Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generations?

[ice]

1991...what a year. The announcement that Spock would appear in TNG sent fans of Trek absolutely wild. "It's passing the torch" was the oft-repeated phrase; from TOS to TNG. Next Gen would now BE Star Trek.

Then STVI came out. "It's passing the torch!" cried the makers. With Kirk's log entry, peace with the Klingons, and Michael Dorn as Col. Worf. TNG, now the old series was laid to rest, would BE Star Trek.

1994: TNG hits the movies. But the makers are unsure if the audience would accept that crew on the silver screen. Oh, what to do? "Kill Kirk," they smirk. "Perfect! With a cameo from the old actors [those who bothered taking part for the $$] "we're passing the torch!"

...and we all know how that went.

Arguably that movie's biggest hamstring was the creators OBSESSION with "Passing the torch", not once but THREE TIMES. It shows their lack of confidence in TNG itself. It gives us the "Kirk must die!" and the hokey time travel concept desperately searching for a plot to fit around them. I don't think ST:G ever really had a chance, with the makers already running out of juice after season 6 of TNG. The obsession with past killed it.

Agree, or not?

 

[sonak]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

100% agree.


Star Trek VI was a fine torch-passing film, yet they just didn't have the confidence in TNG to let their be a stand-alone movie with the new crew the first time out.


As a result, we get a movie that has a random mix of TOS characters, and a movie that's mostly but not entirely TNG, etc.



This hurt in terms of the story being hamstrung by what it needed to be to bring the two crews together and by having Kirk die.




All this said, it may seem I'm bashing the movie, but I think all things considered it's a solid effort, but could've been a lot more as a stand-alone with a story that wasn't just an excuse to get Kirk and Picard together.

 

[Captain Worf]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

I agree. The writers never seemed to be able to do really good cross-over stories. I always thought Spock deserved a better TNG episode than "Unification", and I would add that "Birthright" was a complete waste of DS9.

I did think Moore and Braga's commentary track on Generations was somewhat interesting. They said part of the problem with the film was the fact that so many requirements were set by Berman and the studio. They were told that it had to be a time travel story involving the death of Kirk and the destruction of the ENT-D. One could say that art thrives on restrictions, but that was definitely not the case here.

 

[plynch]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Plus it has a convoluted story that I STILL don't think I get.

 

[BDJ]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Guinan told Picard he could leave the Nexus and go anywhere, anytime he wanted.

My whole problem was why, why, WHY did Picard insist on bringing Kirk out of the energy ribbon right smack into the absolutely worst time in the past. Right when his hiney was in a mess with Dr. Soran.

Why not bring Kirk back, say, when the Enterprise was first attacked by Dr. Soran on the space station. OR even bring Kirk back when they were getting ready to engage the Duras sisters' BoP?

Even if he had brought Kirk back to the Big E while it was in orbit and let Kirk help engage the BoP from the bridge of Enteprise D!

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Kirk kicking Soran's hiney but .....

Jus' Sayin'

 

[Bishop76]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Why bring Kirk back at all? Maybe Kirk wanted to return to his own time. Why wouldn't Picard just return to the time he first met Soran in Ten Forward?

The Nexus is the most intensely stupid thing in a movie, ever.

 

[BlobVanDam]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Generations would have been a much better movie without the original cast. It would still have the plotholes, but it might have been a good enough movie to overlook the problems. There were definitely redeeming factors to Generations, so I think it could have been solid.

 

[heavylids]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Despite the plotholes, I still really like Generations. If you try hard enough, you can deconstruct anything. Especially in the Star Trek universe.

 

[sonak]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Guinan told Picard he could leave the Nexus and go anywhere, anytime he wanted.

My whole problem was why, why, WHY did Picard insist on bringing Kirk out of the energy ribbon right smack into the absolutely worst time in the past. Right when his hiney was in a mess with Dr. Soran.

Why not bring Kirk back, say, when the Enterprise was first attacked by Dr. Soran on the space station. OR even bring Kirk back when they were getting ready to engage the Duras sisters' BoP?

Even if he had brought Kirk back to the Big E while it was in orbit and let Kirk help engage the BoP from the bridge of Enteprise D!

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Kirk kicking Soran's hiney but .....

Jus' Sayin'

they created this silliness themselves by having the line aboit how Picard could go "anywhere, anytime," which made the nexus a magical plot device.


All they had to do was say that Picard could ONLY go back to Veridian III at a certain time because that's a place the nexus had already been through, and they could've avoided the absurdity of having Picard come back at such a stupid point.

 

[StalwartUK]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Yes, Generations was overburdened by having to accomodate Kirk and the 23rd century setting as well as the 24th.

As others have said Star Trek VI was a fine ending for the TOS crew. TNG's first film should have been 100% TNG. Besides, they were passing the torch as soon as TNG's pilot episode (which features a cameo by Leonard McCoy).

 

[C.E. Evans]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

When your main objectives are killing off Kirk, Kirk meeting Picard, and destroying the Enterprise-D--and not exactly in that order--you might be in trouble from the get-go...

 

[Stardate]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Yeah, i agree. It was a mistake having Kirk and others from TOS in this movie. If they really didn't trust TNG carrying a motion picture they should have casted a bigger star then Mcdowell to play the villain. Experienced movie director with a backbone would have helped and maybe little more budget then $35 million so they could have afford new uniforms. Also I had no problem with destruction of the ENT-D because we got to see beautiful ENT-E in the next movie..


ps, i was reading on wiki that 2 different scripts were written, one by Maurice Hurley but it was rejected. Has anyone read Hurley script?

 

[Dukhat]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

ps, i was reading on wiki that 2 different scripts were written, one by Maurice Hurley but it was rejected. Has anyone read Hurley script?

IIRC, it had Kirk only as a holodeck recreation which Picard would converse with throughout the movie for some oddball reason. I totally don't think that would have worked as a feature film (but an episode of TNG, absolutely...but they already did that with Geordi and Leah Brahms...oh, and TATV ).

 

[BDJ]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

I think it would've been so much better if Kirk had been on the bridge of E-D during the Klingon space battle. Who else has more experience fighting Klingons than him?
It would've been sweet to see Kirk's reaction to Worf on the bridge and him collaborating with Worf on the Duras' demise! Then if they had to kill him off, he could've died in the crash, doing what he's always done....saving the galaxy and saving the Enterprise. (well, part of it anyway).

Maybe shoving Deanna out of the way to take the nav com over to land the saucer section and then he gets taken out in the full brunt of the crash. Or something like that. That could've been cool.

 

[sonak]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

what, you mean like have Kirk there on the Ent-D with no time travel in the script?

You realize Kirk would've been like Admiral McCoy in EAF, only slightly OLDER.

They didn't want a very old Kirk who could do little but give sage advice, they wanted a Kirk young enough for some action, hence the nexus plot device.

 

[RAMA]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

The Nexus was a misfire in my opinion. The tried to cram the story with Klingons, mad scientists, Kirk, just way too much stuff...and a lot of it made no sense.

RAMA

 

[Anji]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

You can pass the torch but the relay has to make sense. This story made no sense regardless of who was in it.

 

[Sparky]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Guinan told Picard he could leave the Nexus and go anywhere, anytime he wanted.

My whole problem was why, why, WHY did Picard insist on bringing Kirk out of the energy ribbon right smack into the absolutely worst time in the past. Right when his hiney was in a mess with Dr. Soran.

Why not bring Kirk back, say, when the Enterprise was first attacked by Dr. Soran on the space station. OR even bring Kirk back when they were getting ready to engage the Duras sisters' BoP?

Even if he had brought Kirk back to the Big E while it was in orbit and let Kirk help engage the BoP from the bridge of Enteprise D!

Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Kirk kicking Soran's hiney but .....

Jus' Sayin'

they created this silliness themselves by having the line aboit how Picard could go "anywhere, anytime," which made the nexus a magical plot device.


All they had to do was say that Picard could ONLY go back to Veridian III at a certain time because that's a place the nexus had already been through, and they could've avoided the absurdity of having Picard come back at such a stupid point.

Exactly! A small dialogue change like that would have made the movie a bit less stupid.

One thing that always bugged me since my very first viewing. What was Soran's fate? I assume that when Veridian III was destroyed that he entered the nexus just like Picard did. Is there still a part of him in the Nexus? Did he actually get his wish, even though he was killed?

 

[sonak]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

He entered the nexus along with Picard the first time through.

After Picard came back in time with Kirk, Soren is killed when that platform with the missile explodes.


You'd think there's a "Soren-echo" in the nexus, because he'd been there twice at that point, back in the past around the Enterprise-B's launch, then again with Picard on the planet.



the nexus echo concept was weird anyway. The actual person leaving the nexus seems to have no recollection of leaving an echo behind.


Are these nexus echoes self-aware individuals who can manipulate the nexus fantasies or what?

 

[STR]

Re: Was the obsession with "Passing the torch" what scuttled Generatio

Experienced movie director with a backbone would have helped

There was nothing wrong with the direction of this movie. The directing and the acting are the highlights of this film, as both director and cast did their best to polish the turd of a script. Sure, it could have been grander and more cinematic, but paving over the sinkhole sized gaps in plot takes a lot of effort.

The issue with GEN is writing and production. Period.