Movies - TV
Star Trek IV Wasn’t Always A Movie About Saving Whales
By WITNEY SEIBOLD
In the highly successful Star Trek film “Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home,” Captain Kirk (William Shatner) and Spock (Leonard Nimoy) return to Earth after Spock’s resurrection.
The crew returns to Earth due to the destruction of the U.S.S. Enterprise, facing the consequences of their actions in “Star Trek III.” However, they make a terrible discovery.
The team finds that an unknown extraterrestrial probe is draining the Earth's oceans in search of humpback whales, a species hunted to extinction a century ago.
To address the crisis, Captain Kirk and Spock devise a plan to travel back in time to 1986 aboard a broken-down Klingon ship, aiming to retrieve extinct whales from the past.
Nimoy liked the idea of saving the whales but had creative differences with producer Harve Bennett, who wanted the snail darter to be the object of the time traveler's hunt.
Eventually, Nimoy's efficient ecology story won, and he pushed for change from the tone of the previous movies. "I just felt it was time to lighten up and have some fun," he said.