I finally finished TNG season 3 + the premier of season 4. Definitely the best season so far, though the most dated area of the show is its episodic nature. Everything has to go back to square one at the end of an episode which limits the creative possibilities. Most of the good episodes seem to revolve around ongoing story lines: Klingons, Romulans, Q, the Borg, etc. And most of the one off stories and aliens they create tend to be forgettable (though that may be survivorship bias as whenever they create good aliens or characters they tend to bring them back). The episodes with original scores also tend to be really good, like The Defector and Best of Both Worlds.

I'm going to continue with season 4, but if the show keeps being so hit and miss I'm going to just cherry pick the best episodes to watch and then go on to Deep Space 9, which I might like better due to its more serialized nature.

Most of my issues with the show are addressed in the very next episode, "Family." A wonderful character driven story that is a direct continuation of the previous episode.

Yeah, "Family" is a top-10 episode imo, but unfortunately it's the only time you get a direct continuation outside a two-parter in TNG.

Season 4 is the most consistently good season so far. Just finished episode 7, "Reunion" and the show is doing the soap opera stuff really well. Lots of focus on existing characters and stories: Picard's familiy, Worf's girlfriend, Tasha's sister, the Traveller shows up again. The ones where they actually "seek out new life and new civilizations" and "boldly go where no one has gone before" tend to be dull and cliched. I hope that does change though.

Ok so I'm giving the fan-made series that continues from Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek Continue

Episode 1: Pilgrim of Eternity

This is a sequel to 'Who Mourns for Adonais', the one about the Greek gods actually being superpowerful alien entities who lorded it over humans. And it stars the original actor from that show Michael Forest, reprising his role as Apollo....

Bold choice.

Yeah, I'm not sure how I feel about this. Scotty is played by James Doohan's son and the accent felt bad at first, but once you got used to it, it was ok. The cast replacements are mostly adequate, and I recognised Marina Sirtis as the voice of the computer.

But the acting wasn't great, and the guy playing Kirk was a little effeminate in his vocalisations, which was really distracting. But hell, did they absolutely nail the look of the thing.

Not a great episode really, but I'll watch at least a few more before I decide to ditch this and get back to ST:TNG


Oh and it's all on youtube

original series - started pretty meh but ended up having some really good episodes, stuff that really functioned as thought pieces - have not seen any of the movies

the next generation - whenever Q showed up, I knew it was an episode i'd hate, hated the blonde and was very happy when she left, show picked up significantly about a half season or so after she left - show lacked the single episode brilliance of the original but was far superior because it had more continuity to it - recall being disapointed in how it ended, notably can't remember how it happened - have not seen some of the movies - loved the holodeck episodes

deep space nine - by far the best version as it held onto plot points while still mixing it up with one off subplots, loved everything about it

everythign else unseen, what should I watch and in what order?

Re-watch "Space Seed" and then watch "The Wrath of Khan" and you're probably good.

You could add Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home for campy, humorous Trek.

Also watch Star Trek VIII: First Contact - if nothing else, the Patrick Stewart/Alfre Woodard scenes make it worth watching. James Cromwell is good as Zephraim Cochrane

Wow you're definitely in the minority. It's widely considered one of the best series finales... not just for a sci-fi show, but for any show in general.

Really? I thought the ending to TNG was functional at best.

For finale for a show that ran as long as TNG, just being functional makes it top tier.

Without a doubt, the absolute best ending to a series finale was in Newhart, when Bob wakes up in bed next to Suzanne Pleshette, his wife from his earlier series, The Bob Newhart Show.

AINEC

Picard is coming out soon and based on some early details, lots of people have already set their opinion on the show to "hate." I don't get all these angry fandoms. People need to realize that the memories of things you enjoyed when you were young and impressionable will probably never be superseded in your adult years.

I just read the "Countdown" comics and I like what I see so far overall despite how dumb the reason is for Romulus' destruction and how stupid the whole premise that the Romulan empire would fall apart just because Romulus got destroyed.

I watched the first 5 episodes of Star Trek Discovery and I find myself wishing the ship would just blow up.

The production values are obviously high but the writing and acting are both terrible. Even the fight scenes look like more like tech demos than actual fights. It is like the production team just wants to spend money on VFX.

I also think the captains/characters generally are terrible and their characters don't make too much sense. Burhnam (sp?) seems actively dumb, especially for someone who supposedly is super smart and excelled in Vulcan schools.

In just five episodes, there 10+ moments where I felt like I watching a Star Trek parody. A lot of the mandatory moralizing and difficult moral choices felt tacked on and badly written. Part of it is just how dramatically the uniforms changed. Worse, some of the aliens races' appearances are so dramatically altered I had to google some of them to figure out what races they were.

It has enough fan service (easter egg references to lore) for me to keep watching but I really hope it gets better. If it doesn't, I really hope Discovery just gets purged from canon.

I consider myself a big trekkie but have zero desire to watch that show.

I watched it, and it wasn't great. Season 1 was better, and the only thing Season 2 had going for it was Captain Pike and Number One.

I've tried to like Discovery, but aside from Pike and the alternate universe side plot, I stopped s2 after the Talos IV episode.

My complaints are simple - too many soliloquys and the entire show is way too special effects heavy.

That said, I will still give Star Trek: Picard a shot.

Unsure if I should use this as an excuse to power through the series I haven't seen or just skip and try out Picard without the foreplay

I gave up on Discovery a long time ago and switched to The Orville for my Star Trek fix. It's the best "Star Trek" show since DS9. Each new episode over the last couple of years became appointment tv to me. I guess I'm going to have to get a Hulu subscription now. Ironically, CBS tried to use Discovery as bait to get people to sign up for its streaming service, but Hulu may end up doing better by using The Orville in the same manner.

Word is CBS are panicked about Trek generally.

STD is a dumpsterfire they want to dump, but they feel ditching the show after 2 seasons may affect how people perceive Picard and Lower Decks, so they commissioned a third season just to help prop up the franchise till those shows air.

The only way I'd watch more STD is probably if it could just be Star Trek: TOS with Pike and Number One leading the crew

I think that may be the way to go.

I binged through 1st season of Discovery and am a few episodes into 2nd now. I got the very strong sense the actors/writers of Discovery, like Picard& Crew had to for TNG, are trying to figure out how to make the show work but they just don't have the talent (or perhaps time? A lot of 1st season's central cast already seem to be sidelined in 2nd season) to make it work.

Burnham is still impossibly (given her background) dumb.

Yeah, it's not good when your main character is much less interesting than the Captain in each season, and indeed several of the other cast members too.

I'm not sure ST works as a show when it isn't about the Captain and his officers, frankly.

I'm hopeful Picard will be better that the trailers suggest. When it was announced, Stewart clearly felt this would be a character driven "Logan" style exploration of Picard post-Star Fleet.

However when the first trailer dropped it was just explosions, fights scenes and fan service.

Hopefully the final version is closer to Stewart's interpretation.