Wing Commander Movie Night: Star Trek: The Motion Picture (May 26, 2025)

[Bandit LOAF]

Against all odds, we enjoyed Tora! Tora! Tora! Which makes the score Wing Commander movie club one, war movies fifty. This week we've voted to travel back to the future with Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979). ST:tMP is a sometimes-misunderstood masterpiece that we've found has improved greatly with age… and we're eager to see if that remains the case today! You can join us this Friday via Discord to watch along.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture is full of spectacular effects and incredible spaceships… but the connection to Wing Commander is the music. Back when Chris Roberts was developing the original Wing Commander he told composer George Sanger (The Fatman) that he wanted the game to have an epic score similar to Jerry Goldsmith's work on Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Here it is mentioned in a recent recent interview with The Fatman!

We had the creative brief that was that we should do something that's sort of like Star Wars and sort of like Star Trek: The Motion Picture. Chris Roberts was a very cinema oriented guy and this was the first time to my knowledge that anybody asked a game audio person to imitate John Williams or to do a movie like soundtrack. Before that nobody kind of bothered with that. It was like video, it's got to sound like a video game or just put music in it.

A sample of the original Wing Commander score from the Origin Audio CD:

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Where can I find a copy of the movie for the watch party?

We will be watching the recently restored "Director's Edition" of Star Trek: The Motion Picture which is available for streaming in the United States on Paramount+. It is also available for rent or purchase on all the standard services. If you would like a physical copy, the movie was released on UHD in 2022 and remains in print around the world. If you are not able to locate a copy please stop by the Discord and ping a CIC staff member before Friday's showing.

How do we watch the movie together?

It's pretty low tech! Simply join the Wing Commander CIC Discord on Friday and we will be chatting (in text) along with the film in the main channel. Everyone who wants to join in should bring their own copy and we will count down to play them together at 10 PM EST. Everyone is welcome and we encourage you to join in the conversation; sharing your thoughts helps make the experience better for everyone!

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Original update published on May 26, 2025