Star Trek revisited...
Decided to re-watch the Star Trek films in order. It's been some time since I've seen them, and I never did watch the last two Next Gen films. Here's a few quick thoughts:
Star Trek: The Motion Picture: Not as bad as I remembered, but I can see why I fell asleep in the theater in 1979. Dull, extremely poorly paced, and suffers horribly from Roddenberry-itis. I'm a Star Trek heretic. While I admire Roddenberry's vision and certainly have enjoyed his creation, I think he was an absolutely terrible writer. Just an ungodly hack. The film is based on his idea, fleshed out by SF hack-for-hire Alan Dean Foster (who wrote the original story this was based on, which would have been the premiere episode of Star Trek Phase II. Still, the film holds up pretty well. Too much Enterprise worship, not enough humor. There's some pretty laughable science, and the costumes are abysmal. Every member of the crew looks like they're in an ad for 23rd century sleepwear. The best thing about these pajama uniforms is the brief glimpse of James Doohan's junk swagging around in it*. The bridge design is an atrocity all unto itself. I never understood why they didn't just beam down to V'Ger instead of taking that dumb walk down the saucer. I guess they wanted to spend some more money on effects. The best thing about this movie is Leonard Nimoy, who defiantly proves why Spock is the real star of the series and he out-acts everyone in a 50-foot radius. Bonus props to Nichelle Nichols for rockin' her late-70s mini-fro, and for the start of the recurring theme of Chekov getting wtfpwned by something in every single flick. Poor Checkov. Also introduces the "new model" Klingons with the lobster forehead, which would, many years later, give Michael Dorn one of the best lines in any Star Trek episode or film.**
Story: Meh
Effects: Passable, but too much fapping over the damn ship.
Acting: Good. Nimoy is tops.
Redshirts Sacrificed: None, unless you count Persis Khambatta and Stephen Collins
Chekov Injury: Burnt by exploding console. :(
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: The gold standard of Star Trek films, the second installment was made on the super-cheap. ST:TMP was a dud at the box office and barely recouped its cost, and was savaged by critics. Paramount laid the blame squarely on Roddenberry and bumped him up to the largely ceremonial position of "Executive Consultant". Instead, they gave the film to a team of relative outsiders, including director Nicholas Meyer, who'd never even seen an episode of the series. Sets from the first film were re-used and only vaguely re-worked. New and much better uniforms. Lots of effects shots reused from the first film. This film has everything that the first is missing: pacing, humor, a good story, and--the key ingredient--re-establishes the Kirk-Spock-McCoy character interactions that were so vital to the series. So much of ST II: TWoK is so good not because it's a slam-bang action flick (which, well, it is), but because of the character dynamics. This is something that Roddenberry always seemed to fail to understand about his own creation: it's the characters that drive the damn thing. They also make an important connection back to the original series by crafting a sequel to a particular episode, "Space Seed". Lots of important canon stuff happens in this film. My main problem with it is it just looks so cheap. Reused sets and footage, good effects in general, but it just has an overall low budget feel, which seems to work in it's favor.
Story: Hell to the yeah!
Effects: Passable, but the film overall looks it's budget, which was low
Acting: Good. Nimoy again is tops. Shatner doesn't slab on the ham too much. In fact, some of his best acting in the series in in this film, "KHAAAAAN!" notwithstanding.
Redshirts Sacrificed: (1) Starship captain and probably lots of his crew (the film doesn't tell us how many lived after being exiled to Ceti Alpha V by Khan when he commandeers the Reliant which, by the way, is one of my favorite ships, and apparently came about when Meyer approved the design while looking at it upside-down); Scotty's nephew; numerous anonymous Enterprise crewmembers and most everyone on Space Station Regula One.
Chekov Injury: Ceti Alpha V brain slug made him do bad things and scream a lot when it squirted out of his earhole :( :(
*I have a long-standing and abnormal lust-on for James Doohan. Don't ask me why. It well-predates Fat Scotty. I think it's that mustache. And the accent. I would totally have boned Scotty. Repeatedly.
**If you're interested, it's the "Trials and Tribble-ations" episode of my favorite Star Trek series, Deep Space Nine, in which the crew travels back in time and hangs out during the "The Trouble With Tribbles" episode of the original series. The line comes when Worf, O'Brien, Odo and Bashir are in the K-7 station's cafe and are waiting for the Klingons to get there. When Worf explains there are already Klingons there, the others look around confused and then look to him for an explanation, and he says: "It was a long time ago, and we do not discuss it with outsiders!"
Star Trek: The Motion Picture: Not as bad as I remembered, but I can see why I fell asleep in the theater in 1979. Dull, extremely poorly paced, and suffers horribly from Roddenberry-itis. I'm a Star Trek heretic. While I admire Roddenberry's vision and certainly have enjoyed his creation, I think he was an absolutely terrible writer. Just an ungodly hack. The film is based on his idea, fleshed out by SF hack-for-hire Alan Dean Foster (who wrote the original story this was based on, which would have been the premiere episode of Star Trek Phase II. Still, the film holds up pretty well. Too much Enterprise worship, not enough humor. There's some pretty laughable science, and the costumes are abysmal. Every member of the crew looks like they're in an ad for 23rd century sleepwear. The best thing about these pajama uniforms is the brief glimpse of James Doohan's junk swagging around in it*. The bridge design is an atrocity all unto itself. I never understood why they didn't just beam down to V'Ger instead of taking that dumb walk down the saucer. I guess they wanted to spend some more money on effects. The best thing about this movie is Leonard Nimoy, who defiantly proves why Spock is the real star of the series and he out-acts everyone in a 50-foot radius. Bonus props to Nichelle Nichols for rockin' her late-70s mini-fro, and for the start of the recurring theme of Chekov getting wtfpwned by something in every single flick. Poor Checkov. Also introduces the "new model" Klingons with the lobster forehead, which would, many years later, give Michael Dorn one of the best lines in any Star Trek episode or film.**
Story: Meh
Effects: Passable, but too much fapping over the damn ship.
Acting: Good. Nimoy is tops.
Redshirts Sacrificed: None, unless you count Persis Khambatta and Stephen Collins
Chekov Injury: Burnt by exploding console. :(
Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: The gold standard of Star Trek films, the second installment was made on the super-cheap. ST:TMP was a dud at the box office and barely recouped its cost, and was savaged by critics. Paramount laid the blame squarely on Roddenberry and bumped him up to the largely ceremonial position of "Executive Consultant". Instead, they gave the film to a team of relative outsiders, including director Nicholas Meyer, who'd never even seen an episode of the series. Sets from the first film were re-used and only vaguely re-worked. New and much better uniforms. Lots of effects shots reused from the first film. This film has everything that the first is missing: pacing, humor, a good story, and--the key ingredient--re-establishes the Kirk-Spock-McCoy character interactions that were so vital to the series. So much of ST II: TWoK is so good not because it's a slam-bang action flick (which, well, it is), but because of the character dynamics. This is something that Roddenberry always seemed to fail to understand about his own creation: it's the characters that drive the damn thing. They also make an important connection back to the original series by crafting a sequel to a particular episode, "Space Seed". Lots of important canon stuff happens in this film. My main problem with it is it just looks so cheap. Reused sets and footage, good effects in general, but it just has an overall low budget feel, which seems to work in it's favor.
Story: Hell to the yeah!
Effects: Passable, but the film overall looks it's budget, which was low
Acting: Good. Nimoy again is tops. Shatner doesn't slab on the ham too much. In fact, some of his best acting in the series in in this film, "KHAAAAAN!" notwithstanding.
Redshirts Sacrificed: (1) Starship captain and probably lots of his crew (the film doesn't tell us how many lived after being exiled to Ceti Alpha V by Khan when he commandeers the Reliant which, by the way, is one of my favorite ships, and apparently came about when Meyer approved the design while looking at it upside-down); Scotty's nephew; numerous anonymous Enterprise crewmembers and most everyone on Space Station Regula One.
Chekov Injury: Ceti Alpha V brain slug made him do bad things and scream a lot when it squirted out of his earhole :( :(
*I have a long-standing and abnormal lust-on for James Doohan. Don't ask me why. It well-predates Fat Scotty. I think it's that mustache. And the accent. I would totally have boned Scotty. Repeatedly.
**If you're interested, it's the "Trials and Tribble-ations" episode of my favorite Star Trek series, Deep Space Nine, in which the crew travels back in time and hangs out during the "The Trouble With Tribbles" episode of the original series. The line comes when Worf, O'Brien, Odo and Bashir are in the K-7 station's cafe and are waiting for the Klingons to get there. When Worf explains there are already Klingons there, the others look around confused and then look to him for an explanation, and he says: "It was a long time ago, and we do not discuss it with outsiders!"