The sixth and final Star Trek movie to star the cast of the original series is bittersweet, fun, and a little silly. It’s like the last game of the regular season — no reason to hold anything back.
And so they didn’t.
When the film was released, Star Trek: The Next Generation had already been on the air for five and a half seasons. Indeed, while The Undiscovered Country hit theaters in December of 1991, just a month earlier The Next Generation aired the two-part episode “Unification,” guest starring Leonard Nimoy as Spock. The torch had already been passed. So how do you keep from making a film that is, for lack of a better term, “Your father’s Star Trek“?
By turning convention on its head, first. Klingons were both good guys and bad guys. Spock was the one cracking the jokes.Kirk battles a big alien and invents a new form of kneecapping your foe:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BS-f_KwM81I
Kirk also made out with himself. Ok, not exactly. Just watch:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2wBtcmE5W8
And did I mention Spock mindrapes Kim Catrall?
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1NgX-w54RY
Second, the film took a lot of ballsy chances. The zero gravity attack with the pink Klingon blood squirting everywhere remains the most bloody and viscerally violent moment in the Trek franchise. You also have the film opening with the explosion of the Klingon moon of Praxis, unleashing an explosive ring that would change sci-fi movie history. While this so-called “Praxis Effect” was first employed here, bi-curious fanboys (by which I mean ones who like both Trek and Wars, of course) will remember this wave was added to the Death Star explosions in the Star Wars Special Editions.
Other ballsy chances include the fact that most of the film also plays out as a whodunit mystery rather than a typical Star Trek adventure. This was far more Law and Order than Trek. And, as evidence of that, we even have a full Klingon trial. Don’t blink, or you might miss Michael Dorn as “Colonel Worf” the Klingon lawyer, and an ancestor of Lt. Worf fron Next Gen, defending Kirk and McCoy:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bf4YINfjQaQ
Third, it hit on an important piece of zeitgeist that I remember, even as a kid, being very prescient. The plot revolves around the attempts to broker a peace between the Klingon Empire and the Federation, which would mean ending the neutral zone between the two powers and an end to the Cold War between them. This was also aprorpos for the time, as the Cold War ended between the United States and the Soviet Union. Indeed, just three weeks after the release of the film, the USSR formally dissolved and ceased to exist.
“There is an old Vulcan proverb: only Nixon could go to China.”
Now, that doesn’t mean the film isn’t without its problems. Christopher Plummer is far too good of an actor to be so stupid a character as General Chang, who seems to only speak in Shakespearean idioms. Come on– even Aaron Sorkin doesn’t overwrite his characters this much. The Federation President, played by Kurtwood Smith, is similarly overwritten– if you think politicians are full of hot air, then this guy is for you. His makeup is also ridiculous looking. In a movie with so many Klingons, did you have to make him look so much like one of them? Leonard Nimoy’s makeup is also troublesome. You can see in the Hi-Def version, but to keep Spock looking younger (as opposed to how he looked in Next Generation), it looks like they applied his makeup with a trowel.
But, there are also some fun nods for Trek fans looking for connections to other films and series. I already mentioned Michael Dorn playing “Col Worf,” but the Klingon Chancellor Gorkon was played by David Warner (Sark from TRON!), who also was in Star Trek V. Similarly, both Rene Aberjonois and Brock Peters play smaller roles and both would end up on Deep Space Nine.
So, what a way to end a film franchise. Well, at least this part of it. I’ll let the man himself explain:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrizm2gnQBo
“This is the final cruise of the Starship Enterprise under my command. This ship and her history will shortly become the care of another crew. To them and their posterity will we commit our future. They will continue the voyages we have begun, and journey to all the undiscovered countries, boldly going where no man… where no *one* has gone before.”
No more Romulan ale. And I mean it.