Thoughts on the TOS Movies.

The six Star Trek movies featuring the original series cast were Star Trek during the 1980's - The only Star Trek for most of that time. The success of the films led directly to the return of the franchise on television, and also gave a chance for viewers to say a proper farewell to the crew that started it all.

In effect, the six movies form one last, multi-year season of the original Star Trek. The films even end up having much the same structure as a television series - right down to an arc that connects the episodes... And right down to a pilot that bears little resemblance to what the series would properly become.


FALSE STARTS AND EARLY STEPS: THE MOTION PICTURE



It's now reasonably well-known that Star Trek almost returned as a television series in the 1970's - the aborted Star Trek: Phase Two. Then Star Wars, and its enormous box office performance, made Paramount rethink its decision to relegate its most famous science fiction property to the small screen.

This probably saved Star Trek as an ongoing franchise. From what I know of Phase II, and from the couple of Phase II scripts that were repurposed into (very poor) TNG episodes, I strongly suspect it would have been a weak series, one that likely would have lasted a single season.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture has many of the failings of early TNG. The atmosphere is too sterile, and the human characters often feel only marginally less emotionless than Mr. Spock. It is also awkwardly paced, particularly in the version that was actually seen in theaters in 1979. Robert Wise's eventual "director's cut" lessens the problems with pacing and characterization - but it doesn't quite eliminate them, and it's a little too evident that the film was put into production before the script was fully ready.

Still, the movie does have a sense of grandeur, aided by some top class visual effects and a sublime Jerry Goldsmith score. There are fantastic sequences and set pieces, and I admit to having had a soft spot for it long before the director's cut was ever released. Most importantly from a studio standpoint, it made money - Which meant that big screen Star Trek was given a second chance to get it right...


TAKE TWO: THE WRATH OF KHAN AND THE TRILOGY



The Wrath of Khan was a much smaller film than The Motion Picture, and in fact remains the lowest-budget Star Trek film of them all. It's also the best of the lot, perfectly capturing the core appeal of the series: The cameraderie and chemistry among the regulars, and most particularly among Kirk, Spock, and Dr. McCoy. The film has some strong action set pieces and a remarkable villain in Ricardo Montalban's vengeance-crazed Khan - but at its heart, it's a character piece, with Kirk having to confront age and death, and having to learn to accept both of these.

The film was so successful, its own sequels simply carried on from it, forming a Star Trek motion picture trilogy. The Search for Spock picks up only a short time after Khan's endpoint. The Voyage Home carries on from Spock's endpoint. All three are very different films, but all were successful both financially and critically. All three movies revolve around the characters. The stories are built around their interactions, and those interactions feel right.


FALLING OFF THE MOUNTAIN: THE COLLAPSE OF STAR TREK V, THE RISE OF TNG, AND THE END OF AN ERA



What goes up must inevitably come down, and the Star Trek film franchise came crashing to Earth with Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. William Shatner took his turn in the director's chair, and also collaborated on the story... Making it hardly a surprise that the movie centers entirely on Kirk, actively at the expense of the other characters. The film is poorly paced and even worse-structured. The seemingly endless first hour is centered on what is revealed to be a subplot, with the actual story not even starting until more than halfway in - which leaves the rest feeling rushed and underdeveloped.

The movie was released into a summer already crowded with blockbusters; and set along side the likes of Lethal Weapon 2 and Tim Burton's Batman, this particularly Trek came up decidedly short. Even worse for Star Trek V, it released just as TNG started to properly find its footing, leading many to grumble that the Star Trek television series was getting to be better than the movies. In the space of one bad film, the big screen future of Star Trek had gone from entirely assured to very much in doubt.


A GRACEFUL EXIT: STAR TREK VI - THE EPILOGUE



Star Trek VI was the final movie for the full 1960's cast, and it did much to recover viewer goodwill. Nicholas Meyer returned as director and co-writer, and the film features multiple callbacks to the core trilogy - most particularly in Kirk's resentment of the Klingons over the death of his son, David, something which helps drive the plot. In plot and also in tone, the movie feels like an epilogue to that trilogy... and with not a single mention of Star Trek V to be found, viewers who are not dedicated to being completists should feel absolutely safe in skipping that unfortunate misfire.

It's a dignified final bow for the crew, only slightly tarnished by Shatner's insistence on having Kirk be the one to outwit the villain at the end after the script had carefully laid the groundwork for Sulu to do so. A minor, if very visible, blemish on an otherwise very fine movie, one that allows the original series crew to go out with a winner.


FINAL THOUGHTS

As the above summaries make clear, the trilogy forms the core of the TOS movies, and those three films and Star Trek VI are what most people mean when they talk about the movies with the original cast. Star Trek: The Motion Picture and Star Trek V are clearly the odd men out, not quite fitting with the other four pictures, and it's likely no coincidence that these two outliers are the least popular TOS movies.

All of the movies (even Star Trek V) are carried by the seemingly effortless chemistry of the cast. There's a magic to this particular cast, and a joy in watching their interactions. I like all the subsequent Trek casts to varying degrees, and some of the later Trek stars would actually be better actors than some of the original stars. But however long Trek has run in however many forms, the magic of that original cast is one that would never be recaptured.


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