Pretty much 100% of this.
What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?
- Thread starter Amasov
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Pretty much 100% of this.
"The Man Trap" ends with McCoy killing the last surviving member of a species. That's not a very Star Trek ending, IMO, although Kirk's thoughtful regret at the end is very Star Trek.
I think "The Devil in the Dark" is much more typical of a Star Trek story, where we start out encountering a new, different, and frightening creature, and by the end we've seen things from the creature's POV and come to an understanding. We also see this in "The Corbomite Maneuver" and "Arena." Even "Errand of Mercy" has this to a degree, although there it's the Organians that surprise us. The Klingons are exactly what they appear to be at first glance.
I definitely agree with this, particularly of early TNG. Picard's speeches tended towards the trite side, although Patrick Stewart is such a great actor he could sell the hell out of them. Kirk is a more open character in a lot of ways, because he seems less concrete in his convictions. Picard was much more prone to grand proclamations, whereas Kirk would be more likely to give us a "Did we do the right thing? I'm still not sure..." at the end of an episode.
It's the difference between TNG telling us what to think and TOS inviting us to think and reach our own conclusions, I suppose.
I bolded the part of your quote that reminds me that DS9, more than any other spinoff, is the closest in spirit to TOS.
I agree!
What’s odd is Paramount seemed all in on production order until the DVD box sets, then they switched to airdate order.
For what it’s worth, I remember syndication order always being in production order in the 70s and 80s, but I suppose that may have been up to the individual stations.
With regard to Quark, I always wondered in our favorite DS9 Ferengi was named in homage to this show.
All Our Yesterdays
The Alternative Factor
Amok Time
And The Children Shall Lead
The Apple
Arena
Assignment Earth
Balance of Terror
Bread and Circuses
By Any Other Name
The Cage
Catspaw
Charlie X
The Changeling
The City on the Edge of Forever
The Cloud Minders
The Conscience of the King
Corbomite Maneuver
Court Martial
Dagger of the Mind
Day of the Dove
Deadly Years
The Devil in the Dark
The Doomsday Machine
Elaan of Troyius
The Empath
The Enemy Within
The Enterprise Incident
Errand of Mercy
Friday’s Child
For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky
The Galileo Seven
The Gamesters of Triskelion
I, Mudd
The Immunity Syndrome
Is There No Truth In Beauty?
Journey To Babel
Let That Be Your Last Battlefield
The Lights of Zetar
The Man Trap
The Mark of Gideon
The Menagerie
Metamorphosis
Miri
Mirror, Mirror
Mudd’s Women
The Naked Time
Obsession
The Omega Glory
Operation: Annihilate!
Paradise Syndrome
Patterns of Force
A Piece of the Action
Plato’s Stepchildren
A Private Little War
Requiem for Methuselah
The Return of the Archons
Return to Tomorrow
The Savage Curtain
Shore Leave
The Squire of Gothos
Space Seed
Spectre of the Gun
Spock’s Brain
A Taste of Armageddon
That Which Survives
This Side of Paradise
The Tholian Web
Tomorrow is Yesterday
The Trouble with Tribbles
Turnabout Intruder
The Ultimate Computer
The Way to Eden
What Are Little Girls Made Of?
Where No Man Has Gone Before
Who Mourns for Adonais?
Whom Gods Destroy
Wink of an Eye
Wolf in the Fold
I saw TOS in Production Order in the '90s.
In the summer of 1992, the station I watched Star Trek on (WNAC-64, a.k.a. FOX 64) switched from showing TNG every day to showing TOS every day. They made it to the middle of the second season, before switching back to TNG.
In the summer of 1993, they showed TOS again, making it to the end of the second season this time.
Then another station, that was also showing Star Trek (WLVI-56), started showing TOS weeknights at midnight. They did this for a while, probably a few years. Only problem was: I was in high school, and my parents wouldn't let me watch TOS at midnight on a school night. So, eventually, I came up with a solution: Program the VCR to record every episode overnight. By 1995, I'd recorded every episode.
Which means I watched TOS in Production order and it took me three years, as long as the show actually ran. So I got the best of both worlds. Pun intended.
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Think that Picard comes off as more experienced and more confident in his role. Kirk in contrast has some uncertainties there. There is some dialogue between himself and McCoy in ep "Balance of Terror" where he expresses this, asking why it has to be him to make these decisions. If I remember correctly. I do agree that this leads to Kirk being much more relatable to any of us. I guess what I am wondering is if Picard had found himself in any such situation. I do think this was part of his personality, and he does express it being a weakness in some sense in the very beginning when saying he has a hard time with children, which is to say he is not very personable.
You know, considering that Picard has previously commanded the Stargazer, and is in his 60s during TNG instead of his 30s, I'd expect him to be more experienced, confident, and less uncertain. And those lectures, he's probably given them 100,000 times.
With Kirk, it would be more like he's discovering these insights in Real Time. And he hasn't given the same lecture to aliens 100,000 times. So, naturally, it would sound more organic and less cut-and-paste.
Another difference is that Kirk is more ambitious than Picard. Kirk was offered a promotion to Admiral after the Five-Year Mission and took it. Picard was a Captain forever and ever and ever; and settled into his ways. Picard didn't become an Admiral until MUCH later. Then he wasn't just out of his lane, he was way out of his lane. Then, at the beginning of PIC, he thought he could be like Kirk, and it didn't work.
With Kirk, it would be more like he's discovering these insights in Real Time. And he hasn't given the same lecture to aliens 100,000 times. So, naturally, it would sound more organic and less cut-and-paste.
Another difference is that Kirk is more ambitious than Picard. Kirk was offered a promotion to Admiral after the Five-Year Mission and took it. Picard was a Captain forever and ever and ever; and settled into his ways. Picard didn't become an Admiral until MUCH later. Then he wasn't just out of his lane, he was way out of his lane. Then, at the beginning of PIC, he thought he could be like Kirk, and it didn't work.
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At least the Ballad of Bilbo Baggins is entertaining.
Wasn't that because Kirk himself told Picard to stay in the captain's chair for as long as possible?
Yes and no. If Picard took command of the Stargazer in 2333, he'd already been a Captain for 38 years before he met Kirk in 2371.
In "Rascals", he says he'd been a Captain for 30 years. If that's 30 non-consecutive years and you don't include the nine years between the Stargazer and the Enterprise-D, it lines up with the above.
Either way, he'd already been a Captain for a long-ass time, and Kirk had nothing to do with it, up to Generations.
Afterwards, he stays Captain for another 10 years. So, whether he was commanding a ship or not, he had the same rank for up to a grand total of 48 years!
2333-55 and then 2364-69. Twenty-seven. Close enough given how Trek likes to round off dates and how many years pass between one event and another.
That was the case; when TOS aired on KCOP (channel 13 in L.A.) in the early 70s, episode order could be random at times. However, when TOS moved to KTLA (channel 5 in Los Angeles) in the mid 70s, the episodes were broadcast in airdate order, so instead of "The Corbomite Manuver" airing after "Where No Man Has Gone Before" (production order), it was placed before "The Menagerie, Part 1".
I think for TOS I'd show The Corbomite Maneuver, Balance of Terror, and Errand of Mercy. I'll have to think about the rest.
I tend to tailor my lists a bit - at the least, I ask the new inductee if they want a straight-up "best of" list, or more of a "speed-run the Trek experience" list, meaning a smattering of the great, the horrible, and the ridiculous.
I could come up with a list, but it really comes down to who you're showing these episodes to and what their interests are. It really depends on the person. You don't want to show them a list of episodes they have to go through. You want to get them hooked and then they're watching episodes they want to watch, instead of episodes they "have" to watch. If you get them hooked, they'll want to see more.
Don't show them what you want them to see. Show them what they want to see.
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