Date: Fri, 06 May 2005 11:35:20 -0400
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>
From: "Mike B." <omni at omniphile.com>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Orson Scott Card takes a flamethrower to Trek
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

At 06:46 AM 5/6/05 -0700, Drew Bittner wrote:

>The socially relevant stuff is what fans tend to shove
>in the faces of anyone who suggests Star Trek is not
>the ultimate achievement of the television medium.

SF fans maybe.  Trek fans hated those shows...one reason another letter
writing campaign didn't work very well to save it after the third season.
Social relevance may be fine as a concept, but doing it as ham-fistedly as
Trek did it in the third season was just painful to watch.  For example,
Frank Gorsham painted half black and half white, and trying to kill another
guy who was painted mirror image from him *because* the colors were
reversed?  Give me a break.  The "messages" were as subtle as Shatner's
acting, and that just wasn't entertaining.  It was like being lectured by a
street-corner evangelist: sad, insulting and almost funny all at the same
time...but not fun.

>TNG's allusions to previous episodes were usually
>fleeting and easily missed.

I disagree.  "Q" for instance.  He'd show up, and things would pick up from
where they left off in the previous show with little or no explanation.  He
started off in the pilot testing humanity, and continued to pop up doing so
all through the series...gradually developing some respect for humanity (or
at least Picard) along the way, and eventually wanting to marry a human.
Other things from prior episodes would show up every once in a while, such
as the Crystalline Entity, along with other aliens, such as the
Ferengi...who developed a bit too as their screen time went up.  Wesley
evolved a lot too as he aged...though it did get old with him creating new
forms of life to threaten the ship every few episodes without losing his
lab privileges.

>according to JMS). And Enterprise's "Expanse" season
>is arguably what killed the show, with lackluster
>storytelling and a ridiculous ending.

I think that one had problems with equal amounts of depression and
confusion.

The time travel stuff created a lot of confusion I expect, and they never
did completely resolve the temporal war thing clearly (like the guy running
the Sulabon...was he one of the aliens trying to make the expanse, or an
ally of the guy running the Enterprise crew, working to manipulate things
against the expanse aliens?  Perhaps a faction with a different idea of who
would make the best opposition to the expanse aliens?  The fact that Archer
and the Sulabon guy ended up working together could indicate a resolution
of that difference.)

More importantly, Trek is a golden future where everyone is nice and things
always work out honorably...and here you have a captain torturing captives
and doing illegal things, being pissy, etc. because the stakes are
high...very un-Trek-like.  The last few shows in the series continue to
miss the point entirely, with the mirror universe shows where all the
humans are short-sighted and back stabbing mean bastards.  May fit the
current kiddie video-game-induced attitudes, but it alienates the
traditional Trek audience.  Lose your core support and your ratings will tank.

-- Mike B.
--
The Borg assimilated my planet and all I got was this lousy tagline!