What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?
- Thread starter Amasov
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Season 2 of Picard was great, and I feel robbed of whatever they were setting up with the Borg and Jurati Queen as Federation allies acting as "Guardians at the Gate".
Linear thinking or not - Q should stay dead and gone. I rolled my eyes at his mid-credits Season 3 return. The possibility of him turning up again to taunt Picard's son is something else that takes away from Season 2's journey.
Strange New Worlds' Mr. Kyle isn't the same person as Original Series/Wrath of Khan Mr. Kyle. My head canon has them being a married couple, with his other half so far unseen but serving on the Enterprise. But by 2266 posh English & blonde Kyle is the only one aboard, either through separation, reassignment or death of the Asian recast character.
Linear thinking or not - Q should stay dead and gone. I rolled my eyes at his mid-credits Season 3 return. The possibility of him turning up again to taunt Picard's son is something else that takes away from Season 2's journey.
Strange New Worlds' Mr. Kyle isn't the same person as Original Series/Wrath of Khan Mr. Kyle. My head canon has them being a married couple, with his other half so far unseen but serving on the Enterprise. But by 2266 posh English & blonde Kyle is the only one aboard, either through separation, reassignment or death of the Asian recast character.
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I have a controversial one:
Star Trek Nemesis - bad and disappointing as it is - is a better final send-off for the TNG crew than PIC season 3.
Fight me
I agree and disagree...
I adore season 3 of Picard, despite it being over the top fanservice at times. I just loved that. Fight me.
However, I have often said, that in the script of Nemesis was an amazing TNG movie, and if the director knew more of Star Trek and TNG it would have been amazing. If Insurrection wasn't received so poorly and Frakes had had another shot at the big chair, I think things could have turned out quite differently. Or any other director that did multiple episodes of TNG AND knew how to direct a movie.
I liked all of Picard, though I can understand why people don't like the first two seasons. Season three, though, was wonderful. Could it have been better? Sure. Was it fan service? Absolutely. But I'm prepared to forgive a lot when the end of episode nine reduced me to a sobbing wreck.
With Nemesis... It's not a fun movie to watch, at least to me. It leaves you with this dark, depressing ending, that doesn't feel entertaining at all. It just feels like something you endure. And, apparently, a lot of the cast had the same feeling behind-the-scenes, and didn't enjoy making it.
There are three plot elements which don't feel right:
There are three plot elements which don't feel right:
- I have never liked making the villain a clone of Picard. It feels like a very soap opera type plot element. The evil clone just hits like an "evil twin" story that 70s-era General Hospital might do Although, admittedly, TNG had their own evil twin stories (e.g., Lore).
- The fall of the Romulan government is treated like an "and that happened" moment, where we're supposed to believe forces across the entire Romulan Empire were quelled by Schinzon without any major divisions or dissent. To me, what happens in the opening should have led to unrest, riots and civil war that would have pulled apart the Romulans long before the supernova destroyed Romulus.
- Data's death was the first attempt to duplicate Spock's death from Wrath of Khan, and I don't think it works any better than Kirk's death in Into Darkness.
Yup. Shitty script through and through.
Not to mention, each one those has a giant plot hole attached to it. (Though, Trek films are like driving down a Minnesota state highway in springtime.)
Not to mention, each one those has a giant plot hole attached to it. (Though, Trek films are like driving down a Minnesota state highway in springtime.)
The best parts of NEM are the Deleted Scenes, which speaks volumes for how good a movie is that you'd rather watch the bonus content and discover what you missed out on AND the director and studio felt "wasn't good enough" to include in the actual film.
I think for many people here (especially those that became fans as kids, and excepting for perhaps the Star Wars original trilogy), the Star Trek films may be their most rewatched films. Every single line and shot is buried in the subconscious. The director's cut of TWOK stands out so much because the few minutes of added scenes can throw you out of the movie due to their novelty, for example. They're always the "new scenes".
When the TNG era films came out on DVD, I only watched NEM twice (once for the single disc edition, once again for the two disc special edition). On Blu-ray, just once. And last year I bought all the films again on 4K. I've seen GEN and FC over 20 times. INS at least 10. But NEM? I'd only seen it twice in 18 years. So it was bizarre rewatching it again. The good in the film is always a pleasant, unfamiliar surprise. But then the bad is the bad.
Now I want to try and do a TNG films + PICARD rewatch before the end of the year. See how all that somehow strings together.
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In their review of Picard season 3, the guys over at Red Letter Media made the argument that season 3 not only attempts to course correct some of the things from the first two seasons, but it also tries to "fix" some of the issues from the TNG movies.
That putting them back on the Enterprise-D, and not the Enterprise-E, was symbolic of rewinding things to the end of season 7. Data's death is finally undone, and the resolution to Picard's story-arc for the season depends on him becoming more the cerebral leader, not an "action-hero." The ending depends on him making an honest connection with the son he hasn't known as a father, not in a fist-fight or blasting the Borg Queen.
Nemesis is one of those Star Trek movies that I waited for the DVD to come out. And I bought the DVD when it was initially released, knowing its bad reputation, not expecting much, but hoping it wouldn't be as awful as I was expecting.
In some ways it was even worse than the low bar I set. And about a year ago, I tried re-watching it thinking, maybe with 20 years time, I'll see stuff I didn't appreciate at the time. And it just isn't there.
- I thought the visual effects and production design were dated even for 2002. It's very 90s TV. I remember thinking the Schimitar had bad production design ever for a setting in a science-fiction film of the time (e.g., look at some of the other stuff made in the early 2000s, and this looks so much worse). The bridge looks really flat. It has a cargo bay full of fighter craft that it never launches. And all the displays look like video game graphics.
- It has some elements that just feel out of place, not done well, and give the "ick." For example, I don't think they handle Troi's sexual (mind) assault well at all.
- The Romulans feel like they're two planets, not an Empire.
- It arguably is one of the worst offenders of the Trek movies copying Wrath of Khan's template without making the underlying themes work for these characters. It has all of the elements (e.g., a villain that wants to hurt the lead character over a grudge, a device that threatens to destroy life on a planetary scale, a major character sacrificing their existence for their friend, etc.), but all of the character development is worse. Schinzon is no Khan. The connection and grudge that Schinzon has to Picard feels forced. And Data's death feels more like something that happens because the script says it has to happen to give the story significance rather than a natural progression of the story.
Come to think of it, I only saw NEM in the theatre once... and I even did a repeat of INS!
One challenge with most Berman era stuff is it's hard to break out when to blame Berman himself and when to blame the studio. GEN clearly had an imposed from above laundry list... and Braga and Moore were too inexperienced to navigate just how to pull off the crossover and kill off Kirk. FC somehow came through unscathed. Thanks to Michael Piller, we have thorough documentation of how brutal preproduction was on INS and how a death of a thousand cuts turned it into an overbudget TV two parter.
There should have been a TNG film in 2000 (chronologically that would overlap with VGR season 7). Instead they ended up with a four year gap trying to correct for INS and bring in new people, but in the process killed off the TNG films.
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I think it's ok and mildly entertaining.I may have employed a bit of hyperbole, there…
I thought Seasons 1 and 3 both started off really well, especially Season 1.
Unfortunately (for me) I think the show shit the bed at the end of both seasons.
I thought Season 2 was a shit show from Episode 1. What are you going to do?
I wanted Picard to be good. TNG is my favorite series (okay, maybe tied with Voyager). I just don’t think it was.
Which is how I feel about Nemesis too.
I always thought it an odd choice Michael Piller originally wanted Insurrection to be Star Trek meets Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now. If I remember right, they initially were hoping to get someone like Tom Hanks to be the Kurtz character.
Unless they wanted to go very dark, in a way that a Star Trek movie has never gone, I don't know how that would have ever worked. The entire point of Conrad's story and Apocalypse Now is contrasting the behavior of how "civilized" societies behave towards "savages" to see true savagery, and questioning the very nature of humanity. And as bad as forced relocation of a community sounds, I think you would need to show the Federation tolerating something much more awful than what's depicted in Insurrection for it to have the dramatic impact.
I could potentially see a Star Trek series doing some variation of this, since you would have time to do nuance and surround it with other stuff that's maybe not so dire, but not really a movie. Beyond just how it would seriously have to upend the view of the Federation in a way where you would need to question everything, and I don't know if you can really do that well in a 2-hour movie, I don't see a movie like that being a "fun" Summer movie that executives at Paramount see as a potential blockbuster.
Controversial Opinion: The Federation was right in Insurrection. At best the issue is far more complicated that Captain Picard makes it out to be.
It could have been an interesting conundrum but the scale is too messed up. 600 people vs... The entirety of the Federation? I'm leery of "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" but even I would have a hard time with this on paper. (Paging the Majalans.) "How many people does it take, admiral, before it becomes wrong?" Complicated question except the simple answer is "more".
I suppose the intractable part of the argument is that the Ba'ku do not give their consent. So let's have some scenes where they are asked. (That's not the adventurous action rebellion that someone wanted to make with Jean-Luc McClane but it sounds a lot like Star Trek.)
The assumption, of course, is that the Process would have worked. But that's not much of the argument against relocating the Ba'ku. It's suggested that the stretchy face people are quacks (and conveniently awful people) and this would all have been for nothing. But that's not what is driving Picard to resign from Starfleet. Picard and his Righteous Gang would have saddled up even if the process was guaranteed and the Federation (and who knows who else) would have achieved astonishing medical advances. It's not that moving the Ba'ku is a half-baked plan that assuredly won't work but that the Ba'ku are being moved at all.
The parameters of the argument are that when this is over the Ba'ku will STILL have the extended and possibly eternal life and that it will now be available to all of the Federation. (And potentially beyond.)
The hutzpah really is that after decades of telling us that the Federation is post-scarcity and that humanity has moved past such petty concerns. "We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity." (That was just two years before this.) But you dangle nearly eternal youth and suddenly it's all worth killing for.
As with so much Star Trek it comes down to "Deep Space Nine did this sort of thing better."
It could have been an interesting conundrum but the scale is too messed up. 600 people vs... The entirety of the Federation? I'm leery of "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" but even I would have a hard time with this on paper. (Paging the Majalans.) "How many people does it take, admiral, before it becomes wrong?" Complicated question except the simple answer is "more".
I suppose the intractable part of the argument is that the Ba'ku do not give their consent. So let's have some scenes where they are asked. (That's not the adventurous action rebellion that someone wanted to make with Jean-Luc McClane but it sounds a lot like Star Trek.)
The assumption, of course, is that the Process would have worked. But that's not much of the argument against relocating the Ba'ku. It's suggested that the stretchy face people are quacks (and conveniently awful people) and this would all have been for nothing. But that's not what is driving Picard to resign from Starfleet. Picard and his Righteous Gang would have saddled up even if the process was guaranteed and the Federation (and who knows who else) would have achieved astonishing medical advances. It's not that moving the Ba'ku is a half-baked plan that assuredly won't work but that the Ba'ku are being moved at all.
The parameters of the argument are that when this is over the Ba'ku will STILL have the extended and possibly eternal life and that it will now be available to all of the Federation. (And potentially beyond.)
The hutzpah really is that after decades of telling us that the Federation is post-scarcity and that humanity has moved past such petty concerns. "We work to better ourselves and the rest of humanity." (That was just two years before this.) But you dangle nearly eternal youth and suddenly it's all worth killing for.
As with so much Star Trek it comes down to "Deep Space Nine did this sort of thing better."
Wasn't 'All Good Things...' a great way to end the series?I have a controversial one:
Star Trek Nemesis - bad and disappointing as it is - is a better final send-off for the TNG crew than PIC season 3.
Fight me
I steer away from the films and what came after them.
Perhaps there was some hope that maybe, maybe it'll get better.
Apparently it didn't.
If I remember right, and if you can take what Admiral Doughrety says at his word (and believe he's not a Trek "B-Admiral"), the Federation Council is trying to use a loophole to circumvent the Prime Directive. The Federation Council's argument being that since the Ba'ku are not native to the planet, the Prime Directive does not apply.
I think Picard's perspective basically comes down to, whether it's 600 or 600 million, trying to justify this (or anything like it) basically amounts to a rationalization for selfishness and exploitation. And once you can subscribe to those kinds of rationalizations, even if it's "only" 600 people, then you open the door to rationalizing anything on any level. To paraphrase a Supreme Court justice, the precedent lies about like a loaded gun, ready to be used for any situation where it can be rationalized to be necessary.
In the abstract, if you can believe the Federation is right in Insurrection, then you can probably agree with the basic trade-off in Ursula K. LeGuin's The One's Who Walk Away From Omelas or Strange New Worlds' "Lift Us Where Our Suffering Can't Reach." That the intentional suffering of one person can be "ok" if it means you can assure a better society for everyone else.
When I was in college, I had an English professor point out some of the nuances of LeGuin's story. For example, most readers imagine themselves as the "the ones who walk away," righteously objecting to a system that would torture a child for the pleasure of everyone else. However, one can make the argument the people who "walk away" are in some ways worse ethically. The fact they are so bothered by the situation they can't accept it, but instead of doing something to change it they just "walk away" from it.
The other thing pointed out in the class is the basic situation of Omelas is around us in our present-day world every day. We have smartphones, computers, and clothes that may have been constructed in places and ways that are barely above the standards of quasi-slave labor. There's a level of suffering in all of the products we purchase. Most people have probably heard and know this sort of thing exists, but put it to the back of their mind when buying the next version of the iPhone.
Is this the part where I blame Matalas?
Might as well. They both contributed to that cloudburst of fanwank diarrhea and dead end plotlines.
It's not a loophole, it's the Prime Directive. It's the flip side of "You don't have warp drive, we can't rescue ANY of you when your planet burns." The Ba'ku have interstellar travel. And IIRC they are in Federation space. (I never thought about that. What the hell kind of borders does the Fed have if not every world in its space has to be a member?)
I unfortunately haven't read the LeGuin stories. In Lift Us Where Our Suffering Can't Reach the point that they make is that it is done with consent. Which makes it far more thought provoking than INS, IMHO.
Yes, the part that gets icky is: How can it be good if it's by force? Picard's question "How many before it's wrong" is snarky and is meant to come across as obviously scoring a "point". (The implication is meant to be, I think, that one is too many.) But at face value, he is really asking "What is is the limiting principle here?"
The problem with Insurrection when you start to think about it: Who is being selfish?
Maybe the Ba'ku are the poster children for this principle. If we believe everything that we are told about them, they will not lose as much as the Federation gains. Obviously classic Star Trek, to say nothing of Real Life would tell us that nobody can foresee the Ironic Unintended Consequences. But that's not what's being argued here.
As I said above: What would the Ba'ku have said if asked? And if they say "Hell no, we won't go" are THEY being selfish? I'm not saying that they don't have that right. But clearly they would be looking after their narrow self interests. (Seriously, is there any point in the movie where they are ASKED?!?)
But if we hold fast to the Ba'ku's rights to their planet then we can hold fast to the rights of the less "privileged". Like the people who were displaced by the Cardassian peace treaty. Those people were displaced for the "common good" that was a lot less good than Eternal Life.
OK, now I want to see the episode where the family of some settlers from Journey's End that are now homeless AND have a really sick kid are told about how Captain Jean-Luc Picard resigned his Starfleet commission and fought a pitched battle for the Ba'ku that might have prevented their child from being cured. "Gee. That doesn't sound like the Captain Picard we met at all."
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