The "Star Trek" movies: Rank 'em!
I'm pumped up about the new Star Trek movie, though the opinions of my colleagues are mixed ("J.J. Abrams hasn't done me wrong yet" vs. "No way. The guy in the lead role looks awful."). I'm an old fan of Star Trek, going back to the days when my mom and I would watch syndicated episodes in the late afternoons. My dad would come home right at the resolution of each episode and try to greet us only to get shusshed (sorry, Dad!). And I watched the animated episodes when they were on Saturday mornings. But over the years I missed out on most of the TV series (I caught up with them later on DVD) while keeping up with the movies. Here's how I myself would rank them in terms of watchability, but really it's all about the top four--I can shuffle them around depending on my mood, but those stand far above the others. How would you rank them? --David
- Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan: Totally classic Trek, a great villain, and space dogfights I can watch over and over again.
- Star Trek: First Contact: Obviously the best TNG movie, and one of the best in the series because of the thrilling action and its place in Federation history (future series played off this movie a number of times).
- Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country: I like the mystery aspect of this one.
- Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home: I know many people would rank this first for its character and humor. I do enjoy it, but i just don't rewatch it that often.
- Star Trek: Nemesis: Just a solid, enjoyable movie, but again not one I tend to rewatch.
- Star Trek III: The Search for Spock: It's important to see following Wrath of Khan, but it was so cheaply done in comparison that it was a disappointment.
- Star Trek: Generations: This was an OK jumping-off point for the TNG movies and the farewell to a classic character.
- Star Trek: The Motion Picture: The director's cut saves it from being ranked lower, but a disappointment for those of us who had been waiting years for new Star Trek.
- Star Trek V: The Final Frontier: I actually didn't mind this when I saw it in theaters, but yeah, it doesn't hold up.
- Star Trek: Insurrection: It's often criticized as an extended episode, and the worst thing I can say is I just don't remember it, other than Data singing Gilbert & Sullivan and some people hiking into the mountains.
Jeff B. on May 06, 2009 at 08:16 AM
Nemesis all the way up at #5??? Are you serious??? Surely that's a typo! Lamest villain and most contrived plot of any Star Trek movie. Switch 5 and 10 and you've got yourself a fairly accurate list.
MEC2 on May 06, 2009 at 12:23 PM
List is about right - the first place, and last place, movies are inarguable. I would raise ST5 as it has some of the best humor of the films. Generations committed the inexcusable sin of killing Captain Kirk by having him leap for a television remote control. Otherwise, most are within a place or so of where I would put them, so well played sir...
Gregg on May 06, 2009 at 12:24 PM
I think #1 and #2 will always be debated. They are clearly the two best. I personally think Generations is better than Nemesis, and Insurrection might be better than Nemesis too. Star Trek V was, without question, the worst of all of them.
MadHatChemist on May 06, 2009 at 12:25 PM
Star Trek IV was the worst trek movie. And I can say this because Star Trek V does exist...
Gregg on May 06, 2009 at 12:29 PM
#1 and #2 will always be debated. They are clearly the best of the bunch. I personally think that Generations is better than Nemesis. Insurrection might even be better than Nemesis. Star Trek V is, without question IMHO, the worst.
lorien1973 on May 06, 2009 at 12:56 PM
Even though I'm a dork for participating in this:
The order is:
Wrath of Khan
Undiscovered Country
First Contact
Voyage Home
Then the rest.
The worst is "Motion Picture"
What a depressing piece of crap that was. Yes, worse than V. Yes. Worse than V.
At least V had a quote in it, "Why does god need a starship?"
Mongbat on May 06, 2009 at 12:57 PM
#1 and #2 will only be debated by people who prefer TNG so much that they will be tempted to shoehorn a TNG movie on top as some sort of sign of primacy.
I like TNG quite a bit, but the essential trio of TOS will always have the strongest emotional impact on me. I love the other characters, too, but Spock, Kirk and Bones are the essence of Star Trek for me.
With that said, if there was a TNG movie that beat all the TOS movies, I would be the first to admit it.
Finally, NOBODY can tell me that Shatner can't act. I don't know if it was him or the director that led him to underplay the Death of Spock, but there is more acting in his quiet "no..." than some actors have in their entire career. Watch it on YouTube, RIGHT NOW, and tell me that he and Nimoy didn't hit a freaking home run with that scene.
Rumpletweezer on May 06, 2009 at 12:59 PM
I remember leaving the theater after seeing Star Trek The Motion Picture thinking, "Well, that's that. With all the time they've had to work on it they came up with that? Surely they won't try to make another." It's since become the setting for one of my favorite thought exercises: What was the meeting like where they pitched the notion of a 2nd Star Trek movie? "That was so awful we know the next one has to be better."
Mongbat on May 06, 2009 at 01:02 PM
And lest we forget, Kirk falling backward and missing his chair when his son dies... to this day they are not sure if he really fell and acted through it or improved the move, but brilliant. Klingon bastards, you killed my son....
Mongbat on May 06, 2009 at 01:03 PM
errr improved=improvised.
GK on May 06, 2009 at 01:09 PM
Switch 5 and 7 at a minimum.
Nemesis : The first 3 minutes of the movie (wedding) were the only good part. Plus, they wasted an 'even number' opportunity with this movie.
Insurrection : How on earth did they merely make this an episode, and not a Dominion War movie, is beyond me. It would have been a great way to show what the Enterprise-E/Picard were actually doing during the Dominion War.
Plus, why was there no movie in 2000??????
It is safe to say that we haven't had a good movie since 1996. That is TOO long.
Pixelkiller on May 06, 2009 at 01:12 PM
I began watching the original on a B&W tv. I think you have the order just right.
Lummox JR on May 06, 2009 at 01:17 PM
IV belongs above VI; it's simply a better movie. Insurrection was forgettable, but Nemesis belongs way lower on the list. (When the director has to retcon a new race just because he's got a thing for the Nosferatu mythos--I kid you not, he's on record as saying that--it's time to can his sorry butt and find someone with respect for the canon.) V clearly belongs at the very bottom of the list. And if there wasn't so much competition at the bottom, I'd really like to rank Generations even lower for the stupidity of its plot.
HopeSew on May 06, 2009 at 01:17 PM
I always thought it was amazing that the movie Khan looked 10x more built and menacing than the tv Khan despite being played years later by the same actor.
kurt on May 06, 2009 at 01:20 PM
I like TNG quite a bit, but the essential trio of TOS will always have the strongest emotional impact on me. I love the other characters, too, but Spock, Kirk and Bones are the essence of Star Trek for me.
Without passing judgment on the movies themselves, I can't help but notice that this sounds like someone preferring TOS so much they are shoehorning a TOS movie on top as some sort of sign of primacy.
scottkellyfa711 on May 06, 2009 at 01:28 PM
What? No GalaxyQuest? [runs away] ;)
Bill Woods on May 06, 2009 at 01:34 PM
Rumpletweezer: 'It's since become the setting for one of my favorite thought exercises: What was the meeting like where they pitched the notion of a 2nd Star Trek movie? "That was so awful we know the next one has to be better."'
'Quality-shmality, look at the box office!'
fmg on May 06, 2009 at 01:50 PM
Star Trek:The Motion(less) Picture is a very good.....serious, high quality, not kiddie sci-fi. Of course, it's long and a little slow moving but it's a more realistic space adventure.
Wrath of Khan was good, no doubt.
The Undiscovered Country is a fine, under-rated flick. I like it.
Voyage Home.....fine but I'm not crazy about humor in Trek. Final Frontier has too much humor, not enough sci-fi adventure and discovery.
Problem with most of TNG was.......too "pc", too "metro-sexual", too Barack Obama, "can't we all get along and have dialog with each other"....give me a break. Although that said, First Contact was good. Just that I never liked the uber "pc" TNG.
Then again, I'm not a modern liberal. I actually thought Enterprise was pretty good. Not great, but pretty good. More down to earth characters. A little less "pc".
jimpithecus on May 06, 2009 at 01:51 PM
I tried to watch Star Trek V again recently and could not do it. It is, in my opinion, the worst of the Trek films. Trekkers might be concerned about what J.J. Abrams has done with the series but Shatner threw in a jarring number of universe discontinuities in that film. "Row, row, row your boat?" I would rank ST III higher (certainly above Nemesis) because it was well-acted, resolves the Spock death story line and also focuses on the unity of the crew. It also has one of the best lines of the franchise: "Gentlemen, your work today has been outstanding. I intend to recommend you all for promotion, in whatever fleet we end up serving."
Rod on May 06, 2009 at 01:56 PM
All the TOS movies were pretty sub par to me. By the time they started making movies with the original cast, Shatner’s over acting and Fufu hair had become nearly intolerable.
Of the six, only the Undiscovered Country stands out. Khan was a showcase for over acting, with both Shatner and Montalban vying for worst actor of the universe accolades. The Whale flick was funny, but it did it by turning the characters into a bunch of retarded buffoons. The Motion Picture was pretty to look at but excruciatingly slow while the Search for Spock and the Final Frontier were just ego-driven directorial train wrecks. The TNG movies were a vast improvement, well, most of them. Generations was well done and thoughtful. Yes, Kirks death was lame, but Shatner’s performance in that film was actually pretty good. Insurrection was the equivalent of a good TNG TV episode, which I consider to be a compliment. Nemesis was nearly as bad a Start Trek V, if that is even possible. To me, First Contact is the obvious winner - exciting, funny, and interesting.
1. First Contact
2. Generations
3. Insurrection
4. Undiscovered Country
5. Voyage Home
6. Wrath of Khan
7. Search for Spock
8. Motion Picture
9. Nemesis
10. Final Frontier
Brian Hancock on May 06, 2009 at 02:03 PM
Dogfight in Star Trek II? Not quite. Best of the rest, I agree, but look at the end of the original Star Wars for what a dog fight is.
Scott on May 06, 2009 at 02:12 PM
Who ruined Astro Quest?
Michael K Pate on May 06, 2009 at 02:15 PM
18 years ago, Peter David has a great explanation of everything that was wrong with Undiscovered Country. I still think he was dead on.
http://www.peterdavid.net/index.php/2004/11/09/star-trek-vi/
I am simply shocked that anyone like Nemesis. It failed on countless levels. That only good thing to say about it was that it tanked so bad the people who made it never got to try again.
Insurrection, on the other hand, I actually liked. Of all the TNG movies, this one actually captured the relationships that made the show successful. I still don't think maybe a movie that could have been an episode was a bad choice.
And Generations would score much higher if Kirk had died in some way other than falling down to serve as a distraction.
My order would be: Wrath of Khan, Voyage Home, First Contact, Insurrection, Search for Spock, Generations, Motion Picture, Undiscovered Country, Final Frontier, and Nemesis.
kcom on May 06, 2009 at 02:40 PM
I watched Star Trek: The Motion Picture in college when they sometimes showed first run movies in our college auditorium. I don't know if I was really tired from studying (they usually played films during finals week) but I wound up more or less falling asleep not all that far into the movie and only woke up a few minutes from the end. And I still figured out what was going on. Needless to say, I don't rank it very high in the movie pantheon. And, okay, I admit it, it so put me off the Star Trek movie franchise I haven't seen any of the others. [runs away, too.]
Sarah on May 06, 2009 at 02:50 PM
Count me as a solid "me too" on the Nemesis criticisms. What the heck.
I was born in 1980; I watched the series in roughly the order of TNG, Animated Series, DS9/Voyager/TOS, Enterprise, and saw the movies IV, V (first in the theatre), VI, I, II, III, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X. I say this only because generationally, I ought to be agitating for the adventures of Picard and crew.
1 - Wrath of Khan (II)
2 - Undiscovered Country (VI)
3 - Voyage Home (IV)
[giant howling chasm of emptiness and despair]
4 - Search for Spock (III)
5 - First Contact (VIII)
[somewhat less cavernous canyon of mere doom]
6 - Generations (VII)
7 - Final Frontier (V)
8 - Nemesis (X)
[a smaller gap of minor inadequacy]
9 - Motion Picture (I)
10 - Insurrection (IX)
I can be persuaded to switch around films that are in the same general vicinity. I usually refer to the groups as "Awesome," "Pretty good," "Umm, okay," and "Dude. Just... dude." The last two categories are largely distinguished by the incredible audacity of failure observed. Insurrection was especially bad because everyone involved had actually succeeded at this exercise in the recent past.
I haven't seen it yet, but I'm guessing based on the reviews that the latest film will fall into categories two or three for me - if I had to make an exact prediction, it'd be between Search for Spock and First Contact. But we'll see; I felt the same way about Nemesis back when all I'd seen were the previews.