The Final Frontier - the best of the series?
- Thread starter Ken Dodd
- Start date
Many media outlets will say, in retrospect, that Summer of 89 was one of the best, if not THE best, blockbuster summers.
It must be a matter of tastes associated with Trek. I too find TUC to be flawed and difficult to slog though. Not a bad movie, but I don't appreciate it nearly as much as general fandom seems to.
It's the movie Trekkies love to hate, because they focus way to hard on the weird or bad things. And there are weird and bad things in this movie, no doubt.
However..... There is so much gold in this one as well. Scotty's snarkie log, the campfire season, the not-hug, the emotional exploration of our Holy Trinity. Some pretty good effects. A beautiful score.
To me, it's NOT the best Trek movie. Not by a long shot. However, my favorite would either be TMP or TUC, movies also hated by conventional Trekkies. So I understand how people who claim TFF as their favorite might feel.
However..... There is so much gold in this one as well. Scotty's snarkie log, the campfire season, the not-hug, the emotional exploration of our Holy Trinity. Some pretty good effects. A beautiful score.
To me, it's NOT the best Trek movie. Not by a long shot. However, my favorite would either be TMP or TUC, movies also hated by conventional Trekkies. So I understand how people who claim TFF as their favorite might feel.
It's the movie Trekkies love to hate, because they focus way to hard on the weird or bad things. And there are weird and bad things in this movie, no doubt.
However..... There is so much gold in this one as well. Scotty's snarkie log, the campfire season, the not-hug, the emotional exploration of our Holy Trinity. Some pretty good effects. A beautiful score.
To me, it's NOT the best Trek movie. Not by a long shot. However, my favorite would either be TMP or TUC, movies also hated by conventional Trekkies. So I understand how people who claim TFF as their favorite might feel.
'Some pretty good effects' - where?
I really liked it, but it did have some problems. Obviously, the special effects were terrible. So there's not much to talk about there.
The problem I think hurt it the most was the imposing of unnecessary humor that didn't flow naturally from the characters and situations. I think the success of Star Trek IV was largely to blame for this. TVH was so successful and picked up a much wider audience than just Trek fans. TPTB wanted to hold onto that audience. They figured there were two things that distinguished Trek 4 from the others: Time travel into a contemporary setting, and lots of humor. They probably figured they couldn't do another trip into the 20th Century, so they insisted on making it funny. Or at least, trying. Unlike the previous film, where the humor was fairly organic, stemming largely from the crew being in the past and creating a "fish out of water" situation, The Final Frontier's humor was largely one liners. ("Spock, are you one with the horse?" "I've always wanted to play to a captive audience," "Mind if we drop in for dinner?" "Please, Captain. Not in front of the Klingons.") The humor was forced. It just didn't fit in naturally.
In my opinion, that really hurt the integrity of the film.
On the other hand, it had some of the best character moments in all of Trek filmdom, such as the "brainwashing" scene with Sybok. Even the campfire scene hit home.
The problem I think hurt it the most was the imposing of unnecessary humor that didn't flow naturally from the characters and situations. I think the success of Star Trek IV was largely to blame for this. TVH was so successful and picked up a much wider audience than just Trek fans. TPTB wanted to hold onto that audience. They figured there were two things that distinguished Trek 4 from the others: Time travel into a contemporary setting, and lots of humor. They probably figured they couldn't do another trip into the 20th Century, so they insisted on making it funny. Or at least, trying. Unlike the previous film, where the humor was fairly organic, stemming largely from the crew being in the past and creating a "fish out of water" situation, The Final Frontier's humor was largely one liners. ("Spock, are you one with the horse?" "I've always wanted to play to a captive audience," "Mind if we drop in for dinner?" "Please, Captain. Not in front of the Klingons.") The humor was forced. It just didn't fit in naturally.
In my opinion, that really hurt the integrity of the film.
On the other hand, it had some of the best character moments in all of Trek filmdom, such as the "brainwashing" scene with Sybok. Even the campfire scene hit home.
Its one of the weaker Trek films, but its bad in the same sense the lousy TOS episodes are; you can find fun in the dubious aspects. TMP can be really tedious, Generations frustrating, Insurrection obnoxious, Nemesis poorly conceived, and Into Darkness a bit hollow.
Final Frontier though, is a harmless and silly movie overall. Easily ignored if you don't like it, and easily riff-able if you do watch it. I personally find a lot of humor in it, its just happens to come from the blatant ego stroke of Shatner's character and the over the top depiction of Starfleet's incompetence rather than any of the one liners.
Final Frontier though, is a harmless and silly movie overall. Easily ignored if you don't like it, and easily riff-able if you do watch it. I personally find a lot of humor in it, its just happens to come from the blatant ego stroke of Shatner's character and the over the top depiction of Starfleet's incompetence rather than any of the one liners.
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Yep, I love Final Frontier and don't quite understand the hate. I basically enjoy all aspects of it - plot, message, humour, soundtrack, memorable scenes - though I am not a massive fan of Sybok being Spock's brother but, yeah, I find it a lot of fun. Plus there are some great serious scenes as well as funny ones.
I like some of the production design sets in TFF :
- 1701-A Shuttlecrafts
- 1701-A Hangar deck set with the two Shuttlecrafts
- 1701-A Bridge
Okay, I liked the Shuttles, but I hated the hangar deck unless you want to say that behind that (retractible) wall is the cargo deck we see in TMP.
The bridge was okay, but at the time (and still) I would have preferred they used what was shown in TVH. I'm partial to that overall bridge design.
I haven't seen it since my first viewing on opening day, so perhaps I need to revisit it to see if my opinion changes any.
The bridge was okay, but at the time (and still) I would have preferred they used what was shown in TVH. I'm partial to that overall bridge design.
I haven't seen it since my first viewing on opening day, so perhaps I need to revisit it to see if my opinion changes any.
Agree, I would have liked it if behind those two doors they had shown us the cargo deck seen in TMP 1701-Refit too.
Agree, I loved TMP/WOK/SFS Bridge redress done briefly for TVH. That would have been a great bridge.
It's a good film that with a bigger budget and some editing and script changes could have been great. I don't think all the comedy lands and I think reusing the same arc for Spock from 4 was a mistake. I liked Sybok and it was neat when he showed up in "Tears of Eridanus". There's a lot of great ideas like Paradise City being such a shithole, old washed-up general Korrd (also in "Tears of Eridanus" and "Sarek"), young warrior Klaa, a hostage situation, stealing the enterprise, a Vulcan with emotions. The execution may be off but I like these additions to the universe and more down-to-earth feeling of it. The campfire scene and Bones and his father scene are among my favourites in all Trek.
I actually was capitivated enough to sit through FF, unlike TMP where I fell asleep during the endless V'ger flyover.
I never could understand all the negativity. Is it great? Certainly not, but people behave as if it's the "Jump the shark" moment in the film franchise, but I felt it was actually just a continuation after the real jump the shark moment that was The Voyage Home, which isn't all that bad either, but did reduce the franchise to being a parody of itself. Kind of hard for anyone to pick up the pieces & move forward, after a gag reel movie like that
For me, TFF is better than TUC. And I have difficulty writing that. The score was beautiful. The scenes between the big 3 were good. However, I there are some really bad things: vfx, shatner's ego, the buffoonery of the rest of the crew, deck 78. I also didn't care for "Maybe God's not out there, Bones. Maybe he's right here. In the human heart." Um..it's the 23rd century, the UFP has 150 members in it. He goes with "human" heart? That bothers me for some reason. However, I don't see all of the glory that TUC gets. Spock's mind rape of Valeris. The goofy interrogation scene in Dax's quarters where everybody is standing around (Doesn't anyone in that room know that Dax's species has big feet and wouldn't wear those boots?), phasers in the galley. Those things make me like TFF a little bit more.
I have to admit that I would have liked Kirk to have said (in GEN) to Picard, "I always thought I'd die alone. But, I'm glad I didn't." For me it would have given some level (albeit small) of credibility to the events of TFF.
I have to admit that I would have liked Kirk to have said (in GEN) to Picard, "I always thought I'd die alone. But, I'm glad I didn't." For me it would have given some level (albeit small) of credibility to the events of TFF.
I thought the iconic shot of the Enterprise over Sha Ka Ree as the shaft of light shoots up was pretty freaking cool too.
