From: ottoh3@CFSMO.Honeywell.COM (Otto Heuer #3)
Subject: Re: Series' beginnings
To: rec.arts.startrek.misc
Posted-Date: Mon, 13 Apr 92 10: 03:06 CDT
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Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1992 15:03:06 GMT
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Jason Snell posts:

| ottoh3@CFSMO.Honeywell.COM (Otto Heuer #3) writes:

| >Someone (sorry, the article was too long for me to sift through
| >to get an attribution) started comparing TOS's "Where No Man
| >Has Gone Before" to TNG's "Encounter at Farpoint".
| >
| >This is interesting, because I was just thinking to myself that
| >almost EXACTLY half the TNG episodes have been better and half
| >have been worse than the original two-hour premier.
| >
| >On the other hand, at least 90% of the TOS episodes were better
| >than WNMHGB.  From such a lame beginning, it was extremely hard
| >for them to come up with a worse piece of dreck than the opener.
| >The only ones that come to mind right now are "Charlie X",
| >"The Doomsday Machine", and "And the Children Shall Leave."
| >At least "Spock's Brain" and "The Way to Eden" were fun to 
| >laugh at.

| Wow, Otto, I think you're totally out of the water here. TNG is indeed a sorry
| show if "Encounter at Farpoint" is the midpoint in episode quality. "EaF" is a
| hideous episode. Worst acting I've ever seen in a TV series? Well, yeah, Don
| Rickles in "CPO Sharkey," but second up is Denise Crosby's "You've gone too
| far.." speech to Q in "EaF." Makes me SICK to this day. Couple that with "I
| sense pain.." repeatedly from Troi. Mix in a boring and transparent plot about
| space jellyfish, and you've got more of a TOS parody than a real episode. the
| show's only satisfying bits are the introductions to the characters
| (Picard/Riker, Bev/Wes, Bev/Picard, Riker/Data) and the Data/McCoy scene.

I say it's half-way for TNG because there were such stinkers as "Skin of
Evil", "Neutral Zone", "The Outcast", "Too Short a Season", "Lonely Among
Us", "Samaritan Snare", "Haven", and "Justice".

That's just a few of the TNG eps that I think have been worse (by far) 
than the season opener.  EaF had a few things that grated on me (Troi
saying nothing but "The paaaain... I sense paaaaain... i'm a paaaain..."
and Picard's annoying smugness) but there were a few things that were
WORSE for the rest of the season (all eps of season one except EaF have
Troi with her hait in an unattractive bun, Troi shows off her legs a
bit in EaF (okay, so I'm a chauvinist), EaF had some neat effects that
were unmatched throughout the season, etc.)

| Now, to flame point #2: "Where No Man Has Gone Before," which, in my mind, is
| one of TOS' best episodes.

Let's see if I can even IMAGINE something from the show that could have
made it even an AVERAGE episode of TOS...  hmmm.... any humorous
interaction between the crewmen?  nope... any deep thought-provoking plot?
nope... any deep look into a major character?  nope...

Okay, feel free to try to convince me why this episode is so good.

| You've got a mysterious force which kills a few
| crewmembers, and seriously injures others,

"mysterious"? sorry... didn't even cause me to CARE.  Maybe if they had
concentrated on exploring WHY this was happening at the barrier it 
would have held my interest, but they just decided to abandon it and
focus on this minor character that we aren't even led to care about.

| The evil-looking first
| officer, who is not really close to the captain,

Maybe that's another reason I didn't like it.  It doesn't mesh with
the rest of the series.  Inconsistencies...

| The friend is a tragic figure,

"tragic actor" is more like it.  :-)

| Kirk is forced to kill his friend,

The highlight of the episode.  :-)

| "WNMHGB" is classic trek,

"WNMHGB" is classic drek, with cardboard characters (Mitchell and the
doctor, not to mention the worst acting I've seen from Kellerman in her
entire career).

| chilling and disturbing, 

Musta been watching different episodes...

| as well as being a pretty
| solid action show.

They had at least 10 better show that were "action" oriented:

Space Seed
Day of the Dove
Patterns of Force
Mirror, Mirror
A Piece of the Action
The Savage Curtain
Spectre of the Gun
Wolf in the Fold
Dagger of the Mind
Amok Time

Even if we steer away from the "action" episodes, there were many that were
better that WNMHGB":

The Paradise Syndrome
Thr Trouble with Tribbles
The City on the Edge of Forever
Wink of an Eye
By Any Other Name
I, Mudd
The Way to Eden
Journey to Babel

| your choice of "Doomsday Machine" also baffles me. I don't like this
| one as much as some, and I think the model shots of the Space Log dwarfing the
| E, then matching it in size, etc., are pathetic, but there's still a good bit
| of humor and tension in that episode.

I musta missed the humor.

The only thing missing was Troi screaming "the paaaaain..."

I really do find it painful to watch DM.   When Decker  starts drooling and
spitting on the cast members as he utters (with no sense of  acting at all)
"it had a maw that could swallow a dozen  (or was  it thousand) starships!"
(as we see a shuttle that looks larger  than the  stone carrot),  I have to
reach for the remote and hope there's an  old rerun  of "The  Gong Show" on
another channel to raise the entertainment level a few notches.   (Sorry, I
used to watch these in the 70s).

| So, Otto, I keep wondering if your post was left over from April Fool's Day!

No, but perhaps "Where No Man" and "Doomsday" were (unfortunately).

| Singling out "EaF" as an average TNG is a slap in the face,

Not when I can name 50 episodes of TNG that were worse...

| but saying that
| "WNMHGB" is dreck is just baffling.

.and can name 50 episodes of TOS that were better.

| Confusedly yours...

Time to try to get back in the top 25 (it's been a few years)...  :-)

                --Otto "HACK-MAN" Heuer
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