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Star Trek Picard is not Star Trek

The Wormhole said:
Despite it being the party line, there really isn't much exploration in Star Trek. To examine the point in TNG, let's take a look at the first five episodes of each season:
Encounter at Farpoint: Basically heading off to the Farpoint outpost to pick up their crew gets sidetracked at first by Q and later they have to sort out why the alien jellyfish is so interested in Farpoint.
The Naked Now: Responding to a distress call. Crew then gets infected.
Code of Honor: They go to the planet to get a vaccine needed on another planet.
The Last Outpost: The episode starts with them dealing with the Ferengi attacking and stealing from a Federation outpost. Only because they happen by a planet which interferes with both ships do they go to the planet to check things out and learn about the civilization that lived there.
Where No One Has Gone Before: The Enterprise is undergoing engine experiments when they are thrown to a distant part of the universe. I suppose there is exploration in this one, but it's accidental.
The Child: Between acquiring their new CMO and transporting biohazard material, an alien entity boards the ship and impregnates Deanna.
Where Silence Has Lease: The Enterprise is dragged into another region of space by an alien douche.
Elementary Dear Data: The Enterprise is literally sitting still waiting to meet up with another ship, so Data and Geordi go to the holodeck and accidentally create a sentient hologram.
The Outrageous Okona: While just passing by, the Enterprise responds to a request for help.
Loud as a Whisper: The Enterprise transports a diplomat to a war-torn planet.
Evolution: The Enterprise hosts a visiting scientist.
The Ensigns of Command: While the Enterprise deals with an approaching alien ship, Data visits a colony to convince the people to leave before said alien ship arrives.
The Survivors: The Enterprise responds to a distress call from a colony.
Who Watches the Watchers: The Enterprise responds to a distress call from another group of explorers. I guess there is exploration being done in this one, just not by the Enterprise.
The Bonding: This one actually does start off with the Enterprise doing some exploring, though ultimately the episode isn't really about that.
The Best of Both Worlds, Part 2: Pretty much defending the Federation and rescuing Picard.
Family: The Enterprise is parked in Earth orbit. Picard visits his brother and family, Worf's parents visit.
Brothers: The Enterprise is rushing to a starbase to meet the medical needs of a child on the ship when Data is hijacked and himself hijacks the Enterprise.
Suddenly Human: The Enterprise responds to a distress call.
Remember Me: After the Enterprise leaves a starbase, Dr. Crusher gets stuck in some sort of pocket universe.
Redemption Part 2: Picard puts together an armada to try to prove Romulan involvement with the Klingon Civil War.
Darmok: Aliens reach out to the Federation to open diplomatic talks. Tangentially related to exploration.
Ensign Ro: An Evil Admiral manipulates the Enterprise dealing with Bajoran terrorists.
Silicon Avatar: The Enterprise as transporting colonists to a planet to settle on, planet gets attacked by the Crystalline Entity, the Enterprise spends the rest of the episode dealing with that.
Disaster: The Enterprise is disabled.
Time's Arrow Part 2: An Earth-bound adventure, for the most part.
Realm of Fear: The Enterprise responds to a distress call.
Man of the People: The Enterprise is transporting a diplomat to a conference.
Relics: Okay, this one does have exploration.
Schisms: Aliens abduct the crew.
Descent Part 2: Dealing with Lore and his band of independent Borg.
Liaisons: The Enterprise hosts alien diplomats while Picard is stranded on an abandoned planet. I guess you could say there is exploration, but it's the aliens doing the exploration here.
Interface: While experimenting with new technology, the Enterprise responds to a distress call.
Gambit: Investigations into Picard's apparent death lead the Enterprise into a fight with space pirates.
Phantasms: The Enterprise leaves a starbase after getting a new engine, which breaks down, turns out to be a threat to the crew, and to save the day, the crew must interpret Data's nightmares.

So out of those thirty-five episodes, about seven are related to exploration and most of the time only incidentally so, which actually works out to 20% exactly, as Vger23 asserted above.
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cooleddie74 said:
Star Trek is not Galaxy Quest.

Discuss.
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agreed, but only for two reasons:
a) There is no Star Trek in the title
2) The production company was Dreamworks who never owned the right to Star Trek
III) The movie was financially more sucessful than most regular Star Trek movies are
$) The Mak'tar are both highly intelligent and a brave, honorable people and it's totally against Gene's Vision that an alien race can be both
.) To paraphrase George Takei: Galaxy Quest is not fiction, it is "a chillingly realistic documentary. The details in it, I recognized every one of them. It is a powerful piece of documentary filmmaking."
 
Greg Cox said:
I think it's fair to say that TNG represented his vision of STAR TREK at that point in his life.

This doesn't not necessarily mean that Older Roddenberry had a better approach than Younger Roddenberry. It would be lovely if creators' work automatically improved with age but this is not always the case. And certainly the audience may well prefer somebody's earlier works to their later works.

The truth of the matter is that we like to pretend that STAR TREK is a single unified work, but, in reality, it's actually eight different TV series, 13 movies, hundreds of books and comics, produced by diverse hands over the course of more than half of century--which is why sweeping statements about what STAR TREK is and is not tend to be troublesome, because we're trying to cram hundreds of different stories, produced and written and directed by armies of different people, into one box that everyone agrees on, no matter what flavor of STAR TREK is "their" TREK.

Heck, as far back as DS9, I remember a Trekkie friend insisting that "it's good, but it's not STAR TREK."

Because STAR TREK is different things to different people.
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George Takei himself said that DS9 wasn't Star Trek because it was the "polar opposite" of Gene's vision. It turned out to be maybe the most critically acclaimed show and my personal favorite (and TNG is frankly a fairly distant second).

I think people fail to recognize how much each of the shows are basically filtered through the times in which they are created and the times that we saw them. TNG may have been Gene's vision, but it was filtered through a lot of 80's Americana with all that respect for authority and confidence that the Federation is always going to be the good guy. I still love it but I frankly think DS9 holds up better because it is a bit more relevant to today. PIC still has some of Roddenberry's vision in it, but we are in such a different world now, and it is going to change things. I am plowing through that discomfort myself and finding it rewarding.
 
My wife and I actually have spent the last six weeks or so re-watching Enterprise and I've gained a new appreciation for it.

Sure, it's not fantastic..but it's not as bad as I remember it. It's really a shame that it never got a full 7 season run..it feels like it hit it's stride in Season 4, just in time for the end. I would hope that had it not been cancelled and they been able to carry on through we would have not seen Trip die and additionally see the Romulan War, etc.

But alas.
 
Shran as a regular cast member in Season 5.

Yep. We'd have gotten Shran in the regular cast had it gone on another season.
 
cooleddie74 said:
Shran as a regular cast member in Season 5.

Yep. We'd have gotten Shran in the regular cast had it gone on another season.
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I would have been fine with that, I really like the character of Shran and it would have been interesting seeing him as a crew member on Enterprise
 
I'm guessing he would have been an "exchange officer" of sorts aboard Enterprise and not an honorary member of Starfleet holding a Starfleet rank but you never know.
 
Racefuel said:
My wife and I actually have spent the last six weeks or so re-watching Enterprise and I've gained a new appreciation for it.

Sure, it's not fantastic..but it's not as bad as I remember it. It's really a shame that it never got a full 7 season run..it feels like it hit it's stride in Season 4, just in time for the end. I would hope that had it not been cancelled and they been able to carry on through we would have not seen Trip die and additionally see the Romulan War, etc.

But alas.
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The problem with Ent was never that it was bad, per se, the problem was it was more of the same after 14 years and 519 episodes of the other series. The setting and characters were slightly different, but the types of stories it told were the same, in mostly the same way, with the same musical cues, and the same visual style. If you aren't watching it literally on the back of all of the rest of that Trek, it's a decent show.
 
EnderAKH said:
The problem with Ent was never that it was bad, per se, the problem was it was more of the same after 14 years and 519 episodes of the other series. The setting and characters were slightly different, but the types of stories it told were the same, in mostly the same way, with the same musical cues, and the same visual style. If you aren't watching it literally on the back of all of the rest of that Trek, it's a decent show.
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The only show we're watching concurrently is Picard, so it's more or less standing alone
 
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