The Eternal Question: TNG or DS9

DS9 is a loud party with lots of interesting, complicated, and ocassionally annoying characters who never bore you. TNG is a simple, serene, and occasionally dull day trip with some admirable acquaintances. Some times you're in the mood for one, sometimes the other.

 

I love both, but I do love one more than the other. It's like having two kids, I'd imagine. Just 'cause I love one more doesn't mean I don't love the other. ...And don't give me that "I love my children equally" stuff. We all know the truth.

 

I think any show that can do "Little Green Men" and "Far Beyond the Stars" was easily as creative as TNG at its best.

 

DS9 for me. I just think it's a better show, largely due to the writing.

 

DS9 could certainly be creative. As of yet, though, I haven't seen it equal TNG at its best. DS9 has not given me a Yesterday's Enterprise, Best of Both Worlds, Cause and Effect, Q Who or All Good Things.

 

I think DS9's writing was far more consistent, even from the very beginning. TNG, in its first two seasons, made so many elementary errors in storytelling it almost beggars belief that professionals could be so bad. But when it got up and running, it ceased making those mistakes, and I think its best episodes are better than anything I've seen through four seasons of DS9.

 

Not even "Far Beyond the Stars" or "Duet" or "In the Pale Moonlight"?

 

The Inner Light vs The Visitor?

 

The Inner Light Vs. Hard Time. Both are flipsides of the same premise.

 

Vs. jabbing myself in the eye with a rusty spoon? Never was a fan of either.

 

Well, to be fair, a lot of them were being rewritten by Gene Roddenberry's lawyer Leonard Maizlish. So we weren't always seeing professional writing.

 

Hard Time is not a contender in this competition

You were born without a soul

 

Couldn’t be. It is actually interesting.

 

I'm still working my way through season five, so the first and last I haven't yet seen. I think Duet comes about as close as any episode I have seen so far, along with Improbable Cause and maybe one or two others. But I would put Duet below Q Who, Yesterday's Enterprise, Cause and Effect and top episodes like those.

 

Those are both good but overrated episodes, in my opinion. But I would go with The Inner Light as the better of the two.

 

Well, anything can be overrated if it becomes too highly or frequently praised, even whole shows

However, in this case, Inner Light won a Hugo award and The Visitor was nominated for one, so there's that.

 

So did NK Jemisin.

 

I always go back and forth.

If I want to do a re-watch, then I'll re-watch DS9. But with TNG, it is kind of my comfort, go to TV show for when I'm feeling down and there are so many single episodes I can watch that will cheer me up. DS9? I think the overall quality of the show is better, but TNG has so many episodes that are just strong, standalone episodes that I adore. But I haven't done a full re-watch of TNG in years, I just put an episode on and watch. With DS9?: I don't really do that, I re-watch it entirely.

 

That makes sense. Rewatching TNG means slogging through some bad crap. But their best episodes were brilliant.