Still, Star Trek II was at least produced by a guy who sat down and watched every episode and was very concerned with the fanbase. There was an emphasis on character and was in the space opera vein of the original series. It wasn’t trying to be a blockbuster. Just the opposite, it was a modestly budgeted film that just wanted to be an entertaining story. New York critics of the day actually called it “an overblown TV show.” So it wasn’t a Big Summer Tentpole Blockbuster. It made less money than the first but made a larger profit (or so it’s been said) and was a critical improvement over the first.
Agreed, but I still think the film was chock full of drama and high stakes as well as the action and excellent character work. Once the end credits roll I still feel as pumped as I would if I'd just watched one of the reboots. Maybe it's because I saw it twice on the big screen in 1982 and it blew me away. And yes it was more profitable (probably the most profitable of the lot) due to it's 12m budget compared to TMP's then massive 46m.
Arguably, the second, third and fourth films were the most successful critically as well as in how they captured the essence of the series without bending the format to appeal to the normal or having to shoehorn studio mandates. It was “Star Trek before it became a franchise.”
Thinking about it, there hadn't really been that many sequels released by 1982 - Superman 2, Empire, Godfather, Rocky, I'm struggling to name many more.
Star Trek doesn’t require blistering action and lots of yuks to be good. Look at the best of Star Trek: how much action was in City on the Edge of Forever? Did Mirror, Mirror require 51 minutes of space battles? At the same time, The Doomsday Machine and Balance of Terror aren’t great episodes because of the combat. They’re exceptionally well written character pieces with a semi-subtle commentary. There needs to be content, not simply pyrotechnics. Something has to separate Trek from Wars other than "the guy with the ears" or whatever.
You'll get no argument from me there, my point is that an extended version of the TV show doesn't cut the mustard IMO. I want to see something with a bigger scope if I'm paying over £10 to see it at the cinema. I want more of an event. Insurrection wasn't even as much as an event as half the series it was based on.
Even The Wrath of Khan wasn’t an “action movie” per se. It was a movie with action sequences – and not even that many. After the simulation, the first ship confrontation 45 minutes in, then the climax – much of which was a “seek and destroy” submarine type sequence. Star Trek's 2 and 4 were repeatedly used as templates for box office success, but the studio kept looking at the wrong things. It wasn't simply the battles, the laughs, the time travel and Khan like villain that made these films work. Without good writing, content and character, that's just bullshit.
The wrath of khan was lightning in a bottle as far as Star Trek was concerned. To me it has it all. Action, drama, suspense, great villain, brilliant character arc for Kirk (and Shatner's best performance in the role IMO), superb score, heartbreaking and ultimately uplifting ending, great visuals for the day, the list goes on. It's also accessible to non fans - it was my wife's first ever piece of Star Trek she ever watched and she enjoyed it, and she generally
hates stuff like this. My 5 year old daughter loves it more than the rest too. None of this is a coincidence.
It's no great surprise they keep trying to capture it.
