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Return to cheesy fun Star Trek?

I'll feel bad for Strange New Worlds. It'll get savaged for not being Old School enough. It won't be zeroth season TOS anymore than Picard is eighth season TNG.

I ought to take a cue from @Vger23 who looked at how many episodes of TOS and TNG were actually about boldly going where no one has gone before. In this case, I'd look at: how many episodes of TOS and TNG actually really were "bright cheesy happy fun!"? I think the actual numbers won't back up the idea that those series were really mostly like that.
 
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I'll feel bad for Strange New Worlds. It'll get savaged for not being Old School enough. It won't be zeroth season TOS anymore than Picard is eighth season TNG.

I ought to take a cue from @Vger23 who looked at how many episodes of TOS and TNG were actually about boldly going where no one has gone before. In this case, I'd look at: how many episodes of TOS and TNG actually really were "bright cheesy happy fun!"? I think the actual numbers won't back up the idea that those series were really mostly like that.

Honestly, everyone’s Nostalgia-brand Rose Colored Glasses about how everything used to be is pretty much the biggest cliché in genre fandom these days. It gets immensely old, immensely fast.

I think fans overworry nowadays about canon and canon status.

Not as much as they seem to worry about whether or not something “feels like Trek” or not, though.
That one has grown tiresome, as it’s been bandied about since May 2009 as a rally cry for anyone trying to justify their dislike of whatever the franchise product of the year is.

Some of the very best Star Trek ever produced feels very little like Star Trek.

Hell, Star Trek is so varied and diverse, I don’t know what the hell it even means to “feel like Trek” any more. And, frankly, I actually think that’s a GOOD thing with a 50 year old franchise.
 
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I don’t know what the hell it even means to “feel like Trek”
This. I would love for someone to nail this down for me. Such claims are often quite nebulous, for very obvious reasons, yet the phrase is clutched to with such intensity one would think life or death was on the line.
 
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Again, why does fun have to mean cheesy? So many shows have managed to balance serious drama and social realism with a sense of genre fun. Why does Star Trek seem to target one or the other?

I just think when you're talking about CGI spaceships and rubber-masked aliens and Space Elves, it's just inevitable that when you're having fun there's going to be a little bit of cheese. Just a little bit of cheese is intrinsic to the space opera format.

This. I would love for someone to nail this down for me. Such claims are often quite nebulous, for very obvious reasons, yet the phrase is clutched to with such intensity one would think life or death was on the line.

To me, I think the only real throughline that people are responding to when they say something feels or doesn't feel like Star Trek is that ST from TOS through ENT had a sense of there being a place of emotional safety that the characters and audience could retreat to. Whereas DIS and PIC are both stories about, in essence, people losing that place of emotional safety and needing to find a new one. I think that's why people felt so much like they weren't "real" ST, and I think that's why they felt like LD was -- because LD starts off with that place of emotional safety.

For whatever it's worth, I think PIC and DIS have developed places of emotional safety in their narratives by the end of their respective first seasons.
 
I just think when you're talking about CGI spaceships and rubber-masked aliens and Space Elves, it's just inevitable that when you're having fun there's going to be a little bit of cheese. Just a little bit of cheese is intrinsic to the space opera format.

Tell that to Joss Wheadon, or Stargate, or Firefly. They all found the line where it's fun but not cheesy or campy.
 
This. I would love for someone to nail this down for me. Such claims are often quite nebulous, for very obvious reasons, yet the phrase is clutched to with such intensity one would think life or death was on the line.

I've found it basically means "if it doesn't feel like a quintessential TNG episode, it doesn't feel like Star Trek." Certainly not from everyone...so YMMV...but that's generally how I take it.
 
"Star Trek is..." according to Gene Roddenberry in 1964:

Lots of good stuff in the episode descriptions. Have at it. And find out some of what Gene's Vision actually is. Not all of it is what you think. I especially love "A Question of Cannibalism". ;)
"The Next Cage" - Captain April is caged like an animal, and offered a mate. This was adapted into "The Cage".
"The Day Charlie Became God" - A normal man accidentally gains infinite powers. It was adapted into "Where No Man Has Gone Before" and "Charlie X".

"President Capone" - A "parallel world" set on a Chicago where Al Capone won the presidency. This outline was the basis of "A Piece of the Action", and went through several versions (including George Clayton Johnson's treatment, "Chicago II") before the actual episode was developed. [1]

"To Skin a Tyrannosaurus" - A modern man is reduced to stone-age level. This concept later appeared in TOS: "All Our Yesterdays", TNG: "Genesis" and ENT: "Extinction".

"The Women" - Some "hanky-panky" occurs when escorting a cargo ship of women to a deep space colony. This outline was the basis of "Mudd's Women". Also, vaguely similar to TNG: "The Perfect Mate".

"The Coming" - A parable about an alien condemned to crucifixion and his dignity around the subject. The idea of a religion parallel to early Christianity was used in "Bread and Circuses". The plot of TNG: "Transfigurations" is similar.

"The Perfect World" - The SS Yorktown lands on a supposed "perfect world," which appears similar to Earth ca. 1964. Only later do they realize that it is ruled by an authoritarian, Big Brother type; vaguely similar to "The Return of the Archons".

"Mr. Socrates" - The SS Yorktown discovers a planet which duplicates famous Humans, and then forces them into gladiatorial combat. This concept was used in TOS: "The Savage Curtain".

"The Stranger" - A "strange" alien intelligence begins to take over the minds of key crewmembers, in an attempt to fight a rival civilization. While similar to "Day of the Dove", this story much more closely resembles the later TNG and DS9 story concepts for "Conundrum" and "Dramatis Personae".

"The Man Trap" - The crew lands on a seemingly harmless planet, and begin to see apparitions. Eventually, they find that their wishes are being fulfilled in deadly ways. Despite the title, this story line had more in common with "Shore Leave" than with the episode of the same name.

Camelot Revisited - On Hermes II, a modern society exists, yet they contain many medieval characteristics, such as knighthood; vaguely similar to TNG: "Qpid" and VOY: "Heroes and Demons".

"100 A.B." - An exploration of a parallel world a hundred years after an atomic holocaust. The Enterprise visited a post-atomic war civilization in "The Cage". One of the three story drafts written by Roddenberry for the second pilot, "The Omega Glory" was based on 100 A.B., and by the end of the second season of TOS, "The Omega Glory" had been written by Roddenberry into a series episode.

"Kentucky, Kentucky" - An Earth colony in the Sirius group is reduced to fighting Viking-like savages in a "frontier" like community. The savage Klingons eventually appeared in "Errand of Mercy", where they invaded a primitive frontier community.

"Reason" - The crew visit the Isaac IV group, where they discover a group of sentient robots. Shares similarities with "I, Mudd".

"Reason II" - The story of the last Human survivors of the Isaac IV group, trying to take back control over the robots; similar to "I, Mudd".

"A Matter of Choice" - A world where the natives have the power to relive any portion of their lives over again. The implications of such a concept are explored, albeit in a radically different way, by TNG: "Tapestry".

"The Radiant One" - A love story with a woman from a "Garden of Eden" planet, except, because of her body chemistry, anyone who becomes her lover will die. Similar to "That Which Survives" in plot. Also, thematically similar to "The Way to Eden" in that death awaits those who find the Garden of Eden.

"The Trader" - The crew visit the oriental planet Satunii, that is strangely similar to the court of Genghis Khan. Though the plot itself was not used, Genghis Khan did appear in the series, in "The Savage Curtain". The notion of a rogue space traveler setting himself up as a leader over a world's natives appears in "I, Mudd", "Bread and Circuses", "Patterns of Force", and "The Omega Glory"

"A Question of Cannibalism" - The crew discovers that the colonists on Regulus are actually herding sentient beings, and face angry settlers when trying to free the "cattle." The idea of colonists accidentally destroying sentient beings is re-used in "The Devil in the Dark" and "Home Soil". Also, the idea of sentient beings used as a commodity by others appears in DS9: "Captive Pursuit". Roddenberry wanted to use this story outline as the basis of the first Star Trek feature film, when he approached Paramount with such an idea as early as 1973. Herb Solow commented, "Gene's story premise would have been rewritten, because it did not foreshadow an enjoyable night at the movies." (Inside Star Trek: The Real Story, pp. 420-421)

"The Mirror" - The Yorktown discovers a duplicate Yorktown. Now they have to decide whether or not to destroy their counterparts. Somewhat similar to "Mirror, Mirror" and "The Enemy Within". A similar concept was also used in VOY: "Deadlock".

"Torx" - A strange alien being "devours" intelligence, and is headed straight for Earth; somewhat similar in concept to "The Changeling" and Star Trek: The Motion Picture.

"The Pet Shop" - A world similar to St. Louis, 1910, except women are the masters and men are women's pets. The concept was revisited much later in TNG: "Angel One" as well as in Roddenberry's 1974 pilot Planet Earth and a similar idea, regarding Orion slave girls, was established in ENT: "Bound".

"Kongo" - A planet where the "Ole Plantation Days" still occur, yet the racial roles are reversed. Worse yet, the crew find themselves stranded on the planet as runaways. This idea was later developed by Barry Trivers as "Portrait in Black and White". Although multiple attempts were made to create the story work, it never got into a suitable form for the screen. According to David Gerrold's book The World of Star Trek, DeForest Kelley in particular hoped to see a story episode where McCoy and Uhura become stranded on such a planet. NBC program manager Stan Robertson dismissed the idea, calling it "far from the accepted Star Trek norm". (Inside Star Trek: The Real Story, These Are the Voyages: TOS Season One)

"The Venus Planet" - The crew discover a planet of women. The men become increasingly attracted to the women, and almost too late do they realize that there are no more men on the planet. The story bears a striking resemblance to both TAS: "The Lorelei Signal" and VOY: "Favorite Son".

"Infection" - A female crew member discovers that she may be pregnant with an alien larva. Likely formed the basis for the Star Trek: Phase II premise "The Child", which was itself then recycled into TNG: "The Child".
 
Tell that to Joss Wheadon, or Stargate, or Firefly. They all found the line where it's fun but not cheesy or campy.

Joss Whedon would be the first to admit that his stuff has a bit of cheese in it. He and Tim Minear have openly described the use of dramatic zoom-ins in Firefly as being intentional camp. And Whedon literally had a character called the Cheese Man in the surrealist Buffy episode "Restless!"

There's nothing wrong with a bit of cheese. And having a bit of cheese does not undermine the power of your drama if you use it correctly.
 
Joss Whedon would be the first to admit that his stuff has a bit of cheese in it. He and Tim Minear have openly described the use of dramatic zoom-ins in Firefly as being intentional camp. And Whedon literally had a character called the Cheese Man in the surrealist Buffy episode "Restless!"

There's nothing wrong with a bit of cheese. And having a bit of cheese does not undermine the power of your drama if you use it correctly.

There's a big difference between "intentional cheese" and "unintentional cheese".
 
There's a big difference between "intentional cheese" and "unintentional cheese".

I think Whedon just acknowledges that there's an element of cheese to almost any fantastical premise, and chooses to embrace that rather than pretend that fantastical fiction has the same level of suspension of disbelief as Realism/Naturalism. When you do that, you transform the cheese from unintentional to intentional.
 
A little cheese is okay if you hang a lantern on it. But Joss Wheadon's cheese was not social cheese, it was magical cheese, which is a big difference.

The villains had elements of cheese but the humans acted like believable humans.
 
I In this case, I'd look at: how many episodes of TOS and TNG actually really were "bright cheesy happy fun!"? I think the actual numbers won't back up the idea that those series were really mostly like that.

I can't speak for anybody else, only myself.

Before the pandemic, the only Trek series I had liked was DS9 but even with that, the lighter moments didn't sit with me with the overall tone of the later seasons which involved the Dominion arc which was my only then interest in that series. I don't know, it just felt that things were a bit too safe and comfortable. No mater how bad the predicament of the characters, they always had the net of the replicator to get anything they wanted, a good time at Quarks or a session on the Holosuite.

When the pandemic came, I had the chance to catch up with a few TV series I had wanted which included Enterprise for the Xinidi arc as well as giving Voyager a try. I tried watching a few episodes of the first two seasons of Ent, gave up and went straight to season 3 and was hooked. I gave Voyager a try but again, skipped to the best episodes throughout all the seasons.

I then gave TOS a try. I had tried watching it a few years ago and until go halfway through Season 1. I kept at it and enjoyed it. I thought I'd give TNG a try but again, found the first two seasons unwatchable so just watched the best episodes throughout all the TNG's seasons.

I then went back to TOS and finished it. In doing so, I got the lighter moments of the Trek franchise and I really enjoyed the humour and yes, the cheesy moments. It is fun with the exaggerated chest beating machismo, the battle of the sexes themes and yes, the rubber suited aliens and their alien 'cultures and customs'.

I've finished TOS and started from the start of the TNG and while quite a few of the early episodes are essentially comedies, it is great to get in the spirit of things where it is bordering on cult sci-fi. I can see where Red Dwarf got it's inspiration.

Looking back at my past attitude towards the Trek franchise, I had found it lightweight and not very sophisticated. However, now I see the charm in it and yes, I do like the contrast and mix between light moments and drama. Essentially, I think Trek is more a traditional way of telling stories in a TV setting where more other shows like Babylon 5, nuBSG and SG:U are a more structured like a book with a beginning, middle and end as well as fast pacing that enjoyable page turning novels have. There is a space for both of these types of shows and now I appreciate both of them for their different ways of presenting stories an story lines.
 
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