Troi’s costumes were a curious thing indeed. Basically, the producers wanted cleavage on the bridge to get the randy nerds on board. This continued throughout the 90’s with the tradition of the great Trekkian catsuit. I still can’t believe that Kira got saddled with one, which always felt like an affront to the dignity of her character. But, I guess, after a while you just get used to these things and tune them out. I liked Troi’s bergundy/wine coloured costume from season two onwards. Of all the others it seemed the most professional. The blue dress just looked horribly out of place, with Troi slinking around the bridge looking like she’s got lost en route to the ballroom. That said, Marina Sirtis was so beautiful she could make anything look good. I did prefer it when she found the standard issue Starfleet uniform and kept her skimpier garments for off duty hours.
Can we talk about Beverly Crusher in red for a moment? These images have me wishing we saw Captain Beverly in "Parallels" or somewhere. I prefer Deanna in her proper blue, but I think Deanna in purple will always be the Platonic Ideal Deanna to me. I can just picture us now, in Ten Forward, having ice cream together...her in her purple outfit, me in my skant ...legs everywhere. This gender swapped TNG artwork is sensational and includes maybe male counselor's variant uniform? Maybe on Wednesdays they wear green.
Beverly wearing a red uniform would take me a LOOOONG time to get used to, though we did get to see Beverly in red in the "All Good Things..." version of the future when she was (or would've been) commanding that medical ship. OMG so did I! In fact, of all Troi's looks throughout the whole franchise, her burgundy jumpsuit was my second favorite look, my first favorite being the blue uniform with the Season 7 hair (my avatar). I personally didn't care for the Season 6 hair or the skant from the premiere. In fact, I kinda wish "Timescape" was a Season 7 episode to see Troi in uniform like she was in the episode but with the Season 7 hairdo as it was one of my favorite episodes from that particular season. Going back to my days in the 90s as a very young child, I recall being so fascinated with seeing Deanna Troi in uniform in the last two seasons of TNG, especially in the dark corridor scenes in the "Dark Page" episode, that that's actually how blue came to me my favorite color... or one of my favorite colors (pink, purple, and lilac/lavender being my other favorites). What's also interesting is that it wasn't until like, 2010 or 2011, did I learn that "Chain of Command" wasn't actually Deanna's first time since TNG's "Encounter at Farpoint" premiere that she wore a starfleet uniform as Deanna was seen wearing one in "Future Imperfect", a Season 4 episode. But yeah, I liked seeing Troi in a blue starfleet uniform on TNG. The reason being is that it kind of felt more like she "blended in" with the rest of the crew and provided a sense of regularity within the crew, but I liked the Season 7 look the best is because that uniform and hairdo ALWAYS reminds me of "Dark Page." It's that scene with her jumping off into space in the dark corridor that had me fascinated for some reason. She became my favorite character on that show since then. Also, i wish there could've been another episode or at least scene besides the beginning of "Sub Rosa" with her wearing that dress uniform thing with that hairdo. Speaking of "All Good Things..." I remember always being disappointed in the very last scene of the episode, and the show, when the senior crew is playing poker, Troi is out of uniform and always wished she would've wore her uniform in that scene. But now it kind of make sense why she didn't wear it in that scene because the uniform was always more of an on-duty thing. Besides at least she wore her blue uniform in Star Trek: Generations which took place the following year.
The season 6 hair (or rather the hair she wore for most of season 6) was a crime against humanity. Apparently even Marina Sirtis hated that hairpiece in particular and said it made her look like a country singer.
Idk, I thought the playing field was better when the men and women wore similar shaped outfits. As for Beverly, she should get her own thread, but I did like her off duty outfits.
Every female character looks so much better when in a proper uniform. Troi, Seven and T'Pol all had episodes when they were in more formal attire and it suited them all well. If Trek insists in putting characters in little more than body paint then its about time we had a man in the ridiculously tight catsuit!
She's giving me Kira Nerys vibes in the first pic, red uniform under read hair...red Mufasa "King of the Lions" hair. And her in the command chair? Kneel before Captain Crusher, bitches.
I can't recall season six hair for Troi. I tried to google it and it didn't focus on season 6. She had weird hair pretty much the entire series. What was different in season 6?
I can't link a picture right now, but the picture in this blogpost: http://www.myyearofstartrek.com/2013/05/tng-in-tribute-to-troi.html depicts the hairstyle I'm talking about. Or just watch the episode where Captain Jellico shows up (I just finished watching Season 6 and that hairstyle debuts in the episode right before Chains of Command) or any of the episodes of season 6 after that. Or google that old "Ermergerd the Berg!" meme. In my opinion it's just a very bizarre and ugly hairstyle. The fornt part look heavily hair-sprayed,w while the back has this weirdly shaped mass of extremely tight curls, making them not even look like part of the same hair (which well they aren't, since the back part is a hair piece, but the older styles and the Season 7 one were better about pretending it's all her hair). In my opinion, unlike her older hairstyles I can't even tell how it's supposed to keep it's shape. In addition to that it's, again imho, rather unflattering and makes her look years older than she actually is (though the makeup they chose to go along with that style didn't help). And unlike the older hair it doesn't even have the excuse that it's meant to look alien, since it looks very human ca. 1970s/80s country singer. Compare that with her Season 7 hair (the softer, free waves) where she looked absolutely stunning and, if I'm completely honest, a lot better than any other look she ever had on the show.
In the 90s some Finnish article mentioned something like this about the Starfleet uniforms: "Low cut neckline means psychologist". Or something like that, it's been a while since I read it. It was somekind of fantasy / scifi fan magazine.
I have actual hair that pretty much looks like her hair on the show. I could get my hair to look almost just like that, if I blew dry the front part around a medium sized, say about 7 inches circumference round brush, then pulled my hair back with a barrette (hair clip) I would have to use hair spray on the front part though to keep It straight. Kidding, by the end of the day it would be curly again. But I could get it to last for and hour or so. Except that most of it isn't her hair and her hair isn't curly, on the show, to me I could empathize with her, the never ending battle to not have your hair needs its own zip code.
^ The difference between a psychiatrist and a psychologist is that a psychiatrist is also a medical doctor who can prescribe medication. A psychologist usually needs a masters degree but no further medical training. Typically you want to see a psychologist for therapy and psychiatrist for meds. I was joking sharing the low-cut counselor’s uniform for men as (I hope) the artist was too. Men can be sexualized too, and in the same way (sexualized as “pretty,” not just as “strong” as they usually were in the past), but I think it’d look closer to the males from “Angel One” than here where it’s just Frazier Crane in Deanna Troi’s outfit.
...was Deanna qualified to prescribe meds? We usually just see her doing therapy work when we see her in her function as ship's counselor.
I think she was a psychologist, not psychiatrist, but honestly who knows where the fields will go in the next four hundred years? Anyway, she was a “counselor,” stationed on the bridge, so I dunno.
I still can’t get over Crusher in red. With that big red hair and a name like Captain Crusher, it’s surreal. But then it was always fun seeing the crew in different colors. Data in red as Captain Riker’s first officer in “Future Imperfect,” Picard in blue in “Tapestry,” Thomas Riker in gold in “Second Chances...” who else could have made a splash in another color?
Well the darker tones of red like maroon and burgundy (and personally I'd say the TNG command uniform looks pretty maroon) are one of the clolours redheads tend to look good in, so it's no suprise that Gates McFadden looks good in the command uniform. We know Deanna looked quite good in the maroon jumpsuit, so I bet she would have looked good in the standard command uniform as well. I sometimes think he TNG cast after season 1 was a bit awkward with the colour distributio; among the main characters science blue/teal became a female-only colour, while command red and operations/secuirty yellow became male only colours. It was a bit awkward imho. Once Wesley became a recurring role rather than a main (season 3, if I'm not mistaken?) they should have considering introducing a Ro-like character in Red or Yellow way sooner. I also wish they would have changed Data's makeup rather than putting him into yellow instead of blue/teal like they originally planned.
So I finished my quarantine re-watch of TNG and, for a bit of addtional fun, I made notes on which episodes Deanna wears her various costumes. And I found out that the turquoise dress with the lopsided cleavage is only used in Seasons 3 and 4 (and one episode of Season 7, Parallels) meaning it wasn't used at all during seasons 5 and 6 when Deanna was still in her civilian attire. It makes sense that it fell out of use, because while pretty, the dress is kinda the most awkward and unprofessional looking of her "on duty" attires. Plus Marina Sirtis reportedly hated the dress in particular because she thought the asymmetrical cleavage looked silly and it was particularly uncomfortable to wear because it had a built-in corset and was actually a jumpsuit with a skirt attached rather than a dress (so those aren't tights under the skirt, those are the pant legs of the jumpsuit) So does that make the "dress" a sort of "maxi skant"?
Kind of haha... I actually like Troi's blue "Parallels" dress. Of her non-uniform looks, the crimson red jumpsuit is my top favorite, with that blue dress or "maxi skant" in second place. On another note though, I would've liked more Season 7 scenes in which Troi wears her dress uniform. She wore one in the opening of "Sub Rosa" and she also wore it in "Liasons" which was a Season 7 episode but annoying she still had her Season 6 hair, which looked tacky compared to her Season 7 hair (beginning with "Interface"). I also liked how when she's in uniform, no bangs, but when out of uniform, there are bangs so i take it the producers thought the bangs were less formal... even though she had bangs in uniform in Star Trek: Generations. But like i said before my favorite look on her is the science uniform with the Season 7 hair.
Oh don't get me wrong, I love the dress/"maxi skant", specially in Parallels. I just think it looks more like "off-duty" attire and it sometimes looked a bit awkward with the matching alice band Danna wore with it in seasons 3 and 4. And I agree, Season 7 was Deanna's best look, by far.