Best Performance by Series

[Trekfan4387]

What's the best single performance from each series, delivered by a regular cast member? And then guest actor...

STAR TREK:
Series Regular: Leonard Nimoy in "Amok Time"
Guest Actor: Ricardo Montalbon in "Space Seed"

STAR TREK THE NEXT GENERATION:
Series Regular: Patrick Stewart in "The Inner Light"
Guest Actor: Dwight Schultz in "Hollow Pursuits"

STAR TREK DEEP SPACE NINE:
Series Regular: Avery Brooks in "In the Pale Moonlight"
Guest Actor: Andrew Robinson in "The Wire"

STAR TREK VOYAGER:
Series Regular: Robert Picardo in "Someone to Watch Over Me"
Guest Actor: Tom Wright in "Tuvix"

STAR TREK ENTERPRISE:
Series Regular: Connor Trinneer in "Similitude"
Guest Actor: J. Paul Boehmer in "Carbon Creek"

 

[StarryEyed]

STAR TREK:
Series Regular: William Shatner in "The Enemy Within"
Guest Actor: Mark Lenard in "Balance of Terror"

STAR TREK THE NEXT GENERATION:
Series Regular: Patrick Stewart in "The Inner Light"
Guest Actor: John Delancie in "All his appearances"

STAR TREK DEEP SPACE NINE:
Series Regular: Armin Shimmerman in "The Siege at AR558"
Guest Actor: Andrew Robinson in "In the Pale Moonlight"

STAR TREK VOYAGER:
Series Regular: Robert Picardo in "Lifeline"
Guest Actor: Mark Harelik in "Counterpoint"

STAR TREK ENTERPRISE:
Series Regular: John Billingsley in "All his appearances"
Guest Actor: Peter Weller in "Demons/Terra Prime"[/QUOTE]

 

[carlmarx]

TOS:
Shatner in "City On The Edge Of Forever"
Kelly in "City On The Edge Of Forever"

TNG:
Stewart in "Chain Of Command Part II"
Stewart in "Measure Of A Man"

DS9:
Brooks in "In The Pale Moonlight"
Tony Todd in "The Visitor"
Honorable mentions:
Harris Yulin in "Duet"
Andrew Robinson in "In The Pale Moonlight"

VOY:
hmmm.....
Picardo in "Living Witness" maybe.
Maybe Wang in "Timeless".
And you know what? You can all kick my ass for this, but as abysmal as "Threshold" was, McNeil's performances in sickbay I thought were pretty good. Atleast it was different from the rest of a formulaic, pretty stiffly-acted series.

ENT:
Haven't seen enough to make an educated choice here, but maybe:
Bakula in "Cogenitor"


This was hard.

 

[carlmarx]

Oh I totally screwed up. I didn't read the topic thoroughly. Missed the guest actor thing. My bad.

 

[Anji]

TOS: Leonard Nimoy "Galileo Seven"
William Marshall "The Ultimate Computer"

TNG: Jonathan Frakes "The Best of Both Worlds Pt. II"
Charles Cooper "Reunion"

ENT: John Billingsley "Dear Doctor"
Jeffrey Combs (any episode)

 

[I am not Spock]

TOS: William Shatner 'City on the Edge of Forever'
Guest: Ricardo Montalban 'Space Seed'

TNG: Patrick Stewart 'The Inner Light'
Guest: Jerry Hardin as Mark Twain 'Times Arrow'

DS9: Avery Brooks 'Far Beyond the Stars'
Guest: Tony Todd in 'The Visitor'

VOY: Robert Picardo in 'Living Witness'
Guest: Kurtwood Smith in 'Year of Hell'

ENT: Connor Trineer in either 'The Forgotten', 'Similitude', or 'Terra Prime'
Guest: Fionulla Flanigan in 'Fallen Hero'

Movies: DeForest Kelley in STV The Final Frontier
Guest: James Cromwell in FC

 

[Eyes]

Too many to narrow it down to just 2 for DS9.

DS9: Siddig in 'The Quickening'
Rene Auberjonois in 'Necessary Evil'
Nana Visitor in 'Duet'
Shimerman in 'Business as Usual'
Lofton in 'Nor the Battle to the Strong'
Brooks in ItPM and FBtS
Alaimo in 'Covenant'
Harris Yulin in 'Duet'
Andrew Robinson in ''The Wire'

TNG: Stewart in 'The Inner Light'
DeLancie in 'Deja Q'

VOY: Picardo in 'Living Witness'
Harelik in 'Counterpoint'

Haven't seen enough of TOS or ENT to say.

 

[Pemmer Harge]

Can't necessarily narrow it down, and there are episodes I've not seen, so this is partial:

TOS: Shatner in Balance of Terror
Guest: Ricardo Montalban in Space Seed

TNG: Stewart in Lessons
Guest: Michelle Forbes in Preemptive Strike

DS9: Meaney in Hippocratic Oath
Visitor in Second Skin
Guest: Tony Todd in The Visitor

Voyager: Picardo in Latent Image
Ryan in Survival Instinct

Enterprise: Trinneer in Cogenitor
Guest: Andreas Katsulas in Cogenitor

 

[TheQman]

TNG -
Regular: Jonathan Frakes - "Frame of Mind"
Guest: Paul Winfield - "Darmok"

DS9 -
Regular: Colm Meaney - "Hard Time"
Guest: (Tie) - Casey Biggs - "The Dogs of War" (and others)
- Jeffrey Combs - (All apperences as Weyoun)

VOY -
Regular: Robert Picardo - (All apperences)
Guest: (Tie) - Andy Dick - "Message in a Bottle"
- Kurtwood Smith - As Annorax

 

[Emnabtond]

Series Regular: Avery Brooks in "In the Pale Moonlight"

 

[apenpaap]

TOS:
Leonard Nimoy in Amok Time
Ricardo Montalban in Space Seed
TNG:
Patrick Stewart in The Inner Light or The Best of Both Worlds
John DeLancie in Deja Q
DS9:
Nana Visitor in any episode that focuses on Kira
Andrew Robinson in The Wire
Voyager:
Robert Picardo in Tinker, Tenor, Doctor, Spy
The Voth scientist in Distant Origin
Enterprise:
Jolene Blalock in Terra Prime
Jeffrey Combs in any Shran episode

 

[Trekfan4387]

Series Regular: Avery Brooks in "In the Pale Moonlight"

Care to elaborate?

 

[Kirkman1987]

^

I like Brooks in that episode, but many tend to feel that Brooks goes over the top in some of his big speeches, like the ending of this episode or the "THIS IS REAAAL!!" speech at the end of the Benny Russell episode. My brother laughed at the end of this episode because of Brook's performance. To each his own.......

I don't think I can go by Episode, I'll just go with best actor overall.

TOS - Shatner. Nimoy in some respects was better, but I think Shatner really held the show together. His acting style, often mocked, lent The show a sense of grandeur and largeness that the budgets didn't allow at times.
Guest Star- Mark Lenard as Sarek.

TNG - Patrick Stewart by a mile. He's the best actor in any Star Trek production.
Guest Star - I'm not sure who was the best, but it was really cool seeing Kelsey Grammer

DS9 - They were all great. I'll go with Quark (Shimmerman?)just for the hell of it. I think you guys need to remember that pulling off comedy is hard.
Guest Star - Jeffrey Combs as Weyoun. What a memorable character. He was both sinister and hilarious.

 

[Trekfan4387]

^

I like Brooks in that episode, but many tend to feel that Brooks goes over the top in some of his big speeches, like the ending of this episode or the "THIS IS REAAAL!!" speech at the end of the Benny Russell episode. My brother laughed at the end of this episode because of Brook's performance. To each his own.......

Indeed. I can see where people would say he overplayed his big scene in "Far Beyond the Stars", however I found him to be utterly brilliant in "In the Pale Moonlight". However I was very tempted to go with Nana Visitor in "Duet", or Colm Meaney in "Hard Time", or Cirroc Lofton in "The Visitor", or Rene Auberjonois in "Necessary Evil", or ... Eh, I better stop listing. Just so many fantastic performances in that show...

 

[Kirkman1987]

^

Yes, DS9 had the best cast overall I think. It helps that DS9 was the series that focused the most on character development. There's no question the actors had very solid material to work with.

Good pick with Colm Meaney in "Hard Time". It was tragic when he was thinking about suicide in the end. He played it really well.

 

[DevilEyes]

TOS - Shatner. Nimoy in some respects was better, but I think Shatner really held the show together. His acting style, often mocked, lent The show a sense of grandeur and largeness that the budgets didn't allow at times.
.

I cannot agree with this. Nimoy is IMO head and shoulders above everyone on that show (only Kelley comes close) and certainly overshadows Shatner in almost every scene. Even when Spock is not doing much.
For guest stars, I would pick William Marshall as Dr Richard Daystrom in "The Ultimate Computer", but Mark Lenard was of course also great.

Patrick Stewart was, of course, head and shoulders above everyone on TNG. For guest star, I loved James Sloyan in "The Defector".

I can't possibly pick just one actor in the DS9 cast, main or recurring, let alone just one episode. Nana Visitor, Rene Auberjonois, Armin Shimerman, Colm Meaney, and out of recurring 'guest stars' cast Marc Alaimo, Andrew Robinson, Casey Biggs, Jeffrey Combs...
But in any case, I have to mention Harris Yulin in "Duet".

I'll hold off on comments about VOY and ENT until I've watched entire series' runs. I agree that Robert Picardo is the best in VOY main cast.

 

[Kai Winn]

^

Yes, DS9 had the best cast overall I think. It helps that DS9 was the series that focused the most on character development.

big deal on a station, which is, well, stationary. character development is a virtue out of necessity, at the expense of the story.

 

[Kirkman1987]

^

You are free to think however you want, But DS9 easily had the most developed and intricate story in the franchise.......it's not even close. The other series were in fact DESIGNED to not have significently complex stories, favoring a episodic approach.

Both formats have their respective advantages, but to claim DS9 was lacking in story is.....well, it's wrong


Character Development at the expense of story????......why not have both?

 

[DevilEyes]

^

Yes, DS9 had the best cast overall I think. It helps that DS9 was the series that focused the most on character development.

big deal on a station, which is, well, stationary. character development is a virtue out of necessity, at the expense of the story.

Um, no, it's not. Character development is essential for having a good story. Otherwise, who gives a fuck about the story if you don't care about any of the characters?

And DS9 had the best story out of the Trek series - which, granted, wasn't difficult, since the others hardly had a story most of the time, not counting the episodic stories that get forgotten by the next episode and never mentioned again.

If anything, Voyager had the necessity to develop characters, since the story was supposed to be about a ship lost in the Delta Quadrant, trying to get home and faced with the probability that they'd spend the rest of their lives on the ship; and to make things more complicated, about 1/3 of the crew consisted of a terrorist faction hostile to the Federation. This gave so much material for interesting stories, and just cried out for character development. Just how are these people going to be changed by their new circumstances and experiences? But instead, someone thought that it was a better idea to focus on anomalies and random aliens of the week. Bleh.

 

[apenpaap]

You are free to think however you want, But DS9 easily had the most developed and intricate story in the franchise.......it's not even close. The other series were in fact DESIGNED to not have significently complex stories, favoring a episodic approach.

Let's not forget Enterprise. Though it started as episodic, it ended up serialized like DS9.