I'd rather watch a light ep like Liasons than Half a Life

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I understand that Half a Life is a more important dramatic episode with a scifi premise about people being usefuul at old age and all that featuring the sincerest performance from Majel, but it bored me to tears! I don't think I've made it through the entire show.

I think the best Trek is a good drama, which is Duet and Waltz and Necessary Evil, and Inner Light are some of my favorites, but occassionally TNG gwould get so heavy handed with it. "Ethics" bordered on unwatchable for me, but it does have a good Worf story,a good Crusher story, a good moral dilemma and fine acting. Its almost too much. It's obviously a a show with a point, aand so is Half a Life. Therein lies the problem: watching those two episodes makes me yearn for the days when an ST episode would begin with Kirk beaming down with a team with phasers at the ready.

Liasons is total fluff and not even well executed, really but at least I can watch it and be mildly amused by the situation comedy presented by it and other late-season TNG episodes that came out in later seasons that many consider to be the demise of TNG's overall quality as it neared its end.

Thoughts?

 

[startrekwatcher]

I like variety and that is why I always enjoyed TNG. It always had a nice mix of stories from the high concept sci-fi stories like Remember Me, Clues, Night Terrors, Cause and Effect to nicely done quieter character pieces like Legacy, The Inner Light, Silicon Avatar, Half a Life, The Host to light fluffy pieces or action adventure like Qpid, Rascals, Power Play to big epic stories like the Klingon saga episodes, Unification or The Best of Both Worlds.

Sometimes I'm in the mood for a serious drama and other times I want to turn my brain off and go along for the ride.

I thought Half a Life was a great piece as was Ethics which I think is vastly underrated. Ethics covered all sides of the issue and wisely chose the right characters to be the mouthpiece for those arguments. Worf was the perfect character to have this disability happen to, Alexander and Troi were effectively used and there were some nice ethical debates among Dr Crusher and Dr Russell.

Out of all the Trek series TNG was the one I find myself most rewatching.

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I really DO like Ethics a lot, don't get me wrong, and it really was a smart move that the writers did it to Worf.

I also agree that there all kinds of episodes TNG did and I enjoy them all.

My only point was that sometimes the heavy episodes were TOO heavy and they lacked pacing, and punch. Ethics was fine though ..but I don't rewatch it much.

 

[WillsBabe]

It depends what mood I'm in. I love the heavy "issue" episodes. They're what make me a Trek fan, frankly. But, when I'm chosing to sit down and watch something, I usually head for the lighter stuff. A well watched episode for me is Descent I&II. It's not the world's greatest episode but it's got loads of stuff in it, none of it massively meaningful but I just enjoy the romp. So, on balance, I enjoy the heavy stuff when it's part of televised tv, but when I'm chosing stuff to sit down and watch, it's oftenthe lighter stuff.