What's right about Star Trek(Opinion)

[Edgewood]

There is a plethora of threads about what's wrong with Star Trek. I thought I start one about what's great about it. So here it goes.

1. A positive vision: Star Trek has a positive vision. Our future can at times seem bleak and hopeless. Star Trek shows us a future that has promise. It explores humanity's potential and presents the growth that the human race can achieve. (I know we have all heard this before...but it's true.)

2. Solid characters: Star Trek gives us great characters. Strong leaders, brave explorers, intelligent scientists. Kirk and Picard have sparked the great, "who's the better leader," debate. We have had Data and Spock help us explore the human condition. We had Barclay represent the neurotic in all of us.

3. Technology: Everything from starships to phasers to space travel. Although these are sci-fi constants, Star Trek has been of the few vehicles where art imitates life. Now we have cell phones that are reminiscent of communicators. Anytime modern science tries to describe a new emerging technology or idea, they invariably referrence Star Trek as the standard measure.

4. Great stories: We all have our favorite story. It's why I love this show. Episodes like The Deadly Years, The City on the Edge of Forever, Measure of a Man, Best of Both Worlds part 1&2, Yesterday's Enterprise, For the Uniform, The Siege of AR-558, Year of Hell Part 1&2, Pathfinder, The Augments. These are just the few episodes I have enjoyed. There are a ton more.

I know that the above list a very subjective and doesn't represent what everyone feels, but it represents what I feel. I realize that Star Trek may be broken at the moment, but that shouldn't diminish what Star Trek has accomplished. However, I want to celebrate it, not admonish it.

So how about joining me? Lets list what's right about Star Trek.

 

[Wombat]

In many ways I am a Kennedy Space Child.

I was born in 1959, watched all the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo launches that I could. I also loved reading, old horror and sci films, etc. So, when Star Trek first came on, I was happy. I mean, let's be fair -- it's competition was Lost In Space ... which clobbered Star Trek in every single ratings group. But I loved to watch the adventures of the Enterprise and her crew. Trek fit perfectly into an era and an ideal, that the human race was still possibly perfectable, that if we could get to the Moon, we could do anything. In a lot of ways Star Trek was the last grand gasp of Science and Progress that our culture had inherited from the Victorian era, that things were getting Better, despite hiccups and setbacks.

During the "lost years" (prior to the films), I didn't join in the letter writing campaign or anything. I watched the reruns now and again and loved 'em. Every episode? Nope, there were some real clunkers, especially in the 3rd season ("Spock's Brain" anyone??). But still I loved the show. Maybe it seemed slightly less relevant during the end days of Vietnam, but that hopeful vision remained.

It became very fashionable later on to bash on Trek. especially after Star Wars came out (and then Alien). It was too "clean", too "nice", too "PC". Heck, I liked it for all those things (well, the PC thing might be a different issue, but we'll leave it for the moment). The Federation offered to let people join; they did not conquer like the Klingons and the Romulans. It was a spirit of hope, a dream of cooperation. Maybe this dream is easily derided nowadays, but I still hold to it.

Yet for all the things I loved in the original Trek, my favourite series remains Deep Space Nine. Why? Look at the characters you had -- Benjamin Sisko (trying, not always 100% succesfully, to be combat commander, diplomat, single father, project leader, and defacto religious icon in turn without losing his cool, a very difficult task), Major Kira (how does an ex-freedom fighter/terrorist become part of the mainstream again?), Constable Odo (what does it mean to be a man? What does it mean to know yourself?), Doctor Bashir (supped-up genius medical student, the bright eyes of old skool Star Fleet, yet coming to terms with what it takes to save some lives when others must be lost), and, of course, Plain, Simple Garak (spy, tailor, exile, and a person who has a hard time telling the truth even to himself). These are only some of the complex, compelling characters who, in many ways, are the culmination of what Trek was all about -- human, fallable, determined, confused, humourous, thoughtful, and ultimately hopeful even in the face of horrible adversity.

Each of the shows, even the animated series, had bits to add to the vision that people now sum up as Star Trek. Each of them offered a different view of the universe. Not all of these views have been consistent, but given that both TNG and DS9 lasted 7 seasons, the original series 3, and ENT & VOY about 5 each, that is a LOT of time on the tube -- inconsistencies are bound to pop up. Heck, Star Wars has about as many and in only six films.

No, I will not try to defend the whole canon of Trek. There is no point to this any more than there is to trying to defend every story about King Arthur. Many of the points gleefully contradict others. What's up with Klingons and their foreheads? When did the Borg first show up? Was Cochran from Earth or Alpha Centauri and was he a young guy or an old guy, white black? Who knows and, ultimately, who cares? Was Doctor Who always consistent? Gunsmoke? Columbo? Nope. Trek was more about morality tales set in space, like the old episodes of The Twilight Zone more about a message in a tale reflecting current reality than about creating a seamless overall vision. But for all that and all that, Trek has done pretty darn good by itself.

Kirk, Spock, and McCoy, love 'em or hate 'em, are part of the cultural vocabulary of US television. The other major characters are not quite there yet, but they are pretty close.

So here's to the hope that was born in space ... the final frontier.

May we never lose the courage to explore the next mystery.

 

[Andre]

Character development.

As Wombat mentioned, DS9's characters grew and changed over the entire run. Same for TNG's characters (though to a lesser extent). Same for Voyager when Seven joined the crew (Seven and the Doctor were two very good characters). Even the movies with the original crew did some of this.

Any new series needs to focus on the characters - not special effects, not sets, not the obligatory "alien member of the crew". Those things are important, but the characters make Star Trek classic.

 

[Wolf72]

dang Wombat ... I've got a Boston tune stuck in my head now

*wolf sings badly: What does it mean to be a maaan ....* [I think it's off of 3rd Stage]

 

[mojo1701]

*wolf sings badly:

I didn't know we were singing William Shatner now.