Hey guys! How's it going? I'm doing pretty good. Welcome back to Geek Talk from the Basement, where I pick a topic and talk about it. Today I'm going to talk about why Star Trek: The Next Generation is my favourite TV show of all time. Originally, today's topic was going to be why Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is my favourite Harry Potter book (and film). But I changed my mind. So let's dive into some Trek Talk shall we?
As long time readers of my blog know by now, I am a huge Trekkie. Star Trek is my favourite franchise of all time. Unlike Star Wars, I can't remember a time where Star Trek was not a part of my life. I was born a Trekkie, and through its ups and downs, its dormant periods, its times where it faced a lot of controversy, I have stayed with the franchise. Though during Star Trek: Enterprise I will admit to not being as enthusiastic in my fandom, preferring to watch That '70s Show on Wednesday nights instead, relegating Star Trek to the encore airings on Sunday nights instead. I was in high school, and I wanted the girls to like me. Star Trek is what kept me entertained during those long nights in the hospital.
At the focal point of this fandom was Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994). This was the second live action Star Trek series (third overall) and the final one to be created by Gene Roddenberry. It was my introduction into the Star Trek Universe. Sure, I watched reruns of the original series on CBC on Saturday mornings, but to me TNG is the series that formed my love of Star Trek. It's the series I go to when I just want to relax and have fun, but not have a comedy or campy superhero show or movie on.
When I was a kid, Riker was my favourite character. He still is. Played by Jonathan Frakes, Commander Riker is the fictional character that I looked up to. Picard was more like a parent in my eyes, but Riker was like a friend who was older. Much of the talks he had with Data and Wesley I also took to heart because in a way I felt like they were directed at me too. I also wished that my doctors were like Doctor Crusher sometimes, just so I wouldn't have to be in the hospital for quite so long as I ended up being in most cases if I wasn't having Day Surgery. While Riker was my favourite character as a kid, as a teenager I identified with three characters: Lieutenant Worf, Lieutenant Commander Data and (Acting) Ensign Wesley Crusher.
I identified with Worf as a teenager because, while I'm a Human Being, I still felt like an outcast. Someone who stood out and often had to make decisions that might not be what the majority of my friends and classmates would've decided to do. Also, my ways were not always their ways and so I felt connected to Worf for that reason. That, and he was also a funny character even though he was played as the straightman the majority of the time. Especially when he says lines like, "Sir I protest! I am not a merry man!" when Q has the crew dressed as Robin Hood and his Merry Men in a facsimile of Sherwood Forest in "Qpid" to when he tells Q "Die" when Q asks what he must do to convince the crew that he was mortal in "Deja Q". It sucks that Worf only became appreciated by the writers when he moved over to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine at the beginning of that show's fourth season. But I like him a lot.
I identified with Data as a teenager, and now as an adult, because like him I don't understand Human behaviour at all. At least not very often. I also don't know how to articulate certain feelings, which of course Data has a problem with when he first gets his emotion chip in Star Trek Generations, the first movie starring the TNG cast. I realize now that Data was an allegory for Autism, even if that wasn't Roddenberry's intention when he created the character in early 1987. I still think it's cool though, because Data is an awesome character and I love when he tries to emulate Humans.
Of course I identified with Wesley, because he's the teenager on the ship. Yes, he had Bridge access and got to helm the Enterprise for almost three whole seasons, but he's still a teenager and is more identifiable with the younger audience of the show. Which is something the show lost when Wil Wheaton left the show in the middle of season 4. I say the middle, but it was more like a quarter of the way through the season, because his final episode as a series regular, "Final Mission" is the ninth episode of the fourth season. The ninth episode out of 26 episodes in the season. That's why I identified with him, because he was the younger character in a sea of adults, which is a situation I often found myself in growing up because I was around adults a lot more than I was around other kids, due to me being in the hospital so much, oftentimes having a room to myself, or needing to be in isolation due to illness and being contagious.
One of my favourite episodes of the series is "Encounter at Farpoint". It's not a good episode by any means but I absolutely love it. I owned it twice on VHS when I was a kid, and I've owned it more than once on DVD since I had it on the Star Trek: The Q Fan Collective DVD box set, which was a collection of every episode that Q, played by the wonderful John de Lancie, appeared in from Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and Star Trek: Voyager, as well as the DVD set for the first season of Star Trek: The Next Generation. So I've owned the episode several times. I watched it on VHS the most though. In fact I'm pretty sure that every time I wanted to watch TNG on VHS that's the episode I would ask my parents or my nurse to put on, or I'd put it on myself when I was old enough to be putting in and taking out tapes from the VCR.
My other favourite episodes are "The Arsenal of Freedom", "Skin of Evil", "The Outrageous Okona", "Q Who?", "Deja Q", "The Defector", "Yesterday's Enterprise", "The Best of Both Worlds Part I", "The Best of Both Worlds Part II", "First Contact", "Qpid", "A Matter of Time", "Cause and Effect", "Tapestry", "Parallels", and "All Good Things...". I know they aren't the usual episodes that are on people's best episodes of all time lists, but these are my personal favourites.
Oh and the Enterprise-D is my favourite ship in all of Star Trek. The Bridge is spacious, the corridors are brightly lit (the whole ship is), Sickbay is where I wish I could've stayed and had my operations in, instead of CHEO (only sometimes though), and I love Ten Forward, Engineering, the Transporter Room and the Holodecks. Not to mention the living quarters on the ship were great too. I don't know, there was just this homey feel to the Galaxy-class in general that other starships just didn't have. I mean, sure the refit Constitution-class ships from the first six TOS movies had that big recreation deck in the middle of the ship, but Ten Forward felt more comfortable. It helped that Guinan, played by Whoopi Goldberg, was the hostess of Ten Forward and she was a good listener, and not just because her race, the El Aurians, are a race of Listeners. So yeah, while the other ships are cool looking, especially Voyager, if there's any starship I would want to live on, from any franchise, hands down it would have to be the USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D, commanded by Captain Jean-Luc Picard.
TNG was my show. I like TOS, DS9, Enterprise, Discovery, and Picard, and I love Voyager and Lower Decks, but Star Trek: The Next Generation is home. It's family. It's taking risks and going on adventures with people you love. Characters who are so memorable that their faces are etched into your mind so that when someone asks you to talk about them, you remember every single detail, even if they only ever showed up on TNG. Even the recurring cast members are memorable and they aren't so numerous or rotating that you can't keep them straight. If you've never seen Star Trek: The Next Generation I implore you to find it on CBS All-Access, or Netflix, or on DVD or even on TV in reruns and watch an episode or two. I remember every weeknight at 6:30, TNG would be on and my mom would change it from CJOH News (after the weather report) to CHRO and we'd watch the rerun episodes, and then watch the new episodes on Saturday nights at 7 pm. And it was appointment viewing in my family, no matter where we were. My parents even made sure I could get CHRO in on the TV in my hospital room at CHEO so I wouldn't miss an episode.
That's gonna be it for me for tonight. I could go on and on about Star Trek: The Next Generation, but I'll save that for another time. Stay tuned in the near future for reviews of all of the episodes I mentioned in this post, because I wanna get into the specifics. When I do get to them, there will be spoilers, because it's a 30 + year old show so if you haven't seen it by now, that's something you have work out with yourself. I have nothing to do with it. Lol. Have a great night guys and I will see you all next week for more great content here in the Review Basement. Later.
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