Something TNG fans underestimate about conflict?

[Jayson]

When people talk about the lack of conflict on TNG I notice you always get the argument that you don't want to see people who hate each other and at each other's throats. Basically I think they think all conflict leads to a "Sopranos" type of show were everyone hates each other and so forth.

IMO the biggest problem with a lack of conflict is that I feel it ruins humor and without it you can't create a familiar or family bond between characters. Some of the best friendships in Trek is defined by conflict or some major differences such as Spock/McCoy, Bashir,O'Brien, Quark/Rom. Politeness is all well and good but how many people here never have conflcit and major conflict with your friends and family? In fact I suspect you see more conflcit with people who care about each other than you do see it with people who are strangers or simply co-workers.

Also humor works off conflict as well. People when they get angry and can do some really stupid and thus funny things because they take a leave from their senses. It's hard to get humor from the TNG crew because they are always the straight man. Their is nobody wierd or wild enough to so something funny and thus you see the straight man's reaction to it.

Jason

 

[A beaker full of death]

There was interpersonal conflict between characters in TOS because they presented different points of view. They'd be passionate, principled and RIGHT on all sides. That's what happens with adult issues. And I'm talking about adult topics here - superpower involvement in brush wars, interference in the evolution of a culture, etc. When TNG didn't follow that path, it adopted a boring "we all believe the same thing" approach - so much so that not ONE voice was raised in the crew to suggest that clones shouldn't be destroyed, or that saving a race might trump non-interference.
But of course, TNG was more interested in who was dating whom, anyway.
They were the Waltons in space. Yawn.

 

[DostoyevskyClone]

Here's the top 20 list as voted on by TrekBBS members in this forum:

Best of Both Worlds, Pt. 1
Yesterday's Enterprise
All Good Things
The Inner Light
The Measure of a Man
Tapestry
Darmok
Best of Both Worlds, Pt. 2
Cause and Effect
Q-Who?
The Drumhead
Chain of Command, Pt. 2
Family
The Offspring
Sarek
Parallels
Lower Decks
The Defector
Pegasus
Conspriacy

Just because TNG episodes in general didn't fall into the "man vs. man" area of conflict, that doesn't mean there wasn't conflict! Most of these episodes above fall into "man vs. himself" or "man vs. society" and work very, very well on that level. I think this is a huge oversight that people make when talking about TNG. There didn't need to be conflict among the crew because they represented ideal examples of people (typically) working together to solve other types of conflict.

Many TNG episodes had great *concepts* behind them and I know as a TNG lover that I really enjoyed watching the crew work together to solve problems.

Edit: *Special Message to A Beaker Full of Death* - it's funny what you say about the crew not standing up for certain things - because I can think of at least one example for each crew member where they DID go against the grain and did what they individually felt was right while others stood by and went by protocol.

 

[Jayson]

DostoyevskyClone said:
Here's the top 20 list as voted on by TrekBBS members in this forum:

Best of Both Worlds, Pt. 1
Yesterday's Enterprise
All Good Things
The Inner Light
The Measure of a Man
Tapestry
Darmok
Best of Both Worlds, Pt. 2
Cause and Effect
Q-Who?
The Drumhead
Chain of Command, Pt. 2
Family
The Offspring
Sarek
Parallels
Lower Decks
The Defector
Pegasus
Conspriacy

Just because TNG episodes in general didn't fall into the "man vs. man" area of conflict, that doesn't mean there wasn't conflict! Most of these episodes above fall into "man vs. himself" or "man vs. society" and work very, very well on that level. I think this is a huge oversight that people make when talking about TNG. There didn't need to be conflict among the crew because they represented ideal examples of people (typically) working together to solve other types of conflict.

Many TNG episodes had great *concepts* behind them and I know as a TNG lover that I really enjoyed watching the crew work together to solve problems.

TNG did have great concepts but doesn't the fact they didn't have great characters kind of bring the show back to the pack so to speak. Granted TNG got alot of mileage out of outstanding guest stars and I think the lack of great guest stars is partly why season 1 and season 2 is inferior to later seasons. You had Q and K'hlear and few decent ones here and their but not many. TNG live and died on it's guest stars. Granted DS9 did as wel but Ds9's guest characters felt more like regulars and apart of the family. In fact I got another question Does anyone think TNG could have worked if it hadn't been so reliant of guests stars to make things intresting? I mean I could watch whole seasons of Kirk/Spck and McCoy just interating which each other and I feel the same with the Ds9 crew but I think TNG would be deadly boring if it'a focus had been on the main characters interactions with each other.


Jason

 

[DataRules]

DostoyevskyClone said:
Here's the top 20 list as voted on by TrekBBS members in this forum:

Best of Both Worlds, Pt. 1
Yesterday's Enterprise
All Good Things
The Inner Light
The Measure of a Man
Tapestry
Darmok
Best of Both Worlds, Pt. 2
Cause and Effect
Q-Who?
The Drumhead
Chain of Command, Pt. 2
Family
The Offspring
Sarek
Parallels
Lower Decks
The Defector
Pegasus
Conspriacy

Just because TNG episodes in general didn't fall into the "man vs. man" area of conflict, that doesn't mean there wasn't conflict! Most of these episodes above fall into "man vs. himself" or "man vs. society" and work very, very well on that level. I think this is a huge oversight that people make when talking about TNG. There didn't need to be conflict among the crew because they represented ideal examples of people (typically) working together to solve other types of conflict.

Many TNG episodes had great *concepts* behind them and I know as a TNG lover that I really enjoyed watching the crew work together to solve problems.

Edit: *Special Message to A Beaker Full of Death* - it's funny what you say about the crew not standing up for certain things - because I can think of at least one example for each crew member where they DID go against the grain and did what they individually felt was right while others stood by and went by protocol.

What he said! :thumbsup:

 

[sbk1234]

I think TBTB really lost an opportunity to show humanity's growth here. I agree that in 400 years, it would be nice to show that humans have grown beyond our pettiness that we have now. I can accept that in Star Trek's future, we're past that. But what they should have shown as a difference to how we savages are in the 20th and 21st centuries, is HOW they dealt with conflict. People will disagree. They will be angry. They may not even like each other. But during all this, they should have shown them dealing with their differences in a mature, professional way. Discussing differences, and not just yelling about it, or being petty.
That would have made the point better about humanity's growth, and made for interesting dramatic conflict.

 

[Blueicus]

There was interpersonal conflict, primarily involving the senior officers in various situations. Data and Worf argued about what to do in Gambit, in Disaster Troi had to make a command decision based on what she believed in (As opposed to Ro or O'Brian), Beverly and Picard argued over whether or not the prime directive should govern some of their choices in command, etc. Even Riker and Jellico argued in Chain of Command over particular points of view (although Riker was a bit of a baby about it).

 

[Red Ranger]

People,

Frankly, those who accuse TNG of being conflict-less are glossing over the many times the characters did have conflict. Here are a few instances:

-Picard and Dr. Crusher didn't see eye-to-eye on the application of the Prime Directive in the ep where one society has become a world of pushers and the other a world of drug addicts, doing the pushers' bidding.

-Riker and Worf are in conflict when Riker tells Worf he won't help him commit suicide, and in fact, says the ritual sickens him.

-Picard gives Worf a dressing down when Worf kills Duras, in violation of the principles of a Starfleet officer.

-Picard gives Geordi a hard time for not accepting Data's supposed death in "The Most Toys." In that same ep, Worf has to deal with, once again, taking over the position of a deceased colleague (first Yar, then Data). That's more of an inner conflict, of course.

And yes, there was more conflict between the regulars and guest stars, like Jellico vs. Riker, Data vs. Hobson, Picard vs. Captain Maxwell, and O'Brien vs. Maxwell. But so what?

Was there a bit more conflict among TOS regulars than TNG regulars? A bit. But the point about TNG being a show without conflict is a hollow one, in all candor.

Red Ranger

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

None of those really compare with D'argo, Zhaan and Rygel cutting off Pilot's arm though...do they?

 

[Red Ranger]

UWC Defiance said:
None of those really compare with D'argo, Zhaan and Rygel cutting off Pilot's arm though...do they?

Only if you count Riker turning off Data in "The Measure of a Man," and before that, removing his arm to show he was just a piece of machinery. But yeah, that was definitely more drastic! -- RR

 

[Spider]

Red Ranger said:
People,

Frankly, those who accuse TNG of being conflict-less are glossing over the many times the characters did have conflict.

RR is right. I just don't get where folks think there was no conflict between characters on this show. It happened on quite a few episodes. Perhaps not to the degree that some want, but it was there.

Besides, I don't need "gritty" in my TNG anyway. If I want "gritty", I'll watch nuBSG. Two entirely different shows, both damn good.

 

[Jayson]

Red Ranger said:
People,

Frankly, those who accuse TNG of being conflict-less are glossing over the many times the characters did have conflict. Here are a few instances:

-Picard and Dr. Crusher didn't see eye-to-eye on the application of the Prime Directive in the ep where one society has become a world of pushers and the other a world of drug addicts, doing the pushers' bidding.

-Riker and Worf are in conflict when Riker tells Worf he won't help him commit suicide, and in fact, says the ritual sickens him.

-Picard gives Worf a dressing down when Worf kills Duras, in violation of the principles of a Starfleet officer.

-Picard gives Geordi a hard time for not accepting Data's supposed death in "The Most Toys." In that same ep, Worf has to deal with, once again, taking over the position of a deceased colleague (first Yar, then Data). That's more of an inner conflict, of course.

And yes, there was more conflict between the regulars and guest stars, like Jellico vs. Riker, Data vs. Hobson, Picard vs. Captain Maxwell, and O'Brien vs. Maxwell. But so what?

Was there a bit more conflict among TOS regulars than TNG regulars? A bit. But the point about TNG being a show without conflict is a hollow one, in all candor.

Red Ranger

There might have been some conflict at times but I guess what I am getting at is the conflict didn't enhance the relationships between the characters. Just because Picard and Riker might have got into a disagreement didn't make Riker and Picard compelling characters to watch interact with each other. The lack of conflict prevented the characters have conflict that bonded the characters to each other and such as Quark/Odo Kirk/Spock/McCoy etc. In essence the conflict would sometimes help the story out but it didn't help make the characters all that more intresting because it usually would be forgotten the next episode. TNG like I mentioned before tended to revolve around the idea of taking a series regular and having him or her interact with a guest star and that would be the focus of the show. TNG rarely focused on the TNG characters interacting with each other to a point where at interaction drove the story. Look at "Best of Both World's" for example. It is about Riker and Shelby's conflict.

Jason

 

[Vic Sixx]

They tried it again with Pulaski and Data, but that came off too much like they were trying to recreate the Spock/McCoy conflict.

 

[Salinga]

Just curious: Why was the conflect-less TNG so successfull and the other shows with more conflict less?

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Novelty, and the fact that it was a direct sequel to the original.

 

[A beaker full of death]

Salinga said:
Just curious: Why was the conflect-less TNG so successfull and the other shows with more conflict less?

And you're pulling that out of... where?

 

[Jayson]

Salinga said:
Just curious: Why was the conflect-less TNG so successfull and the other shows with more conflict less?

Plenty of reasons. It had a Enterprise which people associate as trek. It wasn't a bad show which was a nice thing for sci-fi back in those days. You didn't get much quality back then. TNG and X-Files I feel helped make Sci-Fi accesible. Only problems is the shows TNG's succes help create shows that eventually surpased it in terms of quality. Another reason is Trek fans were buying into Roddenberry's nonsense about how trek was always about a perfect scoiety when in fact it was action based sci-fi show that told allegories about the human condition. The Roddenberry "vision" didn't happen until years later in his own mind.

Jason

 

[Red Ranger]

Jayson said:

Salinga said:
Just curious: Why was the conflect-less TNG so successfull and the other shows with more conflict less?

Plenty of reasons. It had a Enterprise which people associate as trek. It wasn't a bad show which was a nice thing for sci-fi back in those days. You didn't get much quality back then. TNG and X-Files I feel helped make Sci-Fi accesible. Only problems is the shows TNG's succes help create shows that eventually surpased it in terms of quality. Another reason is Trek fans were buying into Roddenberry's nonsense about how trek was always about a perfect scoiety when in fact it was action based sci-fi show that told allegories about the human condition. The Roddenberry "vision" didn't happen until years later in his own mind.

Jason

Jason,

You do have a point about Roddenberry's reinterpretation of ST as originally envisioned for TNG. TNG was a "kinder, gentler" show in some respects. I don't think it detracted from the show. In fact, it was refreshing to have a show with characters who generally had a congenial attitude toward one another.

But if you recall, Picard was a bit of a stuffy hard-ass in the beginning. As with all shows, they mellowed him out in terms of his attitude toward his chief officers -- hell, even with children, as time wore on.

As to your other point about how the conflicts between the TNG characters didn't enhance their relationships, perhaps you're right. However, in the case of Picard and Worf's disagreements, I think the conflict between the Captain and his overly Klingon security chief was at the crux of their relationship.

And not all the TOS characters had conflict at the core of their relationship. In the case of Spock and McCoy, yes, and a bit less in the case of Kirk and McCoy and Kirk and Spock. The minor characters didn't seem to have that tension -- witness Sulu and Chekov's normally good-natured banter and friendship, or Scotty and Uhura's congenial relationship.

Red Ranger