Overrated

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

Though I would have like to seen more of Chad and Morgan, and though the acting wasn't exactly Academy Award (it was a bit kitchy), this was a fun story with an interesting plot, watchable special effects, and a storyline that I always like (junior officer takes command and saves the day). Seeing the hero win by cleverness and bravery instead of a plot trick makes it worth watching. The bad guys were suitably evil to deserve their fate. There was probably an even better movie in here somewhere, but what we got was a lot of fun. I'd compare it to Midshipman's Hope by David Feintuch or On Basilisk Station by David Weber (though those are probably a cut above this movie in story). Seafort in Midshipman's Hope is a bit more doom ridden though, and that gets kind of old. The hero here is gets to actually enjoy the experience, finding his forte at last instead of washing out of the academy.

As someone else pointed out, this was a television pilot that, fortunately for all humanity, never made it any farther. Everything about this movie was terrible. The acting was horrendous, although that might have been attributed to the even worse plot that lacked any shred of believability. They seemed more interested in finding ways to show off the 90210 wannabes in sexy yet totally unpractical uniforms than actually working on getting a story line together. As for the main issue of defeating the evil doers, I've seen more coherent battles between He-Man and Skeletor. Stay away from this one. There's a reason why even syndication wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole.

What do you get if you take every space sci-fi cliche in the book, a limp story, mix with some pretty faces and Dynasty cast-off costumes? You get something pretty close to this - a truly awful movie that you just have to watch out of complete and utter disbelief. Which is a pity, as with a bit more thought and a lot less gloss this could have been very good. I have seen some cheesy movies in the past, but this was irridemable. Even MST3K would be embarrased to use this!

This was intended as a pilot for a series. Thankfully, it was never picked up. One expects better from executive producer and writer Melinda Snodgrass, who wrote several episodes for Star Trek - The Next Generation. There's not a single original idea here. Worse yet, none of the ideas copied were good to begin with.The single worst shortcoming of Star Command is its cookie cutter cast of characters. Each of them has a single distinguishing characteristic and nothing else. The Admiral's son who can't live up to the family reputation but ends up saving the day. The tough girl from the slums of LA. The rich-boy slacker. The traitorous coward. The smart Japanese female engineer. And a female African-American pilot to round out the ethnic mix who has no backstory whatsoever. Essentially, the Power Rangers without their giant robot. To add "star power," Chad Everett and Morgan Fairchild appear as "old hands" in the corps.If the heroes are from a familiar mold, the villains are plucked straight from a World War II movie. In contrast with the United Colors of Benetton kids, they're unabashedly older, Aryan types who would look completely natural saluting Hitler, which I suppose is the point since the writer beats us over the head with the parallels to old Germany, what with the blatant bigotry and the "we need elbow room" justification. Their commander even has an indistinct accent vaguely reminiscent of German. Their uniforms seem derived from the SS. Just when you think it can't get more black and white, the space cadets from the other side sit next to the good kids. Black uniforms and white uniforms.The other aspects of the production are not much better. The music is completely forgettable. Costume design is only average for a TV sci-fi movie. And the effects and production design are the usual fare for 1996, less impressive than "Space: Above and Beyond." The virtual reality is another of the most pathetic and unimaginative parts of the movie. They would add glitches in the picture every few seconds, as if we would otherwise forget that it's not part of the "real world." And somehow, I can't imagine slacker guy watching these dull, slow-moving costume pieces straight out of a romance novel. He'd want to just cut to the chase and rip the clothes off the gorgeous woman in the VR. Those VR sequences are a woman's fantasy, not a man's.It all goes on far too long. This could have been done in an hour. Still, despite all its flaws, it was somewhat watchable. Every once in awhile, we do seem to need some simplistic escapism. But we just can't shake the feeling that this would have been right at home in the pages of a comic book.