What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

[Gul Sengosts]

As someone whose first contact was with TNG, be it unrealistic or not, the optimism is inspirational. The idea of "look how it could be if we got our shit together". I may have grown a little more critical with time, more leaning toward a less idealistic view of the future, but I just can't deny how it inspired people, many of who are working at NASA and stuff today after watching TNG as kids. There is value in having something that is idealistic and worth aspiring to.

There is great value in having less idealistic versions of the future too, I just believe one doesn't devalue the other. I believe we should be grateful that we have both TNG and DS9. We can have one series that is idealistic and another one that is more "realistic", and can have them both contribute to how we think about how things are and where we want to go.

 

[ananta]

I do like the aspirational and inspirational quality of Trek. I guess I just prefer it being less overt, less in your face than it is at the moment.

 

[fireproof78]

If you're going to give me aspirations scifi then please provide a path for me to get there. TNG looked down on contemporary humanity, treating them, and by extension the audience, as lesser, with no clear path forward. TOS and DS9 at least acknowledged choice and ability to grow.

 

[Qonundrum]

The best thing about TOS and how it portrayed Starfleet was that it was a group of wildly imperfect individuals who still pursued a noble goal, even if they might never reach it. TNG lost sight of that and all but said at different times that we'd reached that goal and any problems in the system came from outside, from alien and enemy sources not of the Federation.

Which was a lovely thought at first, but (a) it's harder to write drama that doesn't involve interpersonal shenanigans, and (b) season 1 still shows people being real donkey hinds to one another on the bridge. Even Worf gets a moment to be impudent and asking Riker what the point of keeping score on a game is if it's not important to do, and noting how much of a burro Riker could be, especially to Data but Data's not a biological being so it's okay... then again, even Data was not immune; unknowingly being a neddy plenty of times himself as Picard would ultimately be a proper moke in turn and icily spout "shut up thank you, mister Data". And that's just in season one's early episodes, before they nixed the idea that no interpersonal conflict could be used. (On the minus side, or rather it's a plus from a different perspective, the same edict also led to the character pairing of Geordi and Data and theirs is one of my favorite double-acts in sci-fi.)

But, perhaps ironically, and possibly in part due to all the substance abuse issues* over the years**, Gene thought that TOS was no longer canon and TNG was the way for Trek to be now, also unaware that it was trying to sell - via different means also told glibly - what hippie rock bands were selling in the 1960s to achieve shiny happy people utopia, how sex, drugs, and rock and roll would solve everything and all would be happy, squeeee! (hint, they don't - or certainly not in the way some of them mishandled it all. At least STDs were easier to treat back then...)


* Like this one and where'd they come up with the stylish photos worthy of a 80s catalog, had the white powder in question be legal? The popularity of it in society peaked in 1985
** he easily could have lived into his 80s otherwise

 

[1001001]

If you're going to give me aspirations scifi then please provide a path for me to get there. TNG looked down on contemporary humanity, treating them, and by extension the audience, as lesser, with no clear path forward.

First contact with a friendly alien race. That’s the path forward in Star Trek.

Not sure we can count on that, though.

 

[Qonundrum]

If you're going to give me aspirations scifi then please provide a path for me to get there. TNG looked down on contemporary humanity, treating them, and by extension the audience, as lesser, with no clear path forward. TOS and DS9 at least acknowledged choice and ability to grow.

^^this

Just showing alleged utopia without engendering any ideas is underwhelming at best*. Even worse, how they handled future-humans being oh-so-better was often done cringe-worthy -- as much as, in terms of unintentional parody, the story "Lonely Among Us" goes, the scenes where Riker's got his nose up by 90 degrees and being haughty toward the Sela and Anticans over how much better humans are... or Picard talking at the band of 20th century weirdos from "The Neutral Zone" is another lovely moment -- of which some aspects of his superiority complex are readily disproven, even in episodes prior to that one. Like how he has the fish and the model Stagazer ship in his room. Oops... and who fed the fish anyway? Don't touch the spikes, they're poisonous as well... it's amazing Q didn't snap his fingers to give the thing lungs and a set of muscular legs, followed by a prompt barking of "SIC, GO GET 'EM! CRUSHERS FIRST!" for five minutes of hijinx...


* unless it's like movies like "Logan's Run" where it's all ostensibly utopia except the twist is they all go explode in a big chamber in a ritual named "Carousel" just when they hit the optimal point in their lives before the body starts its sloooooooooooow-decay** and all ostensibly so they can plop out of an incubator again to have more preprogrammed fun, for which they didn't go into pedantic details either***, but being 1975 and all they wouldn't either way...

** Oh goody, now I have flashbacks to what my 5th grade instructor said about aging, what a day to have stayed half-awake in class...

*** for which the audience creating their own ideas to fill in the gaps with can be entertaining in of itself... assuming the audience does, it's hard to tell when you're gawking at everyone in a barely-lit room to see if they're thinking or not... apart from "Why is that weirdo staring at us?"

 

[ananta]

Rewatching “The Neutral Zone”, the crew’s behaviour toward the 20th century humans (who are admittedly caricatures) is staggeringly obnoxious.

 

[tesral]

First contact with a friendly alien race. That’s the path forward in Star Trek.

Not sure we can count on that, though.

We do not understand the Japanese, and they are Human. Every evidence exist that Cetations and Elephants are sentient, and we cannot freely communicate with them. We're doomed.

Star Trek is a fantasy.

 

[plynch]

And the whole alien intervention implies we couldn’t/didn’t get our act together ourselves, no?

 

[cooleddie74]

Rewatching “The Neutral Zone”, the crew’s behaviour toward the 20th century humans (who are admittedly caricatures) is staggeringly obnoxious.

When Ralph Offenhouse comes off as more sympathetic and less of an asshole than Captain Picard that's saying something. He figured out the Romulans were hiding the fact that they, too, didn't know who attacked the Neutral Zone outposts before Riker did.

 

[Farscape One]

I think "The Neutral Zone" suffered from not getting another script revision or two due to the WGA strike that year. (It was produced right when the strike began in 1988.) It might have made Picard and the crew come off a little better.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

So, the series' last season is solely depended on the nostalgia factor. Not interested.

What other reason would anyone have to sit through another season of that ready-to-be-flushed series?

* unless it's like movies like "Logan's Run" where it's all ostensibly utopia except the twist is they all go explode in a big chamber in a ritual named "Carousel" just when they hit the optimal point in their lives before the body starts its sloooooooooooow-decay** and all ostensibly so they can plop out of an incubator again to have more preprogrammed fun, for which they didn't go into pedantic details either***, but being 1975 and all they wouldn't either way...

Anyone who participated in Carousel were killed--no one was ever "renewed" (as Logan-5 learned from the Computer). All newborns were simply new children, not new versions (or reincarnations) of dead citizens.

 

[Sci]

I do like the aspirational and inspirational quality of Trek. I guess I just prefer it being less overt, less in your face than it is at the moment.

I honestly think that modern Trek has a pretty good balance between realism and optimism. DIS S1 and PIC S1 both explored how the Federation can falter and be deeply flawed, and DIS S3 explored how the Federation can fail even when it hasn't betrayed his values, just by losing political unity. And every single ST series now portrays people who, even when they're pretty good folks, are still flawed human beings who have interpersonal conflict and have to cope with profound traumas. Even when modern Trek is hopeful, it's not as thoughtlessly -- or dishonestly -- utopian as a lot of TNG (especially TNG S1-2), and it's more psychologically realistic than most of VOY. Modern Trek portrays a world where there is hope but people are still deeply flawed. I think every modern Trek show is very strongly influenced by DS9 that way, honestly.

 

[Lord Garth]

I don't know when it's going to happen or who's going to do it, but I think the best episode of Star Trek hasn't been made yet.

 

[tesral]

I don't know when it's going to happen or who's going to do it, but I think the best episode of Star Trek hasn't been made yet.

We can hope.

 

[Oddish]

With efforts like "Best of Both Worlds", "The City on the Edge of Forever", "The Visitor", and even "Year of Hell" to contend with, it'll have its work cut out for it.

 

[Farscape One]

Along with "BALANCE OF TERROR", "ERRAND OF MERCY", "THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE", "YESTERYEAR", "The Measure Of A Man", "Yesterday's Enterprise", "The Inner Light", "All Good Things...", "DUET", "THE WAY OF THE WARRIOR", "IN THE PALE MOONLIGHT", "DISTANT ORIGIN", "LIVING WITNESS", "BLINK OF AN EYE", "COGENITOR", and "TWILIGHT".

And between the two of us, we've only covered some of the best material.

I don't know if 'the best episode has yet to be made' will ever be an accurate assessment. At best, one may join the ranks of 'best episodes ever made' because it's impossible to have a single best episode of a single series, let alone a franchise.

("YESTERYEAR" probably being the only exception that almost proves the rule.)

 

[Oddish]

Well said. I was merely quoting single faves from each series, but your list was far more comprehensive. I think either of us could have furnished 50, or even 100 great Treks. And there is room for more greatness.

 

[Disco]

Balance of Terror is a bit dull for me. It's all subjective though.

 

[Farscape One]

Balance of Terror is a bit dull for me. It's all subjective though.

Wow. That's the first time I have heard anyone say that episode was dull. Not knocking your opinion because everyone has their own tastes, but I'm genuinely shocked at that. (Particularly as it's one of my two absolute favorites in TOS, the other being "THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE".)

Can you tell me why you think it's dull? Genuinely curious.