Agreed. GR, Bob Justman, D.C. Fontana, Matt Jefferies, Bill Thiess, etc. etc. all contributed to creating a ground breaking television show.
Still the best?
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Agreed. GR, Bob Justman, D.C. Fontana, Matt Jefferies, Bill Thiess, etc. etc. all contributed to creating a ground breaking television show.
There's only one Star Trek series you can apply the term "groundbreaking" to... that is the original Star Trek.
I agree that TOS is pretty sexist as was TNG but done 20 years later when in real life women were allowed to be heads of companies, airline pilots, astronauts etc so it should have been a hell of a lot better. DS9 and VOY had women leads not depending on men to save them.Well, if you're going to criticize the male/female dynamic of TNG, TOS gets it just as bad. Unless you want to make the 'Grandpa from a different era is allowed to be that way' argument. "If only she could be happy being just a woman."
TNG has dumb episodes but IMO, 2/3 of them are at least good, same with DS9. Whereas TOS hits a couple strong strides in mid to late season 1 and season 2 but has a lot more weak periods and is ultimately a lot more formulaic.
And TOS leans more on the (Admittedly excellent) dynamic between the lead three characters and mostly ignores the rest, and suffers more from Ensign Expendability. Like in the episode with the intelligent bomb, Kirk sends it off with two nameless ensigns, it vaporizes them, comes back, and he again sends it off with two nameless ensigns who it again vaporizes. He should have realized then that anyone but him he sends it off with will be vaporized, but he treated the second group like their lives didn't matter.
Another thing which TOS in my opinion suffers from, everyone they meet on a planet comes off as way too stupid and prone to manipulation. They need to be so Kirk can give them a speech and change their entire way of living.
TNG is plenty formulaic A story B story, Lots of end of episodes saves by technobabble. And aside from Picard, Data and Worf all the other ensemble cast was pretty bland. Still they were pretty likeable.
What perhaps sums up to me why I like TOS better than TNG (and maybe it works the other way for some people) is the episode in which they pick up the frozen humans from the 20th/21st century. This was I think the A story. The B story ws I think Picard had to deliver some 'portant' packages to some Starbase or another. In fact Picard was so busy and important that he couldn't be bothered talking to the unfrozen people, In fact he couldn't be bothered unfreezing them. After some apathetic persuasion Beverley unfroze them - still Picard was so uninterested he couldn't be bothered seeing them, talking to them, welcoming them to the 24th century. Then Riker proceeds to tell them how good they all are in the 24th century, how much better than they are than the people of the 21st century, how they're all vegetarians, non-meat eaters who aren't greedy like we all are in the 21st century. (Sigh - I've never forgiven Riker for this)
When Kirk picked up some guy from the 20th century, he talked to him, personally walked him around the ship, tried to help him. Didn't give him lecture on how much better Kirk and everyone else in the 23rd century was than him.
Yes Kirk goes around space and lectures various races but only when assigned there by Starfleet, to fix a problem or when they try to capture his ship. He never tells them what scum they are, just that peace and freedom are better.
The color palette is very much 1960s due to the rise of color television becoming standard in 1966, though a handful of shows had used color before then. I personally adore what the designers did with color and lighting, but few shows are going to be made today with that style. Even TNG didn't try to recreate the colorful look beyond the costuming. DS9 comes the closest - and is more refined, at least with sets. Many alien species have luxurious, detailed, and colorful costumes of the sort that look flat on standard-definition but would be eye-poppingly gorgeous given the larger gamut that Blu-Ray can store. The only other era that wanted to be as rich with costuming would be TOS, but they often had no budget.
TOS also had a limited amount of music compared to TNG-onward. Incidental music is best when used sparingly, to let the actors really steal the show, but it has its place. I'll admit, Ron Jones' contribution helped elevate a number of early episodes and he shouldn't have been fired. Shame he never got to do DS9...
TOS also dared to show epic battles on what amounted to a shoestring budget. The CGI folk who created new scenes stayed true to the stories rather than throwing in any old nonsense the way Star Wars and Red Dwarf had. The result is TOS-R feels even more luxurious, "The Enterprise Incident", "Space Seed", and "The Doomsday Machine" being some excellent examples of little nuances you just know the original makers would have wanted to do. Indeed, the only TOS episode that I stick to the original effects with is "The Immunity Syndrome" - the remastered edition did a great job but something about the oil/water and lavalamp effects feel just slightly more tangible, even of the remastered edition took into place the opaque nature of the fluid mass, which II also appreciate.
Plotwise, a lot of TOS holds up. some doesn't. But DS9 won me over with taking the same premise as TOS (a final frontier, mystery, character conflicts, human condition, etc) and expanding on it, even with a space station - though the Defiant was the perfect addition to the show since they then get the best of both worlds (snarf)...
I can imagine TOS doing a "Section 31" sort of arc. Not so for the others. TNG doesn't get that deep and the others might be out of place and ENT was too busy with its own continuity.
And, indeed, would Kirk do what Sisko did to get a traitor like Eddington? I'd be borderline but leaning toward "Yes". I can't fathom any other captain doing that, much less succeeding.
Sisko rules.
As much as I love TNG and Voyager, DS9 and TOS are tops and of those two DS9 ultimately wins as it does everything TOS did but took it on a bigger scale, without losing itself.
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I would love an HD treatment for DS9, and VOY too while we're at it. I think every Star Trek series deserves the high color, high definition treatment.
Aye. Blu-Ray sales might be slower but it's definitely future-proofing for streaming media, which - while not blu-ray - certainly often has the sharpness being near-perfect. Costs would still be recouped, that's a given.
My fear is, even with how well they're preserved, the films might still succumb to the vinegar effect in a couple of decades, especially if cheaper film stock were used. Which is why I';m thankful for even TNG-R as seasons 1 and 2 definitely didn't have the same quality stock season 3 onward had (less grain, especially for darker scenes) and I'd wager more sensitive stock would be quicker to start decomposing anyway...
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I'm wanting to get TOS, TNG, DS9 and VOY on blu-ray eventually. Streaming is nice, but having them all in physical format would be best.
There's only one Star Trek series you can apply the term "groundbreaking" to... that is the original Star Trek.
When you say Star Trek:TNG, DS9 and VOY, it doesn't feel right to me! They are good series I agree but there is only one Star Trek, and that's the one with Shatner, Nimoy and Kelley made in the sixties and in glorious colour!
JB
Star Trek was very liberating, and the women on the show were ladies, something the rest of the other series lacked with the exception of Troi. Uhura, was an elegant, strong representation for women in my view, I'm just not on the side of some who think beating up men, or acting like men is a sign of progressiveness for women.
Trust me, there's strength in being a nurturer and expressing emotion, Star Trek gave women a grand full of opportunities and anyone who actually watched and appreciated the series would see anything less.
Trust me, there's strength in being a nurturer and expressing emotion, Star Trek gave women a grand full of opportunities and anyone who actually watched and appreciated the series would see anything less.
I think that the one thing TOS fails miserably at is its treatment of women. When the actresses themselves wonder why, as trained astronauts, they only get to function as frightened waitresses, efficient receptionists, or decorative beauties, then the writers are missing a trick.
The progressiveness comes not from beating up men, but in variety and in equal representation across the board. It's fine to have nurturing characters but they should stand alongside male nurturing characters and female combatants. TOS had a crew that was one third female and yet how often did we see a landing party that was one third female (excluding occasions where the women were forcibly beamed down as playthings) and why did they not show a single female security guard or engineer in TOS?
But then we also had echoes of this in TNG when Gates and Marina, both trained in fencing, had to stand back and let the male actors, who were not trained in fencing, perform the heroics. Is Marina less a lady because she likes fencing?
I'm disappointed that TOS rowed so far back from the pilot that they failed to meet even their low standards but the sexism is so blatant that it has become part of the charm, especially when Kirk has to repeatedly shake some courage into his poor hysterical or frightened lady crew!
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That sums up the appeal of TOS for me. Don't get me wrong, I like TNG. It's my second favorite trek show but I wish they had done more with exploration. The Five Year Mission concept is a big draw for me.
This is one of the things that's pretty glaring for me. I think it's in the episode Arena where Uhura screams when Kirk is taken off the ship by the Metron. None of the males scream. There are other similar examples throughout the series.
Yes I agree. They were pushing out beyond explored space, where resources were scarce and assistance was limited. They certainly evoked more of a submarine feel. Enterprise D was too much like a pleasure cruiser and in Voyager they refused to put the characters through the ringer and it diluted the show's concept.
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Still the best by far, though not flawless , the sine qua non
Maybe that's one reason why the third season seems to be such an abberation compared to the previous two seasons. It's well known that GR turned his back on the show and old Fred Freiberger produced some of the worst TOS episodes ever.
I actually disagree wholeheartedly. Roddenberry had a great idea that was fleshed out and carried on by a massive, creative group of people over time.
Fontana
Justman
Coon
Black
Lucas
Friedberger
Meyer
Bennett
Nimoy
TNG arguably didn't get GOOD until Roddenberry relinquished his hold on it. The Trek films were infinitely better off without him.
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