Season TWO OFFICIAL TNG Blu-Ray Discussion Thread

[MikeS]

That's so true about Berman. I never "got" the hate for the man.

[trekker670]

I just completed season 2 and, like others have mentioned before, Shades of Grey wasn't nearly as bad as I remembered. Granted, I did skip the flashback sequences themselves, but the new scenes and story were actually rather good, compared to how I remembered it.

I did find the planet they used rather humorous though (sorry for the low quality):



Apparently Michigan isn't unique to Earth!

[Trekker4747]

MikeS wrote:

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That's so true about Berman. I never "got" the hate for the man.

The "hate" for him comes from how much he homogenized Trek, distilled it down to pretty much just a product. He watered down the music, he preferred episodic story-telling and pretty much ran the series (aside from DS9) on minimal life-support, just enough to keep money flowing in but not enough to allow them to be truly fantastic or dramatic. He was VERY hesitant about taking on risky subject matter or doing anything bold. He wanted it as a product to put money in his pockets, not use it for artistic enlightenment or to do bold story telling.

[jimbotron]

MikeS wrote:

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That's so true about Berman. I never "got" the hate for the man.

For starters, firing Ron Jones.

[tomalak301]

FrontierTrek wrote:

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Here's part two of the interview:
http://tng.trekcore.com/bluray/01112...rburnett2.html

Some really nice insights into the Season 2 material here, along with Rob's opinions on the DVD extras and his approach to interviewing actors

Awesome stuff. I really agree with the sentiment that we don't want to know about the character, we want to know about the actor. I'm glad they are taking this approach and it's making for a much meatier documentary.

I'm glad they are getting Ira Behr to talk about Season 3. I know he didn't like working on the staff in Season 3, and that soured his opinion on the series as a whole. I'm really looking forward to hearing what he has to say, considering I know it will be genuine. Everything else, so far, has been. Reading this interview, the season 3 version of the Documentary just got a whole lot more interesting.

[SonicRanger]

Trekker4747 wrote:

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The "hate" for him comes from how much he homogenized Trek, distilled it down to pretty much just a product. He watered down the music, he preferred episodic story-telling and pretty much ran the series (aside from DS9) on minimal life-support, just enough to keep money flowing in but not enough to allow them to be truly fantastic or dramatic. He was VERY hesitant about taking on risky subject matter or doing anything bold. He wanted it as a product to put money in his pockets, not use it for artistic enlightenment or to do bold story telling.

The studio deserves at least as much blame for this, probably most, rather than Berman personally. Their executives have a great deal more power than most fans realise.

[USS Intrepid]

SonicRanger wrote:

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The studio deserves at least as much blame for this, probably most, rather than Berman personally. Their executives have a great deal more power than most fans realise.

Don't talk sense. It's much easier to demonise the easy target.

I don't get the hate either. The level of hate is hardly reasonable. He made some choices people didn't like in the production of a television show. It's not like he's the head of the WBC or something.

[Salinga]

SonicRanger wrote:

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The studio deserves at least as much blame for this, probably most, rather than Berman personally. Their executives have a great deal more power than most fans realise.

That is true. Berman always wanted to rest Trek for a while after TNG and DS9, but the studio demanded VOY and ENT. And AFAIK the big reset button after each VOY episode was also a demand from the studio, not Berman.

If you can blame Berman for something, that he didnt stood up enough against the demands from the studio and didnt support his creative staff enough because of that. He was too much willing to compromise.

But in the end Berman also always stated, that Trek was the vision of Roddenberry and not his personally, but he was determined to continue this vision, because he promised that to Roddenberry. So in the end he was always a producer/writer, who wasnt actually representing the core of Trek personally but representing it for Roddenberry. And so he also represented the studio's wishes, as he did represent Roddenberry.

[BillJ]

I don't hate or even dislike Rick Berman, he made some fantastic Star Trek. He simply stuck around too long.

[davejames]

I frankly blame the writing staffs for the lack of quality more than Berman. Because even with him in charge they still managed to come up with some fantastic stories now and then (even on VOY and ENT)-- so clearly it WAS possible to do. They were just horribly inconsistent at it, and had probably been writing for Trek waaay too long.

And yeah, it was a mistake switching from Ron Jones to the wallpaper sound on TNG, but I can understand Berman's reasoning there. Jones' big, swashbuckling scores were great, but seemed suited more for TOS or the TOS movies, and Berman probably felt TNG needed to sound a bit richer and more sophisticated-- which I think those later seasons definitely do, thanks to the more atmospheric scores.

And I have to say, I've been rewatching DS9 lately, and I think they made that style of music work really WELL for them. I can't imagine Jones' style of music working nearly as well on that show.

[tomalak301]

Oh man, the thing I don't like about DS9 the most is the music. It just sounds like scratching on a chalkboard. Yeah they had some good music in the series run, but there are sometimes when I wish they didn't have music in most sequences at all.

[FrontierTrek]

Glad everyone's enjoying it!!

Part 3 is up, and it keeps getting better!
http://tng.trekcore.com/bluray/01122...rburnett3.html

In this part we touch on the differences between Season 1 and 2 VAM, the tremendous struggle interviewing Diana Muldaur and scheduling Whoopi Goldberg, the use of music in the documentaries and the fascinating origin of the Blooper Reel!

[picard_2305]

Salinga wrote:

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That is true. Berman always wanted to rest Trek for a while after TNG and DS9, but the studio demanded VOY and ENT. And AFAIK the big reset button after each VOY episode was also a demand from the studio, not Berman.

If you can blame Berman for something, that he didnt stood up enough against the demands from the studio and didnt support his creative staff enough because of that. He was too much willing to compromise.

But in the end Berman also always stated, that Trek was the vision of Roddenberry and not his personally, but he was determined to continue this vision, because he promised that to Roddenberry. So in the end he was always a producer/writer, who wasnt actually representing the core of Trek personally but representing it for Roddenberry. And so he also represented the studio's wishes, as he did represent Roddenberry.

A lot of great Trek was produced under Bermans's watch and to me I feel he was more respectful to the material than JJ Abrams. Not to mean any disrespect to Abrams as he is making Trek for a different audience but Berman worked with Gene and he always maintained that it was Gene's but he tweaked just a bit but stil kept it Trek. yes berman made some mistakes but I think the great stuff has to outweigh them.

[tomalak301]

FrontierTrek wrote:

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Glad everyone's enjoying it!!

Part 3 is up, and it keeps getting better!
http://tng.trekcore.com/bluray/01122...rburnett3.html

In this part we touch on the differences between Season 1 and 2 VAM, the tremendous struggle interviewing Diana Muldaur and scheduling Whoopi Goldberg, the use of music in the documentaries and the fascinating origin of the Blooper Reel!

I probably missed this some place, but what does VAM stand for?

[throwback]

VAM is Value-Added Material.