Movies - Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country

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	Movies - Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country

Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (Paramount Pictures, 1991) is the sixth feature film based on the popular Star Trek science fiction television series. It is often referred to as ST6:TUC or TUC. It is the last of the films based solely on the original series cast and it presents their final mission together.

Cast

Plot summary

The Klingon economy is thrown into turmoil after the explosion of their homeworld's moon Praxis, a key Klingon energy production facility, ruins their homeworld's atmosphere. Estimates are made that the Klingon Homeworld has only a 50-year supply of oxygen remaining. No longer able to maintain a hostile footing, the Klingon Empire sues for peace with the Federation. Starfleet chooses to send the USS Enterprise to meet with Chancellor Gorkon to open negotiations, a decision that doesn't sit well with Captain James T. Kirk, who lost his son to Klingon commander Kruge in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock
.

Captain Kirk, upon rendezvousing with Gorkon's battle cruiser Kronos One at the Klingon border, invites the Klingon chancellor along with his guests to dinner aboard the Enterprise. The dinner does not go well, as the humans and the Klingons spar on the eventual course of the projected peace, discussing, among other things, the possible annihilation of Klingon culture. (Kirk, later: "Note to galley: Romulan ale no longer to be served at diplomatic functions...")

Whilst en route to Earth, some time after the ceremonial dinner, the Enterprise appears to fire upon the unguarded Kronos One with a pair of torpedoes. The hits are scored in strategic spots on the ship's underside, and, among other things, artificial gravity on board the Klingon vessel fails. During the calamity, two men wearing Starfleet atmospheric suits and magnetic boots beam aboard Kronos One, and fight their way through to the chancellor's private room. Chancellor Gorkon is assassinated, although General Chang is notably absent. Captain Kirk, after surrendering the Enterprise, beams aboard Kronos One with Dr. Leonard McCoy in an effort to save the chancellor's life. They fail, are arrested, accused of the crime (In Kirk's case, ordering the attack; in McCoy's case, failing to save the Chancellor's life.) and taken to Qo'noS for trial while Gorkon's daughter, Azetbur, becomes the new chancellor, and wishes to push forward with diplomatic negotiations, this time, for reasons of security, on a neutral world, the location of which is kept a secret from the general public and from most Starfleet and Klingon Defence Force officers.

Kirk and McCoy, after a show trial on Qo'noS, are taken to the gulag planet Rura Penthe, a forced labor camp. After a brief time there, they meet a shapeshifter by the name of Martia, who conveniently offers them a method of escape. After making their way across the frozen wasteland that is the prison world, they are betrayed by Martia, who is killed by Klingon guards upon arriving at the scene. The Enterprise, however, manages to con its way past bored Klingon border guards, beam up the two in time, and escape across the border unmolested.

Kirk proceeds to contact the USS Excelsior, commanded by Captain Hikaru Sulu. Unbeknownst to him, but revealed in an episode of Star Trek: Voyager, the Excelsior had just been forced to retreat from Klingon space after Sulu had also decided to stage a rescue attempt. Kirk learns of the location of the peace conference. Both ships, at opposite ends of Federation territorial space, head for the conference, at Camp Khitomer, at maximum speed. Shortly before reaching it, the Enterprise is intercepted by Chang's modified Bird of Prey, which can fire while cloaked, and was responsible for firing on Kronos One. Chang fires upon the Enterprise multiple times, and then upon the Excelsior when Sulu arrives midbattle, until a specialized torpedo, modified by Captain Spock and Dr. McCoy to track engine emissions from the Klingon ship, impacts Chang's vessel. The Excelsior and the Enterprise then fire repeatedly on the ship, which succumbs to the assault.

Parties from both ships beam to the conference, halt an assassination attempt on the Federation President, kill the assassin, and arrest several conspirators. Afterwards, the Enterprise heads back for Earth, to be decommissioned, but not before the crew takes one last defiant joyride.

Themes

TUC is an allegory for the fall of communism in eastern Europe circa 1990 and the recent peace movement which was happening while the film was being made (the Soviet Union itself had not yet dissolved during the filming or even at the film's release). An apt reference is made by Spock, when he confronts Kirk's apprehension of dealing with the Klingons, by quoting a 'Vulcan' proverb: "Only Nixon can go to China."

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