The Final Frontier vs. Star Trek XI

[CaptainStoner]

In many respects the films are like the episodes, and the reactions to the films are like those to favorite episodes: in other words, you have your TWOK people, and your TVH people, and all shades in between.
If we think of how utterly silly TOS often was, TFF is darkly serious by comparison. TOS and TNG were full of silly humor, but when it makes its way into one of the films, some can't stand it any more than Worf in a mud bath with Lwaxana. Which was hilarious, btw.

 

[GhostFaceSaint]

In many respects the films are like the episodes, and the reactions to the films are like those to favorite episodes: in other words, you have your TWOK people, and your TVH people, and all shades in between.
If we think of how utterly silly TOS often was, TFF is darkly serious by comparison. TOS and TNG were full of silly humor, but when it makes its way into one of the films, some can't stand it any more than Worf in a mud bath with Lwaxana. Which was hilarious, btw.

Surreal would probably be more accurate!

 

[DevilEyes]

In many respects the films are like the episodes, and the reactions to the films are like those to favorite episodes: in other words, you have your TWOK people, and your TVH people, and all shades in between.
If we think of how utterly silly TOS often was, TFF is darkly serious by comparison. TOS and TNG were full of silly humor, but when it makes its way into one of the films, some can't stand it any more than Worf in a mud bath with Lwaxana. Which was hilarious, btw.

Imagine if a DS9 movie was finally made and it looked like an average Ferengi episode. Somehow I don't think that would go down well.

 

[Amaris]

In many respects the films are like the episodes, and the reactions to the films are like those to favorite episodes: in other words, you have your TWOK people, and your TVH people, and all shades in between.
If we think of how utterly silly TOS often was, TFF is darkly serious by comparison. TOS and TNG were full of silly humor, but when it makes its way into one of the films, some can't stand it any more than Worf in a mud bath with Lwaxana. Which was hilarious, btw.

Imagine if a DS9 movie was finally made and it looked like an average Ferengi episode. Somehow I don't think that would go down well.

Niner here, and I loved the Ferengi episodes.

J.

 

[trevanian]

DS9 is the only Trek series I like (or own any of) besides TOS, but even so, I'd forego most Ferengi shows, some of the Klingocentric ones and just about everything trill- and changeling-related in an instant, if it meant getting another Maquis episode.

In fact, even though the war years were mostly excellent, I'd forego the dominion war altogether to get DS9's 'tudes and characters focusing on Maquis-oriented issues, which could have involved s31 and Garak just as much as the series wound up doing.

 

[CoveTom]

It's nice to once again see the membership here rehashing all the same old arguments about TFF and STXI.

About the only thing I've seen here that I care to respond to, because I don't think it's been beaten to death, is the issue of Shatner's direction. He gets saddled with all the blame for TFF's problems. And, of course, you have to expect that when you're the director. But I still think it's a bit unfair.

Many of the key problems with the film were totally out of his control. To wit:

- From the very beginning, both the producer and the studio refused to allow him to tell the story he wanted to tell. They insisted on watering it down and going in a much more standard direction. Strike one.

- They insisted that he shoehorn lots of humor into what was supposed to be a serious, dramatic story, following the standard Hollywood mentality of "well, IV was funny, so that must be the key to Star Trek's success." Strike two.

- All of the good visual effects houses were too busy to take on the project. People other than Shatner, most notably Ralph Winter (who admits so on the DVD), said Ferren could handle it. He couldn't. Strike three.

- The entire climax of the film was botched because the people building the rockmen costumes and effects couldn't pull them off and didn't bother to admit that to their director until the day they were supposed to shoot those scenes. Strike four.

- Unions were on strike at the time of the filming, meaning that all the well-trained, experienced people were not only unavailable, but dedicated to causing problems for their replacements. Strike five.

- Paramount was unwilling to cooperate in allowing any reshoots, new effects, or anything else, even after seeing the mess that was a major summer film release in a tentpole franchise. Strike six.

Given all of this, I think it is amazing what Shatner actually managed to pull of. Despite all those problems, the film actually manages to have alot of heart, get the three main characters right moreso than any other film, and is to me the only film in the series -- Robert Wise's TMP not withstanding -- to feel like it was shot like a film and not a big TV episode. Plus, the production design is beautiful, the cinematography is gorgeous, and the score is fantastic.

Shatner may not be the best director in the world, but I think he did a fine job with what he was given, and is not to blame for much of the film's problems.

 

[JarodRussell]

Is The Final Frontier, or any DS9 Ferengi episode really worse than this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhQA-06kSLU


Really?

 

[Anticitizen]

Whenever I see someone criticize The Final Frontier, I have to wonder if they ever watched TOS.

Bad special effects? I must be blind to them; I was raised watching TOS, in which fuzzily-filmed and poorly-detailed models subjected to camera-flash-effects served as a stand-in for a scene depicting a ship under fire.

Secondary characters having comedic roles? Let's take off the rose-tinted glasses of history for a moment: in TOS, these characters had no roles. Our beloved Uhura, Sulu, Chekov? They probably had less lines in every scene in every episode - combined - than Shatner, Nimoy, or Kelley in one typical episode. Seriously. Scotty ekes out just enough of a contribution to cement himself as a possible Number Four to the Big Three. Those complaining that Scotty's head-banging on the pylon cheapened his character forgot about his use of Klingon nerve toxin as an 'afternoon beverage', and those bemoaning Uhura's 'seductive sequence' in TFF have forgotten about her submissive 'captain-i'm-frightened' helplessness in TOS.

The Final Frontier is a fantastic movie. It is the only Star Trek film besides TMP to break the movie-mold of Battle Trek, which is how I describe what Trek has become - a series of films about Space Bad Guys and the Heroes that Blow Them Up.

These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise... to seek out strange new worlds, and new civilizations... and blow them out of the stars...

 

[Penhall99]

This isn't a fair comparison, because Trek V had to deal with budget cuts, writer's strikes, no ILM, an incompetent effects guy, studio interference ect...

The new Trek had the studio's full support, the biggest budget of any Trek film EVER and the creators could basically could do whatever the hell they wanted.

Trek V had so much going against it, and yet it still turned out to be a good film, IMO.

 

[JarodRussell]

Whenever I see someone criticize The Final Frontier, I have to wonder if they ever watched TOS.

Bad special effects? I must be blind to them; I was raised watching TOS, in which fuzzily-filmed and poorly-detailed models subjected to camera-flash-effects served as a stand-in for a scene depicting a ship under fire.

Secondary characters having comedic roles? Let's take off the rose-tinted glasses of history for a moment: in TOS, these characters had no roles. Our beloved Uhura, Sulu, Chekov? They probably had less lines in every scene in every episode - combined - than Shatner, Nimoy, or Kelley in one typical episode. Seriously. Scotty ekes out just enough of a contribution to cement himself as a possible Number Four to the Big Three. Those complaining that Scotty's head-banging on the pylon cheapened his character forgot about his use of Klingon nerve toxin as an 'afternoon beverage', and those bemoaning Uhura's 'seductive sequence' in TFF have forgotten about her submissive 'captain-i'm-frightened' helplessness in TOS.

The Final Frontier is a fantastic movie. It is the only Star Trek film besides TMP to break the movie-mold of Battle Trek, which is how I describe what Trek has become - a series of films about Space Bad Guys and the Heroes that Blow Them Up.

Agreed.

 

[Cyke101]

Is The Final Frontier, or any DS9 Ferengi episode really worse than this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhQA-06kSLU


Really?

I think it depends on who you're watching it with. Say, if you were with a bunch of stoned out college kids, it would be the greatest thing since Cheetos

 

[Harvey]

Whenever I see someone criticize The Final Frontier, I have to wonder if they ever watched TOS.

Given the reviews, and the box office, I very much doubt there were many people who went to the movie that didn't.

Bad special effects? I must be blind to them; I was raised watching TOS, in which fuzzily-filmed and poorly-detailed models subjected to camera-flash-effects served as a stand-in for a scene depicting a ship under fire

So, after four films with outstanding visual effects, The Final Frontier gets a pass because the modestly-budgeted and two decades out of date television series it was based upon had dodgy effects work? It was an entry into the feature film series, and it didn't have effects work that measured up to it.

Secondary characters having comedic roles? Let's take off the rose-tinted glasses of history for a moment: in TOS, these characters had no roles.

True, but this wasn't an episode of TOS with only 50 minutes to tell the story. It was a feature film more than twice as long in a feature film series that had, in the previous two installments at least (The Search for Spock and The Voyage Home), given the secondary characters important roles.

I'm sort of making this point for the sake of argument--The Final Frontier has enough character moments for the supporting cast to suit me-- although I wish Uhura in particular wasn't given such lousy ones.

The Final Frontier is a fantastic movie. It is the only Star Trek film besides TMP to break the movie-mold of Battle Trek, which is how I describe what Trek has become - a series of films about Space Bad Guys and the Heroes that Blow Them Up.

Remind me where the space bad guys got blown up in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier is bad enough that it repeats the "only ship in the quadrant" syndrome so prevalent in the film series. True, there's some hand-waving as to why an experienced crew is needed (rather convenient that Spock is part of the crew that confronts Sybok!), but it doesn't explain why they're sent in operating a ship that is barely functional.

These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise... to seek out strange new worlds, and new civilizations... and blow them out of the stars...

I suppose we should strike episodes like Balance of Terror from the record then?

 

[Kegg]

Whenever I see someone criticize The Final Frontier, I have to wonder if they ever watched TOS.

Based on your arguments, it seems those people to appreciate The Final Frontier must have seen TOS but not seen any other Trek film (since as Harvey observes that's the standard the SFX, narrative, and character roles are judged by).

I mean, come on! TVH had animatronic whales so realistic they supposedly got complaints about them from animal rights groups. To go from that to... well... TFF is nothing less than a severe step down.

And I really do not abide the notion that TFF is a better movie because stuff didn't blow up. Firstly, there's nothing wrong with stuff blowing up (come on, we're fans of space opera, we fundamentally all enjoy that, yes?) and secondary, something with intellectual pretensions is not automatically better than something which doesn't. While nobody's said quite as much, a lot of the defence of TFF in this thread honestly seems predicated on that being true.

Abrams' film is a well made popcorn flick. Shatner's TFF poorly stumbles about in search of unearned and haphazardly executed depth. For all people boast about its idea, it does nothing with the concept of searching for and confronting God that wasn't done ten times better on the TV show, and more than once:

I'll go so far as to say watching TOS's episodes endlessly challenging the notion of godhood and the arguments Kirk can deploy to befuddle a Vaal or an Apollo are far more satisfying affairs than "What does God need with a starship?"

So watching TOS may actually make TFF more disappointing and put that disappointment in sharper contrast.

 

[Geckothan]

TFF: ambitious but rubbish.
XI: unambitious AND rubbish.

They're both pretty awful, but at least TFF has some good character moments and isn't a generic-action-movie-BUT-IN-SPACE popcorn flick.

 

[Cyke101]

XI: unambitious

This I would disagree with. From the start, the intention of the movie was to reinvigorate a dying franchise. Now, whether or not they wrote the story in a way that satisfied you is another topic altogether, but trying to make a film to breathe life into a sci-fi institution is by itself very ambitious.

 

[JarodRussell]

Funny is that the ratio of First Contact to ST 09 is 54:27 (or 82:41 voters), and the ratio of ST 09 to The Final Frontier is 54:39 (or 57:41 voters).

 

[Bones2]

Funny is that the ratio of First Contact to ST 09 is 54:27 (or 82:41 voters), and the ratio of ST 09 to The Final Frontier is 54:39 (or 57:41 voters).

...and?

And dear God, if I wouldn't confiscate the patronising wink smiley from every forum I might ever visit.

 

[shadowedgalaxy]

lol @ internet drama.

 

[Chrisisall]

And dear God, if I wouldn't confiscate the patronising wink smiley from every forum I might ever visit.

I gotted them.

 

[kessy joe]

I can't say I like either.