To those around when TNG first aired: what did you think of it?
- Thread starter MikHutch
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I loved it right out of the gate. I was in 7th grade when TNG premiered and I watched “Encounter at Farpoint” opening night.
I thought on the whole it could be boring, preachy and pretentious at times, but for the most part it was great fun and I never missed an episode.
I thought on the whole it could be boring, preachy and pretentious at times, but for the most part it was great fun and I never missed an episode.
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TNG premiered at the beginning of my sophomore year of high school. I believe I taped the first episode on my VCR and watched it a day or two later, because I remember walking into school the day after it premiered and my friend & fellow Trek fan Travis greeted me with "I don't see no points on your ears, boy." Not having seen "Encounter at Farpoint" yet, I had no idea what he was referencing. 
I liked the show, but not as much as TOS. Data was my favorite character right from the start, and I developed an instant crush on Tasha Yar (I was 15, after all). I remember a two-page article in a People magazine issue previewing the new fall shows of 1987 and I wondered how Jonathan Frakes' "Number One" character was related to the character Majel Barrett played in "The Cage." (Not at all, as it turned out.)
I watched it every week, although in retrospect, it was a pretty hit & miss show. But I enjoyed "Datalore," "The Big Goodbye," "The Measure of a Man" and other episodes. It got consistently better in the third season when the writers room stabilized. I recorded my favorites when they reran and rewatched those episodes a lot. I don't think I missed an episode until the spring of 1992 when I spent a semester abroad in the UK, so I missed the last half of S5. (England was a couple of seasons behind the US, as I recall.)
And I remember watching the last episode of TNG with my college roommate about a week after we graduated college. By the time Star Trek: Generations premiered, I was living in New Jersey and going to art school.
These days, I still have a nostalgic affection for the show, but I tend to only rewatch my favorites. The rest are too slow & talky for me to enjoy very much. All those damn conference room scenes...
I liked the show, but not as much as TOS. Data was my favorite character right from the start, and I developed an instant crush on Tasha Yar (I was 15, after all). I remember a two-page article in a People magazine issue previewing the new fall shows of 1987 and I wondered how Jonathan Frakes' "Number One" character was related to the character Majel Barrett played in "The Cage." (Not at all, as it turned out.)
I watched it every week, although in retrospect, it was a pretty hit & miss show. But I enjoyed "Datalore," "The Big Goodbye," "The Measure of a Man" and other episodes. It got consistently better in the third season when the writers room stabilized. I recorded my favorites when they reran and rewatched those episodes a lot. I don't think I missed an episode until the spring of 1992 when I spent a semester abroad in the UK, so I missed the last half of S5. (England was a couple of seasons behind the US, as I recall.)
And I remember watching the last episode of TNG with my college roommate about a week after we graduated college. By the time Star Trek: Generations premiered, I was living in New Jersey and going to art school.
These days, I still have a nostalgic affection for the show, but I tend to only rewatch my favorites. The rest are too slow & talky for me to enjoy very much. All those damn conference room scenes...
That's the best way to make it, which ensures high initial ratings. While streaming exists and renders popularity harder to discern (though there are some ways to mitigate that), those overnight/initial figures can still say a bit no matter how long you count the viewing tallies.
TNG premiered at the beginning of my sophomore year of high school. I believe I taped the first episode on my VCR and watched it a day or two later, because I remember walking into school the day after it premiered and my friend & fellow Trek fan Travis greeted me with "I don't see no points on your ears, boy." Not having seen "Encounter at Farpoint" yet, I had no idea what he was referencing.
LOL, that must have been a fun conversation!
Don't blame ya re: Tasha.
I had my ups and downs, but nothing took me fully off the show, which is a positive. But, yeah, TOS was still my go-to.
TNG probably wouldn't last if made today. It was in a unique position given the sheer popularity of the franchise back then, combined with little easily-found competition, or how having missteps wouldn't mean insta-cancel as a result.
Season 3 definitely polished what made season 2 stand out and is still my favorite with its high points, even if season 4 - despite maintaining the iconic feel - didn't have as many interesting episodes.
I remember watching the finale with a friend at the time. Enjoyed nitpicking the plot details but still appreciated the piece as a whole and what it really got right and hit out of the park with.
I saw it 2.5 times in the theater. Asked everyone for spoilers before seeing it and still couldn't believe it. But at summer camp, kids were saying spoilers for what TVH would do and it didn't faze me either at the time. Then come the subsequent viewings...
^^this
I also find it easy to forget (been there, done that, apart from my ex) that - on initial viewing - the different episode formats (serious, light, dark, comedic, in between, afterschool special for the kids, NC17, etc, etc, that season 1 had helped demonstrate a variety all while figuring itself out to see what worked.) I find it too easy to go back to "the good ones" later on while underappreciating how, at the time, a weekly fun respite (which still took itself seriously enough) were sometimes needed. Indeed, some of season 1, which I didn't care for at the time, are now enjoyable - in other ways or in ways I couldn't have appreciated back then. Some episodes are still weak, but that's inevitable regardless of season.
The conversation didn't really continue much beyond that, as I recall. He said a thing I didn't understand, I said "Huh?", he explained he was referencing the first episode of TNG, I said I hadn't watched it yet, he said something like "It was good, you should watch it," and that was that.
I'm sure we talked about it later on after I watched the episode.
Yeah, same here.
I certainly wouldn't have as much patience with the early part of TNG today. In today's media landscape, if a show doesn't grab me right off the bat, I'm on to the next thing pretty quickly.
I like S4 a lot. I think it did a very good job of maintaining the momentum of S3. And it's got some episodes I really like, like "The Best of Both Worlds Pt. 2," "Family," "Brothers," "Remember Me," "Reunion," "Future Imperfect," "Final Mission," "Data's Day," "The Wounded," "Qpid," "Half a Life," and "In Theory." That's a pretty good season of television overall.
I was kinda young when TNG came out. I was obsessed with TOS and the films around 8 years old onwards.
I do remember thinking you can’t replace Kirk and crew. Have memories of watching it when it was on the bbc or somebody recorded them of satellite tv and given the tapes to watch for our family. But I warmed to it very quickly. It became an evening tradition to watch TNG with my parents. As a teenager it became a firm favourite especially when the films started rolling out.
I do remember thinking you can’t replace Kirk and crew. Have memories of watching it when it was on the bbc or somebody recorded them of satellite tv and given the tapes to watch for our family. But I warmed to it very quickly. It became an evening tradition to watch TNG with my parents. As a teenager it became a firm favourite especially when the films started rolling out.
I was a mere youth and was hooked just because it was Star Trek. I persuaded my family to get cable once BBC stopped showing it then I started renting videos on Blockbusters (R.I.P) to catch up. In those days the UK was months behind the US when it came to watching the same TV show.
I recognised Riker from North and South
I recognised Riker from North and South
A remade "Turnabout Intruder" with PS chewing the scenery like Shat might have put me off TNG...
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