Episodes that are considered "good" that you actually dislike

[bolak]

I'm baffled at how genuine TNG fans not only praise First Contact, but site it as one of their favorites.

You are not alone. I saw it once at a preview event and never had the desire to do so again; I left afterwards rather shocked that I hadn't seen a Star Trek movie but some generic actioner that happened to use the same characters' names as Star Trek*

The last time I had that reaction was with TWOK...

* and I really enjoyed BoBW, mainly because the resolution wasn't more firepower but a clever hack. Then FC came along and it was time for pew-pew-smash-the-Borg. It was boring.

 

[WraithDukat]

I enjoyed it back when it was released (I was only 14 at the time) but looking at it now I can see it's flaws, of which it is riddled.

 

[lurok]

I'll do one popular episode that I dislike for each series (minus STD):

TOS
City on the Edge of Forever

TNG
The Inner Light (This is my least favorite episode on this list)

DS9:
Far Beyond the Stars (This is a very close second behind TIL, and a top 3 worst DS9 episode for me)

VOY:
Bride of Chaotica (this was hard because I like most popular Voyager episodes, but this one I just found boring and I'd rewatch stuff like Threshold before rewatching this)

ENT:
In a Mirror, Darkly (This isn't the worst thing ever, I don't really "dislike" it, but its extremely overrated and not one I'd generally go out of my way to rewatch)

I'll give you City and Inner. You don't like other three, OK . (But I think you do )

 

[kirk55555]

I'll give you City and Inner. You don't like other three, OK . (But I think you do )

I absolutely hate Far Beyond the Stars, and Bride of Chaotica is boring, pointless filler. In a Mirror, Darkly is the least bad episode on the list, but I don't intend to rewatch it. I can't stand DS9 or Enterprise's attempts at Mirror Universe episodes.

 

[WraithDukat]

Similarly, if you think that, given the opportunity and means, if the W359 had ever shown up on screen in full glory it wouldn't have looked a lot like the Death Star battle, you're kidding yourself.

We did, in 'Emissary' and a similar battle in FC, neither reminded me of the Death Star battle.

it was oversimplification for the audience's benefit. I cringe whenever someone suggests it matters. Certainly, there are much greater offenses to be found throughout the films.

It was an error on the writers part, why couldn't he have said 'Starfleet'?

And the ones in the TOS films weren't?.

No, the only time it looked anything like that was the wormhole in TMP.

 

[Rahul]

everyone seemed to love "magic to make the sanest man go mad", but i thought it represented some of the discovery's worst impulses: it tells (rather than shows) us the war is suddenly going better for the federation, new emotional scars are revealed in burnham but do nothing to tell us who she is, it contains graphic deaths with no dramatic effect, and recycles a tired trope without using its "unique perspective" to make it new again.

I'm mostly with you on that! While I still think "Magic makes the sanest man go mad" was one of DIS season 1's better episodes - it still was a horrible episode.

I usually really like timeloop episodes. And making it into a video-game-savefile/Edge of Tomorrow-inspired battle of wits was actually a unique twist at first.

But the timeloop in this episode was kinda' stupid (magic balls!), the solution dumb (hit him in the face when he's distracted!) and the character drama didn't really work either. (Do I think Mudd CAN be an ice-cold killer? Perhaps. Do I believe for ONE SECOND he's the type of guy that runs around with a phaser, gunning down professionally trained combat officers? No fucking way. Neither the TOS nor the DIS version for that matter.)

it tells (rather than shows) us the war is suddenly going better for the federation

This on the other hand is actually the one thing I liked about this episode! Because, for one second there, it looked as if DIS wouldn't fall into the boring sci-fi trapping of having a war to save humankind. And instead could offer a closer look to a war going on, that is not WWII in space, but a regional thing, where you really have to ponder about if it's worth the costs, what can realistically be achieved as an outcome, and when it would make sense to just stop and come together despite the casualties not being avenged (on either side). That could have been good stuff!

Like that one scene in "Lethe" where Lorca was pulling a gun on Cornwell, it actually hinted at a much more complex, complicated and realistic view of the world. There was so much potential in there. Instead they wasted all of it and turned to complete schlock, where they had to save Earth (and the entire Multiverse!) in the last second and Lorca was a simplistic, moustache twirling wanna'-be dictator instead of a complicated character with a warped sense of morals.

 

[Rahul]

I'm baffled at how genuine TNG fans not only praise First Contact, but site it as one of their favorites. Despite the fact it completely reverses and misses the point of Picard and how he feels about the Borg, which is even shown post-assimilation in the series, where he still doesn't want them all dead. But now in this movie, he does because.... movie?

That said, First Contact isn't a bad movie at all, but as someone who values characters, progression, and characterization most in my stories, such a blatant backpedaling irks me.

Also, it was one of the first steps into turning Trek from genuine slow science fiction into action schlock, which is where it's at now, and I am not happy about that.

I'm one of those TNG/FC fans!
Is the difference between TNG and First Contact jarring? Absolutely! But IMO not more than, say, the jump from TOS to TMP to TWOK, which all as well kinda' re-imagined the characters and the universe a little bit.

I think it works because both of them are actually good on their own.
"Generations" might have been a better implementation of the TNG crew in a movie. But it was just such a crappy movie overall. First Contact was actually establishing a new kind of Trek universe, one that's a better fit for movies, and why I was genuinely excited for the follow-up films Insurrection and Nemesis. Sadly, none of those really were really convincing on their own merits, which is IMO the main thing any movie has to achieve.

 

[PureCrimson]

You are not alone. I saw it once at a preview event and never had the desire to do so again; I left afterwards rather shocked that I hadn't seen a Star Trek movie but some generic actioner that happened to use the same characters' names as Star Trek*

The last time I had that reaction was with TWOK...

* and I really enjoyed BoBW, mainly because the resolution wasn't more firepower but a clever hack. Then FC came along and it was time for pew-pew-smash-the-Borg. It was boring.

I didn't get that reaction at all from Khan. I'm not the biggest fan of TOS, but the characters seem very faithful in the films to that show, from the ones I've seen.
Maybe ultra hardcore fans can see a difference, that maybe some of the subtleties are off, etc; but it's nowhere near as jarring as the TNG movies vs the show, in my opinion.

 

[tomalak301]

Reading this thread from the last few days, there was another episode I find I don't look forward to rewatching that is a classic: The Trouble With Tribbles

It's not a bad episode, but it's more corny than funny, and I actually thought Trials and Tribble-ations was better, even though that episode is a little overrated. Also, it hasn't aged well in that once we find out what happened after the Tribbles got beamed to the Klingon ship, it turns Genocide into a comedy and that's not right. Heck, Scotty could be an accessory to mass murder.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

^ Dark dude, very dark.

 

[Tenacity]

Also, it hasn't aged well in that once we find out what happened after the Tribbles got beamed to the Klingon ship

Dude, they're rats.

 

[The Old Mixer]

Also, it hasn't aged well in that once we find out what happened after the Tribbles got beamed to the Klingon ship, it turns Genocide into a comedy and that's not right.

One shouldn't hold somebody else's decades-after-the-fact projection of the aftermath against the original story or its tone. TOS didn't turn genocide into a comedy, DS9 turned a comedy into genocide.

 

[tomalak301]

One shouldn't hold somebody else's decades-after-the-fact projection of the aftermath against the original story or its tone. TOS didn't turn genocide into a comedy, DS9 turned a comedy into genocide.

Well, I blame the DS9 episode for that then, as well as putting the original cast on too high a pedestal. Still, it has impacted my enjoyment of the original episode.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Can tribbles be Federation citizens? Genocide isn't the correct term.

 

[CorporalClegg]

Better yet, I think it's time for the first tribble crewmember. "Captain's Advisor.' It sits on the captain's desk and telepathically berates the other crew on the current situation in an extremely condescending tone. Voiced by Holland Taylor.

 

[tomalak301]

Better yet, I think it's time for the first tribble crewmember. "Captain's Advisor.' It sits on the captain's desk and telepathically berates the other crew on the current situation in an extremely condescending tone. Voiced by Holland Taylor.

There's a Discovery idea for season 2.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

TOS didn't turn genocide into a comedy, DS9 turned a comedy into genocide.

I seem to remember an episode called "Patterns of Force" that did make light of genocide, and I wouldn't be surprised that Jewish writers would use genocide comedically (in fact, Beimler's father was the first person to report on antisemitic violence by the Nazi regime).

 

[Ovation]

Better yet, I think it's time for the first tribble crewmember. "Captain's Advisor.' It sits on the captain's desk and telepathically berates the other crew on the current situation in an extremely condescending tone. Voiced by Holland Taylor.

I’m confused. Didn’t we see that crewmember on Lorca’s desk?

 

[Tenacity]

I seem to remember an episode called "Patterns of Force" that did make light of genocide

The Zeonans were shown as hated, hunted and when captured beaten and killed. Their home world to be invaded.

Was genocide made light of?

 

[Sarxus]

I noticed that "Bride Of Chaotica!" from Voyager seems to be very popular among trekkies, but I didn't really like the episode. Yeah, it's intended to be funny, but there's often a really thin line between funny and ridiculous and in my opinion this episode really crossed it. That captured woman and her yelling and screaming all the time, it was so exaggerated and annoying to me. No, absolutely not my cup of tea (or rather coffee in the case of Voyager ).