Tag Archives: George Takei

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (1989) | William Shatner



Star Trek V starts off with the crew taking over the reins of new Enterprise starship, and their first impromptu mission requires them to travel to the near desolate planet of Nimbus III, where a rogue Vulcan known as Sybok (Laurence Luckinbill) has placed several key ambassadors as hostages in order to draw a starship to the planet.  His plans are to hijack the ship and crew, taking them on an odyssey to the Great Barrier, a place that no other ship has successfully breached.  His mission is to find the Higher Being that all life in the universe refers to as their God, whom he says has beckoned him to be the one to find out life’s eternal mysteries.  Is Sybok a madman or a visionary anointed with divine responsibilities?

William Shatner makes his feature-film debut as a director of this maligned entry in the Star Trek movie series.


Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) | Leonard Nimoy



Star Trek IV starts with our heroes on planet Vulcan, loading up to go home and face punishment from the Federation for their hijacking of the Enterprise and its subsequent destruction, as well as the sabotage of the Excelsior.  As they approach Earth, they find that a giant space probe is threatening to destroy the planet, emitting a signal that those on Earth are baffled how to respond to.  It is determined that the probe is sending messages in the language of humpback whales, which have been extinct for over 200 years.  With seemingly no obvious solution, Kirk and crew decide to time warp back to the late 20th Century to snatch a couple of humpbacks to bring back with them in the hopes of saving the Earth.  They discover two whales in captivity at a San Francisco Cetacean institute. Still, they have only a limited amount of time to figure out how to transport these whales in tons of seawater, in addition to needing to harvest enough nuclear energy to send their tapped out ship back to the future. Leonard Nimoy directs.