Waxing Geekical...
I just finished watching the final episode of Enterprise. It makes me very sad that Star Trek is now going to be off the air for the first time in 18 years - which is how long the break between The Original Series and The Next Generation was. I've been watching it religiously for 15 of those 18 years, which means that I've been a Star Trek fan for more than half my life. I think it will probably be back in a few years, but I still feel like it's the end of an era somehow - and one I was never fully sure would come. I watched Star Trek when things with my stepmother got bad. When TNG ended, the TO's wife of my company let me watch it in their apartment. I watched DS9 and Voyager all through college and grad school, and Enterprise comforted me a lot in Hawaii. I'm very, very sad to see it go.
Tonight's episode was actually rather mixed. It ended well, and I really liked the way they blended TNG and Enterprise - and especially how they lovingly recreated the Enterprise-D, both inside and out. However, the sub-plot of the episode was rather pointless, and there was no real reason to torpedo a romance that had been building for four years, or to kill off a main character. All the same, I really felt like Enterprise did some of its best work this year, and I personally think that even if not a single person watched the show, Paramount could still make money on licensing and DVDs. It says something (I think) that the first season of Enterprise cracked the Top 10 in DVD sales on Amazon last week.
Anyway, I feel really melancholy tonight. I know it's just a TV show, but it's a TV show that's been a part of my life for more than half my life. There's only one episode I haven't seen (which I'll rectify in July when Enterprise Season 2 comes out), and some I have literally seen two or three or four dozen times. I hope that when it comes back, it recaptures the wonder it had in Seasons 3 and 4 of TNG, but keeps the consciousness of the universe that it developed this season. I really loved the way that they set the stage for The Original Series in a hundred little ways this season. I hope they continue to build on it in years to come. Star Trek, is at heart, a show for optimists, and I think that even now in a world where we expect grittier, edgier television, there's always room for a message that we can beat back our personal demons if we try hard enough.
So, in the spirit of Treks gone by, what's your favorite episode? What about from each series? There are so many I love, but I think I have to go with "The Next Phase" from TNG, followed by Voyager's "Before and After". Neither are the best work of either show, but something about each resonates with me a little differently every time I watch either one. Don't ask me to explain it - I can't. After that, I'd have to go with (in no particular order) DS9's "In The Pale Moonlight", TOS's "The City on the Edge of Forever" and ENT's "Future Tense" - though I haven't really firmed up my feelings about Enterprise yet...
Also, what do you think the next series should be? Don't respond with, "for God's sake, let it die!", just tell me what you would most want to see a new series do. For me, I would love to see Star Trek: Timefleet. I would love a Star Trek that could play around in not just Archer's universe, but Kirk's and Picard's/Sisko's/Janeway's, and all the interstices that are only referred to or glimpsed. What happens a hundred years after the Dominion War ends? Is there an uneasy truce with the Borg? Are Starfleet ships pushing toward the Magellanic Clouds and Andromeda? What was the Federation like 50 years after Archer? Or 50 years before Picard? What happens to the Klingons? The Romulans? The Suliban? The Borg? The Dominion? I would love to see a Star Trek that takes the entire Star Trek Universe as its playground. But that's just me. What do you think?
Tonight's episode was actually rather mixed. It ended well, and I really liked the way they blended TNG and Enterprise - and especially how they lovingly recreated the Enterprise-D, both inside and out. However, the sub-plot of the episode was rather pointless, and there was no real reason to torpedo a romance that had been building for four years, or to kill off a main character. All the same, I really felt like Enterprise did some of its best work this year, and I personally think that even if not a single person watched the show, Paramount could still make money on licensing and DVDs. It says something (I think) that the first season of Enterprise cracked the Top 10 in DVD sales on Amazon last week.
Anyway, I feel really melancholy tonight. I know it's just a TV show, but it's a TV show that's been a part of my life for more than half my life. There's only one episode I haven't seen (which I'll rectify in July when Enterprise Season 2 comes out), and some I have literally seen two or three or four dozen times. I hope that when it comes back, it recaptures the wonder it had in Seasons 3 and 4 of TNG, but keeps the consciousness of the universe that it developed this season. I really loved the way that they set the stage for The Original Series in a hundred little ways this season. I hope they continue to build on it in years to come. Star Trek, is at heart, a show for optimists, and I think that even now in a world where we expect grittier, edgier television, there's always room for a message that we can beat back our personal demons if we try hard enough.
So, in the spirit of Treks gone by, what's your favorite episode? What about from each series? There are so many I love, but I think I have to go with "The Next Phase" from TNG, followed by Voyager's "Before and After". Neither are the best work of either show, but something about each resonates with me a little differently every time I watch either one. Don't ask me to explain it - I can't. After that, I'd have to go with (in no particular order) DS9's "In The Pale Moonlight", TOS's "The City on the Edge of Forever" and ENT's "Future Tense" - though I haven't really firmed up my feelings about Enterprise yet...
Also, what do you think the next series should be? Don't respond with, "for God's sake, let it die!", just tell me what you would most want to see a new series do. For me, I would love to see Star Trek: Timefleet. I would love a Star Trek that could play around in not just Archer's universe, but Kirk's and Picard's/Sisko's/Janeway's, and all the interstices that are only referred to or glimpsed. What happens a hundred years after the Dominion War ends? Is there an uneasy truce with the Borg? Are Starfleet ships pushing toward the Magellanic Clouds and Andromeda? What was the Federation like 50 years after Archer? Or 50 years before Picard? What happens to the Klingons? The Romulans? The Suliban? The Borg? The Dominion? I would love to see a Star Trek that takes the entire Star Trek Universe as its playground. But that's just me. What do you think?