I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

To me, this movie is perfection.

hyped garbage

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Set directly after Wrath of Khan this is a decent movie about undoing a death scene. Kind of hokey in parts, it does have its moments, but it's no 2, 4, or 6.

I'm a more recent Star Trek fan and have recently moved onto the movies. I have to say, this one was a bigger disappointment to Star Trek I for me. After the how brilliant 'The Wrath of Khan' was, I was hoping Star Trek III would be a worthy follow up, but even the title seemed a little unimaginative now I look at it. The story takes forever building up, has some great moments during that, for example, the Klingons are brilliant but it just lacks some imagination much like how 'Star Trek: The Motion Picture' often felt. It's like the franchise took one huge step forward, Star Trek II was an exciting film but still about morality at the end of the day, but this film offers none of it.

The needs of the franchise outweigh the needs of the movie. It's certainly logical. I just wish the movie left me more to think about.Shortly after the battle that resolved "Star Trek II," we join a largely vacated U. S. S. Enterprise heading home. Still mourning his friend and comrade Mr. Spock, Admiral Kirk (William Shatner) discovers Spock's sealed-off cabin occupied by "Bones" McCoy (DeForest Kelley), himself occupied by Spock's "katra," or spirit."Climb the steps of Mount Seleya," a tranced-out McCoy tells Kirk, kicking off a new journey for the Enterprise.No doubt the "Star Trek" production team, buoyed by the great success of their prior film but now stuck with a gaping, pointy- eared hole, saw its repair as job one. Bringing Spock back to life thus becomes the focus of the film, and the only thing that it gets right.A series of decent if lully setpieces that awkwardly cohere into a larger story, "Star Trek III" feels stuck in orbit from first to last. The funeral tone of mourning Spock, established in the opening moments, hangs over the rest of the film. Kirk broods about the "emptiness" he feels, about abandoning "the noblest part of myself" and "our dearest blood."Having spent decades unsuccessfully separating himself from his best-remembered part, director Leonard Nimoy could have told his old comrades it was no use. You don't just say goodbye to Spock and expect him to stay dead. Nimoy lets his film linger over the loss of our favorite Vulcan, at the expense of the tension and suspense that animated "Star Trek II."What Nimoy does do well is engage the other actors, at least the ones he worked with in the original series. Kelley is delightful as the keeper of the katra, struggling to reconcile his new persona as a logical Vulcan while retaining Bones' short temper. "It's his revenge for all those arguments he lost," McCoy fumes when Kirk explains what has happened to him.What did happen, anyway? The introduction of a mystical element to the Vulcan story, that Spock has what Kirk calls "an immortal soul," is at odds with "Star Trek's" materialistic approach to life, especially as it culminates in a religious ceremony conducted in English with a lot of "thou" and "thee." I can't say I bought it, but then again, it wasn't like I felt expected to. It's something to justify the reason we are here, getting Spock back.The rest of the film punctuates this by giving us little else to watch. There's some business about renegade Klingons trying to steal the secret of the prior film's Genesis project from the Federation, but the action here is strictly by the numbers. Christopher Lloyd spits every line as the head Klingon, pushing to dominate every scene he's in. Long sections of narrative deal with the collapse of the Genesis planet and its impact on a young Vulcan who may be Spock, a plot device which is neither believable nor compelling.What "Star Trek III" needed was something to pull us from the Spock story, a crisis/adventure to engage us long enough for Spock's return to take us by surprise, the same way his demise did in "Star Trek II." Unfortunately, "Star Trek III" doesn't find that hook, and the film becomes a minor slog with some funny character-driven moments, pleasant for fans but eminently forgettable.

It feels a little strange to say, but this film may be worse than the first Star Trek movie. At least the first film was creative and slightly intriguing, even if it did not translate to the big screen. But The Search for Spock contained little mystery, a prolonged and obvious outcome, and continued the same flawed subplot (and basically the only negative aspect of) The Wrath of Khan, that being the Genesis Project. This unlikely Federation project was at least a bit on the afterburner in the previous film, compared to Khan's quest for vengeance against Kirk. Now it's the main story as it gives Spock his rebirth, but this time there is hardly any thought to the moral dilemma of the project.There are some positives in this film; I don't think it is a disaster. It was nice to see the rest of the crew given a little more of the spotlight, such as Uhura putting the young Federation member in his place (then she disappearing for basically the rest of the film…) and Sulu taking out the Federation MP's (his hand-to-hand combat is much more believable than Kirk's; more on that in a bit). Also, while it is a little strange to see Christopher Lloyd as a Klingon, he made the character sinister and interesting.But my main criticism with Search for Spock is that we always know Spock will return, and the child version of the character is found early on. The film could have been so much better if the Spock regeneration was settled during the first or second act, then we can move on to a new Star Trek adventure with the crew back together. There is a sense with this film, especially since it was directed by Leonard Nimoy himself, that Kirk got his movie with Wrath of Khan, now let's explore more about Spock's nature throughout this entire film. But it all just comes across as a lackluster, immediate follow-up to the previous installment. With Wrath of Khan, it felt like a reboot to the franchise, not a sequel. But this film exemplified exactly what most of us don't like about sequels: trying to wrap- up loose ends from the last film and taking it up a notch from there, but failing.Final thoughts: Please, no more hand-to-hand combat from Kirk, it doesn't work anymore. The character plays so much better as a captain outwitting the enemy, as he does with the destruction of the Enterprise. And are you serious with that Ponfar scene? I know Kirstie Alley said she didn't want to be typecast, so she chose not to continue her role as Saavik, but I have to think that this scene with post-adolescent Spock had to really push her over the edge. Plus, do we really think that these characters who are pushing 50 could walk up all of those steps on Vulcan carrying a comatose Spock? Scotty must have been freaking out. And what is Bones regular "poison"? Gotta be Romulan ale.*My film rating follows the soccer player rating measure of 6 as a baseline: you did what was expected of you. This film is a 4 because it fails to intrigue and shows essentially nothing new. It is simply a sequel trying to continue the excitement of its predecessor, but utterly failing.