The Unofficial Star Trek Thread

[profholt82]

I should mention one of my favorite Trek sites:

https://www.jammersreviews.com/

I found it sometime in the aughts, but it's been up since the 90s. He's reviewed all of the episodes from every series and the movies, and there is a comment section for each episode. I've written my share in the comments over the years, but not for a long time, and there are some excellent discussions there. Anyway, often when I sit down to watch an episode for the first time in a while, I check his site to read his review and the discussion about it after. It's often enlightening.

[Leynos]

I always say DS9 is a great Science Fiction show. It's a TERRIBLE Star Trek show. WAR WAR WAR WAR WAR WAR WAR...ugh...

Voyager was so inconsistent in everything. Janeway ranged from strong to a psychopath. They hit reset every week so the ship being on the other end of space meant little. Harry Kim was the most useless crew member in Trek history until Mayweather.

Nu Trek is total garbage. Picard is Space Jesus who dies then who is brought back as an android who is dying of old age..what in the fuck. STD is just that, an STD on the franchise. Instead of science and absolutes, this franchise became about "Destiny" and a bunch of bullshit. Gotta have nude Klingon fuck scenes and F-bombs and eyeballs ripped out. Things I'm fine with...just not in Star Trek. These animated shows look like the same shit every animated show is. Lazy animation with HAHA GET IT jokes and MEMBER THIS references.


Orville is the true successor and I'm hyped for Season 3 in March!

[Carl Sagan]

Ah, my story with Star Trek. I "grew up" watching Voyager in the 90s. To be honest to me it is the best of the Trek shows. But I always wanted to watch TNG because I heard it was better. And then at the beginning of the 2000s, they finally aired previous ST shows in my country after people started the online petition.

They started with the TOS and I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it, how funny it was.

After TOS, they started airing TNG, and I was a bit disappointed with it, especially first few seasons when they were still searching for the show's identity, but I liked the show nevertheless. But I also didn't get to watch it till the end because I was drafted into the army. And so I went to the army but the TNG continued on TV. After a while, while I was in the army base, I saw that TNG was ending and the "new" show was to follow it: DS9. I wanted to watch it, but still had 3 more months to go in the army, so I played insanity and got discharged from the army and went home to watch DS9.

And I enjoyed DS9, I liked the epic story of it and how its character's background story unraveled (like Odo's) slowly over time.

I also liked "The Enterprise", but not so much when the war started.

And with the coming of the internet, I did rewatch lots of episodes and watched the ones I didn't catch in the past, but not so in the last few years, I guess I am a bit bored with it all.


Now, it seems to me that Star Trek changed over time from pacifist to war-like (e.g. DS9) and action, but that seems to be accordingly to Gene Roddenberry's death. He envisioned ST as a utopian world where no one suffered and where there was hardly any war, so I doubt that he would have allowed war arc in DS9 and even less the dystopian curve it took in the current shows like "Picard". He already fought against the "Wrath of Khan" as being too violent.

So it is a real slap in the face to Roddenberry of what they have turned the show into, now with those J.J. Abrams movies and TV shows.

[JCU]

If only TNG continued with a few more motion pictures rather than the abrams crapfest which are forgettable.

[gamevet]

Ah, my story with Star Trek. I "grew up" watching Voyager in the 90s. To be honest to me it is the best of the Trek shows. But I always wanted to watch TNG because I heard it was better. And then at the beginning of the 2000s, they finally aired previous ST shows in my country after people started the online petition.

They started with the TOS and I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it, how funny it was.

After TOS, they started airing TNG, and I was a bit disappointed with it, especially first few seasons when they were still searching for the show's identity, but I liked the show nevertheless. But I also didn't get to watch it till the end because I was drafted into the army. And so I went to the army but the TNG continued on TV. After a while, while I was in the army base, I saw that TNG was ending and the "new" show was to follow it: DS9. I wanted to watch it, but still had 3 more months to go in the army, so I played insanity and got discharged from the army and went home to watch DS9.

And I enjoyed DS9, I liked the epic story of it and how its character's background story unraveled (like Odo's) slowly over time.

I also liked "The Enterprise", but not so much when the war started.

And with the coming of the internet, I did rewatch lots of episodes and watched the ones I didn't catch in the past, but not so in the last few years, I guess I am a bit bored with it all.


Now, it seems to me that Star Trek changed over time from pacifist to war-like (e.g. DS9) and action, but that seems to be accordingly to Gene Roddenberry's death. He envisioned ST as a utopian world where no one suffered and where there was hardly any war, so I doubt that he would have allowed war arc in DS9 and even less the dystopian curve it took in the current shows like "Picard". He already fought against the "Wrath of Khan" as being too violent.

So it is a real slap in the face to Roddenberry of what they have turned the show into, now with those J.J. Abrams movies and TV shows.

I’m really surprised that Roddenberry would have been against Wrath of Khan. The original series had an episode called “Balance of Terror”, where Enterprise was matched up against a Romulan Warbird. During the battle an explosive device took out the Enterprise phaser crew and the battle eventually ended with the captain of the Romulan ship self destructing his ship.

I checked out this clip from "Balance of Terror" on Youtube. The writers of Enterprise must not have seen it, because Spock mentions that humans don't know what Romulans look like. Yet, in Enterprise, the crew interacts with Romulans.

[Carl Sagan]

Yeah, I've read some books by people involved with making Star Trek and, for example, Nicholas Meyer (writer and director of Khan) in his autobiography mentions how Gene Roddenberry wrote a series of memos and letters objecting that Starfleet was portrayed as a primarily military organization. He did not like that human weakness was used as a source of conflict in the film. He felt that humans had evolved away from that, by the time of Star Trek.

Roddenberry also had similar objections with Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country.

He was also in war with writers of TNG who frequently got fired. So you can imagine what he would do to JJ and writers of "Picard".

[Baloo]

Roddenberry didnt realize that some of his ideas, like the fact that there is no interpersonal conflict among crewmates, no religion and no war makes for boring, unrelatable TV. It is unsurprising TNG was only good after he passed, and I am pretty sure Paramount isolated him from the movie making process after Star Trek The Motion Picture.

[Carl Sagan]

Come, come, Roddenberry died during the 5th season of TNG and the show got good before that.

His vision had its course and in these days it is hard to follow. I mean, they did Voyager in his honor because he wanted a woman captain from the start but couldn't persuade the producers. And I remember the actors of Voyager saying that people love the show because it gives them hope that things will be alright (in the future).

But what seems to be the trend lately is that they like to take existing TV shows and make them dark and depressing, which is what they are unfortunately doing with Star Trek.

But at least we have (or had) that show "Orville" which is in the spirit of Star Trek. Kind of goofy like Star Trek once was.

[gamevet]

Roddenberry didnt realize that some of his ideas, like the fact that there is no interpersonal conflict among crewmates, no religion and no war makes for boring, unrelatable TV. It is unsurprising TNG was only good after he passed, and I am pretty sure Paramount isolated him from the movie making process after Star Trek The Motion Picture.

Spock and Bones were always in conflict with each other, so there was some interpersonal conflict with crewmates there. "The Balance of Terror" also introduced some begetry with Stiles showing mistrust in Spock on the bridge, which was quickly addressed by Kirk.

[Joe Redifer]

OK I haven't read every post in this thread but I hope some of you echo my opinions as listed below so as to validate my opinions and make me feel good about myself:

Star Trek TOS - Great for what it was. Might be hard to get into these days but it was great before Next Generation existed so I still have a fondness for it. Some great main characters. The movies are all great, except for 5. Yes, even 1 and 3.

Star Trek The Next Generation - Rough start, but ended up being the best series in my opinion. Extremely well-developed characters (mostly) and some absolutely amazing episodes scattered throughout. Absolutely saved Star Trek as a whole and for good reason. The movies are OK, but the second one is pretty good... mostly.

Star Trek Deep Space Nine - This one starts off even slower than TNG before it gets good. Once it does, you wanna make sure you see the next episode. I feel the series as a whole is a hair overrated, but there are a few absolutely phenomenal episodes in there that make the series worth a watch. You won't feel like you wasted your time.

Star Trek Voyager - Fun, but often kinda stupid. It's worth watching but aside from a few episodes here and there, it's like everything has been reset after the events of the previous episode. Still some great stuff though occasionally they leaned on the schlock. The hot chick (Seven of Nine) actually has good character development and played by a capable actress. More than the eye candy she was likely intended for.

Star Trek Enterprise - Better than most people say. The first season is kind of rough. But it does get better and better as it goes. The worst part is that they cancelled the series right as it was starting to get REALLY good. Actually scratch that... the worst part is the very last episode. Don't watch it. It's insulting.

JJ Star Trek "NuTrek" movies - These are fun for what they are I guess, at least the 1st and the 3rd. I really wish they didn't tie themselves in with REAL Star Trek. Into Darkness is the worst Star Trek movie ever made. Might be one of the worst movies ever made, period. All it is is fan service poorly done. It's BAD.

Star Trek Discovery - Always dark and edgy because I guess that's what audiences want? Everything is always a galaxy-ending super high stakes situation. The main character Michael Burnham almost always singlehandedly saves the day. She cries so much one wonders how she's even able to function in Starfleet. The stories are stupid.

Star Trek Picard - Oh geez. This isn't Picard. Forget The Next Generation, it's not action action action! Oh... let's not forget dark and edgy. And super-high stakes all life in the galaxy going away-type of storylines. Season 2 looks to be similarly high stakes, but nothing matters because in the future the Federation will be screwed because a baby cries.

[Fozzy]

Random thoughts about ST:

Star Trek IV was alright, but looking back, I think it would have been better off as a made for TV reunion.

I really liked the Star Trek TNG / Dr. Who graphic novel.

As far as modern sci fi, I think they all go for that gritty dark look that was kicked off with the battlestar galactica remakes. Epic crisis with wild special effects. Heck, SW: TLJ is basically the BSG episode '33' with AT-ATs and the force.

[NeoVamp]

What I like so much about Star Trek IV, is that originally I was all like "yay!, they're traveling to OUR time!" and now I'm watching it and saying "yay! they're traveling back to the awesome 80s!" so it still works.

[Leynos]

Where I am at as a fan

[JCU]

What I like so much about Star Trek IV, is that originally I was all like "yay!, they're traveling to OUR time!" and now I'm watching it and saying "yay! they're traveling back to the awesome 80s!" so it still works.

Time travel is so cliche when it comes to science fiction and Trek was supposed to be different. Even though the crew came back to the 80's it didn't resonate in terms of the time as well as lets say a BTTF in 1955.

[Leynos]

Star Trek had Space hippies. They went to a Nazi planet. A planet with a giant easter bunny. Evil twin universe. It could get pretty out there. Time travel is tame compared to those.