Nemesis is better than it has any right to be. This is faint praise as it shouldn’t be any good at all. That it is watchable (on free cable—it is not worth actually paying for) is a miracle. There were no good decisions made in constructing this film:
- An unemotional and unnecessary wedding scene.
- Yet another Data twin doing a jokey-idiot routine.
- That twin being detectable from many light years away (if androids emit that much radiation, Data should wipe out any planet he sets foot on).
- Picard driving a dune buggy.
- A species of nosferatu.
- An evil Picard clone.
- The Troi mind-rape scene.
- Picard questioning if rising up against slave masters isn’t too mean.
- Multiple clock-running-out plot points (the clone is just happening to die in a few days; the weapon will kill everyone in seven minutes).
- Picard doing the manly-man “this is something I have to do” action hero bit.
- Military officers (and they are military officers here, not explorers) who don’t give a damn when acquaintance die all around them but fall apart when anyone in the credits die. (I’m guessing no one invited those officers that got sucked out of the bridge to any poker games).
- A big death that obviously means nothing.
- Choosing a director who didn’t know the television show and had no interest in working in an established universe.
Normally I’d say that last one was the real problem, but this is a better film than it should be, so maybe not. It is horribly structured and poorly written. But, if you ask very, very little from it, you might enjoy it. It is bright and flashy. Lots of things blow up. Many weapons are fired. Lots of people die. It’s an action movie for toddlers who like shiny things that rattle about. But everyone, at sometime in their life, likes shiny things that rattle about, so at sometime in your life, you will find this mildly diverting. In that way, it is the inspiration for the J.J Abrams movies that were to follow.