Star Trek films on Blu-Ray... what we know so far (2 Viewers)

[Camper]

Maybe because they're the most popular of the TOS movies? I honestly don't know and, since they're the same as the existing discs, I've blocked them from my memory.

Yes, but why a re-release if they are exactly the same and are still available? New packaging? For 4 of 12 movies?

 

[Ethan Riley]

There's got to be deleted scenes for V...there's no way a movie that stupid wasn't shot with more material that'd make it less stupid.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

There's got to be deleted scenes for V...there's no way a movie that stupid wasn't shot with more material that'd make it less stupid.

There are some deleted scenes on the previous 2 disc DVD special edition, which I believe carried over to the Blu-ray. William Shatner discusess in his "Star Trek Movie Memories" book the differences between what he intended to do and what he was able to do. He wasn't given much of a budget to work with (if memory serves, Star Trek V had about the same budget as Star Trek III years earlier), and he didn't have final cut on the picture. Some things weren't able to be shot; some things that were shot weren't able to be completed; and some things that were completed were cut from the movie before it came out.

 

[Nelson Au]

Like the Rockmen sequence where they are chasing Kirk. Didn't work out so it was cut. I can't recall if the footage is on any of the discs, but I've seen it. So it's probably on the discs.

 

[Sam Favate]

Like the Rockmen sequence where they are chasing Kirk. Didn't work out so it was cut. I can't recall if the footage is on any of the discs, but I've seen it. So it's probably on the discs.

It's in Galaxy Quest.

 

[Camper]

There were other cuts from the movie that didn't make the DVD/Blu-ray.

McCoy removing a projectile from a soldiers leg during paradise city fight.

Rather long bit with McCoy and Spock in the observation room before Kirk walks over.

Spock explaining that Sybok's "flashback ritual" is from the past and now forbidden.

A brief discussion of the hostages suffering from "Stockholm syndrome" after the taped message is received.

Kirk asking Spock if he was okay in the shuttle before the Paradise city battle. Spock--"Fine--damn fine."

A scene on the Blu-ray (but not in the deleted scenes section) where Klaa's ship approaches Enterprise and Vixis says "They haven't detected us yet."--They play it in the extras section with the interview of the two Klingon actors without the sound.

And a bit in the 2nd Klingon scene where Klaa says after hearing the Enterprise is the Federation ship dispatched to Nimbus--"Kirk's ship!" and Vixis replies--"They shall be no peace as long as Kirk lives!"----restating the Klingon ambassadors line from Star Trek 4

All the movies have a lot of cut footage 2, 3 and 6 have the most 4 and 5 the least and the first one has had most of the deleted scenes in one version or another.

 

[Jason_V]

Yes, but why a re-release if they are exactly the same and are still available? New packaging? For 4 of 12 movies?

Maybe they're trying to ride as much on the coattails of the next-to-last season of TNG on BD as they can? After S6 at the end of June, there's one new release for TNG left. And if marketing feels whatever is coming next won't have the "oomph" on TNG on BD, maybe they figure dump all the existing movies on BD again to make them look new.

 

[Osato]

Well as of 5/9/2014 Amazon is listing Star Treks 2, 4 and 6 for a new release. There are no particulars listed, but I would be %99.9 sure this is just a repressing of the existing cuts.

But why?

Anybody know anything about this?

Is there a link to the 3 titles? They didn't come up on my amazon search.. Thanks!

Edit: Found them!

Looks like they are the same ones just reissued maybe with a new sku number? I'm not sure what the benefit is to doing this, but I have seen studios do this with titles before. That is reissue them with a new sku number..

 

[Paul_Warren]

There's got to be deleted scenes for V...there's no way a movie that stupid wasn't shot with more material that'd make it less stupid.

Blame Paramount they cut the budget several times all of Shatners grand vision like the original opening powers of 10 pullback shot as seen in the superb 1997's movie Contact so ST V never had a chance once the budget got slashed, ILM were not available & writers strike of 1988 pushed the movie back from 1988 to 1989 it was just never meant to be. Paramount also insisted on the lame humour thats why the finished movie is lacking in so many places.

I still like it though as the character chemistry between the TOS leads is the best it ever was in the movies so to me STV is a big budget TOS episode released in 1989 with some grand epic moments, a terrific Jerry Goldmith score & classic Kirk/Spock/McCoy scenes.

Paramount have a long history of not spending money on these though as seen by all the lame extras some of the movies had many extras were actually made for free (it shows!). Its probably too much to expect new HD transfers for the 50th anniversary now catalog movies on BD are getting the do not sell enough rep from the studios sadly...........

 

[Sam Favate]

Dammit! I've been strong. I've held out for five years now since the Star Trek films were released on blu-ray -- the lack of director's cuts and the reports of lackluster transfers for most of them were reasons enough to hold out for the films to be done properly on blu-ray.

But now comes Amazon and their &^%$#@* sale -- less than $30 for all six original films. I only have to be strong for a few more hours; the price will go up tomorrow.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Sam -- if you get it, it won't be the worst purchase you ever made. It's not the best example of classic film on Blu-ray that I've ever seen, but I've also seen far worse. I think I paid closer to $75 for my set when it first came out and didn't mind too much, for $30 if I didn't have it, I'd jump on it. Also giving up hope that they'll be done "properly" - in 2009, I was more hopeful it would be redone, and when the 2009 "Star Trek" Blu-ray came out with such an amazing special edition, I thought perhaps when the sequel came out they'd re-do the original discs. But not only did that not happen, but "Star Trek Into Darkness" got a horribly fragmented release, with bonus features split up as retailer exclusives, so you had to buy it three times if you wanted to get everything -- and that "everything" was still less impressive than what was on the first Abrams film. If it didn't happen then, I'm not too hopeful of it happening in the future. But if it does, I can't imagine it being any earlier than 2016.

Amazon also has the "Stardate Collection" set onsale for $40, which includes the six original cast films and the four next gen films, plus the bonus discs from both of the individual Blu-ray sets. That's an option worth considering if you like the Next Gen crew.

 

[Tom St Jones]

Well, one thing is for sure: Paramount/CBS definitely isn't waiting til 2016 to put out more Star Trek product. Who knows what they have in mind.

 

[Kevin EK]

A few quick things to clear up here.

Star Trek V was a bad idea from the get-go. Shatner's own description of it sounds a bit too much like "Kirk saves everyone" and, as he admits, never flew with the rest of the cast. Nimoy and Kelley had the clout to make sure they weren't put into a ridiculous situation.

Star Trek V's budget was actually a bit higher than Star Trek IV, allowing Shatner the luxury of distant location shooting just like Nimoy had in San Francisco. The places where he got stuck were with the VFX and the post production. His "Rockman" idea never sounded like anyone worked out what it would be, and Shatner has admitted that with the crunch of VFX movies for 1989, he couldn't get the best guys for the VFX. That said, picking Bran Ferren's group was a really odd choice and apparently a cost-crunching measure.

I've seen fan attempts to upgrade the VFX from Star Trek V but it doesn't help the overall movie very much.

I remember seeing Star Trek V in the movie theater. I remember enjoying it at the time, but it's really come down in the years since its release. I remember enjoying that it was the first movie to really deal with the shuttlecraft, and then to crash a shuttle into the deck, and also to show what happens when you jump in the elevator shaft without an elevator. Of course, people have pointed out that the assembly of the guys flying up to the top of the elevator shaft has some hilariously mismatched shots.

Based on what I've seen of Paramount's treatment of the Star Trek movies, I wouldn't hold your breath on further special editions of anything other than The Motion Picture. There's frankly not much water left in the mop for the others, and Paramount is painfully aware that just slapping some minutes of deleted scenes on a new Blu-ray will not get more than the really hardcore fans to pick it up. I still hope that TMP can get a proper Blu-ray for the Robert Wise cut, but this will require Paramount spending a little more money to upgrade the VFX from the 2001 edition.

 

[Lord Dalek]

It wouldn't cost nearly as much money to redo the Director's Cuts of Wrath of Khan and Undiscovred Country. Paramount just doesn't seem to care though.

 

[Kevin EK]

Part of the problem re the slightly different cuts of Wrath of Khan and Undiscovered Country is that I don't believe even Nicholas Meyer is that interested in doing anything with them. Meyer himself has talked about how director's cuts tend to be longer but not better than what was initially released.

 

[Grady Reid]

Having recently picked up the blu-ray box set I noticed TMP is "not rated". The theatrical version was G. The Director's edition was rated PG. I thought the version on blu-ray was the theatrical version. What is the reasoning for this?

 

[Jason_V]

Star Trek V was a bad idea from the get-go. Shatner's own description of it sounds a bit too much like "Kirk saves everyone" and, as he admits, never flew with the rest of the cast. Nimoy and Kelley had the clout to make sure they weren't put into a ridiculous situation.

There is a line in this week's Mission Log Podcast with Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens where they recount the many, many aborted attempts to get Trek onto the big screen in the 1970s. One of them called The God Thing (IIRC) was "killed" by Barry Diller of Paramount because it was too much like a lot of TOS and TAS shows (wherein the crew meets "god" or a creature purporting to be "god").

The same thing should have been done with The Final Frontier...

 

[Kyrsten Brad]

There is a line in this week's Mission Log Podcast with Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens where they recount the many, many aborted attempts to get Trek onto the big screen in the 1970s. One of them called The God Thing (IIRC) was "killed" by Barry Diller of Paramount because it was too much like a lot of TOS and TAS shows (wherein the crew meets "god" or a creature purporting to be "god").

The same thing should have been done with The Final Frontier...

Can I get a huge AMEN to that one from the entire Home Theater Forum!!

And don't get me started on what was wrong with ST-TFF. Just wish we could erase that film completely from existence in our time line.

 

[Nelson Au]

While Star Trek V wasn't Star Trek at its best, I nominate Star Trek Generations as the real ill fated effort. More urgently though, I still hope for Star Trek The Motion Picture DC remastered to be released soon.

 

[Jason_V]

Can I get a huge AMEN to that one from the entire Home Theater Forum!!

And don't get me started on what was wrong with ST-TFF. Just wish we could erase that film completely from existence in our time line.

Don't get me wrong...there are things I like about the movie. The interplay between Kirk, Spock and McCoy, for instance. The score. The way Kirk's actions in ST III versus the Klingons is remembered here and becomes a plot point. Laurence Luckinbill is just fine.

But then there's everything else I see when I watch the movie. The terrible effects. Some of the terrible jokes. The uninspired reuse of TNG sets. The idea of finding god, again. And it becomes a jumbled mess.

Interestingly, I'm not a fan of The Voyage Home and have a hard time finding people who agree with me on that. I found two in my office of 80 people this past week.