Hi! Just finished last night a special subset of July-August “POPCORN MOVIES” at a local non-commercial movie house in a museum.
They featured, each Thursday night in July, one of the first four Star Trek movies at 8 pm. (In order, BTW, although that is not important to what I bring up here.) Each was preceded, at 7 pm, by an appropriate enough choice of a “regular” Star Trek episode.
So which four would you choose? Or should I say which three?
I mean, if you are familiar enough with ST to be interested in taking this thought experiment at all, you probably remember what the SECOND movie was all about, and it seems a bit obvious to me which is THE “definitive” matching episode. Even had the episodes been shown after the movies rather than before.
Now, I thought that all three other choices made good sense, some for multiple reasons. But there was no “of course!” factor to the these three choices.
So I thought I’d leave it to hte Teeming Dopers to come up with their own choices, to see how different minds work. Just put in your own freaking half-slips of Latinum!
Remember, there would be no wrong answers!
I’ll reveal the curator’s choices presently! Have fun!
ST:III? Hrm. We’ve got Klingon baddies, Kirk’s son, Spock’s re-birth. I don’t know. Maybe Journey to Babel, as that’s where we meet Spock’s folks, and Sarek does open ST:III.
For ST:IV, if I were matching for tone, I’d pick A Piece of the Action. It matches the tongue-in-cheek attitude of the movie. Or, maybe the one where they end up on the Nazi planet. A “dudes from the ‘future’ passing for locals” kind of thing going on in both A Piece of the Action, the Nazi episode, and ST:IV.
For The Motion Picture? I’d say maybe The Changeling. Wasn’t that the one with the Nomad probe that had gone out to explore the galaxy and came back looking for its creator?
Oh, I do want to add, I bet folks will suggest City on the Edge of Forever as a match for ST:IV because of the time travel thing, which I think is an ok match (and it certainly was a good episode). However, it’s just such a serious and brooding episode, that I can’t imagine watching that and ST:IV in the same sitting.
Yes, City is too grim for Trek IV. I’d suggest Assignment Earth, which has a similar end-of-the-world premise (death from above), but also a lot of levity stemming from a young Teri Garr (your Catherine Hicks analogy, roughly). And the cat who is actually an intelligent woman is sorta-kinda-maybe analogous to the whales who are actually intelligent enough to converse with Spock.
Absolutely Changeling for TMP.
ST: III is trickier. I’d suggest Operation – Annihilate!:[ul][li]Kirk loses a family member[/li][li]Spock’s self-sacrifice is magically reversed at the end[/li][li]Creepy hostile critters (flying brain cells, coffin snakes)[/ul][/li]
I might also be able to argue for All Our Yesterdays or even The Tholian Web, if all you need are a few points of commonality.
(“Space Seed” preceding its sequel “Wrath” (#2) is an “obvious” choice, although if anyone wants to REALLY think outside the box and pretend it was somehow unavailable, I’d love to see what folks came up with.)
So far NO ONE has matched the curator’s choice with ST:TMP.
Which is to say that the other two HAVE been “duplicated” by the curator’s decisions. Mind meld
Okay, I’m certain of my choice for 2-4 is the same as the curator. I’d even bet on it. If they chose not to show The Changeling for TMP, then I would guess they picked “The Doomsday Machine” for it’s “oh, no, we’re gonna die” format. Plus it has Dekker’s dad (William Windom) as Commodore Dekker. That’s the other logical choice for it.
As far as thinking outside the box for two: hmmmm. . .“The Ultimate Computer” would be a good match.
“Where No Man Has Gone Before” may be the best match outside of “Space Seed” becuase of the man vs. superman aspect.
ST: TMP = The Doomsday Device, because it’s got Captain Decker’s father in it.
ST2: Space Seed, because Chekov isn’t in it.
ST3: Amok Time, because T’Pau’s in it.
ST4: The one where we meet Spock’s parents.
Good thought on “The Doomsday Machine” for ST:TMP. “The Corbomite Maneuver” might be a good choice here too.
I can’t believe no one has suggested “Tomorrow is Yesterday” to correspond to ST IV. (If someone has - sorry, I didn’t see it.) While not light hearted, it’s not dark either.
ST: II - “Space Seed”, I agree. It’s a natural. If that’s too obvious, my alternate would be “Whom Gods Destroy,” where the villain is an insane former starship captain, in charge of a rag-tag group of henchmen.
ST: III - “The Galileo Seven,” perhaps, since it did have a ‘search for Spock,’ so to speak.
I stand by Assignment Earth as a better match than Tomorrow is Yesterday. In the latter, they went to considerable (and somewhat incomprehensible) lengths to ensure they left no traces of themselves behind. In the former, they’re far more casual about it, which more closely matches the tone of ST:IV. Admittedly, the latter has a captured cast member trying to explain himself to some 20th-century types, but the former shows Spock having to cover his ears for his exploration of the surface. Oh, well…
On reflection, Spock and Kirk do get arrested in Assignment Earth, though I don’t recall an interrogation scene where they offer up a lot of double-talk. This does happen in City, though.
You’re definitely right on ST:TMP; it’s basicallya remake of the Changeling with a much bigger budget.
Stepping outside of the OP, I’d match ST VI with “Errand of Mercy”; the former ends the Klingon Cold War, the latter begins it. Though it would be nice if there were SOME explanation of what happened to the Organians.
