Star Trek Crap

[Berlin]

Wil Wheaton can act and he had the chops to play a pretty good officer in the later seasons but they Mary-Sued him from the get go and he was never able to escape that image for a good few years in Trek fandom.

Wesley would’ve worked best if he had already been at the academy at the beginning of S1 and graduated in S3 so we could have him assert his place in the crew much more easily and constructively as the seasons progressed. But he is essentially the stereotypical genius kid who wanders the ship, saving it a few times and not having much else to do but act awkward around the senior staff and women onboard.

Pity as the movies would’ve did well with a more experienced Wesley joining the crew and acting as a decent third element to the Picard – Data focus that overtook the films.

[Warbodog]

Comparing to TOS season 3 would make early TNG more bearable. Going back to it when you’re used to the look and feel of the later years, it’s just weird. You’ve done ‘Space Africa’ already, that’s probably as bad as it gets, but there’s also a ‘Space Irish Stereotypes’ one in season two to look forward to.

Even though all Star Trek series are massively variable in quality and have loads of writers, the good stretches really line up with the exec/”showrunner” and you can feel the change when they take over, even if you’re 12 years old and not aware of it – Michael Piller for TNG, Ira Behr for DS9.

[Ben Saunders]

I read that the director on the Space Africa one was the person who decided to make the aliens all black, and was subsequently fired. TOS season three had a couple of clunkers but isn’t as bad as it’s reputation would lead you to believe imo

[Berlin]

‘Up The Long Ladder’ or Space Irish as I’m now calling it was hilariously out of touch for 1988 and wouldn’t have fared much better in 1968. What you had was an American’s view of the Irish as stereotypical rural drunkard simpletons who wept for the old country and all the unmarried women were just waiting for big, strong colonists to take then away to a better life and have a half dozen bairns each.

Yet somehow managing to exist as they are in the 24th century like some lost Amazonian tribe from deepest darkest Galway and yet most bizarrely, not the worst episode out because of the solid story-line running alongside Space Irish about the ethics of cloning.

Fucking drivel but yet works in a manageable way.

[Warbodog]

Look, Colm Meaney’s actually in that one! Considering how angry he got about a leprechaun appearing in DS9 – that they changed to a less culturally insensitive Rumpelstiltskin – I bet he was delighted to be a part of that.

[Berlin]

It’s the only episode you can somehow smell.

[Ben Saunders]

Yikes I can’t wait for that one

[Ben Saunders]

It took until Season 01 Episode 09, but The Battle is the first truly great episode of TNG, imo. That was great. The preceding episode, Justice, was none too shabby either, despite being somewhat of a retread of similar TOS episodes.

[Warbodog]

I remember liking The Battle, 11001001 (didn’t need to look up that title to know it’s correct, FFS) and there’s a story arc later in the year that’s literally mind-blowing.

There’s the “growing the beard” idea that season 2 improves considerably, but I don’t really see that. It has more good episodes, but I’ve always put 1 & 2 in their own formative category before they work out what they’re doing in season 3. That’s one of the strongest years in the franchise.

[Ben Saunders]

The Big Goodbye, Datalore… TNG just keeps getting better

[Ben Saunders]

and Angel One… absolutely terrific. Although while going to rate it on IMDB, I saw it is rated only 5.7 and has been described as a “horrible episode”. Interesting.

[Warbodog]

Angel One is one of those episodes that has a noble intention but gets confused in the execution. The strong women of Woman Planet are basically waiting for dominating human men that they can be traditional wives for, rather than the twinks they’ve got. I was somehow allowed to get away with writing my final 10,000-word dissertation for my “English Literature” degree on Star Trek TOS vs. TNG where I passed off other academics’ opinions as my own, and that was a common complaint.

But more importantly, enjoy spotting that nice Angel One matte painting showing up as other planets again and again.

I’m rewatching season 3 and just saw the “Space IRA” episode (The High Ground) for the first time, since it was banned in the UK in the 90s for being rather insensitive and including a mad off-hand prediction that violence would eventually reunify Ireland. One of the worst episodes generally – season 3 gets weirdly obsessed with angry rebels in the middle, but then it’s back on track.

[Ben Saunders]

I guess it could be seen that way but we only see two of the women fall for non-local men and both for interesting or necessary story reasons. Riker is a total babe so who can blame her tbh. I just really loved Riker’s speech about revolution vs. evolution and how executing the men would just turn them into martyrs, and the stuff with the disease aboard the Enterprise preventing them from beaming up made everything very tense. I thought it was a very well written and tight script, but another one of those where if an episode deals with something like race or gender and is perhaps construed by some to be not totally spot on or insensitive in some way, it causes people to completely write off the script as a hunk of trash with no redeeming qualities, despite the other aspects of the script being quite strong. Like writing off the Space Africa one for being racist when that was just an unfortunate directorial decision which the script did not call for. It still isn’t a particularly good episode, but for other reasons

[Warbodog]

That gets more true as time passes and memory fades. I haven’t seen season 1 since collecting the re-released videos in the late 90s, so I can’t remember much about those nuanced details, just the broad gimmick and received opinion. I wouldn’t write off an episode I can’t remember well without rewatching, but since I remember others from that era much clearer, I probably didn’t watch / like it very much at the time.

I probably overrate some episodes when I agree with them too, like the more outspoken atheist ones, but that’s fine.

[Ben Saunders]

Had to get a month’s free trial of Netflix because multiple downloaded copies of Haven and 11001001 had sound issues, potentially because they were using the surround sound from the Blu-Ray and I only have headphones, and all the perfectly legal copies available online are in horrendous quality, mirrored, or have the speed altered. Absolutely livid that I have to become a law-abiding citizen.

[Warbodog]

I hope Red Dwarf in HD is released for legal paid download in obscure foreign territories, I don’t have a Blu-ray player and don’t like physical belongings any more.

[Ben Saunders]

Echoes of the resolution to M-Corp in the resolution to The Arsenal of Freedom, where they defeat the planet’s defense system by purchasing it and telling to to shutdown. Also a story you could air today and say it’s about a very modern concept, drones.

You were right about every episode ending with a proper resolution, it’s quite nice to see everything resolved and nice and tidy at the end of every episode.

[Ben Saunders]

In the beginning of Symbiosis, they’re investigating a sun, bring it up on the viewer, the light overwhelms everybody and Picard orders a little black circle to be placed in front of the sun on the viewer to cover it up.

Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha

Can’t you just make the image dimmer? It’s not a window

[Ben Saunders]

Also why bother beaming an away team containing your first officer over to a ship that’s about to disintegrate into a planet’s atmosphere when your transporters are clearly operative and you could just beam the six crewmen over?

[Warbodog]

I enjoy early instalment weirdness like that. Like the male skirt uniform in the first episodes and the ‘Vulcanian’/UESPA stuff in TOS. Symbiosis has Wesley getting a drugs are bad lecture like it’s the end of a Sonic cartoon, I can’t remember how cringey it comes across because that was one I didn’t watch much either.

Good spot on The Arsenal of Freedom / M-Corp. That was the first one I saw on TV after being radicalised by First Contact, so my nostalgia mainly starts there. Interest faded by season seven, I never bothered to watch some of the later episodes when the synopses sounded dull or repetitive.

[Ben Saunders]

Just after my post about how they manage to resolve every episode nicely in TNG… in Symbiosis, don’t they just forget about the sun/solar flares and warp out of there leaving that unresolved?!

The drugs lecture wasn’t cringy, maybe it was a bit preachy but it was well-played by Crosby and I found it to be a nice moment. I’m really enjoying Tasha Yar’s presence but I know she leaves the show at the end of season one(?) which is a shame. I like her more than I ever liked Chekov, whose sudden inclusion in seasons two and three of TOS never sat well with me.

The viewscreen has always been a screen and never a window, because in like the second or third episode, and on more than one occasion, Picard orders LaForge to the observation deck to get a “proper look” (through a real window) at what they’re observing. The video effect of placing a little black circle over the sun, a correctly-sized little black circle which they actually move into position (if they have to move it into position did they just get lucky on the size?!) is just so absurd I had to pause the episode to laugh at it.

TOS was more of an “every installment weirdness” thing, they really didn’t seem to try all that hard for continuity back then – Stardates are all over the place, the Prime Directive/General Order One/whatever is inconsistently defined, followed, broken and ignored. Vulcan has no moon until it does in TMP. Etc

[Warbodog]

Yar could have developed nicely, she had more potential than Troi and Crusher if she’d made it to the character-based seasons. There’s a recurring guest character much later on who brings back the girl power a bit, but otherwise it’s mainly romances, mind rapes and nagging mother plots.

I don’t know what they would have done with Worf if she’d stuck around, since I think he was a late addition to the show which is why he doesn’t have a clearly defined role in season 1. With its crowded cast that doesn’t even think to include an engineer.

[Ben Saunders]

Literally the episode after I menton how much I like Yar is the one she leaves in. Damn that hit pretty hard. The episode did seem fairly rushed, but then you can understand why, it leaves time for the ending sequence. I really like Doctor Crusher, I think her dynamic with Picard is interesting, she’s a great actress and her intelligence and devotion to duty are pretty nice. Troi is Troi, she looks great and cries a lot, pretty convincingly, but isn’t the strongest character on the show.

Worf was a late addition if I remember right, and so far isn’t all that enthralling, although I remember him being a pretty funny character later on. His big focus episode where those two other Klingons come aboard the Enterprise ended up being my least favourite so far.

[Plastic Percy]

Worf was originally conceived as a ‘glorified extra’ or secondary character, much like Chief O’Brien. I think Roddenberry’s idea was to him to illustrate about ‘present enemies becoming future friends’ (much like Chekov in TOS). Denise Crosby leaving – apparently with a rather huffy “nobody treats Bing’s granddaughter like this” – worked in his favour as Michael Dorn is a better actor and allowed them to do more with Worf, who was a more interesting character. When she comes back in Yesterday’s Enterprise she sticks out like a sore thumb with her acting. Everyone else has settled into their roles, got to know the characters, but she plays alternate Tasha in a very flat way.

It always sticks in my mind that Crosby clearly quickly regretted leaving the show. Robert Beltran hated doing it as well, but he had the common sense to stick it out for the whole run because it (most likely) netted him a nice little paycheck and royalties over the years.

[Ben Saunders]

>and there’s a story arc later in the year that’s literally mind-blowing.
I see what you did there. Man, that was gruesome and unexpected. I’m enjoying this.

I did read on Crosby’s Wikipedia that she asked to return to the show later, and did so in a couple of ways. I had no idea she was related to Bing, and I feel I’m a bit young to even know who Bing is, really, outside of a vague familiarity.

[Ben Saunders]

THAT was the season finale for season one?! Nothing happened!

[Warbodog]

Conspiracy is a really good episode, but that gory ending is fucking mental. It was censored by the BBC, so when I eventually got it on video it was even bigger surprise. At 13 I thought it was hilarious and rewound it again and again, but now it seems so out of place.

[Ben Saunders]

Conspiracy is an episode that raises the stakes to an astronomical level, and the gore is the icing on the “holy shit” cake. If similar gore occurred at the end of Encounter at Farpoint or Code of Honour, it would be completely out of place and gratuitous… it’s still gratuitous, but sort of earned. It’s a shame that The Neutral Zone doesn’t even attempt to build on Conspiracy in any meaningful way, and is a low-key, rushed mess, which should have come BEFORE Conspiracy, being a total letdown after the darkness of Skin of Evil and Conspiracy.

I read that The Neutral Zone was originally supposed to be, or lead into, a three-parter which then lead into an extremely arc-heavy season two featuring the proto-Borg, so it could have kept ramping things up, but then… it didn’t. Writer’s strike. What a shame. I wonder how different the course of TNG and Star Trek in general would have been without that strike.

[Warbodog]

I think the Borg were planned to be the conspiracy aliens in some more direct bug-man form, but when they couldn’t think of how to make them look convincing or within budget, they scrapped that and made a new adversary. The Neutral Zone still works as a prelude to the Borg and is referenced later… despite that episode itself being a weird mish-mash of completely unrelated plots.

So Conspiracy isn’t followed up on, but if you liked the conspiracy theme, Star Trek VI and mid-DS9 are heavy on that.

The writer’s strike afflicted the already severely afflicted Star Trek V too. Enjoy.

[Warbodog]

I just watched that Conspiracy clip in HD for the first time. I always thought that was Remmick’s guts being pushed out by the mother creature, but now I realise it’s just little bugs. That makes it maybe 10% less WTF TNG.

Imagine if they’d combined that plot with Tasha Yar’s exit and the last we saw of her was her smouldering, headless corpse. “Au revoir, Natasha.”

[Ben Saunders]

I can’t wait for Star Trek V, sounds like a right hoot. A different writer’s strike more recently caused the finale for season one of Chuck to be a total non-event, too. It wasn’t a bad episode, it just wasn’t a finale.

That would have been far too horrific, at least as is it happens to a character we don’t particularly like, so there’s a cathartic element to it. And Tasha’s funeral would be absolutely horrific had that magnitude of disgustingness happened to her just hours beforehand.

[GlenTokyo]

Love Conspiracy. First time I saw it was when Netflix got it in HD as I was just a casual viewer when TNG was on in the UK in the 90s, plus I don’t think it was shown anyway so I was genuinely gobsmacked by it.

[Warbodog]

BBC showed the episode, just cut around the gore. Quite a few episodes were edited like that, if something was deemed too violent or gross. The only episode outright banned was The High Ground (‘Space IRA’) and four TOS episodes were considered too violent/sadistic until they were eventually allowed in the 90s.

In America, the only censorship I’m aware of is some Southern states banning or censoring the Kirk/Uhura kiss and DS9’s same-sex kiss in the 1990s. Blasting some guy’s face off at teatime is fine though.

[Ben Saunders]

Started season two. I actually quite liked the scene in The Child where they all sit and discuss what they should do with Troi’s baby while she’s sitting right there, with them acting as if she isn’t. They’re discussing the issue like they would any other space anomaly or cloaked vessel, almost dehumanising her and removing her agency. It’s not very nice, but it’s very interesting, and quite a strong moment when she gets them to shut up and tells them she’s going to have it. The episode does suffer a little from “Sarah Sutton In Logopolis Syndrome” where character’s reactions to things are very understated or hardly register at all, although not to such a degree as Nyssa.

The “what is death” scene in Where Silence Has Lease was pretty nice.

Bring back Doctor Crusher!! Where did she go :(

[Warbodog]

I always liked the Nagilum one, even if it’s a bit silly and Worf’s idiot-berzerker characterisation is ridiculous. It’s the cosmic horror of TOS’s Doomsday Machine, giant amoeba etc. Space still feels big and scary in season 2, which you don’t really get in later years when the universe building gets better and there’s a bit less exploring and more diplomacy and character-based-stories-that-are-technically-better.

Pulaski & Data seems like an attempt to do Bones & Spock again, but it didn’t catch on. Geordi & Data’s friendship is the heart of TNG for me, I think that kicks off around here. I can’t watch them now without thinking of Troy & Abed in Community.

[Warbodog]

Looking at the season 2 episode list through 21-year-old adolescent memory, there are maybe 8-10 decent keepers in there (of 22) and some really dire stretches with 3-4 episodes in a row of absolute tedium that were very disappointing when I was watching on a weekly basis and waiting for them to get to the good ones. Not a terrible year, but not one to be proud of.

In better news, the back half of TNG season three is almost one top 10 candidate after another, definitely my favourite stretch of the series. Yesterday’s Enterprise wasn’t anywhere near the definitive classic I remembered though – mainly a mash-up of two of the most famous 60s episodes, propped up by the sort of continuity/fan-service overload they hadn’t really done before. Other episodes were pleasant surprises.

Don’t think I’ll keep going after that point, it averages to a comforting ‘good’ with somehow not so many stand-outs and a more run-of-the-mill feeling now they know what works and will eventually run it into the ground (then make another spin-off with a different ship and cast so they can secretly keep on making more seasons of the same tired thing).

[Warbodog]

So I guess I can stop talking about Star Trek now? (DS9 is best).

[Ben Saunders]

The Outrageous Okona… yikes. Are we supposed to like Okana? Are we supposed to care about this Eastenders In Space plot? They were clearly going for some Han Solo/loveable rogue type character, but all we got was a smug arsehole with no real charisma.

The subplot about Data trying to be funny was excellent though, a real shame that they didn’t marry it with a more engaging A plot.

[Plastic Percy]

Good thing Data didn’t use the holodeck to talk to Bernard Manning about comedy.

[Ben Saunders]

The Schizoid Man was very good, despite the fact that I absolutely hate the cunt who inhabited Data’s body. Cue extremely inappropriate laughter at the “women aren’t people” line.

[Warbodog]

Well, that self-imposed ban didn’t last for long. Maybe someone needs to make it official for me.

I just rewatched the big three Borg episodes. I was thinking I might have outgrown the Borg, since Daleks and Cybermans are never interesting to me, but those episodes are so good. To avoid title spoilers, ‘A New Hope’ is a much-needed blow to the high-and-mighty early TNG, while ‘Empire’ & ‘Jedi’ have fantastic character stuff and palpable dread. Definitely among the best episodes of the series.

[Ben Saunders]

Two episodes that reminded me of Red Dwarf in a row – Measure of a Man echoes The Last Day while The Dauphin echoes Camille. Wesley suddenly being really upset that his girl can shapeshift was really strange. Is Wesley Crusher transphobic? It got even weirder when her real, true form was incredibly beautiful. They probably weren’t trying to say anything with it, but it was still a bit odd.

Measure of a Man is of course as good as its reputation would lead you to believe. It was really sweet when Data pulled out that little hologram of Tasha.

[Ben Saunders]

I already know the name of the big famous Borg episodes and some of what happens in it thanks to popular culture, and I’m sure I’ll have their other appearances spoiled by the Netflix synopses/thumbnails.

[Warbodog]

DS9 implies the advantages a shapeshifting sexual partner can have, Wesley will curse his narrow-mindedness later in life. DS9 was more honest about what people use the holodeck for too.

Measure of a Man’s one of those objectively top 10 episodes I never loved that much, there are other Data episodes I prefer. But definitely a landmark and one that’ll get brought up in the future when AI reaches that point.

The next few are good. The Royale’s divisive, some people thinking it’s a quirky, creepy mystery, others a load of bollocks. Very TOS / Twilight Zone.

[Ben Saunders]

>DS9 was more honest about what people use the holodeck for too.
Endless shagging, I’m sure. 11001001 almost felt like it was going to get into how dangerous Holodecks can become, with a lonely first officer falling in love with a hologram and electing to spend more and more time away from real life, deeply entrenched in his hologrammatic fantasy. A bit like Better Than Life. But then it didn’t.

I gave Measure of a Man an 8, I don’t think it’s the greatest episode ever, but it was definitely solid, and elevated Data in my eyes to one of my favourite characters.

>some people thinking it’s a quirky, creepy mystery, others a load of bollocks
A bit like Ghost Light, then? With me in the latter group

[Warbodog]

They made your holodeck idea as season 3’s Hollow Pursuits, with a flawed audience surrogate character rather than Riker. *That’s* a top 10 episode.

[Ben Saunders]

Can’t wait.

Time Squared was good. Managed to get really into it despite being extremely sick which usually limits my enjoyment of things. I like how we went from a comedy episode into a deadly serious one, though the opening of the episode remained comic. I liked the no-win scenario and the decision of Picard having to do what he did, I just wish it impacted him more and we had a little scene of him having to deal with the trauma of such an image.

We almost got a “reverse the polarity” line, with the polarity of the power being wrong for the shuttlecraft and them having to re-align the phase. Almost.

[Warbodog]

(Ti)me² featuring two Picards who don’t get along. Broadcast April 3, 1989. I hope Rob and Doug called their lawyer.

[Warbodog]

It’s Future Echoes as well, isn’t it?

[Ben Saunders]

The two Picards don’t really interact much and when they do one of them is hellbent on carrying out a task so it’s not all that similar, Future Echoes maybe.

Just reached the Space Irish episode and… yikes. Q Who was decent but absolutely not the 9 that IMDB claims it is. And yes, the Netflix synopsis did spoil the appearance of that enemy. But then I knew already that it was Q who flung them into that encounter so it was hardly a surprise.

[Author]

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