It remains to be seen what Rotten Tomatoes score the upcoming Paramount+ movie Star Trek: Section 31 will wind up with, but it may surprise people that of all the franchise features, the one with the highest Rotten Tomatoes score is... Star Trek (2009), directed by J.J. Abrams. Everyone tends to forget how much they liked the first Kelvin big-screen adventure. It actually boasts a better score than either of the highest-rated movies featuring the cast of Star Trek: The Original Series or Star Trek: The Next Generation.
Star Trek (2009) maintains a 94% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The best-regarded and most financially successful of the Next Generation movies, the Jonathan Frakes-directed Star Trek: First Contact, comes in at 93%. As for the original cast features, Nicholas Meyer’s Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan tops the list with a 86% rating, a number that might strike some fans as surprisingly low.
Intriguingly, Star Trek Beyond, directed by Justin Lin, is at 86% and Star Trek Into Darkness sits at 84%. Those numbers also might shock fans, as they are higher than those for Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (83%), Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (82%), and all the other features. It’s worth noting that the other six Star Trek films don’t even crack 80%, as Star Trek III: The Search for Spock is at 79% and Star Trek V: The Final Frontier brings up the rear at 23%.
Star Trek: Section 31 finds recent Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh reprising her Star Trek: Discovery role as Emperor Philippa Georgiou. A brief synopsis provided by Paramount+ teases that Georgiou “joins a secret division of Starfleet tasked with protecting the United Federation of Planets and faces the sins of her past.”
Some fans have used social media to express their concerns that, based on the trailer, Section 31 may stray too far from the Star Trek ethos. And in a recent interview with SFX magazine (via GamesRadar), Section 31 co-star Robert Kazinsky, who plays a character named Zeph, stated, “I’m terrified of how it’s going to be received, because it’s not the Trek people want.”
Everyone will get their answer on January 24, when Section 31debuts. It could be the Star Trek no one wanted, or it may be the Star Trek no one realized they needed, and could lead to more movies. Whatever the case, the reaction will be duly reflected in the movie’s Rotten Tomatoes rating.