Generations: A Defence
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On the commentary, i like the way Branna Braga and Ronald D Moore are actually quite brutally honest about what worked and what didn't work in the film, it's quite refreshing, i like the part on the BOP bridge where Soran says ''there's no time for this, eliminate them!'' and they start sniggering in the backround on the Commentary.
I always thought Picard Crying was a mistake, though to be fair, the mistake really was to put the nephews death subplot in there in the first place, since Patrick Stewart probably figured 'how the hell else is my character going to react if he's just found out his nephews have both burned to death in a fire' and just added the crying on the spur of the moment.
I always thought Picard Crying was a mistake, though to be fair, the mistake really was to put the nephews death subplot in there in the first place, since Patrick Stewart probably figured 'how the hell else is my character going to react if he's just found out his nephews have both burned to death in a fire' and just added the crying on the spur of the moment.
No Stewart was brilliant and it was a good, emotional scene, the mistake was puting the subplot there, it's just felt a bit too 'heavy' for the first Next Gen film. On the commentarry, they dont even think they had him crying in the script, which when you think about it was silly, since no matter how 'hard hearted' the Picard Character is, no way would he not react emotionally to something as tramatic as that.
Well the original had already had the s@#t kicked out of it by Khan in the last movie and was still in bad shape so it was believeable. Where as the D should have wasted the Duras sisters with only a couple of torpedo hits as it was still completelty functional. I still thought Generations was a good movie but some plot holes challenge disbelief.
And futhermore in TSFS you actually get to see the crew react to the destruction of the Enterprise when they see her burn up in Genesis's atmosphere with the whol My god Bones what have I done. Where as in Generations the crew is like well it sucks the ship was destroyed, oh while at least we'll get another one.
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darkwing_duck1
Vice Admiral
It's a PR stunt. They were invited guests for her commissioning ceremony. There was "good press" to be had having the crew of the "old" Enterprise participating in the beginning of the service of the "new" Enterprise.
In story terms, it sets up the theme of "changing of the guard" and "passing the torch" from the classic cast to the TNG cast, showing how the passage of time has changed and is changing them.
We also see that Kirk is having second thoughts about his retirement (similarly to his reticence about accepting promotion to the Admiralty in ST I & II), which is important later on.
They mention several times that this is just the Commissioning Ceremony. Real life ships are commissioned before they are 100% finished as well, usually at the point they have reached a set minimal level of seaworthiness. Then they are taken to the "finishing yard" for the rest of the work to be done before her formal maiden cruise.
It survived the extreme forces of the Nexus, saved over a 100 lives and only suffered some deflector damage and a few opened compartments...hardly "getting it's ass handed to it, and certainly worth the price.
Continuing the theme of time and change by symbolically repeating the opening.
First, we are informed about the death of Picard's brother and nephew, which sets him on the path of thinking "what might've been". Now Picard is at the place Kirk was earlier...looking in from the outside at "my life that was/could have been".
Then we see Data realize that he has come to a complete dead end in his development. He has reached his limits and to expand and evolve needs the emotion chip.
His systems react badly to the chip at first and he cannot control the emotions he is feeling (which is very human by the way). After Geordi is kidnapped, he understandably is second guessing himself, and feeling VERY guilty.
Shaped by his recent loss of family, and questioning the path he took in life, the Nexus is giving him "his heart's desire": home and family. It's tempting...VERY tempting. At this point I'm going to quote from another genre "It does not do to dwell on dreams, and forget to live." Picard is tired and grieving.
You weren't paying attention, because SHE explains it to him. As the Nexus exists outside normal space time, it forever holds a "part" or "echo" of everyone who ever is taken into it.
Ok, I'll cop to a bit of a plothole here, but not an insurmountable one, esp when dealing with time travel. One "in universe" explanation would be the Temporal Prime Directive, which he's breaking BIG time just by going back at all. By going back the MINIMUM distance in time, Picard is minimizing any unforseen effects on the timeline from his interferance.
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Because Picard knows he can't do it alone...that was the mistake he made the first time around.
Also, bringing the two characters together instigates the payoff of the two themes of "passing the torch" and the personal themes for Kirk and Picard of them second guessing their lives.
So what? It's part of Kirk's Nexus reality...home, a woman...all that which he gave up for his career. Again, paralleling Picard's position.
You mean they both come to the conclusion that they cannot just sit and let Soran kill an entire solar system.
Also, this is where the personal themes are fully paid off, as both realize that as tempting as home and family might be, their TRUE heart's desire is to Make a Difference with their lives.
They can't DO that in the Nexus...they HAVE to go back.
Same reason Picard can't go back further.
, see above.
He burries him on the planet in the solar system his sacrifice helped save. A fitting resting place if any, I would say.
Kirk died (this time for real) the death he wanted: making a difference. Picard finds resolution to HIS "mid life crisis" as well. The E-D is lost, true, but part of living life instead of hiding from it is moving on after loss. Data finally becomes a complete person, and comes to terms with the DOWNside of emotions as well as the positive. In the course of all that, they saved MILLIONS of lives. Hardly "sweet fuck all".
darkwing_duck1
Vice Admiral
Uh, point of order...the Klingon's first shot went RIGHT THROUGH the shields (thanks to their inside information from the tap into Geordi's VISOR) and hit the Enterprise's bare hull. That alone was a crippling shot, and the following fire ALSO was uninhibited by the shields, since they had the modulation setting.
And futhermore in TSFS you actually get to see the crew react to the destruction of the Enterprise when they see her burn up in Genesis's atmosphere with the whol My god Bones what have I done. Where as in Generations the crew is like well it sucks the ship was destroyed, oh while at least we'll get another one.[/quote]
This I WILL agree with at least in part...I would have liked to see a bit more "OMG", but it fits with the theme of "life MUST go on"...
Okay, I've read what you said and honestly it doesn't make Generations any less of a shit film than it already is. I'll reply to some of the comments but others I either don't want to, or simply don't want to.
You talk about things like the temporal prime directive in a place where time has no meaning. This being said nothing will change if Picard goes and gets an army to go back and fight Soran, once again if he were to go back to the Enterprise-D and stop him then, nothing would have changed either. It would be like going back in to a room that you've already been in.
Okay, I'll agree with you that the scene where Picard is wondering "what could have been" was very powerful and probably one of the top 2 scenes in the film. Although what you've said about Data's programming "reaching it's limits", is complete bullshit. In just three films Data will learn what it is to be human by sacrificing himself to save his friend without the aid of the emotion chip. Now I would say that's a definate increase in his humanity, wouldn't you?
Okay so the last two things I'm going to comment on, Picard's family in the Nexus. Now this I can understand, the whole film he's been greeving about a family and wanting one before so the Nexus tempting him there is understandable. Now how Guinen gets there is never explained and one of the stupidest things ever, does she have some kind of super power? No. The fact is she is there for the films convenience and to get the running time up.
But Kirks... Now this is where it gets completely confusing for me because we have literally been dragged to a parrell to Picards, but we've seen Kirk for a whole 10 minutes of this film and now we're in a place we've never seen, inhabited by a person we've NEVER heard of before. Now don't get me wrong I know where they're coming from BUT IT'S FUCKING STUPID. He says about not going back to Starfleet, but then he doesn't mean his son, doesn't mean his sons mother again. Ugh, the whole thing is him being a selfish little child, worse than Simba from The Lion King. Any Star Trek fan knows that Kirk would want to be on the Enterprise, he said himself more than once, instead we have to believe that he wants to be with this random woman we've never heard of. Even worse it's not the mother of his son, which to be honest I might have believed.
Okay so very last thing, Kirks burial. WHY? Why make a comment like that? Of course it's not a good way to send off Kirk, I think after saving the Earth and the Federation he sould have a good fucking burial. I mean crying women at his grave, the works. They don't know anything about that planet, that day could have been the only one which normal weather. Why Picard drags him up the mountain only to pile him under some rocks baffles me. (And I know that in the original ending he was shot in the back and died at the top of the mountain, and they reshot his death but not his burial).
So all in all, it really was a shit movie, not as bad as Insurrection I'll admit. And don't even get me started on the tourture of Geordi.
darkwing_duck1
Vice Admiral
But those changes happen OUTSIDE the Nexus in the "real" universe. Plus, Picard has no way of knowing who might be there to help him. It's Guinan that says there "may be someone who can help".
Data has the emotion chip from Generations on...it's specifically mentioned in First Contact.
She was in the Nexus during the Kirk incident (she was on one of the transports). The Guinan we see in the Nexus with Picard is an "echo" or temporal duplicate of sorts left behind. She herself states this to be true. Her awareness of events outside the Nexus is part of that weird temporal sensitivity that El Aurians have, as demonstrated several times in TNG (most notably in "Yesterday's Enterprise").
Everything having to do with Carol and David ended up in pain and misery for Kirk. I can easily see why "his heart's desire" would involve a realtionship NOT burdened with that baggage. The same thing likely explains why it wasn't Miramanee, for that matter.
Jillian Taylor might've been a candidate I suppose.
By definition, it's HIS heart's desire, not Carol's or David's or anyone else's. Maybe objectively speaking it IS selfish...but everyone can be selfish on occasion.
Provisionally agreed. It is important, however, thematically that Kirk be having the same sort of existential crisis as Picard, because it is Kirk who give Picard the insight into himself that helps him (Picard) deal with not only the larger situation, but his own personal dilemma.
See above.
Your opinion. I could make a defense of Insurrection as well (and pretty easily, since it was a pretty good movie in and of itself.
Okay, I've read though everything but our quotes are getting to long and annoying.
Everything in Generations happens for convenience and to waste time, Diana was only at the controls on the Enterprise because she didn't have as much screentime as the rest of the characters.
Touching on what i just said, the whole film follows this same pattern, every character -- including Guinan, are just on screen for the sake of getting screen time. Nemesis is a prime example of this, as they follow the same system as Generations.
Okay sure, David and Carol probably wouldn't be in this scene, but either way he wouldn't be there, to introduce something like that in to this film is just stupid, it's like in another TNG film, saying Picard had a house in England that he always lives in, even though we know he doesn't and have never heard of it before.
Oh and Data's emotion chip is mentioned in First Contact, but it's not mentioned at all in Nemesis, and I don't think it's mentioned in Insurrection.
Everything in Generations happens for convenience and to waste time, Diana was only at the controls on the Enterprise because she didn't have as much screentime as the rest of the characters.
Touching on what i just said, the whole film follows this same pattern, every character -- including Guinan, are just on screen for the sake of getting screen time. Nemesis is a prime example of this, as they follow the same system as Generations.
Okay sure, David and Carol probably wouldn't be in this scene, but either way he wouldn't be there, to introduce something like that in to this film is just stupid, it's like in another TNG film, saying Picard had a house in England that he always lives in, even though we know he doesn't and have never heard of it before.
Oh and Data's emotion chip is mentioned in First Contact, but it's not mentioned at all in Nemesis, and I don't think it's mentioned in Insurrection.
I'm not sure what we get to see in the movie is meant to be his final resting place, it always seemed to me more like a temporary arrangement, a more personal way for Picard to cope with Kirk's death and to say good-bye.
At least I think the matter is open to interpretation.
(btw, don't get me wrong, I don't think Kirk's death itself was done well - it's just the burial scene that didn't bother me.)
darkwing_duck1
Vice Admiral
I guess I just don't get how that makes the D's destruction more epic. I still believe the original's was more epic.
I like Generations, but I don't think it is a good movie.
The scenes all work, but it isn't put together well. I enjoy watching the scenes on the E-B, I enjoy the scenes about Picard grieving, I enjoy Data's emotion chip, I enjoy the destruction of the the E-D, I enjoy Picard in the Nexus, I enjoy him meeting Kirk, I enjoyed Kirk's death scene (and I actually think it is fitting that he was buried on this planet) and I enjoyed the final scenes. But as a film it doesn't work for me.
It's a jigsaw puzzle where each piece looks nice but when put together it doesn't make a picture. Some pieces probably came from an entirely different board altogether.
Overall I find it to be an enjoyable experience to watch despite its obvious short-commings.
The scenes all work, but it isn't put together well. I enjoy watching the scenes on the E-B, I enjoy the scenes about Picard grieving, I enjoy Data's emotion chip, I enjoy the destruction of the the E-D, I enjoy Picard in the Nexus, I enjoy him meeting Kirk, I enjoyed Kirk's death scene (and I actually think it is fitting that he was buried on this planet) and I enjoyed the final scenes. But as a film it doesn't work for me.
It's a jigsaw puzzle where each piece looks nice but when put together it doesn't make a picture. Some pieces probably came from an entirely different board altogether.
Overall I find it to be an enjoyable experience to watch despite its obvious short-commings.
Actually I'm trying to poiny out how the D's destruction wasn't as epic as the original. Sorry for not making my point clear.
Another interesting thing, wouldn't there be 2 Picards when he went back to the planet? Did the Picard that was going to square off agaist Soran alone just dissapear in place of the Nexus exiting Picard and Kirk? Did Nexus Picard do a 'Quantum leap' into Planet Picard's body, and if so that would not explain Kirk, who was previously in the Nexus and came out in his own physical body. For Guinan and Soran is a bit different since they were half phased in tho the Nexus then transported out, thus leaving an echo of Guinan and presumably Soran behind in the Nexus.
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