seriously to be a really good vilain, but it’s just me)
The funeral was quite touching, new music along the edit works quite good (and stay after the end credit: nice little found here!)
The edit could have been even shorter though, I think.
My only major problem is technical and deals once again with the 4:3 letterboxed (2.35:1) ratio, but as the first “V’ger” edit also was presented this way I guess I need to take it as a continuity thing and just thanks bionicbob for making once again a Trek edit that I liked!

Review by Rogue-theX — August 28, 2010 @ 6:53 pm

This review is based on my opinions and my viewing experience. Nothing is meant as an attack. Spoiler warning.

AUDIO: Audio quality sounded fine on my 2.0 system. when the Reliant is coming around Regula to chase the Enterprise the audio transition between the two pieces of music did not work right, but it may have been the only option. The shot of the Reliant coming at the camera (just before spock says “they are reducing speed”), the music looping there could have been better. I felt that certain scenes were too quiet and others were too loud. When chapter 8 came in the music builds and then almost immediately dies off, the music there could have been left out entirely.
7 out of 10

VIDEO: The picture is letterboxed, but me and my regular tv didn’t mind :smile: . Image quality did not seem on par with the special edition dvd. I noticed a blip frame at around 1:12:52 between the shot of Uhura looking at the viewscreen and the shot of the damaged Reliant.
7 out of 10

Editing: When Chekov comes onto the bridge near the end offering assistance and the music continues, that worked very well. The first attack of Reliant towards Enterprise was excellent. The original series music worked wonders for the edit and helped make me believe I was watching a trek episode. It would have been nice to see a bit more Khan, not seeing very much of him now he loses some of his depth, but just hearing his last words over the comm was great. The cut where Sulu says “reliant in this sector and slowing” felt a bit forced.
8 out of 10

Entertainment: I very much enjoyed this edit of The Wrath Of Khan, it was fun. The black and white footage seen throughout from space seed ect. was very cool. Awesome title/credit sequences. Spocks funeral was classic trek, again made me feel like I was watching a genuine episode, but if it was shorter around 50-55 minutes it would have been even more convincing.
9 out of 10

Overall 8 out of 10.

On a side note, there was something about this edit, I don’t know what it was, but it reminded me of what originally attracted me to the film when I was a kid, all the fun and excitement that I had. I remembered what it was like watching it for the first time. It brought back forgotten memories of Lego Wrath of Khan re-enactments, making my friends watch the movie for the upteenth time. For that brief time I was a kid once again, a person I thought was lost, so thank you very much for that bionicbob.

Sincerely. Rogue.

A very cool edit, even though less Ricardo Montalbán means less of his impressive performance, but this is not the goal of this edit.
Perdition’s Flames really feels like a great two-episode finale of a star trek tv-season and if they would have presented a story like this in the star trek series it would have definately become a legendary entry.
With cutting the Khan scenes out and just focusing on Kirk the story progresses without many of the redundancies that the original suffers. The scene with Chekov discovering Khan’s vessel is a great opening and bionicbob manages to make it feel like a tv-opening, everything is there, the captain’s log voiceover as the starship flies by ending with the beaming sound of the away mission, there are dramatic fadeouts and fade-ins, one very very cliffhangery freeze frame
with about half an hour cut this is a very quick and exciting ride. it doesn’t replace wrath of khan, this was never the intention it just gives us a new take on an old classic