Was moving 'The Next Generation' over to movies a bad decision?

[BillJ]

Iamnotspock wrote:

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It's arguably what Generations did at the beginning....

Unfortunately, the audience had no more emotional connection to the Enterprise-B than they did Veridian III.

[sonak]

ok, the TOS movies had a HUGE advantage over the TNG ones-the first four of them came at a time when there was no other competition from Star Trek on TV. If you wanted new Star Trek, you went to see a movie that came out every two-three years.

The TNG movies came out at a time when the market was saturated with Star Trek. Two of the movies came out when there were TWO DIFFERENT Star Trek series on TV at the same time. And FC was a big hit coming out in that situation, and INS, while a disappointment, wasn't a bomb.

It's comparing apples and oranges unless you look at TFF and TUC, both of which came out when there was the very popular TNG on TV. And guess what? Neither performed as well as the previous Trek movies that came out before new Trek on TV.

[Lance]

I remember Stewart blamed "franchise fatigue" among the audience for the failure of Nemesis at the box-office. I was working at a movie theater at the time it was released, and a lot of the feedback the customers gave me about it on their way out the door would tally up with that. I remember very few screenings where more than a dozen people were in attendance, and of those most of the people I asked about it seemed to indicate that Star Trek itself (ie, the franchise as a whole, including Enterprise on TV) had just gone flat at the time.

[RAMA]

BillJ wrote:

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If you had to kill Kirk and destroy the Enterprise in the same film, then you have him go down with the ship.

I never understood the logic of doing it any other way.

I find it funny that none of the TOS characters who appeared in TNG ever made it to the bridge of the Enterprise-D.

Imagine Kirk flying through the viewscreen or out of the ceiling window during the crash. Could have been good...I'd love to do that to Shatner sometimes.

RAMA

[DarKush]

To the OP's original question, I would say no. I don't think it was a bad decision. It made a lot of sense to me. At the time of Generations, Star Trek and TNG were riding high and fans wanted more. Where I think mistakes were made were in the execution. I wish there had been something more of an arc for the films, instead of the more stand alone, haphazard way each film seemed to be done. I understand why it was episodic, but I wish there had been some strains established in Generations that would bear fruit by the time of Nemesis.

I also didn't like trying to change Picard and Data into Kirk and Spock. There was too much aping of the TOS films. With TOS, thankfully they had no one to emulate. But TNG got caught in the losing proposition to recreate the magic of TWOK.

So I thought the idea to go with TNG movies was a good one. I don't think the execution was as good as it could be. With all that being said, the only movie I didn't like after leaving the theater was Nemesis. And my dislike lessened once I bought it on DVD and watched it again.

[CoveTom]

Iamnotspock wrote:

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It's arguably what Generations did at the beginning....

Yes, except that Kirk didn't have any clue he was about to die. His intent was to rig the deflector and get the ship out of there intact.

My thought is that it would have been very dramatic, and a very poignant moment, for Kirk to realize that he was in a no-win scenario, the very scenario he had always denied could exist, and make a final, deliberate sacrifice of himself so that others might live. In a sense, he would beat the no-win scenario, but only by sacrificing himself.

And, yes, one could argue that story arc had already been done in TWOK with Spock. But (1) Spock never had a problem accepting that there are no-win scenarios like Kirk, and (2) Spock was resurrected, meaning it really wasn't a no-win scenario.

[sonak]

CoveTom wrote:

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Yes, except that Kirk didn't have any clue he was about to die. His intent was to rig the deflector and get the ship out of there intact.

My thought is that it would have been very dramatic, and a very poignant moment, for Kirk to realize that he was in a no-win scenario, the very scenario he had always denied could exist, and make a final, deliberate sacrifice of himself so that others might live. In a sense, he would beat the no-win scenario, but only by sacrificing himself.

And, yes, one could argue that story arc had already been done in TWOK with Spock. But (1) Spock never had a problem accepting that there are no-win scenarios like Kirk, and (2) Spock was resurrected, meaning it really wasn't a no-win scenario.

it's interesting that they gave Kirk a better "death" in the beginning of the film than the end. The beginning gave him a death on a starship, saving the crew of an Enterprise as well as his friends, and he fulfilled his prophecy from TFF that he would die alone.

Instead, he dies from a bridge collapse with a guy he's just met on a planet no one knows about.

[Dream]

sonak wrote:

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Instead, he dies from a bridge collapse with a guy he's just met on a planet no one knows about.

Just pretend the real Kirk died saving the Enterprise B, and the one that got out with Picard was a echo/duplicate version of the real Kirk. Remember Guinan's echo in the Nexus? That is how I choose to interpret it to wave away the stupid death scene.

[sonak]

Dream wrote:

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Just pretend the real Kirk died saving the Enterprise B, and the one that got out with Picard was a echo/duplicate version of the real Kirk. Remember Guinan's echo in the Nexus? That is how I choose to interpret it to wave away the stupid death scene.

I like that idea! I think I'll use it.

[Lance]

sonak wrote:

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I like that idea! I think I'll use it.

Seconded. That's quite a neat explanation, and is fully consistent with what we're presented with on screen (the Guinan-echo introduces Picard to Kirk, but she never specifies that Kirk is any more 'alive' within the Nexus than she is).

The nexus is a very weak story device, isn't it? :facepalm:

[King Daniel]

The problem with that being that Echo Guinan couldn't leave the Nexus, and said as much. So Echo Kirk couldn't have done so, either (should he even exist, I assumed Guinan still partly existed there only because she was forcably beamed out)

Besides, Kirk may have died twice in Generations, but he got better. Read The Return.

[dub]

Then how well does this one work:

Kirk and Picard never left the nexus. Everything from the point Picard enters the nexus onward (including Kirk's "death," FC, Ins. and Nem.) are all part of Picard's nexus. Spock also sought out the nexus to rescue Kirk. He entered the nexus, and now JJ Trek is part of Spock's nexus.

*just to clarify: I keed, I keed.

[CorporalCaptain]

dub wrote:

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Then how well does this one work:

Kirk and Picard never left the nexus. Everything from the point Picard enters the nexus onward (including Kirk's "death," FC, Ins. and Nem.) are all part of Picard's nexus. Spock also sought out the nexus to rescue Kirk. He entered the nexus, and now JJ Trek is part of Spock's nexus.

*just to clarify: I keed, I keed.

That's the problem with assuming that Kirk never left the Nexus: it raises the question of how we know that Picard did.

[Allyn Gibson]

CorporalCaptain wrote:

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That's the problem with assuming that Kirk never left the Nexus: it raises the question of how we know that Picard did.

Actually, that has always been a problem with Generations. Did Picard actually leave the Nexus, or did he only imagine that he left the Nexus? The Nexus is a philosophical problem that the ancient Greeks would have jumped for joy to experience.

[BillJ]

King Daniel wrote:

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The problem with that being that Echo Guinan couldn't leave the Nexus, and said as much. So Echo Kirk couldn't have done so, either (should he even exist, I assumed Guinan still partly existed there only because she was forcably beamed out)

Besides, Kirk may have died twice in Generations, but he got better. Read The Return.

But Echo Kirk is just that awesome.