All Six Original Cast Star Trek Films Ranked!

 Every Original Cast Star Trek Film Ranked

The legendary Barnes & Noble movie rack pull that prompted this ranking. Sixteen bucks!

     As regular listeners to the podcast will know, last fall I began my journey into Star Trek fandom. I watched the entire Original Series run and am midway through The Next Generation, with plans to continue on to Deep Space Nine afterwards.
     Star Trek lives on TV, I think most fans will tell you that, but the Enterprise and her ongoing mission are no strangers to the silver screen, either. Star Trek on film certainly has an uneven track record, especially in the latter years of the franchise, especially recently, but before the mixed bag of TNG movies or the more mainstream-oriented Abrams reboot, there was a run of six movies featuring the crew that started it all. How do they all measure up, both as individual films and against each other? Let's find out!



#6) The Motion Picture

     I'll tilt my hand early on here and say that I think every original Star Trek movie is good on at least some level.
     Except this one.
     The Motion Picture isn't a catastrophe; it doesn't ruin any of its beloved characters, it's not a betrayal of the franchise's core values, it's not dumb or offensive, it's just . . . boring. Gene Roddenberry is an utterly fascinating figure, both as a person and as a creative, and in this film, the one he had the most direct control over, he's hardly lacking in vision.
     V'Ger's ship is a jaw-dropping piece of art design, and a pretty decent effect all things considered, but the minutes-long journey through its bowels perfectly exemplifies the problems afflicting this movie. Rather than spending time with the core trio of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, or even with the eclectic and lovable souls of the crew, much of the film's runtime is dedicated to shots of spaceships going over, under, or through things that last forever. 
     For me personally, I fell in love with Star Trek thanks to the aforementioned trio, and the intricate politics of the world they inhabit. The Motion Picture seems completely disinterested in both of those things, which isn't necessarily a death blow - I like new things just as much as I like familiar things - but the attention that would have (and maybe should have) been spent on them is wasted on superficially pretty visuals attached to a story that feels cold and impersonal.



#5) The Search for Spock

     The Search for Spock is hardly a bad movie, or a bad Star Trek adventure. I enjoy Bones chafing against the new personality he's unwittingly been made to host, I find Christopher Lloyd and his gang of Klingons to be charmingly single-minded, and the ultimate reunion between the title character and his friends is an absolute joy. 
     Frankly, I don't have that much negative to say about this movie, but that's mainly because I don't have too much to say at all. Star Trek III is fun, but in my view a missed opportunity.
     The absence of a character, especially an important character like Spock, can be an opportunity for reflection on that person: what they meant to their friends, and how they feel changed without them. There is a bit of that here, but not as much as you might hope. Partly that's because the movie is balancing two substantial plot threads, and partly that's because Spock is reintroduced somewhat quicker than I was expecting. 
     It seems like we've barely had any time to feel Spock's loss before we're on the path to bringing him back, and that seems like a bit of a missed opportunity to me. Like I said, this movie is entertaining, but a pervading feeling of shallowness prevents it from a higher ranking.



#4) The Final Frontier

     I'm as surprised as you. The Final Frontier is not a well-regarded movie. Fans and critics lambasted the movie for its effects, pretentious story, and the general slap-dash feel of a product hamstrung by budget cuts and a director who may have been in over his head.
     Perhaps that overwhelming disdain is what ultimately saved the movie for me. I went in with adjusted expectations, so I was less stung by disappointment. Lots of people like The Original Series for lots of different reasons; I liked it best for the warm, lived-in friendship shared by Kirk and his right hand men, so when The Final Frontier served that up to me in heaping helpings as the main dish, I came away more than satiated. 
     To me, this is a buddy comedy featuring a space captain, an alien, and a grouchy doctor, and what can I say, both the humor and the rapport amongst the central trio landed for me. I loved getting to learn more about Bones (and DeForest Kelley gave one of his best performances in this movie), I loved Kirk and friends working together, and I found the idea of an emotional Vulcan to be an interesting idea.
     Is the movie flawless? Of course not, the effects are shoddy, the story is shallow, and the rest of the crew are kind of left in the lurch (although Captain Chekov tickled me) which is why the movie is where it is on the ranking, but I'm a naive, oblivious sucker when it comes to a good movie friendship, and Kirk, Spock, and McCoy singing campfire songs in a moment of quiet comity filled my heart with joy to the point of bursting.



#3) The Undiscovered Country

     Just look at that picture, doesn't it make you smile? The Undiscovered Country is the last time these characters were together, and it's an affectionate, exciting, worthy sendoff.
     What a rapprochement between the Federation and the Klingons might look like is an intriguing question, and one that's explored here with Star Trek's usual mixture of intelligence, humor, and adventure. 
     If there's one thing I tired of in The Original Series, it was far and away the flattening of Kirk's character, which already wasn't the deepest pool in fiction, into an unreflective, invincible meathead. Star Trek VI offers an unusual thing for the character, even on film: a true arc. Forcing Kirk to reexamine his position in a post-Cold-War-in-space isn't a groundbreaking idea, but it's well executed here with the help of a delightful Kirk-Bones pairing in a story with some fantastic shades of political thriller. 
     The rest of the crew shines as well, particularly Captain Sulu, and my beloved Spock mentoring a new Vulcan character. Actually, that Vulcan is the only reason this movie isn't at number two. Valeris's Vulcan logic delivering her to a different conclusion than (presumably) the rest of Vulcan society is, like Sybock, a supremely intriguing prospect that doesn't go anywhere, and I just can't let go of being teased with a different kind of Vulcan twice in a row. 
     That's a minor quibble, however. The Undiscovered Country makes great use of its alluring concept, contemporary special effects, and its legendary cast of legendary characters. I love it.



#2) The Voyage Home

     The Voyage Home is a bit of an outlier in the original run of Star Trek films. As people have pointed out before, in many ways this concludes a mini trilogy with Wrath of Khan and The Search for Spock, not to mention the more lighthearted, comedic tone it strikes compared to its more serious brethren. 
     Star Trek IV certainly is unique, and that's a big part of why I love it so much.
     This movie is pure fun. The humor consistently lands, Spock dispassionately swearing gives me life, and it wears its big, cheesy, Greenpeace loving heart on its sleeve. I felt like Nimoy's directing was much better served by the kind of easygoing fare in this movie compared to Star Trek III, and the decision to split the cast up so everyone gets a chance to shine imparted an energy to the film that's dynamic and engaging. 
     Time travel was not new to Star Trek, but it was a nice refresher for the look and feel of the films (and, I'm sure, for the budget), and this is the first time our heroes have really had to inhabit a different time and place. True, it's mostly put to comedic effect, but like I said, that humor almost always landed for me, with my favorite gag pictured above. 
     The Voyage Home feels like a release after the high stakes and emotional drama of its predecessors, and although I was initially skeptical of soft-resetting Spock's character back to a time when he was more conflicted over his dual Vulcan-human heritage, it ultimately won me over, and, I still grin out of nowhere when I randomly think about, "Tell her . . . I feel fine."



#1) The Wrath of Khan

     Could it have been anything else? Star Trek II revitalized the series in one fell swoop after the rocky start in The Motion Picture, and even though I was expecting to enjoy it after hearing all the love and praise, I was still surprised at just how much I loved this movie. 
     There are so many things that make The Wrath of Khan great: from its charismatic villain, to its methodical, weighty starship duels reminiscent of Balance of Terror, to its devastating climax, but it's Kirk and Spock's dynamic that tie it all together. Spock has become one of my favorite characters period, and his friendship with Kirk is one of the things that made me a Star Trek fan. That character and that friendship is put to brilliant use in this movie, weaving a tale that leverages all the history between the two for that finale that, like it did to so many others, left me in shambles despite knowing it would be reversed almost immediately.
     Kirk, too, is at his absolute best in this movie. As in Undiscovered Country, Kirk is more than just a fist-fighting, space hottie-bedding galactic James Bond. Here he's grappling with change, both to himself and his role, and to the people around him, and Shatner, for all that we make fun of him, sells it perfectly. 
     This movie is exciting, warm, funny, smart, and has one of the best endings in genre filmmaking history. It is everything that made me fall in love with Star Trek as I made my way through The Original Series in between work and classes, and even though Star Trek has stumbled, every time I start a new episode or watch a new movie, it's in the hopes of experiencing again the wonder, the curiosity, and the profoundly human center that has led to the heights like Balance of Terror, Best of Both Worlds, and The Wrath of Khan.