Star Trek V: The Final Frontier‘s USS Enterprise-A accomplished what no other starship had before, but the USS Discovery in Star Trek: Discovery matched this feat centuries later. Directed by William Shatner, Star Trek V is considered the low point of the movies starring the cast of Star Trek: The Original Series, despite the director’s lofty intentions. Star Trek V saw Spock’s (Leonard Nimoy) renegade brother, Sybok (Lawrence Luckinbill), hijack the Starship Enterprise on a mad quest to find God.
Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, set in the late 23rd century, and Star Trek: Discovery season 4, taking place in the late 32nd century, both involve Star Trek’s Galactic Barriers. Star Trek‘s galaxy is divided into four Quadrants: Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Gamma. Surrounding the galaxy is the Galactic Barrier, a field of strange energies. Star Trek V revealed that at the center of the galaxy is another energy field, the Great Barrier, beyond which lies the fabled world of Sha Ka Ree. There, Sybok believed God resided and was waiting for his Vulcan prophet.
Captain Kirk’s USS Enterprise-A Is The Only Star Trek Ship To Cross The Great Barrier & Make First Contact
No Other Starship Ever Found Sha Ka Ree
In Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, Sybok’s hijacked USS Enterprise-A truly traveled where no one had gone before by breaching the Great Barrier at the center of the Galaxy and achieving First Contact. The Enterprise did indeed find Sha Ka Ree on the other side of the Great Barrier. However, when Sybok, Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner), Spock, and Dr. Leonard McCoy (DeForest Kelley) explored Sha Ka Ree, they didn’t find God. Rather, it was a malevolent alien claiming to be God (George Murdock).
In truth, the USS Enterprise-A wasn’t the only starship to enter the Great Barrier. A Klingon Bird-of-Prey led by Captain Klaa (Todd Bryant) followed the Starship Enterprise into the Great Barrier, hunting for Captain Kirk. The Klingon starship also escaped Sha Ka Ree and traveled back to the Alpha Quadrant. However, the Klingon ship did not make First Contact with “God”; only Kirk, Spock, McCoy, and Sybok did. Still, it was the Klingon Bird-of-Prey’s disruptor cannons that destroyed the pretender God and saved Kirk, thanks to Spock manning the guns.
USS Discovery Crossed The Galactic Barrier & Made First Contact
Discovery Is The Only Starship To Meet Species 10-C
Captain Kirk’s USS Enterprise-A in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier remains the only Starfleet ship to cross the Great Barrier, make First Contact, and return. In Star Trek: Discovery season 4, Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) led the USS Discovery through the Galactic Barrier into another galaxy. Burnham’s starship made First Contact with Species 10-C, the creators of the Dark Matter Anomaly. Like Star Trek V, a second ship piloted by Dr. Ruon Tarka (Shawn Doyle) and Cleveland Booker (David Ajala) also breached the Galactic Barrier.
No other starship has entered the Great Barrier at the center of the galaxy since Star Trek V: The Final Frontier.
The Galactic Barrier was introduced in Star Trek: The Original Series’ second pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before.” Captain Kirk’s USS Enterprise NCC-1701 ultimately entered the Galactic Barrier three times in the original Star Trek series, but it was the USS Discovery 900 years later that achieved First Contact with beings from a neighboring galaxy. Yet no other starship has entered the Great Barrier at the center of the galaxy since Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, although after “God” was found and destroyed, there is no reason to return to Sha Ka Ree.
