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Review: Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986)
When last seen on the planet Vulcan, the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise were elated at the resurrection of their comrade Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy), despite knowing that they had put their future in Starfleet in jeopardy. For they deemed “the needs of the one outweighed the needs of the many.” Well Paramount must feel the wants of the many Star Trek afficianadoes merit another film. Such a supposition would be most logical.
Once again, Nimoy is the iconic alien and at the helm as director of Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. This time, the reputation of the famed septet aside, the threat virtually dwarfs their prior cinematic conflicts against Khan and the Klingons. For Kirk (William Shatner), Spock, and company find that Earth is facing a destructive power no weapon can neutralize. That power comes courtesy of an alien probe that has crippled many a Federation craft and Starfleet’s defenses.
En route to Earth in an appropriated Klingon craft now redubbed by the Starfleet mutineers as HMS Bounty, the former crew of the Enterprise—with the exception of Spock—find their home planet is on the verge of doomsday. Finding that nothing in the present will enable Earth to render the probe harmless (not too different a variation on the alien force which Kirk and crew ultimately faced in the first film), Kirk and company travel to twentieth century Earth to procure the means to do so.
Nimoy’s follow-up to Star Trek III: The Search for Spock isn’t quite as serious as the last cinematic forays of the crew of the Enterprise. There are some amusing moments where challenges are faced by the crew in regard to language and twentieth century technology—the former by Kirk and Spock, the latter courtesy of Scotty (James Doohan). Amidst the machinations of the mission at hand, Kirk makes time to woo a lovely biologist (Catherine Hicks, who recently stepped from present day into the past as a school chum of Kathleen Turner’s in Francis Ford Coppola’s Peggy Sue Got Married).
Being a Star Trek afficianado isn’t a prerequisite as it was for the first three films in the series. Just when Sylvester Stallone might think the bell has sounded on the fourth film in a series, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home makes for a viewing pleasure even though it cannot quite measure up to the opus Nicholas Meyer (one of the writers of this film’s screenplay): 1982s Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Still Trek adherents will be elated to see Mark Lenard once again portraying Spock’s Vulcan father. Such long-time-no-sees as Jane Wyatt as Spock’s mother (why she wasn’t in the last film is a mystery); Starfleet veterans Majel Barrett-Rodenberry now director of Starfleet medical services and Grace Lee Whitney as Janice Rand.
Robert Baum is Currently a Bryn Mawr, PA-based film afficanado and pop culture junkie.
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