Star Trek 6 “The Khitomer Conspiracy”

I've watched all of BionicBob's Star Trek TOS film edits in order, and I have to say that sadly, this was the one that worked least for me. I see that most of the other reviews here are quite positive, so I'll explain what my issues were and let potential viewers make up their own minds.

Firstly, I should say that I don't like the original film much to start with. It's my 2nd least favorite Star Trek film, and a lot of the issues are just script-deep, nothing that can be changed without radical restructuring of the film. (Full review here: https://letterboxd.com/nottheacademy/film/star-trek-vi-the-undiscovered-country/) This is not that edit, though it does improve on the story in some areas.

I liked all the cuts and trims, they were very welcome. Many more would have been, especially where the film contradicts other films or series (which it does a lot). The non-stop Shakespeare references could've been trimmed way back, as well as Spock's line about being related to a fictional character (is this meta now? We the audience know that Spock knows he's fictional???) Perhaps the traitor falling for such a stupid ruse could've been trimmed back, and perhaps Spock's mind-rape could've as well. But anyway, I'll stop with my wishlist and focus on what's here...

The additions and alterations are my main issue with this edit. While I thought BB hit a sweet spot on how to finetune the commercial cutaways and the TV tone with his previous edit (STV), this one is a big step down. Fades are overlong, music often doesn't fit the scene, and the music and sound effects frequently stomp on the dialogue, particularly when cutting to commercial. The effects added in here at a key point look pretty bad and scream fanedit, I'm sorry to say. And the bookends are overlong and send the same message. They really have very little to do with what's onscreen and attempt to reframe the whole film with explanatory title cards. It's the classic case of Telling rather than Showing, a mis-step that faneditors often try to fix when a director does it. For me, writing a bunch of text that explains what was really happening in a movie just doesn't work as a fanedit, and it's also at odds with the supposedly "TV series" presentation of the whole rest of BB's Star Trek series.

There may be some big Star Trek Enterprise fans that love this film connecting to that series. I've never seen it and don't think I should have to in order to enjoy this edit. It's supposed to be for fans of TOS, so all the connections to a massive Enterprise storyline just felt really forced to me. I'd appreciate another version of this that simply tries to fix the original film, but I suppose this is an alternative for superfans who feel differently.

All respect to BionicBob, I appreciate the hard work on this series. The other ones all worked better for me, so you can chock this up to my personal taste.

A worthy finish to BionicBob’s Trek edits. I wasn’t a fan of Undiscovered Country and the changes here worked quite well.

A/V Quality - 9
Editing - 9 visual, 8 audio
Narrative - 8
Enjoyment - 8 (original 7)

Recommended drink: Synthehol

Review by DwightFry78 — May 20, 2012 @ 9:49 pm

This edit is the end of an era, in which a man who calls himself Bionic Bob dared to boldly go where no man, where no one, had gone before: take all the theatrical Original Cast Trek movies, and make leaner, meaner TV episode style edits out of them. All of the entries have been successes IMO, and with this final one Bob gave his all and wrapped the whole thing up in a way that ties The Undiscovered Country with a lot of other elements of the Trekverse. Now, while I have always tended to enjoy all things Star Trek, I wouldn’t consider myself a Trekker and I still have a lot to watch, so being a bit less than a fanboy yet a bit more than a casual viewer, I must say that the newly added elements worked great for me, even if I didn’t “get” all of the references. But I didn’t need to, even for newcomers I think there’s enough of a pattern to sense there and a mystery element that works. Particularly, I loved the book-end structure. It gave the whole thing a flavor of mythic, larger than life “old legend” narration. Genius.

The rest of it is a much improved pacing-wise version of the sixth movie in the franchise, which once again shows that it contained a lot of unneeded filler. However, I got slightly disappointed in seeing that some cheesy stuff had remained, which might even be my fault in part for not suggesting its removal while this edit was in the works. Much of that cheese has to do with Bill S. No, not him. The other Bill S. Starting from establishing that Shakespeare’s works were originally written in Klingon (wut?), and culminating in the non-stop quoting by Chang of lines from the plays that, for my tastes, turn him into a buffonesque operetta villain and deprive the last third of any tension. It’s unintentionally funny and works against the narration. My other complaint is Spock’s bloodline link to Sherlock Holmes. Not only is it way too forced and unlikely, but it reminds me of how everyone in the world who claims to have been reincarnated, claims to have been the likes of Alexander the Great or Cleopatra, never a random XII Century leper beggar… I will concede, though, that the Holmes line is hard to remove given the flow of the conversation.

Some other reviewers have complained about the commercial fades. I think they were fine. Bob has come a long way since his early Trek edits that faded out and in the audio and the video at the same thing, which WAS jarring. Here he used different timings, and it felt natural. In fact, other than the moments I mentioned above and some spelling errors that others have pointed out already, both the narrative and the technical stuff were flawlessly handled.

A great final chapter of a great fanedit saga, and yet another one of Bob’s edits that replaces the original for me. On top of everything, I couldn’t agree more: KIRK LIVES! 9/10.

Review by TMBTM — May 1, 2012 @ 7:39 pm

I did not see the original for along time but one thing is for sure: this new version left a better taste in my mouth. It’s well paced, there’s a sens of urgency that I don’t remember being on that level in the original. New music is very well used. Fade to black breaks are always anice addition when watching Trek fanedits (exept for The Motion Picture and JJ’s Trek, I feel like all Trek movies are a bit like TV series “deluxe episodes”, so making them look like TV even more is nice)
Another great job from Bionic Bob!