Star Trek The Next Generation Retrospective/Review - Star Trek Retrospective, Part 8

By the mid-1980s, the Star Trek franchise was a pop culture phenomenon with a huge international fandom that replicated increasingly popular television series and a successful film franchise, while the familiar trio of Kirk Spock and McCoy embarked on continuous adventures in the great wide world. screen those in supreme began to consider a second installment of the franchise on the small screen, but surely without the iconic characters known around the world no new Star Trek series could succeed in 1986, after the success of the fourth Star film Trek, The The longevity of the Star Trek franchise surprised senior executives who considered the property their crown jewel.

President Frank Machuso Jr. once said that the lifespan of this business is usually three days to flourish for 20 years, which is unheard of. Star Trek is an invaluable asset. whose potential should not be wasted, while the Harv Bennett-produced film series was a reliable source of income for the studio, the budgets and salary demands of each new film had steadily increased along with the ages of the cast to ensure that audiences I could enjoy Star Trek more. Adventures for many years Paramount executives decided to move forward with a new spin-off series following new characters played by lesser-known actors and it was a big gamble.

Star Trek: The Original Series had been airing successful reruns in dozens of countries for nearly 20 years. At this point, years despite a wealth of new programming, Star Trek was still Paramount's most profitable series to date, an astonishing feat. Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, and Dr. McCoy were pop culture icons recognized around the world. The intrepid crew of the Enterprise battled Klingon villains as they traveled. Where no one had gone before was what defined Star Trek for many people: asking those same people to accept a new crew and a new ship in stories potentially very different from the previous ones was thought to be absolutely impossible to help conceive this new series.

Star Trek Paramount decided that they needed to enlist the help of the creator of the original Star Trek concept, Gene Roddenberry, despite not having been directly involved with any of the Star Trek films, after the film Gene Roddenberry had become an icon almost as big as some. Of the characters he had created throughout the 1980s, Roddenberry made frequent appearances on science fiction convention panels, as well as at other public lectures at universities throughout America and Europe, speaking frequently about his vision of a utopian future. and the big ideas that influenced his conception of Star Trek's premise, he also told often embellished stories about his time working on the original show and the first film.

These conversations gradually built a prestige around the man and many devout Trekkies came to think of him as a great philosophical and creative thinker. Genius even to this day in online fan discourse, this image of Gene Roddenberry is almost deified and the proverbial vision of genes is frequently used as the definitive yardstick by which to measure each and every new story of Star Trek in any medium, the fan adoration was so intense. Roddenberry even joked that, like Ron Hubbard, the science fiction author who founded the Church of Scientology, he too could

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t his own religion if he wanted to, in truth, although Roddenberry's career as a writer and producer had Having encountered many obstacles after his abrupt ouster from the Star Trek franchise, he had written numerous pilots for ambitious television shows that usually failed to get off the ground due to this resentment toward superiors.

He initially turned down their offer to help develop the new Star Trek television series, however he later saw it as an opportunity to right the wrongs he felt had been done to him, hiring an infamous lawyer named Leonard Maslish, who will appear more forward in this video, and sought to secure his position as the lead creative voice, once again negotiations went down to the wire, but Roddenberry eventually signed on to develop the

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installment of the Star Trek franchise just as before, Roddenberry assembled his team of writers and producers to create Star Trek. The Next Generation hired producer and writer Rick Berman, who had been program director at Paramount since 1984.

Roddenberry believed his work on the PBS show The Big Blue Marble and the miniseries slot made him an ideal choice to help to ensure that his vision of a progressive and enlightened future was captured on screen. He also hired writer and producer Maurice Hurley. Curiously, Hurley was inexperienced. With science fiction and the majority of his credits being crime dramas such as The Equalizer and Miami Vice, along with others, Roddenberry hired Star Trek veterans such as Robert Justman and DC Fontana, and his team contributed several ideas of their own. Roddenberry set about rewriting the series bible, which was Initially written by another Star Trek veteran, David Gerald, some of his initial ideas were quite radical, one of those ideas was that Roddenberry speculated that a century after the original series The characters would not even need to use a spaceship of any kind to travel through space, however this was considered too radical and difficult to film.

Their original bible set the show in the 25th century, 150 years after the original series and would continue. company g, but for some reason this was pushed back to the 24th century and after company d another higher one. Roddenberry made the team Andrew Probert, a conceptual designer who was originally

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of the Star Trek Phase 2 team and was famous at the time for designing these Cylons in Battle

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Galactica from Phase 2. Probert had wanted a radically new look for the company. He was never completely satisfied with the look of the Constitution class. His design extended the ellipse-shaped saucer section and moved the warp nacelles further back and lower in the frame rather than Matt Jefferies' strict modular look.

Probert wanted the shapes of the new company to flow into each other to achieve a more streamlined silhouette, the producers' only demand was to separate the ship into two

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s originally, the battle section of the ship was a smaller D-shaped vessel that was Later it was revised to a saucer separation to create the visual effects for the program. Paramount approached dozens of companies across the industry. Some ambitious early tests used early CGI tools to create shots. Looking at it now, the shots are obviously very dated, but they're also surprisingly impressive. For the moment, ultimately, although it was decided to move forward using the tried and true method of miniature map paintings and optics, as the CGI tools simply weren't ready for the pilot episode, Paramount was privileged to have the light industrial and magic would lend their services to the project without committing the same resources as they would with a feature film, having such a successful team working on the visual effects would ensure that this new Star Trek could surprise audiences with its images.

Composer Dennis McCarthy came on board to create the music for the show. At first, McCarthy created his own original theme for the series, somewhat in the spirit of a naval adventure story, however it was later decided to combine Alexander Courage's original theme with the one Jerry Goldsmith composed for the film production that was being made. starting. When looking for a distributor for the new Star Trek series, they initially approached Fox Network, but were only able to commit to 13 episodes. NBC and ABC only accepted one pilot. CBS proposed creating a miniseries that could then be turned into a full series.

Showing that this lack of commitment from the major television networks was quite disconcerting to many Paramount executives. Star Trek was a proven hit with a huge international fan base, several successful films, and a television show that was still profitable after two decades, so Paramount decided on a radical distribution. Distribution method for the first time traditionally on American television. Big television shows were first broadcast on a major network and, after proving successful, were syndicated. Episodes were sold to other networks and smaller stations for higher profits. This was the Star Trek model that was the original series. released with, but for Star Trek, Paramount's

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wanted to ensure its creative control over the show and with the big three networks refusing to greenlight a full first season, Paramount decided to essentially skip airing the show on an original network and it went straight into syndication.

The smaller local stations that had hosted the successful reruns of the original series had tripled in number by the 1980s. Paramount gave the syndication right to these smaller stations for free and the 12 minutes of commercial time was divided into five minutes to the local station and the remaining seven. For Paramount by October 1987, the show had been sold to more than 200 stations covering 90 percent of the United States. It was a very unorthodox strategy, but it guaranteed a full first season for the team of this new company. roddenberry gerald and fontana created a great set of diverse characters, roddenberry knew from the beginning that he wanted a member of the team to have some type of disability and it was gerald who suggested blindness, something that could be alleviated thanks to a visor that the character would wear over your eyes during the day.

The character's name was inspired by a disabled Star Trek fan named George T Leforge, whom Roddenberry encountered several times at conventions in the 1970s. Gerald later adjusted the name slightly to Jordy Laforge in the character's initial breakdown, although He was not a chief engineer, coxswain or even a deck officer, he was simply listed as a regular on the visiting team who ran a school for children aboard the ship, among those considered for the role were Wesley Snipes and Tim Russ, in fact, Russ He was close to landing the role before the producers finally decided on Levar Burton.

At the time, Burton was probably the most famous name in the cast, having hosted and produced the PBS show Reading Rainbow and garnering widespread praise for his portrayal of Kunta Kinte in the landmark miniseries Roots: The Ship's Operations Scientific Officer Was Going to An artificial life form being an Android, this was inspired by the desire to replicate Spock's logical presence on the bridge, but also by the Android character Questor from the Questor tapes of a television movie that Roddenberry had made together with Gene L Kuhn. Data's original backstory was quite different from what he became later.

Explained in the series in its original backstory, the data was created by a race of invisible aliens who stored the memories of a doomed human colony inside their brain. His resulting personality would be derived from these memories. Among the names considered for the role were Robert Englund Kim. miuri kevin peter jones and eric menyuk brent spiner eventually won the role at the time he was considered a comedic character actor known for adopting various voices and playing big personalities such as the recurring role of bob wheeler on the sitcom Night Court Spiner Drew. Drawing on a variety of inspirations for his portrayal, including Pinocchio, Roy Batty from Blade Runner and Stan Laurel from Laurel and Hardy, to better appeal to a younger audience, Gene Roddenberry created the character of Wesley Shredder, a 15-year-old boy with a brilliant mind that the audience followed as he became a capable starfleet officer during the character's development bob justman suggested changing the character to a teenager named leslie crusher his reasoning was that television and movies were already full of stories which described the experience of the male teenager but very few followed the female I experienced for quite some time that the character of Leslie Crusher existed in the show's Bible and in the early scripts, however, Gene Roddenberry later changed his mind and changed the character again to a boy named Wesley Crusher.

Fifteen-year-old Will Wheaton, best known at the time for Stephen King's coming-of-age adaptation Stand by Me, got the part. Beverly Crusher's character was originally created as a schoolteacher, appearing in early development to be a normal character. would be a civilian master would abort the ship however this never happened beverly Crusher was changed to the ship's doctor, thanks to david gerald, he remembered a lunch where he said we don't have a ship's doctor yet, why don't we make Beverly Crusher be the ship's doctor? I wish I had recordedthis conversation because everyone said no. doesn't work and then they started arguing about it Eddie Milk has said, you know, that saves us a character, if Beverly Crusher is the ship's doctor, then we don't have to create a ship's doctor, so Bob Justin said no, that makes make it harder for the Captain, to have this relationship with Beverly Crusher that we want to have, on the other hand, the fact that it's harder to have this relationship creates more tension, you know, Gene, that's not a bad idea and then Gene started to discuss it over lunch.

Beverly Crusher was the ship. doctor cheryl gates mcfadden was chosen for the role mcfadden had a years-long career with the jim henson company working as a dance choreographer in labyrinth and the muppets take manhattan in this role she chose to be credited as cheryl mcfadden but for her work as an actress she used her middle name, gates, except for a brief appearance in the search for in october alongside alec baldwin, was better known as a comedic actress after landing the role, she was quite surprised at how much more serious the character was in the role, without However, the character of Beverly Crusher was The characters were defined very loosely, they created her as Wesley's mother and as Picard's love interest, but beyond that, not much of her personality was defined for the role of head of ship security.

Bob Justman was largely inspired by the character of Vasquez from James Cameron's Aliens for the company he and Gene Roddenberry created the character of Mata Hernandez, actors considered for the role included Julian Nixon and Rosalind Chow, however, a An early favorite was Marina Certis, while the character of Diana Troy was also being cast, David Gerald and Bob Justman first conceived of a character aboard the ship who could be a kind of wise emotional healer. Roddenberry suggested that this character be the ship's counselor, as he believed that in the future mental health would be considered as important as the physical health that he should have. be the brains of the team and many compared the character's intelligence to that of Spock in the show's Bible.

Troy was described as a woman with Icelandic blonde hair and at one point three breasts. DC Fontana objected to this feature and later said that he felt women already have enough problems with two. and how are you going to align them vertically horizontally or how was I please don't go there among those who auditioned for the role was susan gibney but it was denise crosby who emerged as the favorite but as the auditions continued jaden roddenberry decided certais and crosby were more suitable for each other's roles, so they were switched. Crosby was a promising actress at the time, having appeared in the thriller 48 Hours and had a small role in Trail of the Pink Panther and its sequel The Curse of the Pink Panther.

Granddaughter of legendary singer-songwriter Bing Crosby, she had been involved in the arts. stage from a young age and was excited to play a difficult and non-typical role like Matcha Hernández, although after being cast, the character's name was changed to Natasha Yar Certis. She was born in Hackney, London and had landed several roles in British television shows such as Up the Elephant and Round the Castle and The Return of Sherlock Holmes. After moving to the US, she appeared in a handful of B-produced canon films before landing the role. In Star Trek, a notable new character in the company would be a Klingon crew member.

Gene Roddenberry reasoned that between the 23rd and 24th centuries relations between the United Federation of Planets and the Klingon Empire would have changed. Worf was originally conceived as a serving Klingon marine. on the ship before being changed to a Starfleet officer, his original story was that he was aboard a Klingon ship as a child during one of the last battles between the Federation and the Klingons during the battle in which he was rescued from the wreckage of his ship by Worf, a Starfleet officer, was also not conceived as a main character, but rather as a recurring role.

He would have appeared in only seven episodes of the first season. Michael Doran remembered auditioning him. I didn't wear makeup, but I faced these psychological guys. klingon I entered the supreme character without jokes or laughter with the other actors I sat alone waiting for my interview when my turn came I entered I did not smile the reading thanked them and I left he got the role shortly after before Star Trek Dorne had extensive theatrical experience and did not He had time for his character Jedediah Turner on the television show Chips. A departure from the original series was the choice to have a first officer who did not take on other duties such as the science officer as Mr.

Spock had done. This was to address criticism that Captain Kirk often put himself in unnecessary danger while on duty. On away missions, it was also more realistic to have a dedicated executive officer, as is the case on real-life Navy ships, therefore Commander William Riker was going to be the more mission-oriented role. action with great inspiration taken from james t kirk among those who were considered for the role were william o'campbell james horan vaughn armstrong christopher mcdonald and even jeffrey combs of whom we will talk more about in a later video michael o'gorman was originally cast as the commander riker, but executive producer john pike felt he wasn't a good fit and said he wouldn't follow this guy into battle, so they chose his second choice jonathan fricks frix began his career working for marvel comics appearing as captain america in the circuit Convention star for a time played the role of Tom Carroll on the NBC soap opera The Doctors, after which he made numerous guest appearances on other shows, including the 1980s reboot of The Twilight Zone, as well as Fantasy.

Island, where he acted alongside ricardo montelban the most crucial character of this new star

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cast would be the captain of the company from the beginning this captain would be an older man more of an administrator than captain kirk's action hero originally named jacques picard but later changed to julian picard turned out to be one of the most difficult roles to cast as dozens and dozens of names were considered for the role john saxon james earl jones yafit koto avery brooks louis gossett jr kier dulia and many more dc fontana highly favored actor stephen Mack for the role, but not many members of the production team were happy with that choice at the time Bob Justman and his wife were taking an extension course at UCLA in humor writing as part of the course, Jasmine and his wife They attended a dramatic reading by two actors, one of whom was then Patrick Stewart Justman, 46, later reflecting, Patrick sat down, rolled up his sleeves and began to read, he spoke a few sentences and I was stunned.

I turned to my wife Jackie and told her that I think I found our new captain the day after justman. chased down Stewart's agent and arranged a meeting between him, the actor and Gene Roddenberry Patrick came in his rental car and we sat for 30 to 40 minutes and then he said goodbye and left to fly back to England after he left, Gene closed the door. and come to me and I will quote it exactly, he said he would not accept it. Apparently a sticking point with Roddenberry was the actor's evident baldness. Roddenberry reasoned that by the 24th century baldness would have been cured.

Roddenberry remained vehemently against Stewart's casting thereafter. Although the rest of the production staff championed him for the role, Rick Berman constantly pestered Roddenberry by proclaiming that Stewart was clearly the perfect choice, Stewart eventually auditioned for Roddenberry's fit again, this time accompanied by executive John pike, among others, for that specific audition, although Stewart was asked to wear a fake pike. He was impressed by the audition, but knew that Stuart was actually bald, so Stewart was asked to audition one more time, this time. once without the fake pipe. He agreed with the others. Patrick Stewart was clearly the best of the bunch.

Finally Roddenberry relented and Patrick Stewart clinched. The role of Captain Julian Picard was later changed to Jean-Luc Picard Stewart was truly unknown at the time in the United States. He had a distinguished career in Shakespeare's Royal Company for over 15 years and made several appearances on British television in roles. as Sedginus in the BBC production of I Claudius Cross the Pond he landed a minor role as Guernie Halleck in David Lynch's Dune, as well as the role of Dr. Armstrong in the space vampire film produced by Canon. Yes, really Life Force Stewart was completely unaware of Star Trek culture.

Presence and aside from good memories reading Dan Dare comics when he was a kid, he had no real interest in science fiction; In fact, he was often baffled as to why many of his colleagues would want to appear in the British doctor who was applying at the time after consulting. with his agent and many other Hollywood industry veterans, they all concluded that this new Star Trek show was doomed to fail. Take the job because you know why it won't work. It will not work. Everyone, including my agent, said the same thing. You can't revive an iconic series.

You can't, you're going to be Captain Kirk, well, they give you a different name, don't you, come here, make some money for the first time in your life, make us arrive on time, go home despite the confidence that supreme had in his new. show that there were many industry-savvy fans and even other Star Trek cast members who didn't believe tng could work. This sentiment was expressed most strongly by a vocal portion of the fan base who often proclaimed that if they're not Kirk Spock and McCoy, they are Star Trek convention magazines and newspapers were packed with angry fans who already despised the show. before having seen a single frame of an episode.

What amuses me about reading this kind of thing is that it sounds so much like the kind of absurd discourse that can be seen today on Internet forums and comment sections that fans hold the franchise to a completely arbitrary set of standards for what it is. and it is not, quote, real Star Trek. Looking back, it now seems ridiculous to imagine that Star Trek couldn't survive without the original cast. members, while many of these angry fans had already set their hearts on disliking this new incarnation before even seeing it, for the more open-minded casual viewer and critic, the first impression of this new star ride was of the utmost importance. for the most important pilot.

The episode Gene Roddenberry assigned the task to DC Fontana. His version of his pilot was titled Meeting at Farpoint now because this first stab was written long before all the characters and casting were finalized. It has many differences from the episode that ended up being the one that opens the episode. With the Enterprise D commanded by Captain Julian Picard, who has just completed a successful mission, they travel to Farpoint Station, where Picard's first officer, Kyle Summers, will take his first command of the USS Starseeker, while on station the Enterprise hires new crew members, including William Riker. and data who are close friends, as well as Dr.

Beverly Crusher and her daughter Leslie, shortly after an alien ship appears and attacks, destroying the starseeker and killing Kyle Summers, a visiting team encounters the inhabitants of this enemy ship on the surface of the planet known as Disturb Troy. She eventually uses his telepathic abilities to discover that his ship is, in fact, a life form that has been enslaved by the nuisance. With the help of Leslie Crusher, the Enterprise crew was able to defeat the nuisance and free the captured lifeform with Riker appointed as the new first officer. The intrepid team of this new company once again boldly goes where no one has gone before as Fontana wrote his draft Roddenberry and Pike clashed fiercely behind the scenes for the duration of the episode In Pike's mind This new Star Trek show had to make a big splash with a feature-length first episode and, along with the previous 30-minute special, the show would be set as event television.

For some reason Roddenberry was vehemently against this, at one point Pike even threatened to ban Gene entirely. Roddenberry of Supreme Law If he did not get a feature-length episode written at the last minute, Roddenberry relented and accepted the two-hour premiere after the two-hour pilot was agreed upon; Gene Roddenberry rewrote Fontana's version of the episode by adding an additional 30 minutes of runtime and introducing the character of Q, an omnipotent alien life form with godlike powers who takes the company's team on trial for alleged savagery after making these additions. , many of the production staff thought that Q's character concept was eerily reminiscent of Trelane from the original series episode, The Squire of Gothos, which is one of my personal favorites, David Gerald remembered that we were looking at each other saying that it is trelano over and over again, we all hate it and very gentlyWe suggested we generate which wasn't very good, of course this fell on deaf ears. he said trust me, the way I'll do it, the fans will love it, John de Lancie, who was cast in the role, also saw similarities between the two characters.

He liked the series, although he was not a die-hard fan and worried the next

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. stalled in attempting to recreate what happened before conflict arose between Roddenberry and Fontana after Roddenberry attempted to take full credit for writing the pilot's script, this dispute went to arbitration with the Writers Guild of America, who Ultimately ruling in Fontana's favor, giving the two writers equal credit, this dispute severely damaged Fontana's working relationship with Roddenberry for the remainder of his time on the show. Once the script was finalized, the team had five weeks to complete the entire episode, which included filming and post-production.

A dizzying pace. Production designer Herman Zimmerman. oversaw set design and construction while working under the direction of production manager david livingston during this process michael okuda joined the team to design the l-cars menu system for the new console screens, among other contributions, Like Jordy Laforge's visor, most of the sets that debuted in the episode were original creations, but some sets and elements were reused from the films. The hallways, for example, used pieces from the Kirk-era Business Corridor sets, although even these were originally created for the canceled Star Trek Phase 2 and the Far Point Market reused many pieces from Kirk's apartment in The Wrath.

Khan After a fast-paced and exhausting shoot, the film contributed to the pilot's visual effects in collaboration with Paramount Television's in-house team of Peter Laritzen, Robert Legato, Ron Moore and Gary Hudson, Bob's There Watching Me and the final shot of the main sequence. of the company comes into frame and if you look out the little window, you can see these little people walking around. My jaw fell to the floor and I said, "Oh my God, there are people there and of course there's Bob." Jasmine, who is laughing out loud, I knew she was going to get it, I would be so excited that there was a pencil animation that was there, it was incredibly crude, but when you scale it down and diffuse it and backlight it, that's it. what the people would look like extensive use of motion-controlled miniatures optical composition map painting and other effects were created for the episode when production finally wrapped paramount held an internal screening for the debut episode while executive john pike admitted he had no idea What the episode was even the high production values ​​and lavish visuals made it a hit at the highest levels, whether the Star Trek fanbase or pop culture at large was ready for it or not.

The first episode of Star Trek The Next Generation debuted on September 28, 1987. On Board for Star Trek The Next Generation here on weekends on the Farpoint Rendezvous Channel is an episode I fondly remember watching as a child. , but watching it today feels like a mess, it certainly has excellent production values ​​enhanced by today's high definition. remastered, but the pacing of the characters' plot seems very confusing as the newly commissioned D Company sets out to solve the mystery of Farpoint Station, they are intercepted by the divine alien Q who judges them for being a terrifying race. savage, Captain Picard then demands a test to see if humanity really is as he thinks it is, so he allows them to continue to Farpoint Station, easily letting their originally planned mission serve as a test in itself.

One of the strongest elements of the episode is John de Lancie as a signalman, much like Trelane. He embodies the archetype of the trickster character comparable to Superman's Mr. Mixes Pidlik, although in this episode Delancey is very charismatic, he is much more threatening in this first episode than shown in later appearances, which depresses the episode as a whole is The pacing of the viewer can really tell that it was originally intended to be an hour-long episode that was stretched to 90 minutes with a lot of filler. It starts well with a high-octane chase between the company and Q, a spectacular saucer separation sequence and then. a battle of wits between picard and q only for the episode to suddenly stop immediately after, when we are introduced to riker jordy and the crushers, it's like the episode starts over, we follow riker almost as audience pov character through him, we are They introduce all the new crew members, the new company and their amazing new technologies and the new captain again, Picard, especially he comes across as very cold and unapproachable during his scenes with Riker, it feels strange considering we only had 30 minutes of Picard.

He clearly demonstrates deep concern for his crew, one of whom jumps to his defense to proclaim his great morality for the most part. The middle section of the Farpoint encounter feels very slow and clunky with many cutscenes inserted solely for filler, such as while. It's wonderful to see Leonard McCoy make an appearance and have him appear in the middle instead of at the end of the episode It's a strange choice The pacing problems plagued the episode until its climax, when the characters seemingly take forever to figure out what the The audience has already deduced for quite some time that as a concept it is essentially Star Trek, but in execution it is a big mess, that being said, the visuals and production values ​​are indeed top notch.

Dennis McCarthy's music and strong visual effects put it far above what was possible for a sci-fi show in the '80s, it looks like it could have been released in theaters as a demonstration of what was to come from Star Trek, the next generation. I'm not sure it really succeeds, although there are some nice moments between them. This new team doesn't feel fully established as people and it's unclear what the dynamic will be between the cast. It seems there was a conflict deciding whether Picard was going to be the protagonist or whether it should be Riker, Riker.

After all, he's very confused with Kirk, so it would make sense for him to take on the action role while Picard serves as a wise mentor of sorts, but the episode somehow does both and yet neither of them al At the same time there are many things that others can do. into the plot of the episode, but there's not much going on story-wise, it all seems like pretty thin material. The encounter at Farpoint would certainly benefit from being shorter, but as it stands, I think the problem is the lack of a unified creative vision it has. its moments and is entertaining enough that I've watched it multiple times, but as The Next Generation's debut episode doesn't make the best first impression for the show, critical and audience reception was equally divided, criticisms were raised with many of the characters and others called it disappointingly boring rabid fans who had already condemned the show before its release naturally felt their skepticism was justified upon watching marina certais then reflected on the episode's reception saying they hated us and jonathan frakes also remembered what Extremely vocal negative reaction that it will continue to receive after its debut, all that being said, however, The Gathering at Farpoint was a ratings hit, over 27 million viewers tuned in to watch the premiere, making it the top syndicated drama series. most watched of the year, although overall reception was very mixed Paramount was already committed to a full season and hopes that the show can retain its audience for subsequent episodes Unfortunately the first season of Star Trek The Next Generation is quite poor overall.

Lack of good character development and woeful creative decisions result in some truly terrible outings for the Star Trek franchise, such as Code of Honor and Angel One, the episodes are heavily plot-driven and the business team really only serves as exposition devices most of the time, much of this was due to the often chaotic situation behind it. The scenes from the first season of The Next Generation effectively had no showrunner during the original series, this role was performed jointly by Gene Roddenberry, Genell Kuhn and DC Fontana considering that Roddenberry had been out of the television production landscape for so long that it is possible who was not used to spearheading the creative direction of a show in the way the 1980s demanded there was a writers' room but no head writer several executive producers but no head producers Roddenberry himself often had health problems for much of his life. part of the production, which seriously affected his ability to oversee the series.

What also frustrated many writers was Roddenberry's insistence that the next generation's characters were not allowed to have any conflict with each other. His reasoning was that by the 24th century humans had evolved so much that conflicts in the workplace no longer existed. This edict left many writers adrift when it came to screenwriting, after all, the driving force of great drama is often conflict, even veteran startup writers found this a difficult thing to do. implement, as it certainly wasn't something that was described in the original series. Kirk Spock and McCoy argued with each other. others often and the banter between the three is what possibly helped cement them as pop culture icons.

Tempers were also very frayed among the writers and producers thanks to the involvement of Leonard Maislich Gene Roddenberry's lawyer due to Roddenberry's poor health Maizlish often served as Roddenberry's representative but the lawyer supposedly used this position to give his own notes and doing their own script rewrites, something strictly prohibited by Hollywood unions and, frankly, atrocious behavior in its first year of Star Trek, the next generation had a turnover of 30. That means there were 30 staff members who were hired and then quit or were fired - that's almost three times the average amount for a major TV show at the time - while the behind-the-scenes chaos had an undeniably detrimental effect on the resulting episodes, if not the first season. .

It's a complete loss once again, as with part 1 of this video series, I chose to highlight the episodes based more on personal preference than universal acclaim. The first episode I chose to highlight is appropriately titled where no one has gone before. The Enterprise brings a seemingly brilliant warp drive specialist named Kaczynski and his assistant on board to improve the Enterprise's engines, while Kozinski's equations seem like gibberish to the crew. The first test sends the Enterprise hurtling through space towards another galaxy at speeds impossible after repeating this first test. The company then reaches a kind of ethereal realm where the crew's thoughts become real.

Eventually, Kozinski's assistant is discovered to be responsible for a mysterious being from an unknown region of space known only as the Traveler, although it's a simple premise and the characters are still cute. Two-dimensional for the most part, the concept is Star Trek to a t, literally, boldly going where no one has gone before, exploring strange new worlds and finding strange new life. It's visually spectacular, fast-paced and exciting, much like Star Trek the movie as it is. It doesn't have much emotional impact, it exchanges some great ideas that stay with the viewer long after it's over. The idea that the universe has some higher dimensions currently hidden but we are on the cusp of one day exploring is fascinating and Eric Menik is a traveler. delivers a subtle but intriguing performance that makes what could have been boring exposition sound really profound, it's no surprise that he originally auditioned for the role of data is far from one of the next generation's most important episodes, but it is one of the first entries to manage to be funny and at the same time rich in themes as filming of the first season progressed, many of the actors became as frustrated as the writers when it came to characterization, most felt that They weren't being given much real drama to sink their teeth into. and felt that their characters were being wasted, one cast member in particular who felt strongly about this was Denise Crosby, so towards the end of the season the decision was made to write Crosby off the show and kill off Tasha Yar in The episode's villain aspect, while it's true that Tasha Yar wasn't a particularly layered character, Crosby still managed to imbue the role with a lot of charisma and presence.On screen, looking back, it's interesting to wonder how the show would have evolved if Crosby had chosen to remain part of the cast. yar and wharf made a badass duo and their intimate encounter with data could certainly have sparked something interesting between the two.

Unfortunately, his farewell is not one of Star Trek's finest hours. While attempting to rescue Troy from a crashed shuttle, the crew encounters an oil-like life form capable of intense cruelty and possessing immense power. Tasha Yar is inadvertently killed when trying to get past her. It's such a sudden death. that comes out of nowhere that doesn't really feel earned, which is handled better, however, you see the funeral. at the end of the episode, it's one of the rare times that tng manages to provoke real emotion in the viewer. The acting, dialogue, music and staging are fantastic. It's a shame that I get to the end of such a weak plot much later.

The season is an episode that I have chosen to highlight and I think it is something of a hidden gem among the first tng. We will always have Paris. The company begins to encounter strange temporal anomalies that appear to originate from an outpost run by Dr. Paul Manheim, whose experiments. They have torn a hole in the very fabric of space-time. What I appreciate about the episode is that it's one of the few in the first season that successfully ties its concept and themes to a character specifically Captain Picard. Here, Patrick Stewart gives a great performance. since the beginning of the show, but like the others, jean-luc picard had not yet fully become the icon he would later become, we will always have paris is really the first time, outside of a few brief moments, in the ones we can actually glimpse personally, that the wife of dr.

Mannheim being an old flame of Picards makes for much more interesting dialogue and genuine chemistry between Stuart and guest star Michelle Phillips and their concern over what could very well have been ties to the temporary shenanigans that occur throughout the final episode. a data set making its way inside the outpost to repair the fracture of space-time ends with some solid action and cool visuals and, just like where no one has gone before, there are some great ideas that the episode invites to the spectator to reflect later. Rolled's credits are by no means a classic, but the episode illustrates what the creative team generally missed during the first year.

Right after this episode comes the conspiracy, which I kid you not, I really love it. It was written by Tracy Tormey and after I felt so deeply. Limited by what she saw as Roddenberry's unworkable demands, she went out of her way to write an episode to deliberately anger Roddenberry, much to her complete surprise, however, Roddenberry fully endorsed the finished script. Picard is called to a secret meeting with an old friend and several exceptional Starfleet officers, where he is located. he told of mysterious happenings in Starfleet Command, including warnings of a possible takeover or invasion when this same friend is later killed.

Picard enlists the Enterprise team's help to uncover this conspiracy after an almost entire season of cringe-worthy, boring planet-of-the-week episodes. The corporate conspiracy shenanigans feel like the show suddenly woke up from the beginning, there's a tense atmosphere and foreboding tone, plot twists that are truly shocking, and a final act that feels so bold it's hard to believe it's in the same show as most of the other episodes, the revelation that Starfleet Admiralty has been taken over by alien parasites feels like it came straight out of a Roger Corman B. Whisker-Twirling Villain movie. mocking the worms. Fistfights on the Enterprise and phaser fights at Starfleet Headquarters.

It all seems miraculous considering Roddenberry's demands for a peaceful utopian future where everyone gets along, Roddenberry himself, though he was also frustrated by some persistent notes from Paramount superiors, just as Tormey wrote his script in an attempt to deliberately antagonize to Roddenberry. It is possible that Roddenberry commissioned this episode to antagonize Paramount executives. It was Roddenberry who insisted on the bloody demise of Commander Remick, who had been taken by the queen of these alien parasites. The Conspiracy is one of the few episodes that feels truly fresh and exciting from Season 1 and remains a first for fans of the show.

An episode Nobody on Staff was expected to be made, but somehow it was after the first season ended with the Neutral Zone episode that saw the reintroduction of the Star Trek Romulans. The next generation was essentially in the same place after the Farpoint encounter. Ratings were strong with an average of 10 million. Viewers tuned in for season 1, but critical reception was lukewarm at best and vocal fan reaction continued into season two. Big changes occurred behind the scenes as Roddenberry's health continued to decline. For whatever reason, he essentially named Maurice Hurley as the main writer of the series. show that this was quite strange considering Hurley and Roddenberry frequently clashed during meetings that erupted into shouting matches on several occasions at the beginning of the second season.

Roddenberry and his wife Majel Barrett took a vacation, leaving Hurley in charge. This abrupt change in leadership left many writers behind. angry and resentful dc fontana david gerald and bob justman had been with star

trek

since its inception and were well versed in science fiction, they found it disconcerting to have to respond to Hurley, who had never written any science fiction before and was not into all familiar with Star Trek, if the accounts of many TNG writers are to be believed, Hurley perhaps could have made more of an effort with the production team, however, he was in an incredibly difficult position, he and Berman chose to try Adhere to Roddenberry's vision as much as possible. maintaining the edict of no character conflict as much as possible, however, by their own admission, Burma and Hurley did not fully believe in Roddenberry's vision of the future, which meant they often took an absolutist approach to this philosophy. of narration, while many of the writers considered that these edicts First, it would be unreasonable to constantly fight against them to craft their stories.

Roddenberry himself was sometimes very inconsistent with his own rules, as in the aforementioned conspiracy episode, this worsened the already volatile work environment and eventually led to DC Fontana, Bob Justman and David Gerald, leaving. During the second season, one departure from the cast was Gates Mcfadden as Beverly Crusher. The exact reasons cited over the years have been numerous and contradictory. A diplomatic explanation from Hurley and John Pike was that the Beverly Crusher character was simply, quote-unquote, not working. I've speculated about Hurley's personal dislike of Mcfadden for one reason or another. Instead, the character of Dr. Pulaski was added to the ensemble played by Diane Mulder, who previously appeared on Star Trek, the original series.

Another important addition to the show was the recurring character of Gainen played by Whoopi Goldberg, being a huge fan of Star Trek, the original series, she originally asked Levar Burton to convince Paramount executives to offer her a role for the first season, although this request rose to prominence when they assumed it was a joke. An Academy Award-winning actress and acclaimed theater performer, executives pondered why someone with that kind of star power would want to be cast in a low-budget syndicated sci-fi show, eventually in a meeting with Roddenberry Goldberg explaining that When she was growing up as a young sci-fi Star Trek fan from the original series, it was the first time she saw herself represented on screen through the character of Ahura and she wanted to continue that legacy for the next generation, understanding the importance of this.

Roddenberry created the character of Gainan for the actress, while that of Pulaski. Additionally, in season 2 it is a topic of much debate between the Trekkies and the production staff. One universally loved edit in season 2 was Riker's beard, so the next day, Roddenberry, uh, Michael Westmore, the king of makeup, did all the shows, something we wouldn't hear about on stage later. They showed it on camera whether they liked or didn't like the hair stuck in their face, so this went on and on until six months later, a mid-level executive sent a memo contrasting the TV language of jumping the shark. has coined since then. the phrase growing a beard to describe the moment when a show begins to improve in quality and this is true for the second season of Star Trek the Next Generation, although it still suffers from many of the problems that the first season had, it has episodes of highest caliber and even some absolute classics, however, before highlighting those classics, I wanted to mention one that I especially like, where silence has lease while exploring space, the company finds a strange hole of some kind that does not emit any reading After failing to learn more, the mysterious void soon engulfs the entire ship where the crew subsequently encounters a series of strange events that defy all logic.

This is an episode I love simply because of how genuinely creepy and disorienting it is. The initial encounter with the anomaly leaves the viewer as bewildered as the characters. and like any good horror story, you want to reach the screen and beg the characters to turn around and run, but instead they move further inward, watching in anticipation and wondering what new disconcerting thing will happen next as the entire understanding of time and space slowly disintegrates. The Enterprise team is perhaps a little disappointed when it is revealed that the puppet master of these events is an alien entity calling itself Nagilum.

He subjected the Enterprise team to a series of experiments. The concept of a divine entity playing with our heroes was something that nailed it. old for the original series, but here it feels fresh again rather than being subject to the embarrassment of something like Plato's Stepchildren, where silence has lease brings back that sense of real danger that the company has run into something truly beyond them; It can be built on a family basis. premise, but the visuals and atmosphere of this episode are something that really sticks with you, the new character of dr. Pulaski is often dismissed or outright vilified by many Next Generation fans and it's understandable considering she replaced beloved Beverly Crusher in less than Ideal Circumstances, but I've never personally disliked the character of Dr.

Pulaski that much. I see what the writers were going for in trying to bring back that archetype of Dr. McCoy, someone more cynical and down-to-earth to counteract the angelic superhuman gene that Roddenberry sought to create. Dion Mulder gives us a solid performance throughout the season, but Pulaski often falls victim to a lack of character development, which also hindered most of the rest of the cast, but if there is one episode where Pulaski was used well to complement a story, it's elementary facts, darlings, jordy leforge becomes frustrated with the facts after he takes the fun out of solving a sherlock holmes style mystery by spoiling the ending by overhearing their conversation, pulpaski claims that the facts are simply unable to solve a true Sherlock Holmes mystery due to their lack of human intuition and instinct, so the characters enter into a challenge by programming a new antagonist for Data to face, however this inadvertently leads to the holographic version of James Moriarty gains self-awareness and eventually threatens the ship.

It's a wonderfully strange premise that uses the mechanics of sci-fi technology to evoke. images and settings that aren't possible in any other genre, literally ripping a fictional character from his surroundings and placing him in the Star Trek universe is a stroke of genius and Daniel Davis is excellent as James Moriarty, but what makes the episode What stands out is that it is one of the few early TNGs where the premise is driven solely by the characters, everything that happens happens as a result of the conflicting perspectives and friendly rivalry of Pulaski La Forge and Data, their personalities and individual arcs. and history are woven into the wacky sci-fi plot in In a really fun way, it's also the first Star Trek episode to actually use the holodeck in a way.which isn't simply an excuse to save some money by shooting the main backlot with costumes and props pulled out of storage, rather than whatever the holodeck was used to create.

Unique, eccentric stories allow the writers to really have fun, while those episodes in particular are good examples of typical Star Trek Fair season 2. The measure of a man is his greatest achievement. The company receives a visit from Dr. Bruce Maddox, a leading figure in the field of robotics who asks Data to undergo a risky and dangerous procedure to learn more about him. When Data refuses, Maddox questions Data's right to do so. claiming that he is simply a machine and property of Starfleet, what follows is the trusty courtroom drama format with a truly fascinating case being discussed with some of the best dialogue on the show.

Every one of the actors is in top form here. Stewart's stage experience makes his monologues magnetic to watch the lines. The innate sympathy makes you really feel for Riker when he's forced to lead the case against his friend Brent Spiner, however, had been highlighted since the first episode, though it's worth noting in the first season how much more emotional data they seem to have in them. The second season, his interpretation of the character was more refined with the desire to become human. The heart of data is due to its robotic nature. The actor initially feared being pigeonholed in terms of the types of dramatic material he would be offered today.

He and the writers consistently found rich ideas to explore with the character. This episode is one of the best examples of what is possible when data is the center of a story, but the brilliance of the story is its turn away from questions about sentience and what it means to be alive and towards ideas related to civil rights, the cruel act that societies are capable of when exerting power over so-called disposable creatures, the courtroom drama formula is one that Star Trek would return to many times, but none of those other cost-cutting episodes, in my opinion, at least, was ever as powerful or thought-provoking as the measure of a man, the episode's signal about who is where the next generation began to make a real mark on the larger tail of Star Trek's legacy appears a increasingly offering to join the business team as an advisor to make sure the company doesn't stumble over something it can't do.

Picard's handler refutes this by saying that no matter what may be out there, they are ready for it and see this as a challenge. q launches the company deep into unexplored space seeking to meet the challenge of q. Picard orders the ship to survey the area they will soon come into contact with. an imposing cube-shaped ship this was the introduction of the borg the borg were originally part of an ambitious season long arc that maurice hurley had in mind and was something he was trying to set up in the first season the alien parasites in the conspiracy of The first season were originally intended to be revealed as being sent by the Borg and in the finale, Neutral Zone, the company investigates the disappearance of entire colonies that have been uprooted by an unknown force.

Hurley's plan for the second season when he took over as head writer was for the board. to launch a full-scale invasion of the galaxy and would see the Federation form an unlikely alliance with the Romulan Empire to defeat the Borg in an epic season finale, these plans unfortunately had to be scrapped as a writers' strike halted pre-production of the second season. for several months a relic of hurley's long term plans is the character of ensign sonia gomez played by lucia naff she was destined to become a recurring character and a love interest for jordy jordy would eventually undergo a dangerous operation to cure his blindness so he could look at the woman he loves with his own eyes, the same writer's strike and poor planning around naf's schedule prevented this arc from materializing as well and naf only appeared in one other episode besides this one, very similar to the aforementioned conspiracy. kyuhu demonstrates his willingness to be bold and change things the introduction of the borg would have lasting consequences for the franchise and as a faction they would become an icon in the same league as the klingons or the vulcans.

Their concept makes them the ideal enemy for the federation, as I proposed in other videos on this channel, the central theme of Star Trek is empathy, being parallel to technology, the optimistic future of Gene Roddenberry's vision is a future where human empathy has kept pace with technological advancement allowing devices like replicators to eradicate world hunger rather than being coveted. The benefits of the Borg are a distorted version of this relationship where the obsession with technological advancement has destroyed individuality and created a uniform collective society. In many ways they echo the Cybermen of Doctor Who who see their actions as a twisted form of altruism that benefits other civilizations through assimilation, although in their first appearance, the inner workings of the Borg are slightly different than who became, while kuhu is far from the best borg story, its introduction is very memorable, the characters are forced to leave their comfort zone in the face of an enemy who has no interest in understanding them and with whom they do not It can be reasoned that it is only thanks to Q's reluctant intervention that the ship and its crew were saved.

If Picard and company had found the Borg on their own, the episode makes it clear that they would not have survived due to the writer's strike. the next generation was forced to finish. began its second season with a money-saving clip episode, while critical reception for certain episodes improved and ratings continued to hover around 10 million, marking the angry reaction of fans and the perception of the show as a second-rate sequel. category of the original. The series persisted: Maurice Hurley saw his ambitious plans for the entire season thwarted and was disliked by many members of the staff. He left the show at the end of the second season; despite some improvements, the series was once again left without a showrunner and without a single creative vision to guide it.

A costume change was also necessary because the tight one-piece spandex uniforms had detrimental effects on many cast members, particularly Patrick Stewart suffering from severe back pain. Therefore, for the third season onwards, uniforms were redesigned into two-piece cotton uniforms following the departure of maurice hurley, writer producer michael piller joined the team as the new head writer and showrunner, by all accounts a union of mainstays it effectively saved the next generation virtually overnight. The atmosphere of the writer's room changed significantly due to Roddenberry's deteriorating health, he was forced to take a less active role in the series and, although it was under unfortunate circumstances, this allowed the writers some freedom outside of the guidelines to Roddenberry's strict times, the central pillar philosophy for future stories. was to focus on character first and foremost, the new episodes would adopt a sort of rotating protagonist format where the stories would focus on a single central character, giving them a personal obstacle to overcome with encouraging guidance or sometimes opposition from other members of the team. , this finally paved the way.

In order for the company's team to get the much-needed development, two more important figures also joined the third season. Ronald D Moore, who was only 26 at the time, was hired by Pillar after pitching a specific script for the series to his staff. Known as the Klingon Guru and wrote many of the Klingon-centric stories, the second major figure was writer-producer Ira Stephen Bear, although he only worked on The Next Generation for a single season, he would make sure of it in the later deep space. . Nine Star Trek The Next Generation's third season is an almost shocking leap in quality.

The series as a whole feels much more confident having finally cemented a creative vision separate from the original series rather than struggling to replicate previous hits that the company found the freedom to forge. its own path, the focus on characters results in a much slower pace in many episodes, but the greater emotional depth each story explores more than makes up for this instead of phaser fights or flashy spaceship maneuvers, some of which The most memorable scenes from each episode are simply two. or three of the characters in a room talking about Commander Riker's regular poker games and Gain's intended counseling gave the characters the opportunity to provide commentary on the events of each episode, which also allowed the writers to explore the themes and concepts of these same episodes into much more. details as the show's vocal detractors continued to shout betrayal and other hyperbolic criticism of bad faith, there was a cultural sense that the tide was beginning to turn the different approach to the story in season 3 is readily evident in ronaldi moore's first contribution to the program, the link While on a remote mission commanded by Lieutenant Worf, Marla Astor dies leaving behind her son Jeremy Astor As the ship continues to orbit the planet, a species of entity boards the ship posing as Jeremy's deceased mother and takes him forces him to join her on the planet's surface.

A very underrated episode with a fantastic script and solid performances in my opinion. It's a story that uses the elements of science fiction to address a truly human theme dealing with loss and grief, while the story might have had more impact if the central characters had been Regular rather than One-Time, even so manages to have an impact. What I especially like is the drama it creates between Captain Picard and Wesley Crusher. Forces them both to face difficult truths about their relationship. If this same premise had been used for a season one episode, it's easy to see how these great opportunities for emotional depth and character drama could have been lost in favor of an evil thieving villain. of alien children, but thanks to michael piller's new vision for the series and ronald d moore's talent as a writer, the bond was created is a moving and moving story, episode 15 of the third season is essentially a showcase of the new talent in the writers' room as yesterday's enterprise encounters a temporal anomaly from which the maritime enterprise, the previous ship that bore the name, emerges changing the timeline dramatically now picard commands a Warf warship has disappeared and the Federation is plunged into a brutal conflict with the Klingon Empire;

However, due to Gainan's intuition, the crew soon deduced that if the Enterprise Sea is returned and destroyed during the battle against the Romulans to defend a Klingon outpost this war that the Federation is losing badly could be avoided. It is a brilliant setup. as time travel stories go, but it once again manages to pile on touching moments in unexpected ways, most notably in Tasha Yar's return after having prevented her death during the events of Skin of Evil under this new Tasha Yara's writing team finally get some real depth and one wonders how the show would be different if Denise Crosby had remained part of the cast once again, the focus on the character becomes a classic time travel plot .

Set in a tense emotional drama, it is ultimately a story about self-sacrifice, no one knows for sure if Gainan's intuition is correct, the only certainty for anyone during the final act of this episode is death in battle, but it is this capacity for self-sacrifice. hoping to forge a better future that defines many of Star Trek's central themes and turns yesterday's enterprise into another classic episode, a slightly underappreciated episode this season is another data-centric story, the son, to a surprise of all, the data reveals that he has created a A child for himself who grows into a young woman called low offspring evokes similar ideas as the measurement of a man, although with a slightly different twist.

Naturally, Data sees this as a perfectly ordinary act with himself as the default father figure, however, due to his status. As artificial life forms, the creation of a second positronic android sends many Starfleet higher-ups into a panic, and the visiting Admiral Haftel suggests forcibly removing Lyle from custody of the data while debates continue. la develops rapidly and eventually exceedsthe emotional capacities of the data itself. Hayley Todd's performance is simply wonderful, she echoes many of Brent Spiner's own mannerisms, but instills the character with a unique personality. What makes the story especially powerful is the tragedy of it.

A reset button of sorts hangs over the episode like a sword of Damocles from the pre-title sequence, though that doesn't make it any less sad when LOL's rapid development leads to an irreparable failure of its systems. I have to say that on my most recent rewatch I was fighting back tears during this particular scene, thank you for my life. Illustrative of how much the writing improved for the next generation, that farewell scene between two emotionless robots can be so heartbreaking, though a later, more light-hearted episode was the introduction of a fan-favorite character into hollow pursuits, the hapless Reginald Barkley Slacks. in his engineering duties to spend more time in a holodeck fantasy world where he can play a capable and confident womanizer and swordsman who confronts Wright's holographic counterparts of those he often ends up on the wrong side of.

When Jordy discovers his fantasy life, he goes out of his way to try and help Barkley get out of it. perhaps as a response to the two sometimes perfect and morally upright superhuman futures of Roddenberry Barkley's earlier edicts, he appears as a much more relatable character to the audience, someone who feels nervous in social situations has shaky confidence at best and is not completely enamored with life aboard a spaceship, most likely describing aspects of a good portion of the show's audience; It's a refreshing change of pace and Dwight Schultz is sublime in the role, using his skills as a professional character actor to effortlessly switch between Barkley's fantasy life and real life, the warped holodeck versions of the main characters, They were certainly very funny for the actors and certainly very funny for the viewer.

Not surprisingly, Barkley appeared in several more episodes and made more appearances in the future. The third season of the Star Trek spin-offs had clearly won over many critics as it came to an end, the show was about to surpass the episode count of the original series, but it was the end of the third season the one that would see the next generation surpass its predecessor. As the definitive incarnation of the franchise in the minds of many viewers, this was the best of both worlds. One year after their first meeting, the Federation's worst nightmare comes true when the Borg launch an invasion of the Federation and the frontline. of defense is the enterprise, as well as a sign that the Borg in their second appearance feel like an insurmountable threat and the viewer does not really know how our heroes can succeed without him being there as a deus ex machina available after having worked 24 hours a day to develop a new weapon against the Borg, the Enterprise successfully engages the enemy ship, but with reinforcements many days away, it is an almost hopeless battle.

The episode's character drama comes in the form of Commander Shelby, a Borg specialist posted to the Enterprise who seeks to replace Ryker as first officer since he has been offered his own command, this puts Riker in a difficult situation as he He suddenly finds himself unsure of his ultimate goal with his Starfleet career and overshadowed by a younger, more ambitious officer. Riker's character arc is cleverly used to prolong the tension and almost torture the audience. As various pieces of the plot information puzzle come together at the end of the episode, Riker is unsure about taking responsibility and becoming Captain Picard is kidnapped from the company bridge, an away team searches for him at first, and He only finds his uniform, which aggravates the feeling of dread.

The audience senses that this leads to the surprise that Picard, our stalwart captain, has been assimilated into the Borg collective with a rescue mission deemed impossible and with only one chance to use his new weapon, the episode comes to a foregone conclusion. . Mr. Wharf Fire, this was the time for the hearing. They knew they could no longer deny the resounding success of the Star Trek series: The Next Generation had established itself as a definitive new incarnation of Star Trek rather than a cheap imitation, and a shrinking vocal minority insisted that it was the show that who had enjoyed three seasons with an average. audience of 10 million viewers, the third season earned a total of eight Emmy nominations, among other prestigious awards.

Hardcore Trekkies and casual viewers alike spent the summer of 1990 agonizing over the fate of Jean-Luc Picard at a time when Patrick Stewart had not yet renewed his contract. With the series and writers fully prepared, a version of the best of both worlds part 2, in which the series would continue with Riker as captain, thanks to the dedicated efforts of some fans, this fact was known to a large number of viewers, which further increased their anticipation. For the second part, the fourth season had the potential to be something of a victory lap for the production team, after the behind-the-scenes chaos of the first seasons, The Next Generation has successfully established itself as must-see television for millions of homes around the world instead of trying to repair the damage of previous seasons, their only obstacle now was how they could top their previous efforts by joining the production staff for the fourth season onwards, where writers, producers Brannon Braga and Jerry taylor as ron moore and ira stephen bear braga and taylor would go on to become key creative voices in the star trek franchise for the following decade.

This was a team that worked very well together and helped shape some of the best Star Trek stories, but their first task was to wrap up the cliffhanger they had left their audience on immediately after the conclusion. from part one the company's new weapon failed due to the borg gaining knowledge from captain picard and successfully adapting now with riker as acting captain the company takes the borg to earth desperately trying to think of a new plan before time runs out, I could only imagine the feeling of excitement when The Best of Both Worlds Part 2 finally aired, but watch it today with the benefit of airing Part 2 is not as strong as the first part, that That's not to say it's bad, in fact it's easily one of the show's best episodes, but this epic conclusion feels a bit contrived in the end, the tension and drama carried over from the first part with the company closely chasing the cube. borg, there is a lot at stake after the famous battle of wolf 359, although we do not. see the battle itself, the consequences are devastating after an entire fleet failed to stop the borg, what hope does the company have as Riker, having been shoved into the captain's chair, is forced to take on the immense responsibility that you so wanted to avoid later?

All the build-up, although the resolution seems too easy after captain Picard was deemed impossible to rescue at the end of the first half, here an away team can achieve that goal, although it requires some clever maneuvering, the sequence would have benefited. of one or two major obstacles to overcome the pacing of the final act also feels a little out of place, there's all this buildup to the enterprise intercepting borg land, but the payoff is too drawn out to be a true moment of triumph in air and after Riker reaches what seems to be the logical conclusion of his character arc, either becoming captain of his own ship or captain of his own company, a reset button of sorts is pressed that returns him to the first company officer and Picard reinstates his captain, however, the final shot of the episode manages to elide this feeling of turning back after Picard is left alone in his prepared room, leaves his notebook and stares into space with the remains of the borg implants still visible.

Clearly not everything is back to normal and it is this thread that makes the next episode essential as the family revisits the best of both worlds. It sees the Enterprise remain in Earth orbit for repairs while docked the crew is takes some personal time Worf reunites with his adoptive parents Beverly gives Wesley a message from his late father and Picard returns to his childhood home to visit his brother's family. It's a slow pace. plot without spatial anomalies or alien worlds, but the time spent with the characters in a set of emotional personal stories is well earned.

Wharf parents are honestly wonderful. It's the last thing audiences would expect from the parents of a stone-faced Klingon warrior, but. It is in the playfulness of these conflicting personalities that we get our first detailed glimpse of Wharf's central being: a man torn between two worlds and two identities. He clearly loves his parents and they clearly love him, but as a Klingon he struggles to express those feelings in the meantime. Wheaton and Gates Mcfadden each give one of their best performances of the show at this point. Wesley Crusher, as a character, was often looked down upon by many fans of the show, feeling that it was implausible that a quote-unquote child would always save the more mature ones. trained starfleet officers, although the number of times quote unquote wesley saved the crew has been wildly exaggerated, the writing for the character was pretty sparse, but that's true of everyone in the previous seasons.

Season 3 was the first time Wesley really felt like a real person who makes mistakes and is the subject of some decent drama in the Wesley family. Seeing his father's recorded message is really touching, however, it's Picard's thread in Earth which is the highlight of the episode, after his ordeal with the Borg, he feels unsure of his place in Starfleet. Even considering resigning from his position entirely, all he wants upon returning home is some kind of stability, but years of pent-up conflict with his older brother prevent that from happening. When this passive aggression finally boils over, the two brothers finally make amends. peace when the full magnitude of Picard's trauma becomes clear after overcoming such incredible odds as the show's family, it's a welcome break from the expected Star Trek format and a necessary addition to the season, but that doesn't mean the next generation would not continue to excite us with news about this. world adventures one of my favorite sci-fi episodic outings this season is the twilight question remember me while wesley and jordy work on a warp bubble experiment in engineering beverly crusher welcomes old friend galen quais aboard the ship however al The next day Quace has already mysteriously disappeared along with all the records of him that ever existed when she enlists the crew's help to investigate, she discovers that more and more passengers and crew are disappearing and only she remembers they ever existed.

It's a terrifying story built on such a simple premise with a creepy story. the atmosphere slowly builds as Beverly begins to question her own sanity, until the disappearance becomes so obvious and the reality around her quickly disintegrates. I always felt like Beverly Crusher was a woefully underwritten character that Gates Mcfadden practically had to create from the ground up. In terms of personality and character traits, Remember Me is an example of the often untapped potential of centering episodes around her because she rarely spends her time on the bridge of the Enterprise showing a story from her perspective, showing us a side of the ship operations that I usually don't see Dr.

Crusher interact with many characters who are usually reduced to background extras in other episodes. She almost feels like an outsider to the rest of the bridge team, working from a sort of bottom-up perspective. Remind me, it's a sample of this. Crusher's unique perspective and different approach to problem solving. Leforge and Data often solve problems using scientific or engineering knowledge, but not only does Crusher not have this knowledge, she also does not have colleagues like Leforge or Data available to make these suggestions. Her stories are often driven by intuition and foreboding, and it's truly exciting stuff, as Crusher uses her greatly disadvantaged position to deduce what exactly is happening and boldly escape back to normal as the universe itself collapses. around her.

It is a contained but captivating world. episode with a character-centric perspective that only heightens the emotion, something that is also true for the next episode. I want to highlight that the wounded is an episode that has alreadyI mentioned in my evolution of the Cardassians story, as it was their debut appearance, former enemy of the Federation the Cardassians are enraged to discover a rebel Starfleet captain attacking Cardassian ships determined not to start another war the company pursues the royal captain so he can explain his actions what i want to highlight this time however is the character that miles o'brien cole created his first appearance in the first episode of the next generation playing an unnamed officer simply referred to as khan .

He made a handful of other appearances operating the transporters, but it wasn't until the second season that the character had a name since then, O'Brien served as a likable recurring character who could always help with the team's efforts and help with some of the team's challenges. engineering here and there, eventually his personal life also developed by marrying keiko ishikawa's character on the episode data day, however, in the injured mini he is given the opportunity to flex. flexing his acting muscles and further establishing O'brien as a fan-favorite character after serving under the now-rebel captain Maxwell O'Brien is forced to confront a lingering guilt he has carried since his time serving in the cardassian wars the cardassians themselves are written with great pathos instead of villains with twisted mustaches instead of a great ideological struggle like the federation's conflict with the klingons, we get the feeling that the cardassian wars were more morally ambivalent, a bloody conflict and petty where black and white terms like hero and villain don't apply as easily.

The episode uses O'Brien's character, often juxtaposed with these Starfleet officers in the main cast to effectively comment on the lasting consequences of such a conflict. Captain Maxwell himself, played by guest star Rob Gunton, is also not a cartoonish villain, but rather a sad, broken man unable to let go of the past. It's a big departure from the utopian future with the morally perfect characters that Gene Roddenberry had in mind, but it makes for a powerfully tragic story. The Best of Both Worlds has established a tradition of ending each subsequent season. of the Next Generation with a two-part episode, a cliffhanger to keep audience anticipation high for the following year, season 4 rounded out the summer of 1991 with Redemption, Part 1.

Likewise, with Wesley Crusher, The Next Generation Klingon-centric episodes are something I noticed during my recent rewatch of this video. I remember when I was younger I didn't like these episodes because they were, quote, unquote, boring. I perceived them as a solid hour of burly men standing around complaining about honor, but now that I'm older I can understand the story better. They are the highlight of the program. The Klingon identity seen in TNG was first solidified in Star Trek Three: The Search for Spock, when Harv Bennett and Leonard Nimoy drew heavy inspiration from Japanese samurai. for their characterization as they progressed, they also took on some Viking influence with Stovokor acting as a Klingon Valhalla and death and glorious battle being a laudable ambition in Klingon culture within the Star Trek universe.

The Klingon-centric stories offer a glimpse of a rubber e. Howard type fantasy setting only with sci-fi trappings. Noble houses vying for power in a long-standing empire frequently erupt into ritual competitions and one-on-one duels. These are elements straight out of a fantasy or historical fiction novel, but in context with the rest of the Star Trek universe, these Klingon stories are welcome and exciting departures from the norm. Redemption takes years to reach the conclusion of an overarching subplot surrounding the pier. The seeds of this plot were planted early in the season. Warf's Heart of Glory confronts two Klingon fugitives who still believe in waging war with the Federation is a solid episode in one of the few truly character-driven stories of the first year that allowed Michael Dorne to show the potential of her character through the sheer power of her performance alone in the season. 2 this potential was further exploited with the emissary in which Worf works and eventually falls in love with the half-human half-klingon klar played to excellence by susie plaxen the following year gave us sins of the father which introduced another great guest star and fan.

Kern, Worf's favorite brother, played by Tony Todd. Here we learn of a shameful cover-up by the House of Duras in which the blame for a Romulan attack on the Klingon outpost Kittimer was falsely placed on Worf's father, which disgraced his family and exiled him from the Empire itself and Previous season four reunions saw this plot continue with Kalor's return after having given birth to Wolf's son, Alexander, and saw two powerful figures compete to become the next leader of the Klingon Empire, the treacherous Duras and gauran played by robert o'reilly, another one. Fan favorite character When Dirac is exposed as a Romulan puppet Kailar's shocking murder drives Worf into a deal with Duras which he narrowly wins by defeating his nemesis for good redemption See the consequences of these events with the Kligon Empire descending to a brutal civil war War precipitated by the sisters Lirsa and Baitor of the late Duras.

It's a truly epic story as Warf leaves the company to join his brother in battle, while Picard seeks to prove Romulan involvement in the conflict led by the villainous Selah after leaving the show in the first season. Denise Crosby was stunned to see how much the show had improved and asked the producers for a way to return to the series. Sila is revealed to be the daughter of alternate timeline Tasha Yar from Yesterday's Company, while Crosby may have been frustrated by the lack of anything good. material for tasha yar she does an excellent job as sila this two-part film is the next generation as a large-scale space opera depicting fleets of spaceships, intense showdowns, lots of fast-paced action and lots of twists, surprises and betrayals, but thanks once again.

For Michael Piller's core philosophy of character-driven plots, there's also plenty of fantastic drama to enjoy, obviously, there are wars fighting to restore his family name to the empire while still struggling with his divided cultural identity, Picard, and the company's team. who is reeling from the encounter with Selah. remembering his lost friend and a third subplot in the second part sees Data take command of his own ship clashing with his first officer who does not believe an android is suitable to be the captain of a ship. It's worth remembering that this was in 1991 before the debut of the upcoming Star Trek spinoff, Deep Space Nine, and another seminal sci-fi show, Babylon 5.

This was the first time a space opera like this was attempted with a television budget. The big clashes between space-faring nations were the stuff of big-screen action adventures like Star Wars, but despite limited resources, Redemption parts 1 and 2 are absolute triumphs and another high benchmark for the next generation as a whole early in the fifth season, during the production of the Hero Warship episode, the cast and crew were summoned to an unscheduled meeting there they learned. The news that Gene Roddenberry had died that same day, since the second season of the series, his health had worsened, preventing him from actively participating in the show's run, he died of cardiopulmonary arrest on October 2, 1991.

Although I have been critical of the man in this series of videos and in some others on this channel. Star Trek, the universe and the stories that I have loved so much throughout my life began with him, there would be no Star Trek without him and that, despite Gene Roddenberry. The very human flaws are something I will always be grateful for. Season 5 is another set of high-quality Star Trek stories. Honestly, from season 3 onwards it's been incredibly difficult to choose which episodes I want to highlight, for example this season saw the return of the borg with the introduction of hugh in iborg, as well as the hugo award winning episode the light within, without I'm sure there will be a lot of comments under this video asking why I didn't highlight certain ones, but as I said before, I want to balance exploring episodes that are known to be great with some of my personal favorites, hence the first season 5 outing I wanted. highlight is a disaster, while on a routine voyage the company is hit by a quantum filament that severely damages the ship abandoning it. adrift with many of the characters isolated from one another as the danger of a breach in the warped core, among other threats, begins to mount.

Stranded groups of passengers and crew have to band together to save the ship and themselves. Now I am someone who grew up loving. Disaster Movies Towering Inferno Poseidon's Adventure Even The Tornado Roland Emmerich's 2012 4K Blu-ray sits proudly on my shelf, so using this formula for a Star Trek episode seemed like a gift to my childhood. Rowan's initial disaster is a nice touch of practical effects and stunt work, but it's the individual threads of each character combination that always make Picard enjoyable to revisit. Admittedly awkward around children and naturally trapped in a turbolift with three of them, Jordy and Beverly have to devise their way to avoid being killed by radiation.

From a plasma fire, Data and Riker embark on a complicated journey into engineering and the dwarf gets stuck with Caico O'Brien because he's having a baby. congratulations, you are fully dilated to 10 centimeters, you can now give birth, but the most interesting thread takes place on the bridge when Deanna Troy is unexpectedly put in command as the It's a shame to say, senior officer, but Marina Certais was often poorly served over the course of the show when researching this video, reading the above character summary about Troy almost made me laugh. The idea of ​​Troy being a wise and highly intelligent character was rarely followed through with Troy's empathic abilities being basically as useful as the writers decided they were depending on the episode and most of the counseling was best executed by Gainan, who he effectively supplanted troy as the intelligent emotional healer sage, while there are some solid troys out there.

Focused episodes for the most part, the character was stuck with some really poor scripts such as the child rape and the subsequent man of the town in the disaster, however Troy is given solid material as he unexpectedly finds himself in a position of leadership joining her on the bridge. She is Ensign Fila Laryn played by Michelle Forbes, the troubled and insubordinate Starfleet officer who has escaped the horrors of the Cardassian occupation on her homeworld. She has a naturally cynical outlook, assuming that everyone else on the ship is probably dead and that the best option is to separate the saucer. section before the central breach, meanwhile, O'Brien is the much stricter officer who tries to support Troy but also doesn't sugarcoat the situation, but in the end it's thanks to Troy's empathetic nature that leads her to cling to hope a lot. beyond logic.

Deadline finally saving the ship is a simple arc but it's some of the best material given to the character and he certainly delivers a solid performance throughout his contained episode with no profound consequences for the rest of the season, but I've always Had a Gentle Place to Disaster is a tried and true formula based on great characters and fun suspense sequences. I have no idea if anyone else thinks of this as fondly, but certainly a highly publicized double-parter this season was Unification, in which Leonard Nimoy reprized the role. Spock is seen after Spock on Romulus Picard and data is sent to investigate, discovering that Spock is leading an underground movement seeking to reform Romulan society and even unify with Vulcan in the future;

However, this move is soon discovered by Sela, who uses the inner workings of the plan on him. Invade Vulcan While there are many strong aspects to this episode, it has never been one of my personal favorites, while Picard and Spock's reunion is a fan-pleasing event. I've always found the plot thread in the second part quite boring and the Romulan plan to invade Vulcan. It's, oddly enough, quite illogical to me, the real highlight of the episode being the subplot of the company uncovering the Romulan invasion plan. It takes place primarily on the fringes of Federation space, in the seedier part of this generally bright future that we recently got a better look at in Star Trek Picard.

What really works in the episode, however, are the elements that areCarried over from the season 3 episode, Saric Mark Leonard is exceptional as always and the connection shared between Saric and Picard becomes a conduit for Spock to effectively say goodbye. his father is very touching the two part season finale is yet another episode that I think is quite underrated. The Enterprise team is shocked to discover Data's severed head buried in a cave on Earth for over 500 years, shortly after mysterious aliens were discovered on the planet Davidia 2 is powered by human synaptic energy drawn from humans of the past, specifically 1893.

Although my favorite sci-fi property is Star Trek, I'm also very fond of the UK's own doctor, Who, and Time's Arrow is an episode that echoes many of Doctor Who. own adornments to great effect, intentional or not, a strange mystery that can only be solved by a temporal paradox. Disguised aliens prowling these seemingly ordinary streets of a familiar place, and of course bumping into famous historical figures, although, truth be told, the high-pitched, relentlessly irritable tone. The voice used by Jerry Hardin while playing Samuel Clemens, aka Mark Twain, becomes very irritating after a while, but the highlight is Whoopi Goldberg as a younger, almost teenage version of Gainan, with whom the team Enterprise unexpectedly runs into.

It's a fun and charming time travel story with lots of welcome humor and an enigmatic plot that comes together satisfyingly at the end, if you're a Trekkie who likes this episode I recommend checking out the sci-fi show on the other side del charco if you haven't seen the sixth season of the show yet. The show saw some changes behind the scenes and in front of the camera. This season aired almost simultaneously with the first season of Deep Space Nine, so Michael Piller and Rick Berman had to split their time between the two shows, with Jerry Taylor as co-director.

Position with mainstay in TNG Also thanks to the debut of DS9 Chief O'Brien had become a fan favorite, he was promoted to regular cast member for the new spin-off. He appears in a few episodes of the sixth season before his departure is shown. In a touching scene during the first installment of Deep Space Nine, the sixth season overall maintains the show's expected high caliber of episodes at this point, which once again made choosing which episodes to highlight a difficult task - obviously, there are many more strong stories in which i'll mention it, but I think I've made a good selection.

Relics sees the company encounter a Dyson sphere where a brown Starfleet ship has kept Montgomery Scott suspended in its transport shock after being reconstituted. Scotty struggles to find his place in the 24th century while the rest of the team tries to learn more about the sphere. Despite how iconic the original series' supporting cast is, Scottie Chekhov was very rarely given any real sulu and ahura material. Character-based, there were exceptions, but for the most part these characters served as plot devices or tools for exposition in Relics. James Dewan delivers an endearing performance as Scotty finds himself increasingly out of date;

It's also a chance for the writers to show how the Star Trek franchise had evolved by that point, the grittier, cowboy-style swagger of the original series clashes harshly with the more progressive next generation, not only does the episode give more to do, but the same goes for levar burton burton was always likable as jordi laforge, but very few laforge-centric episodes are as strong as season four's booby trap and its follow-up, galaxy boy, demonstrates some very dated sexual politics and, in fact, he made leforge turn out rather poorly for more enlightened modern sensibilities. His attempts to try to work together with Scotty's past offer a glimpse into some missed opportunities with a character like Leforge.

The Starfleet Engineer Corps books have shown what is possible when they are technically minded and take the lead in a Star Trek story rather than playing second fiddle to the traditionally command-focused protagonist. A much darker episode this season involves the Schisms, Riker Wharf, Jordy, and a handful of other crew members. and passengers have had trouble sleeping and experienced strange reactions to everyday objects, while a spatial anomaly of some kind has appeared in one of the cargo compartments. Finally, it becomes clear that the company has been infiltrated by an extradimensional race that has been abducting. people from the ship and conducting experiments on them, a scene that has always stuck with me in this episode is when the affected group gathers on the holodeck to try to understand what has been troubling them, the feeling of fear slowly growing throughout. throughout the scene as each person. gradually contributing half-remembered parts of the image to the whole as the room falls into darkness and the shadows fill with distant alien sounds, a sense of chilling terror is instilled in the characters and the viewer.

I've been in this room before. We've all been here before the final act of the episode when the aliens are seen is a little disappointing, much brighter and the creature design is a little disappointing, but in the end, the unknowable nature of these beings and their callous treatment of other forms of life is something that really manages to get under your skin the tapestry is easily one of the best character-driven stories in the entire show jean-luc picard's artificial heart is damaged during a mission that leads to his death He finds himself in an empty white sky where he meets Q after the usual verbal joust that gives Picard the opportunity to go back in time and avoid the fight with a Nausican that led to him getting his artificial heart in the first place, thus avoiding His death in the present is once again a showcase of Patrick Stewart in arguably his most famous role since their encounter in Farpoint, audiences became much more familiar with the inner workings of his character, understanding Picard's values ​​and traits. which make him not only an excellent starship captain but also an incredibly loyal friend. and mentor, he wholeheartedly believes in Starfleet's mission statement and upholds the ideals of the Federation even to his own detriment, but it's also clear that he would throw away his career in an instant if it meant helping someone else.

The tapestry shows us a more fallible side to the character as he attempts to rewrite what he sees as past mistakes from his youth, but in doing so he alienates his closest friends and, although he manages to avoid the fight, the life he has returned to is horrible for Picard, having led a life that never takes risks, he discovers that he is not a captain of the company or any ship, except a humble junior scientific officer, apparently with no real friends on board the ship and no real career prospects with his life. previous in ruins, Picard begs Q to let him die like the man he was rather than continue with what he has witnessed is a deeply intimate and personal story, something akin to a Charles Dickens story, but with its trappings. science fiction, This is the sixth season of Star Trek in its darkest zone concluded with another solid two-part descent that saw the return of the data.

The ill-fated story of the twin brother in the seventh year of the series, although Paramount had been enjoying the immense success of the show for quite some time, The Next Generation had been a huge success and its characters were so beloved that the studio's higher-ups believed that This cast was now strong enough to carry a new set of Star Trek films, while the cast and crew were contracted for an eighth season, this renewal was reversed, which was technically a cancellation, but not in practice. , contractual obligations for another season would be fulfilled for the next season. The featurettes were cut and the writers were given enough time to write a proper ending for the show due to this slight change of plans, although season 7 feels a little strange since the final year of the next generation if the writers would have known this would be the last set.

Of the tng episodes, they probably would have tried to wrap up a few more threads or create some more impactful stories, but instead, season 7 continues as usual, make no mistake, it's just as strong overall as seasons 4-6, but Maybe it missed an opportunity to try to make it the best season of the show either way, it has some of my favorite episodes, like the two-part Big Tactic, the crew of the Enterprise is shocked when they hear that Captain Picard has been killed while Searching for an ancient artifact, while the company attempts to track down the culprits, they encounter a ragtag group of bandits and mercenaries searching star systems for the same artifacts Picard was searching for.

Piccard himself joined the crew under the guise of a smuggler as he unified upon seeing this. more space, the western side of the Star Trek universe is always a delight and the Indiana Jones-style search for the Macguffin across many worlds is endlessly fun. What's funnier is the subterfuge Picard and Riker maintain as they outsmart their tyrannical captain. Thinking they are sworn enemies, it is always welcome to see established characters break out of their usual roles, similarly, in the company, Data has taken command and his frequent clashes with acting First Officer Wharf create a brilliant dialogue between the two.

It's a wonderfully fun game full of memorable moments. unique characters, lots of solid twists and turns, and overall it's just an excellent Star Trek adventure. An episode that feels appropriate for generations to come last season is the former commanding officer of the Pegasus Riker, now Admiral Eric Pressman coming aboard with a mission for the company. He finds the lost Federation science ship, the USS Pegasus, before it falls into Romulan hands. Jonathan Freaks never phoned in a performance during the show's seven seasons, but occasionally the writers took their Kirk influences too far, a notable example being in the season. 6-episode chain of command in which Captain Jelico's perfectly reasonable demands are met with blatant disobedience and a self-titled dismissal from Riker.

In many cases, Riker was perhaps too infallible a character who opposed authority but always had the script on his side in The Pegasus. However, Riker finds himself in a much more difficult scenario with some regrettable past actions coming back to haunt him. Even Picard, one of his closest friends, comes to view Riker with suspicion and doubt when signs of a cover-up come to light. The conflict in question was due to Pegasus developing an experimental cloaking device in blatant violation of a federation treaty with the Romulan Empire, while Riker in his youth sided with Pressman during his time in the company and mentoring of Picard persuading him to come clean and admit his wrongdoings, while the consequences of his actions are disappointingly left off-screen, is easily the best Riker-centric episode.

The stories focusing on Riker were, on the whole, consistently pretty good, but maybe there was an opportunity to do something a little newer with the classic Kirk archetype as it was. Glimpsed in The Pegasus Another highlight of the final season is an episode that doesn't much concern the main cast at all, instead the focus shifts to a group of low-ranking officers on the lower floors of the episode, obviously the episode that inspired the recent animated entry into the lower floors of the franchise is shown as a typical business mission from a new perspective rather than the veteran space adventurers we've come to know, this tight-knit group expresses apprehension about the upcoming missions and nervousness regarding their burgeoning careers in starfleet.

Something I especially like is the inclusion of the already established recurring character, Nurse Ogawa, as well as Bajoran. Saito Jaxa, who previously appeared in the fifth season's first duty alongside Wesley Crusher, from the perspective of these Below Decks officers, the regular cast whom audiences have come to know and love is presented in a new light, the warm and fatherly Picard comes across as terrifying. and intimidating presence the charming and funny riker seems passive-aggressive and irritable the formidable and dominant worf acts as a wise and encouraging yet firm teacher i think it's a shame that wesley crusher was no longer a regular character on the show at this point as he It would also have been interesting to see how these young officers interacted with him.

The episode becomes even more shocking, though when Saito dies tragically in theline of duty, the loss is deeply felt by everyone and ultimately unites both groups because in the end it doesn't matter. Everyone stands shoulder to shoulder with each other. Season 7 featured many more episodic adventures, but as I mentioned before, some episodes really feel like final season material with the exception of Roe Laren's departure in the penultimate preemptive strike, however, the task. Putting an end to The Next Generation after seven years fell to writers Brannan Braga and Ronald D Moore. After a month of hard work, the duo delivered their final draft for the series' final episode, appropriately titled All the Good Things in the final two-part episode.

Captain Picard finds himself trapped in time moving seemingly randomly between his past, present and future as he and the crew struggle to understand what is happening to him. The Enterprise is sent to investigate a space anomaly that has appeared in the neutral zone. The mystery of the unfolding of events is magnified when Q appears once again, revealing that humanity is still on trial as it has been since the encounter at Farpoint and cryptically stating that the human race will be destroyed as a result of one's own actions. of Picard. The story must have been incredibly difficult to write.

Structurally, the time jumps are as disorienting for the audience as they are for Picard for most of the first half, we spend time exploring the events of each time period, the events just before the encounter at the far point take on life in great detail, providing Returns to the uniforms from the first two seasons, as well as Denise Crosby as Tasha Yar, meanwhile, in the future, a retired Picard tends to his family's vineyard. Leforge now uses artificial eyes. A more emotional data title. Oxford University. Beverly Crusher married and later divorced Jean-Luc. Meanwhile, she now commands her own medical ship, Riker and Wharf have become antagonistic to each other as a result of the tragic death of Diana Troy.

Both periods offer plenty of entertainment for long-time viewers of the show, as the established events of the first episode are altered by Picard's actions and the future offers a tantalizingly dark vision of what could become of these beloved characters. The real wonder of the episode is how its narrative structure itself is used as a plot device in which Picard slowly realizes how his actions could lead to the end of humanity and recognizes a temporal paradox created by the anomaly, which What was a disorienting jump between locations and characters becomes a strength that allows Picard to successfully coordinate with all three time periods and avoid the coming disaster.

The build-up towards the end is a truly rewarding punch-the-air sequence, but it's the final moments that really make all the good things one last triumphant exit from the show. picard shares one last scene with q in which the omnipotent trickster finally grants the great sense of potential in all humans and then a true goodbye to the team with picard finally joining riker's poker game after all this time the beautiful music of dennis mccarthy and stewart's understated, moving performance really pull at your heartstrings i should have done this a long time ago you were always welcome star trek the next generation did what many people considered impossible, but that seems to be what star trek in their ensemble does better: going from a canceled flop to a blockbuster franchise and cultural icon was already unheard of, but for the next generation to do it all over again. is simply amazing despite all the odds the show and its creative team persevered and it was difficult for the characters to be seen as cheap imitations of well-known and beloved names, but they eventually became just as loved by fans around the world in the chaos Behind the scenes of its early years virtually ensured it would be cancelled, but a core team of writers and producers came together to create some of the best stories in the franchise.

Most industry insiders believed that attempting a spin-off show to begin with was doomed to failure, but it was essential viewing. for millions of homes a critical success a definitive new incarnation of star trek and to this day it is considered one of the best works of science fiction ever created that is the incredible legacy of star trek to the next generation all said while it was able To replicate and then surpass the success of Star Trek, the original series on the small screen, could it do the same on the big screen? Thanks for watching, if you like these videos please subscribe and hit the bell icon to stay updated on my new uploads.

Want to help the channel grow, join my sponsors or my YouTube members, where you can watch videos early, as well as some other exclusive content, speaking of which I would like to quickly thank all my sponsors and members who are now featured on the screen. a good one and as always live long and prosper