No, that was following on from and replying to other posts. Controversial would be saying the episode is watchable. 
What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?
- Thread starter Amasov
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Hmmmm. Now I see it. Okay, thanks.
Yes, but it's not the only offender. Spock's Brain, Sub Rosa, Threshold, Night in Sickbay, These are the Voyages... all pretty appalling.
Gave Shades of Gray a pass because with the parameters that were set for the shoot, they weren't going to get a good show.
Of the ones you listed, my true hatred only goes to "THESE ARE THE VOYAGES...".
"THRESHOLD" at least had some good Tom character development and won VOYAGER an Emmy in makeup.
"A NIGHT IN SICKBAY" was at least trying something different, and it was a treat seeing so much of Phlox and his 'pets'.
"SPOCK'S BRAIN" has some good scenes, like the bridge where Sulu, Uhura, and Chekov are giving their opinions on where to go... great use of all of them.
"Sub Rosa"... there's no defense of that one, but I give McFadden credit for really trying to sell it.
"THRESHOLD" at least had some good Tom character development and won VOYAGER an Emmy in makeup.
"A NIGHT IN SICKBAY" was at least trying something different, and it was a treat seeing so much of Phlox and his 'pets'.
"SPOCK'S BRAIN" has some good scenes, like the bridge where Sulu, Uhura, and Chekov are giving their opinions on where to go... great use of all of them.
"Sub Rosa"... there's no defense of that one, but I give McFadden credit for really trying to sell it.
Plus "Spock's Brain(TOS)" had one of the only uses of the Enterprise bridge viewscreen as a dynamic information display with visible graphics and the only one that wasn't a postproduction bluescreen insert.
I can live with most of those episodes. Most of them have something to redeem them, in my eyes.
Spock's Brain - Extremely silly, yes, but it was meant to be. Campy sense of fun.
Sub Rosa - Ok, I really think this one is pretty bad and offensive to Crusher's previously established character as a strong, intelligent woman, but even in this one there are a few scenes I enjoyed. For example Granma sitting up in her coffin, I always saw that as a wink to cheap horror flicks.
Threshold- Shows some genuine character development of Tom, and, more importantly, was entertaining - more so than many standard, boring, middle of the road, formulaic eps where you have the feeling they are just ticking all the boxes and know exactly how it's going to end halfway in. Yes, it has plot holes the size of the DQ and an utterly ridiculous understanding of scientific concepts such as 'evolution' ... so what?
A Night in Sickbay: actually, I like the look into sickbay as Phlox goes about his daily routines. The only thing that's really silly about this ep (imho) is the stubborn intransigence of Archer, refusing to make any apologies at first.
These are the Voyages - in my eyes its main sin is being the series' finale. Had it been just a regular ep, I probably would have frown my eyebrows a bit about that one, but it wouldn't have been in my 'worst evah!' list.
In my eyes a far worse episode is Fury - deliberately heaping shit on a character that many loved (even though I know many also didn't) with a very weak plot resolution to boot (Oh! wait! I remember now! I don't hate you, I love you!).. That's one of the very few episodes in Trek that actually offends me, like most of Profit and Lace does.
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It's rare that I find any Trek episode so awful that I "hate" it.
"Plato's Stepchildren" is probably the closest thing to an episode I simply can't watch. There are 3-4 candidates in TNG that are really bad, and there's a couple episodes from the latest season of LD that I almost turned off mid-watch. I think the only time I've ever done that with a Trek episode was "Aquiel," although I may have just been in a bad mood that day. "Prophet and Lace" is definitely a "hard pass" for me in DS9.
"Plato's Stepchildren" is probably the closest thing to an episode I simply can't watch. There are 3-4 candidates in TNG that are really bad, and there's a couple episodes from the latest season of LD that I almost turned off mid-watch. I think the only time I've ever done that with a Trek episode was "Aquiel," although I may have just been in a bad mood that day. "Prophet and Lace" is definitely a "hard pass" for me in DS9.
I think this is a controversial opinion.
When Riker destroys the clone startups in "Up The Long Ladder", I not only completely agree with this decision, I don't consider it murder like I have read some people say.
When Riker destroys the clone startups in "Up The Long Ladder", I not only completely agree with this decision, I don't consider it murder like I have read some people say.
It was an abortion metaphor.
"And the Children Shall Lead" may be the only TOS episode that's an actual slug to get through and the closest to unwatchable for me. Even "The Mark of Gideon" which is thoroughly nonsensical when you think about it(a planet so dangerously overpopulated that citizens are crammed together outside public building windows yet has enough spare room for a 1:1 scale exact replica of a Federation starship?) and has lots of slow moments also has some genuinely creepy and memorable ones.
The Gorgan episode has the children's chant and Melvin Belli and that's it. And those aren't enough to carry the episode.
The Gorgan episode has the children's chant and Melvin Belli and that's it. And those aren't enough to carry the episode.
"And the Children Shall Lead" has a shocking redshirt death that ranks, um, somewhere on the list of shocking redshirt deaths. It's when the two redshirts are thought beamed down to the planet, but they are actually beamed into space. I don't know where it's going to rank exactly, but I always did find it genuinely shocking. So, kudos to that weak-ass episode at least for for that.
Full disclosure: for me it's going to be Yeoman Thompson earning the most shocking redshirt death on TOS, and she's not even technically wearing a red shirt.
Full disclosure: for me it's going to be Yeoman Thompson earning the most shocking redshirt death on TOS, and she's not even technically wearing a red shirt.
Discovery is not a prequel. I don't mean in the "It's a reboot!" sense. No. This is why...
A prequel would imply it leads into TOS. It doesn't. Say DSC runs for seven seasons (as an example). That's two seasons in the 23rd Century and five in the 32nd Century. That makes it:
A distant sequel, the main body of which takes place in the 32nd Century after everything else, with really just a prologue set in the 23rd Century.
It's similar to 2001: A Space Odyssey, where it starts off in Pre-Historic Times, but the main body of the film actually takes place in a 1968 version of 2001, and that's the time-period we associate with it.
A prequel would imply it leads into TOS. It doesn't. Say DSC runs for seven seasons (as an example). That's two seasons in the 23rd Century and five in the 32nd Century. That makes it:
A distant sequel, the main body of which takes place in the 32nd Century after everything else, with really just a prologue set in the 23rd Century.
It's similar to 2001: A Space Odyssey, where it starts off in Pre-Historic Times, but the main body of the film actually takes place in a 1968 version of 2001, and that's the time-period we associate with it.
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While I think that in general, killing your own clone is still murder, I think that the cloning method being used is bizarre. Instead of gestating an infant, it grows a full sized adult copy. So when that clone had grown to maturity, had Riker not killed it, it would have been effectively a newborn in an adult body: incapable of walking, speech, or self care. Managing an infant is tough enough when they DON'T weigh as much as you do.
i don't agree with what you said, but I'll fight to the death for you right to say it.
death of the innocents. whatever riker's problem with the people who took his dna and created the clones, the clones themselves committed no offense against riker. they were blameless.
This. It's rather convenient that the clones were odd-looking adult sized creatures. I don't think Riker's actions would have been tolerated by the viewers if he had vaporized two infants.
A Night in Sickbay might be the most over hated episode in all of ENT’s run. It’s not the best thing I’ve ever seen but it’s not the worst either. There are far worse episodes of the series.
your dead on about These Are the Voyages. If it had been a middle of the season episode without the idea the series was ending, Enterprise being decommissioned, Trip dying, etc...it would have just been another Trials and Tribbleations or Flashback. Just not as good as Trials or as bad as Flashback.
As a doctor, Pulaski would not have agreed to dematerializing the clones, unless they were not yet people. Ergo, they were not yet viable, they were not people, they were not murdered, and they were ethically disposed of.
That episode was still early enough in the series's arc that there was still an element of early Trek's tendency to force strange new worlds they encountered into Federation norms. TOS seemed to do this a lot, and one does wonder what the results were. One wonders if Vaal's followers could have survived on their own, or if the women in Spock's Brain could adjust to live as essentially cave people. And certainly the results of combining groups like the Bringloidi and the clone colony could be... interesting.
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