I just watched an episode of TNG for the first time in ages, after a long time of watching DS9 and Voy, and some of the characters seem so flat by comparason to the ones in DS9 and Voyager, not standing alone.
Picard, Data and Worf seemed to be the only ones with any real depth, the rest...ye just don't buy it do you?
Did they not do enough character development with
It's not that the characters were flat; if you go back to their original bible descriptions and to EaF, there's a lot of dynamic stuff there. The problem is that the flux in writers and producers in the first season, and to an extent in the second season, along with Roddenberry's "No Conflict" edict left much of those dynamics by the wayside.
Let's see, based on just EaF alone:
Picard, a seasoned captain, who dislikes children but must learn to live with them and deal with his long-dead best friend's son and wife. A man who believed that a family of his own wasn't in the cards, but now could have a chance at a surrogate one.
Riker, a man who doesn't stand down when he's right (example DeSoto and the Away Team incident). A man who wants his own command so bad that he sacrificed his chance at love and happiness, but now has a second chance with the girl he left behind all those years ago.
Crusher, who must now serve with the man who ordered her husband to his death and is raising her son alone because of it. Not only that but she is very attracted to that very man, who is also her commanding officer.
Troi, an exotic alien, with the ability to feel emotions and interpret them. Originally designed to be the smartest person, second to Data, on the ship. Not only must she deal with the unknown alien minds, she also has to deal with the unrequited feelings she has for a man who never said good-bye.
Yar, raised on a failed colony with rape gangs, who had to fight for survival, serves on a ship where her natural instincts must be quelled and sometimes don't fit in with the accepted Starfleet protocols. (She should've been haunted, strong yet somewhat fragile inside but she just came across as bland all around.)
Worf... well that just speaks for itself. The first Klingon in Starfleet.
Data... once again speaks of itself.
Geordi, a blind helmsmen... that's rip for all sorts of antics and drama.
Wesley... well, that just never really worked out on paper or on the show. Too bad for Wheaton, who was an excellent child actor.
There was dynamic characterization in those early concepts, some of which could've lead to interesting, none Soap Opera-ish conflict. The conflict in TNG should've steamed not from petty arguing or a false sense of drama, but from the characters not always seeing eye-to-eye on how to solve the problem of the week. During the first year, I was waiting for a confrontation between Picard and Riker just based on the set-up in EaF. If Riker had gone toe-to-toe with his previous captain, you'd have thought he'd do so with Picard. That damn "No Conflict" edict really hampered the show and the characters. People can still bicker once and awhile and still have an undying respect for each other. Bones and Spock anyone?
The other problem is that the characters, except for the one's you list, were pretty much interchangeable in the episodes. Replace Geordi with Wesley and does the outcome of the episode change, barely. The characters in TNG reacted more than acted. Unlike in TOS, where it's hard to just put Spock in place of Kirk and still get the same result. They were distinct in their worldviews which informed how the plot would develop naturally. At times on TNG, the characters functioned as a means of plot alone especially in those early seasons.
In fact, I rarely watch episodes from season two. I know there are excellent shows from that season, but she's a big reason I tuned it.
