There's interpersonal conflict when Ro Laren joins the crew, too. It's an idea that was often paid only lip service to once Roddenberry was out of the picture.
Has TNG Aged Well?
- Thread starter KirbyHawk
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There's interpersonal conflict when Ro Laren joins the crew, too. It's an idea that was often paid only lip service to once Roddenberry was out of the picture.
The notion that TNG suffered- from a lack of conflict among the Crew is false. You don't need conflict with your crew to be a better show.
"Love Boat", "Emergency", and other shows from my youth had crews that got along fine. It only hurt TNG, because too many characters were too bland.
"Love Boat", "Emergency", and other shows from my youth had crews that got along fine. It only hurt TNG, because too many characters were too bland.
But you never had a warp core breach or evacuation on the Love Boat haha.
Now that might have been fun
Now that might have been fun
The lack of conflict is realistic. That's how astronauts actually work, even today (see ISS). If a starship crew is in permanent conflict, they are pretty incompetent in their job. Astronauts have a well balanced psyche. And you need to have that for deep space missions. Drama queens would be out of the job very quickly.
But is the crrew of the Enterprise(any of them) actually all trained astronauts? or just officers on a spaceship. Does Starfleeet put them through the same kind of training and rigor current astronauts go through?
Star Trek: First Contact implied that all Starfleet officers undergo EVA training, though possibly not regularly. Even on Voyager B'Ellana Torres, who never completed her formal education at Starfleet Academy, was familiar enough with Starfleet issue EV suits to don one in mere seconds. Whether or not that classifies them as trained astronauts... *shrug*
And you made me think of one of my favourite lines from the movie.
"So you're all astronauts on some kind of Star Trek" which raised a lot of laughs when we saw this back in December 96
According to Gene Roddenberry, all Starfleet officers were the equivalent of trained astronauts.
This is very true. Directing in Trek even the later shows does not seem modern by today's standards, though generally when it first started in 1987, very few shows really deviated from standard practices with shooting and cutting. As the 90s progressed the style had already changed but not to a huge degree. As the new century rolled around though, Enterprise was in danger of looking old hat. In 2005 when it left the airwaves it was a nice looking show, tried a few things other Trek shows hadn't, but really hadn't kept up with the radically changing TV landscape that technology was bringing.
This is one reason why I'm excited about Discovery. It's a new production team, the latest tech, and the will to change style and go for something new--which I had argued strongly for in 2001--new producers and writing team as well as directors. Trekkies generally hate anything new and out of their comfort zone. If Trekkies are uncomfortable, then I'm happy.
I just don't like being told I'm wrong for liking the reboot films.
Even Brannon Braga admits now (in "Chaos on the Bridge") that, while he resented it at first, in time he has come to appreciate how the 'no conflict among the crew' rule forced him to learn how to become a better writer, as it meant he had to find other ways to create drama.
Sometimes, a thing that appears to be a challenging constraint, actually ends up being liberating and more rewarding.
I'm not sure "no conflict" is well understood here. "Conflict" as in Pulaski. Pulaski is an opinionated individual that wasn't frightened of asserting her view. She was still a functional and cooperative member of the crew that obeyed orders and someone who would not be out of place in some contemporary mission or other. We're not talking about "conflict" as in crew members arm wrestling with each other or temper tantrums or something of that sort. We're not talking Klingon-ship here. (Although First Officer Kurn was quite good 
)
I don't think "no conflict" is good typically but TNG did punch above its weight with its "no conflict". As long as you keep the external challenges and the villainy fresh, you can get away with it.
) I don't think "no conflict" is good typically but TNG did punch above its weight with its "no conflict". As long as you keep the external challenges and the villainy fresh, you can get away with it.
No conflict is unrealistic--it suggests the ST future is populated by staid, colorless finger-waving types that never have serious differences of background, ideology or anything else. That was one of the biggest anchors dragging TNG down.
To be entirely fair, 'no conflict' was a rule that was only ever supposed to be applied to the regular characters. There are a multitude of occasions where the Enterprise crew find themselves in direct conflict with non-regulars, including not just visiting aliens-of-the-week but also other human Starfleet officers (eg Jellico, Nechayev, Pressman.) Pulaski also neatly fits into this catagory because its easy to miss that, although she's a member of the Enterprise crew, she was never once credited as a 'regular' like the rest of the cast (at actress Diana Muldaur's insistence.) Truthfully, she's more like an outsider who keeps the chair in sickbay warm until Beverly comes back, and therefore has a license to come in and shake things up a bit. 
in terms of the caliber of the storytelling, it is as good now as it was then. Timeless stories and some truely great characters.
from a technical standpoint, god is it slow. And the enterprise-D bridge screams mid 80's at me.
But it's one of my favourite shows of all-time, it's one of the 5-6 shows that to me personally, I couldn't care less about a few flaws. It's like when your mom starts getting old. Who cares. She's your mom.
from a technical standpoint, god is it slow. And the enterprise-D bridge screams mid 80's at me.
But it's one of my favourite shows of all-time, it's one of the 5-6 shows that to me personally, I couldn't care less about a few flaws. It's like when your mom starts getting old. Who cares. She's your mom.
oh yea, I also just want to say that Marina Sirtis is possibly the worst actress in the history of earth
Why do you say that?
ahh i shouldna said anything. a bit petty of me and definitely superfluous. i was just literally watching the face of the enemy whilst reading this thread and found her attempts to be an intimidating tal shiar agent incredibly weak. and as far as I can remember, this was one of her "finest hours". other than beverley crusher, who is largely irrelevant, and the outdated TOS female cast members, to me she is the weakest leading lady in trek shows. but that's just opinion. she rubs me the wrong way. what a body though.
Oh no that's OK I totally get where you are coming from.
OK not Wesley, I'll give him a pass as he was a kid actor off the top of my head I can't find one actor in TNG that really gave me the shits. Now Voyager that was another thing.
She was not good, but she also was given terrible material to work with. I've just started rewatching the show (I haven't seen it since it first aired) on Blu-ray, so I'm only in season 1 right now, but her whole character is poorly thought out and developed. She makes obvious observations most of the time, and is as stumped as everyone else when she might be useful.
The one actor I could never get to liking was Dorn as Worf. Again: terrible material, especially in the first season, but I never thought he got much better. I remember being so disappointed that his was the character they chose to bring over to DS9, which had characters and acting on a much higher level than TNG. Meanwhile, other Klingons - even in TNG - seemed much more interesting.
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