Line #54 Fridge/StarTrekIVTheVoyageHome


1	!!FridgeBrilliance:
2	* The movie's premise makes time travel in the ''Star Trek'' universe seem much too easy. We can only assume that that ship was special because it belonged to [[Franchise/BackToTheFuture Christopher Lloyd]].
3	** Maybe, but it wasn't without precedent in the series -- this was actually the third or fourth time they'd used that method of time travel. Plus it did have its limits, in that it caused huge stress to the ship that was attempting it, and the range was apparently limited to a few centuries in either direction.
4	** Fourth, actually. They did it three times in [[Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries TOS]]. Twice ''on purpose''.
5	** The movie does indicate that relatively small miscalculations could have bad effects in timewarp. They risk it here because, well, it is the only plan they manage to come up with.
6	** The dream state is what effectively acts as the ultimate limiter. It only lasts a matter of minutes if you hop back a century or two, but beyond that you could spend days, weeks, or ''months'' just laying there asleep.
7	** Time travel in ''Franchise/StarTrek'' IS easy. It's just generally a bad idea.
8	** The time cops in ''[[Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine DS9]]'' 's "Trials and Tribble-lations" groaned upon hearing that James Kirk was involved with Sisko's story, calling Kirk a 'menace' and was responsible for 17 separate time violations.
9	** I think everyone's taking this one too literally. If he could get a [=DeLorean=] up to 88 MPH, of course he could get a Bird of Prey to travel through time.
10	** Those prior time trips were taken on the ''Enterprise'', not on a Bird-of-Prey like on this trip. Maybe the ''Enterprise'' is just better suited for time-travel. (Judging by what Scotty says about "these Klingon crystals" being drained by the trip, Federation dilithium crystals may be inherently superior.)
11	* The line "Damage control is easy. Reading Klingon, that's hard!" is actually a in-joke. The original foundations of the Klingon and Vulcan languages stem from the first Star Trek film. And were actually put together by...James Doohan (Scotty).
12	* When the rest of the crew are splashing around celebrating in San Francisco Bay after the Probe departs, Spock is ''very'' noticeably not enjoying himself. He tries to climb as high up on the Bird of Prey's hull as he can, resists the efforts of the others to drag him into the water with them, and lets out a growl of disgust when they finally succeed and he surfaces. On one hand it's funny because Spock is usually TheStoic, and you'd expect him to be reserved and dignified. But then you remember Spock is from Vulcan. Vulcan is a highly-volcanic SingleBiomePlanet that's almost entirely covered by mountains and deserts, with only a few small scattered seas. He doesn't like the water because he's from a planet where thanks to modern irrigation technology one could go their entire life and ''never see open bodies of water''. Spock diving into George and Gracie's tank earlier was merely done out of necessity.
13	* If you view ''Film/StarTrekIITheWrathOfKhan'', ''Film/StarTrekIIITheSearchForSpock'', and this film as a trilogy, you'd see that ''Star Trek II'' was about Khan, seeing himself as [[Literature/MobyDick Captain Ahab]], [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge hunting down his whale]], specifically Kirk, [[BookEnds and this film is about Kirk and his crew saving literal whales]].
14	* The movie's HighConcept bears a passing resemblance to ''The Motion Picture'': A big something is approaching Earth, and nothing in its path can stop it. It is expecting to hear ''something'' from Earth, and the heroes, flying a new and unfamiliar ship, have to figure out what it is in time to save the planet. Given that the latter five films never make any real reference to the events of the first one, this movie could be seen as a modernized reboot.
15	* One interpretation for Sulu's claim that he flew something similar to the Huey at the Academy is that some version of the design is still in use in the 23rd century. One wonders just how similar it is to early models like the Bell 204 from the film, given that some newer versions such as the 21st-century [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_UH-1Y_Venom UH-1Y Venom]] already have some significant differences.
16	** For what it's worth, in ''Film/StarTrekInToDarkness'' we saw a small shuttle about the same size as a helicopter that flew in nearly the same manner. Sulu could be referring to one of those craft.
17	** Or he could be really into antique aircraft.
18
19	!!FridgeHorror:
20	* The crew all know San Francisco well because they went to Starfleet Academy there, yet Chekov and Uhura have no idea where Alameda is. Alameda was probably either bombed into oblivion during one of Earth's major wars, or sunk due to sea level rise.
21	** Or just renamed, which is more likely considering they're entirely unfamiliar with the name. If the area had been destroyed, there'd be memorials and such preserving the name.
22	* While it's great and all that the Planet is saved at the end, eventually, they're going to have to repeat this mission. At best, a humpback can live about a hundred years; if George and Gracie's kid lives that long, the humpback will go back to extinction around Picard's time.
23	** Keep in mind that people in the 24th century seem to have mastered cloning.
24	** The novelization explains that there are samples of humpback whale DNA preserved on Earth, but that without a pre-existing whale to teach the clones how to act like humpback whales, there would be no point. Presumably these samples are used to boost the population to a self-sustaining level.
25	** The whales are also completely alone, with no others of its species. However, according to the Novelization, whales have always had good relations with other marine mammals like dolphins.
26	*** While there may be no other Humpback whales left for George and Gracie to talk to, there are a great many other species of baleen whales, many of which are far more numerous than humpbacks (though none of them sound as nice when they burp at each other). They would likely have had plenty of company to talk to.
27	* If we accept that hump-backed whales are endangered and every single one of them (especially "very pregnant" ones) matter to the survival of the species, then it's quite possible that by taking two away, as well as an expert / activist (who now, without a job, had plenty of time on her hands to work on behalf of the whales), that it's possible Kirk may have inadvertently caused their extinction! Yes I know they were being hunted at the end, but we don't know whether they would have escaped from the whalers...
28	** Would two whales + one baby + one human expert make that much difference though, compared to the dozens/hundreds of whales being slaughtered every year despite efforts to the contrary?
29	** Not to mention the ecological catastrophe(s) of the coming decades in the Trek 'verse; the Eugenics Wars-WWIII.
30	** This is somewhat mitigated by the fact that, in real life, the four decades since this movie was made have seen an eight-fold increase in the number of humpback whales. This was the result of increased conservation and environmental regulation (a fair bit of it driven by the movie itself), so the removal of a single breeding pair is very unlikely to have any lasting impact on its own.
31	* Imagine being a pilot in one of those little shuttles that you see flying around inside Spacedock as the Probe passes by. Not only are you stuck in a powerless metal box with dwindling air reserves, it's only a matter of time before you collide with part of Spacedock, another shuttle, a starship...
32	** You're also stuck inside a powerless metal box ''inside a powerless metal box.'' Even if you can get out of the tiny shuttle, your situation does not significantly improve.
33	** Could be worse. You could've been in the middle of a transporter cycle when everything went down. Statistically, someone had to be. ([[Film/StarTrekTheMotionPicture Poor Sonak...]])
34	* Assume that Bob (Gillian's PointyHairedBoss) is not a bad person, but just a tone-deaf bureaucrat who was forced to screw over her whale project because he's under a lot of pressure... Now imagine how he feels after the movie's events: He deals Gillian a severe professional and emotional blow, then tries to lamely apologize. In return, Gillian (understandably) slaps him, calls him a son-of-a-bitch, and '''''is never heard from again'''''. From Bob's perspective, Gillian presumably either abandoned her life and went off-grid, had a psychological breakdown and disappeared, or committed suicide.
35	** Which is more than likely what she ''did'' in the original timeline. Otherwise, one would expect her time-travel to somehow affect at least local history in a measurable way (interactions with family, friends, or co-workers, or possible future actions?) Yet, based on a lack of commentary from anyone, it doesn't. And Starfleet accepts Gillian's time-jump easily enough to almost immediately give her a uniform and a posting.
36	*** Even sadder, when Kirk and company are about to depart Earth, she even says to Kirk that [[TearJerker she has "nothing left" in her old life. Apparently she not only has no one she'll miss, but no one from her old life will miss her that much either. The Expanded Universe explains this by killing off her immediate family long before she leaves for the 23rd century.]]
37	** Unless it's a StableTimeLoop situation.

Context Fridge / StarTrekIVTheVoyageHome