Although I respect critical opinions, I don't think it's fair to say "________ is not real Star Trek." Things naturally evolve and progress, for better or worse.
Utopia
I'm confused that we're describing TNG Earth/Federation as utopia. I never considered it to be utopia, as the very definition is an "imagined place," not real. But I assumed that it was definitely a more enlightened place overall, at least to the point where old problems like drug addiction, racism, and poverty or wealth inequality were a thing of the past. I don't know what that would look like exactly, but I didn't dwell on it, because it was outer space that was interesting. I did get a kick out of seeing brief glimpses of Earth in TOS, TNG and DS9.
I think what made the enlightened vision of Earth interesting in Star Trek was that it was so different from life is like now. So it really made you feel like you were somewhere else. And often times that what SF is about, a form of escapism. And most importantly, it set itself apart from other sci-fi. Most science fiction that I see or read features something like a dystopia, or something just like life today, but with better technology.
Money
Was money being a thing of the past part of this enlightened culture, or was it just something created for the films as an easy way to contrast our future heroes from present-day humans?
I'm guessing that Roddenberry's idea of the future without money was always his intention, but TOS has references to purchasing and getting paid.
It seems like the idea of a future with no money only really started with Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, and it would be easy to dismiss it as something they added just to draw a contrast between our future heroes and present-day humans, not to mention it made for some great movie-comedy bits. They got a LOT of mileage out of a currency-less Federation for that movie. Prior to that it seems like they had money.
The TNG comes around, and Gene had more control so we find out there really isn't any money in the Federation's future, or maybe just Earth's. It's played as something serious, not for laughs.
I think it's a great idea, as it's one more thing to this world feel much different from our own. However, it's hard to wrap your head around: how do things get done if there's no pay? Why go to work if you don't have to? Are there people who just don't work at all?
When DS9 starts we're back to having currency.
I like the idea, but I haven't found anything online that shows that the creators took time to fully realize this idea of a currency-less future. If you're going to do that, you should have the details explained in a story-bible. For example, what happens if the Enterprise is stuck somewhere where they DO use money. And lets say the crew either want or need to buy something. What do they do? Shit outta luck or what?
Violence
I think this is the one issue where I'm not torn. It seems like the way people are killed here are more in line with a typical action-flick than it is with more serious speculative fiction. I appreciate that most of the time death was considered to be a very serious thing in TNG. I'm sure there are some inconsistencies here and there, and that's going to happen when you have multiple writers turning in episodes. But overall, it seems like it was always treated as a regrettable thing, whether it involved an enemy or not. In the first episode of PIC it came across as a little mindless at times. The people in helmets trying to kill Dahj and Picard? Who cares? Just bad guys. Faceless bad guys.
