Star Trek Into Darkness

Captain Kirk (Chris Pine), Spock (Zachary Quinto), Dr. McCoy (Karl Urban) and the Enterprise crew are on a secret mission on the Klingon home planet to kill a Starfleet renegade (Benedict Cumberbatch)—but it's a trap, and this renegade is no ordinary criminal. Director J.J. Abrams proves that his 2009 reboot of the venerable franchise was no fluke. The spot-on cast is back (Simon Pegg, Zoe Saldana, John Cho, Anton Yelchin) with some welcome new additions—Cumberbatch (a classic villain), Alice Eve, Peter Weller. Written by Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman and Damon Lindelof, this is about as good as space opera gets: It revives our affection for the original series with a rejuvenating new spin. It's fast, fun, dramatically sound and emotionally right, making the old and familiar new and surprising again.