Star Trek The Next Generation movies and whether they basically suck

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

- Crazy Picard

- Enterprise destroyed because they didn't just rotate the shield modulation and apparently Data and Geordi forgot how to save the ship like they did for the entire show in far worse situations

- Kirk falls off a bridge, or on the bridge

- Borg have time travel technology and go to the day before First Contact

- Disobeying Starfleet orders constantly and helping the Ba'ku

- Dune buggy, Schinzon and basically everything in Nemesis

Now, the TNG movies are guilty pleasures, don't get me wrong. Yet, the original series movies due to their generally higher quality and the consistency of the characters with the show feel more like a natural continuation of that series. TNG movies do not. It feels like they were farmed out to writers and people who had no idea what the hell Star Trek was about.

[Wojo 2,453]

I feel your pain, even if I know you've just created a Star Trek thread to cancel out a Tolkien thread. The TNG movies seemed to forget all the wonderful character moments that made seven years of TNG so wonderful in favor of all that over-emphasized Picard and Data action and romance.

I can forgive silly things like totally disregarding Zefram Cochrane's character as seen in TOS for the drunken buffoon played by James Cromwell, because I like James Cromwell enough.

Add:

- Riker kisses Troi in "Insurrection," who recoils with "I've never kissed you with a beard before." Apparently every kiss they shared on TNG from season 2 onward happened in an alternate universe or something.

- Starfleet panics when the Borg invade Earth in "First Contact" and sends Picard and the mightiest ship in the fleet far away. Was Commander Shelby, Borg expert extraordinaire, unavailable? Couldn't they just relieve him of command a la Edward Jellico to use the Sovereign's guns? Oh wait, the script said not to, oh poo.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Captain Picard is a great reader.

You think he has ever read The Lord Of The Rings?

[JoeinAR 1,949]

yes if it's filmed it canon,

even Nemesis which is almost but not quite as stupid as ST 2009, which is not canon in that it's clearly a an alternative reality.

[Wojo 2,453]

- Borg have time travel technology and go to the day before First Contact

This one is particularly heinous because it shows how stupid the scriptwriters thought the Borg to be.

Imagine you want to move diagonally, but you can't go straight there. You can either go up and over, or over and up. The Borg came to Earth in the 24th century, somehow expecting no resistance. Did they forget Wolf 359? Their continengency plan was only initiated once the cube was in jeopardy, i.e. to travel back to the 21st century and assimilate Earth. And as it turned out, 24th century Starfleet personnel followed them along to undo the damage.

I assume that the Borg transwarp conduit system doesn't exist in the 21st century, ok, I get that. But still, travel to the edge of the Alpha Quadrant, far from Starfleet detection, go back in time, and then travel to Earth when there is no Starfleet or Federation to interfere in the 21st century.

What's to stop the Borg from trying this all the time???

[JoeinAR 1,949]

the time police.

[Quintus 5,399]

I'd fire Star Trek out of a cannon. Give it a sailor's burial.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Like Spock?

[JoeinAR 1,949]

Star Trek > hobbit/lotr

[Quintus 5,399]

Poll!

[JoeinAR 1,949]

Kirk>dildo bobkins

[Quintus 5,399]

Bilbo was never one of my favourite characters anyway.

Gandalf > Richard Harris, Michael Gambon, Dumbledore, Voldemeh, Harry Potter franchise, Picard, Kirk, Kahn, The Enterprise (cue), Star Trek Franchise, Whoopi Goldberg.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

I was inspired to re-watch Yesterday's Enterprise after Joey basically did the exact same thing Guinan did when everything changed and this board became about Lord of the Rings.

What a spectacular episode. This is partly the problem when you compare the movies to the show. Most episodes of the show are completely better than the movies. In fact, many episodes of TNG like Yesterday's Enterprise, Best of Both Worlds, Sins of the Father, Chain of Command, Darmok and several of the Q ones are on the level of a major motion picture, even if they're only 45 minutes long.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

Do you consider the Next Generation movies canon?

Are the TNG movies shit?

What question in the poll am I supposed to answer?

[gkgyver 1,645]

For Trekkies, they may be shit, for a regular viewer, they are great. And I am the latter.

[Brónach 1,302]

I'm a regular viewer who thought First Contact was full of nonsense after thinking on it.

[Trent B 337]

As I've said before the Trekkie in me loves ALL the Star Trek films (and scores). I even like Star Trek V...at least until they reach the great barrier. Beyond that it lost hope.

I know a lot of people don't like Star Trek Nemesis but I for one like it.

[Wojo 2,453]

Do you consider the Next Generation movies canon?

Are the TNG movies shit?

What question in the poll am I supposed to answer?

Word. Yes to one is No to the other.

[Marian Schedenig 8,193]

1) They're certainly canon. 2) I don't have specific problems with most of the issues listed (a few of which I don't see as issues to begin with). The series is full of inconsistencies already during its TV run, and the worst moments of the worst Trek movies are still a thousand times better than the first two seasons of TNG.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

There isn't a lot there that doesnt gell well with either TNG or DS9 that was still playing at the time.

Work being back on The Enterprise fro Nemesis is the biggest inconsistency I guess

[JoeinAR 1,949]

I'm a regular viewer who thought First Contact was full of nonsense after thinking on it.

oh please you're so damned young that you were not a regular viewer of Star Trek, and you weren't even a teenage when First Contact came out. First Contact is a very good Star Trek film and the best of the Next Generation ones.

[Quintus 5,399]

It's one of my three favourites in the franchise. Like Skyfall, it's just a good movie in its own right.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

I'm a regular viewer who thought First Contact was full of nonsense after thinking on it.

oh please you're so damned young that you were not a regular viewer of Star Trek, and you weren't even a teenage when First Contact came out. First Contact is a very good Star Trek film and the best of the Next Generation ones.

Hey, I wasn't a teenager when First Contact came out, but I was still a regular viewer. I watched all of the series and movies and I filmed the Star Trek Adventure at Universal Studios Florida. Maybe I'm the exception, but children can be regular viewers of Star Trek...?

[Wojo 2,453]

First Contact is a good movie and it's a good action movie, all right, but it's not a good Star Trek movie.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

You got that right. The Next Gen movies are guilty pleasures.

[Marian Schedenig 8,193]

First Contact is a good movie and it's a good action movie, all right, but it's not a good Star Trek movie.

Like all TNG movies, it neglects half of its principal characters. But the Picard/Ahab stuff and Data's emotional dilemma make it a worthy Trek movie, in my opinion. It's probably my 3rd favourite of the films, after TWOK and TUC.

[Gruesome Son of a Bitch 6,488]

But Picard seeking revenge makes no sense. He was fine with the Borg for the rest of the show. He even let Hugh go and left those other dudes on the planet in Descent. Why the hell would he suddenly go crazy and risk all of his crew, plus murder Borg with a tommy gun while screaming like a madman?

Reminds me, I want to watch I, Borg.

[Wojo 2,453]

Because he's three hundred years in the past, where the Borg aren't supposed to be, and if he doesn't kill all the Borg he sees, they will assimilate Earth and all that he knows. The stakes are much higher than normal, which is why he decides to kill assimilated crew members. He rationalizes that he doesn't have time to save them the way he was. This isn't "suddenly" going crazy, but he does let anger get the best of him, as displayed when he mows down Borg on the holodeck. His personal Ahab moment is used by Lilly when she tries to snap him back to reality. He then decides to sacrifice the ship -- and save his crew, who abandon ship -- to destroy the rest of the Borg.

That's kind of weak compared to the events you describe in I, Borg and Descent, but those weren't huge Earth-assimilating events like First Contact presented.

[Quintus 5,399]

First Contact is a good movie and it's a good action movie, all right, but it's not a good Star Trek movie.

Not dull and turgid enough?

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

The Next Gen flicks are so bad, my favourite is Nemesis.

[Marian Schedenig 8,193]

Because he's three hundred years in the past, where the Borg aren't supposed to be, and if he doesn't kill all the Borg he sees, they will assimilate Earth and all that he knows. The stakes are much higher than normal, which is why he decides to kill assimilated crew members. He rationalizes that he doesn't have time to save them the way he was. This isn't "suddenly" going crazy, but he does let anger get the best of him, as displayed when he mows down Borg on the holodeck. His personal Ahab moment is used by Lilly when she tries to snap him back to reality. He then decides to sacrifice the ship -- and save his crew, who abandon ship -- to destroy the rest of the Borg.

It's perhaps still somewhat inconsistent with his relaxed stance toward the Borg in the later TNG seasons, but as I said before, the TV series itself is full of these kinds of inconsistencies as well. And thinking back to the first Hugh episode, it was Picard who was adamant that they should use him as a vehicle for a computer virus that would wipe out the entire Borg society. The Borg have always been a soft spot for him, and First Contact emphasised that a bit more than the TV series.

[Wojo 2,453]

And thinking back to the first Hugh episode, it was Picard who was adamant that they should use him as a vehicle for a computer virus that would wipe out the entire Borg society. The Borg have always been a soft spot for him, and First Contact emphasised that a bit more than the TV series.

Right. At first, Picard wanted to commit, as La Forge called it, the "genocide" of the Borg, and even Guinan would have gone along with it, until she listened to "Hugh's" case and got Picard to listen as well. This softened Picard's stance toward the Borg. He no longer appeared to be driven by revenge against the Collective for assimilating him, because using the virus in Hugh would have been his moment. Admirals Alynna Nechayev and Norah Satie later called Picard out on this very issue, claiming that Picard was putting ideals ahead of the Federation's interest or even that his loyalty was in question. And then at the close of Descent, Picard permits the individual Borg under Hugh's leadership to survive.

Let's face it, the Borg were really used only four times in TNG -- Q Who?, Best of Both Worlds, I, Borg, and Descent. I believe they were under-used. (Though I would complain that Voyager over-used them, and eventually even declawed them.) They started out as this super, unbeatable villain that became very personal to Picard as a result of the single greatest episode of TNG. After that, the final two TNG appearances of the Borg were continuations of the Locutus experience. First Contact (the movie) returned them to super-villain status, and I really think that while Picard may have wanted to look at the Borg with the "Hugh changed, so can they" attitude, the fact that Earth was assimilated in the future forced his hand.

[Jay 37,364]

Let's face it, the Borg were really used only four times in TNG -- Q Who?, Best of Both Worlds, I, Borg, and Descent. I believe they were under-used.

Right, but two of those stories are 2-part episodes that start in one season and end in another. So you have Borg stories spread out over 6 seasons - there's a Borg episode in EVERY single season except the first.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

I always thought Descent was a bit of a failure.

[Ollie 1,059]

We never got a resolution to the Season 1 ending though, I wonder what ever happened to that signal?

Of course the movies are canon. The screw a lot up but they count.

[Wojo 2,453]

Let's face it, the Borg were really used only four times in TNG -- Q Who?, Best of Both Worlds, I, Borg, and Descent. I believe they were under-used.

Right, but two of those stories are 2-part episodes that start in one season and end in another. So you have Borg stories spread out over 6 seasons - there's a Borg episode in EVERY single season except the first.

Of course, though I didn't think I had to spell it all out quite like that. A two-parter does register as two episodes but I still consider it a single story in my book, especially since TNG kept the same name for Part 2 as in Part 1. (Subsequent series, namely DS9, were more creative with their story arcs.)

So now we have to argue about whether there were 176 or 178 total episodes of TNG, because both the pilot and finale were made and named as feature-length, but were split in two for reruns. That determines what percentage of all TNG episodes feature the Borg, either 6/176 (3.41%) or 6/178 (3.37%). Either way, not a lot. The Borg were underused. Sure, at least two more, Family and The Drumhead specifically, explicitly mention the Borg through discussion of TBOBW, but these don't count.

There is also one implied mention of the Borg. It was planned that the means by which the Federation and Romulan outposts were destroyed in "The Neutral Zone" (the final episode of TNG S1) was by a Borg scouting party.

Maurice Hurley had something more in mind with this episode. The attacks the Romulans complain about in "The Neutral Zone" dangled as an unresolved plot device for quite some time, but there was a plan: Hurley had meant for this episode to comprise part of a trilogy in which the Borg would be formally introduced. The opening episode of the second season further explored matters, including a possible alliance between the Federation and the Romulan Empire to counter the new threat. Such plans, however, were ruined by the writer's guild strike of that year. As such, the Borg's introduction had to wait until "Q Who". (Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion)

We never got a resolution to the Season 1 ending though, I wonder what ever happened to that signal?

What signal? There was a signal sent by the Borg in the Enterprise episode "Regeneration," which serves as a sequel-of-sorts to Star Trek: First Contact by showing the Borg that fell through Earth's atmosphere, likely from the Borg sphere since the deflector dish was obliterated more completely. The crew is aware of Zefram Cochrane's rants about futuristic cyborgs that interfered with First Contact, and these Borg did send a signal towards the Delta Quadrant that wouldn't be answered for 200 years. If anything, this explains why a Borg cube was headed toward Earth the moment that Q took the Enterprise-D out to meet them in "Q Who?" It closed the time loop.

[Brónach 1,302]

I'm a regular viewer who thought First Contact was full of nonsense after thinking on it.

oh please you're so damned young that you were not a regular viewer of Star Trek, and you weren't even a teenage when First Contact came out. First Contact is a very good Star Trek film and the best of the Next Generation ones.

Hey, I wasn't a teenager when First Contact came out, but I was still a regular viewer. I watched all of the series and movies and I filmed the Star Trek Adventure at Universal Studios Florida. Maybe I'm the exception, but children can be regular viewers of Star Trek...?

It seems like unless you saw these things when they came out one is classified as "you just don't get it."

The funny part is that I was actually referring to the "Star Trek fans vs regular viewers" angle that was set up before me.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Wojo in Conspiracy (season 1) a mysterious signal was send out. It was never resolved.

[JoeinAR 1,949]

Wojo in Conspiracy (season 1) a mysterious signal was send out. It was never resolved.

true but that did not concern the borg, but those worm things.

[Wojo 2,453]

Wojo in Conspiracy (season 1) a mysterious signal was send out. It was never resolved.

Ok, I remember that one, yes, that is a quandry. When Mark said "Season 1 ending," I thought he meant the ending, i.e. "The Neutral Zone." You're right, that signal by the destructive alien symbiotes that seek coexistence, which had a story arc of sorts in Season 1, was never resolved.

The Trill as seen in TNG's "The Host" were also symbiotes, though more amicable than the belly worms and not destructive at all, though DS9 completely rebooted the basic ideas of the Trill.

I also thought that maybe the creatures in deep space that would receive the Conspiracy signal were the Founders in the Gamma Quadrant, but that idea was never pursued. It was an idea that ran its course and then dead-ended when Season 2 began.

[JoeinAR 1,949]

I loved how graphic that episode was. Pretty gross for 1988.

[Trent B 337]

Work being back on The Enterprise fro Nemesis is the biggest inconsistency I guess

Work? Who's Work?

Ya I do agree about that though. I would imagine it took place years after the DS9 finale. I doubt he stopped being a Starfleet officer, he probably conferred with Martok about remaining as the Ambassador to the Klingon home world and asked to be transferred to the Enterprise.

BTW I forgot to add in my original posts yes the Star Trek TNG movies are cannon.

[JoeinAR 1,949]

I think Nemesis is a horrible film on the big screen but if you take it as a minor 2 part episode it's more tolerable. It works best on tv.

You have to really avoid the whole horrific B-4 thing, or the buffoonery of Shinzon's reasoning.

But the look of the Romulan Warbirds is awesome, though Shinzon's ship is just ridiculous and boring. But everything is made at least tolerable by the fine performance by Stewart as Picard. Phone Book page 1, letter A.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Its a harmless film, elevated by an excellent Patrick Stewart.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

I thought it was the first TNG one that actually felt like a movie.

[Wojo 2,453]

Not enough lens flare.

[Unlucky Bastard 7,782]

Not enough lens flare.

Easily captured by my Canon.

[John Takis 206]

I think "All Good Things..." was the perfect send-off for the TNG crew. It encapsulated everything that made the show great, in a way that none of the subsequent films ever quite managed to do. Ultimately, the canon of "TREK I highly enjoy and will revisit over the years" jumps directly from the end of DS9 to the 2009 film. The TNG films did give us some fantastic film scores, however! For that reason alone, I'm very glad they exist...

[Marian Schedenig 8,193]

Right. At first, Picard wanted to commit, as La Forge called it, the "genocide" of the Borg, and even Guinan would have gone along with it, until she listened to "Hugh's" case and got Picard to listen as well. This softened Picard's stance toward the Borg. He no longer appeared to be driven by revenge against the Collective for assimilating him, because using the virus in Hugh would have been his moment. Admirals Alynna Nechayev and Norah Satie later called Picard out on this very issue, claiming that Picard was putting ideals ahead of the Federation's interest or even that his loyalty was in question. And then at the close of Descent, Picard permits the individual Borg under Hugh's leadership to survive.

In a way, Guinan was the Ahab character in that episode. Picard was certainly biased by his Locutus experience, but mostly he just didn't consider them individuals/sentient beings enough to see the planned genocide as what it is, thus more easily justifying it as a necessary defensive step in the war. Guinan, on the other hand, was really driven by hatred in that episode.

And you can also argue that Picard's change of mind is exactly what made Starfleet lose trust in him with regards to the Borg, eventually banning him from the battle in FC.

Its a harmless film, elevated by an excellent Patrick Stewart.

I like Nemesis for what it is, and it has Stewart's best performance in all the TNG movies, but it seems it would have been much better if they hadn't cut so many character moments from the final film. They set up the Picard/Shinzon duality and then barely touch upon it again, resulting in a character drama (at its core) with nearly no character bits.

[Wojo 2,453]

In a way, Guinan was the Ahab character in that episode. Picard was certainly biased by his Locutus experience, but mostly he just didn't consider them individuals/sentient beings enough to see the planned genocide as what it is, thus more easily justifying it as a necessary defensive step in the war. Guinan, on the other hand, was really driven by hatred in that episode.

And you can also argue that Picard's change of mind is exactly what made Starfleet lose trust in him with regards to the Borg, eventually banning him from the battle in FC.

Guinan started out as Ahab, certainly, because the Borg's destruction of her homeworld and scattering of her El-Aurian people is the parallel to Ahab losing his leg, but even she, this hater of Q and Borg everywhere, became sympathetic to the Borg cause, and then persuaded Picard to open his mind to possibility as well. I, Borg was a landmark episode because it showed that when we (ok, maybe enlightened Starfleet "we") see the humanity and fear in our enemy, no matter how terrible and destructive he/she/it is, we begin to show pity for he/she/it, and can even bring ourselves to have mercy.

Picard spared the Borg race because he pitied one individual Borg, proving humanity's sense of ethics makes it superior to that of the Borg, even if they still retained the firepower to exterminate the Federation. He decided that the needs of the one outweigh the needs of the many -- whether "many" means the Federation or the Borg collective itself (where many equals one) is open to side debate. And since Picard's next encounter with Borg ended with him leaving those renegade individuals alive, I can kind of understand why some Starfleet admirals may question Picard's loyalty and ban him from the Borg incursion of the First Contact film.

What I cannot understand is why they permitted Picard to remain in command of the mightiest ship in the fleet. If you question the loyalty of the captain of your "flagship," you can't afford him to be a loose cannon. You do not keep him on the Enterprise-D, and after his absence coincided with the loss of that ship and the final (haha) death of Kirk, you certainly do not reward him with the Enterprise-E. You demote him or court martial him (Norah Satie was on pace to do this) or give him a desk job where you can hold his leash, and put a more controllable puppet (Jellico, Riker, Shelby, etc.) in charge. In the end, Picard kept the E because the script required him to heroically defy his orders to sit down and go paint in the corner, and then save Earth's future from the Borg.