Was Yes'days Enterprise really GOOD or really COOL?

[ThankQ]

So, was Yesterday's Enterprise really so great that it is ranked highly in nearly every Top 10 list, or....

Was it just so fan-boy cool with its time travel, old ship, ex-dead crew and all that it has recieved marks which, upon a critical viewing of the episode, it fails to earn?

 

[Cornholio]

umm, it was cool to see the 1701-C, and it was cool to see Captain Garrett with that chunk of umm shrapnel in her head.

it was not cool to see Tasha again.

 

[WisTrekFan]

I think Yesterday's Enterprise was the first great TNG episode. It was the first episode that really made people sit up and take notice of the show.

 

[Kelso]

That episode was awesome.

 

[ThankQ]

"It was awsome" lends itself more to the "cool" than "good" side.

I'm not saying it was a bad episode....

I guess here's what I'm getting at. I don't know if the quality of the episode itself was nearly as grand as the idea. Maybe it did. But to paraphrase Harvey Keitel said, let's not start sucking this episodes dick just yet. I think there's a case to be made that it was a crap episode that was lifted by good acting and lighting.

But then again, maybe that's just the having-seen-150-episodes-of-Voyager coming out in me.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I thought it was cool and awesome and all that stuff. One of my favorite TNG episodes (indeed, one of my favorite eps of *any* Trek series). It would have made a great film.

 

[mythme]

as a plot device time travel is used too much in Trek, but by season 3 of TNG there was hardly any encounter yet. (I think "Time Squared" was the only one that came close). So at this stage it was still relatively fresh (TOS was 15 years past, and probably not too familiar to new Trek fans). So the time travel slant was something that was kinda nifty.

Now I've never thought that Crosby's acting was particularly good, but this episode provided the Yar character with some substance. It gave Tasha more hutzhpah than the entire first season did. So we got a glimpse of the Tasha Yar that should have been, and that was nifty.

For Trek history freaks and canon affecionados, seeing the Enterprise-C, her captain and learning a bit about why the Klingons changed their attitude about the Federation surely helped fill in the gap between TUC and TNG, so that was nifty

The epsiode also played Picard and company and in fact the whole Federation in a different light. Not only was the Enterprise a ship of war but the UFP was getting its butt kicked by the Klingons. TNG has the stigma of being a little too "perfect" and this was nearly like a visit to the mirror universe. Riker bites it. The Enterprise is burning. Picard makes a valiant last stand. That was nifty.

It added more mystery to the Guinan character and her odd perception of time. The episode also lent itself to future stories with Sela and the involvement of the Romulans with the House of Duras, so Yesterday's Enterprise had ramifications rather than being a stand-alone. So retroactively it was also nifty.

In summary, there are a lot of elements in Yesterday's Enterprise that coalesced together very nice....making it a very nifty episode.

 

[Mojochi]

I'd say yes, it was really good, & for the point at which it was made, it was rather special. The only thing keeping it from being incredibly good was Crosby's acting, imo

 

[F. King Daniel]

I love "Yesterday's Enterprise" now, but at the time it was a crushing disappointment.

Why? Young Me read in the TV guide something along the lines of "the old Enterprise and her crew appear from a time vortex". I thus spent the week running around a freaking out that the old Star Trek crew was at last going to meet the new. It was gonna be awesome. The stuff of dreams. What would Kirk say to Picard? Spock to Data? McCoy to everyone?
The day came, the vortex opened and...some bastard fake Enterprise plops out. Me and my family were not amused.

Damn misleading TV guide! "The old Enterprise"? Some random old Enterprise, more like!

Once I got over it and rewatched the episode later I really liked it for what it was.

 

[RegFan]

It was really bad. I hate Yar.

 

[RAMA]

I love "Yesterday's Enterprise" now, but at the time it was a crushing disappointment.

Why? Young Me read in the TV guide something along the lines of "the old Enterprise and her crew appear from a time vortex". I thus spent the week running around a freaking out that the old Star Trek crew was at last going to meet the new. It was gonna be awesome. The stuff of dreams. What would Kirk say to Picard? Spock to Data? McCoy to everyone?
The day came, the vortex opened and...some bastard fake Enterprise plops out. Me and my family were not amused.

Damn misleading TV guide! "The old Enterprise"? Some random old Enterprise, more like!

Once I got over it and rewatched the episode later I really liked it for what it was.

I love the Ent-C..to this day its my favorite Enterprise.

I was never a fan of Crosby but dammit she wasn't bad at all in this episode...that really shows you how good it was...

RAMA

 

[Kelso]

"It was awsome" lends itself more to the "cool" than "good" side.

Those terms aren't mutually exclusive.

And the episode was awesome, so I don't see the problem.

 

[Cornholio]

Now I've never thought that Crosby's acting was particularly good

you're umm, being too kind and stuff.

The only thing keeping it from being incredibly good was Crosby's acting, imo

yeah, we don't even have a full page of posts yet, and there's already 3 of us pointin' out how bad she was.

can't imagine how awful she woulda been as Troi.

I was never a fan of Crosby but dammit she wasn't bad at all in this episode...that really shows you how good it was...

the way she delivers that line where she identifies the ship that comes through the temporal vortex as "NCC-1701-C" is absolutely pathetic. she puts all the emphasis on the 'C'. it's as if they run into other ships designated 'NCC-1701-something' all the time.

IMNSHO, she's a pathetic actress and should be umm, banished from appearing in front of a camera for the rest of eternity. if she didn't ruin just about every episode she appeared in for you, then I'm glad you were able to enjoy 'em. I sure didn't.

I love the Ent-C

yeah, that ship was pretty cool, it's one of my favorites too.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Re: QUINTO'S SPOCK SHOULD BE CONSTANTLY SHOUTING!!!

I never really noticed Denise Crosby's acting being any worse than most of the season one cast.
Troi's 'emoting' in "Farpoint" pretty much blinded me to anyone else's acting crappyness. That and Beverlump's season-long "I'm an inanimate lump of wood" acting technique.

 

[Mysterion]

Cool and good, IMO. Too bad they had to taint it later on with the whole "Sela" thing. Ack.

 

[Mark Antony]

It was really good. It was an interesting story about duty as Yar and the Enterprise C go to their deaths.

 

[Holdfast]

Cool episode. Esp. Picard's awesome "that'll be the day" line and leap over the bridge furniture.

Yeah, it's a bit fanboyish, but not in a bad way. For me, the coolness outweighs the cringe and so it's a good episode too.

 

[sonak]

You know what I don't get about this episode? How Is the war going badly for the UFP? Ever since star trek VI, the Klingons were supposed to be the relatively weaker power compared to the Federation. And yet,twenty-some years before TNG, the Federation is getting it's butt kicked by the Klingon empire. And there's no explanation as to what changed to either make the Federation weaker or the Klingons stronger.

 

[USS Excelsior]

Probably because TUC hadn't been written yet.

 

[Anwar]

Exactly, at the time Yesterday's Enterprise was written the writers were under the assumption that the Klingons were still equal to the Feds in military power and peace was simply the result of diplomacy and sacrifice, not Space Chernobyl.