Why are the TOS movies better then the TNG movies?
- Thread starter The Overlord
- Start date
TNG could have-should have-had done more than just the four films in the uears since the series went off the air. I almost do not know what happened, but it seems the soul of TNG was walked all over in favor of more action-oriented drama. A pity as TNG had the potential and mass market appeal to go longer than even TOS as a feature film franchise.
I think the fact is that TNG was simply harder to translate into something mass market audiences wanted to pay to see on the big screen. Sometimes something that is magical on TV simply doesn't work on the big screen or vice-versa.
There is not much sense of nostalgia when a show moves to feature films only a few weeks after a highly successful seven-season TV run. "The X-Files" had a similar problem, which had a feature film between TV seasons. (Ditto the 60s "Batman".)
Here in Australia, where colour TV didn't come in until late 1975, we had a few screened in b/w prime time TV soap operas ("Bellbird", "Number 96", "The Box") release a feature film version in the 70s that drove audiences wild, not because they were great movies, or even good examples of what made the shows popular on TV, but because fans could see their heroes in full colour for the first time.
TNG on film needed an extra hook.
TOS movies came with ten years of anticipation of seeing our heroes together again. Gene Roddenberry even suggested to Paramount that TOS be pulled from TV syndication for the months leading up to ST:TMP's premiere, to make audiences even hungrier. And it worked. Even though many ST fans were disappointed by TMP, they still went back to see it over and over and over.
I agree. When TNG DID do one that was more like its soul (INS) people complained it was just like an ep. Wow, ya can't win for losin'!
With TOS we had seen the 79 a million times by the 80's and here were some NEW ADVENTURES. Wow, thanks. Another poster is right, that we had seen 7 years of eps of TNG, and oh yeah, here are a few more.
Absolutely agree.
The 1701-A after the end of TUC heading back to Earth for decommissioning passes through a temporal rift and encounters the 1701-D in the 24th century.
^ ugh. really?
Never know. Might have worked.
If you want to know why the TOS movies were better, just look at the plots: the stakes were higher!
TMP - stopping Earth from being destroyed
TWOK - stopping the Genesis weapon
TSFS - ok, not very epic except for getting Spock back
TVH - stopping Earth from being destroyed
TFF - Enterprise getting hijacked, kinda interesting
TUC - peace between Federation and Klingons
GEN - stopping a guy from destroying a planet no one's ever heard of
FC - stopping Earth from being destroyed - that's why this one is the good one!
IN - saving some aliens on a planet no one's ever heard of
NEM - I honestly can't remember...Picard's clone wanted to kill him or something? I think the biggest problem with this one is that they cut out all the character developement bits and the plot didn't make any sense
TMP - stopping Earth from being destroyed
TWOK - stopping the Genesis weapon
TSFS - ok, not very epic except for getting Spock back
TVH - stopping Earth from being destroyed
TFF - Enterprise getting hijacked, kinda interesting
TUC - peace between Federation and Klingons
GEN - stopping a guy from destroying a planet no one's ever heard of
FC - stopping Earth from being destroyed - that's why this one is the good one!
IN - saving some aliens on a planet no one's ever heard of
NEM - I honestly can't remember...Picard's clone wanted to kill him or something? I think the biggest problem with this one is that they cut out all the character developement bits and the plot didn't make any sense
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To be fair, TVH was NOT about saving the whole universe, rather Earth. The remainder of the universe was presumably safe from the Whale Probe.
Yeah, you're right...for some reason I was thinking the timeline got changed somewhow...obviously I haven't watched the movies recently enough!
Well, it's fairly important to the target audience
It might also help that at least TVH and TUC came out in signifigant anniversary years. i.e 20th and 25th. In some respects some of the classic movies where more of classic story.
TWOK is similar to Moby Dick. FC had elements of this as well.
TUC at least at the time could draw parallels to real world events. The collapse of the USSR. Praxis = Chernobyl.
TWOK is similar to Moby Dick. FC had elements of this as well.
TUC at least at the time could draw parallels to real world events. The collapse of the USSR. Praxis = Chernobyl.
Let's try that again:
TMP - save the Earth
TWOK - stop a madman from using a single shot superweapon that could whack one planet
TSFS - save comrades
TVH - save Earth
TFF - deal with a religious fanatic
TUC - avert a war
GEN - save a planet with millions of inhabitants
FC - save the Earth (again) and the Federation (presumably)
INS - keep some people from being relocated against their consent
NEM - save Earth...again
ST09 - save Earth (yet yet yet again) and the Federation
When you look at it that way, the scope isn't the issue.
Unless the Enterprise is actually saving the Earth that I live on, I don't really care. I'd rather see them do something else.Well, it's fairly important to the target audience
Even though some fine movies have been about saving the Earth, I usually prefer ones that are a little smaller and more personal in scope than that. To me there's something too imbalanced about a handful of characters rescuing billions of people.
You would not like The War of the Worlds with Tom Cruise, then....
But Tom Cruise didn't save the world in that one.
