Ridonkulous
I mean, honestly:
Ridonkulous. (I said that already, didn’t I?)
The entire series is streaming on Netflix. A couple weeks ago, I decided to watch it. I made it half-way through one episode and decided to start watching Doctor Who instead.
David Tennant > William Shatner.
Dalek > Gorn.
Oh, and Open Thread!
P.S. Someone pointed out, rightfully, that I should compare old Doctor Who episodes to old Star Trek episodes. To that, I say — I’d rather watch David Tennant! (Haven’t gotten to Matt Smith yet…)
[via Boing Boing]
Little Boots
thread. check it out. new thread.
Hal
If your feeling at all depressed, please don’t click on the link. Piercing blue eyes of abandoned baby ginger seal will haunt you for days…
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2037734/The-lonely-seal-wanted-Pup-abandoned-having-rare-brown-fur.html
Yutsano
Oh. No. You. Did. NOT.
This will be a fun can of worms to watch unwind.
Little Boots
oh, awesome.
and stop trying to kill shatner with styrofoam. it’s not gonna work.
Little Boots
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4y7aVx8oZ4s
just to see if this works here.
Amanda in the South Bay
David Tennant? Seriously, do modern day geeky hipsters even realise there were Doctors before Tennant? You should be really comparing TOS with the 60s era Doctors.
Little Boots
it does.
YellowJournalism
Dr Who versus Star Trek?
And you guys thought the ABL threads were contemptuous.
Little Boots
yes, dr. who has a long and storied history.
Little Boots
contemptuous?
Bondo
Tennant is awesome, I’m frankly astounded that the new Who has never made a casting mistake with any of the major characters.
But, Kirk is fantastic too, there’s certainly room for both.
Little Boots
there’s something very special and wonderful about kirk. it should not be lost. and this is why william shatner should always be loved, no matter what. there’s a whole lotta cheese and silliness, but there is something pleasant in the original star trek. only goobs cannot appreciate it.
Keith
I’ve been watching The Key to Time all day. War Tom Baker!
Little Boots
kirk is so wonderful, in a terrible, cheesy way, but still …
ruemara
I like both and this is like comparing Apples to a Remington Portable.
Fwiffo
Even more ridiculous scene:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOBbmdJTLdE
PanAmerican
Tom Baker. Duh. Which is to say Dr. Who is a lot like pro wrestling. I don’t know anyone who watched either past the age of 12. Except that dopey hippie chick we bought weed from in high school. ….do I want to hang around, get high and watch Dr. Who? Sounds great… but, uh, we are on our way to get Sushi and not pay…
Little Boots
comments not posting.
testing.
Little Boots
okay, guess they are.
piratedan
multicultural ethos…. check
women in positions of authority…. check
liberal outlooks espoused…. check
positive reinforcement of man overcoming his shortcomings… check
not all aliens are out to kill us…. check
science!…. check
spaceships!….. check
Star Trek for the win……
I like Dr. Who but comparing Tennant to Kirk is like comparing U2 to the Beatles… both were/are great but from different eras. Now if you wanna compare shows, concepts, ideas from the same era… sure lets have that conversation but then you’re looking at Shatner vs Hartnell, not Tennant. Perhaps considering as long as Shatner was in the role throughout films, perhaps Tom Baker would be a better choice. Heck in that fight, I’d rather throw in Patrick Macnee from The Avengers… as always, ymmv….
Little Boots
@piratedan:
don’t forget the uhura kiss. pretty daring, in its time.
Jennifer
That fight scene is almost as awesome as the Ultraman fight scenes.
Yutsano
@piratedan:
Adjusted. Let’s not overlook George Takei playing an Asian in an era when white actors were often cast in Asian roles.
Little Boots
@Yutsano:
and that other thing. although nobody knew then.
piratedan
@Little Boots: ground breaking, not to mention the majority of the stories were thought provoking and infecting young minds that religion didn’t have all of the answers. Inspired breakthroughs in science and technology that are still relevant today. Like cool ideas are supposed to.
Little Boots
@piratedan:
agree. it really made an impact.
space isn’t scary. it’s inspiring.
piratedan
@Yutsano: ty, for that modification/clarification.
I don’t want to have this come off as slagging Dr. Who, I LIKE Dr. Who, its just that TOS was such a cultural landmark that I guess its been simply taken for granted.
Jennifer
Why is a comment with no naughty words in moderation?
trollhattan
Today I saw my friend who’d been at the Reno air races yesterday. As it turned out he was about 25 feet from where the plane hit, and has a bruise the size of a grapefruit in his shoulder where he was hit by debris.
An ugly, ugly tale and he and his friends are very, very lucky to be alive. Yeah, there are pics.
I’d rather fight an oversized lizard.
Little Boots
@trollhattan:
damn. that would suck. go to a show, and then … shit.
jheartney
The various Trek series had many ups and downs. “Arena” was one of the downs. While admittedly dopey, however, it’s not particularly offensive. For that, you need “The Way to Eden.” Nor is it the series’ biggest unintentional laff riot – try “Spock’s Brain” for that.
Little Boots
yeah, definitely ups and downs. and some of the downs. jeebus.
trollhattan
@Little Boots:
I can’t begin to fathom. They had seconds to comprehend what was happening and no time to react, it just unfolded in front of them. He told me the plane went into the first few rows, not in front of the seats as initially reported. One friend had shrapnel wounds and another was splattered with body parts, including brains. A lifetime of nightmares is the reward for those lucky enough to walk away.
Little Boots
@trollhattan:
me neither. just. cruel, cruel fate. do they know what happened yet? did he have a heart attack or a stroke? not that it matters. just a horrible accident.
Mnemosyne
@Little Boots:
As far as anyone can tell, it was a mechanical failure — there’s footage of black smoke coming from the rear of the plane just before it crashed. It probably had very little to do with the pilot.
Little Boots
@Mnemosyne:
damn, I mean either way. just, damn. he was 80 I saw, so I assumed, but still, whatever, just very bad luck for everyone involved.
Sleeper
This is madness. “Arena” is classic stuff, classic! Look, DOCTOR WHO is all well and good, enjoyable and usually well-written, and I think “Blink” is one of the best sci-fi/horror hours of TV ever filmed. But STAR TREK sets the standard. You’re doing yourself a disservice if you don’t give at least the following episodes a shot:
“City on the Edge of Forever” – usually acknowledged as the best episode of the original series, with good reason
“Balance of Terror” – basically TREK’s version of RUN SILENT RUN DEEP (or HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER, if you want to be anachronistic about it)
“Shore Leave” – silly, but worth it to see Kirk getting the shit kicked out of him for about twenty minutes by a guy with the worst-sounding Irish accent in a series replete with terrible-sounding accents
“Space Seed” – Khaaaaaaan!
“Errand of Mercy” – great Cold War episode with Kirk and the Klingons
“Mirror, Mirror” – goatees = evil
“Let That Be Your Last Battlefield” – TREK tackles racism, which apparently was responsible for a lot of not very nice things over the years; stars Frank Gorshin, not as the Riddle, unfortunately
“Requiem for Methusaleh” – sort of maybe a little bit similar to “The Tempest” (but no Robby the Robot this time)
Go on, do it! I dare ya! (At least give the first one a viewing. That’s fantastic stuff.)
trollhattan
@Little Boots:
We’re not wired to comprehend watching people die savagely, much less from mere feet away. As lucky as my friend and his buddies are, they’ll be haunted by this the rest of their lives. I confess it’s not easy to even discuss it with him. I prefer my disasters sanitized.
Little Boots
they will. you’re right. I can’t imagine. I mean, I can, but not really. it’s just a terrible moment. no reason, just suckitude. sorry for your friends.
fuckwit
@Yutsano: A GAY Asian actor, on top of that, wasn’t mainstream for the day at all.
Little Boots
@fuckwit:
I know.
that is the best. I mean, nobody knew, but still. what a great thing.
Little Boots
and I hope this works, cause this expresses my view:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puVmKfCwb4M
tam1MI
You should be really comparing TOS with the 60s era Doctors.
Even better, she should check out the British sci-fi series BLAKE’S 7, if for no other reason than she can experience the awesomeness of the Original Magnificent Bastard, Kerr Avon.
Cliff
I don’t know what you’re talking about, ABL, that shit’s fucking gold. Look at that. Kirk’s so strong he can fight a lizard monster that can throw fucking boulders.
As for why they’re moving so slow, they’re obviously on a planet with a thin atmosphere. You try fighting a lizard monster at 14000 feet above sea level, see how fast you move.
Also, Tom Baker is the Best Doctor.
Little Boots
@tam1MI:
oh just let kirk be kirk.
Yutsano
@fuckwit: True, although Sulu himself was never portrayed as gay. In fact in the movies Sulu has a daughter helming the Enterprise. Homosexuality seemed to remain a bridge too far for Roddenberry. Star Trek, however, did have the first lesbian kiss on prime time television. even if the method for getting there was rather contrived. That happened after his death though.
Little Boots
yeah, the 50’s were liberated about everything EXCEPT that one thing.
Anne Laurie
@Jennifer: Far as I can tell, FYWP thinks ‘Ultraman’ might be some kind of naughty male-enhancement drug.
Ian
STAR TREK sets the standard
Star Trek first aired in 1966.
(Youtube) Here’s Dr. Who’s companion Ian Chesterton doing the Vulcan neck pinch in 1964 (“The Azteks”).
Yes, that’s in context. He needs to drop an Aztek warrior without killing him, so he goes for a pressure point. Don’t ask me how an English schoolteacher knows how to do this.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Little Boots:
When it happened I never thought anything about it (I was nine at the time). Didn’t even note it as something big.
Kids.
Little Boots
@Little Boots:
oops, 60’s.
still bitter.
steve
It always bothers me when people make fun of old Star Trek TOS episodes (unless it’s a really dumb episode like “Spock’s Brain). It reminds me of hipsters who laugh like lunatics when someone in a 90s movie pulls out a huge cell phone. “Ha ha ha ha! Lookit that ginormous cell phone! Yeah, people back then sure were stupid!”
Anyway, comparing current Dr. Who to 1960s Star Trek is grossly unfair. Try comparing TOS to 60s and 70s Dr. Who, which generally had the production values of high school theater. Back then I was moderately involved in SF fandom, and I would have been hard pressed to find anyone who actually *liked* Dr. Who. Most of my friends thought it was impossibly lame (although some of us thought Sarah Jane Smith was hot).
Little Boots
@steve:
agree. look at the times, and then see how advanced star trek was. it was pretty amazing for that era.
Little Boots
I need to sleep. but I can’t.
steve
@Ian:
So you’re saying that the Vulcan neck pinch was stolen from Dr. Who? Leonard Nimoy, who says he came up with the idea, might take issue with your claim. Anyway, hardly anybody in the USA was even aware of Dr. Who in the 1960s. I seriously doubt that Roddenberry and his writers had ever seen a single episode.
Donald G
Classic Star Trek and Doctor Who are my two major fandoms. And contrary to PanAmerican at #15, I didn’t encounter Doctor Who until I was 12 (1978) and didn’t become obsessed until 1983 a few months prior to my 17th birthday. Classic Trek was the show that shaped my childhood – and yes, I accepted wholeheartedly the fan propaganda of the seventies about Star Trek’s importance as a groundbreaking television show and the optimistic vision of the future, and the tolerant liberalism (albeit a Kennedy-esque Cold War liberalism with the tolerance more honored in the breach than in the observance).
Star Trek and Doctor Who partake of different dramatic structures and conventions. TREK aimed to be the televised equivalent of literary science fiction, trying to aim for the prestige and respect accorded to Serling’s TWILIGHT ZONE (and didn’t get it in its lifetime, and there are a number of scripts through all three seasons which show why). WHO was aimed for a wider audience in its home country and structured along the lines of a cliffhanger serial and, despite its limitations in budget and expertise, managed a greater flexibility (and ultimately, sophistication) in narrative styles and subject matter that belie its “scare the kiddies” formulae and videotape format.
Yes, STAR TREK does an admirable job of embodying the positives of American idealism, but modern TREK maintained – and became defensive about maintaining – its blind-spots on certain subjects (like sexual orientation) long past the time to break down those barriers on American television. At the time official TREK was ultimately reinforcing hetero-normativity in stories like “the Outcast” and “Rejoined”, the DOCTOR WHO franchise through its spinoff fiction was embracing LGBT themes and its LGBT writers and fans so that by the time the series was revived under Russell “Queer as Folk” Davies, queer characters and themes were hardly an issue within Who-fandom.
Additionally, when it comes to exploring the dangers of living in worlds ravaged by capitalism and corporatism gone wild, I’d stack the Doctor Who scripts of Robert Holmes and Malcolm Hulke up against Roddenberry and company’s most anvilicious allegories any day.
Donald G
@steve:
No, Ian doesn’t claim that Trek stole the neck pinch from DOCTOR WHO. What he says is that a similar concept appeared there two years before STAR TREK premiered – no more, no less. Pointing that out is not an accusation of intellectual thievery on the part of STAR TREK.
I’m fairly certain that the use in pulp fiction of esoteric martial arts techniques involving nerve blocks predate both STAR TREK and DOCTOR WHO.
bin Lurkin'
Star Trek’s Nichelle Nichols on How Martin Luther King Jr. Changed Her Life
Donald G
@steve:
I think that it would probably be more accurate to compare the production values of DOCTOR WHO to the ABC Gothic soap-opera DARK SHADOWS (1966-71). Both shows were notoriously low-budget, shot on videotape, and had to make use of both practical and in-camera effects and pioneering work in chromakey.
Arclite
Tom Baker FTW.
bin Lurkin'
As a fledgling crackerlet growing up in the suburban deep South in the sixties Star Trek was the first vision I ever had in the media of a post rashulist society. My high school was segregated but for one hour a week my black and white TV was not.
bin Lurkin'
FYWP, now my previous comment shows up at last…
harlana
BJ’s favoritee teevee shows blogs now? pleeez! i know, i know, fuck off and move to the next thread
i know there are a few MST3k afficionados here, anybody wanna throw us a bone?
didn’t think so
so there, I AM a geek, also too
(and for me, the original Star Trek is the ONLY Star Trek so I am a crotchety old geek as well–GET OFF MY STAR TREK LAWN!)
magurakurin
ABL, by the tone of your post it is obvious you don’t get it in regard to Star Trek. That is one of the most awesome of all Star Trek episodes.
You can slag Star Trek if you want, but complaining that it somehow isn’t realistic (or as you put it ridonculous) means, as I said, that you don’t get it.
Seriously. You don’t get it.
And you are missing out, because Star Trek is a wonderful, wonderful thing.
Johannes
@harlana: Knew I liked you Harlana. There is no TREK other than the original TREK.
On matters Classic Whovian, I’m a fan of Hartnell and Davison, but frankly, any Doctor prior to Colin Baker is pretty god with me (McCoy tried, but scripts were barely coherent in his era–still, when he got a good one, he could do it justice–note the nice work by both McCoy and Anthony Ainley in “Survival.”)
Ah, the morning reading of a geek…
Samara Morgan
my personal favorite.
i loved the device of the poisonous bite to get Kirk some more exotic tail.
and also the attack of the Mugatu gave us this cultural icon.
Omnes Omnibus
@piratedan: Throw me into the Avengers camp. Esp. the Emma Peel seasons. Oh, yeah, I am also in the Start Trek > Dr. Who camp. (Rolling Stones > Beatles; Prince > Michael Jackson; Clash > Sex Pistols; Replacements > Husker Du; Bronte > Austin; Coleridge > Wordsworth; Biggie > Tupac. Just to cover my bases.)
harlana
@Samara Morgan:
@Johannes:
one of <a href="@mypersonal favorites
a veritable “wowee!” moment for the little white girl raised in the 60’s south!
harlana
@Omnes Omnibus: aaah, the Avengers w/ Emma Peel, also too
finally, we agree on something
Samara Morgan
@Omnes Omnibus: tokio hotel > justin bieber
harlana
“I’m not going back, Jim!”
{swings upside down on tree branch}
Samara Morgan
i guess tom and bill kraulitz > justin bieber is a better compare.
Samara Morgan
@harlana: i dont get the link, sry.
Omnes Omnibus
@Samara Morgan: You seem to miss the essence of the comparison, in that both items must be good and one. Those are both horrible.
@harlana: I wasn’t aware that we disagreed on so much. BTW the movie version of the Avengers should simply be shot on sight – as a mercy killing. I saw it when it came out; I had high hopes given the cast, Ralph Fiennes, Uma Thurman, and Sean Connery, but, good god, it was bad.
Rick Taylor
David Tennant wasn’t even around back when I was first watching Dr. Who.
Sure you can pick when one of the silliest Star Trek episodes and make fun of it. Most Star Trek episodes were pretty bad, but the best of the old star trek episodes were better than the best of the Dr. Who episodes I grew up with. Certainly more thoughtful; they were directed at adults.
Klingons > Daleks
At least when I was watching both shows. Daleks were a one dimensional villain, to say the least. Exterminate!
Samara Morgan
@Omnes Omnibus: only bieber is awful as an androgynous rock star. At the VMAs he looked like somebody’s grandma.
And his musik sukks ass. Just ax ABL.
Tom and Bill are superawsome counter culture avatars….except for old ppl i guess.
:)
schrodinger's cat
Who is Dr. Who? Star Trek is one of my favorite shows. TOS, was before my time, but loved TNG and DS9. DS9 is the best Star Trek in my opinion, so relevant to our current situation.
Even the recurring characters were awesome I am thinking of Garak, Kai Winn and Dukat.
CynDee
1. If you want to see great fight scenes, watch these old movies: Scaramouche, and El Cid.
2. Reno “Air Races” — just think about this. Not a very good idea to race planes in the air, is it. They already had crashes in 1994 and 1998. In Florida there is a several-day anuual “Fly-In” in Lakeland during which there are usually one to four crashes. The locals dread it every year. Like a lot of bad ideas, it just keeps going.
eastriver
Lady*, part of me would like to think that you’re spewing idiotic, bomb-throwing statements just to pump up the comment count and raise your lowly bloggy profile. No one can be so skull-fuckingly stupid as to think that Doctor Who is better than OG Trek. Right?
Oops. My bad.
This is you we’re talking about.
You should be banned from the internet, because one day you’re going to type something so astronomically stupid that you actually break the internet. Not possible?
face/hands/shuddery sigh
*give you respect and props by calling you by your last name
Omnes Omnibus
@Samara Morgan: Yes, fine, dear. The comparison still requires both to be good. If Bieber is bad, then both are not good. Therefore, the comparison fails. It is the difference between saying Lobster > crab (a subjective value judgment between two well-regarded shellfish) saying lobster > belladonna (a comparison between a well-regarded shellfish and poison). Comprends-toi?
WereBear
Geez, the things to compare 1960’s Star Trek to is the OTHER “science fiction” on TV at the time… not only the Dr. Who but the gawdawful Lost in Space. Looking back on my childhood the TV was like 90% Westerns and everyone had laudromats and no one bled when they were shot.
Roddenberry pushed the envelope as far as they would let him; and on things like Women in Charge and Kissing Black People they didn’t let him get very far at all. But it was incredible at the time; just like The Great Train Robbery packed them in back in 1903.
Heck, I’ll stick up for The Invaders; yes, it was basically The Fugitive revamped, but they managed to stick in a scene between a married African American couple that I remember to this day… at eight, I learned a lot about racism from that one scene. They had to sneak stuff in back then… Serling said that he went to fantasy and science fiction because they wouldn’t let him say the same things in a contemporary setting.
Omnes Omnibus
@CynDee: I will grant you the fight sequences, but Scaramouche is simply an awful movie.
bcinaz
Matt Smith = Best.Doctor.Ever. Even better than Tom Baker.
gnomedad
A few years after the original Trek was in syndication, some friends and I were trying to get someone to give it a try. The first episode he caught was the Space Hippy ep (“The Way to Eden”). Groan.
Also, I found “Last Battlefield” cringeworthy; sure it was anti-racism, but in a “both sides do it” sense (ahead of its time, I guess). The repeated shots with the camera zooming in and out on the flashing Red Alert light (DRAMA!) convinced me a noob was directing.
huckster
@harlana: I only like the Joel episodes
Egypt Steve
Kirk, Spock, Bones: Ego, Superego, Id. Everything else fakes it; this went right for the archetypes.
Top 5: City on the Edge of Forever.
Mirror, Mirror
Amok Time
Trouble with Tribbles
Devil in the Dark.
Speaking of Amok Time: I can’t be bothered to learn how to embed, but check this out, if you haven’t before:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FA8-pSznWA0&feature=fvst
If you don’t dig all this, then fuck you, youngster. And get off my lawn.
suzanne
@Johannes:
Oh, bite me. TNG is pretty damn great.
I’ve been re-watching on my Netflix. So damn awesome.
Egypt Steve
@gnomedad: Yeah, but you have to admit Frank Gorshin was great.
Hawes
Personally, I think Kirk should be grateful that the Gorn left his inhaler back on his spaceship. That’s the nasty case of asthma I have EVAH heard.
It’s probably why he couldn’t move that fast.
Poor lizardman.
patrick II
This particular episode brings back memories. I was a teenager when Star Trek was first on. I was at my then girlfriends house watching tv with her mom and dad when we were trying to decide which of the four channels to watch that night. They had never watched Star Trek, but I lobbied for it telling them it was a really great show, so we all watched. It was this episode, probably the worst episode of Star Trek with the worst fight, that was broadcast that night. I can still see the look that girl’s dad gave me — like WTF? Except we didn’t say “F” in those days.
KXB
David Tennant – he with the billboard-sized teeth and excessive hair gel? Yeah right.
Wag
Why limit ourselves to the small screen when it comes to Star Trek? I’m a fan of TOS dating back to the early ’70s, and I thought the last movie was a rocking reinvention of the franchise.
Discuss.
LongHairedWeirdo
I think you mean he gave you the WTH-like look, where the “H” stood for aitch-ee-double-hockysticks because they didn’t even *explain* the hideously awful “H” word back then.
Origuy
The episode “Arena” was based on a classic short story by Fredric Brown with the same name. Star Trek gave Brown a story credit, but he didn’t use the lame gunpowder trick.
normal liberal
@Egypt Steve: Devil in the Dark! A double-whammy episode, with scary murderous pizza turning out to be a desperate mother protecting her children, and a side order of anti-corporatism, with Kirk delivering righteous smackdown on the thoughtless and greedy miners who’d been smashing the pizza eggs. (I think it was a pizza. We didn’t get a color tv until the late 70’s, so it could have been anything, really.)
I didn’t see the show when it first ran, but reruns that ran every afternoon at 4 were always a major discussion item at school,at least among the geeks. I had a high school English teacher who ran the Gorshin episode in class every year – oddly, he was also an Ayn Rand freak.
Dr. Who, even in the Baker days, just doesn’t compare.
West of the Rockies (formerly Frank W.)
I don’t think anyone has yet mentioned the point that Star Trek presented the first interracial kiss on national American television: Uhura and Kirk in “Plato’s Children”. Star Trek remains iconic, entertaining and inspiring people world-wide for decades.
Water balloon
This time you’ve gone too far. Besides, The Next Generation is the best of Trek, at least if you start with season 3. DS9 is pretty good too, despite it’s many goofy macho speeches and boring battles.
Water balloon
@Donald G: How does “The Outcast”reinforce heteronormativity? In the end,Soren gets space lobotomized for not conforming to her society’s gender norms, and this is shown to be a horrible thing. It’s true they chickened out by making Soren identify as female rather than male as opposed to her species’ normative asexualness, but I think the episode still holds up.
Judas Escargot
Watching Dr Who on PBS in the Seventies was something one did in a dark room every Thursday night, all alone, nervously hoping that no one would walk in on you. Much like masturbation.
BTW, I’d pay good money to watch Ben Sisko do this to Matt Smith’s Doctor.
Brian S
@bin Lurkin’: Thanks a ton for that link. That’s a hell of a story.
Shawn in ShowMe
@Water balloon:
I thought TNG was a stunning achievement given the iconic status of the original. To young sci-fi geeks growing up in the early 80s/90s they really seemed like family.
On the original series, there were only really three relationships that mattered Kirk/Spock, Kirk/Bones, Spock/Bones. The TNG the writers broadened their focus — more characters and relationships were allowed to shine. And the TNG classic villains, as a group, were definitely more three-dimensional.
Star Trek TOS, of course, was light years of anything else at the time. Sci-fi fans were spoiled with an abundant of riches in the 90s — two classic Star Trek fans AND Babylon 5.
Egypt Steve
@normal liberal: Yeah, I love “Devil in the Dark” for the mind-meld. Weep for the Children! Eternity … stops!
kideni
Is it OK if I love Star Trek and Dr Who equally, appreciating all of their various incarnations on their own merits? Or is that too wishy-washy multicultural liberal of me? I didn’t care for Colin Baker and Peter Davidson as the Doctor, though. And Voyager nearly drove me away from the Star Trek universe.
On a tangent, I find the differing production values between US and UK television shows fascinating, especially before the ’90s. We’ve been watching “I, Claudius” (tenuous connection to the conversation: British television, and Patrick Stewart has a prominent role [with hair! probably not his!] in several episodes), which is from 1976-77. It was a prestige production, but comparing the sets and the staging to something like “Roots,” which was made in the US around the same time, the differences are staggering. American shows have so much more money to throw at what they do, and that means they can get away with weak performances if everything around them still looks good. You realize how much British actors needed to carry a show with their acting, since the cardboard sets, awful makeup, and cheesy crowd noises aren’t fooling anyone. The great actors and actresses make you forget how sad the surroundings are (and the weak performances make you wonder if you’re watching a Monty Python skit, but there it is).
gnomedad
@kideni:
Time for this again, I think.
russell
It’s like a bar fight on quaaludes.
Also, that creature is a little slow on the uptake.
Djur
I like both shows, although I like TOS and old Who better than new Who, and DS9 better than all of them.
@Donald G: How does “Rejoined” enforce heteronormativity? I thought it was a fairly sophisticated way of handling the issue within the bounds of the studio’s cowardice. They could have never done a show directly about homosexuality because it wasn’t supposed to be an issue in Federation society. “Rejoined” did a good job creating a surrogate issue and driving the plot through that.
Obviously it would have been preferable to actually have gay characters, but the producers refused to do it (to the dismay of the writers, directors, and actors).
Also, I sort of think that it’s unfair to compare spinoff and fan material for Who to Star Trek material broadcasting on network TV and hold the latter at fault for not being as socially bold. When a series is a complete failure and write-off like Who was in the ’90s, it’s easy to take risks.
kideni
@gnomedad: Excellent!
Tim in SF
ABL, you’ve finally gone too far.
You can’t write off Star Trek because of the craptastic Gorn episode. Why don’t you pick the ten best Who episodes and compare them to the ten best Trek episodes? No freaking contest, no freaking way, no chance does Who come out on top?
City on the Edge of Forever.
Mirror, Mirror
Amok Time
Trouble with Tribbles
Devil in the Dark.
What who episodes are as good as any of those? Pffft!
Also, you can’t compare cute young David Tennant with fat old William Shatner. You compare Tennant with Chris Pine, the new Kirk.
Ben Cisco
@schrodinger’s cat:
Agreed, on both counts.
ABL
@Tim in SF: hahaha. ok ok. mea culpa!
ABL
I was talking to my mom about Star Trek this morning and she gave me a good talking to about it. :)
FDRLincoln
Yeah, ABL, you have to give it another chance…don’t just pick a random episode.
City on the Edge of Forever
Mirror, Mirror
Balance of Terror
Devil in the Dark
Amok Time
Trouble with Tribbles
Those are all sound choices. I would also recommend:
The Doomsday Machine: the original 1960s special effects might be distracting, so if you like you might want to watch the re-mastered version from a couple of years ago. This episode is basically “Moby Dick in Space” with a touch of “The Caine Mutiny” and features an AMAZING performance by guest star William Windom.
The Menagerie, Parts 1 and 2: This incorporates footage from the original pilot featuring Captain Christopher Pike, around a framing story with the regular crew. Very solid and tragic episode.
Trip The Light Nerdtastic
My weekly Sunday night nerdfecta has been an episode of Star Trek the original series, an episode of Battlestar Galactica the original series, an hour of a Tom Baker Dr. Who and Firefly.
Shawn in ShowMe
@FDRLincoln:
To get her bearings as far as background is concerned, I recommend ABL also check out:
Journel to Babel, which introduces Spock’s parents
Errand of Mercy, where the Federation is on the brink of war with the Klingons and the Organians are stuck in the middle
Michael Hall
Are you aware, Ms. ABL, that Barack Obama is a big fan of the Trek franchise, and has even been seen giving the “Vulcan salute” in public on an occasion or two? There–after three years and everything that’s gone down, you finally have a legitimate reason to be disillusioned with him. You’re welcome.
As for the rest of you, “Arena” was written by the great Gene L. Coon, based on Frederick Brown’s short story. (Well, sort of. What actually happened is that Coon had already written his teleplay when the studio’s legal department pointed out the similarities to the short story, and it was decided that it would be more cost-effective to throw Brown some money and a screen credit rather than to simply junk the script outright.) And, musclemen in lizard masks and clumsily staged fights aside, it’s a fine episode, with a message (admittedly somewhat heavy-handed, but with the original series that’s a feature, not a bug) that’s more pertinent to our times than ever. Styles in acting, directing, and visual FX have changed enormously in the last 40 years, but to dismiss a show for being a creature of its time and budget limitations while ignoring its inherent worth is far sillier than any of those outdated plots or production values we take perverse joy in picking apart.
(And, just for the record, #89? For all of its mega-budget and production value, I thought the 2009 “reinvention” of Star Trek was just fucking awful.)
Donald G
“Reinforcing hetero-normativity” was a bad choice of words on my part. The way “The Outcast” and “Rejoined” play out, an illiberal, intolerant societal status quo is maintained. In “The Outcast”, IIRC, Soren willingly goes back for “reparative therapy” having concluded that her society’s taboos are correct and proper. The message the episode sends to queer people is “Remain in the closet and don’t rock the boat or your society will crush you and make you conform.”
With “Rejoined”, which is again presented to the viewer as some sort of allegory of LGBT-validation, another soul-crushing societal taboo is ultimately validated.
Then, if you couple those instances with Beverly’s little speech in “The Host” when the (formerely male) Ambassador Odann’s Trill symbiont is placed within a female host, a pattern builds up which results in a message reinforcing a gender-relationship status quo held by a majority of the viewing public… or, in other words, hetero-normativity.
The nineties Trek production team were downright cowardly when it came to the presentation of LGBT themes and while they like to point to these particular episodes to show how enlightened and progressive they were, the episodes ultimately were neither.
gnomedad
@FDRLincoln:
In which we learn that in the 23rd century it’s apparently easier to beam human beings from place to place than to establish a wireless control link.
Hypernerd mode off. Yeah, it’s a good episode.
Michael Hall
“In which we learn that in the 23rd century it’s apparently easier to beam human beings from place to place than to establish a wireless control link.”
Subspace (insert technobabble explanation) interferance.
Also, too, the device had apparently been operating for eons, wiping out countless civilizations, until our heroes figure out that you can defeat it simply by ramming a bomb down its funnel-shaped throat.
But, yeah–it’s still a great episode. :-)
FDRLincoln
Don’t forget “The Tholian Web,” which is the best episode of the much-reviled third season. Even the original special effects hold up in that one.
“Bread and Circuses” has a highly-implausable “planet of the week” setup, but it also has some excellent dialog and characterizations, as well as a nice attack on TV networks and their quest for ratings.
“Charlie X” works well if you are a teenage boy suffering from pubescent angst, or even if you just remember what it is like to be one. The ending to that one is quite sad.
Sleeper
I second that, Michael Hall. The new movie was pretty terrible, and it astounds me that so many people seemed to like it.
Water balloon
@Donald G: No, Soren doesn’t decide that her society is correct. You’re misreading the episode badly, like thinking Jack Nicholson ends up agreeing with nurse Ratched. Soren is put on trial and forced to undergo the procedure against her will, after giving an impassioned speech arguing against what you’re saying the episode is condoning.
Shawn in ShowMe
@Sleeper:
It was fine as far as summer blockbuster popcorn fare goes, it just wasn’t Star Trek. Just like the annual Michael Bay special effects extravaganza has nothing to do with the solid storytelling the animated Transformers series was known for.
I’ve been waiting all my life for a movie adaption of the Foundation series but after the hack job they did with Asimov’s I Robot, maybe we’re better off if Hollywood keeps their hands off.
Michael Hall
#101–
Today just happens to be my birthday, and that link was one of the best presents I could have gotten, almost worth the price of admission of ABL’s original clueless post. Two of my favorite things, together, with the reminder that Trek (or any aspect of American pop culture) is never to be taken too seriously. Thanks.
#117–
It’s a slick, well-produced megapalooza space extravaganza, which goes down as easy as your butter-subsitute flavored popcorn and is just about as forgettable. It’s perhaps understandable that general audiences liked it, but not Trek fans. I could almost forgive the plot contrivances (as has been pointed out, the original series was replete with them), if not the by-the-numbers plotting, but it’s a heartless, soulless mess, totally lacking the orginal’s even perfunctory attempts at scientific literacy or–much worse–its genuine sense of wonder about the possibilities of space travel and what it means to be human. No thanks.
Sleeper
Well, Shawn, I hate to have to break it to you, but there is a FOUNDATION movie in the works…but it’s being done by…Roland fucking Emmerich. So you should probably not even torture yourself by seeing it.
Michael – Unfortunately, most Trek fans I know loved the reboot as well. Fuck if I know why. The script made no goddamn sense whatsoever.
Corner Stone
@Michael Hall: Happy Birthday Anthony!
Corner Stone
@Sleeper: Hated the reboot. Just an awful, awful movie.
Corner Stone
And Picard is the superior officer.
There, I said it.
Donald G
@Water balloon:
Okay, my memory cheated me. I’ve tended to avoid “The Outcast” since its initial airing, since I disliked it so much at the time. It sounds like I’ve conflated the ending of that episode with the David Ogden Stiers episode, which has nothing to do with queerness (outside of David Ogden Stiers, of course :))
“The Outcast” really leaves a bad taste in my mouth, though. Whether it be casting all women to play the J’naii so it ends up looking like Soren’s crime is choosing gendered heterosexuality rather than choosing gendered sexuality of any type. It ends up looking like a group of repressed lesbians is using brainwashing to oppress heterosexuals.
It’s interesting – when one looks at Jonathan Frakes’ comments on the casting for “The Outcast” and Gates McFadden’s opposition to Beverly’s speech at the end of “The Host” – that the actors were often braver than the production team.
Comrade Mary
@Corner Stone: Picard has many good qualities. But he drinks perfumed piss instead of tea. Demerit!
Grumpy Code Monkey
Overall, “Arena” is not that bad an episode. IIRC it changes the ending from the original short story, but overall it’s pretty good. Yes, the fight scene looks silly by modern standards, but creature effects for a weekly show that was operating on a shoestring budget were, shall we say, limiting. The actor in the Gorn suit probably couldn’t see where he was walking, which would make a fight scene hard to choreograph.
I know people like to pick on “Spock’s Brain” as the worst episode of TOS, but to me there are far more deserving candidates, like:
“The Way to Eden” – space hippies;
“The Omega Glory” – space commies;
“Patterns of Force” – space Nazis;
“Let That Be Your Last Battlefield” – space assholes.
Seriously, the awesomeness of Frank Gorshin aside, Bele and Loki are probably the most annoying characters to appear in any incarnation of Trek.
Shawn in ShowMe
@Sleeper:
I haven’t heard a peep out the Foundation project since it got the go-ahead 2 years ago. No casting, no script, no nothing. With Michael Bay, Jr. slated to direct I’m hoping this thing just dies on the vine.
With all the weak sauce coming out the Star Trek labs since TNG went off the air, I think a lot of Trekkies were just happy some enthusiasm was injected into the franchise. Now that the new kids have been introduced, maybe the powers that will be actually demand a functional script the next time around.
Donald G
Star Trek 2009 was a “Star Trek” geared to the tastes of my idiot brother, the one who prefers mindless action fare to ideas… the one who tortured me with Michael Bay’s Transformers movie thinking I would like it.
It’s interesting how, within the immediate family, our reactions differ. I, a fan since the age of six, and my daughter loathe the film with purple passions, while my son and wife (a similarly intense fan of the Classic Series – our first conversation upon meeting was an hours long discussion/defense of TMP) cope with it much better. My wife appreciates ST2009 as some form of demented crack-fic.
To me, Trek2009 is like Kurtzman and Orci came up with some anime adaptation of Trek and then they and JJ filmed a live action version of that anime adaptation.
schrodinger's cat
@Ben Cisco: The Emissary agrees! I am honored.
Michael Hall
“I’ve been waiting all my life for a movie adaption of the Foundation series but after the hack job they did with Asimov’s I Robot, maybe we’re better off if Hollywood keeps their hands off.”
Probably true. One huge problem in adapting Foundation to the screen is that most of its pleasures for the reader lie in the plot twists and Asimov’s deft undermining of your assumptions about how the story will unfold; there’s almost none of the requisite action and physical suspense you would expect in a big-budget SF film made for a mass audience. Another problem is dealing with many of the story’s pretty antiquated 1940s conventions in terms of technology and characterization.
David Ward, who did the delightful adapation of Cannery Row featuring Nick Nolte and Debra Winger in the ’80s, was long interested in bringing Foundation to the big screen; I can’t imagine that I wouldn’t prefer his version to Roland Emmerich’s.
“@Michael Hall: Happy Birthday Anthony!”
Um, thanks. But who’s Anthony?
“Picard has many good qualities. But he drinks perfumed piss instead of tea. Demerit!”
LOL!
Water balloon
The problem with Star Trek 2009 is that JJ Abrams admittedly never liked Star Trek. He used the character names to try his hand at an homage to Star Wars with a nonsensical time travel story tacked on.
Shawn in ShowMe
@Michael Hall:
I’m all for giving younger directors a chance to handle high profile properties. But the mere fact that Roland Emmerich was even considered shows that suits are more interested in brand names than they are about giving a project the best chance to succeed.
If they would just tell the damn story, grateful sci-fi fans alone would guarantee the movie has a long run at the box office. The casual fans would just come along for the ride, like they did with Blade Runner or V for Vendetta.
Michael Hall
Some great recommendations, btw, on Trek episodes well worth the effort of checking out, though I suspect that if ABL can’t get past the admittedly dated conventions of a ’60s action-adventure TV show, it just ain’t gonna happen for her.
For my money, the two-part “Menagerie” episode still stands as the best long-form Star Trek ever made, an even more impressive accomplishment considering its origins as a money-saving attempt to recoup the costs of an expensive, failed first pilot. It has only about 1,000 times the wit and intelligence of the 2009 movie, done on about 1/1,000th of the budget.
virag
@Water balloon:
that movie was bad bad bad, and in 2009 there was no excuse for mangling st so badly. except money of course.
virag
eccleston shoulda stuck with it for a while. coulda kept it dark and not cute while rtd grew to hate it. that woulda been entertaining.
The Commish
ABL is wrong.
About Star Trek and Dr. Who.
Tim in SF
Blame Rick Berman. If I ever run into that asshole, I hope it’s while I’m driving my car. I’d only stop to back up over his twitching corpse.
I could rant about this for days, but it’s been done more thoroughly elsewhere.
Water balloon
TNG recommendations: Q Who, Best of Both Worlds, Darmok, Yesterday’s Enterprise, All Good Things, Cause and Effect.
Wil
Not liking and not understanding what made the original Star Trek great is the sign of a paucity of mind. Too bad…just when I was starting to give ABL some credit.
It’s funny conservatives have never attacked Star Trek. The entire series (all of them) are one great advocacy of the success and future of liberal values and goals.
Probably beyond their understanding.
Tim in SF
My favorite was the Inner Light. It was one of the few that surprised me at the end, and the only one that ever made me tear up.
Michael Hall
“It’s funny conservatives have never attacked Star Trek. The entire series (all of them) are one great advocacy of the success and future of liberal values and goals.”
Agreed, in spades. It’s what kept me coming back, despite all the silliness, weak science, uninspired storytelling, etc. Until 2009, even at its worst, the franchise just about always had heart, and a soaring optimism about the potential of humans to do better.
“My favorite was the Inner Light. It was one of the few that surprised me at the end, and the only one that ever made me tear up.”
Agreed here, too. TIL is actually a better exploration of the themes of the Arthur Clarke classic short story “The Star” than the adaptation that had been done on the revived CBS “Twilight Zone” a few years earlier. Just a reminder that life can always surprise you, and that at its best, Trek could be truly awesome.
Water balloon
@Tim in SF: Yeah it’s a great episode, but not one I’d recommend to someone who isn’t already familiar with the show.
Wil
Except for First Contact, after Star Trek IV the rest of the movies can pretty much be ignored.
And that 2009 piece of garbage wasn’t even Star Trek. It didn’t make any sense and wasn’t anything like Star Trek at all.
Grumpy Code Monkey
I have to admit, I liked the 2009 movie…at first. I had issues with it immediately (cadet to captain? seriously?!), but overall I liked it. Karl Urban playing DeForest Kelley playing Dr. McCoy was pretty awesome, and Pegg’s Scotty was fun. Syler as Spock took getting used to, but Zach Quinto did a fairly admirable job.
But the further away I got from it, the more problems I had with it. Trek had always played fast and loose with physics, but…red matter? Seriously? Yet another manifestation of the damned Rambaldi sphere? The story, such as it was, made little to no sense. It was a clever…if not necessarily good…way to dump the cruft that had accumulated in the canon, but an even easier way to do that would be to just ignore it.
I don’t hate it, but I don’t consider it Trek.
gnomedad
@Grumpy Code Monkey:
So you’re not twisting in the wind by yourself, I’ll cop to having walked a similar path. Hey, finally, more Trek! Some kind of reboot was probably necessary, but a lot of stuff was just random. And, holy shit, a whole planet gets wiped out and one hour later — happy ending? And a brewery for an engine room? But, yeah, Urban as McCoy was amazing.
Wil
It wasn’t clever, or even original. It was just crap. JJ Abrams, a Star Wars guy, should never have been allowed near the material.
From the opening scenes, when Kirk is supposedly being born as his dad is sacrificing himself, the whole thing is so reminiscent of those new Star Wars movies that I expected Kirk’s mom to cry out, “Luke!”—-“Leia!” And then of course she dies in childbirth, just like in the Star Wars prequel.
And the villain is a do-over of the last crappy NextGen movie, Nemesis. Weird creepy pasty Romulan has serious issues with some main Star Trek character—acquires a huge, powerful ship (somehow) that is far more powerful than normal ships. Commence movie.
And when the mining ship attacks Vulcan, we are supposed to believe that Vulcan has no defenses. And when the mining ship attacks Earth, the home of the Federation apparently has no defenses at all either. Luckily Spock has that little shuttlecraft with some little phasers…which is enough to save Earth because the giant mining thingie is actually very vulnerable to even a shuttlecraft…..a good thing too, since Earth apparently has no defenses whatsoever and must rely on Spock and the shuttlecraft to get the job done.
Retarded movie for retarded viewers, made by a guy who doesn’t like or understand Star Trek.
THE
I was a teen when TOS first screened, and was awed by the high-tech special effects, the transporters, phasers, etc. that were far above anything else on TV in those days.
I was also deeply impressed by the science-based rationality of the theme. Mankind using advanced science to explore the Galaxy.
I was hopeful when TNG first came out, but I thought the permanent psychic was a total betrayal of the essential rationality of the series. I ended up never getting into the franchise again. This was no longer a celebration of reason.
Perhaps you have to understand the era. TOS was made during the years of the Apollo project, when everything seemed possible. But by the time they brought back TNG, almost twenty years later, the age of scientific optimism in USA had faded and America has never regained it. So a psychic counsellor actually seemed like a good idea to them.
To me it was a symbol of how far USA had already fallen. Then — late 80s early 90s.
It is so much worse now. Creationism, Bachman, Perry. The war on science.
FDRLincoln
The best part of the movie was Bruce Greenwood as Captain Christopher Pike.
The rest of the movie was pretty lousy. It COULD have been good, but it wasn’t. And there was no excuse either. There are thousands upon thousands of TOS fans in the world who could have taken the script and fixed it, so that it was still Star Trek and still an exciting reboot. But Abrams just didn’t care enough.
THE
@Egypt Steve:
Wow that’s awesome, Egypt Steve. I never noticed that before. You are right.
Donald Gillikin
I guess that I should chime in with my classic Trek recommendations I’ll also add my recommendations for classic Who stories, as well.
For Trek, I’d recommend (and off the top of my head): The Cage (and the two-part Menagerie derived from it), Where No Man Has Gone Before, The Corbomite Maneuver, The Enemy Within, Balance of Terror, Tomorrow is Yesterday, A Taste of Armageddon, Errand of Mercy, City on the Edge of Forever, The Doomsday Machine, Journey to Babel, Obsession, The Ultimate Computer, The Tholian Web and Day of the Dove.
For Classic Who, I’d recommend “The Romans” (a comedy), “The Mind Robber” (a wild postmodern children’s lit fantasy that my kids loved despite it being stagebound and monochrome), “Doctor Who and the Silurians” and “The Sea Devils”, “The Green Death”, “The Ark in Space”, “Pyramids of Mars”, “The Seeds of Doom”, “The Deadly Assassin”,”City of Death”, “The Caves of Androzani”, “Vengeance on Varos”, “Ghost Light”,and/or “Curse of Fenric”.
Corner Stone
@THE: How could you have never noticed this?
The entire ST cast is a shadow of the 12 archetypes.
Donald G
@THE:
And yet the original series gave us the boosted psychic abilities of Gary Mitchell and Charlie Evans along with the Vulcan Mindmeld, not to mention the so advanced as to be magical noncorporeal beings such as the Thasians and Organians.
And then there’s Trelane, the lonely Squire of Gothos.
Classic Trek wasn’t all NASA projections and technical feasiblilty.
THE
@Donald G:
I understand you, but Star Trek was written by many different writers, and they explored different SF themes. So yes occasionally they’d incorporate quasi-religious themes.
Squire of Gothos and the other super aliens was really super high tech and Clarke’s Law: The more science advances, the more it looks like magic.
But a permanent on-board psychic? Why not a palm reader or an astrologer? I guess it just crossed some threshold of woo for me.
Shawn in ShowMe
@Donald G:
I was kind of perplexed by THE’s comment too, in light of all the points you made. Godlike beings were a staple of TOS but the existence of Deanna Troi’s empathic abilities destroys TNG for him? I don’t follow that logic.
Shawn in ShowMe
@THE:
Please don’t take this as me picking on you THE, but what scientific principles explain the Vulcan mind meld?
Donald G
I understand your reticence to swallow the concept of the empathic psychologist, but we had already gone through a three year series with a science officer who was also a touch-telepath. Psychic abilities (while rubbish in the real world) are not unknown in the Trek universe.
For all the use that character’s empathic abilities provided (“He’s hiding something, Captain.”), she might as well not have had them. I’d also suggest that in the sixties and seventies, those psychic abilities would’ve been played up even more to differentiate the character from the rest of the crew and to provide a convenient resolution to the plots, which Next Gen pretty much avoided doing.
Water balloon
THE doesn’t seem to know that spock had psychic powers, and used them frequently. He did more than just the mind meld for instance. I remember him controlling someone’s actions with his mind in that episode with the space Declaration of independence for instance.
Trip The Light Nerdtastic
THE you should give TNG another shot. By season 3 they are in a stride and by season 5 there isn’t a bad episode. It is the greatest of all of the Star Treks.
Also, she’s not a psychic, just an empathic.
THE
@Shawn in ShowMe:
The need for physical contact there suggested to me some kind of extreme sensitivity to the electrical states of the brain, like e.e.g. or something.
Water balloon
@THE: But Spock didn’t need to touch people to use his powers.
Water balloon
Another instance involved Spock using telepathy to sense a shipful of vulcans dying from far away in the episode “The Immunity Syndrome.”
Donald G
@THE:
“Spock, what information were you able to glean from him during your mindmeld?”
“The alien’s brain emits electrical impulses like a human’s brain. Its brain is functioning,Captain, but I am unable to resolve and interpret those impulses to provide you with insight into its thoughts.”
“Then why did I bother to have you meld with it in the first place?”
“Indeed, your choice of action was most illogical, Captain.”
Water balloon
Spock also used his telepathic powers without touching anyone in the episodes “Devil in the Dark” and “A Taste of Armageddon.”
Water balloon
And now I’m going away because I’m being the worst kind of Trekkie.
THE
See, you can find individual episodes that violate anything I say, but I repeat Star Trek was written by many different writers. It wasn’t always consistent. There were many individually weak episodes.
Grumpy Code Monkey
@THE:
Ahem. Vulcan mind melds. Not to mention mechanical telepathy (the Universal Translator). TOS never let rationality get in the way of a fun or interesting story.
Yes, Deanna is beyond annoying for the first couple of seasons, but eventually she becomes as viable a character as everyone else.
And you have no idea what you are denying yourself if you’ve never experienced the absolute force of nature that is Lwaxana Troi. I know most old-school Trekkies think of Majel Barret as Christine Chapel primarily, but to me Lwaxana is her best role.
Donald G
@Water balloon:
Me,too.
So, how about UNIT dating, or Doctors before Hartnell, or even is Sergeant Benton a murderer?
Water balloon
Well no, it was a consistent part of his character that you are retroactively waving away so you can pretend telepathy was new to TNG and emblematic of the general degeneration of the franchise and the culture at large. And now I’m going.
greylocks
Almost any episode of any version of Dr Who is better than almost any episode of any version of Star Trek.
Tennant was one of the better Doctors and I was sorry to see him go. Smith is nothing special.
Wil
Episodes like Devil in the Dark and A Taste of Armageddon weren’t weak episodes.
I think you are trying too hard to thread the needle when you attempt to force Star Trek into a hard-science box and then have to make a bunch of exceptions for all the (quite a few) episodes that don’t match your template.
The first pilot, The Cage, had telepathic aliens and was rejected by the networks as being too cerebral. The second pilot also has telepathic and godlike mental powers, as well as a lot of action and our first taste of Kirk-fu, along with being a kick-ass episode that is still one of the best of TOS or any of the other ST series.
I don’t think Star Trek was ever a “celebration of reason” at all. It was a celebration of imagination, the unknown, and a better future. And of course, women in tiny outfits and fuzzy bras!
THE
@Wil: I would still argue that the super aliens were nearly always using super-advanced science. Clarke’s law — Not “real” magic. Techno-woo if you like. They are using science we don’t understand. Even in The Cage.
Wil
@THE: Well, if you’re one of those guys that takes Clarke’s hard science fundamentalism and absolutism as your model, that’s your business.
With all due respect to Clarke, I always found his view a little too one-dimensional for my tastes.
Besides, if that’s your view, there is no reason the mental abilities of the empath in TNG have to lie outside of that.
My powers and abilities must seem magical to my pet rats, even though they are the result of evolution combined with technology.
Perhaps the abilities of Troi can be viewed in the same light. Her people simply have that ability, just like some beings here on earth can fly while others can’t. ;)
THE
@Wil:
Well you could be right. Let me give you an example. Another show with psychic powers that does not annoy me is Babylon 5.
But in B5 there is always the sense that the mental powers are somewhere on the naturalistic spectrum. There is some genetic factor causing it.
This is about dualism vs. monism. Is there one reality or two? Perhaps it was the lack of any techno-rationalization, in any of the episodes that I saw, that caused me to reject Troi’s powers as pure woo.
Wil
@THE: Troi’s powers might have been ‘pure woo’ but that doesn’t bother me. A show that based everything on hard science alone would have been as dry as Clarke’s writing.
If advanced technologies can come to resemble magic, then so can advanced abilities that may seem like ‘pure woo’
You can probably sense feelings from other people, or groups or crowds of people. You probably know people who can sense feelings better than you can, and others who are about as sensitive as a brick wall.
I’d say Troi’s abilities fit somewhere into that spectrum.
There doesn’t have to be only one reality. There can be two or more.
Having said that, she was the weakest and most useless character on the show, and only slightly less annoying than Wesley. Her ‘pure woo’ powers were largely descriptive (‘they seem angry, Captain, I sense anger’) or a means of moving the plot forward, which could have easily been done in other ways.
Episodes that focused on Deanna Troi were usually a reason to switch channels.
THE
@Wil:
I believe you can infer feelings but the information that allows you to do that is physical, if subtle.
Then you and I are on a different journey. And we are living in a different kind of universe. LOL.
This does not exclude multiverses in the quantum sense. But they are still an aspect of nature.
And that would be my point. I place no limit to how “deep” nature is, but nature does not have an “outside”.
Michael Hall
Jeez, THE. As others here have pointed out, Troi was simply an empath in the same way that Spock was portrayed as a telepath. As these abilities were entirely normal for their respective species, neither in the context of the Trek universe would be considered in the least “supernatural.”
And though I overall prefer the original series, it’s just a fact that TNG is by far more rationalistic (not to mention humanistic), mostly due to Gene Roddenberry’s evolving attitudes during the intervening years between the two productions. It also has better acting overall, and (needless to say) more sophisticated production values. The first two seasons are mostly pretty disposable (with the notable exception of season two’s award-winning “The Measure of a Man”), after which the show found its footing with the level of the storytelling improving enormously. But in the end it’s just not as colorful, or as much fun, as the original.
THE
@Michael Hall:
So you’re saying I gave up too early. I should have stuck with it.
THE
Tell me. When does the series become widescreen?
Particularly on DVD/Blu Ray
Wil
@THE: Just tell yourself that the mental powers of Troi and her people are derived from a technological innovation that was never mentioned on the show, or was left on the cutting room floor.
That way you can enjoy the show….at least the last four seasons, when they started getting good after the first three seasons of dreck. ;)
Michael Hall
“So you’re saying I gave up too early. I should have stuck with it.”
Well, who’s to say? Maybe you’d end up liking it; maybe not. At its best (“The Inner Light,” “The Best of Both Worlds,” etc.), the episodes are certainly every bit as good as anything the original series ever did, in my opinion and that of many others. But it’s a very different kind of show, for a very different era.
Donald G
@Wil:
Hey, Wil: I’d classify TNG as mostly good. That’s the season that gave us “Sins of the Father”, “Sarek”, “Yesterday’s Enterprise”, and “Best of Both Worlds pt 1” and where the series righted itself after those first two rocky seasons.
On my own quality scale, I’d classify the first two seasons as drek, Seasons Three to Five as good to excellent, Season Six as “meh” (I basically enjoyed every other episode of that season) and the final season as tending back toward drekitude with too many character specific episodes that dramatically came across as bad fanfic.
But it’s horses for courses. THE would probably like the reliance upon technobabble explanations that seek to give evrything the veneer of scientific plausibility, though.
Donald G
@THE:
TOS, TNG, Deep Space Nine and Voyager all were filmed as 4:3. The DVDs are at that standard aspect ratio, as is the Blu-Ray of TOS-Remastered.
The final series, Enterprise (2001-2005) was filmed widescreen and in HD, but was released letterboxed at standard definition on DVD.
TNG through Voyager, while shot on film, were edited on video, so no Hi-Def masters exist. CBS is going to have to dig up and reassemble the film bits from their files and reconstruct the more modern series to an HD standard, an expensive proposition.
They’re working on a teaser Blu-Ray of TNG for this winter and an HD release of TNG starting next year, apparently. How successful the project is and at what price point it’ll be available is an open question.
THE
Thanks Donald G. Most helpful.
I found an interesting speech by Brannon Braga that goes into some depth about Gene Roddenberry’s secularism.
Wil
@Donald G:
Yeah, I don’t have that close of a reading of TNG. Maybe some of season 3 is good, but I didn’t keep track of it that exactly. I’m more of a TOS guy.
TNG did get good eventually, and they did make some great episodes. And some of their two-parters were better than most of those terrible TNG movies (except for First Contact).
Wil
@THE:
Is this still about Troi and her mental abilities?
Abilities that are not explained scientifically (and in a TV show) do not mean that religion is the only answer. Unexplained abilities do not require the existence of a deity.
If you can accept warp power, time travel and transporter technology because the show gives you a little pseudo-science bibble babble to make it okay, you ought to be able to get over a little speed bump like Troi being an empath who can sense feelings.
Of all the reasons someone might have to dislike TNG or not give it a chance, that just seems so……minor. And arbitrary.
THE
I don’t know Wil, maybe context is the key to my aversion. You have to recall the era. The explosion in “New Age” thinking at this time – of which interest in the occult was a major aspect.
You can say it didn’t have to be a religion but in reality it was.
If you look at Europe, the seventies were the era when culture turned radically secular. Religion all but died out. But USA became if anything more religious. This was the era when US and the rest of the West really diverged culturally on this question.
This is a split that is still apparent today. USA is FAR more religious than the rest of the West.
Water balloon
@THE: TNG was pretty allergic to religion. The only episode I can think of involving the crew encountering a planets’s deity resulted in said deity turning out to be a con woman using technology to trick her gullible people. It was DS9 that got more into spiritual issues, usually badly.
You really are missing out if celebration of reason is what you’re looking for. Picard sounds like much more your type of captain than Kirk.
As for when it gets good, Donald G is pretty much spot on.
THE
Were any of the TNG movies worth watching?
Michael Hall
As with TOS, pretty good recommendations for watchable TNG episodes that THE and the other uninitiated might want to check out. (Actually, on the whole, The Next Generation’s batting average in seasons 3-6 is pretty impressive, with at least a handful of exceptional episodes every year and just about all of the rest at least watchable and entertaining.) Not mentioned so far is the Hugo award-winning series finale, “All Good Things,” which turned out to be an intricate and heartfelt look both backward, forward, and inward, at the characters and their relationships. (Yes, the story involves time travel yet again, but in a way the franchise hadn’t done to death previously). It’s the best Trek series finale ever, with the arguable exception of Deep Space Nine’s “What You Leave Behind,” which was interesting and ambitious, but far more uneven.
On that subject, THE, if it turns out that you like TNG you might also want to give DS9 a go as well. Developed to replace TNG in the Trek firmament late in its run, the series had solid ratings but never attained TNG’s popularity with the general public; still, there are fans who insist that it’s the best Trek series of all, combining TNG’s sophistication with the more colorful characters and dramatic/political conflicts of TOS. (As a bonus treat to TOS fans, there’s a wonderful 30th anniversary tribute show that sends the DS9 cast back in time to interact, via the miracle of digital compositing, with the original actors in “The Trouble With Tribbles”.) I’m not a hyper DS9 partisan, but I do think its followers have a point.
Wil
@THE:
Well, in reality it wasn’t. As I said, the existence of something on a TV show that wasn’t explained to your satisfaction does not require a deity.
Think about Superman. We know that our yellow sun gives him his superpowers. Kryptonite negates them. We don’t really know why, but there is no reason for there to be a religion or a deity involved.
Wil
@THE:
First Contact, that’s about it.
Herbal Infusion Bagger
‘The various Trek series had many ups and downs. “Arena” was one of the downs.’
The Fredric Brown short story written in 1944 it was adapted from, though, is still a damn good read. Although it doesn’t end with the Earthman showing mercy. I guess that was the difference between the mood in the late 1960s and 1944.
Wil
Arena is a pretty well-loved episode. I think if you polled a Star Trek convention Arena would not be considered ‘one of the downs’ by very many people.
TOS was Wagon Train to the Stars, a western set in space, somoewhat combined with a submarine movie.
It was never ‘Arthur C. Clarke’s Star Trek, nor Isaac Asimov’s, nor any other hard sci-fi writer’s vision.