|
I feel like the characters being a little "off" is definitely one of the biggest problems with the first season. Picard is really a total rear end in a top hat with only a few hints of the character traits that end up making him more endearing and Riker's vibes are just... weird. I do like clearly emotional Data a little more than later season Data, though.
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 15:50
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 11:43 |
|
|
I've always suspected that there was a general idea that there'd eventually be a reveal that Data has emotions, but didn't realize it.
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:13
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:Yeah there's like a whole exchange in if not his final appearance than his second to last appearance and it's clearly implied that he's going to hate it and hate that it will never be the Cardassia he loved, but it has to be done. There’s enough Garak in the last episodes to show that despite being horrified and furious by the destruction he also recognizes that Cardassia brought itself to that point, in part. He isn’t fighting under Damar just to get back at someone for his exile. Declaring most of Cardassia’s history as arrogant aggression wasn’t a kind of sarcasm or deflection.
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:27
|
|
|
 Those last two sound great, I wonder why they didn't get made
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:42
|
|
|
Some of the other episode concepts later in the pitch are even better. I particularly like “A Question of Cannibalism”
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:47
|
|
|
Unkempt posted:
Besides Mudd’s Women? Or am I doing a  here
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:47
|
|
|
Kibayasu posted:Besides Mudd’s Women? Or am I doing a The Coming + the gladiatorial theme in Mr Socrates (on the later pages) is probably the seed of “Bread and Circuses”
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:48
|
|
|
Yeah I pretty much instantly realized the son/sun thing they were doing there It's weird to see Uhura get semi-religious about it when I was raised on TNG "When we were stupid, we thought religion was true" philosophy.
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:51
|
|
|
When I was showing my ex TNG we started with series 1 and I think it was a mistake. It's good that it teaches you about Wesley - like all the memed bits and him being annoying is pretty much exclusively series 1 - but they're so bad she lost interest and good ones were harder to get her into
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 16:56
|
|
|
Sash! posted:I've always suspected that there was a general idea that there'd eventually be a reveal that Data has emotions, but didn't realize it.  I feel like that's kind of implied throughout the series. He misses dead people, he has friends, he has a pet he cares about, he has personal wants and drives. He doesn't recognize those as emotions because he doesn't really have the framework to interpret them as such, and there's certain emotions like humor that he can't have without outside intervention, but even other crewmembers like Troi will sometimes acknowledge him as having an emotional response. Regarding Spiner's early season portrayal, I'm impressed at how well he's able to go back to it in All Good Things, while also doing current Data and Old Data and making them all distinct while still the same character.
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 17:10
|
|
|
Kibayasu posted:Besides Mudd’s Women? Or am I doing a To Sling a Tyrannosaurus likely became Arena.
|
|
#
?
Sep 12, 2023 22:33
|
|
|
Mr.Radar posted:The Naked Now: Didn't Gene Roddenbery not want to tie TNG to TOS too tightly? Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to redo a TOS episode as the second broadcast episode of the series then. They'd hosed around in pre-production and didn't have enough shootable scripts ready on time, so "bang out a fast adaptation of a TOS episode" was the solution.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 00:11
|
|
|
The Omega Glory is the worst episode of TOS yet. Complete trash. Also given the timeline, we're the imitation Earth, not theirs.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 00:16
|
|
|
Timby posted:To Sling a Tyrannosaurus likely became Arena. Also All Our Yesterdays, transferred to Spock.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 00:38
|
|
|
Hmm, Violations. Real unpleasant. Once again, Troi gets raped and they do specifically have a character call it that, to the episode's credit. It's an ugly subject and I can't help feeling it's rather awkwardly handled in this show about space ship go woosh. Oh, I'm not saying the show can't handle grown up subjects, it often does so with aplomb, but boy oh boy, this one falls flat and fails to really say much beyond "Well, we all have a capacity for violence that we're holding back, I guess". There are plus sides. One very effective, spooky and surreal sequence where Beverly's forced to relive the memory of Picard (with a thinning rug atop his bonce) taking her to see hubby on a slab and as I said, the episode doesn't pull its punches. It might not be a physical assault, but it's made very clear that it might as well be. But otherwise, woof, very rough and not exactly a fun old time. The Masterpiece Society has some nice ideas, hamstrung by a general air of dull. John Snyder returns after appearing as a Romulan earlier in the show and he's a fine guest star but that's about all this episode has. Troi and he have a romance. Dull. Geordie meanwhile spends a great deal of time hanging around a woman and manages not to be a creep. But it's dull. There's a big blue space ball. Also dull. There's a dull colony where everybody is genetically engineered to fit a specific dull role and they have a guy who was seemingly engineered to be a (dull) heckling, pedantic naysayer. There's a kid who, by the show's logic, was engineered to be the best musician ever and the best he can manage is a very mediocre piano composition where everybody looks really bored. I was also bored. And that society of 1000+ (unseen) people is supposedly brought to crumbling ruin by 23 people leaving it. Well, gently caress, that's not a very stable society is it? Pretty poo poo. I do hate when I get two bad ones in a row. I don't like complaining, yet of course, it's always easier to complain than compliment. MuddyFunster fucked around with this message at 01:19 on Sep 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 01:16
|
|
|
Watching Past Tense, and the most unrealistic thing in the episode is the thermometer in the sanctuary district using Celsius. This episode has become even more relevant since it aired.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 01:58
|
|
|
Lord Hydronium posted:Watching Past Tense, and the most unrealistic thing in the episode is the thermometer in the sanctuary district using Celsius. This episode has become even more relevant since it aired. The form of identification they ask for is your UHC card. Lol
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 02:12
|
|
|
Lord Hydronium posted:Watching Past Tense, and the most unrealistic thing in the episode is the thermometer in the sanctuary district using Celsius. This episode has become even more relevant since it aired. skasion posted:The form of identification they ask for is your UHC card. Lol Even the dystopian nadir of society is more optimistic than reality 
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 02:22
|
|
|
Lord Hydronium posted:Watching Past Tense, and the most unrealistic thing in the episode is the thermometer in the sanctuary district using Celsius. This episode has become even more relevant since it aired. And they never went as hard as that two-part episode ever again
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 02:36
|
|
|
The universal translator converts units
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 03:22
|
|
|
“It’s not your fault things are the way they are.” “Everybody tells themselves that. And nothing ever changes.”  I've seen this two parter get criticism for being too on the nose, but if any episodes deserve to be it's these. It's 30 years later and every part of this is just as relevant as ever, mid-90s ideas of how the internet would work aside. If anything it probably could have stood to be more on the nose. Lord Hydronium fucked around with this message at 03:34 on Sep 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 03:29
|
|
|
Continuing the TNG S1 watch: Justice: Ah, the Death Penalty Episode. I completely forgot about the whole part of the episode that took place on the ship with the mysterious orbiting space station. I had also forgotten how incredibly horny all the people on the planet are, at least before Wesley breaks their laws. The resolution was a bit of a wet fart, after Picard said they would respect the laws of the people because the Prime Directive says they need to (speaking of, uh, these people don't seem to be warp-capable so why did they make contact in the first place???) they ultimately flaunt those laws and just beam Wesley up (which was previously explicitly offered as a way out by the people of the planet and turned down by the away team) but it's okay because the space station "god" of these people said it was fine by doing nothing to prevent it? The Battle: Oh no, the Ferengi are back! Though TBH they're not too bad this time around (at least they're not slinking about). Nice to get a bit of backstory on Picard with the Stargazer and the Picard Maneuver. Overall a pretty solid episode, probably the best yet. Hide and "Q": Another one I've somehow never seen, though I've seen it referenced enough to know bits of it through osmosis. John de Lancie is great in this one, definitely having more fun than in the pilot and you can tell this episode set the direction for his character going forward. Started strong but kind of ran out of steam towards the end. It looks like the next one up is the first Lwaxana episode, so I think I'll stop here for tonight and end on a high note.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 04:00
|
|
|
McSpanky posted:Even the dystopian nadir of society is more optimistic than reality Everything about that episode is drastically more optimistic than reality. The show goes out of its way to say that the sanctuary districts aren't intentionally malicious, which means the horrific dystopian society at least theoretically thinks that providing shelter and food for people is a good thing. It's an insane and unimaginable mirror world.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 04:11
|
|
|
Man the ending of The Big Goodbye is bleak, that has to be the only time TNG acknowledges the regular holograms are functionally people created and discarded for the amusement of the crew
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 12:33
|
|
|
No Dignity posted:Man the ending of The Big Goodbye is bleak, that has to be the only time TNG acknowledges the regular holograms are functionally people created and discarded for the amusement of the crew
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:07
|
|
|
Nessus posted:If I recall, didn't this poo poo start happening after the Bynars did a system upgrade on the Enterprise (and implicitly all other holodecks, since I assume they were the same platform)? The Bynars got a lot to answer for here. Send Ace Rimmer. No, it's pre-Bynar episode. That guy at the end asking if he's actually going to go back to his wife and kids or just pop out of existence when the program ends is haunting
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:16
|
|
|
Yeah but it's also dialogue ChatGPT might easily write. The limits of sapience are going to be very hard to detect.
MikeJF fucked around with this message at 14:21 on Sep 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:19
|
|
|
The holodeck plot ends with the mob boss stepping out of the holodeck and trying to take over the ship, you could argue that they're all p-zombies just going through the motions of actual thought but it certainly seems like they have awareness and agency in that episode
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:25
|
|
|
Nessus posted:If I recall, didn't this poo poo start happening after the Bynars did a system upgrade on the Enterprise (and implicitly all other holodecks, since I assume they were the same platform)? The Bynars got a lot to answer for here. Send Ace Rimmer. No Dignity posted:No, it's pre-Bynar episode. That guy at the end asking if he's actually going to go back to his wife and kids or just pop out of existence when the program ends is haunting I think you're both correct, because the Bynars episode was supposed to air before the Big Goodbye, but got shuffled further ahead in the airing order. It does make more sense that the reason everyone's so blown away by the Dixon Hill program because the Holodeck just got way better.
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 14:51
|
|
|
It’s Season 1 so stardates are meaningless, but isn’t The Big Goodbye set on something like 41993 which would put it after 11001001? Of course, Tasha’s resurrected herself, but let’s not quibble about that …
|
|
#
?
Sep 13, 2023 18:28
|
|
|
Yeah, the tech manual suggests that the holodeck is meant to be realistic scenarios from recordings as well as allowing for recreational opportunities (for instance, you could simulate kayaking). Potentially if there was an upgrade that made it possible to easily have simulated people, as opposed to 'actors who can do a somewhat interactive stage play', that in turn led to the EMH and Vic and everything.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 00:20
|
|
|
"Conundrum"? These titles are getting very weak, I think this one deserved a little more effort than that! It's like that horror movie Sinister, it might be AMAZING, but I've never watched it because the name is very lazy and one step away from being called "Ooh, That's a Bit Spooky." Anyway, the crew loses their memories and identities, but not their ability and natural instincts, which is a fantastic idea, well done. For the first half, I was a little bit puzzled by... *sigh* the conundrum of Officer MacDuff, convinced he was just a weirdly prominent redshirt. I managed to work it out a short while before they do the Simpsons evil dog shot on him, so now I feel big and clever. I like Ro, she's great. She's like a dash of vinegar in the otherwise sugary comfort of the regular crew and brings the best puffed-up-chest pissiness out of Riker. Captain Worf was a good wheeze too and it's great that when it comes down to it, he's faithful to Picard. CHEXCELLENT I was enjoying Power Play as a bit of campy silliness. It didn't seem to make a lick of sense for a while, there was of course a grey stormy planet with (SING IT WITH ME) electromagnetic interference. Data, Troi and O'Brien get possessed by super angry spirits whose motivations and supposed identities don't seem to match their behaviour and they're all just playing it large as hell evil. Naturally, security on the ship is at an absolute all time low, Worf sucks at his job even worse than Troi. But it's entertaining stuff, quite tense and thrilling. Then it all just ties it all together so nicely at the end with a resolution that does a fair job of making sense of everything. Like, the episode snaps it's loving fingers and you realise "Oh, it's quite good!" Grinning like mad at that. That was a great one-two punch.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 01:45
|
|
|
Watching "Court Martial" on H&I. It's funny watching Kirk go all Frank Grimes in the Jeffries tube ripping out high power cables to save the ship.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 02:02
|
|
|
Paradoxish posted:Everything about that episode is drastically more optimistic than reality. Also, it only takes just one riot for people to realize how bad the situation is and abolish an extraordinarily discriminatory and harmful government policy.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 02:02
|
|
|
MuddyFunster posted:Naturally, security on the ship is at an absolute all time low, Worf sucks at his job even worse than Troi. One of the problems with the genre is that either competent security or even the slightest bit of realism about the kind of control you have on a spaceship means that a takeover would be impossible for anyone short of data
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 02:03
|
|
|
They’re not gonna make episodes about all the times Worf stopped problems are they
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 03:20
|
|
|
Worf's logic in Conundrum is amazing. I have this badass sash thing, so I'm definitely in charge.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 03:22
|
|
|
TNG S1 again. Haven: Lwaxana's introduction is great, the way she walks all over Picard and he just takes it really sets up the entire dynamic of her character. A lot of the relationship comedy reminded me of Charades from SNW's latest season which is a very good thing. The design of the alien ship set was very TOS, particularly the display screens that are just spinning light patterns. As a kid I could never stand Lwaxana episodes so this was a pleasant surprise. The Big Goodbye: Ah, the prototypical holodeck episode. It sets up basically all the tropes: archaic (public domain) Earth setting/story, some kind of power fluctuation causing things to go awry, safeties on the fritz, characters in the program finding out they're not real, the works. The only holodeck trope it doesn't have is a character taking over the ship, but it lays the groundwork for S2's Elementary, Dear Data which hits that one. It was a bit sad when the last surviving fictional character asked Picard if his family would be waiting for him when he went home, and Picard couldn't answer. Overall a fun episode. Datalore: An episode that introduces not just one but two recurring antagonists in the form of Lore and the Crystalline Entity. Brent Spiner does a great job portraying the (at first subtly) sinister Lore in contrast with Data who is straight-laced to a fault, especially since he's acting against himself in many scenes. Also nice to get a "shut up, Wesley" from both the Captain and Dr. Crusher and shortly after Lore calls him "the troublesome little man-child."  Overall a really strong run of episodes.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 04:11
|
|
|
MikeJF posted:One of the problems with the genre is that either competent security or even the slightest bit of realism about the kind of control you have on a spaceship means that a takeover would be impossible for anyone short of data The description of the shipboard security systems in the Klingon Academy manual is really something, and would make for an amazing and completely prohibitively expensive action sequence.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 04:22
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 25, 2024 11:43 |
|
|
Really, with the stuff that should be available to a ship internally just with its standard systems, the only way you should be able to board a ship and not get instantly defeated would be in some kind of full blown self-contained armoured environment suit with the ability to shrug off being gassed/boiled/flattened/beamed/forcefielded/etc.
|
|
#
?
Sep 14, 2023 04:33
|
|