"Conspiracy" vs. "The Neutral Zone"

[JirinPanthosa]

Elitism is a big pundit buzzword that gets invoked whenever somebody wants to cast aspersions on the character of anybody leaning progressive. In our culture the word has been completely stripped of its original meaning.

I like to imagine if 24th century humans saw us today they'd be like "What, you mean you actually cut down eat living plants? You MURDERERS!"

 

[CorporalCaptain]

I think all the accusations of 'Smugness' or 'Elitism' in TNG are more anti-liberal cudgels than actual insightful commentary on the episode.

I don't agree with this at all.

I agree completely with George Steinbrenner here.

Elitism is a big pundit buzzword that gets invoked whenever somebody wants to cast aspersions on the character of anybody leaning progressive. In our culture the word has been completely stripped of its original meaning.

It may be invoked in those situations, but it's completely untrue that the word has no other major senses.

Also, it's not going to fly to mischaracterize objections to TNG's portrayal of humanity as having an anti-liberal basis. That's politicizing a simple difference of opinion. It's awfully presumptuous to suppose political leanings for those who object, and the facts won't bear it out.

The show portrayed 20th Century humans as nimrods who should be actively derided for their savagery, and then had Picard and others expound endlessly on how far 24th Century humans had come. In other words, the creators of the show were painting their audience as out of touch and "backward" with no recognition of the potential for improvement or acknowledgement of things that are being done right in the 20th C., while simultaneously having the heroes look down from ivory towers of superiority. There are more effective ways to show that humans can achieve greatness and move past 20th Century greed and corruption. Kirk did it well on several occasions. So, yeah, I'm as liberal as the next guy, and I'm going to say it has more to do with hack writing than my political agenda.

Exactly.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

It may be invoked in those situations, but it's completely untrue that the word has no other major senses.

Also, it's not going to fly to mischaracterize objections to TNG's portrayal of humanity as having an anti-liberal basis. That's politicizing a simple difference of opinion. It's awfully presumptuous to suppose political leanings for those who object, and the facts won't bear it out.

That's a fair point, calling me on trying to connect smugness accusations to the political misuse of the word. But I do observe that most of the people who deride TNG as 'Smug' and 'Elitist' are the people who disagree with the show's premise that mankind can evolve and overcome its current cultural issues. And they are using whatever specific example is under discussion as a proxy to deride the premise by injecting negative motivations into it.

 

[Maurice]

TNG would have better made its point had it not hung a lantern on "humans have grown up" and just shown us a society that people would want to live in.

 

[erastus25]

TNG would have better made its point had it not hung a lantern on "humans have grown up" and just shown us a society that people would want to live in.

100% agree.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

TNG would have better made its point had it not hung a lantern on "humans have grown up" and just shown us a society that people would want to live in.

100% agree.

Yes.

 

[Robert Comsol]

As for the question of continuity, in hindsight obviously "The Neutral Zone" has a place in continuity, as its threads involving both the Romulans and evidently the Borg were followed up on later.

^^ This. I don't think it's a great episode but it has subtle qualities of a cliffhanger.

Bob

 

[suarezguy]

I don't see the intent of TNZ as to be smug, I see it as to exposit Gene's views on how human culture ought to progress.

I think all the accusations of 'Smugness' or 'Elitism' in TNG are more anti-liberal cudgels than actual insightful commentary on the episode. The problem with TNZ is just how poorly the 20th century humans were written. They were written as Gene Roddenberry's criticism of 20th century culture, and come off as one dimensional in that regard and missing the point. TNZ writes 20th century humans the way it writes alien cultures, something exoticized and unable to comprehend outside its bubble. You'd think somebody capable of making millions of dollars would be smart enough to expect cultural change and would be focusing more on figuring out the culture to get himself back in power than he would just whining that he can't immediately throw his weight around. And a hedonistic musician, wouldn't three seconds of exposure to the holodeck make him forget all about the 'boob-tube'?

If they made the episode about 20th century humans adapting to the 24th century instead of just whining about it, it might have worked.

People say the early TNG characters are "smug" and "elitist" for exactly the reasons you cite. The show portrayed 20th Century humans as nimrods who should be actively derided for their savagery, and then had Picard and others expound endlessly on how far 24th Century humans had come. In other words, the creators of the show were painting their audience as out of touch and "backward" with no recognition of the potential for improvement or acknowledgement of things that are being done right in the 20th C., while simultaneously having the heroes look down from ivory towers of superiority.

If I recall correctly, Sonny and Clare were portrayed fairly sympathetically and with, unlike Ralph, a strong capacity to adapt. Indeed I found it interesting that Sonny, contrary to some stereotypes of Southerners as close-minded and to the behavior of some of the 24th century humans we later met, had no animosity towards and developed a friendship with Data.

 

[f14peter]

It may be invoked in those situations, but it's completely untrue that the word has no other major senses.

Also, it's not going to fly to mischaracterize objections to TNG's portrayal of humanity as having an anti-liberal basis. That's politicizing a simple difference of opinion. It's awfully presumptuous to suppose political leanings for those who object, and the facts won't bear it out.

That's a fair point, calling me on trying to connect smugness accusations to the political misuse of the word. But I do observe that most of the people who deride TNG as 'Smug' and 'Elitist' are the people who disagree with the show's premise that mankind can evolve and overcome its current cultural issues. And they are using whatever specific example is under discussion as a proxy to deride the premise by injecting negative motivations into it.

I am one that considers the crews' behavior to be smug toward the survivors, but it has nothing to do with whether humankind has evolved and overcome cultural issues.

A culture/civilization can do and be all the things that define cultural and/or social evolution and improvement, which I think the show does, without being openly contemptuous toward the survivors as if people from 300 years ago should have known better.

Holding the behavior of cultures centuries old to current standards of ethics, ambition and lifestyle seems out of place, and that's where I find this particular episode lacking.

By the way, TNZ is my favorite Season 1 ep.

 

[T'Girl]

I don't think it's smug and elitist to think that perhaps, in the future, humans can behave better than they do now.

What's interesting with that is that over the course of the series and especially the TNG movies is that we find out that the 24th century man really ISN'T more "evolved" that the late twentieth century people that Picard holds in such contempt.

Lily (in First Contact) pointing out Picard's hypocrisy concerning his own self proclaimed superiority is one of TNG more important moments.

They are no different than us.

And I think you and I would have a similar attitude toward a 16th century human.

Picard expresses his disgust for the twentieth people prior to them regaining consciousness for the first time.

If anything Picard the supposed historian should be fascinated by the possibility of meeting these people.

"I am a DUKE! I have the right to treat commoners however I like! It was their duty to do my bidding the moment they were born!

But how many non-Dukes will you find today with the exact same attitude? That because of who they are (whatever that is) the people and society around them owes them.

We can agree though it was very bad writing.

I would disagree, it certainly was the most interesting episode of the first season. It had a lot to say about the TNG universe.

 

[EnriqueH]

I'm glad I ran into this thread because I just finished my Season 1 run through for the firs time in several years.

In watching the series start to finish for the second time now, I remembered Conspiracy as the season ender, but I was wrong. I got Conspiracy and TNZ confused.

And that's because Conspiracy, even years ago, was more memorable to me than TNZ.

Though Neutral Zone reestablished the Romulans as a threat, the 20th Century subplot felt like an awkward, amateurishly written episode. It was entertaining enough, but I didn't think it came together the way Conspiracy did.

Conspiracy was a much better episode, for me, because it was suspenseful, entertaining and I felt like the good guys were in mortal danger. Something that was lacking in Neutral Zone. Sure, the Romulans were back, but so what? It was all talk. In Conspiracy, the threat is PRESENT.

It's too bad this arc went nowhere. An invasion of Starfleet by an alien force had so much potential.

I didn't like what happened to Remmick. He was a smug S.O.B. and was unlikeable when he was grilling the Enterprise staff, but by the end, he started showing some of his humanity. I would've liked to have seen a little more of Remmick before getting killed off, because I thought his character had potential. He was more interesting than the Admiral IMO.

I also thought the aliens had potential to be developed. They were killed off "Aliens" style, but there seemed to be a hint of greater albeit menacing intelligence there, and it's unfortunate that it was no explored further.

I also thought it was good that Picard cknowledged their holding life precious, but were forced to kill. This was a line of thought that deserved to be explored as well.

Overall, I thought Conspiracy had more to offer. It wasn't executed perfectly since there seemed potential to explore any numbers of threads it presented, but that might've been corrected if they had followed this story arc further.

Neutral Zone was all bark and no bite, and it had a EXTREMELY clumsy subplot.

My vote goes to Conspiracy.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

If I recall correctly, Sonny and Clare were portrayed fairly sympathetically and with, unlike Ralph, a strong capacity to adapt. Indeed I found it interesting that Sonny, contrary to some stereotypes of Southerners as close-minded and to the behavior of some of the 24th century humans we later met, had no animosity towards and developed a friendship with Data.

Fortunately, all three of those people managed to stick it in Picard's face and adapt to their new century:

Spoiler: novels

Sonny is now an entertainer on a kind of interstellar USO tour, performing for Starfleet officers stationed at remote outposts.

Claire is a counselor with the Department of Temporal Investigations, specializing in talking to 'displaced persons' who are not in their own times.

Ralph Offenhouse is the Federation Secretary of Commerce. So in a very real sense, Picard's now working for him.

 

[tomalak301]

Had they brought back the Parasites, Conspiracy would have been a great season finale. The thing is in hindsight they didn't (Which was a bummer) and that great season finale would have been diminished somewhat. If The Neutral Zone didn't have the 21st century humans, it would have been a lot better of an episode.

 

[EnriqueH]

The 20th Century angle was a great idea done half-assed. It COULD have been very good, but it wasn't. There's a great Star Trek episode in there somewhere, but it didn't materialize.

 

[tomalak301]

The 20th Century angle was a great idea done half-assed. It COULD have been very good, but it wasn't. There's a great Star Trek episode in there somewhere, but it didn't materialize.

There could have been two great Trek episodes in there but it just didn't work. If you're going to introduce the Romulans to end the season, make it all about the Romulans and leave the humans out of it.

 

[EnriqueH]

You're right.

You probably could've done two WHOLE episodes with those two premises.

Ultimately, the Romulan angle turned out a bit better, but it still wasn't as awesome or epic as it should've been.

TNZ reminded me a bit of Lonely Among Us, which was NOT a good episode IMO.

 

[Lance]

One thing that is a real "what if?" for TNG is the writer's strike not happening in the second season. It would've been nice to have seen the season open with a continuation of the premise suggested at the end of TNZ: the Federation and the Romulans, full of uncertainty about each other, working together to discover what destroyed their outposts, ultimately revealing the Borg. Alas, the strike did happen, and the producers had to scramble to get scripts ready for broadcast... so in the end there was no time to really tell a long-form storyline, no time to set it up and draw it out to a conclusion.

 

[2takesfrakes]

I much preferred "The Neutral Zone" to "Conspiracy." However, TNZ was not without its problems. The worst of which was that we finally get a good look at Romulans in the 24th Century and they look like a bucket of shit, with their nappy wigs, plastic foreheads and one-size-fits all ears. The uniforms were strangely alien to me, although they would've benefitted from further modification(s). The Romulan bridge set was far more obnoxious to me, than the uniforms, anyway. Cheap! Cheap! Cheap! Honestly, I would've been happy if we never got to see them, this episode, only heard their disembodied voices over the speakers, to preserve the mystery. Give fans something to "look forward to" in the 3rd Season. As it is, the Romulans turned out to be anything else but Michael Westmore's Finest Hour ...

The convenience of the 20th people only having one in their ranks being interested in their new situation bothers me. The Country Singer's happy to just have a guitar and a quiet corner somewhere to play in. The housewife is kept busy by just giving her a bucket to weep in, as she logs onto ancestors.com to find out about what happened to her kids centuries ago. Only the business tycoon is investigating all he sees. Unfortunately, he's designed to do so in the most iritating manner possible, just to make sure we side with the TNG crew's indignation of these throwbacks.

Despite these (and other) issues, this episode still has its charm. The Country Singer wants to be liked and is sociable with the crew. The housewife was sweet. I liked how it's the android who's sent to babysit, for the most part. I'm not sure what Life's Lessons he picked up from it, but I liked how he interacted with the people he picked up. I liked that this episode at least tried to take on a story with so many layers to it. It stands up to repeated viewings, almost despite itself, really ...

 

[MakeshiftPython]

In the grand scheme of things, "The Neutral Zone" is the more appropriate season ender as it sets up a few things for the following season to tackle. But as an episode, it's pretty awful whereas "Conspiracy" has a very ominous quality that would have made it a much better season ender if they were to follow through on the parasites (which were supposed to be what ended up becoming The Borg instead).

 

[EnriqueH]

I'm currently in the middle of "Loud as a Whisper" and have come to realize that BOTH episodes sucked as a season ender because they basically led nowhere.

The parasites clearly became the Borg, and the Romulans were "back"...and then gone again.

I'm a few episodes into Season 2 and the only Romulans to appear were a mirage.

I'm a loss to understand how TNZ is preferred to Conspiracy by some people here. To me, it's like someone saying they prefer Friday's Child to Errand of Mercy.