Star Trek Beyond/Barco Escape/Santikos Silverado review.

This is a three stage review. In this one, I'm reviewing the movie Star Trek Beyond, I'm reviewing the screening format that I saw the film in at this theater, Barco Escape 3 screen projection, and I'm reviewing the theater itself for Tripadvisor, in this order..

So my thoughts on Star Trek Beyond are as follows:

It is one of the better and most epic movies I've seen in 2016.

One of the things I loved about this film was the visual effects. The entire composition of Yorktown, the Swarm, and the planet were absolute top notch. It is a spectacle to watch.

For the characters, we have the crew, who are all on point with their interactions with each other and have great chemistry, and we got the villain, who is very nasty and very effective.

It is a great movie.

My thoughts on the Barco Escape projectors are as follows:

This is basically what I'm terming Cinerama 2.0, Cinerama Light or Diet Cinerama. The basic idea for Barco Escape is, like the classic Cinerama you'd want to see 2001: A Space Odyssey in, it uses three projectors. For the theater I saw Star Trek in, the main Barco projector for it and normal screened movies was in the booth behind the auditorium as normal, but Barco Escape, instead of a curved screen, uses three movie screens, with the outer two angled and conjoined with the middle; it's got a corner rather than a circle. The other two projectors are in little surveillance camera sockets on the ceiling up front and aimed at the other two screens.

What did I think of this format?

It was really cool and unique. I was lucky to have the screening room all to myself and shift to various parts of the room to see what the experience was. You really do need to pay attention to everything going on in the room to get the full experience. My advice: pick a seat up-front in the stadium section, but maybe take a front seat in the little "arc" of the screens if you wish.

Now for the theater.

I've gotten to like the Santikos movie theaters, and this one is very nice. This western-themed locale isn't as nice as the Palladium by virtue of it being older and a bit smaller, but it was still comfortable, the staff were still very nice, and I still liked the popcorn. I'm a bit disappointed by there being no Freestyle soda machines, but it's still good to have self-serve soda fountains. The rooms are a little darker, so keep that in mind.

So I recommend all three parts of this review: the movie Star Trek Beyond, the Barco Escape format, and the Santikos Silverado if the Palladium is booked out or too crowded, or both.

The Force Awakens review

The Force Awakens is a definite step up from the prequel trilogy (I liked Revenge of the Sith quite a bit and Attack of the Clones somewhat). The focus is back on the storytelling in the search to find Luke before the new form of the Galactic Empire, the First Order, led by Kylo Ren, General Hux and Leader Snoke do, and I like the characters of Kylo Ren and Hux as villains quite a bit.

We get some new characters here, and I do like them. I liked the older Han Solo the best, though; when I first saw this film in Kerrville, I thought it was a bit slow until he shows up. Then the characterization, action, and emotion build from there to a great climax at the First Order's Starkiller Base.

I also saw this in the D-Box seating gimmick at the Santikos Palladium AVX in northern San Antonio today, and, let's just say, it's like riding Star Tours at Disney World/Disneyland for two hours, but not too rough to make you lose your popcorn. That was a lot of fun, and I recommend you see this film, and in D-Box or IMAX if you can. Drive 5 hours if you have to.