I would rather watch a bad TOS episode many times over then plod through TNG again. Not looking forward to what comes next for you LOL.
Chronological rewatch from a historical perspective
- Thread starter Turtletrekker
- Start date
We have vastly different opinions of The Next Generation. Pity me come Voyager.
I'm sure we do. Its probably dead last in my opinion. I think I would rewatch Discovery before TNG.
1. TOS/STC
2. ENT
2.5 Lower Decks.
3. DS9
3.5 Disco
4. Voy
5. TNG/Picard
See, now I rate Enterprise much lower and was very happy to just get it out of the way at the beginning. I was about as harsh with Enterprise season 2 as I was with TOS season 3. And with the exception of a couple of questionable storytelling decisions, I've enjoyed Discovery very much.
I almost ranked Disco right after ENT, honestly.... I have much more fondness for the 23rd century, and in my opinion, Ent and Disco are in a new timeline all their own, anyways. To me, production order, for the most part, *IS* chronologically correct; TOS, movies, 24th century, First Contact rebooted timeline, Enterprise, Disco, SNW and beyond.
That's certainly a valid approach. However, my intent with this project is to look at all of Star Trek as a single a narrative from "beginning" to "end" and see how well it all works and fits together. So far, I would have to say remarkably well.
The Animated series is turning out to be a wonderful change of pace. The length of the episodes are just about right for the stories that they are telling, and the stories are in general better than the original series season 3. In fact, there's a much more of a season 1 vibe to the Animated Series than anything else. Even the bad episodes, I'm looking at you The Magicks of Megas Tu, are just long enough that I don't zone out.
Anyway, I thought I would put down some thoughts before I get too far down the road. I have to admit that some of the stories are a little derivative. Beyond the Farthest Star reminded me of The Immunity Syndrome. And One Of Our Planets is Missing reminded me of both The Immunity Syndrome and Star Trek The Motion Picture, both in a good way.
Yesteryear is a great episode that give us a lot of great background information on Spock and his family, as well as the return of The Guardian of Forever. I had to wonder about the timing of this episode and Michael's arrival into Sarek's family. Memory Alpha places the attack on Doctari Alpha in 2336 and Yesteryear in 2337. However, Spock's entry places her arrival just after these events.
It's great to see Uhura in command in The Lorelei Signal, as she is a badass. Let's hope we see some of this in Strange New Worlds.
More Troubles, More Tribbles almost works as a completion of a story arc for the little guys. In The Trouble with Edward, we see the idiot Edward genetically alter the slow reproducing Tribbles to reproduce at a greatly accelerated rate, and we see how they become an ecological menace In The Trouble with Tribbles.
In More Tribbles, More Troubles, Cyrano Jones genetically engineered them again them so that they wouldn't reproduce. However, he didn't restore them to their normal biology. Instead of reproducing at accelerated rate, they just seemed to get fat. However, the fat Tribbles were actually colony tribbles, containing many within. By the end of the episode, McCoy figures out a concoction to stabilize them, and he said that "these really are safe tribbles". So, in other words, the Tribbles have been restored to normal. It's a shame that the Klingons still felt the need to wipe them out. Oh well.
Survivor is notable for guest voice Ted Knight and being the first appearance of the Vendorians, who we will see again on Lower Decks. The Infinite Vulcan is written by Walter Koenig and is the source of the giant Spock clone skeleton also seen on Lower Decks.
The Magicks of Megas-Tu offer a totally unnecessary Star Trek explanation for the Salem witch trials. That said, the Star Trek explanations for Area 51, the Greek Gods and the invention of velcro were totally unnecessary as well. And it's canonically accurate that Kirk will later be unimpressed when he meets God as he is unimpressed here when he meets Lucifer.
Anyway, I thought I would put down some thoughts before I get too far down the road. I have to admit that some of the stories are a little derivative. Beyond the Farthest Star reminded me of The Immunity Syndrome. And One Of Our Planets is Missing reminded me of both The Immunity Syndrome and Star Trek The Motion Picture, both in a good way.
Yesteryear is a great episode that give us a lot of great background information on Spock and his family, as well as the return of The Guardian of Forever. I had to wonder about the timing of this episode and Michael's arrival into Sarek's family. Memory Alpha places the attack on Doctari Alpha in 2336 and Yesteryear in 2337. However, Spock's entry places her arrival just after these events.
It's great to see Uhura in command in The Lorelei Signal, as she is a badass. Let's hope we see some of this in Strange New Worlds.
More Troubles, More Tribbles almost works as a completion of a story arc for the little guys. In The Trouble with Edward, we see the idiot Edward genetically alter the slow reproducing Tribbles to reproduce at a greatly accelerated rate, and we see how they become an ecological menace In The Trouble with Tribbles.
In More Tribbles, More Troubles, Cyrano Jones genetically engineered them again them so that they wouldn't reproduce. However, he didn't restore them to their normal biology. Instead of reproducing at accelerated rate, they just seemed to get fat. However, the fat Tribbles were actually colony tribbles, containing many within. By the end of the episode, McCoy figures out a concoction to stabilize them, and he said that "these really are safe tribbles". So, in other words, the Tribbles have been restored to normal. It's a shame that the Klingons still felt the need to wipe them out. Oh well.
Survivor is notable for guest voice Ted Knight and being the first appearance of the Vendorians, who we will see again on Lower Decks. The Infinite Vulcan is written by Walter Koenig and is the source of the giant Spock clone skeleton also seen on Lower Decks.
The Magicks of Megas-Tu offer a totally unnecessary Star Trek explanation for the Salem witch trials. That said, the Star Trek explanations for Area 51, the Greek Gods and the invention of velcro were totally unnecessary as well. And it's canonically accurate that Kirk will later be unimpressed when he meets God as he is unimpressed here when he meets Lucifer.
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And God and Lucifer are both in the center of the galaxy. Heh.
Oooh! Good catch!
Oooo, we're ranking again!
1. TOS/TNG/DS9
2. Lower Decks
3. Short Treks
4. Enterprise/Voyager/TAS
5 Discovery
6. Picard
Is STC Continues? If we're counting that I'd put it between 3 and 4.
I have to be honest in that I've been unable to sit through a single episode of Star Trek Continues.
Yeah. I always count it, even though its not official or anything. Its a complete season/series, with a bit of an arc, and a finale. I can't do a TOS rewatch without including it. Fanfilms is honestly what reignited by love of Trek/TOS, during a period where there wasn't really any Trek for me. Never liked the movie reboot.
It segue ways so perfectly into TMP, that in a chronology based rewatch like this, there is no way I could exclude it.
Sorry to hear that, Turtletrekker.
The other thing that felt forced for me in "Balance Of Terror" (both logically and compared to the rest of the series ship to ship combat), was the fact that Sulu was lamenting they didn't have a visual target; and Styles response:Oh. One thing about Balance of Terror. When Spock surprised everyone at the briefing table by suggesting they attack first, my first thought was, "Ah, 'the Vulcan hello,'."
"Aim with sensors... Not accurate, but..."
(Again the Romulan ship could be tracked with the ship's sensors just not seen visually)...
But I'm sorry when you're talking about two small vessels in the vastness of space traveling at trans light speeds - One would think you'd need computers and sensors to actually hit anything, and aiming visually would be the major problem here given such circumstances.
But no, for this episode they need a visual target to aim their weapons because suddenly their sensors aren't accurate enough to find anything in space...
The cloaking field did more than just block visual detectors, it blocked all sensor indicators except one which was only a vague location with nothing for the weapon systems to lock onto.
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Yet spa could lock onto a signal from the Romulan ship and get a picture of their bridge. Got to say at that point I even as a kid was wondering why Kirk wasn't ordering them to fire Phasers once spock had locked on to the signal and traced it back to its source.
Again I realize they wanted to make the ship sensors more like a ocean going naval vessels sonar system; but it falls apart on many levels.
I've got it worse. Disco is my favorite Star Trek series. 
I knew that as soon as I came out and said it, my time here -- or my time with Trek Fandom in general -- would never be the same again.
I knew that as soon as I came out and said it, my time here -- or my time with Trek Fandom in general -- would never be the same again.
So, The Slaver Weapon. Written by Larry Niven, adapted from his short story The Soft Weapon.
Actually, a really fun little episode.
As for its place in Star Trek continuity? Well, there are issues.
On the surface, it almost feels like of those those intercompany comic crossovers where Superman can meet Spider-Man or where the the X-Men can meet the Enterprise crew (The meeting of the minds between Beast, AKA Dr. Henry McCoy with ship's surgeon Doctor Leonard McCoy was... Priceless ) . Such stories are generally easy to just sit back and enjoy and write off as apocryphal once they're done.
This really has long been my attitude with The Slaver Weapon. However, now with the Kzinti getting name-dropped in Picard and a Kzinti ensign actually being part of the crew of the Cerritos on Lower Decks, it has to at least be acknowledged. And stuff like this is literally the reason I'm doing this.
Obviously, as with Balance of Terror, some of the dialogue would have to be apocryphal, or at the very least inaccurate.
The dialogue in question, coming from Sulu, is as follows...
"The Kzinti fought four wars with humankind, and lost all of them. The last one was two hundred years ago, and you haven't learned a thing since."
Obviously, Larry Niven's canonical history for the Kzinti is inapplicable (His Man-Kzin wars took place much later on the calander than the 21st century
). No problems there. Multiverses are cool.
Also, as inferred above, you would have to fudge the date a little. It has been said that there were plans to introduce the Kzinti into Enterprise season five, had the show been renewed. And there are 7 years in between Terra Prime and These Are the Voyages.
I could see it being a totally MACO focused affair, separate from the day-to-day business of Starfleet. But, four wars? Maybe the Kzinti see war like a screen door and they can't decide whether they want in or out?
Sulu also said that they were denied weapons other than police vehicles. So, they were... declawed?
Ok, I'm done.
Actually, a really fun little episode.
As for its place in Star Trek continuity? Well, there are issues.
On the surface, it almost feels like of those those intercompany comic crossovers where Superman can meet Spider-Man or where the the X-Men can meet the Enterprise crew (The meeting of the minds between Beast, AKA Dr. Henry McCoy with ship's surgeon Doctor Leonard McCoy was... Priceless ) . Such stories are generally easy to just sit back and enjoy and write off as apocryphal once they're done.This really has long been my attitude with The Slaver Weapon. However, now with the Kzinti getting name-dropped in Picard and a Kzinti ensign actually being part of the crew of the Cerritos on Lower Decks, it has to at least be acknowledged. And stuff like this is literally the reason I'm doing this.
Obviously, as with Balance of Terror, some of the dialogue would have to be apocryphal, or at the very least inaccurate.
The dialogue in question, coming from Sulu, is as follows...
"The Kzinti fought four wars with humankind, and lost all of them. The last one was two hundred years ago, and you haven't learned a thing since."
Obviously, Larry Niven's canonical history for the Kzinti is inapplicable (His Man-Kzin wars took place much later on the calander than the 21st century
). No problems there. Multiverses are cool.Also, as inferred above, you would have to fudge the date a little. It has been said that there were plans to introduce the Kzinti into Enterprise season five, had the show been renewed. And there are 7 years in between Terra Prime and These Are the Voyages.
I could see it being a totally MACO focused affair, separate from the day-to-day business of Starfleet. But, four wars? Maybe the Kzinti see war like a screen door and they can't decide whether they want in or out?
Sulu also said that they were denied weapons other than police vehicles. So, they were... declawed?
Ok, I'm done.
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