Star Trek II: WoK
Finally managed to raise a kid to the age where this becomes an enjoyable watch, so we watched it last night. It was my first time since seeing it on a recorded-off-TV VHS copy, and boy does the Director's Cut look great in 4K! Notes follow:
- The chief scientist is female, the Reliant's captain is black, *Mister* Saavik, and they have brain worms? Gee films are so woke these days.
- Khan is from 1996.
- The models look amazing. CGI would have to work hard to look this good.
- The actual CGI of the genesis demo is also pretty cool for 1982.
- McCoy goes on a racist rant against Spock over a nothing of a comment about how the genesis device works. /Are you by any chance in favour of these experiments??!! Burn the heretic!/
- They use warp 5 to get to Regula 1.
- Kirk creeps on Saavik in the turbolift about her hair, and we also find out later he's an absentee father. Speaking of early 1980s movies about fathers...
- "Dr Marcus never told you about your father..." / "She told me enough. She told me he was never a Boy Scout!"
- In the scene where Saavik is quoting regulations, what is the formula being printed on the screen behind Spock?
- Spaceships moving slowly. Firing weapons and having every shot count. So refreshing!
- Cybersecurity in the 23rd century: each ship has a 5 digit password that allows remote root.
- Hygiene in the 23rd century: space stations have rats.
- KHAAAAAAAAN!
- The nebula chase where they couldn't see each other on screen: do starships not have windows?
- Did the static from the nebula affect communications and sensors, but not transporters? (They seemed to intend to board the Reliant by transporter). Or maybe they were out of the nebula by that point.
- Lens flare on the genesis device. Is this what JJ Abrams was trying to reference?
- Did the genesis device create a whole new star as well as the planet? I guess it had a nebula to work with.
- Ricardo Montalbán reprised his use of mind control in The Naked Gun (1988). Cuban?
- The following main cast actors are still alive: George Takei (Sulu), Walter Koenig (Chekov), Judson Scott (Joachim), and the seemingly immortal William Shatner (Kirk). Dude is 95 and is about to release his first metal album.
Unanimous score: 4/5. Enjoyable, memorable, accomplished, and certainly the best Star Trek movie.
Mapping the plot to the DIY Star Trek Script Flowchart, we get:
Whilst ferrying bigwigs about, the crew of the USS Enterprise encounters a gang of superbeings which pisses them about for fun and depletes the shields to 5%, but their opponent turns out to be mad and vulnerable to a cunning bluff, and so Spock does something seemingly illogical, which means everything turns out okay, give or take a few personal tragedies. Then, finally Kirk says something worthy and they leave at warp factor (rolls dice) 3.
The DIY Star Trek Script Flowchart
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