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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Star Trek V: The Final Frontier.

The Enterprise approaches The Great Barrier.

THE PLOT

Nimbus III is a planet located in the Neutral Zone. It is called "the planet of galactic peace," a world which the Federation, Klingon, and Romulan governments have agreed to develop in concert. In reality, it's a planet-sized garbage dump, its colonists the dregs of all three empires, its ambassadors washed-up failures at the ends of once-promising careers.  The development of the planet was forgotten almost as quickly as it began, and the entire project has become a largely forgotten backwater.

Which makes it all the more surprising when Sybok (Laurence Luckinbill), a renegade Vulcan, raises an army from among the planet's unwashed and holds the three ambassadors hostage. Kirk and the new Enterprise are dispatched on a rescue mission.  But this new Enterprise is a disaster itself, a ship on which nothing seems to function properly. With Klaa (Todd Bryant), a bored Klingon captain eager to use this situation to test his combat mettle against Kirk, the challenges are already mounting.

And that's before they encounter Sybok, and realize that this entire mission is playing right into his plans!

Shatner braces himself for the first round of reviews.

CHARACTERS

Capt. Kirk: After a near fatal accident at the beginning of the film, Kirk reveals that he knew he wasn't going to die. He tells Spock and McCoy that he has always known that he will die alone. This is echoed at the end of the film, when he tells Spock he was sure he was going to die and Spock replies that this was impossible, because Kirk was "never alone." Kirk fights Sybok for control of the ship until they breach the Galactic Barrier. Then he stops fighting - Having encountered the unknown, Kirk is every bit as eager to explore it as Sybok is.

Spock: His surprise at seeing Sybok on the monitor is too evident for Kirk and McCoy not to catch. It's immediately obvious that while he is telling them the truth about Sybok's background, he is at the same time withholding something. That comes back to haunt all of them, when Spock disobeys the order to shoot Sybok and then reveals that the renegade is his half-brother. Spock refuses Sybok's entreaties to join him, even after he removes Spock's pain. He declares that he has found his place. His loyalty to Kirk is a part of his identity, and Sybok's mental powers can't disguise that fact.

Dr. McCoy: "Human life is far too precious to risk on crazy stunts!" Though the campfire scene is ludicrously overlong, McCoy's declaration of the value of human life is one of (too) few moments of value. The Razzie Awards, in their enthusiasm for damning this picture, nominated DeForest Kelly for Worst Supporting Actor. They couldn't have been further off the mark, in my opinion. Despite the script's focus being Kirk and Spock, it's McCoy who gets the best character moments. I even enjoyed his "group therapy" session with Sybok. Though the euthanasia backstory may be ham-handed, Kelly's knack for making his material seem authentic manages to make it work in a way that most of the surrounding material doesn't.

The Enterprise Crew: The script has little use for the supporting cast and doesn't know what to do with them.  The results are dismal. Scotty at least gets a few decent bits, and is the only supporting crew member to not instantly turn on Kirk when cured of his "pain." But even he bashes his head  into a bulkhead for the sake of a cartoon pratfall.  Meanwhile, Uhura spends the film coming onto Scotty after no previous film or television episode indicated the slightest hint of romantic feeling; and Sulu and Chekov mimic a blizzard, apparently forgetting that starships have sensors. The entire crew turns on Kirk the instant Sybok works his magic on them ... which, once it's revealed that Sybok isn't actually brainwashing anyone, makes no sense given that these same people were willing to throw away their careers for Kirk just two films earlier!

Sybok leads Kirk and his crew into the unknown.

THOUGHTS

After two movies directed by Leonard Nimoy, it was agreed that William Shatner should get a chance to sit in the director's chair. The results were... noticeably less successful. Star Trek V became the first film in the series to be considered a failure, and the critics were even less kind to it than the box office was. Nor has time granted it much respectability. This is very much the black sheep of the TOS films, widely regarded as the worst Trek movie with the original cast.

It should be said that Shatner's directing is competent on a technical level. Despite some weak effects, the film isn't really any worse visually than Star Trek III. Unfortunately, Shatner lacks Nimoy's ability to work with actors.  Laurence Luckinbill gives a surprisingly commanding performance as Sybok, but I suspect that was all Luckinbill rising to the role he was given.  With the exception of DeForest Kelly, the regulars give their weakest performances of any of the feature films.  And even a veteran character actor like David Warner seems basically uninterested in his (very weak) role.

The movie's most significant problem, as with most failed films, is the script.  The story often grinds to a halt in the first half for the sake of material that is either irrelevant, repetitive, or ill-advised. Some of this was studio-imposed.  The success of Star Trek IV was credited in large part to the film's humor. It was therefore decided that whatever else it was going to be, Star Trek V needed to Be Funny.

This creates several problems.  Star Trek V's narrative is heavily centered around a literal quest to find God and unlock the secret questions of creation.  This does not naturally lead to comedy situations, which means that the content and tone are at odds from the get-go.  Beyond that, the way in which comedy is applied is strained.  The previous movie never forgot that the situation was deadly serious to the characters.  Kirk and his crew weren't running around 20th century San Francisco cracking jokes; they were trying to get on with the mission as efficiently as possible.  The laughs came from how incompatible the characters were with the time and place in which they were stuck.

In this movie, the comedy arises not from situation and character, but from an externally-imposed need for "funny bits." The results are largely bad: The infamous Uhura "fan dance" scene; the Sulu/Chekov "blizzard" bit, which may be a series low for both characters; or Scotty's Clouseau-like head bash.

A little after the halfway mark, the movie finally stops grabbing for laughs and lets the story and characters take themselves seriously. I doubt it's a coincidence that this is where it finally gets better. A lot better. Once the jokes drop away, the last 45 minutes is able to establish a reasonable dramatic rhythm. There's some good character interplay, such as Spock's declaration to Sybok of having found his place or Kirk's statement that Spock and McCoy are his family. And if the climax falls a bit flat, it's still adequate on its own terms.

Looking into the face of God(?)

OVERALL

Once it became obvious that the comedy didn't work and made a mess of the pacing, Paramount should have authorized a ruthless re-edit to tighten things up. Without the misfired gags slowing the pace and annoying the audience, this could have been reduced to a lean and passably absorbing 90 minutes. It would still be noticeably weaker than the preceding trilogy, with a misjudged structure that keeps the story from even starting until after the halfway mark... But with the bad comedy removed and the pace tightened, I doubt it would be even half as badly-regarded as ended up being the case.

As it stands, the first hour lives down to the movie's dismal reputation, turning the viewing experience into a grim slog.  Things do eventually get better, though, and viewers who make it through will be rewarded with some decent character scenes that allow it to close on a pleasant note.

If that doesn't sound like a ringing endorsement... Well, it isn't. The Final Frontier is by far the weakest TOS film, and even a ruthless edit would only downplay its flaws. I have no hate for the film - but with the best will in the world, it's a long way from being a good movie.


Overall Rating: 2/10.

Previous Movie: Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home
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