14 Dumbest Things In Star Trek The Motion Picture
12. Beaming Baloney
DECKER: I knew it. The transporter sensor was not activated. Faulty module.
SCOTTY: Cleary. Put a new backup sensor into the unit.
Not three minutes later…
CLEARY: Redline on the transporter, Mr. Scott.
SCOTT: Transporter, do not engage. Do not—
CLEARY: It’s too late. They’re beaming now.
And, sure enough, science officer Sonak and another crewmember are effectively turned inside out by it.
One would think... hope… the SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) would involve a series of test-transports of inanimate objects before putting fragile life forms through a molecule scrambler. But nooooo. Cleary doesn’t even seem to have closed the panel where Decker found the problem before everything goes pear-shaped.
The ship was still almost 12 hours from launch. Would an extra five minutes have killed them? Cause the hurry sure did!
And if the Enterprise transporters were unreliable, why beam to them instead of Starfleet just beaming these crew members directly to the ship, something we saw time and time again on the Original Series? Why couldn’t Kirk just say, “have the Enterprise clear the Rec Deck and beam people directly there?”
Bones was absolutely right to mistrust that murder machine.