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•	2016 Regular

•	2016 Regular

One of the more unfortunate decisions by Giacchino for Star Trek Beyond is his partial abandonment of his original, beautifully evocative idea for Spock that had morphed into an action theme in the previous film. It's not entirely gone (even if the erhu is), as it is littered in its fragmentary, somber tones throughout the work, notably at the start of "To Thine Own Death Be True" and on piano in "Spock's Vulcan Grip on Death." An intentionally abbreviated hint of it exists poignantly at 4:41 into "Night on the Yorktown," and some might hear it at 0:50 into "Par-tay for the Course" as well. Rather than continue using the Star Trek Into Darkness adaptation of this theme as an action motif, Giacchino oddly transitions to a new theme, heard first at 3:40 into "A Lesson in Vulcan Mineralogy" and highlighting the middle of "Crash Decisions." It's a sufficient identity, but film score enthusiasts may find themselves making unwanted connections to Elmer Bernstein's Ghostbusters identity in its first phrase (ironically, there's more of that theme evoked here than in Theodore Shapiro's own Ghostbusters reboot score released at the same time as this entry) and Goldsmith's The Wind and the Lion in its second phrase. While enjoyable as an action motif in "Crash Decisions," the decision not to reprise the prior score's development of Spock's identity remains curious. Perhaps balancing out this potential displeasure are a few nods to the film franchise's far past by Giacchino, references that really only collectors of "Star Trek" music will consciously identify. Whereas Star Trek Into Darkness supplied a nugget of Gerald Fried's music for "The Original Series," Star Trek Beyond offers tributes to both Goldsmith and James Horner. You hear Horner's swayingly romantic, alternating of notes on strings from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan at 1:22 into "Night on the Yorktown." Meanwhile, the tribute to Goldsmith exists in Giacchino's adaptation of the composer's malleable four-note identity that started in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier as a "quest motif" and evolved through the later Goldsmith scores (especially Star Trek: First Contact) into theme for Starfleet mores, friendship, and perseverance, which is why you hear it resurrected at the ends of "Franklin, My Dear" (2:35) and "Crash Decisions" (3:04).

It's easy to wish that Giacchino had worked more such connections to the franchise's past into his prior "Star Trek" music. Of the four new themes penned for Star Trek Beyond, only one is really a positive development. Already discussed is the unnecessary and potentially distractingly derivative idea for Spock. The themes for the two off-world characters, Jaylah and Krall, are by no means memorable. In fact, their expressions are often little more than percussive, rhythmic flair, with no easily discernable identity outside of their relentless pounding at times. Jaylah's idea is nebulous to a fault, vaguely noble in a stifled manner, but it remains too skittish through the end and fails to evolve clearly enough into Starfleet-worthy material at the conclusion of the picture. While brief hints at 2:37 into "Mocking Jaylah" suggest her theme, among other references, it never congeals into anything remarkable. The comparatively redemptive suite of this material the composer collected for "Jaylah's Theme" makes you wonder what he was thinking when adapting it so poorly into the actual underscore. The lack of a really prominent villain's theme in Star Trek Beyond is a shame, and perhaps it contributes to critics identifying Krall as a particularly meaningless villain in "Star Trek" lore. Giacchino ran into this problem in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story as well. The best franchise villain themes have all been extremely memorable (Goldsmith's Klingon and Borg themes, the Cliff Eidelman conspiracy theme from Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country), and if you were among those to never really warm up to the effectiveness of "Ode to Harrison" from Star Trek Into Darkness, then expect nothing to even remotely compete here. In fact, if not for the solo trumpet performances of the idea to open and close "Cater-Krall in Zero G," the idea may never really sink in for some listeners, despite the fact that the idea does wiggle its way into several prior action sequences during the second half of the story. Even in Giacchino's dedicated suite for Krall's theme, "Krall Things Being Equal," the idea is tortured to such an extent that it doesn't really illuminate itself well here, either. Villains' themes shouldn't require three passes through their suite tracks to nail down the actual melodic progressions. It's rare for any composer to spare the time and expense to arrange and record separate album suites for four characters and concepts in a movie during this era, so for two of them to be devoid of much personality is really a shame.

All of that said, Giacchino finally supplies a winning idea of romance to his "Star Trek" musical universe in Star Trek Beyond, coined for the Yorktown space station in this score but really extending to the Horner-like romanticism of the entire concept of space journeying in general. After the lovely adaptation of the main theme to piano in "Thank Your Lucky Star Date," the composer unleashes a massively beautiful rendition of the Yorktown theme in "Night on the Yorktown" and returns to a bittersweet reprise of the idea in "Par-tay for the Course." It's intertwined with the main theme in "The Dreaded Rear Admiral" and receives a somewhat redundant arrangement in "Yorktown Theme." This idea shares fragments of the main theme to great effect and is a tremendous highlight of Giacchino's three works thus far in the franchise. Unfortunately, the suite arrangement of the theme in the end credits did not make the initial Varèse Sarabande album for Star Trek Beyond. As with the prior two scores, pivotal music (not to mention the several songs in the film) is missing from Varèse's first offering, suggesting that another "Deluxe" version was likely to emerge soon after. Not surprisingly, it happened shortly as a limited "Club" title; later in 2016, Varèse provided a massive expansion that more than doubled the presentation and included all of the suites recorded by Giacchino for the film. A doubling of the Spock and Yorktown theme cues, much better illumination of the weak Jaylah and Krall ideas, and a plethora of significant crescendos ("Krall Work and No Play" and "The Cost of Abronath" both feature immense choral bursts) await listeners on this far more appropriate product. Most of the additional cues are short and incidental, though as with "Krall Hell Breaks Loose" and "Bright Lights Big Velocity (Part 1)," there are solid action and melodic highlights to be heard in the newly released cues. Fans of the Courage theme receive more bones thrown their way in "The Dreaded Rear Admiral" and "Space, The Final Frontier," the latter a full suite rendition with Giacchino's main theme in the middle. The songs are still absent on this product, unfortunately, but it's a significantly better offering than the prior album. Still, this habit of two "Star Trek" releases a year (or merely 6 months) apart has become a bit obnoxious for film score collectors who simply desire a proper presentation of the new scores up front. The score itself is arguably the weakest of Giacchino's first three in the franchise, but its romantic portions and nostalgic glances backward are all welcome developments. Seek only the fuller product for the proper experience.   @Amazon.com: CD or Download

• Music as Written for the Film:  ***
• Music as Heard on the Varèse Regular Album:  ***
• Music as Heard on the Varèse Deluxe Album:  ****
• Overall:  ***

Bias Check:

For Michael Giacchino reviews at Filmtracks, the average editorial rating is 3.46 (in 43 reviews) and the average viewer rating is 3.21 (in 21,590 votes). The maximum rating is 5 stars.