REVIEW - Star Trek: Section 31 is a flawed spin off with few redeeming qualities
Further redaction needed.
By Jonathan Garrett
19/02/25
There is nothing inherently wrong with a franchise as comprehensive and nuanced as Star Trek spreading its wings and telling different kinds of stories. After countless tv shows, spin offs, and feature films, there is an inherent need to satiate longer term fans whilst still shooting for a broader audience. As divisive as the JJ Abrams rebooted movies, and Star Trek: Discovery, can be amongst the ardent hardcore faithful, there can be no denying their respective box office returns and viewership. In many ways, this current premium era of Trek on TV owes its very existence to those properties, no matter how much certain closed minded “fans” would care to admit.
Section 31, the first of hopefully many more Paramount Plus produced streaming Trek movies, certainly had the ingredients for success. A spin off centred on Michelle Yeoh’s hugely popular character Philippa Georgiou, following the momentum of Yeoh’s recent Oscar success. A “Mission Impossible meets Guardians of the Galaxy” premise, during a time period set in the “lost era” of Trek between Kirk’s death in Generations and Picard’s precursor ship the Enterprise C.
Transforming the original pitch from a limited series to a movie made sense given the lack of mainstream awareness of what Section 31 actually is. That being said, one of the film’s successes is they do a good job giving you the cliff notes albeit without the nuance afforded by Deep Space Nine’s exploration of the concept. It certainly benefits from the pacing of its 90 minute run time, and the costume design (as you’d expect from the team behind DISCO) is on point.
Unfortunately, that’s where the unanimous positivity ends. For every lovely piece of set design (gotta love that garbage scow bridge), there’s a wonky green screen or weird set visual that throws things off. The over reliance on snap zooms and shaky cam makes the camera work feel disjointed, and at times incomprehensible. When you have someone as capable as Yeoh, it makes no sense to mask her choreography.
The story is paper thin, with a universe ending McGuffin that does little to make the stakes understandable. There’s also far too much exposition heavy dialogue. And then there’s the cast; the Irish “Vulcan” (no spoilers here) feels miscast, and the quippy dialogue doesn’t gel with the supposed stakes at play. It’s perfectly competent but fiercely generic, and although a departure for the Star Trek universe, Section 31 feels too familiar to effectively stand on its own.
In fairness, the key art is nice.
WORTH IT?
At the bottom of every review, we ask the question: Worth it? And the answer is either “Yeah!” or “Nah”, followed by a comment that sums up how we feel. In order to provide more information, we also have “And” or “But”, which follows up our rating with further clarification, additional context about something we love, or perhaps a redeeming quality for something we didn’t like.
NAH.
Star Trek: Section 31 is a misfire, with poor direction and a lack of originality hampering an already generic premise.
BUT
The lean run time is appreciated, while the impressive ship and costume designs really pop on screen.
