Forget 'Die Hard.' Is 'Star Trek Generations' a Christmas Movie?
Every year, the internet and your friends in bars love to debate whether or not Die Hard is or is not truly a Christmas movie. But is this even the most controversial choice for the best Christmas action movie? To be clear, plenty of movies that have Christmas stuff could be claimed as Christmas movies, but if you want to make people really mad, pick a movie that almost nobody claims is a Christmas movie, and then show them the Christmas tree in it.
Recently, at Men's Journal, we compiled a list of the 15 Best Christmas Action Movies that are specifically not the original Die Hard. And sitting at number eight is perhaps our most controversial choice: 1994's Star Trek Generations.
Don't remember everything about Star Trek Generations? Well, back on November 18, 1994, the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation made the leap to the big screen with a crossover movie that featured Captain Picard (Patrick Stewart) teaming up with Captain Kirk (William Shatner). It also featured Picard learning the true meaning of Christmas. Sort of.
Smack dab in the middle of the movie, Picard gets sucked up into a timey-wimey Nexus, which transports him into a Dickensian Christmas scene, which, we're meant to think, is his idea of a perfect life, away from starship job responsibilities. Picard's got fake kids in this Christmas scene, a fake wife, and not one, but two Christmas trees; one inside, and one outside in the snow.
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While the fantasy world is very enticing (and slightly anachronistic for the 24th century), Picard soon realizes that everything is not as it seems, thanks to the image of a vibrant star inside various Christmas decorations. This isn't the star that guides the Wise Men! It's an exploding sun that a mad scientist (Malcolm McDowell) blew up moments earlier in the film. And, as we saw, the shockwave of that nova destroyed what was left of the Starship Enterprise. So, if Picard is going to fix everything and walk back these horrible events, he has to realize that his Christmas world is a fantasy.
Somewhat famously, in 1991, Patrick Stewart performed a one-man version of Dickens ' A Christmas Carol, which was later released as an audiobook in 1991, arguably, at the height of Next Generation mania. The Christmas scenes in Generations aren't a direct adaptation of anything from A Christmas Carol, but at that time, Patrick Stewart was famous for having Christmas epiphanies. Some might say he was the official Christmas Carol actor for a brief time in the 1990s, rivaled only by Michael Caine in 1992's The Muppet Christmas Carol.
So, Patrick Stewart is a Dickens and a Christmas Carol expert. He's the incumbent Star Trek leader in 1994 when Generations hit the big screen, and the movie came out around Thanksgiving, meaning people were totally going to see this in the theaters throughout December. Plus, the plot pivot, which allows Picard to get back to his own time and save the doomed solar system, as well as the crew of the Enterprise, is a very Christmas Carol scene.
When he starts to realize his Christmas world is fake, Picard meets a sort of spirit version of his friend and confidant, Guinan (Whoopi Goldberg). Basically, she represents the Ghost of Christmas present, and also, kind of, the Ghost of Christmas Future, since one possible future is everyone on the Enterprise being dead. And, the thing that solves the whole movie is Picard teaming up with Captain Kirk, who, obviously, is the Ghost of Christmas Past.
Spoiler alert, but after helping Picard, Kirk later dies (for our sins?) in a humble, quiet moment, buried on a desert planet, which feels very close to the kind of landscape you can imagine Moses trekking through. If this isn't a straight-up Christmas movie, Generations is certainly...Biblical.
Will you be able to convince any of your friends that Star Trek Generations is the most interesting Christmas action movie? Maybe. Maybe not. But, 31 years later, this strange, quirky film holds up. There wasn't as much CGI in sci-fi movies in 1994, so the big action set pieces with the Enterprise crashing and with Picard fighting Dr. Soren all feel very visceral and real. Plus, Picard and Kirk riding horses together is sort of worth the entire movie.
So, this holiday season, do yourself a favor, boldly put on Generations and tell all your loved ones that this is the greatest Christmas movie that time forgot.