Trekathon '07
So I'm watching my way through Star Trek: TNG, starting with Season 1. And it's just jumped out at me: the Wesley/Picard interaction is ridiculous.
I get that Picard isn't hugely comfortable around kids, but he deals with bizarre alien cultures every day; he should be capable of intelligently putting aside his discomfort and treating Wesley as an intellectual issue, if nothing else. Picard is portrayed as being capable of overcoming his human emotional frailties and taking the high road on so many occasions; it's ridiculous that this isn't one of them.
And Wesley's a teenager going on 40; he shouldn't be such a dewy-eyed idiot; he's got no idea of appropriate behaviour or interaction with adults. Which is frankly not plausible from a highly-intelligent only child.
It's just a wrong, jarring, jangly note -- if the writers wanted captain/kid conflict they should have made the characters different; otherwise, they should have written the relationship a lot more intelligently.
I get that Picard isn't hugely comfortable around kids, but he deals with bizarre alien cultures every day; he should be capable of intelligently putting aside his discomfort and treating Wesley as an intellectual issue, if nothing else. Picard is portrayed as being capable of overcoming his human emotional frailties and taking the high road on so many occasions; it's ridiculous that this isn't one of them.
And Wesley's a teenager going on 40; he shouldn't be such a dewy-eyed idiot; he's got no idea of appropriate behaviour or interaction with adults. Which is frankly not plausible from a highly-intelligent only child.
It's just a wrong, jarring, jangly note -- if the writers wanted captain/kid conflict they should have made the characters different; otherwise, they should have written the relationship a lot more intelligently.