History Trivia / StarTrekVTheFinalFrontier

* OldShame: Virtually nobody involved with the film has anything good to say about it. Creator/WilliamShatner has since admitted that the film fell short of his vision for it and that it greatly harmed the franchise. Several cast members, among them Creator/GeorgeTakei, also disliked the final product. The person probably the most positive about the film in retrospect is screenwriter David Loughery, and even he admitted that it could have been better had the writer's strike not cut into the time he had to work on the script.

* Shatner's attempt to direct a ''Star Trek'' film led to the movie winning the Worst Picture of 1989 UsefulNotes/GoldenRaspberryAward. He personally won the same "awards" for Worst Director and Worst Actor.

* ShoutOut: During the campfire scene, to Series/TheWaltons!

** The acting career of Cynthia Gouw (Caithlin Dar) didn't exactly take off either (fortunately she found work elsewhere).

* CreatorChosenCasting: Creator/WilliamShatner discovered Laurence Luckinbill by mistake. He was channel-surfing one night and saw him play UsefulNotes/LyndonJohnson.

* WriteWhatYouKnow: The scene in which [=McCoy=] disconnects his father David's life support systems was inspired in part by the death of [[Creator/WilliamShatner William Shatner's]] father. Watching Kelley and David [=McCoy=] actor Bill Quinn perform that scene was emotionally difficult for Shatner, who found himself reminded of his father's death in that scene. For his own part Kelley was reluctant to film that scene because he believed some fans would have object to [=McCoy=] "pulling the plug" until a line was added where [=McCoy=] was asked why he disconnected his father's life support.

* BoxOfficeBomb: ''The Final Frontier'' started out strong, with its opening weekend beating out ''The Voyage Home'', and it would be number one at the American box office during its opening week. But already the next week the film's gross would dramatically plummet by 58%, and it never recovered. Eventually Creator/{{Paramount}} would pull the plug on the wide release after just ten weeks, giving ''The Final Frontier'' a markedly shorter time in the cinemas than that of any ''Star Trek'' film before it. Ultimately, the film made $49,5 million on the domestic box office, and ended up with a global total of $63 million, against a budget of $33 million, but this fell drastically short of Paramount's expectations, and along with ''Film/PinkCadillac'', it was seen as one of the summer of 1989's biggest box-office disappointments. For comparison, ''The Voyage Home'' had grossed $133 million against its $21 million budget, and that was in spite of several factors working against it, like a somewhat limited release and a cheaper ticket price. The end result was so bad, that, according to its producer, Harve Bennett, ''The Final Frontier'' was almost a FranchiseKiller for the ''Star Trek'' film series, and it was the root cause of the budgetary issues that was at the heart of ''The Undiscovered Country''[='s=] TroubledProduction.

* WrittenByCastMember: has co-story credit with Harve Bennett and scriptwriter David Loughery.

* WrittenByCastMember: Creator/WilliamShatner has co-story credit with Harve Bennett and scriptwriter David Loughery.

* WagTheDirector: A rare example where the actors arguably had ''better'' ideas than the director. Shatner's original draft included [=McCoy=] and Spock betraying Kirk along with the rest of the crew. However, Creator/DeForestKelley and Creator/LeonardNimoy flat-out refused, pointing out that it would be out of character for either of them, Spock especially, given how Kirk gave up everything to resurrect a Vulcan whose [[ItHasBeenAnHonor honored last words]] included "I have been and always shall be your friend".

* BoxOfficeBomb: ''The Final Frontier'' started out strong, with its opening weekend beating out ''The Voyage Home'', and it would be number one at the American box office during its opening week. But already the next week the film's gross would dramatically plummet by 58%, and it never recovered. Eventually Creator/{{Paramount}} would pull the plug on the wide release after just ten weeks, giving ''The Final Frontier'' a markedly shorter time in the cinemas than that of any ''Star Trek'' film before it. Ultimately, the film made $49,5 million on the domestic box office, and ended up with a global total of $63 million, against a budget of $33 million, but this fell drastically short of Paramount's expectations, and along with ''Film/PinkCadillac'', it was seen as one of the summer of 1989's biggest box-office disappointments. For comparison, the ''The Voyage Home'' had grossed $133 million against its $21 million budget, and that was in spite of several factors working against it, like a somewhat limited release and a cheaper ticket price. The end result was so bad, that, according to its producer, Harve Bennett, ''The Final Frontier'' was almost a FranchiseKiller for the ''Star Trek'' film series, and it was the root cause of the budgetary issues that was at the heart of ''The Undiscovered Country''[='s=] TroubledProduction.

* ExecutiveMeddling: The original story idea from Shatner involved the ''Enterprise'' encountering ''{{Satan}}'' posing as {{God}}, and Kirk and Spock descending into Hell to rescue [=McCoy=] ... which probably wouldn't have been suited to ''Franchise/StarTrek'' anyway, really. The executives also demanded "More humor!" (due to the previous film's success in that area). This resulted in severe MoodWhiplash between a grand, epic story about the search for God and slapstick farce. Last, they slashed the film's budget, resulting in awful jokes and massive special effect failure throughout.