What was the plan with Diana Muldaur?

[AntonyF]

Thank you!! Good grief that moment in Generations drives me nuts. Yes, it was funny. And they had just dumped Worf in the water moments before. Data wasn't in the wrong there; Crusher was.

Agreed it was very funny. And in some ways shows Data did get humour.

The reason felt very out of character from what I knew of the TNG crew, but I guess they needed to contrive a reason for him to put the chip in his head.

 

[tim0122]

Agreed it was very funny. And in some ways shows Data did get humour.

The reason felt very out of character from what I knew of the TNG crew, but I guess they needed to contrive a reason for him to put the chip in his head.

Even then, they could have had him push her in, have her and others find it funny, but him not being able to enjoy it with them, and thus he decides to finally put the chip in. But, yeah, I kind of get why she'd be annoyed at him, but even so, for him (and probably the audience) they needed to explain why it wasn't funny even though he did exactly what she advised (doing something unexpected and living in the moment).

 

[Mojochi]

Even then, they could have had him push her in, have her and others find it funny, but him not being able to enjoy it with them, and thus he decides to finally put the chip in. But, yeah, I kind of get why she'd be annoyed at him, but even so, for him (and probably the audience) they needed to explain why it wasn't funny even though he did exactly what she advised (doing something unexpected and living in the moment).

Nothing was ever said about her ability to swim. If she'd started drowning because she couldn't swim, & they had to jump in & pull her out, the scene would've gotten sketchier pretty quick & Data would face a legit cause to figure he needed to be better at reading the room.

As it was, his stunt was also played for laughs, even if it was the audience's & not the characters'.

 

[LunaMaiden]

From my understanding she didn't want to commit to staying on the show so they made her a special guest star in the episodes she appeared in. Truth be told really had more to do with the actress's preference at that time. Yes she wasn't well received TNG by a majority of the fans and I admit I was one of them but not too long after leaving TNG she landed a role on LA Law as Rosalind Shays a character well received and viewers liked but she didn't wish to remain in that cast either and her character took that notorious plummet down the elevator shaft. Well at least we knew Rosalind's fate to this day we don't know what happened to Pulaski. As for her being better than Beverly where at no seriously Beverly was original Pulaski to me came across like a female McCoy and if I wanted McCoy I'd watched TOS. There was really nothing Pulaski added which annoyed me because every episode she was in with the notable exceptions of picking on Data and having some past with Will's father there was literally nothing she did that Crusher couldn't have done had she been there in fact I found myself liking Selar more in one episode then I did that entire season, so sorry for me Beverly beats her she's the OG who should never been shown the door.

 

[suarezguy]

In fact Beverly acting like a stuck up bitch in Generations because of Data's joke, leading Data to have a crisis of confidence and stick an emotion chip in his head which fucked him up I'd say is far worse than anything Pulaski ever did to Data. We're maybe aiming at the wrong doctor.

Pretty sure Geordi was joking with his "Stay out of sickbay for a while" comment and even if he wasn't that isn't that bad, strong a reaction, she was peeved but knew it wasn't, didn't take it as malicious or as that thoughtless.

 

[Yistaan]

She had some rough moments with him for about two episodes, but people seemed to just switch off and forever took that as fact.

I saw someone who was inquisitive and at the end of the day was talking to a machine when her deal was healing biological lifeforms. She didn't get it entirely.

But she adapted. I saw nothing but respect from her after that, she dealt with Data properly, she apologised to him when she got things wrong, she played on the holodeck with him, fought his corner, was his ally in Penpals. It was part of a wider narrative of her being very adapting, see also the Klingon tear ceremony with Worf.

35 odd years later (I'm not having a go at you here, as you summed up why people took to disliking her quite correctly) I admit I'm still fed up with the "Oh Pulaski was mean to Data!" narrative. It was mild, for a brief moment and he can't feel hurt. Get over it, it's been decades already!

In fact Beverly acting like a stuck up bitch in Generations because of Data's joke, leading Data to have a crisis of confidence and stick an emotion chip in his head which fucked him up I'd say is far worse than anything Pulaski ever did to Data. We're maybe aiming at the wrong doctor.

I never realized until reading this that the entire series of incidents leading up to the Enterprise-D being destroyed could've been avoided if they had just NOT dunked Worf into the water as a promotion joke.