Heh, "Hero Worship" would be quite a disappointing and underwhelming endpoint for Trek! And people thought "Turnabout Intruder" made a weak finale... Meanwhile, this thread has made me realize I really do need to rewatch the TOS films. I doubt I've seen TFF more than once and that was easily 25 years ago.
Probably not very diplomatic to bring that up when you've got the Klingon chancellor over for tea though. Quite. There was a war in it, that's not the same as being pro-war. There were many episodes showing the sacrifices (not only in manpower/lives, but also in morals/scruples etc.) that both sides made, and the toll it took. He was also a philanderer/adulterer, drug abuser, and stole credit for other people's work - I'd be careful how high you put that pedestal.
Saying that DS9 was pro-war might be justified if the Federation had pre-emptively attacked the Cardassian/Dominion forces to try taking them out before they got too big, or if Sisko had been deliberately trying to provoke an attack from the Dominion by setting up a minefield next to the wormhole. But it seemed pretty clear that the Federation was going to be forced into a war sooner or later. The only other grounds I can think of for describing the show as pro-war is that the war ended up being resolved via a military invasion of Cardassia Prime instead of a negotiated peace (ignoring Odo's agreement with the Female Changeling, which wasn't obtained until after the Dominion had effectively been defeated anyway), but the only "negotiations" the Dominion seemed interested in were the Federation offering up a complete and unconditional surrender before Earth got glassed.
I don't necessarily think so either (I'm trying to argue a point of view that's not mine), but Gene Roddenberry could've tried to say episodes like "Call to Arms" were. Granted, the Federation had to do something about the Dominion's build-up in Cardassian Space and the inroads they were making with non-aggression pacts, making it harder for the Federation to gain allies... but I don't know if he would've favored all out war, his being WWII generation, unless the Dominion actually struck Federation Space in the episode. America didn't support getting involved in WWII until Pearl Harbor was attacked. He might've interpreted anything where the Federation declared war first as being pro-war.
Which is really weird, considering that Roddenberry wasn't especially involved with TNG the last few years of his life.
The silly thing about that criteria for TNG is that Roddenberry pretty much had no real input regarding the show's content from season 3 onwards.
I think it was more mid-late Season 4 that Roddenberry effectively ceased to be involved. He gave up active showrunning duties as early as two-thirds of the way through Season 1, when he palmed the job off to Maurice Hurley, but he still had the power of veto over any script he didn't like, such as with the original version of "Captain's Holiday."
As I noted on several occasions (example) during my time at TrekBBS.com (2002-2010), I was never a fan of ST:TNG especially considering that I wasted seven years trying to convince myself with minimal success that it was the greatest thing since, well, ST:TMP. Furthermore, I am perfectly cognizant of the fact that Gene Roddenberry's creative involvement - for lack of a better term - was effectively non-existent long before Hero Worship was an oily twinkle in Berman/Piller's eye (example). Finally, I should perhaps note that in retrospect I was never even a Star Trek fan per se; I was a Gene Roddenberry fan, and being a fan of a particular Hollywood writer-producer in no way implies an unshakeable faith in his artistic infallibility. After all, if Steven Bochco (probably my third favorite childhood HW-P after GR and Dan O'Bannon) could bestow Cop Rock upon an unsuspecting television audience, who was I to hope that The Great Bird could do any better? H.
A pity he couldn't find his veto pen for "Code of Honor". Concerning Star Trek V: The Freaked-Out Frontier - Technically, it is canon. Whatever it was supposed to be was on-screen, which, sadly, is the only qualification that matters. Personally, it's not in my video collection and never will be. I'm happy to pretend it never existed. An easy thing to do since it added nothing of substance to the overall lore.
Well, he did "veto" the original director from finishing the whole shoot, so... there's that, at least?
Thought. Turning this back around to Star Trek V. What if we're being too literal? "Never been this close" doesn't mean the Enterprise being in proximity of a Klingon ship. It doesn't even mean mingling with the enemy as both have happened in TFF. What if "Never been this close" means never been this close to actual peace? Which is not the same as just a ceasefire, or the Organian Peace Treaty that was forced on them, or the peace treaty the Federation and Klingons were trying to negotiate behind the scenes in TSFS but completely fell apart.
It's canon. Believe me, if I could kick things out of canon, there would be plenty ahead of Star Trek V. There are also stories in the books I would bring in. Unfortunately, I don't have this power.
Oh, yes. Gene Roddenberry was certainly the rarity, having been a Hollywood celebrity using and/or finding himself addicted to recreational drugs, wasn't he? Same with having been an adulterer, for that matter. Not unlike, say ... Majel Barrett. Other social pariah in that category include FDR, JFK, Ike, Bill Clinton ... yeah, GR's in bad company there, that's for sure. As for "stealing" credit for other people's work, yes ... that is unethical, but, again ... how rare for Hollywood to take someone else's "original" concept, change 7 or so things then repackage it as their own. That Gene Roddenberry ... his "pedestal" is still pretty solid, with me. He did alright.
HausmeisterOHBSystemAG is TheGodThing under a new screenname. That's why he's linking to his old posts and referring to himself in the first person. I presume that's why his new account is now deleted.