I geek out to much more than Japanese cartoons about giant robots from the 80s, but that's what provokes the most thought for me, so that's what this blog is named after.
I (re)watched Star Treks II, III and IV over this week. These three are my favorite ST movies. Partly that's because my father took me to all three in the theater (seeing a movie in the theater in the summer was BIIIG thing at my house) over the course of the 4 years it took for them to be released (summers of 82 and 84, and around Thanksgiving in 86). The original series wasn't on TV in my area at any regular time in that period, so this is really the first Star Trek I've known. Yep. For me, Kirk always had a son and Saavik was always a part of the crew.
Compared to the later films (V right on up to the JJ Abrams rebootacular) these three all hang together and seem to contain more of that original Star Trek feel. Granted, it seems to diminsh somewhat in III and IV, but it's still there. I'll try to define what I mean by that later on in this post. But, overall, the three movies tell one story, the main themes of which are aging, death, friendship, loyalty, revenge, and self-sacrifice.
As an adult, I enjoy the literary references (A Tale of Two Cities and Moby Dick) in Star Trek II. They give it a certain extra layering of depth--especially Ricardo Montalban's hammy over-under-acting. (I've never seen someone else's idea of restrained anger turn out to be "hiss out every syllable while visibly quiviering like you're about to explode." At least, no one else has ever been able to pull it off).
The Search for Spock is about as close to mythology as the series gets. By that I mean classical mythology, Greek tragedy. (Oh, I know about that original series episode with the Greek gods. That's not what I mean). David Marcus' hubris in trying to create life--and how it ends in his death. But it gives a chance for life for Spock, who sacrificed him in the last movie to save his ship and crew. So then certain of his shipmates sacrifice the ship for Spock's life.
It's all a cycle.
And then the one with the whales.
Honestly, I don't think it's all as terrible as it often gets made out to be (usually by people who write for Entertainment Weekly, not other Star Trek nerds). I miss James Horner's soundtrack, but that's a minor quibble. Unlike later attempts at Star Trek humor, the characters stay in character. This is almost a british comedy. People just trying to go about their daily life (in this case it happens to be trying to save the world) are stuck in an abusrd situation (well, the past of their own world) which is similar enough to their own time but just off enough to make everything doubly awkward.
Seriously, watch IV. Then watch V. (shudder). The humor in IV is intrinsic to the plot. It's funny because the plot-driven situation is funny. In V the humor is just sort of slathered on top of the plot. And there's not much plot. Or budget. So I guess they had to increase the joke-quotient.
Oddly enough, I think III had the most impact on later Star Trekses. For example, the Klingons. I remember reading an article (probably in EW) that called Kruge and his crew bumbling. Bumbling? Arrogant. Bloodthirsty. Pirates. But bumbling? Anyway. They're privateers--dirty, shaggy, in a patched-together ship. In an earlier version of the script (or at least a subplot that was dropped) their ship was a stolen Romulan prototype. So these weren't really intended to be archetypal military Klingons--they were freebooters.
And yet, in Star Trek: the Next Generation, that's what we get. These freebooters are now the template from which all Klingons derive. Personally, I kind of liked them as the Red China of the Star Trek universe in the original series. A whole lotta guys with substandard equipment, but a lot of pride and they would just pile on top of you until you lost or gave up, superior equipment and training be damned. Now? Good lord, I once took a history class that covered the Viking Age (Anglocentrically from around 700 to 1100, but anyway) and we had to do individual research projects and present them to the class. One student's project was to convince us that the Klingons were like the Vikings. His presentation consisted of watching clips of his favorite Star Trek TNG and DS9 episodes.
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