MovieChat Forums > Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) Discussion > This movie is ridiculous

This movie is ridiculous

posted 9 years ago by MaximRecoil
50 replies | jump to latest

Though I have always liked it for the humor.

Some examples of absurdity:

1. The probe is supposedly intelligent, or at least, created by intelligence, yet it didn't know that its transmissions would wreak havoc on the planet? Not only was there not enough intelligence to predict such a thing, but there wasn't enough to detect it while it was happening either.

2. Uhura detects whale song from orbit. Not only do sound waves not travel in space, but even if there were some magical way to detect them without dropping a microphone down into the atmosphere, there's no way you're going to pick out whale song among the unfathomable level of noise present in a major city, without knowing exactly where to look for it.

3. According to Scotty, regenerating dilithium crystals can't be done in the 23rd century, even though it is as easy as collecting some nuclear fission radiation, and the device to do so can be cobbled together from whatever happens to be aboard the average Klingon ship. No one in the 23rd century ever thought of that, even though it took Spock all of 10 seconds to think of it. I guess this "discovery" puts a damper on the value of dilithium crystals and associated mining operations in the future.

4. The crew of the "nuclear wessel" detects a "power drain" while Chekov and Uhura are collecting radiation, even though they are only collecting radiation that has already escaped through the shielding that would otherwise just get absorbed or settle somewhere on or outside of the ship. That radiation is always escaping whether someone is collecting it or not. It would be like detecting a "water drain" if someone happened to be filling a cup with water coming out of their bilge pump.

5. Uhura detects Chekov at the hospital, but they can't simply beam him back to the ship? Even if for some reason they don't know his location precisely enough to beam him back at that point, once Kirk and company are right there in the operating room with him, they certainly could have beamed them back.

6. McCoy ridiculing the doctor who planned to evacuate Chekov's epidural hematoma:

"My God, man, drilling holes in his head is not the answer. The artery must be repaired."

Okay, genius, what are you going to do with the hematoma (blood clot) that's still applying pressure to the brain after the artery is repaired? Beam it out of there? I didn't know that little pocket-sized Heal-O-Matic was also a transporter. In any event, drilling a small hole in the skull to evacuate the hematoma is a sound procedure; I know because I had that exact condition (epidural hematoma) after a roll-over car accident in 1992, and the exact procedure mentioned by the doctor in this movie (evacuation of epidural hematoma) saved my life.

7. The probe receiving George and Gracie's whale song from outer space (see #2).

8. The whole idea that whales are intelligent and capable of anything beyond the most rudimentary "thoughts" and forms of communication that plenty of other critters are also capable of. They aren't even smart enough to avoid whaling ships. If they were even smart enough to "spread the word" among themselves that ships of any kind are best avoided, they wouldn't be in a mess to begin with, but that is far too complex a thought for them to comprehend. Their reputedly "intelligent" cousins, dolphins, aren't smart enough to avoid tuna nets, so we have to adjust our method of tuna fishing so the dumbasses don't constantly get tangled up and drown in the nets. Yes, they can learn "tricks", but so can dogs, elephants, monkeys, apes, and plenty of other creatures.

I don't dance, tell jokes or wear my pants too tight, but I do know about a thousand songs.

[–] Costumer (1829) 5 years ago

An old post, but I thought I'd add a thought.

>>>1. The probe is supposedly intelligent, or at least, created by intelligence, yet it didn't know that its transmissions would wreak havoc on the planet? Not only was there not enough intelligence to predict such a thing, but there wasn't enough to detect it while it was happening either.<<<

My interpretation is that the probe, and the intelligence that sent it, didn't care about humans or any other species except the whales. Their communication with the whales, however it was accomplished, was cut off. They wanted to find out what happened.

The effect on other species was irrelevant to them. Do you notice the anthills or other bugs you walk on your way over to your friends to find out why he isn't answering the phone? As far as the probe was concerned, that is what humans were. Insignificant.

[–] mikethemartian (6857) 5 years ago

2) Ever heard of laser microphone? It sends a carrier light beam to a window and the reflected light gets modulated by the audio information inside the room. You don’t need the sound to travel any long distance through the atmosphere and vacuum of space. Once the light is modulated near the source that information is encoded in the beam and can easily transverse that distance. The rest of the problem is just a complicated DSP problem which I have no problem giving the benefit of the doubt in Star Trek’s 23rd century. At least if they were on the Enterprise and not the Bird of Prey.

[–] Darren (1376) 5 years ago

I agree with all of the above. And had I the time, I could add a few of my own criticisms as well. I enjoyed the movie, and I can still watch it for escapist entertainment, but in truth, it is quite silly. In fairness, it was meant to be. A great many scenes in the film are intentionally comedic. The whole film is broadly similar in some respects to original series episodes like "Shore Leave," "The Trouble with Tribble's," "I Mudd," or "A Piece of the Action" -- it's deliberately whimsical, just as those episodes were.

That makes for an entertaining romp, but it is a rather jarring continuity break with the seriousness of the three previous films, especially II and III, which had downright tragic moments in them.