What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

[TREK_GOD_1]

Actually, the rest is 95% actor ego demanding these action hero aspects and 5% the writing having to bend over backwards to accommodate it.

This.

Picard as a character throughout TNG and the NG movies was not presented as a man approaching or going through a mid-life crisis; he was quite comfortable being that dry, tea-drinker sitting on the Prime Directive / Finger Pointing Throne, so for any who viewed "Die Hard Picard" as an aberration of his character, they were correct, as it was a forced, ego-driven decision having nothing to do with anything established in TNG.

 

[1001001]

Yeah, Dune Buggy Picard was ridiculous.

 

[Orphalesion]

This.

Picard as a character throughout TNG and the NG movies was not presented as a man approaching or going through a mid-life crisis; he was quite comfortable being that dry, tea-drinker sitting on the Prime Directive / Finger Pointing Throne, so for any who viewed "Die Hard Picard" as an aberration of his character, they were correct, as it was a forced, ego-driven decision having nothing to do with anything established in TNG.

I agree, and it really sucks, because I genuinely like Picard as he was portrayed in TNG (well, after season 1, anyway)
He was Jaques Cousteau in space. and I loved it.

 

[cooleddie74]

Dune Buggy Picard just sucked. I get it, 74-year-old Captain feeling the passage of time after events like the Ba'ku crisis and watching Riker and Troi get married and start their new life together but still, the Argo is one of the dumbest sequences in a Trek film that on a GOOD day ranks #12 out of thirteen movies and usually dead last.

 

[Richard S. Ta]

DeForest Kelley routinely acts both Shatner and Nimoy off of the screen. He is superlative and deserved his name in the credits far earlier than the beginning of Season 2.

 

[cooleddie74]

DeForest Kelley routinely acts both Shatner and Nimoy off of the screen. He is superlative and deserved his name in the credits far earlier than the beginning of Season 2.

His reaction to reliving his elderly father's death in TFF is a better performance than any other in that film save Laurence Luckinbill's, and may even top that.

 

[Richard S. Ta]

His reaction to reliving his elderly father's death in TFF is a better performance than any other in that film save Laurence Luckinbill's, and may even top that.

It was exactly you posting that clip elsewhere that made me rush over here.

 

[Macintosh]

This.

Picard as a character throughout TNG and the NG movies was not presented as a man approaching or going through a mid-life crisis; he was quite comfortable being that dry, tea-drinker sitting on the Prime Directive / Finger Pointing Throne, so for any who viewed "Die Hard Picard" as an aberration of his character, they were correct, as it was a forced, ego-driven decision having nothing to do with anything established in TNG.

That would be the fencing, shooting, raquet-balling, horse-riding, marathon-running, special-ops-and-getting-captured-by-Cardassians-ing, Die Hard-on-a-starshipping Picard established in TNG who is "suddenly out of character" when he does these things in the movies

 

[Weyoun 251]

That would be the fencing, shooting, raquet-balling, horse-riding, marathon-running, special-ops-and-getting-captured-by-Cardassians-ing, Die Hard-on-a-starshipping Picard established in TNG who is "suddenly out of character" when he does these things in the movies

Plus part time Indiana Jones cos-player and rogue lothario when it suits him

 

[Elias Vaughn]

Profit and Lace was solidly watchable.

 

[CorporalClegg]

DeForest Kelley routinely acts both Shatner and Nimoy off of the screen. He is superlative and deserved his name in the credits far earlier than the beginning of Season 2.

I'm not entirely sure that's controversial.

 

[Farscape One]

Profit and Lace was solidly watchable.

My wife says this, too. But her favorite characters are Quark and Garak, so that may factor in.

 

[Lord Garth]

Scraping the bottom of the barrel here, but I don't know where else to put this:

TOS Font on a TNG+ Era show will never NOT look weird to me. Just not what I associate with the 24th or 25th Century.

Disco gets away with it, in my eyes, as a nod to when it originally took place.

 

[Citiprime]

Here's what may be a controversial opinion/idea for a Star Trek series: Mix elements of Star Trek + Final Space + Farscape.

Premise: Similar to the opening on Voyager, a Federation starship encounters a space weirdness that throws it somewhere, where and even when is left a mystery. During the emergency, all hell breaks loose, most of the command crew is killed, and what's left opts to attempt escape on shuttles and pods in the middle of the event. The main character of the series, who is a junior officer, is left behind on the ship ... alone.

He awakes to a damaged ship where the computer has been damaged to the point that star charts and the ability to compute the ship's location have been lost. So, unlike Voyager, he has no idea which direction to even go towards home. It's also implied that whatever weirdness caused the event may have affected time, since the ship's computer shows signs of operating for a very long time even though the main character doesn't seem to have aged much, and the computer may have spent gods knows how long attempting to repair the damage to the ship, and in doing so it may be somewhat sentient.

The region of space the ship has ended up in has all new types of weirdness, but also an authoritarian government that all the cultures they initially encounter fears. Over the course of the season, the main cast is a rag-tag group of characters that come together to become the new crew of the ship episode-by-episode, with the junior officer that was left behind slowly emerging as worthy of being this lost ship's captain in how he brings his collected crew together and responds to the various crises. The Federation starship may even slowly get refitted with new tech along the way and be somewhat altered as things go along. And little-by-little, the ship spreads Federation values among the cultures it encounters, possibly planting the seeds for a new Federation in whatever part of the universe it ended up in.

Eventually, at the end of the first season, the ship's journey bothers the wrong people and brings it into conflict with the empire that claims this particular area of space. The twist comes when we find out the empire was founded by the survivors who left him behind (i.e., because of the time weirdness of the anomaly, they showed up in this area of space before he did). Also, this new empire is a blend of the empires we've already seen, with elements of the Klingons, Romulans, Cardassians, Dominion etc., that have been carried over. Instead of using Federation tech to explore and build connections like the main character, things get twisted and they decide to use their resources for control. We also find out that whatever caused the original anomaly may be a Q-level entity and may be directing the "evil" Starfleet survivors in their actions of establishing control through their empire.

And that entity may be the only source of knowing where home is and how to get home.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Wow, that's a neat idea... https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/ship-and-crew-backstories-for-shows.313972/

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

DeForest Kelley routinely acts both Shatner and Nimoy off of the screen. He is superlative and deserved his name in the credits far earlier than the beginning of Season 2.

Kelley was a strong performer, but I would not say he "routinely" acts Shatner & Nimoy off of the screen. Each served theor role, and in Shatner's case, he never ran out of great performances to make Kirk the icon that he remains today.

His reaction to reliving his elderly father's death in TFF is a better performance than any other in that film save Laurence Luckinbill's, and may even top that.

Well, Spock being half Vulcan was going to prevent him from delivering a bigger, dramatic reaction to his "pain memory", while Kirk flat out refused to have his personal life held up by a manipulator's puppet strings, so Shatner's performance was--by necessity--subdued compared to the others, with the exception of his growling "I need my pain" moment.

 

[KamenRiderBlade]

TOS Font on a TNG+ Era show will never NOT look weird to me. Just not what I associate with the 24th or 25th Century.

IMO, each Era / Century of Trek should get it's own Font.

 

[Guy Gardener]

IMO, each Era / Century of Trek should get it's own Font.

Don't forget about gods.

Time ballers don't want to make a power move when they are totally outgunned.

They only get away with making changes that are approved by those that can object and wind it back.

 

[KamenRiderBlade]

Don't forget about gods.

Time ballers don't want to make a power move when they are totally outgunned.

They only get away with making changes that are approved by those that can object and wind it back.

If you're a God-Like-Entity, you should have your own freaking entrance theme music and special intro.
At that point, you're as big of a Rock Star / Pro Wrestling Star and deserve your own special entrance video package + pyro or special effects

 

[Tallguy]

Kelley was a strong performer, but I would not say he "routinely" acts Shatner & Nimoy off of the screen. Each served theor role, and in Shatner's case, he never ran out of great performances to make Kirk the icon that he remains today.

We all love Kelley, but I don't think he ever acted anyone off the screen.

Shatner is far better than he is ever given credit for. Possibly a silly statement about an Emmy award winning actor? Better as KIRK than he is ever given credit for. To be fair, he's also just about fearless so he has some performances that come off as over the top or silly. But something that never gets said about Shatner's Kirk is his ability to underplay.

Also, you see all of these characters (including Spock) being "grown into". Shatner was James Whatever Kirk right out of the box in frame one.

But Nimoy... Nimoy's TOS Spock is a recipe that has never been replicated, not even by Nimoy. I think his most interesting performance outside of TOS was The Motion Picture, followed by "Serene Spock" in The Wrath of Khan. After that he started picking up a paycheck. OK, that's very derogatory. He wasn't as nuanced about his role.

I was on a panel with Walter Koenig (sorry, can't help myself) where he said (paraphrase) "Anyone could have played any of our roles on that show except for Leonard Nimoy playing Spock." I think that's stunningly true. Koenig takes self-depreciation to a mania but this is insight.

Well, Spock being half Vulcan was going to prevent him from delivering a bigger, dramatic reaction to his "pain memory", while Kirk flat out refused to have his personal life held up by a manipulator's puppet strings, so Shatner's performance was--by necessity--subdued compared to the others, with the exception of his growling "I need my pain" moment.

Now I'm trying to think of what my favorite McCoy moment is. Surely this is one, but that's the easy answer. His monologue to Spock in TSFS is also great.

Nimoy had kind of lost what Spock was about, I think. It was kind of an outgrowth of The Voyage Home. It was more Data than Spock. I'm not saying Data had anything to do with his performance but it became more robotic than logical. It had an "innocence" (or ignorance?) about it. Which was never Spock.

I can't say with any authority, but there are parts of Shat's performance in TFF, particularly the comedic bits with Nimoy and Kelley, that feel very improvised. Maybe someone can point me to an example of Shatner doing improv that is great, but these moments are not great. But when he's being serious, and dare I say "on script" he's as good in TFF as anywhere else.

TOS Font on a TNG+ Era show will never NOT look weird to me. Just not what I associate with the 24th or 25th Century.

Are you talking about title fonts or in world fonts? Examples? Deep Space Nine?

Funny that the TNG font went the same way as the Enterprise D bridge: Never heard from again.

I have a promo pin from 1987 of Star Trek: The Next Generation in the TOS font. It was pretty cool, actually.