Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) is remembered for many things, all of them good. People call it “the one with the whales”, but I call it “the funny one”. It really was the closest they got to doing flat-out comedy. (Don’t forget: director Leonard Nimoy also directed the hit comedy Three Men and a Baby.) As the second-best Trek (behind The Wrath of Khan), The Voyage Home was successful by utilising the old reliable time travel gimmick.
Sending the crew of the USS Enterprise HMS Bounty back in time to 1986 set up numerous fish-out-of-water sequences. One of the funniest involved Spock and Kirk on a bus, annoyed by a punk rocker playing a song called “I Hate You” on a boombox.
Just where is our future, the things we’ve done and said!
Let’s just push the button, we’d be better off dead!
‘Cause I hate you!
And I berate you!
And I can’t wait to get to you!
The sins of all our fathers, being dumped on us the sons.
The only choice we’re given is how many megatons?
And I eschew you!
And I say screw you!
And I hope you’re blue, too.
With a single-fingered gesture, the punk refuses to turn it down. Spock makes the point moot with an ol’ neck pinch. It’s a brilliant scene.
“I Hate You” was written and performed by associate producer Kirk Thatcher, who also played the punk in the scene. The full song was never heard in the movie, only a few seconds. Now you can hear the whole thing on Youtube. Enjoy!
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That is truly wonderful. I am most grateful I did not eschew a visit to mikeladano.com.
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HAH! And I thank you for that!
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The best two moments are Spock with the headband to conceal his ears and Kirk tries to explain that he is an old radical student who took a little too much LDS, and Scotty addressing the computer on the ship.
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“Hello computer!”
Yes I love how Spock is always so difficult to explain in these time travel stories. Reminiscent of how how had his ears caught in a “mechanical rice picker” in an episode from the original series.
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I loved that movie. I actually saw that one in the theater and you are right, it was pretty dang funny.
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Funny goes a long way for me, especially when it has a good story to go with it. This is one of the movies I am trying to buy back. Trying to find the right edition.
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Thats funny. Never was big into Star Trek but I did see this one in the theatre at the time but my noggin is fuzzy from the details.
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Sadly I didn’t see it in theaters! In fact, if I remember right, I only saw 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10 and 11 in theaters. Most often when I was a kid, I would read the novelization first. Then the movie would hit pay TV or VHS and we’d see it for the first time.
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that eschew you / screw you rhyme is terrific!
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The story goes that Leonard Nimoy had some new wave music picked out for that scene from the Paramount library of music. But Kirk Thatcher said “No that’s not what that guy would be listening to.” And he wrote “I Hate You” to match the beat that the punk is rocking to in the film, and he perfectly inserted that “SCREW YOU!” line for when the punk flips Captain Kirk the bird!
And of course you know what happens next! Spock neck pinches him, and the whole bus applauds!
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Not to burst anyone’s bubble, but would any self-respecting punk band use “eschew” in a song? I think not. That scene WAS so dumb that it was hilarious though. Great post.
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Hah! Good point. Somebody find me a punk song with the word “eschew” in the lyrics…good luck finding one!
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My favourite Star Trek movie. My favourite part is Scotty addressing the computer. Scotty was always my favourite character anyway.
Loved the comedy in that movie.
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We watched this with #2Son two nights ago, as it happens. He’s a young’un and getting into Star Trek and luckily, I’ve got lots of Star Trek! He did think this scene was funny and also laughed at the old lady and her new kidney in the hospital!
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I love that scene! Dialysis? No way! Just grow a new kidney. Great scene.
I also love: “Pavel Chekov…rank…Admiral…”
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The whole film’s lightness of touch and humour is just what the franchise needed before we went off to the Next Generation the year after and before Shatner stuck his size ten into with Final Frontier!
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My first big screen Star Trek movie. Great scene.
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Brilliant scene from a brilliant movie that I wish I saw on screen! Alas, after Star Trek III, we didn’t expect a good Trek so we didn’t go.
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We just watched II, III, IV together with the family and III hangs together well when played as a triple bill, to be fair. It’s not Empire Strikes Back by any stretch, but it’s got it’s moments and it fits into the sequence well.
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This was my first Star Trek movie. I was already into the Next Gen at the time, but after seeing this I became a bigger fan of TOS. And THIS is still my favourite Star Trek movie. The scene where Spock has to explain to Kirk and McCoy that they need to find humpback whales to talk to the probe… pure Star Trek.
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I also love how Spock asked them permission via mind-meld. He was not about to kipnap a whale.
I really wanna re-buy this. It has been so long and it makes me feel so good.
Everybody remember where we parked.
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Yeah, its the respect he has for the animals that he treats so casually that makes it funny. It remians me of the Horta.
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That was awesome!
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I feel like a Star Trek night tonight.
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