The Eternal Question: TNG or DS9

But even now, like in this thread, Hands of the Prophets is more likely to generate a discussion than Who Watches the Watchers.

ITHOP is more relatable because the subject matter is more relatable, if not more realistic. Religious fanatics are making a big fuss over terminology and all a teacher wants to do is teach facts about the wormhole using scientific terminology.

If someone can make an interesting discussion from Who Watches The Watchers (TNG) it would be interesting to see. How far is it going to get?

No, only that there are certain flaws with it, depending on how much it allows the characters to grow. TNG used to be my favorite trek show above all others. After watching DS9, I noticed the differences and became more of a fan, especially after re-watching them or seeing reruns of it.

And it's also how far the characters were allowed to express themselves, ideas the show avoided and other things. It had limitations.
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Lol, true, but it tended to have the after effect making it seem like either the TNG crew or 24th century people had a stiff, elitist vibe to them. The music, I can understand, but plays and concerts all the time, quoting Shakespeare, the tea as refreshment, the stiff way the characters tended to express themselves-- I noticed this even as a fan of TNG-- I really liked the show but the characters didn't seem relatable--the 24th century didn't seem relatable.

 

Thou shalt not dis the bard, thou damned and luxurious mountain goat!

People in TNG seem cultured. I appreciate it. American anti-intellectualism has infected enough of the media. Seeing heroes who are not brutes is welcome. TNG has the certain air of a period piece, and it should. After all, these are people from another time.

 

This is my feeling as well. TNG has a fun aesthetic and storytelling but the characters are hard for me to connect with.

 

Autocorrect. And I'd already changed it by the time you posted this, so...?

 

Some say that TNGs 24th century people don't feel relatable. Maybe they shouldn't.
They are people in a very different time and live in a different world.
Some things may be relatable but not everything.
If everything would be like it is now, would that be realistic? Or interesting?

When it comes to 'Who Watches the Watchers' and 'In the Hands of the Prophets', which is more interesting?
An argument over what should be taught in school or becoming a supernatural being to an entire culture?
I'd say 'Who Watches the Watchers' wins easily. 'In the Hands of the Prophets' is an episode with a problem for people of today. TNG's episode here is about what humanity might encounter in the future. Might encounter, doesn't mean it will happen but it's not an episode about the 90s.

 

Realistic? No, probably not. Humans can't hardly imagine next year, much less a hundred years from now.

Interesting? That's up to the individual. I prefer DS9 because I can connect with them, their struggles, their worries.

I mean, when I read history I look for the human moments, the aspects that are fully relatable, even if I don't fully understand their era. Stories about Abraham Lincoln struggling with depression is interesting to me, while his being the President is less relatable.

Relatability is huge for me. Finding those human moments is the interesting part to me.

YMMV.

 

The characters in TNG are very authentic to what life is like in a command structured environment. In real life, they would probably good around a whole lot more, but they don't do that all that much on DS9 either.

Unless the objection is to the first season, TNG characters are every bit as relatable(or not, depending on the circumstances) as any of the other shows. They experience all the same emotions, struggles, etc.

 

For you. I keep trying but it's a struggle, save for occasional episodes .

 

You're right, and this is actually one of my points. On the TV show, the mold that TNG followed focused mainly on Picard, Riker and Data, as far the characters getting to have substance to their lives.

Geordi and Crusher had romances of the week that were pretty much forgotten about.

When a characters have serious experiences and relationships and mentions them later, it tends to make them look "real" like they have real memories and emotions.

When they don't, and it seems like the whole thing is reset and forgotten later and never mentioned again, it's hard to see a growing, changing, interesting character. Instead you see a frozen one. Because they seem to have no past, no insight into their memories or opinions, just adventures.

Flash forward 15 years, Geordi is still just acting as chief engineer with nothing else going on-he's not being transferred to a new assignment or getting married or resigning to pursue another career--he's just there. So is Crusher.

Worf should be an ambassador and it should have been brought up or discussed or asked about, but it was totally ignored. Instead he's in his Starfleet uniform and acting like security officer. As if the mold wanted to plug him back into a familiar role--not change and grow but to simulate the same episodic crew we were used to seeing on TV.

If during the show, these other characters had serious occurring relationships, other interests or ambitions, opinions and beliefs, we might have seen that featured in the movie.

I think DS9 did a great job with juggling an ensemble cast. Ironically, I think if it was a DS9 styled movie, all the characters would have a bigger roles.

This is exactly what happened during the war arc--all the characters had big roles and parts in it. By the end a lot them went in different directions or had different fates.

The reason some DS9 fans or fans in general may think TNG is not as relatable is many of those emotions and struggles seem to be forgotten by next week. It's a pretty important thing if you want to see the characters as interesting or relatable.

Yes it did happen occasionally, but it seem mainly reserved for ones like Picard because he is the main character. We get to see glimpses of his struggle with the Borg, but for everyone else it's reset.

But its also that TNG characters just seem too ideal, sterilized and safe. It was always plays and theatre for entertainment. Tea and alcohol for drinks. Classical music and jazz, but even with the outside explanation, it does make for awkward view sometimes.

In Nemesis during the wedding scene, Worf says "Romulan Ale should be illegal". Geordi says, "it IS illegal' -- that was supposed to be the comedy. It's like you heard that joke before.

DS9 characters talk and sound more like relatable everyday characters. They talk about silly things like the toilet, drink coffee and root beer, eat pancakes and gumbo, discuss politics and things from previous episodes months or years back.

Sisko says, "Do you know what the trouble is? Earth. You look outside and you see paradise".

This type of dialog just sounds more relatable and attention grabbing than just technobabble and speeches.

(OK, nothing is ever going to beat "There are FOUR lights!") lol

 

You mean like a main character participating a murderous conspiracy that should shake him to his core and alter his whole worldview and it is just forgotten by the next episode? That sort of thing?

 

Some say that they want to feel relatable to the characters but can't.
Maybe people of 2019 shouldn't / couldn't feel relatable to people from several hundred years in the future.
Could somebody from 1671 feel relatable to us if it was possible to show our life on TV to them?
Something like Breaking Bad would be easier to relate for us, it's from our era.

I can't agree with that. While not all episodes made a permanent stamp on the show, there were more things that changed over time than just Picard and his relationship to the Borg.

 

I mean TNG people feel perfectly relatable to me. They don't feel like people of our era and they shouldn't, but they're relatable. People speaking differently than I do or having different interests do not make them non-relatable for me*. Having different values might, if the difference is too drastic. But people in a good period piece or indeed in Shakespeare's plays feel relatable to me. Perhaps this is a cultural thing. Americans tend to mostly consume American-made media, they're rarely exposed to dramas which do not depict their culture. Now, as a Finn, most of the media I consume is made somewhere else. They're products of a foreign culture to me, so I'm used to watching dramas that depict people who are different from me.

* (That being said, personally for me Picard liking Shakespeare is far more relatable than Sisko obsessing over baseball.)

 

They are quite different, as well as understandable in their culture. I personally enjoy each of the TNG's characters little quirks. I personally But, staying with them is not appealing to me. It's not a matter of their different culture. It's a matter sticking with them through their adventures. That's the challenge.

 

Yaknow... DS9's most relatable character...


...was a TNG character(O'Brien)

Wuubammm!

 

So true!

 

Yes, indeed. I think O'Brien was one of TNG's bright spots to be sure, with episodes like "The Wounded," "Diaster," and "Power Play" being stand out episode for me.

 

And he couldn't go to holodeck like Tuvok- weren't invented yet. It was either go crazy, or go to some brothel.

Exactly, this is kind of what I meant. They always show the adventures or romances, but leave out the details or consequences.

The more episodic a show is, the more of this you tend to see in the characters. TOS was way more than TNG. TNG was a bit more than DS9. DS9 had it too, but it focused more on character continuity so they tended to talk about even small things that happened weeks, months or years ago.

It fleshes out the characters more when they do things like that.

If this is "In the Pale Moonlight", the entire point of the ending is that he deletes the log and decides not to ever speak of it ever again.

Before that, he says he can live with it. There's a subtle moment when while saying it again, he's raising a glass of alcohol to his mouth and then realizes it and calmly puts it down and repeats he can live with it. Then he deletes the entire record of what happened.


In fact, the actual event happened 2 weeks prior to Sisko talking about it in the log. Technically, he IS remembering something that took place a week ago

After DS9 helped bring it all out . Even Obrien claimed he was getting bored standing by transporters all the time lol.

Obrien got air time, scenes and whole episodes in DS9 in ways that he could never get from TNG. DS9 was more supporting of an ensemble cast.

 

The whole fucking point of him repeating 'I can live with is' that he is doubting whether he can. He is shaken, he is changed. It should affect his behaviour. He is not the same man any more. This should have an impact.

LOL, that's an absurd cop-out. It was in the same episode!

 

Honestly, and I doubt this was intentional, but I think his pouring out the drink with Martok wasn't just rejecting the Klingon tradition but also turning his back on the man he had to become during the war.

That might be me reading too much in to it. But, I think I can live with it.