why do people hate Wesley Crusher?

[Arpy]

I didn't hate him at the time - or now. I was 7 when the show first premiered but even then I wondered why it was the kid saving the ship...that is after the first time - which was neat.

But after that, I didn't like how we didn't get to see him as a Future Kid. That is, acting in a away I could relate to but in the future with all its cool future ways...it's not just weapons and soldiers and scientists that'll be different in the future after all but toys and school and childhood. Young me wanted to see more of that. Instead, I saw another bridge officer.

I eventually realized how twisted that was, for the reasons others have said up-thread.

Now I see Wesley as, well, Seven of Nine. He was a "draw". Seven's boobs, like Troi's before her, brought in the older boys and men and lesbians. Wesley was supposed to bring in kids. He was one of them after all, and make them think they could fly starships and fight Romulans too - and soon and without the training initially. And maybe they were Mozarts and didn't know it either. ...He was the Harry Potter of his day?

 

[Cheapjack]

Amazing that he was disliked, cos he was based on Gene Roddenberry, as a child. He was a bit gushing. But, the real Wil Weaton, from what I've read in interviews with him, is a little objectionable, too. Maybe, he's not like that. A bit ignorant, but maybe he just has to say that to compensate.

If you can save the day, what do you do? Keep it to yourself, and let the ship blow up?

I must admit, I like the bit in Sarek, when Beverly slapped him, mainly cos he told her to get lost.

My best friend's brother didn't like him, and his mother used to wash him very night, till he was ten!

It's ironic that people didn't seem to like him, cos he was seen as precocious. In the very library where I am writing this, there are kids coming in who rule the place, do nothing but play games on the computers and shout over everybody else and stare you out if you look at them. They look away fairly quickly, if you hold their gaze, though.

Could be worse.

I don't think any of them will ever save the ship, now, or as adults.

 

[SPCTRE]

edit: Oh, it was at TV Squad. If you've never read any, you should at least check them out. You may not like them, but I find them quite funny myself.

http://www.tvsquad.com/bloggers/wil-wheaton/

Yeah, his reviews are hilarious

 

[DevilEyes]

Amazing that he was disliked, cos he was based on Gene Roddenberry, as a child. He was a bit gushing. But, the real Wil Weaton, from what I've read in interviews with him, is a little objectionable, too. Maybe, he's not like that. A bit ignorant, but maybe he just has to say that to compensate.

If you can save the day, what do you do? Keep it to yourself, and let the ship blow up?

I must admit, I like the bit in Sarek, when Beverly slapped him, mainly cos he told her to get lost.

My best friend's brother didn't like him, and his mother used to wash him very night, till he was ten!

It's ironic that people didn't seem to like him, cos he was seen as precocious. In the very library where I am writing this, there are kids coming in who rule the place, do nothing but play games on the computers and shout over everybody else and stare you out if you look at them. They look away fairly quickly, if you hold their gaze, though.

Could be worse.

I don't think any of them will ever save the ship, now, or as adults.

And that's where the whole Gary Stu/Marty Stu thing comes from. I don't believe for a moment that this is what GR was like as a kid - but I'm sure that's what he wanted to be like.

The problem with Wesley was not that he was a precocious child, or that he was a nerd (which I'm not sure is accurate anyway - Geordi was portrayed as a nerd rather than Wesley). I love precocious kids, I was rather precocious myself. But the thing is, Wesley is absolutely not a realistic, true to life portrayal of a precocious kid. When you're a kid and you're a bit mature for your age and interested in 'adult' stuff, and you want desperately to be taken seriously... you're likely to be frustrated, because, truth of the matter is, the adults will NOT take you seriously. (And your peers would probably just dislike you.) And there's no frakking way that a teenager would be treated anything like the way Wesley is treated on TNG. Not to mention that, no matter how smart or talented he might be, someone who is lacking experience and proper education is certainly not going to be better than people with years of experience, and Wesley's role was just a ridiculous wish fulfillment fantasy.

Wesley might have been a good character if he wasn't written as being so damn perfect; he could have been interesting if he had been written as a troubled, precocious kid who had problems connecting to his peers, who had issues with his father's death and Picard (as both a father figure but also someone who might be blamed for the death of Jack Crusher - I think someone upthread has already suggested this), and if he was just a kid on the ship who wanted to do adult stuff and be taken seriously but was reminded time and again that it was not his place. He wouldn't be acting ensign and wouldn't be saving the ship all the time. It's this kind of thing that's grating (and it's the same kind of thing that I hate about Neelix the most - it's not his looks and personality, it's that he's being sent on missions and participating in senior staff meetings, when he's nothing but a civilian with no useful skills).

 

[Forbin]

I think the time I most wanted to slap him silly was when he was stood up on the bridge in the middle of a crisis and whined "If I was an adult, you'd take me seriously!"

Shut UP Wesley!

 

[Cheapjack]

It may be that the kids of today, who do little but play computer games, go on facebook and talk about the latest haircut, may save the day at some point. They have the potential.

Wesley may be objectionable, but at least he was interested in something a little more deep than that, interested outside of himself, in physics and maths and science and the universe and how to make life better and so on, rather than his mirror.

I don't think I would like to see a Wesley who resented Picard, for his father's death. We get enough of that s*** with Pink, and her songs. Bring it up, yes, expose the resentment, but resolve it and focus it and forget it, rather than perpetuating it and using it as an excuse to do the same to others.

 

[barnaclelapse]

I think it was partially that he just rammed down our throats so much in those early seasons. The character still yielded some good episodes, but I don't think people really gave a damn by the time those first couple of seasons were over and done with.

 

[MikeS]

edit: Oh, it was at TV Squad. If you've never read any, you should at least check them out. You may not like them, but I find them quite funny myself.

http://www.tvsquad.com/bloggers/wil-wheaton/

Yeah, his reviews are hilarious

Thanks for the link. Very funny, but also some great "behind the scenes" insight.

 

[sonak]

I just thought of a connection between Wesley Crusher and Anakin Skywalker from "Phantom Menace." In both cases, a young genius character with unbelievable abilities(Anakin's building robots and racing pods at age nine) is brought on to appeal to a specific audience that would have liked the show/movie anyway if it told a good story, and didn't need to be condescended to by having a character so obviously targeted to them. Then, both characters were so terribly conceived that they end up annoying large segments of adult audiences.

 

[Cheapjack]

You've just put me right off having kids, you have.

I'll have mine stilettoing kittens and dealing crack by age five, I will!!

And, blaming me for everything. That's normal.

 

[knine]

I think the time I most wanted to slap him silly was when he was stood up on the bridge in the middle of a crisis and whined "If I was an adult, you'd take me seriously!"

Shut UP Wesley!

But that moment give birth to one of the greatest Picard lines ever.

 

[Cheapjack]

Well, OK, maybe he shouldn't have been on the bridge.

But, his talent should have been recognised, or it would have withered away.

He might have been better off in the science labs????

 

[Trek_princess]

Wesley is a young genius, and he knows it - consequentially he is an arrogant, smug know-it-all. He can be annoying at times. One of his saving graces is that he is (usually) very considerate to others - except in "Hollow Pursuits" where the little shit makes fun of the perpetually nervous Barclay (Broccoli), a trained, seasoned Starfleet officer with years on him - come on Wesley, show some respect!

 

[The Wormhole]

^^At the same time Hollow Pursuits did show us the only time an officer with training and experiance got pissed off at being upstaged by a teenager. I like that episode.

 

[Cheapjack]

So what do you do if you can think of things other people can't think off, that will benefit everyone? Keep it to yourself? Not when it will benefit everyone, you shouldn't. Not if you care about your fellow humans, rather than yourself, and, you should be praised for it, too. Praise is good. Wesley did get pulled up for that a few times, but the adults realised their mistakes.

He should just be in the science labs.

Kirk was precocious, even in classic Trek. He was the youngest Captain and the youngest admiral. Even in new trek he was precocious, a tearaway too.

What is wrong, for goodness, sake, of thinking of things other people can't think off? I must admit, I would be jealous, cos I was not very good at maths, not unless I busted a brain cell, not as good as he was, but I would grudgingly acknowledge him and take his advice. He's a useful person.

 

[Mr Darcy]

I don't think this "hatred" of Wesley Crusher should be analysed from an in-universe perspective.

While the writing was less than stellar in most of season 1, Wil Wheaton was really dealt the worst hand. First impressions are crucial and Wesley Crusher often was the weakest link in some of the earlier TNG episodes.

e.g. "I'm with Starfleet. We don't lie."



This has to be among the worst lines of dialogue ever to be written in the history of Star Trek.

 

[Mr Darcy]

For the record:

I never hated Wesley Crusher and thought he was used quite effectively in later episodes with "The First Duty" arguably being the best Wesley Crusher episode.

However, I just never really felt that Wesley Crusher added anything valuable to Star Trek: TNG. After he left the main cast in "Final Mission", I really did not miss the character at all.

 

[RandyS]

I dislike him because he's a teenager who acts like one.

No he didn't, and that was the problem. He was the WWII generation's rose colored view of what a teenager should be.

Plus, he was a wuss.

Also, it didn't help that the whole reason for his existence was ruined almost immediately. When TNG first premiered, they stressed the fact that the new Enterprise would have families aboard, and Wesley was there to give a face to that, but seven or eight episodes in, Picard makes him an Ensign, rendering his whole point on the series moot.

 

[RandyS]

It may be that the kids of today, who do little but play computer games, go on facebook and talk about the latest haircut, may save the day at some point. They have the potential.

Let's not even get into THAT. That's a whole other discussion.

 

[Praxius]

The whole idea that teenage fans would rather see a teenager on the bridge than heroic officers doing cool stuff makes the whole concept a non-starter.

Like Sonak said:

Really, it boggles the mind that they never anticipated the backlash against this character. A supergenius teenager who serves on the bridge and is told how wonderful he's going to be by an advanced alien, and frequently outsmarts capable officers with far more expereience than him. Yeahhhh.... hard to see problems with that.

I always wanted him to have a real confrontation with Picard and say something like, "I wish it had been you that didn't come back," or at least play up the tension Picard would have felt. What we're given is that Picard doesn't feel comfortable around children, and Wesley is a child, so Picard doesn't like him. A better story would be that every time Picard looks at Wesley, he's reminded of the death of his friend, a death that he was perhaps responsible for.

They did do that though.... from the first episode of Picard meeting him as described in my previous post and then later in the episode "The Bonding".......

.... Wes describes his experiences when he lost his own father, admitting that he was angry at Picard since Jean-Luc had led the mission where his father was lost, he was mad that Picard came home and his father didn't.....

And you could see the expression on Picard's face when he was explaining this.... Picard practically dragged him to talk to Jeremy Aster about losing his father, and when Wesley told the story and how he felt, it appeared as though Picard was taken aback a little bit.