In Best of Both Worlds part 2...

[Belz...]

Am I the only one who thought back then "you know, if Picard dies, Riker becomes CO and Shelby XO, I'm okay with this" ?

I mean, Picard was my favourite TNG character, but the prospect of such a major change was very interesting to me. Am I the only one who likes those kinds of statu quo changes ?

 

[Finn]

no



no, you weren't the only one

 

[GameOn]

I don't really like the idea of killing off Picard but I am in favour of shaking things up. I kinda liked the idea of killing off William Riker, replacing him with Thomas Riker and making Data first officer. That would have shaken things up without removing any of the principle characters.

 

[Takeru]

What they should have done is have Picard survive, make Shelby first officer and dump Riker, it made zero sene to keep him around after BOBW.
Losing Picard would have hurt the show, Patrick Stewart is hard to replace, everyone else could have gone, even Data.

 

[Tosk]

How about this: Picard dies, Riker become Captain, Shelby his 1st, and when Tom Riker shows up he stays too.

 

[Portal]

You sound like Captain Jellico.

 

[Jimi_James]

What they should have done is have Picard survive, make Shelby first officer and dump Riker, it made zero sene to keep him around after BOBW.
Losing Picard would have hurt the show, Patrick Stewart is hard to replace, everyone else could have gone, even Data.

I like that idea, if for no other reason than it would have afforded the writers the opportunity to highlight a stronger female character, with Shelby. And it still would have provided a good shake up by losing one of the main cast, after having risked so much to save Picard. You think the entire time, Picard will be the one that is lost, but then they kill off Riker as a bit of a twist ending.

I would have liked to have seen some of the conflict Shelby and Picard might have gotten into, given her more direct and unorthodox approach.
Riker tended to play things safe in a 'What would Picard do?' sort of way, which of course was one of the themes presented in TBOBW, but Shelby was even more of a risk taker. It also would have been interesting to see how Shelby interacted with Ro Laren later on in the series.

 

[Takeru]

I was thinking of giving Riker his own command but if you want to kill him that's fine too.

 

[Belz...]

I always thought Riker was a bit underused in favour of Picard, Data and Worf.

 

[Jimi_James]

I was thinking of giving Riker his own command but if you want to kill him that's fine too.

I suppose both options have merit. I might have been interesting to have Riker go away on his own command for a while and then return later for some guest appearance.

It could have even been worked out so that rather than Jellico getting command, Riker comes back and is finally given command of the Enterprise while Picard is off being tortured. That certainly would have been interesting I think, given how badly Riker wanted command of the Enterprise.

 

[Hober Mallow]

I always thought Riker was a bit underused in favour of Picard, Data and Worf.

Especially when he seemed to have been introduced as the main action hero of the series. Riker was going to be leading the Away Teams and getting the action and the girls. Picard was going to be more the diplomat. That's how I saw it at the beginning, anyway.

The character of Riker was ruined by BOBW. Unfortunately, the writers wrote the character into a corner. It made for a great Riker story, the best of the series, but then the reset button is pressed and Riker is Number One for the next Unpteen years.

(I was just thinking it would have been an interesting story to have an episode in the fifth or sixth season where Captain Shelby boards the Enterprise, and is basically like, "You're still a first officer?!")

How about this: Picard dies, Riker become Captain, Shelby his 1st, and when Tom Riker shows up he stays too.

How about Riker dies, Shelby becomes first officer, then they find Tom Riker and Shelby phasers him to death?

(Jus' kidd'n)

 

[Mojochi]

I thought it more intriguing that Picard would be saved & that would be the catalyst to have Riker be a hero who is promoted up. It really did seem to be the shape of things, given how Riker looked in pt. 1, stagnant & depreciating with each passing minute

Pity that some of the liberties that shows can take now with their cast weren't as widely accepted back then. If any show of that era had the capacity to venture into the decision to periodically replace a character in its core, TNG was definitely the candidate, because they could have expounded on the theme of it's former seasons, more than what they did in the later ones

Tasha dies
Worf is reassigned
Geordi is reassigned
Guinan comes aboard
Beverly leaves
Pulaski is commissioned
Beverly returns
Barkley is introduced
Wesley leaves & returns in guest star capacity
Ro does similarly

Frankly, Riker could have done very much the same. Perhaps returning for the Tom Riker episode, at which time Tom could have joined the crew, thus making the Pegasus episode about Tom coming forward to face the music, instead of Will, the fallout of which could have had an impact on Captain Will, wherever he be

With a core as stable as Dorn, Spiner & Stewart, I think the show wouldn't have suffered much by having Frakes' Will Riker become a recurring character, like Lwaxana or Q, at least until Tom surfaced.

I'm a big supporter of mixing things up like that

 

[Tiberius]

With a core as stable as Dorn, Spiner & Stewart, I think the show wouldn't have suffered much by having Frakes' Will Riker become a recurring character, like Lwaxana or Q, at least until Tom surfaced.

I'm a big supporter of mixing things up like that

I like that idea. End of the teaser, and we see Tom appear, and we think it's Will! It would be much better having the crew think it's will, and he'd even think that he was Will!

 

[Tomalak]

The character of Riker was ruined by BOBW. Unfortunately, the writers wrote the character into a corner. It made for a great Riker story, the best of the series, but then the reset button is pressed and Riker is Number One for the next Unpteen years.

Yeah, I've been banging that drum for ages. It's Riker's finest hour, but the ending totally guts his character. BoBW was about Riker proving he can step out of Picard's shadow and be his own man, command his own ship. Then at the end he's happy to bump down to being Picard's second in command again, despite 40 of Starfleet's finest captains having bitten the dust at Wolf 359.

I don't really blame the writers, as it was pretty much the way TV worked at the time. They had these actors locked into long contracts, and only do so much with them. If you were making TNG these days, the cast would probably be far more fluid. You could give Riker his own ship, perhaps taking Worf or Geordi with him, and have him as a recurring captain. They started to do this on Deep Space Nine with the Dominion War, where we had principle cast members split up and engaged in their own semi-independent stories. BSG did it with Galactica and Pegasus for a while.

 

[sonak]

having Riker go back to being Picard's XO after BOBW was pretty ridiculous.

 

[R. Star]

Having Riker as captain, and Picard survive and eventually returning as a guest role as an admiral would've been interesting. Might've been nice to have a non-corrupt/stupid admiral.