After all this time....

[Albertese]

Warped9 said:
I've always felt there was a lot more to be done with TOS' ideas, but sadly I feel for the most part that TPTB didn't go in that direction. Rather I feel TOS' ideas were diluted and ursurped into "touchy-feely" drivel. Drama seemed almost entirely dependent on ship battles and tensely uttered techno-b.s. rather than a conflict of ideas. And appreciated humour became almost wholly nonexistent except for chances to laugh at the characters rather than with them.

Personally I feel Trek is now viewed and defined near totally through the contemporary material which I believe has strayed greatly from what made TOS so good. It's now just "Trek," a clutch of cliches as opposed to genuine Star Trek as we knew it.

Thats why I feel TOS' great concepts could now be better served through original non-Trek work rather than rehashed and misunderstood Trek material.

Well said. I agree with this almost totally. I'm only 27 years old so I was raised on TNG and the newwer stuff, but once I was old enough to follow the stories and not just the eye-candy, I came to appreciate that the original Star Trek show really did have a lot more to offer in this regard. But I'm not sure it's fair to discount the newwer stuff, quite so quickly; I thought quite a few DS9 episodes handled interesting theamatic ideas in the second half of the show. I would say more than the first few years. However Voyager and Enterprise lost my interest pretty quickly, there were only a couple Voyager shows that I remember as being prety good and not really any of Enterprise (except for "In a Mirror Darkly" but not because it was thoughtful, more of a guilty pleasure for my inner fanboy)

As for other sci-fi, "Firefly" only lasted half a season but was pretty good. A friend of mine has exposed me to some "Dr. Who" which I never really saw before that was pretty cool. A different friend of mine introduced me to "Stargate," which I remember being really lame but th last couple years (which they have of DVD) where the Ori come into play have been surprisingly interesting to me. I recently picked up a DVD set of the mid-90's series "Space: Above and Beyond" which I thought handled a number of ideas very well. So there's other stuff out there if Trek gets too stale. Not to mention real life, which I hope we're all participating in to some extent....

Anyway, I too am pretty non-plused about future trek projects, I don't have real high hopes for the next movie, but I'll reserve judgement.

 

[RAMA]

I had a similar realization in the the late 90s, early 2000s...I became less of a "fanatic" but still enjoyed the various series very much. It wasn't a lack of quality from Trek that changed, it was me who changed, and I think that's rather common for people in their late 20s, early 30s.

In a sense, I am rediscovering all of Trek, as I finally have taken a trip through DVD land of several of the shows, and the combination of superior video quality and ability to watch the shows at my leisure, and in order has made me appreciate many of the series even more. TOS Remastered is also allowing me to revisit TOS, a series I had barely watched since the mid/late 90s. TOS-R has certainly spawned a new interest amongst fan circles for the old series and the fact that it is being preserved for future generations is something most fans appreciate a great deal. Enterprise on DVD is a revelation...the colors and details in that format make it seem like a totally new show. I also feel that the new movie will bring some fans into the fold...ST is forever a self-renewing entertainment form and this will mark it as a greater classic than anyone could ever have dreamed when we realized it was making a comeback in 1978!

RAMA

 

[Hambone]

Warped9 said:
...I feel TOS' ideas were diluted and ursurped into "touchy-feely" drivel.

I agree 100%.

 

[RAMA]

Warped9 said:

Personally I feel Trek is now viewed and defined near totally through the contemporary material which I believe has strayed greatly from what made TOS so good. It's now just "Trek," a clutch of cliches as opposed to genuine Star Trek as we knew it.

Without change, modern Trek would not have lasted over 700 episodes, its that simple. Various series made ST concepts their own, and altered and deepened many of them. If you prefer inbred, unchanging variations on the original theme, watch the many fan films...we can appreciate the creative effort going into them, but ultimately they add nothing to ST. A show that was patterned after these efforts in the early 80s would have been a pale copy and died off horribly(only with better acting).

RAMA

 

[RAMA]

Hambone said:

Warped9 said:
...I feel TOS' ideas were diluted and ursurped into "touchy-feely" drivel.

I agree 100%.

On the contrary, it was an advanced take on an already established theme, and allowed for a new exploration of humanity. The fact the STNG took mental and emotional stability as seriously as physical health can only be viewed as an improvement. Its more complex and interesting...not "diluted".

RAMA

 

[Warped9]

RAMA said:
Without change, modern Trek would not have lasted over 700 episodes, its that simple.

RAMA

So what? Hundreds of episodes of drivel? Thats nothing to write home about.

It changed, yes. It didn't get better. It got diluted and dumbed down. Out of twenty-five seasons collectively since 1987 you could get perhaps one season's worth of decent to respectable material. Thats an abysmal record.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

I'm not tired of "Star Trek," but I'm tired of people complaining about it and nitpicking it and fussing about what ought to be "considered real 'Star Trek'" and other meaningless, tedious crap like that.

 

[Hambone]

RAMA said:Without change, modern Trek would not have lasted over 700 episodes, its that simple.

RAMA

You know, at any given time I can run a search for "Star Trek" on my satellite dish; it seems as if the show is always on in one incarnation or another. And while I watched every single episode of "modern" Trek during its intitial run, I simply cannot bring myself to watch reruns. There's nothing there to capture or hold my interest. Even TOS repeated itself a couple of times; after 700+ episodes, it's just variations on a theme.

TOS somehow stays fresh, at least for me.

 

[Saxman1]

UWC Defiance said:
I'm not tired of "Star Trek," but I'm tired of people complaining about it and nitpicking it and fussing about what ought to be "considered real 'Star Trek'" and other meaningless, tedious crap like that.

Agree 100%! :thumbsup:

 

[Good Will Riker]

Which is the reason why I prefer 60s, 70's, and 80's Trek (which includes TNG Seasons 1-2) to that of 90's and 00's Trek.

90's and 00's Trek happens to be carbon copy. It has been copied by many people so many times that what made the original so great is faded beyond recognition.

 

[T'Bonz]

My liking waxes and wanes. I'm not watching it that often now, but I'm sure in future I'll get the desire to do so again.

 

[davejames]

My interest in Trek is pretty much confined to TOS right now. And while it may not be at full burn at the moment, I have a feeling that interest will always be there. Even if the next movie or spinoff sucks, I'll still be crossing my fingers and hoping that something else good comes along. What can I say, I just love Trek.

 

[RAMA]

Warped9 said:

RAMA said:
Without change, modern Trek would not have lasted over 700 episodes, its that simple.

RAMA

So what? Hundreds of episodes of drivel? Thats nothing to write home about.

It changed, yes. It didn't get better. It got diluted and dumbed down. Out of twenty-five seasons collectively since 1987 you could get perhaps one season's worth of decent to respectable material. Thats an abysmal record.

I think we've been through this topic before...your concept of drivel obviously includes STNG, a show with almost 100 Emmy Nominations, Hugo, a Peabody Award and numerous Writers/Directors/FX Guild awards for a genre that is continually passed over for such awards....DS9, often considered the best of ST by many "Trekkers", and so on. You can conveniently gloss over the ratings (17 million plus viewers at its peak) and critical success, but in the end, there were more GOOD episodes of STNG than total TOS shows in existence and even more good episodes from the other series. Dismissing the success of contemporary Trek is an attempt at diminishing it, but only at the cost of reality and common sense.

RAMA

 

[RAMA]

Good Will Riker said:
Which is the reason why I prefer 60s, 70's, and 80's Trek (which includes TNG Seasons 1-2) to that of 90's and 00's Trek.

90's and 00's Trek happens to be carbon copy. It has been copied by many people so many times that what made the original so great is faded beyond recognition.

I don't agree with this at all...the simple fact that there is a split in fandom over the various series would demonstrate the each individual ST show had its own identity with different reactions.

RAMA

 

[Trekwatcher]

Warped9 said:
I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm tired of Trek. But I have to say I've near had my fill.

I will always have a great love and respect for Star Trek TOS as well as TMP and TAS and the handful of decent to good episodes TNG and early DS9 served up. But even with that my interest level has really dipped for whatever else Paramount may serve up in the forseeable future.

Near everything we've gotten in the past twenty plus years as well as what I hear forthcoming has really soured me on the notion that a Star Trek I could really get behind. As far as I'm concerned the best is long past and will never be resurrected--certainly not by those currently in charge. The only way I could see myself getting even mildly intrigued would be if something genuinely new would be done, something that looked forward rather than back.

And since that isn't likely in the forseeable future then I can only hope that some honestly new and refreshing SF project comes out of left field. Something that may even play with some of TOS' best concepts and reinvigorates them into something exciting.

I love TOS, but the future isn't in regurgitating the surface trappings of the past even if it's from the very best Trek ever done.

I want the things that made TOS great to drive something new. Something genuinely ambitious and creative and not just rehashing.

I can only hope.

It is easy to get overwhelmed with it all. Give it a rest for a few years. One day, if you find yourself thinking of a certain episode or scene and you want to pull that tape/disc out of our collection and watch it again, then that is great. Trek is supposed to be fun. If it is no fun anymore, just stop. If you get interested again, great. If not, you had a good run with it.

 

[RAMA]

Trekwatcher said:

Warped9 said:
I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm tired of Trek. But I have to say I've near had my fill.

I will always have a great love and respect for Star Trek TOS as well as TMP and TAS and the handful of decent to good episodes TNG and early DS9 served up. But even with that my interest level has really dipped for whatever else Paramount may serve up in the forseeable future.

Near everything we've gotten in the past twenty plus years as well as what I hear forthcoming has really soured me on the notion that a Star Trek I could really get behind. As far as I'm concerned the best is long past and will never be resurrected--certainly not by those currently in charge. The only way I could see myself getting even mildly intrigued would be if something genuinely new would be done, something that looked forward rather than back.

And since that isn't likely in the forseeable future then I can only hope that some honestly new and refreshing SF project comes out of left field. Something that may even play with some of TOS' best concepts and reinvigorates them into something exciting.

I love TOS, but the future isn't in regurgitating the surface trappings of the past even if it's from the very best Trek ever done.

I want the things that made TOS great to drive something new. Something genuinely ambitious and creative and not just rehashing.

I can only hope.

It is easy to get overwhelmed with it all. Give it a rest for a few years. One day, if you find yourself thinking of a certain episode or scene and you want to pull that tape/disc out of our collection and watch it again, then that is great. Trek is supposed to be fun. If it is no fun anymore, just stop. If you get interested again, great. If not, you had a good run with it.

He's not tired of "Trek" , he's tired of watching the same 80 episodes and one movie over and over and over again.....and it took him what....40 years?

RAMA

 

[Green Shirt]

Mallory said:

Warped9 said:
Thats why I feel TOS' great concepts could now be better served through original non-Trek work rather than rehashed and misunderstood Trek material.

And that's certainly not a bad idea at all. Many of the themes in Trek are universal and so the concepts are easily transported to a different environment.

Exactly. After all, it was Roddenberry's original intention to tell meaningful stories in a "science fiction setting". It would "get past the censors because it seemed so make-believe". That was his explanation in the late 80s "Cage" video.

 

[Outpost4]

RAMA said:

Trekwatcher said:

Warped9 said:
I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm tired of Trek. But I have to say I've near had my fill.

I will always have a great love and respect for Star Trek TOS as well as TMP and TAS and the handful of decent to good episodes TNG and early DS9 served up. But even with that my interest level has really dipped for whatever else Paramount may serve up in the forseeable future.

Near everything we've gotten in the past twenty plus years as well as what I hear forthcoming has really soured me on the notion that a Star Trek I could really get behind. As far as I'm concerned the best is long past and will never be resurrected--certainly not by those currently in charge. The only way I could see myself getting even mildly intrigued would be if something genuinely new would be done, something that looked forward rather than back.

And since that isn't likely in the forseeable future then I can only hope that some honestly new and refreshing SF project comes out of left field. Something that may even play with some of TOS' best concepts and reinvigorates them into something exciting.

I love TOS, but the future isn't in regurgitating the surface trappings of the past even if it's from the very best Trek ever done.

I want the things that made TOS great to drive something new. Something genuinely ambitious and creative and not just rehashing.

I can only hope.

It is easy to get overwhelmed with it all. Give it a rest for a few years. One day, if you find yourself thinking of a certain episode or scene and you want to pull that tape/disc out of our collection and watch it again, then that is great. Trek is supposed to be fun. If it is no fun anymore, just stop. If you get interested again, great. If not, you had a good run with it.

He's not tired of "Trek" , he's tired of watching the same 80 episodes and one movie over and over and over again.....and it took him what....40 years?

RAMA

That's a cheap shot, RAMA, and inaccurate. Warped9 has consistently stated that he has watched all the other Trek out there and doesn't enjoy it as much, if at all. I watch anything Sherlock Holmes I can but I enjoy only the Jeremy Brett BBC productions now. I've seen Basil Rathbone and Roger Moore both play the part badly. I still watched them.

Warped9 knows of my fondness for him and my admiration for his purist point of view. Without stalwarts like Warped9 or TGT (what ever happened to Orion Randy?), I could see Trek reduced to a soap opera with technobabble. We need the purists to keep the form honest.

Take a break, Ray. Put the DVDs away and forget about Star Trek for a while. I agree with others; you'll come back to it when you are ready. Star Trek will be waiting for you, as good as ever.

 

[The Laughing Vulcan]

TV shows are a product of their time, and there have been two instances of innovation in Star Trek, the original series and The Next Generation. TNG was a touchy feely boardroom of a show that appealed to the decade of greed and self-centred navel gazing introspection.

The shows that came after had to build on that, there was no twenty year gap to allow for a reinvention. DS9, much as I love it, still had that style of characterisation and acting to build upon. That it managed to create a compelling and fascinating long running storyline is to its credit. But the first season and half is TNG redux. Then there is Voyager and Enterprise which took the lowest common denominators of the franchise and repeated them into mundanity.

Currently, US television is stuck in post 9/11 angst, so any Trek made today, were it divorced from the handicaps of the past, would be dark and moody a la nuBSG, gritty and amoral like 24, and it would also conform for the current vogue for event TV, a long running storyline with a never ending mystery, with meaningless hints dropped each week, ensuring the mugs that are hooked by the first episode are compelled to watch it week in week out, just like Lost. The idea of individual episodic TV is dead. So are the creative talents of Hollywood.

TOS isn't going anywhere. There's nothing wrong in taking a break now and again, like I'm doing right now. I may not be watching Trek, but that won't stop me talking about it. But there is inspiration to be found everywhere. There is a whole world of television and cinema to inspire, when Hollywood fails, look abroad.

 

[Warped9]

RAMA said:

Trekwatcher said:

Warped9 said:
I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm tired of Trek. But I have to say I've near had my fill.

I will always have a great love and respect for Star Trek TOS as well as TMP and TAS and the handful of decent to good episodes TNG and early DS9 served up. But even with that my interest level has really dipped for whatever else Paramount may serve up in the forseeable future.

Near everything we've gotten in the past twenty plus years as well as what I hear forthcoming has really soured me on the notion that a Star Trek I could really get behind. As far as I'm concerned the best is long past and will never be resurrected--certainly not by those currently in charge. The only way I could see myself getting even mildly intrigued would be if something genuinely new would be done, something that looked forward rather than back.

And since that isn't likely in the forseeable future then I can only hope that some honestly new and refreshing SF project comes out of left field. Something that may even play with some of TOS' best concepts and reinvigorates them into something exciting.

I love TOS, but the future isn't in regurgitating the surface trappings of the past even if it's from the very best Trek ever done.

I want the things that made TOS great to drive something new. Something genuinely ambitious and creative and not just rehashing.

I can only hope.

It is easy to get overwhelmed with it all. Give it a rest for a few years. One day, if you find yourself thinking of a certain episode or scene and you want to pull that tape/disc out of our collection and watch it again, then that is great. Trek is supposed to be fun. If it is no fun anymore, just stop. If you get interested again, great. If not, you had a good run with it.

He's not tired of "Trek" , he's tired of watching the same 80 episodes and one movie over and over and over again.....and it took him what....40 years?

RAMA

Shows what you know. Actually whenever I come accross a TOS episode I quite often easily hang in and watch it through to the end.

Perhaps I should clarify my terms. Whenever I refer to "Star Trek" I mean solely TOS. Most everything after '79 is just "Trek," generic stuff that only occasionally resonated with what made TOS good.

I'm not tired of Star Trek. I'm tired of "Trek."