The original show offered everything anybody could want in a space opera; vile and dangerous alien aggressors; a testosterone-drenched go-get 'em Captain who wasn't afraid to actively woo any blue-skinned babe in a silver miniskirt and go-go boots; a sputtering humanist doctor consistently outraged by the flat logic of Mr. Spock; a "Prime Directive" that was nothing but a loose guideline of suggested behavior. The first series, retro-campiness notwithstanding, was just too good to last more than the three glorious seasons it ran.
Then, after ten years of reruns and a damn fine Saturday morning cartoon series with Nimoy and Shatner, came the first misstep. "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" forgot all the qualities that made the TV show so great, and instead focused on state-of-the-art special effects to the detriment of plot and character. This was only the beginning of what would be, apart from the rip-roarin' second film, a freefall from grace. The original crew never seemed as real or entertaining on the big screen as it did on television those frozen evenings after school. Series creator Gene Rodenberry, obviously bowled over by the continuing success of his brainchild, took the burgeoning cult following of his show as an opportunity to dust off a politically correct soapbox and preach to the 'Trekkies' concerning his rather stilted utopian vision of the future. Oh, every few episodes of the old show would display some of that bleeding-heart philosophizing. It would peek through in the occasional over-the-top monologue by Kirk on the values of humanity, but Shatner's bad-Shakespearean emoting would turn it all into a hoot. From this nascent pedantry bloomed the rotten orchid that became the most wretched offense against man and nature ever perpetrated on such an adoring public; Star Trek: The Next Generation.
With a built-in audience, ST:TNG created an immense buzz. Another Star Trek! Anything Rodenberry gave us was bound to be good, no? No. The Next Generation were all a bunch of whining pantywaists who bore little, if any, connection to the rootin'-tootin' space cowboys of the Federation we had all grown to love. Talk about an abyssal generation gap! The new crew was naught but fluff and dead weight, the angst-ridden "Gen X" of the science fiction genre. The basic plot of any ST:TNG was; Enterprise almost gets into trouble, but the crew talks its way out of it before any real action becomes necessary. Nonviolent solutions became the norm. While admirable, the diplomatic approach did not make for good TV. There wasn't even very much "boldly going where no man has gone before." The Enterprise served as an intergalactic United Nations, flying peace convoys and ferrying vaccines to far flung corners of the Federation. This formula allowed for every single character to have plenty of time to get in touch with their feelings, to heal their inner child and maximize their personal potential. It became one huge group-therapy session in space, with the new Enterprise looking suspiciously like a tricked-up home spa unit.
While launched in the mid-'80s, The Next Generation carried all the most self-indulgent signatures of the nadir of the '70s. Most indicative of this psychobabble new age space opera was the character of Counselor Troi. An empath, Troi hung out on the bridge poking her Mediterranean schnoz into everybody's business, while managing to be both weepy and neurotic on her own time. The classic stereotype of the messed-up psych major carried over even into the 24th century. In the good old days she would have been exiled to sick bay to gossip away the mission with Nurse Chapel and Yeoman Rand. Would that it were so! "Counselor Worthless" was a staple of the new cast and would not go away.
The new, kinder, gentler Enterprise had a Klingon security officer.(!) Kirk would've literally flipped his wig! And beefy Lt. Worf wasn't even a good security officer. He couldn't hit the broad side of a barn with his phaser, and every other episode some weasely alien was taking him out in one punch. Not a good Klingon, not a good Starfleet Officer, and certainly not a well-written character. Worf has survived the demise of ST:TNG and moved over, as sort of an in-house superstar, to the pale and pathetic Trek spinoff, Deep Space Nine.
The most popular cast members are Lt. Cmdr. Data, an android who yearns to be human, and Kirk's supposed replacement, Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Data is a cyber-Pinnochio mostly played for cheap laughs. There is no room on the Enterprise for a puppet who wants to be a boy, even a fully-functional model with a positronic brain (whatever the hell that means). Data is an attempt by the writers to provide a running commentary on the foibles of being human, but ends up as a treatise on the pitfalls of being a hack teleplay writer.
Picard is almost a real Star Trek captain. Almost. As played earnestly by British thespian Patrick Stewart, Picard is a lot stuffier and far more introspective than Kirk ever was. Picard is most often content to drink Earl Grey tea in his private "ready-room" and ruminate on the interpersonal relationships he has missed in exchange for his brilliant Starfleet career. Apart from the occasional fast-paced stream of absurd technobabble, Picard delegates most of his duties away. A good portion of those duties go to his second-in-command, a pompous jerk named Cmdr. William Riker.
Played with 'actorly' intensity by second-rate TV commercial and way-off Broadway dinner theater alumni Jonathan Frakes, Riker is written as the wannabe-Kirk prototype. Problem is, he's incompetent. Almost every time he's been given the helm of the ship, he crashes it, blows part of it up or gets it captured. His stints in landing parties are no less fraught with bad luck and even worse decision-making acumen. Riker is the ultimate second banana in a program overstuffed with losers and also-rans.
In the real world, Frakes has been handed the directorial helm of several episodes, and now the second big screen Next Generation adventure, currently enjoying a successful run at the Goldstream Theater. His TV episodes are the type where the whole cast dons green tights and prances about a virtual Sherwood Forest playing Robin Hood, or where several characters come to terms with personal emotional pain. Although, it is a boon to viewers that when he directs a show, Riker is usually dropped back to a tertiary character. Other regular crew members don't even warrant a mention.
The current Star Trek movie, "First Contact," gives Frakes the chance to direct with the big boys. Budgeted in the high double-digit millions, with most of the cash going to special effects and advertising, "First Contact" can be considered a really good try to recapture the heart of the original program, but one that fails to engage any sort of visceral reaction. It is a tremendous improvement over the first ST:TNG feature film, which suffered from a creeping lethargy of spirit that they attempted to compensate for by concocting several gargantuan set-piece special effects to distract the viewer from the yawning chasm of interest at the center of the film.
The underwritten plot of "First Contact" involves the return of the only half-interesting villains ever to spring from the second series, the Borg. Half flesh and half machine, the Borg is a collective intelligence that bops about the universe absorbing every race they encounter. Funny thing though, they all look the same; half human and half Radio Shack. The Borg travels back in time in an attempt to assimilate earth in the 21st century, but must reckon with an obsessed Picard in hot pursuit.
Patrick Stewart is given almost all of the lines and all of the action in the movie, which is good, because he is the only participant who has an inkling of how to act. Everybody else is reduced to comic relief schtick, especially Counselor Worthless, who gets to soldier through an embarrassing drunk scene. Makes you long for Marina Sirtis to go back to pornos, where acting isn't so important.
Those who blindly buy into any sub-par product with the Star Trek logo will be ecstatic with this mediocre mess. Regular viewers of the execrable "Voyager" and the ho-hum "Deep Space Nine" will see this film as something really special, just because they are so conditioned to the reek of wet garbage that dry rubbish smells like home cookin'. The current "Trekker" is woefully unprepared for even the barest shred of quality, which, unfortunately, is the most they are ever going to get from this mass market sci-fi juggernaut.
The original cast of Star Trek are all in their dotage now, with DeForest Kelley somewhere in his decrepit mid-70s, and Leonard Nimoy enjoying a career directing awful MOR comedies. But leave it to Paramount Pictures to follow the sparkle of filthy lucre straight to the bank. This franchise is just up and running now. We'll be subjected to bad spinoffs far into the 21st century, which is bound to attract another generation of socially retarded weenies ready to dress up in tacky Starfleet uniforms and attend weekend-long conventions. So, until the next big screen Star Trek; stay in your parent's basement, study up on the Klingon language, and live long and prosper.