They deserve the logo because 1) they at least attempt to tell complex and original science fiction stories, and sometimes succeed,
Being a long-time reader of literary sci-fi, I never really found any version (including the original, my favorite) complex or original.
and, 2) the acting is far better. In all of them. Not all the time, but on balance far more often than in nuTrek.
Each of the series had a good actor or two. But I've found the acting superior in the Abrams movies on an overall scale. Though it really isn't fair to compare the two as each of the spinoffs had 98 or more episodes to iron out the kinks vs. four hours combined for the two movies.
Well, yes, compared to literary SF, often simple and lagging behind in what is considered a fresh idea. This is true of all tv sf that I can see. Nothing on tv has the complexity of ideas of, say, Dick's Martian Time-Slip (time travel via autism? the plumbers union being the most powerful political entity on Mars?). On screen, one or two very strong ideas tend to dominate; we see much more in good literature.
Complex by comparison to 1) other tv sf, and 2) all other tv.
I was watchng the Voyager episode "Blink of an Eye" last week. Actually, although I like this episode, I also kind of detest it, as it's an uncredited rip-off of Robert Forward. But at least they tried to give us an unusual idea as our touchstone idea: time running much faster on a planet's surface (although Forward had us on a neutron star and this "planet" had a "tachyon core", but,
anyway)...) and exploring the consequences from there.
As you say, it's not exactly fair to compare a series to a movie, but we can't really compare tv to books, either.
Abrams' movies leave me with such an
empty feeling. Like these entertainments are being done
to me, instead of me somehow being almost drawn into the story. Maybe it was my usual fan's immersion in the prime universe that made me so prone to enjoy Trek across most of its incarnations, but I don't think so. There was a feeling of heart coming off the screen, and I don't mean a lame Planetteer power. Just a sense that the actors wanted to be there and they wanted to do something for you and, at best, with you. Not to you. I can't explain it better than that I think--it doesn't explain.
That experience with "A Fistful of Datas"? I've had it too. With Best of Both Worlds. It seems so dull and weak and
contained compared to what I remember, now. BUT: Cause and Effect is actually better for me, and Chain of Command gets better and better. BoBW was groundbreaking because the foundations of the Federation were being struck at, but years later, after the excitement of that has long faded, there isn't much but a shoot-em-up invasion story. Cause and Effect takes a somewhat new look at time travel and wonders what might happen if SOME information got passed from an "erased" timelime to a new one...and Chain of Command has David Warner and Patrick Stewart playing off each other, wonderfully, and Frakes rises to the occasion to do the same with Ronny Cox's in-my-opinion brilliantly dislikable Jellico. Point being: where in nuTrek do you have anything like the tautness of the presentation of the idea of multiple timelines we see in Cause and Effect (we see none of the spooky, atmospheric stuff that Cause and Effect shows us in a poker game and Dr Crusher cutting flowers) or the fine acting we see in Chain of Command?
