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The terrifying, never-ending (old) Star Trek thread - new movies and Discovery talk in the other, dedicated threads

Wiper

By Wiper
in Film, TV & Radio

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The Bag

The Bag

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Michael Pillar's book 'Fade In' about the writing of Insurrection, also covers stuff about writing for the TV series (he joined as a writer in season 3 of TNG and quickly because one of the head writers), has stuff about this. By the time they were doing the movies Stewart & Spiner had a lot of power to veto ideas. It never got published but there's a pdf out there, I can email you a copy if you pm an email address.

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McCoy

McCoy

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Michael Pillar's book 'Fade In' about the writing of Insurrection, also covers stuff about writing for the TV series (he joined as a writer in season 3 of TNG and quickly because one of the head writers), has stuff about this. By the time they were doing the movies Stewart & Spiner had a lot of power to veto ideas. It never got published but there's a pdf out there, I can email you a copy if you pm an email address.

In some ways it was bad to focus so much attention on Data in the movies but he was always one of the more interesting characters and so naturally was going to have the lion's share of attention in the movies. I don't think Crusher, Troi or Geordi would have sustained a massive film storyline although more attention on Riker and Work would have been nice.

Even though I quite like 3 of the 4 TNG films, there is always that slightly sad thought that for all of the potential of a TNG movie we got one amazing films, two good films and one stinker. With that cast and crew we should have been aiming for four great films.

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LyonJacques

LyonJacques

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The Cinema Museum in Kennington is screening the Star Trek movies in double bills with films starring the original cast - sunday was TMP with Shatner in The Intruder. Next up is KHAAAAAAAAAAN! (obv) with Nimoy's The Good Mother, then Search For Spock + Fear in the Night (DeForrest Kelley),Voyage Home with James Doohan in Pretty Maids All In A Row (apparently a Roddenberry script?) and so on:

http://www.cinemamuseum.org.uk/2013/star-trek-ii-the-wrath-of-khan-the-good-mother/

http://www.cinemamuseum.org.uk/2013/star-trek-iii-the-search-for-spock-fear-in-the-night/

http://www.cinemamuseum.org.uk/2013/star-trek-iv-the-voyage-home-pretty-maids-all-in-a-row/

http://www.cinemamuseum.org.uk/2013/star-trek-v-the-final-frontier-truck-turner/

http://www.cinemamuseum.org.uk/2013/star-trek-vi-the-undiscovered-country-return-from-the-river-kwai/

http://www.cinemamuseum.org.uk/2013/star-trek-generations-inalienable/

(due to popular demand they won't be bothering with the TNG oeuvre)

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The Bag

The Bag

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Is reading it going to make me dislike them?

I don't think so. It's worth a look just for the stuff near the start where he talks about writing for the series and Roddenberry's box - human socity has evolved beyond such petty things as jealousy, greed, and conflict, now write stories without these commonly used dramatic elements. The story of Insurrection's development is they started with a set release date then worked from there. Iirc it started as Heart of Darkness meets Star Trek with dodgy crap going on at the heart of Star Fleet/the Federation. Then over time it gets moulded into what we got by suggestions/interfearance from other producers, objections of this character wouldn't do this and star fleet command wouldn't do that, and the ever present time constraints.

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sprite

sprite

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Has anyone ever come across good deals for the TNG or Enterprise Blu rays? They're just a tad pricey for me. I got Best of Both Worlds and the trailers really made me want more, especially Enterprise surprisingly, the trailer really makes it look excellent and what I remember was good.

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Nick R

Nick R

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I watched a Trek movie yesterday! So I'll post this here rather than in the movie watchers blog thread:

Star Trek III: The Search for Spock

This was, I think, the first Star Trek movie I ever saw. I don't remember much of that viewing, except that the fact I hadn't seen Wrath of Khan meant that I didn't get much out of it.

Watching it now: it's okay, I suppose. The problem is that it's very much an in-between film. On the one hand we have the film's main goal, to resurrect Spock. As dramatic as the idea of resurrecting one of the world's most recognisable fictional characters sounds on paper, if you look at it another way, the ultimate aim of the movie is merely to return to the status quo: our familiar crew, reunited again. Put that way, it's really quite a mundane goal to base a movie around.

That wouldn't matter too much if there was another interesting storyline going on. But the Genesis Planet aspect of the plot is really just an epilogue to Wrath of Khan; the concept is not developed significantly enough to justify stretching it out and dedicating a whole second movie to it.

Like I said, "an in-between film" - one storyline is a continuation of something that didn't really need to be continued from the previous film; the other might seem extraordinary, but is a goal that just returns the series to the way it was before, rather than moves it forward.

Even the death of Kirk's son David happens in a rather un-dramatic fashion: wouldn't it have been more interesting if there was a more direct link between Kirk's efforts to resurrect Spock and the death of his son - the price he pays for the return of his friend?

David is a bland character, and he and the Vulcan Saavik get lots of screen time that would have been better dedicated to other things. For example, McCoy's conflicts with Spock were one of the fun things about the original TV series, but the idea of them occupying the same body is wasted in this film: we get a couple of minor jokes involving the doctor suddenly coming out with Spock-y logic, but that's about it.

It's far from being an annoyingly bad film. It passes the time pleasantly enough. There are things to enjoy: for one thing there's the novelty of seeing Christopher Lloyd in Klingon make-up (though he's not the most threatening baddie).

Kirk's trick with the self-destruction of the Enterprise is probably the best sequence in the film. (Having said that, it does rely on us accepting the idea that a spacecraft that size could be capably run by only a few crewmembers - which, incidentally, also happens to be one of the many suspensions of disbelief involved in watching this year's Star Trek Into Darkness...)

Fun Fact! Apparently, Frank Welker, animal voiceover god extraordinaire, contributed some screaming noises to this movie! Bit of trivia for you, there.

** 1/2

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Mr Ben

Mr Ben

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Kirk's trick with the self-destruction of the Enterprise is probably the best sequence in the film. (Having said that, it does rely on us accepting the idea that a spacecraft that size could be capably run by only a few crewmembers - which, incidentally, also happens to be one of the many suspensions of disbelief involved in watching this year's Star Trek Into Darkness...)

The thing there though is that Scotty specifically mentions he's rigged the Enterprise to run with a minimum of 2 people when Kirk and co. join him on the bridge before they steal the Enterprise.

Its the little things like proper plot exposition that's missing in the new films. That and a lot of other things.....

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Mogster

Mogster

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I absolutely love the first half or so of Star Trek III, basically everything up until just after the Enterprise goes boom. The whole stealing the Enterprise thing is great! It just falls a bit flat after that.

The film is peppered with some great little bits of dialogue though. Scotty's exchange with the Excelsior turbolift for instance. :)

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Mr Ben

Mr Ben

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I absolutely love the first half or so of Star Trek III, basically everything up until just after the Enterprise goes boom. The whole stealing the Enterprise thing is great! It just falls a bit flat after that.

The film is peppered with some great little bits of dialogue though. Scotty's exchange with the Excelsior turbolift for instance. :)

The Stealing the Enterprise score itself is great, especially the bit after Sulu says "We have cleared space doors".

I really wish Paramount would make a make a new Trek series based in the Prime timeline, preferably set a while after Voyager got home.

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McCoy

McCoy

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The Stealing the Enterprise score itself is great, especially the bit after Sulu says "We have cleared space doors".

I really wish Paramount would make a make a new Trek series based in the Prime timeline, preferably set a while after Voyager got home.

Whilst I doubt a new feature film in the Prime timeline will be forthcoming, I would like to see a few feature length TV specials using some of the characters from that period.

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Garwoofoo

Garwoofoo

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I've just finished working my way through season 2 of TNG. It's taken me much, much longer than I expected, mostly because sheer apathy overtook me halfway through and I took a long break from it.

Overall I thought, if anything, it was worse than season 1. There were a handful of excellent episodes (Elementary Dear Data, Measure of a Man, Q Who, A Matter of Honour) but generally it was just very dull. Season 1, for all its hammy acting and terrible planet scenes, at least had a certain wide-eyed charm about it all (and, even when terrible, was often hilariously so) whereas season 2 struggled to maintain my interest. Looking back over the list of episodes I can hardly remember a couple of them already. I'll be charitable and blame the writers' strike, which clearly hit this season hard, not just in the recycled script that opened the series and the clips show that finished it but obviously in the quality of some of the intervening stories too.

That said, there were definite plus points. The whole thing looked much slicker - the lighting was much better, the costumes had improved, Worf had a new forehead, etc etc - some of things weren't immediately noticeable but it all stood out a mile when watching some of the Blu-ray extras where clips from the first series looked really cheap in comparison. Riker's beard was awesome. And I liked the new characters a lot. Guinan provided some of the series' best moments, and I liked Dr Pulaski, who at least had personality. Shame she'll be replaced again with the utterly insipid Beverley Crusher at the start of the next series.

Anyway, best episode: Q Who. It was like it had been dropped in from another, better show. Suddenly there was pacing, tension and drama, and no easy resolution either. Loved this one. I also really liked Elementary Dear Data, but I'm already a sucker for the holodeck episodes. Worst episode has many contenders, and Shades of Grey is too easy a target, so for me it's probably The Dauphin, an excruciating Wesley episode with some of the most laughable (and least scary) monster designs I've ever seen. (Honorary mention, also, to The Child, in which Troi gets raped by an alien lifeform and no-one, including her, really minds).

I'm now really looking forward to series 3, which is apparently the point at which it all picks up. Right now it's almost there, but it can't quite hold onto the stuff that makes it good.

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