What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?
- Thread starter Amasov
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It's from the third one.
I must say, a nice thing about “unpopular opinion” threads outside of Reddit is that they actually contain unpopular opinions.
I will say:
I will say:
- Most Star Trek series have always been bad to mediocre, and most Star Trek episodes are bad; we simply remember the good ones.
- Star Trek started and ended with not taking “canon” seriously; there are only three series which somewhat attempted to build a canon between them, and they discarded most that came before them, and what came after them discarded them again.
- Far Beyond the Stars was a boring, meaningless episode with no plot, no conclusion, and no interesting message.
- Star Trek has a ridiculous, eurocentric treatment of alien cultures
- Since T.N.G. onward, Star Trek has been filled with cheap nostalgia grabs that have no narrative point.
Now that's controversial stuff. You might have won this thread. 
Yeah, this is absolutely the correct thread for that post!
I love the first Austin Powers movie! Saw in the theater twice and watched it a bunch of times afterwards. I couldn't get enough of it. It worked as a parody of the Sean Connery and Roger Moore James Bond films and it worked as a '60s vs. '90s Culture Clash.
Then came the second Austin Powers they cranked everything up to an 11 and it lost something. It became a parody of a parody. I only saw it the one time in the theater and didn't watch the third.
I didn't hate the second film but once you lose me, I tune out just like that.
Then came the second Austin Powers they cranked everything up to an 11 and it lost something. It became a parody of a parody. I only saw it the one time in the theater and didn't watch the third.
I didn't hate the second film but once you lose me, I tune out just like that.
The third one is the best one.
Austin Powers movies are all fun. First one is the best though.
I mean, most people I think can agree hate-watching is a strange phenomenon but that doesn't mean there's never any reason to keep watching a show you aren't enjoying.
Others already mentioned the hope of a series improving to become something you really like, which is an experience I've had many times with both possible results (when the show actually does get better and when you, eventually, have to admit it isn't going to happen and give up).
But there can also be value and interest in the franchise even when you don't like a specific iteration of it. As part of getting back into Trek more I've gone back and rewatched all the old series (well, still working on DS9 but I only left if for last because it was the only one I'd already seen all the way through repeatedly). Prior to doing this I hadn't actually seen all of VOY or ENT and maybe not even TNG (wasn't really sure). I really disliked a lot of the TNG and VOY episodes I watched and in the end I found I still dislike ENT as a series quite a lot, but I don't regret giving them all a second chance. Because I did see at least some interesting things in all of them, even if a lot of times they were only interesting because of the things which add to the story of the franchise as a whole (like ENT's Vulcan/Andorian arc). I like the franchise overall enough for that to be worth watching, at least once.
Another one of my favorite franchises is the X-men and I'm doing basically the same thing with all the old X-men comics. They, too, vary wildly in quality. The 60s era in particular was painful to read sometimes (actually, most of the time). But it was still interesting to see the history of where the franchise started and where this character originated and how different that character was at the start, etc. I'll never read that era again, but I don't regret reading it, either. And reading through over fifty years worth of material that came after it, I've still only found one book that was so dire I genuinely couldn't bring myself to enjoy it at all and so gave up reading it (and that one was only just barely tangentially connected to the franchise, anyway, so that was also part of why I couldn't see past the quality).
Sometimes a franchise transcends the quality of an individual entry not just to the point of making up for the bad but to the point of making it worthwhile despite being bad. And that also doesn't mean that it stops being bad or that you don't still wish it was better. You just find the parts about it that you do enjoy to be significant enough to endure the rest.
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Great points, @Grendelsbayne
I'm not sure how controversial this is, but I don't really like Reg Barclay. His first episode was okay and I like his bit in First Contact but by the time we get to Voyager... Yeah. Really could do without him.
I'm not sure how controversial this is, but I don't really like Reg Barclay. His first episode was okay and I like his bit in First Contact but by the time we get to Voyager... Yeah. Really could do without him.
It's more people confusing "good" for "entertaining" than it is "they only remembering the good ones". As when most people declare a show or movie as "good" it's because they find it entertaining. Not realizing entertainment value and product quality are two separate things. Though for some the latter can influence the former.
For instance. You can watch the world's most shithouse low budget movie ever made and find thoroughly entertaining. You can watch the world's most well crafted high budget movie ever made and find it an insufferable slog.
Of course then you've got the little wrinkle that whether a piece of art is good or bad is a personal opinion and not a fact. You know the whole "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" thing.
What you're complaining about is continuity not canon.
You'll never have a TV show with a continuity that doesn't get changed at some point in its life. And you'll most certainly never have a franchise that spans several decades with multiple shows and movies with a single continuity either.
Later shows and movies will always contradict the older ones in one way or another. This is due to different production teams and influences from the time periods in which they are made in.
So, forgive me, because you definitely posted in the spirit of the thread...but if this is where you stand on the franchise, why waste your time on a message board that is for fans? This would be like me signing up on an MCU discussion board and trying to contribute to discussions with people who are passionate and have a love for a franchise that I don't care about.
I wouldn't do that in a million years. Life is too precious.
Don't knock cheap nostalgia grabs. A good chunk of human culture revolves around them. And they work.
Yep.
Everything seen on screen is canon.
Even the stuff that contradicts the other stuff.
My dear moderator...ESPECIALLY the stuff that contradicts the other stuff....
My controversial opinions:
TWOK would be middle to the lower end for me when ranking the films. It has its strengths but for example I prefer watching INS.
Sisko and DS9 are good but not the best Star Trek because they don't portray the positive future I want to see. Into the Pale Moonlight is a brilliant episode but also not Star Trek to me.
TWOK would be middle to the lower end for me when ranking the films. It has its strengths but for example I prefer watching INS.
Sisko and DS9 are good but not the best Star Trek because they don't portray the positive future I want to see. Into the Pale Moonlight is a brilliant episode but also not Star Trek to me.
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