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So who did the worst single acting job in the first 10 films.

Unfortunately, when I first saw this thread, the first person who came to mind was Shatner himself in TFF. He obviously has trouble directing himself, as evidenced by his over-the-top performance. Just check out his scene in the brig with Spock and McCoy - he's so hyperactive it's absolutely hilarious.

It's asinine to say that's the WORST acting performance in the first 10 movies.
 
I don't think it's the worst performance either, but I already gave my pick earlier in the thread: Caithlin Dar.
 
The life-size stand up cut out of Admiral Kirk, as "he" and Scotty were in the Pod, docking with the refit Enterprise at the beginning of TMC. His performance in that short scene is flat and wooden. :guffaw:
 
The life-size stand up cut out of Admiral Kirk, as "he" and Scotty were in the Pod, docking with the refit Enterprise at the beginning of TMC. His performance in that short scene is flat and wooden. :guffaw:

thumb_dwight-schrute-meme-generator-well-played-good-sir-well-played-4bf2d8.jpg
 
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Shatner may not have been uniformly awful in TFF, but that one scene in the brig was enough to warrant a mention in this thread. Even at his best he tends to overdo it, so I can only imagine how exhausting it must have been for Nicholas Meyer to rein him in.
 
The life-size stand up cut out of Admiral Kirk, as "he" and Scotty were in the Pod, docking with the refit Enterprise at the beginning of TMP. His performance in that short scene is flat and wooden.
Bizarrely, for all the CG tomfoolery of the Director's Edition, they left that scene untouched. :(
 
There's nothing wrong with that shot. Yes, the fact that they're projected is obvious when you look, but it was a very clever solution to something which was not easy to do in 1979.
 
I thought Kirstie Alley was awful as Saavik. I don't know if it was just the way they wrote her character, but she didn't seem very Vulcan to me with her constant displays of emotion.
 
That certainly alleviates my nerd rage. I kept thinking, "DID ANYONE ELSE NOTICE THIS? WTF IS GOING ON?" Was it mentioned at all in the movie or was this from somewhere else? Just curious if I missed it.
 
Half Romulan or not, I loved that Saavik was more emotional than your average Vulcan. It actually seems like something that would naturally happen to a Vulcan in Starfleet, constantly being surrounded by humans and other emotional species.
 
^^Dialogue regarding her heritage was filmed as part of the conversation between Kirk and Spock in the corridor outside the Enterprise simulator but was ultimately dropped from the final film.

For TSFS, Nimoy dropped the Romulan angle and told Curtis to play Saavik as fully Vulcan.

--Sran
 
Caithlin Dar was fine with me and the least of TFF's problems, really. I got the impression that she used her beauty and feminine wiles to get as far in Romulan politics as she could, but her foolish optomism put her government off, so they were glad to send her off to some loser posting like Paradise City to spin her wheels, knowing she'd go willingly, happily. She got more than she bargained for, that's for sure - a trip to the center of the galaxy and David Warner for a boyfriend. It's too bad, though, that we never got to see what her Secret Pain was - as bubbly as she is and everything ...

Ok,this threw me for loop. I have never seen such a compassionate perspective on this character. I confess that I dismissed this character as a bad read from a beautiful actress in a crappy movie. It never occurred to me to look at it from this perspective. Thank you for shedding light on a different pov.
 
The failed Planet of Galactic Peace would certainly have been a dumping ground for diplomatic embarrassments. Imagine what kind of Klingon would get sent to a place with that name!
 
The failed Planet of Galactic Peace would certainly have been a dumping ground for diplomatic embarrassments. Imagine what kind of Klingon would get sent to a place with that name!

``We send Koord out to the middle of the Mallak'tin Crisis and the fool tromps right into a tinderbox that's been readying for war for a generation and inside of 36 hours pacifies the whole quadrant! There were faction leaders openly hugging their rivals! Where can we dump him?''
 
Half Romulan or not, I loved that Saavik was more emotional than your average Vulcan. It actually seems like something that would naturally happen to a Vulcan in Starfleet, constantly being surrounded by humans and other emotional species.

It does seem a natural thing to happen, but from what I understand, it's not that Vulcans have no emotions; it's that they have to suppress them for the sake of themselves and everyone else. From what I recall, the Vulcans before they suppressed their emotions were more like earlier humans - brutish, prone to making important decisions based on feelings, etc. It's certainly possible that they could reconcile those emotions with the logic they've mostly mastered today, but it can get iffy as we see with T'pol in ST:ENT. I also think Vulcans are used to give that "purely logical" viewpoint often to counter how we humans have a tendency to fly off the handle. It's not always the right viewpoint or the one that works out best but it's nice to have that different perspective.

^^Dialogue regarding her heritage was filmed as part of the conversation between Kirk and Spock in the corridor outside the Enterprise simulator but was ultimately dropped from the final film.

For TSFS, Nimoy dropped the Romulan angle and told Curtis to play Saavik as fully Vulcan.

--Sran

That makes sense. I'd originally thought that Robin Curtis was simply hired to portray a more realistic Vulcan. Thanks for the clarification.
 
I thought Kirstie Alley was awful as Saavik. I don't know if it was just the way they wrote her character, but she didn't seem very Vulcan to me with her constant displays of emotion.

There was the Romulan thing, also if I remember reading the novels from 25 years ago she and David got romantically involved.

I don't see where she was overly emotional and not Vulcan like at all. Yes she had moments where she displayed subtle emotions, but to me that was part of her character development. She was young and was now experiencing new and stressful real world situations for the first time and she would occasionally let her feelings show a bit.

And even though Vulcans chose a path of logic they weren't machines that were incapable of showing emotions at all. Spock was much more emotional in early episodes until his character smoothed out. Even then he displayed emotion like when he realized Kirk was alive after the Pon Farr fight, or when he saw Surak (and Surak picked up on it). He also was more emotional the older he got.

Even Sarek, mr. logic himself, got visibly irritated in TSFS when he confronted Kirk in his home about leaving Spock and later said he wasn't always logical about his son.

Jeez NuSpock is always getting pissed off and resorts to beating people up in fits of rage.......And Savvik isn't Vulcan like because she mutters "damn" or tears up a little at Spock's funeral?
 
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