LizstarTrek - The Original Series Movies

I’ve finished watching the Original Series, so now it’s time for the MOVIES! I’ve decided to make a new thread for all of the Original Series movies, so if you’re interested in my thoughts, follow through!

Engage!

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Star Trek the Motion Picture

5/10

It’s not… bad. It’s just kinda boring. It has some cool ideas, neat effects and setpieces, relatively good acting, but oh my god. The movie starts with 2 minutes of a black screen and half the scenes are that interesting.

The infamous scenes are the scenes where they’re flying by the Enterprise and it’s glamour shots while cutting back to Kirk and Scotty smiling, for like 3 minutes. Or the scene of Spock in a space suit.

This movie is kinda “We have 2001 A Space Odyssey At Home”.

It’s to the point where the Director’s Cut REMOVES LIKE 45 MINUTES FROM THE MOVIE. How do you even pull that off?

So yeah, its pacing is the only really terrible part, apart from all the behind the scenes horrible sexist shit like Roddenberry always pulled.

The plot is… interesting. I really like the Voyager plot twist actually? I think it’s kinda creative and cute, out of left field. Pretty Trekky. Dekker having sex with V’ger was… weird and unnecessary, and the “new lifeform” part was also… cheesy and meh.

Some parts of this movie are shockingly fucked up, like the teleporter fuck up. And then they immediately beam over Bones, prolly not telling him what just happened cause he’d threaten to maul them if he knew.

Also, Bones with a Beard is WAY TOO SEXY. FUCK.

A lot of this movie really feels like “we need to differentiate ourselves from Star Wars” but to its detriment. I often mock the series for shoving in fisticuffs to bring in some action but this movie maybe needed a BIT of it. But it really is beautiful.

The fact that this movie’s main problem is pacing considering the hellish production cycle it went through is honestly impressive. Oh, one more fun thing, all the new designs feel VERY proto-TNG, a lot of the designs feel like how they’d be in TNG, years later.

Trek II The Wrath of Khan

10/10

Good fucking God, watching this after The Motion Picture was like night and god damn day. This movie being so damn good RUINS TMP even more. That movie gets so much worse when compared to this, it puts spotlights on its inadequacies. I almost feel its not fair on the poor movie.

First of all, the writing. Like, the themes of getting old was in TMP, but it’s much better here. The Moby Dick inspirations are here like they were in two TOS episodes, but here it’s SO much better cause THE AHAB CHARACTER IS THE VILLAIN, TOS. COME ON.

And most importantly, the characters are… the characters. Many of em felt off in TMP, here they bicker and snark like they usually do. There were no good Trio Conversation scenes in TMP. Here they’re in spades, and the characters feel GREAT and the lines are FUNNY

Secondly, the acting. On god damn point, every part of it. Even SHATNER acted well, and that’s only because the director intentionally made him act out scenes dozens of times until he got lazy and toned down the ham acting. It works well.

And Spock. Whoo boy.

I, of course, cried. How can you not?

This is not a perfect movie. But the things I’d change are like a few minor things. As it is, it’s a Trek Movie done perfectly. It’s a great entertaining film while ALSO being Trek, which is hard to do.

Absolutely loved it.I gave the Motion Picture a 5/10, and watching Khan immediately after feels unfair to it because now I wanna give it like a 3/10. I was like “yeah it’s boring but a bunch of things in it are nice” and now I’m like “holy shit THEY COULDA DONE THIS THE WHOLE TIME?!”

It’s worth noting Roddenberry had barely anything to do with this movie. He had notes, they were ignored.

Also, the Spock scenes at the end. Nimoy wanted OUT of this franchise, then loved making this movie SO MUCH he asked to be put back in, and to direct the next~

Oh, one more thought.

The costume designs. TMP had “throw away one use outfits, cause that’s futuristic”. Khan has outfits that FEEL ACTUALLY FUTURISTIC, and look REALLY cool. Thank GOD they ignored Roddenberry this time.

Star Trek III: The Search for Spock

8.5/10

Super strong movie. It’s funny, any time you hear ANYONE bring this up, they go “Oh yeah, 3. It’s the best of the odd numbered movies!” which yes it is. But it’s a great character driven piece, and it surprised me!

This movie is Nimoy’s first directing credit, and for his first movie, he decided the story would be about his best friends wanting to give him a traditional Jewish funeral which is funny

Khan was much more… focused, but this is good in different ways.

A lot of the scenes were really fun too, like it felt less like one solid plot like Khan did but more a bunch of tiny but great character moments.

Also, Christopher Lloyd was… more subdued than I expected. I wanted him HAMMY AS HELL. He was only KINDA hammy.

It was nice to see a prototype for TNG Klingons, tho. Its the first time a Klingon says the word “honor”! Q’PLAH!

Also Horny Spock Needs To Fuck was the ONLY thing I knew about this movie but it wasn’t as bad as I expected. That was apparently aaall Roddenberry.

Also lots of emotional scenes here too. Kirk’s son’s death, the fucking Enterprise blowing up. And the self destruct scene is JUST like it was in The Racism episode, too! Cool!

…..I’m VERY excited to watch the next movie, though >w>

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home

10/10

Let me preface this by saying this is an EXTREMELY DIFFERENT 10/10 to Wrath of Khan, because this is a very different movie. It’s almost untrekky, in a way. It’s a lot of screwball goofy comedy, done very well.

I feel like whichever is your favorite (2 or 4, maybe you’re a weirdo who lives 5 the most I dunno you), it just depends on taste. Because both are really practically perfect movies that set out to do what they wanted to do. Which do I prefer?

Well, I’m a goofball

I just really admire the fucking audacity of Nimoy writing this concept. What do we make the movie about? Okay, whales are extinct, a probe is killing the Earth, we need to go back in the past and find some whales.

What the fuck. That’s so silly

I fucking love it

It almost reminds me of A Piece of the Action. Is this the most logical realistic story? No. Who the fuck cares. Space Whales.

Is Spock saying “Damn” and “Hell” to try and blend into Earth Society realistic? Who gives a shit, it’s fucking hilarious

The movie really sells it too. Like yeah it’s goofball comedy, and if they winked and nodded to the audience going “ha ha isn’t this WACKY?” it woulda been AWFUL

But it’s treated as so serious, it really makes me latch on and go “Hell YEAH we gotta save the whales”

I think it’s a great conclusion to the 2-4 trilogy. 2 and 3 are… so serious, so emotional. It’s real good, and hits and lands well, but this is like a breath of relief. The fun at the end. Yes it’s still serious and the stakes are high, but the levity is needed.

I want to add, I’m really bad with awkward comedy. But I kinda still love it? I muted the movie during the “hello computer” scene cause Scotty being silly was hilarious but also gave me The Office vibes.

Also omg the fucking Hospital scene with the wacky music

Bones and Spock keep bouncing back and forth as my favorite characters, this movie made Bones bounce to the front. “My GOD it’s the dark ages!” grows a woman a kidney

Or the scene where he and Scotty say “is it right to change the future? Eh. Whatever.”

This movie was the highest grossing Trek film until 2009’s Reboot Film. When I said it’s less Trekky, that also means it’s more… accessible. I get why this was popular. My mom said it was her favorite lol

This woulda been a good one to end on. Alas…

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier

4/10

If I was rating this on enjoyment, it’s like a 6/10. Way higher than TMP. Rating on just quality, like a 3, 3.5 on a good day. So I’ll even it out to a 4. I weirdly liked a lot of parts of this, but not for good reasons

I’ll say, #1 reason I enjoy this in any way, is Sybok. His actor is good (and very hot, jfc), he’s a fun villain who’s like, barely a villain. I think a lot of him could be better explored, themes and whatnot are just… left on the table. Especially involving god

The premise of the movie is easily mockable. It’s SO easy to make fun of, but it’s way better than I remembered/expected it to be. The problem is, it was supposed to be serious but Shatner is a bad director, so that failed, then Executive Meddling forced it funny

Which makes sense, the previous movie pushed the funny to 11. That sold, let’s do that again. But they slashed the budget and the writing fails too. Lots of jokes just don’t land, or are awkward. And it doesn’t fit the serious bits.

I really love how there’s a scene where McCoy tackles the grief and guilt he feels about euthanizing his father. It’s touching, and kind of powerful. This was 20 minutes after Uhura does a half naked caberet dance to distract some guards. I’m saying it’s got a tone problem.

Some things are also just not the deal they’re made out to be. Wow, the Enterprise is breaking down (PS, why is the Federation so shit at making new ships). This won’t be a problem in the plot. Ooh, here are our three hostages. Only one has any plot significance.

It did its best in the circumstances though I think. The original plot involved literal Satan and going to hell to save McCoy, so it COULD HAVE BEEN WAY WORSE.

Anyway, I love Sybok, he is my sexy Vulcan boyfriend. Plus, canonically into trans women, based

Star Trek VI - The Undiscovered Country

11/10

This did it. It broke the scale.

This was actually my first time watching this movie, and uh, holy shit. I knew it was supposed to be good but I was stunned how good it was. And such a perfect send off to TOS.

It really feels like the perfect end to the storyline of the series, and moving forward into TNG. And that’s what it’s about, moving forward, constantly forward, progressing, becoming better, despite all things trying to hold us back.

ALSO IT HAS A LOT OF KLINGONS!

I LOVE KLINGONS. THEY’RE ALL SO GOOD. Gorkon is like Abraham Lincoln Gorbachev, Chang is SO GOOD as a main villain.

Also Trek had never done anything like this. This movie had… MYSTIQUE. ESPIONAGE. Who dunnit, politics, conspiracy. And it did it SO WELL.

The other 10/10 movies are so good, obviously, but they’re, for Khan, a strong tense character piece, and for Voyage Home, it was super funny character piece. This is both. And also great lore building. This is the most lore building Trek EVER had to this point.

I dunno if I can even come up with flaws. Like there’s parts I disliked, but that was the point. Most of it, I was stunned how into it I was. On the edge of my seat, constantly. I was ENRAPTURED.

Wow. I fucking loved this. I can’t imagine anything topping it.

This is also the end to my ToS movies thread. Over all? Real enjoyable movies. I didnt NOT enjoy any of em. I barely enjoyed TMP I guess, but I did enjoy em all. I’m surprised I liked em all so much, and how good they were over all.

Next up… the animated series.