I'll Always Have Trek

So, I decided to DVR Star Trek: The Next Generation and see how it held up. Thought I'd record a weekend's worth and watch them all in one big go, but it turns out it doesn't run as much as I'd expected. And it also turned out that the third episode, recorded last night (MLK Jr Day) was one I remembered VERY fondly.

"We'll Always Have Paris."

Saw it 20+ years ago and loved it. Haven't seen it in almost that long. Just finished watching it.

It's probably not fair to start with a favorite old episode of a show you haven't seen in years and years. Perceptions could be colored as memories shift.

"Paris" holds up like gangbusters.

I took notes as I watched it. Mostly those notes were very surface, and ignored questions of writing and acting. I know, right? Why the fuck am I watching a TV show if I'm going to just give it a pass on the writing and acting?

Because. It's Trek. You don't go back to your childhood home and pay attention to whether the house is laid out well. You don't notice that there is a bigger closet off that bathroom than the one that was in your bedroom when you lived there. You just look around and think it's smaller than it used to be. And then you realize it's where you grew up. And you look around a little more and you realize, it's a pretty nice place, with a decent little yard, and sure the highway is right there...

And then you get smacked RIGHT in the face when that metaphor you've been stretching breaks.

Anyway.

Most of the notes I made had to do with impressions. Music, design, and so forth. And a fair few were snarky. The music is dated as hell, and my notes do have a couple comments and cracks about it. So let's get that out of the way.

My first note referring to the music is one word long: SynthTASTIC! But knowing what little I do about music production for TV, I totally get it. Ron Jones was probably operating under horrendous time pressure. Synths make it (relatively) easy to do so, and the FM synths he seemed to be using were state-of-the-art. The music gets a bit busy from time to time, but for the most part it's completely forgivable. And the music in the cafe scenes is actually pretty damn good.

And concerning music Jones DIDN'T write, there's the theme. I can't even tell you if I objectively think the theme is any good. It reminded me of my thirteen year old self, and that's something.

Design of set and special effects? I have no idea what kind of budget they were operating under, but I'll promise you that BONES has a bigger special effects budget for four episodes than TNG had for an entire year. And the gear required has only gotten cheaper in the past twenty years. So never mind that. But the computer interfaces were pretty shiny. Wouldn't mind having the TNG touch screens as a theme for my phone, to be honest. Also, the matte painting used for the Paris holodeck sequences? Pretty nice.

Costume design is... well, terrible. Apologies to the costume department. The uniforms needed the collar introduced later on, the piping looked kind of silly, and the guest stars... oh, that poor woman. That poor, poor woman.

So that's the superficial stuff out of the way. (Except for the makeup, which I will dispense with quickly: It really seems like the Klingon makeup got better.)

There is some GREAT stuff here. Primarily in character work, but I'll get back to that.

There's a scene about halfway through where Picard, Riker, and Data see themselves in the turbolift. They're experiencing some sort of time loop, and the trio of "now" is aware of the trio of "then" and vice versa. Data Then: "I feel no disorientation." Data Now: "Nor do I." And then Riker takes a minute to explore the philosophical ramifications of the bilocation and seems to have a good grasp on it, even though you know what he's really thinking of is tag teaming Troi with himself.

Love that scene.

For character work, Brent Spiner as Data delivers what I recall as being an incredibly reliable, quirky interpretation of a highly advanced, logical being. So advanced and logical that TNG pretty much didn't bother with Vulcans.

Jonathan Frakes as Riker didn't have a whole lot to do, but he did it well, even if he was still holding Captain America's shield. Gates McFadden as Dr. Crusher had about as much to do dealing with the occasional subplot of her involvement with Picard. Levar Burton, Michael Dorn, and Marina Sirtis were really just there to be there as Geordi, Worf, and Troi, respectively.

This is mostly a Picard episode, though, and Patrick Stewart, being Patrick Stewart, delivers in spades. And there's a lot of setup for his character in this episode, even though it's mostly just touched on. As usual, he elevates every scene he's in.

The thing I liked about this episode, and still like, is that it set Picard even further apart from Jim Kirk. This was NOT a love-'em-and-leave-'em guy, most emphatically. He had baggage, and he remembered his loves and his losses, and they informed who he was. And even at thirteen, that spoke more eloquently to me than Kirk ever could.

I'm really glad I gave Trek another try. Don't expect more of these lengthy reviews of episodes, but I will continue to comment as I watch. And remember, It's Wheaton's Fault.

Trek some more...

Does Paramount really not want to sell anything besides the Abrams movie? Looking around online, the prices on new copies of the various DVD sets hover around $50. (Except the fan collectives, which retail about $40.) Admittedly, that's only about two bucks an episode, or three for the collectives (which have far fewer episodes than a season.)

iTunes is selling the first three seasons of DS9, the run of TOS, and the first seasons each of Voyager and Enterprise for very reasonable prices - $13-$14 for seasons, and a buck or two per episode if you'd rather go a la carte. Not bad. But they aren't selling any other season of any of the above shows, and they're not selling TNG at all. I'm thinking about grabbing season 3 of DS9 because that's when Saint Ron joined the creative team... but I never got into DS9.

There's rumors around that Paramount is going to do a big re-release on TNG, do it up in a nice blu-ray edition and probably remaster the effects and so forth the way they did TOS in the past couple of years.

Oh, goody. So they'll be charging $90 for each season. Maybe I'll be able to get it on iTunes by then... but I don't much like iTunes.

Except for one season of TOS on NetFlix, I can't find any season of any of it available for streaming.

The only thing it would cost Paramount to put these things up for streaming, or to sell them on iTunes or Zune or similar, would be some server space (and they may have to convert episodes to the appropriate formats.) Have I missed something? Are hard drives getting more expensive? If the recent Bionic Woman remake can get online, why the hell can't Trek?

TREK REVOKED!

Another reason my Geek Card has been revoked: Star Trek.

I used to watch the old show when I was a kid. I remember liking it, but not as much as Star Wars - but then, I didn't like ANYTHING as much as Star Wars at that point in time. Not even girls. Give me a break, I was only eighteen at the time, girls were icky!

Anyway, I was thirteen when TNG came on the air. And it was the absolute BALLS. I didn't mind that Picard was not Kirk - that's what Riker was clearly there for. The new look of the ship and the uniforms and even the aliens was great! The hot women didn't have 60s hair and good lord was Marina Sirtis hot! And that Q guy! And yes, Wesley. There was a kid my age on that ship, and he might've dressed in Cosby sweaters but dammit, he was a smart, geeky kid who the adults LISTENED TO! (Sometimes.)

I watched as much as I could, but this was pre-DVR days. I'm not even sure if we had a VCR at this point. My parents weren't against Trek, but they certainly didn't go out of their way for it. So I saw the first few, caught more here and there, and generally liked the show. But after a while Trek and I just sort of parted company.

I've tried to write some sort of explanation for why Trek just stopped working for me. And deleted it. And wrote it again. And deleted it again and again. I really don't know why, but Trek just never worked for me the way other stuff did.

I do have favorite episodes of TOS and TNG. Never really got into DS9 or Voyager and I barely gave Enterprise a chance (insert cheap Enterprise joke here.)

I have read Harlan Ellison's book about City on the Edge of Forever, and that ruined the episode for me. I remember really liking The Trouble With Tribbles and Balance of Terror from the old show (haven't watched either one in years, what with City turning out so badly for me.)

TNG had The Measure of a Man, the Cardassian Torture episode Chain of Command, the one with Ryker's Dad, and the final episode, All Good Things...

And like everybody, I love me some of the Trek movies. The only TNG movie I really dug was First Contact, but I really enjoyed seeing Kirk and Picard share the screen in Generations. Wrath of Khan holds up damn well. And the Abrams relaunch blew my head right off. It had its flaws, but man oh man.

So yeah. I guess what I'm really saying is I'm an at-best casual fan of the Trek 'verse. But willing to give it another go.