Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home

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It's our 25th episode of Here Be Spoilers! And to celebrate, the guys sat down to watch Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, a movie that begs the question, "Just how goofy can we be and still count as an actual Star Trek movie?"

The answer, of course, is pretty darn goofy.

After the two incredibly dark installments of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, someone at Paramount decided it was time to lighten things up a bit, but still try to cram a message of some kind into it. With that in mind, they gave Leonard Nimoy a shot in the director's chair, and came up with a story about a probe that comes to Earth and inadvertently causes havoc with the planet's atmosphere through a signal it is sending toward the Earth's oceans.

Meanwhile, on Vulcan, the crew of the recently destroyed Enterprise, completely unaware of what's going on back home, decide that, after Spock finishes having his brain fixed, they should take their captured Klingon Bird of Prey back home to face whatever trouble they are in as a result of the events of the previous two movies.

Confused yet?

Wait...We do what now?

Upon getting close to Earth, they receive a warning message from Earth, telling them to stay away. After a bit of research, the crew realizes that the signal from the probe is supposed to be a message to the whales, which have, at this point, been extinct since the late 21st century. Therefore, obviously, the only option is to travel back in time and get a couple of whales to bring back and save the world, because that's the sort of thing the crew of the Enterprise does.

They also display their ineptitude with old-fashioned technology for laughs.

After reaching Earth of the past (in this case, 1985), they dive headlong into a comedy of errors that result in the ship being unable to go anywhere, one of the crew in the hospital from massive head trauma, and countless violations of Starfleet's Prime Directive. But, hey! There were a few laughs, so that makes it okay, right?

LAUGH NOW!

Jake is back! And he's extremely upset by everyone's hair, including the thick tufts sticking out the top of Spock's robe.

Larry is surprised that most of the male leads in this movie are wearing more makeup than the women. In particular, Sulu and Kirk appear to have been made up by teenagers from New Jersey in the mid-eighties, due to the vast quantities of blue eyeshadow they have on.

Derek is traumatized by Chekov's eyebrows, which, by this point, have reach Andy Rooney-level hugeness.

In times of danger, they cover him in a protective shroud.

Along the way, there are lots of News items, a few Coming Attraction, an excessively technical Nerd Rage, One Thing, Larry's List, and Jake's as-yet-unnamed segment. (More on that in a moment.)

So join us, won't we, for our 25th exciting installment of Here Be Spoilers!

*****

So here's the deal: Jake recently came up with an idea for his own segment, which will focus on what a movie would be like if the original director/writer/actor...whatever...had not been replaced. For example, what if Superman Returns had been made by Tim Burton and starring Nicholas Cage (this was an actual thing that almost happened), instead of whoever was responsible for the most Emo Superman movie ever?

It's a fun segment, but we're having trouble coming up with a name for it. So we've decided to come to you, the three or four of you who listen to this show, for suggestions! We'll also be mentioning it in next week's episode to make sure we get the message out there.

In the meantime, if you can come up with a fun or interesting name, please put it in the comments below!