The Lighter Side of Life...

And now for something from the lighter side of life...

So today I finished my goal of watching all eleven Star Trek movies in order (yes, I am that lame) and as I have had some time to reflect now on the different captains, crews, stories and ships and the voyages of all the different star ship Enterprises that appear in the feature length movie franchise, I have made some observations that I’m ready to share with the citizens of the internet.

First of all, even as a self-identified Trekkie and long time follower of the franchise – it has to be said that a few of these movies are absolutely terrible! By and large the accepted rule of thumb with the Star Trek film franchise is that the odd-numbered movies are awful and the even numbered movies are great or at least passable for entertainment value. This pattern largely holds true in experience with the even numbered films being the most successful and the odd numbered movies being critically reviled even into the Next Generation films (7-10) that aren’t officially numbered. The theory breaks down when you get to the latest film “Star Trek”, which is J.J. Abrams first foray into the Star Trek universe and is unofficially number 11 as it is technically a sequel and NOT a reboot as is most commonly believed (more on that later).

So rather than give a synopsis or evaluation of each individual film (which could take a long time and would be rather uninteresting) I want to quickly give an overview of the film franchise as a whole and highlight some notable things that stuck out to me and then afterward I’ll go out on a limb and give my nod to the best and the worst of the film franchise in a move that is sure to infuriate the die-hard faithful in my readership. So here goes.

Star Trek: The motion picture begins with the ominous arrival of a dangerous energy cloud that of course threatens the very existence of Earth (a theme that would be repeated in various forms in films IV, VIII, and XI) and the first thing we notice is how OLD all of the original crew have gotten in the 10 years since the end of the original series. William Shatner in particular did not age well, nor did DeForest Kelley, James Doohan or Walter Koenig. All of the crew look significantly older than their characters should be.  An indeterminate amount of time has passed in the story universe but we know that Kirk cites his 5 years at the helm of the Enterprise as the reason for his special qualifications for taking control of the ship so it would seem that not that much time has passed in screen time since the end of the original series – which makes the age of the crew all the more jarring when we first see them on screen. The second thing that we notice is that the crew have all scattered. Kirk is now an admiral, Spock seems to have resigned his commission and is searching for some sort of inner peace on Vulcan and McCoy has retired. The Enterprise has gone through some sort of extensive retro-fit and there is a new command crew in charge. Captain Will Decker, the man hand-picked by Kirk to command his ship is getting the crew ready for its shakedown voyage but the crisis forces crew and ship into premature service to save Earth.

Which of course they do after reassembling the original bridge crew and killing off the interesting new characters that could steal attention from the stars (interestingly the characters of Decker and the telepathic Lieutenant Ilia who shared a romantic past became the templates for the more famous and enduring characters of Will Riker and Deanna Troi in The Next Generation continuity) the movie ends without much resolution to the characters’ futures. Kirk is still an admiral, Spock’s future in uncertain and McCoy never officially re-enlists.

In Star Trek II we begin with the first mention of the famous Kobayashi Maru test at Star Fleet Academy.  A new character, a Vulcan female played by a strangely miscast young Kirstie Alley (Saavik would later be recast for Star Trek III). We learn in this scene that Kirk is still an admiral, that Spock is now the captain of the Enterprise and that it has been reassigned as a training ship for cadets and young officers. In the next scene we learn that Chekov has been reassigned to the crew of the USS Reliant and once again the main crew is scattered across different assignments needing a crisis to pull them together. That crisis is Kahn – Ricardo Montalban reprising his role as the genetically augmented superhuman who is this time out for revenge against the man who marooned him and his crew in the original series episode Space Seed. Star Trek II is nostalgically remembered by many as possibly the pinnacle of the original six movies but frankly I think that nostalgia is clouding better judgement. Kahn is a mediocre villain at best and the genesis device which serves as the ultimate weapon that endangers the crew is one of the worst MacGuffins in all of Star Trek lore. The only thing that makes this movie the least bit memorable is the sacrifice of Spock at the climax of the film. Followed by a funeral service that even had be tearing up the franchise follows it up by immediately squandering all the good will they built with the horrible movie that is Star Trek III.

The less that is said about Star Trek III the better, but the consequences of the plot is that Kirk’s newly discovered son is killed (setting up a major plot point for movie VI), Spock is resurrected and the Enterprise is destroyed. Oh, and we learn definitively that Christopher Lloyd, while making a great Doc Brown, makes a horrible Klingon. That distinct voice just does not work.

Star Trek IV is also fondly remembered by most fans of the series. It is also known as the movie with no Enterprise, very little action in Space and of course Whales. This is the second time an large and powerful probe of some type is inexplicably headed for Earth and has threatened human existence. The plot takes the crew back in time to 1980s San Francisco in what ends up being one of the most lighthearted and funny films in the series. At the end of the film a new Enterprise is unveiled (NCC-1701A) and Kirk is busted back down to the rank of captain finally getting things back where they belong in the Star Trek universe and all but guaranteeing a fifth film in a few years time; which is a shame – because Star Trek V was awful. Anytime you mix themes of getting old (a theme that would be much better realized in the sixth film), space exploration and the search for God within the campy universe of Star Trek – you know that good things are not forthcoming.

Star Trek VI is where I think the original crew really shines in the film universe. The film is a social commentary on the western world coming to terms with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the passing of a generation into irrelevance. This is demonstrated not only by the reflections on age and retirement, but also in the comparison of the aging Constitution class Enterprise with the new and powerful USS Excelsior under the command of former Enterprise helmsman, Captain Sulu. I think also that the legendary Christopher Plummer delivers what is probably the best performance ever in the role of a lead villain in a Star Trek film.

Star Trek Generations (VII) is by all accounts a movie that only existed to kill off Kirk and give the crew of The Next Generation ‘permission’ to start making movies. It also features the only canon appearance of the Excelsior class Enterprise B (The Enterprise C had been previously featured in the TNG episode “Yesterday’s Enterprise” and the destruction of the Enterprise D – which was to give the Next Generation movie franchise a fancy new ship to carry on with; which set-up the events of Star Trek First Contact (VIII) and the debut of the fancy new Sovereign class Enterprise E.

First Contact was undoubtedly the most frightening of the eleven feature films with a deliberate attempt to mix a bit of the space horror genre into the plot. It balanced this with lighthearted shenanigans on 22^nd century Earth trying to get a notoriously irresponsible and drunk Zephram Cochrane to successfully launch the first warp ship in human history to preserve their timeline. It also started the trend of Data being the unquestioned secondary lead in the crew for plot attention and the trend of finding excuses for Worf to keep coming along for the adventure since he was no longer an official part of the crew as he was assigned to Deep Space Nine.

Following First Contact was Star Trek Insurrection (IX) which was notable not only for its general lameness, but also for being the film where Riker and Troi rekindle their romance (an important plot point in the next movie). Stuff happens, stuff blows up. Worf inexplicably ends up along for the ride and the good guys win.

Star Trek Nemesis (X) was the fourth and final movie in the Next Generation franchise. The whole theme of the movie was goodbyes. Riker and Troi were married in the opening scenes and Will had accepted the post as the captain of the USS Titan. Beverly Crusher had been (once again) appointed the head of Starfleet Medical. Worf was once again somehow there (and yet officially not there because he wasn’t a part of the crew) and Data did his best impression of Spock saving the ship by sacrificing his own life in the climax of the film. Being an even numbered film and featuring a fearsome new foe with ties to the Romulan Empire it should have been a great movie, but at this point the air was out of the Next Generation crew’s balloon and the whole movie was just one long epilogue to the TV and film series that spawned it.

Star Trek (XI) the reboot that wasn’t really a reboot would follow seven years later with a new take on the original series crew and a new vision for the franchise courtesy of J.J. Abrams. It turned the tables on  Kirk making him an outsider fighting his way in, turned Spock into a much more human character (and gave him a romantic relationship with Uhura), remade the Enterprise into some sort of hybrid between quasi industrial and Apple computers type of ship (seriously, the Engineering section looks like it belongs on a 20^th century steam ship while the bridge looks like it’s a part of Apple headquarters in Cuppertino). It also changed history in a big way by destroying one of the most important planets in the Federation – Vulcan. Yet by a stroke of genius Abrams incorporated a time travel element that kept it firmly in the original continuity as a sequel to Nemesis while creating a new timeline that essentially frees him from sticking to the original canon in subsequent sequels.

So after wasting so much of my life watching all of these films in order (not all in one day thank goodness) I do have some awards for the best and worst aspects of the film franchise as we get ready  for the much anticipated 12^th film due in theatres this May.

Best Captain: This is the question that is most likely to divide the fan base in half but I think that hands down the best captain in the series has to be Picard. Even with only four moves to Kirk’s seven (and I count Kirk Alpha as a different captain) he distinguished himself as a much more capable and intelligent officer than Kirk ever did. How Picard is not yet an admiral (and Janeway is!?!) is beyond me.

Worst Villain: The whaling industry. Seriously. In Star Trek IV Leonard Nimoy, who directed the film, wanted to have such a strong environmental message that he wrote no villain into the plot. The antagonist was us and the way we treated the environment. Lame.

Best Villain: General Chang from Star Trek VI. You don’t get much better than a Klingon who recites Shakespeare as he tries to kill you and ruin the plan for peace between the Klingons and the Federation. That and Christopher Plummer.

Best Ship: Hands down that has to go to Picard’s Enterprise E, although I am also partial to Sulu’s Excelsior.

Most Bizarre Casting Choice: Christopher Lloyd as the Klingon Commander Kruge. I spent the whole movie waiting for him to invent the flux capacitor.

Worst film: Star Trek the Motion Picture is hard to beat in this category but Star Trek III:The Search for Spock gives it a run for its money.

Best Film (I-VI): Certainly the Undiscovered country wins this award

Best Film (VII-X): Hard to find a better Next Generation film than First Contact. How can you go wrong with the Borg?

Best Film overall: I’m going to offend all the traditionalists here and go with Star Trek (XI) on this one. Abrams has re-imagined the Star Trek universe in a way that is fresh and modern and has found a way to both honour the source material and canon while simultaneously freeing himself from it.

Bonus Category – Worst Uniforms: Star Trek the Motion Picture. What were they thinking? Who knew that the 70s would be back in style in the 23^rd century.