TNG was cheaper looking because it was made for a syndicated market while Star Trek was a nationally televised network show on NBC.
Harlan Ellison: Star Trek Was Just "A Cop Show"
- Thread starter cooleddie74
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Mission Impossible had Barney Collier as the teams tech expert the same year Trek debuted.
Hogan's Heroes had Sgt Kinchloe as their radio operator a year before Trek debuted.
Both were arguably more important in their series than Uhura in Star Trek.
ETA -Corrected Barney's last name. Must have combined him with Barnabas Collins!
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To add, Barney was also the owner and founder of his own electronics firm.
And Julia, which premiered two years after Star Trek's debut, had a black female lead, who was a nurse and a single mother. A far more groundbreaking character than Uhura.
Well, I did mention Julia. 
TNG Season 1 just feels cheap and not just because of the sometimes obvious soundstage planet sets with purple or green skies and harsh lighting. Those kinds of sets looked just fine in 1967 or 1968 but somewhat less believable in 1987 or 1988.
I also think that the bland, fluorescent lighting of the later seasons makes the TNG sets look cheaper than the TOS ones. YMMV.
You have a point there. Frankly, gumdrop buttons and physical controls and switches on black consoles wind up looking better under bright soundstage lighting than the faux wood paneling and flatscreen interfaces of the TNG Enterprise sets. There's so much carpeting and soft trim on those sets that they often don't look very good in some scenes.
The 60s are cooler than the 80s.
That's because the 60s gave us The Byrds, The Beatles and The Stones to name a few
The 80s gave us fucking Kajagoogoo
I miss that old Tomorrow show format, was very laid back, and feels like a bunch of people talking in a living room. Interesting that Star Wars was about a year away and was about to reshape the sci-fi/fantasy genre in a big way.
James Doohan mentioning 1776 on the artistic rendering of the Enterprise, he seemed surprised, but 1776 was everywhere in 1976, celebrating America's bicentennial and all.
Harlan Ellison was a very outspoken person, especially in regards to his writing, and television in general, he was on another Tom Snyder show blasting NBC, and ABC exec's. The guy had a pair, and wasn't afraid to mince words. I doubt any talk show host would dare have someone on like that now, the networks simply wouldn't allow it. It's refreshing to see old interviews like this.
It somewhat amazes me how much of the Trek-tech Deforest, and James Doohan know. They know the layout of the ship etc. Almost gives a Galaxy Quest vibe
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Did Walter come across as grumpy to anyone else? He also mentions he wants equal time before a station break, guess he forgot his mic was still hot, oops.
Wasn't it soon after this Deforest stopped doing the conventions?
James Doohan mentioning 1776 on the artistic rendering of the Enterprise, he seemed surprised, but 1776 was everywhere in 1976, celebrating America's bicentennial and all.
Harlan Ellison was a very outspoken person, especially in regards to his writing, and television in general, he was on another Tom Snyder show blasting NBC, and ABC exec's. The guy had a pair, and wasn't afraid to mince words. I doubt any talk show host would dare have someone on like that now, the networks simply wouldn't allow it. It's refreshing to see old interviews like this.
It somewhat amazes me how much of the Trek-tech Deforest, and James Doohan know. They know the layout of the ship etc. Almost gives a Galaxy Quest vibe
. Did Walter come across as grumpy to anyone else? He also mentions he wants equal time before a station break, guess he forgot his mic was still hot, oops.
Wasn't it soon after this Deforest stopped doing the conventions?
Because that's the only act from the 80's comparable to the Byrds, the Beatles and the Stones.
The Doors with Billy Idol, if only.Because that's the only act from the 80's comparable to the Byrds, the Beatles and the Stones.
Ellison also wrote a great deal of television critique during this period, which was published in the collection The Glass Teat.
No act from the '80s is comparable to the Byrds, the Beatles, or the Stones.Because that's the only act from the 80's comparable to the Byrds, the Beatles and the Stones.
Disagree. I think U2, REM and Bruce Springsteen hold their own.
U2? REM?
DeForest? Kelley? No, he kept doing conventions until he was physically unable to. Back in 1991, about a month before GR died, I had the misfortune of telling De Kelley that John Hoyt had died in front of about 3000 people. His response was "I didnt know that." Boy did I feel bad.
Snyder and Ellison obviously had a friendship and a real chemistry together. I still remember once when Ellison was a guest on The Late Late Show with Tom Snyder in the mid-90s, Synder was so comfortable talking to Ellison that almost swore live on air. Synder stopped himself in time, and said, "I almost said the worst word of all!" Without missing a beat, Ellison responded, "You didn't say Nixon!"
Synder laughed pretty uproariously at that.
I'd throw in Joy Division-cum-New Order, Oingo Boingo, and the Bangles.
