The 14 Dumbest Things In Star Trek: Insurrection

The whole “fountain of youth” aspect of the story is as poorly thought out as anything else in the film. The metaphasic radiation does whatever the plot requires of it for any given character. Logic be damned.

It’s one thing for it to cause cells to go back to peak operating efficiency, but that’s not the same thing as reversing time. The Ba’ku haven’t all reverted to teenagers without a line on their faces, so why does Worf end up reliving Klingon puberty? And how does the radiation fix Geordi’s eyes if he was born that way? Anij says it's been three hundred years since she's seen a bald man, but male pattern baldness isn’t usually caused by disease or age, it’s genetic, and many men begin to experience it in their early twenties. Can this radiation selectively change genetics? And how come it doesn’t similarly rejuvenate every damned virus and harmful bacteria around and make them extra hard to kill?

The nonsensical nature of this was exemplified by the villain Ru’afo’s death in the original cut of the film. After receiving a megadose of metaphasic magic, the script says Ru’afo “begins to change... growing younger and younger... face-lift falls into middle-age... then taking on the Ba’ku facial skin pattern as he reaches young adulthood... then adolescence... then childhood. White out.” How does that make any sense? Where would all his adult mass go as he un-grew into a child?

We’re lucky that got tossed in favor of ‘splosions, because everything about Insurrection’s fountain of youth is a mountain of goof.