Ok, I admit it, I’m a Trekkie from way back. Not an extremist, mind you. But I grew up on the original series, and by the time I was old enough to recognize how cliche it was, Next Generation was there as a deserving successor. Deep Space 9 was better yet, almost (but not quite) reaching the level of genius found in Babylon 5 (the best SF series ever made).
I must confess though, Voyager was a let down. I started watching, ready to give it the benefit of the doubt, but somehow it just didn’t work. Every other episode consisted of alien race threatens/invades ship, Janeway & Co. save ship, ship gets a few miles closer to home. Yes, there were a few gems in there, but on those occasions I watched I was more often than not disappointed.
With Enterprise, I started out hopeful, but again it seemed uneven. I almost gave up, but at the end of the last season something happened. Whether it was the introduction of multi-episodic story arcs (a key element of the success of both DS9 and Babylon 5), or just more sophisticated storytelling, I actually began to look forward to seeing it. With this week’s conclusion of a three part series illustrating a key historical event on Vulcan, I feel they’ve reached a level as high as any of the other shows.
So, for those of you who have abandoned Star Trek in one of its later incarnations, but remember one of the older shows fondly, I think it’s time you pay the franchise a visit. You may be pleasantly surprised.
Yeah, I would agree – Enterprise is actually pretty good this season. I watched all of Season 1, skipped 2, and startup again with 3, and I must say that the whole Xindi storyline was an improvement over the first season. Not spectacular, mind you, but a good improvement. Now that they are regularly doing multi-episode story arcs, I too am looking forward to watching it.
Have you ever seen Farscape? You might want to check it out. Sadly, it’s not on TV any more (stupid SciFi channel…grrr) but after the show got going it took the multi-episode story arc idea to the extreme, and pulled it off with great success. All of the episodes are available on DVD, so they can still be watched. 🙂
Sigh. Gee, thanks Dan! Just when I’ve weaned myself completely off TV…
I’ll give it a shot!
you are so right. This last 3 part series on vulcan was very interesting. I really hope they develop the story line surrounding the “creation” of the federation. This could add a lot of dimension to the overall star trek universe.
However, I have not liked this constant time shifting stuff. It seems to me that there is a lot interesting things they can do in their own time period.
I guess you could say my timing must be impeccable then becuase I only started watching this season… And I’ve really enjoyed it…
I’m not so sure I would consider myself a Trekkie but between TOS, TNG, and Enterprise (sounds like a Trekkie to me), I watch at least one Star Trek episode a day. By some people standards this is definately Trekkie territory.
Personally, I’m blaming Pirillo for my problem. He turned me on to Dancing Barefoot, which led to Just A Geek, then TNG, and now it’s TOS and Enterprise.
I guess I’m going to need a twelve-step soon!
The Vulcan story wasn’t bad, but the previous multi-episode event was even better: the one with the genetically engineered offspring of Dr. Sung (Data).