Treknobabble #9: What Has Gone Before At The Movies, Part 1

Posted by on March 14th, 2008   Filed under: Treknobabble

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Treknobabble is a continuing series of columns written by uber-Trekkie Reed Farrington in anticipation of the upcoming J.J. Abrams Star Trek movie.

Although the intent of the upcoming Star Trek movie is to make it a standalone movie, I think it might be of interest to recap what has been done in the past. (And because Drew asked.) Given that there are ten of these movies, it’s natural that some of them are considered duds. I’ll let you know what the general opinions are, and then I’ll throw in my biased opinions. I’ll highlight key moments. I’m not going to give you much of a synopsis for each movie. If you’ve seen any of the movies, then hopefully, you might learn something new about them. Warning: there will probably be spoilers!

Before I begin, let me state that I do find it the ultimate act of hubris if the next Star Trek movie will be simply titled, “Star Trek.” This feels like J.J. Abrams and crew are implicitly stating that the movie they are making is the definitive version of Star Trek. I’m sure they would deny this. But it does show a lack of imagination on their part.

Roberto Orci, one of the writers, has referred to the new movie as Star Trek Zero, and avoided describing the movie as a rebooting, re-imagining, re-visioning, reintroducing, remaking, or any other “re” prefixed word. (When the movie does come out, I’ve got dibs on describing the movie as redundant.) He does make it clear that the movie will most likely be simply titled, “Star Trek.” And that the movie is their version of Star Trek. So I guess fans will refer to the movie as “J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek.”

Now, blast off to the movies…

Star Trek: The Motion Picture

Star Trek: The Motion Picture has often been unkindly referred to as Star Trek: The Motionless Picture. You would think that having Robert Wise (if you don’t know who this is, look him up) as the director would make this movie fantastic. (You didn’t look him up, did you?) He directed the original The Day the Earth Stood Still. West Side Story. The Sound of Music! And no, neither Kirk nor Spock sing in this movie. I think twelve minutes of this movie are spent taking a tour of the outside of the Enterprise. Some fans wet themselves at this, but unless you’re into hardware or appreciate Jerry Goldsmith’s glorious musical score that was recycled for The Next Generation television series, you would be forgiven for squirming in your seat.

The bald female alien played by a former Miss India started a trend of bald females being sexy; however, this trend lasted only for about a week. Reverend Eric Camden from 7th Heaven guest starred as a new Star Trek captain. Jerry Goldsmith’s musical score really is outstanding. Kirk’s toupee is kind of distracting. This film made a lot of money, but only because it rode on Star Wars’ coattails and Trekkies had been waiting a decade for this movie.

Robert Wise was crucial in getting Nimoy back to play Spock. Somehow, Wise recognized that Spock was a crucial element of the Star Trek mythos. I like Spock, but I think Star Trek can survive without him. Witness the success of The Next Generation. Nimoy had been annoyed that he wasn’t being paid what he thought he should for all the merchandising that involved the Spock image. I wonder what actors get paid for having their likenesses put on action figures. I’d pay money to be immortalized as a Reed Farrington action figure! (I’m not going to make the joke about playing with myself.)

The best moment occurs when Kirk and Spock hold hands. I’m not kidding! This hand holding scene wasn’t in the original theatrical release.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan is everyone’s favourite. It has Rebecca Howe from Cheers playing a Vulcan. This has the Ceti eels that crawl into your ear and drive you insane. I think this is even Abrams’ favourite Star Trek movie. But the tenth Star Trek movie used this movie as a template to copy from and the tenth film was bad. The music composer, James Horner, would go on to eventually score Titanic. Celine Dion does not sing the title tune.

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The boss guy from Fantasy Island plays the villain Khan whose name is more than occasionally misspelled as Kahn like the author James Kahn. (Just like Chekov is occasionally misspelled as Chekhov like the author Anton Chekhov.) This movie’s director, who is not a fan of Star Trek but will sort of become one, claims that Khan’s Arnold Schwarzenegger like pectorals is not a prosthetic.

This movie was originally sub-titled The Revenge of Khan, but Star Wars was naming their next movie Revenge of the Jedi, so Star Trek changed its name so as to avoid looking like Star Trek was riding on Star Wars’ coattails. (But then George Lucas decided to spite Star Trek, and changed his movie’s name to Return of the Jedi. Lucas’ excuse was that Jedi good guys don’t commit revenge. Too bad Bush hadn’t adopted the same philosophy.)

The reason why Khan wants revenge is that in The Original Series’ episode Space Seed, Kirk had shown mercy and compassion by stranding, I mean relocating, Khan and his fanatical followers to a hospitable planet by episode’s end. How was Kirk to know that the planet’s indigenous life-forms, the Ceti eels, would kill Khan’s wife? How was Kirk to know that the planet’s moon would collide with something and cause Khan’s planet to become desert-like? And Khan, like a cry-baby, blames Kirk for not coming back to visit once in a while to see how Khan and family were doing. Khan and his followers were genetically superior! Khan blames Kirk on his misfortune. It’s karma, Khan! You tried to take over the planet Earth. Now this planet’s taken over you!

Come to think of it, Space Seed would make a good porn title for Capt. Kirk’s outer space adventures… nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more.

Oh, in this movie, Spock dies. So I guess Khan does get his revenge, and the bad guy wins.

Star Trek III: The Search for Spock

Star Trek: The Search for Spock has Reverend Jim Ignatowski from Taxi and Asst. D.A. Dan Fielding from Night Court playing Klingons. Philosophically, this movie shows what friendship is all about. Spock gave his life to save everyone in the previous film, and now his friends sacrifice their careers to bring Spock back. The Enterprise gets blown up really good. Unless you’re one of the ones who wet themselves in the first movie, I guess the Enterprise getting destroyed won’t mean anything to you. I did find it kind of silly that Kirk sacrificed his ship to get rid of less than a dozen Klingons.

Saavik, the Vulcan played by Kirstie Alley in the previous movie, is played by a different actress, because she asks for too much money. I wonder how much she asked for. The general consensus among Trekkies is that the new actress isn’t as good as Kirstie, but I think she’s more than competent. After this movie, the actress did some B-movies, and I saw her in an infomercial once. So what do I know? Saavik has sex with Spock while he’s rapidly maturing, but this is off-screen. I wonder if anyone has made a porn movie with a CGI shape-shifting character. Just a thought.

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Kirk’s son, David, dies as retribution for playing God in his role in developing the Genesis device. In actuality, he almost gets stabbed in the back by a Klingon. Or maybe he saves someone from getting stabbed in the back, and then gets stabbed himself. I don’t think David is really dead. Saavik probably has his Katra, and his body was probably preserved by the Genesis planet and transported off somehow. But the actor who played David has passed away, and no-one really cares about the character, so we probably won’t see him again.

Spock gets a chance to direct a film with this movie. His competence allows him to direct the next film. Nimoy was an astute business man in coercing the producers to allow him to direct. If Nimoy wasn’t allowed to direct, then Spock wasn’t coming back either!

Oh, Kirk does find Spock.

This article is getting long, so I’ll break it up into a three-parter. In the next article, I’ll summarize the final three movies with only the Original Series crew. The human adventure is almost over.



  • Once a week is fucking not enough. I think you’re getting funnier with each post. The redundant comment was pretty hilarious.

  • You listened! :)

  • This is great. I asked for this in the comments of your first post. It out to say “Because Rusty James and to a lesser extent Drew both asked.”

    I think all of the original cast movies are good and all of the TNG movies are bad. One of the most interesting things about the original cast movies are the atheist/theist themes that run through the series. V’ger communing with it’s creator, Khan the genetically enhanced warrior made in man’s image, Spock returning from the dead (via the genesis device) and of course the unforgettable Final Frontier where they actually meet God and kill him by shooting him in the face with lazers.
    It’s a satisfying arc that runs through the movies. And it adds so much to context the painting Spock has in his room in VI.
    Man as creator / man as god / man killing god / man being killed by his own creation. Awesome stuff that’s often over looked.

  • Why did all the Next Generation movies look so flat and uninspired. They had some good actors in the Villain Roles:

    F. Murray Abraham
    Malcolm McDowell
    Anthony Zerbe (double duty as villain in OmegaMan!)
    Alice Krige (this actress is a thousand degrees of awesome, wasted here and in Silent Hill)
    Ron Perlman

    yet somehow, bad direction and lame production design, and a desire to keep destroying the mother ship and time travel crushed all of the TNG films. I dislike all of them.

    Star Trek V and Star Trek VI (the last two original cast member movies) are both seriously underrated.

  • Reed Farrington

    Sorry, Rusty. I should have given you credit for the impetus behind the article. You make a good point in the religious overtones present in the original cast movies.

    I agree with most of what you said Kurt, although I wouldn’t criticize the direction or production design. I’m having a hard time getting inspiration for Part 3 of the articles reviewing the movies. I really do hate to make negative comments about things that people have tried really hard to make good.

  • Kurt, I agree with every word you’ve written. Though I would not die for your right to say it.

    The problem with the TNG movies is that the “show runners” became extremely conservative. They only wanted to tell certain types of stories in certain ways. They subscribed to a dogmatic cannon which they refused to challenge. Every movie wanted to be Wrath of Khan. Some of the films literally seem like remakes sometimes.
    And every idea needed to be run through the continuity filter. I read an interesting interview with one of the DS9 writers who was also a consultant on some of the films and everyone of his ideas was met with “what does this mean for voyager”, “how will we reconcile this for the films”. Why even bother if that’s gonna be your attitude?

    It’s ironic because the guy who informed the TNG aesthetic more than anyone else was Nick Meyers and he didn’t give a shit about continuity. Sometimes it seemed like he went out of his way to contradict it.

    By the way, I know someone who actually liked Insurrection.

    Reed, I’d be curious to read an article defending the muddy / ass ugly production design of the latter films. Seriously, Star Trek V looks better than Nemesis.
    As for not wanting to attack something that people tried hard to make good; I don’t think that applies to the TNG, especially not the last two.

  • I don’t mind Insurrection. There are some decent parts to the film, and the idea could have been interesting (it still is to some degree). The desire to make Star Trek a ‘sci-fi-action’ movie is what has always bogged it down though. Remember your favourite episodes of Star Trek? Was the action ever a plus in them? Not for me it’s not. Funny how people seem to like First Contact the best, when it’s the least ambitious of the films. Although I guess it does have the speech about how humanity becomes united which is pretty unforgetable.

  • However, I do agree that Nemesis is painful. Watching Nemesis is like having your wife die from cancer.

  • Actually Henrik, a lot of my favorite episodes are action heavy. Kirk fights the gorn, Amok Time, The First Romulans Episode, Yesterday’s Enterprise, The Enterprise Incident, Best of both Worlds, Doomsday Machine. Of course Wrath of Khan.

    I agree about first contact.

  • I would judge you Rusty, but I am trying to get away from doing that.

  • I don’t think it counts as not judging if you still make snotty comments.

  • Like I said it’s an ongoing attempt.

  • Come on dude, these facts* and proof* i mean who is posting* lol :P