ST TNG S6E12: Ship in a Bottle

Rather good holodeck episode, where Moriarty has become sentient and believes he can get out of the holodeck.... Strong episode, with Moriarty being a well-rounded character, only doing wrong when it is to serve his purpose of escape, but all is not what it seems, and the inception-style holodecking written in a clear and clever way makes it a very watchable, intriguing episode.


7.5/10

Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home

With my CBS All Access subscription running out in a few days, I decided to do a watch of Star Trek IV, which is one of the few remaining movies that I have not seen in recent memory. I thought I was burned out from Star Trek after episode after episode of mediocrity from Discovery and Picard, but this movie reminded me of why I love Star Trek. The series is by default a space opera, but it can often be so much more: drama, action, comedy, mystery, almost anything. This movie is essentially a fish out of water comedy.

The philosophy of the movie is refreshing: "No dying, no fighting, no shooting, no photon torpedoes, no phaser blasts, no stereotypical bad guy." It's about a probe from outer space that attempts to communicate with Earth but ends up almost destroying it instead. It's basically the same plot as The Motion Picture, but they got it right this time.

The chemistry between the cast is great and this is the most ensemble performance we get out of them in a series where the roles of half the cast are usually little more than cameo appearances. Especially Spock and McCoy. It really feels like they captured the feeling of the TV show here. It's such a fun movie. The shot of them swimming in the ocean together with the whales put a smile on my face. And it has Roddenberrian themes like communication and humanity that great Trek needs to have.

5 out of 5

ST TNG S6E13: Aquiel

A silly episode that doesn't really work on any level. Geordi is back to his slightly sex pest ways a little, and the woman he fixates on isn't very likeable, and comes across a bit creepy in places... there's no chemistry between them. The plot snakes unconvincingly and unengagingly, and it just doesn't work that well.

Even at the end, she feels like a bit of a con artist, even though the plot indicates she isn't.

2/10

ST TNG S6E14: Face of the Enemy

A reasonable episode with Troi waking up to find herself a plant on a Romulan ship, and having to act all Romulan-y. Marina Sirtis doesn't really pull it off, he's not great at forceful, but it's interesting, though sometimes a little confusing.

5/10

i remember seeing a doc that talked about they intended on giving him a love interest but never told anyone when she was first introduced what long term vision was so they acted like they were only friends and then writers decided it was too late to undo the friendzone and just went with it

Poor Geordi only seemed to get episodes about him trying (and failing) to get laid. He did have that one good one where the Romulans mind controlled him. And the one where the Romulans made him invisible with Ro.

The Troi episode where she turned into a Romulan was one of her best, if not her best episode. Usually she just gets mind controlled or mind raped or whatever. I love Marina Sirtis but Troi was a pretty bad character. They did make her better in the last few seasons though when she started acting more like Marina Sirtis. Kind of like how Riker got better when he started acting more like Jonathan Frakes.

ST TNG S6E15: Tapestry

I enjoyed this one a lot. I do like Q, and they use Q really well here, cutting down the camp, and have him has a malignant version of Clarence for this 'It's a Wonderful Life' story for Picard.... seeing the consequences of his life when he changes his younger self's behaviour.

It's really about how the passion of youth shapes the older self, and how important it is for everyone to evolve and not try and force themselves to change before time, I think.

Very, very good, and written well.

8/10

There was a season 2 episode where Picard and Wesley are in a shuttle and he tells him the story about his heart. IIRC they kept all of the details in this episode. I like when continuity holds.

Penny for your thoughts...

Flowers! Is there a John Luck Pickard here?

"Penny for your thoughts", hah!

My ranking of the Star Trek movies:

The "good" tier:

1) Wrath of Khan
2) Voyage Home
3) First Contact
4) Undiscovered Country
5) Star Trek

The "flawed" tier:

6) Search for Spock
7) Generations
8) Final Frontier
9) Beyond

The "bad" tier:

10) Motion Picture
11) Insurrection
12) Nemesis
13) Into Darkness

The good tier movies are completely solid with great story, characters, themes, music, etc. that I would go out of my way to watch. The flawed ones are a mixed bag with some good stuff but also problems. If these happen to be on and I had nothing better to do, I would watch them. The bad ones have few redeeming qualities and I would actively avoid watching these.

The only one I haven't seen in recent memory is Final Frontier, but I have some good memories of it so I put it in the mixed tier. When I was deciding the rankings, I asked myself "would I prefer to watch X movie or Y movie?" and placed them accordingly. Ranks 7-9 could change as they're all nebulously kind of mediocre with some bright spots. The other tough one was Undiscovered Country vs First Contact, but for now First Contact edged it out. There is an argument that Star Trek should be in the mixed tier since it's basically Star Wars in a Star Trek skin but it's a very fun movie regardless of its somewhat impure status as Star Trek.

5 out of 13 good ones for such a notoriously difficult series to do in big budget form is not bad at all.

Interesting. I would only have TWOK, TVH and TUC as top tier Star Trek. All of these really nail it, and have few/no flaws. The Voyage Home in particular is such an ambitious movie - I can't imagine they would ever make this movie nowadays, or at least be able to do it so well. It's a shame the Eddie Murphy role fell through!

In my view, Beyond is the best of the new Trek. In this movie, they do a similar thing to TVH and split the characters up to help with their development. It's got a good story, and some great visuals. I'd have liked more development of the villain to flesh the movie out, and the finale is a bit flat, but its the closest movie to classic Star Trek. It's flawed, but I at least appreciate what they tried to do after "Into Darkness".

The Motion Picture is also a much better move than is usually acknowledged. It's often called boring, but in reality it just spends a lot of time on the characters. I really appreciate the details in this movie, for example Spock not achieving kolinahr and re-joining Star Fleet. Indeed, Spock and Kirk have great arcs in this movie, and Shatner is terrific.

Oh, and Final Frontier is also pretty bad - it's in my virtually unwatchable category.

I agree TMP is better than most people remember it.


And I'd definitely have First Contact as top tier.

I find Final Frontier charming but very goofy. But not just straight bad.

Otherwise solid listing

I also think there needs to be more props for Christopher Lloyd basically nailing the nature of the Klingons so well in SFS, that's how everyone thinks of Klingons going forward.

I may rewatch TMP. My dislike for it stems from my first impression that it was too derivative of "The Changeling" (s2e3).

I've grown to like SFS more after a couple of re-watches.

Wrath of Khan still #1, of course.

I put First Contact #3. The Patrick Stewart/Alfre Woodard scenes alone elevate it to top tier status.

Yeah, I like Search for Spock. It's a good companion to TROK, and there is a greater emphasis of developing the supporting characters. For example, Sulu's character arc towards captain of the Excelsior effectively starts in SFS.

It is probably a movie for the ST fans, but if you are a fan, there is plenty to enjoy.

The main problem with Search for Spock was it felt more like Star Trek 2.5 than Star Trek 3. This makes 2 movies in a row where Kirk is facing off against a villain who wants Genesis. Robin Curtis wasn't that great as Saavik. But unlike the first two movies where the rest of the crew were little more than cameos, they all had parts to play in this one. The destruction of the Enterprise and David's death were great scenes. And the Vulcan stuff at the end was cool.

TMP is straight up a bad movie. The concept is cool. And the resdesign of the Enterprise is the best looking ship in the whole franchise. I've never seen The Changeling but I enjoy stories that aren't the typical "baddie seeking revenge" plots. The first 15 minutes are good with the Klingon scene and the Kohlinar scene. The problem is the rest of the script is terrible. The acting is terrible. The pacing is terrible. There is no chemistry between any of the actors. The movie is boring. Robert Wise was a bad choice for director. Half the movie is "shot of special effects->cut to reaction shot of the crew looking on in wonder->cut back to special effects->cut back to crew looking in wonder" Zzzzzz.

And Sulu was supposed to be the captain of Excelsior after Star Trek II. There was a cut bit of dialogue:



George Takei had blamed Shatner for purposefully flubbing his dialogue so they couldn't get a usable take, but as you can see, the audio is fine and it was an editorial decision by Nick Meyer or perhaps the editor.

NCC-1701-E > NCC-1701-D > NCC-1701-C >>>NCC-1701 (no letters!) >>>>>>>> everyone else.

I'd disagree with some of your TMP points. Shatner gives a great performance. Shatner is really a much better actor than he is given credit for, and he really nails the serious stuff here. I don't remember too much about the other performances, so you may have a point about them. On your other points, the script is okay for a TV show, but it's not suitable for a movie. pacing is terrible, and they do spend far too much time wanking over their own special effects (which are mostly terrific, and are re-used in other movies and in TNG).

Thanks for sharing the Sulu scene - i never knew that. I suspect it was cut very late on. In Nimoy's autobiography, he talks very much about TWOK just being a one off with no planned sequel. However, towards the end of filming the movie everyone realised they were onto a good thing, so they started planting seeds for a follow up. For example, the "remember" scene before Spock's death was something Nimoy came up with after a discussion with Nick Meyer late on in filming. So the Sulu scene would have been removed so he could be in the next one, but was originally inserted as the film was supposed to be a send off.

On the final point, George Takei is great value on social media, but comes across as a bitter old bastard when it comes to Shatner.

It's interesting that The Voyage Home repeated the two main arcs in TMP: A probe returns to earth to try to communicate with people (or lifeforms) that aren't around anymore, and Spock learns the value of emotion.

TMP, like Final Frontier seems to have been soft retconned out of the franchise. There aren't really any mentions or follow ups of it in later Trek and they're both fairly self contained stories that don't connect to any other parts of the franchise.

I wonder if Nimoy considered his character arc in TMP when doing Spock after that. I guess he only had 1 chance, in Wrath of Khan. They made him a blank slate when he came back in Search for Spock and then as I already said, they repeated that character arc in The Voyage Home. Then I guess the question is, did he consider that character arc when doing Spock after Voyage Home? His opportunities were: Final Frontier, Undiscovered Country, Unification and Star Trek 2009 / Into Darkness.

ST TNG S6E16+17: Birthright (1+2)

Solid first episode, where Worf investigates the possibility his father was taken as a prisoner of war (a source of familial dishonour and shame) and is still alive, whilst Data suddenly starts 'dreaming' after a power surge renders him temporarily immobile. He encounters his creator, his 'father', in these dreams, and then starts to paint as a possible way to access something in these memories.

Oh, and they are docked at Deep Space 9.

So this is about fathers and family, and how your father shapes you, to some degree. Both threads were very absorbing, but the second episode completely jettisons the Data plot (which I was keen to see more of, as it was about Data reaching a certain level of sentience, but instead of seemingly reaching that level, he had accidentally triggered these implanted memories - shades of Blade Runner here....) and concentrates on Worf being trapped with PoW Klingons, who had raised another generation who were unaware of their birthright. And whilst I did like that arc and story, I did miss the Data thread.

Good pair of episodes though.

7/10

I rewatched search for Spock recently and really enjoyed it, although bones Spock impression got old REAL quick

1. Wrath of Khan - one of my all time favorite films on top of my favorite Star Trek film
2. The motion picture - I like this a lot more than most, I agree with red letter media that this is the closest film to get the feel from the original series. I thought the voyage reveal was a cool concept.
3. Search for Spock - felt like this was a well paced Star Trek adventure after my recent rewatch. Story is mostly nonsense (even more so than usual)
4. Undiscovered country - I really like this one as well, although the first half is a little stronger than the middle parts (the asteroid mine part was kind of lame) good ending
5. Voyage Home - also enjoyable film, although on a recent rewatch the “we are from the future” jokes felt a little stale after a while.

Those are all really close together for me, and I have moved them around a bit over the years and rewatches (search for Spock might have been in fifth a couple years ago)

6. Star Trek 2009 the reboot - I liked the reboot quite a bit. Not without problems but overall an entertaining and engaging reboot (story makes no sense but most of these movies don’t)
7. Into Darkness - I liked this movie more than a lot of people but it definitely has some problems. I liked it well enough .
8. Star Trek Beyond - this was ok too, might have gone ahead of into darkness but I didn’t care for the villain, idris Elba wasted in some weird revenge plot (all three reboot movies have revenge based plots, biggest complaint for me)
9. First Contact - TNG cracks the list, I don’t care for the tng films but if I had to pick one first contact is alright, it’s got some good action and a decent plot. Nonsense time travel story, I would have just made this film a sequel to best of both worlds and have them fight the borg without going back to 2070s
10. Nemesis - this is a dreary film that feels more like a horror movie. Some decent action pulls it ahead of the rest of the list.
11. Insurrection - this one and nemesis are pretty close, at least this one has some upbeat parts instead of the dreariness of nemesis. Kind of a boring plot with throwaway characters
12. Generations - this movie flat out stinks if you ask me. The plot makes no sense and it’s boring. They bring back kirk to get into a fist fight with Alex from clockwork orange? It’s definitely not dead last tho that honor goes to
13. The final frontier - holy Moses this movie is terrible. I rewatched it recently and I was honestly shocked at the sheer terribleness one hour in and they’re still on Nimbus III! Then the plot finally starts and they end up fighting dollar store god and goodwill Klingon Captain. The sets look cheap the costumes look cheap the plot is horribly boring. I’m shocked they made another one after this it’s so bad

recently discovered these and love them

don't know why they do this in the thumbnail though

Yeah, I love the pitch meetings, too. Some of them are really epic. And I don't get the big-eye thing in all of the thumbnails either. In fact, I find it really off-putting and disturbing.

This was funny thanks for posting 😆

Youtube 101: Give your video a catchy thumbnail to attract clicks.

My biggest gripe with Beyond was the lame villain and how repetitive the whole "revenge seeking baddie" trope has gotten with those films. Until watching that pitch meeting I didn't realize that all 3 "revenge seeking baddies" in the new movies are also from different time periods.

I also like the episodic stories at the beginning of most of these movies better than the actual movies. In Insurrection, they're doing some diplomatic stuff. In Nemesis, they are at the Riker/Troi wedding. In Into Darkness, they're saving those natives from the volcano. In Beyond, they're giving that gizmo to those tiny aliens.