Entertainment
A Forgotten Star Trek Episode Brought William Shatner’s Craziest Idea To Life
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Here’s a question for you Star Trek superfans out there: what do you think William Shatner’s craziest idea was? If you know enough about the man’s creative resume, you might be tempted to say his TekWar series. Or, for an even deeper cut, his musical journey (seriously, his rendition of “Tambourine Man” is shocking in all the worst ways). When it comes to the franchise that made him famous, though, the answer probably involves Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. Following Leonard Nimoy’s two successful Trek movies, Shatner switched from the captain’s chair to the director’s chair to give us the worst film in the franchise (at least, until Section 31 came to life).
Most of the jokes about the Final Frontier focus on the bonkers ending in which Kirk pisses off God so much that this higher being sprouts laser eyes. Believe it or not, though, this ending was originally going to be even crazier because Shatner wanted to film himself fighting 10 rock men (not a euphemism, I swear) as an appetizer to his fight with God. This had to be cut for budget reasons, but Star Trek later brought this idea to life by showing hallucinated rock monsters in the Enterprise episode “Strange New World”!
What Does God Need With A Rock Monster?
You’re gonna need a lot of context for this, so grab your favorite “Go climb a rock” shirt and buckle up. In Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (which Shatner both directed and co-developed the story for), there was an epic fight scene scripted where Captain Kirk would fight 10 “rock men” who emerge from the stone faces of the exotic alien planet, Sha Ka Ree. But this plan was mostly scrapped due to the extreme budget cuts facing the film. The crew did rig up a single animatronic rock man, but the scene of it attacking Kirk looked so embarrassing that it was cut entirely.
A mere 12 years later, the Enterprise episode “Strange New World” premiered. Some of the Enterprise crew excitedly visit the surface of an Earth-like planet, but a storm sends them seeking shelter; they soon discover that there are creepy monsters hiding within nearby caves. In a twist, the monsters are revealed to be hallucinations caused by some trippy space pollen on the planet. What’s interesting, though, is exactly what the crew members hallucinated. Look closely, and you will see they are rock men, which is a clear homage to the abandoned rock monster concept from the Final Frontier!
Sci-Fi Meets The Stone Age
While it was cool to belatedly see Star Trek bring William Shatner’s rock monsters to life, the franchise was effectively beaten to the punch two years earlier. 1999 saw the release of Galaxy Quest, which was one big love letter to Trek. In it, Tim Allen’s Shatner-like character faces off against Gorignak, a giant rock monster that also serves as an homage to The Final Frontier’s abandoned rock monster idea. Eventually, worlds collided when the video game Star Trek: Fleet Command got a Galaxy Quest crossover that brought over several familiar characters from the film, including the Gorignak!
On one hand, it’s kind of sad that we never got to see William Shatner fighting a bunch of animatronic rock monsters in The Final Frontier; after all, an added layer of cheesiness could only improve that stinker of a film. On the other hand, though, all of the rock monster homages over the years, including a giant CGI monster in Galaxy Quest and creepy hallucinations in Enterprise, almost make the sacrifice worth it. If you’re still disappointed you never got to see Captain Kirk fighting a rock-hard alien who could easily pin him, you could always just go read some fanfiction based on “Amok Time.” Don’t worry, I won’t judge you!
Not that much, anyway.