World Famous Comics: Star Trek The Next Generation - The Complete First Season
Star Trek The Next Generation - The Complete First Season
Starring: Star Trek Next Generation Average Rating: Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated) Binding: DVD Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Subtitled, NTSC Label: Paramount Number of Items: 7 Region Code: 1 Release Date: March 26, 2002 Running Time: 1183 minutes Theatrical Release Date: September 26, 1987
Amazon.com: Warping into syndication in 1987, Star Trek: The Next Generation successfully launched its seven-season "continuing mission" of the starship Enterprise, and this classy DVD boxed set gathers the show's inaugural season in crisp picture clarity and dazzling 5.1-channel sound. A ratings leader with a sharp ensemble cast, this revamped Trek honored series creator Gene Roddenberry's original Trek concept, nurtured by returning veterans like producer Robert H. Justman and writers D.C. Fontana and David Gerrold. Several first-season episodes have original-series counterparts, and while the season was awkwardly inconsistent for all involved (including Roddenberry's heir apparent, producer Rick Berman), in retrospect the series began on remarkably solid footing.
Patrick Stewart was perfect as Enterprise Captain Jean-Luc Picard, while Marina Sirtis struggled with a wretched hair bun and an ill-defined character, eventually blessing Counselor Troi with delicate nuance. Denise Crosby made a strong but underutilized impression as Security Chief Tasha Yar, and left the series before season's end, allowing writers to develop Klingon Lieutenant Worf (Michael Dorn) into a fan favorite. Brent Spiner transcended Spock comparisons with his triumphant portrayal of the android Lieutenant Commander Data; and while Jonathan Frakes was accepted as First Officer Will Riker, fans ultimately rejected Wil Wheaton as ensign Wesley Crusher, the teenaged son of the ship's doctor (Gates McFadden). Still, these 25 episodes laid a firm foundation for subsequent seasons, and highlights include the Raymond Chandleresque "holo- novel" of "The Big Goodbye," Data's backstory in "Datalore," the Klingon rituals of "Heart of Glory," and a Romulan encounter in "The Neutral Zone." The DVD supplements (all on the seventh disc) are good enough to make anyone wish for more: four featurettes recall myriad first-season challenges, filled with insider perspective and enough NextGen trivia to satiate all but the most obsessive Trekkers back on Earth. Looking back, it's easy to see why NextGen lived long and prospered. --Jeff Shannon
Description: 25 episodes on 7 discs: Encounter at Farpoint, The Naked Now, Code of Honor, The Last Outpost, Where No One Has Gone Before, Lonely Among Us, Justice, The Battle, Hide and Q, Haven, The Big Goodbye, Datalore, Angel One, 11001001, Too Short a Season, When the Bough Breaks, Home Soil, Coming of Age, Heart of Glory, The Arsenal of Freedom, Symbiosis, Skin of Evil, We'll Always Have Paris, Conspiracy, The Neutral Zone. Four new exclusive featurettes: "The Beginning" (the genesis of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Gene Roddenberry's vision), "Selected Crew Analysis" (first-season cast members discuss their roles), "Making of a Legend" (first-season production staff reminisce about their favorite episodes), "Memorable Missions" (cast and crew discuss key episodes and events of the first season).
Slow Ahead (2.5/5) I was surprised to see that as of this writing, 161 people have given STNG's inaugural season either four or five stars. I respectfully suggest that some people are grading on a curve, allowing their overall affection for a great show to blind them to the first season's many failings. At best, I think Season 1 staked along the edge of pretty good, and I don't think it can be taken as Trek-bashing to point out that fact.
Like all new shows, STNG had a lot of teething troubles, as well as problems escaping the shadow of the original series. Some of its flaws:
1. Ill-defined characters. Deanna Troi has nothing to do except fret about her terrible haircut and occasionally state the obvious via painfully dumb dialogue. Data is written as if he has never been around humans before and is baffled by virtually every non-literal expression they use, a device which quickly becomes annoying. Riker comes off as pretentious and silly. Worf seems to be partially feral. And Wesley...don't get me started on frickin' Wesley.
2. No, on second thought, let me start. This character was a failure from second one, almost unbelievably annoying. He dragged every scene he was in into a kind of cringing, sugary, cutsey land of sickly-sweetness, and there were times when he made me long for the ultimate destruction of all life on the ship. The writers seemed to have no clue whatsoever of how a real 15 year old kid acts, and made him a kind of sexless, overachieving Beaver Cleaver I kept wishing would stumble into an airlock.
3. Did I mention the dialogue? Although the writers occasionally show flashes of the brilliance that marked later seasons (such as when Admiral McCoy tells Data, appropos the Enterprise, "You treat her like a lady, and she'll always take you home") it's frequently terrible and sometimes embarrassing, not to mention self-righteous. Bad dialogue makes for bad acting, and many good actors gave ham-fisted, scene-chewing performances as a result.
4. Most of the devices used to differentiate new Trek from old turned out to be clunkers which were swiftly shunted to the background, such as the ability of the ship to separate in battle, the presence of families on board, or the introduction of the Ferengi as the series' staple villains, which flopped so completely they were soon changed to comic-relief role.
5. The planetary sets, which later became extraordinarily realistic, were horribly fake.
6. The stories. Many are lame, and some are terrible. It also annoyed me that when they ripped off a classic Trek episode, they always acted as if what they were encountering had never happened before.
Of course, all of these problems were eventually resolved, and by mid-season the show was showing signs of real maturity. "Hearts of Glory", "The Arsenal of Freedom" and "Conspiracy" are all pretty good examples of STNG starting to slough off its difficulties and stand up straight, and "Too Short A Season" was nearly brilliant, but I really don't think STAR TREK THE NEXT GENERATION assumed five star status until its third season.
A strong beginning for a superb show This is where Star Trek really begins for me. I know. I know. I'm not the most die hard fan, but I got into this series enough to get the novels, comics and DVD's. I also realize this has been reviewed a million times, and maybe my retrospective review really won't capture the full breadth of this seasons airing in the late 1980's, but I'll try to do it justice. Some people might disagree with my perceptions considering my point of view is based on having seen all the other seasons.
In comparison to what is now considered Classic Trek, I can assume that many people had some misgivings or were worried about the prospect of a new series under the Star Trek name. I know I did when The Next Generation ended and Deep Space Nine was created. However, The Next Generation launches us hundreds of years into the future from where Classic Trek started us off. Maybe I got into this one a lot more because the technological differences available to the creators are so vastly different. I'm not saying the original Star Trek didn't have any merit, it sure did in the era it was made, but being a child born in the early 1980's I've been spoiled with an ever increasing world of technology, so the design on The Next Generation is a huge difference for me. However, the technological increase between the shows should be an expectation of viewers!
Being a first season this isn't a hundred percent perfect, but it is very good regardless. You can see a rather noticeable difference between the pilot episode and the others, even in terms of writing and characters in some senses. It's funny because the pilot absolutely screams 1980's, but after that things take a shift. For example, the most noticeable is Deanna Troi, because in the pilot she's wearing a skirt and has big poofy hair, then for the rest of the season that abruptly changes. She has on a more normalized kind of uniform and has her hair done tight behind her. This isn't a complaint; this is just showing how they shifted her character, frankly the change made her seem much more professional and more a part of a Starship rooted in military concepts and training.
However, the writing has taken a bit of a shift from what I've read about the earlier Star Trek series. The Enterprise 1701-D is primarily an exploration vessel to seek out new life and new areas of the universe... "to go where no one has gone before" et cetera, et cetera. It brings us through all kinds of radiant adventures and very well thought out stories. A lot of episodes mirror social problems or stigma's 20th century Earth is sort of facing at the time, but a lot of times the episodes are just very good adventures. One other part that I really enjoyed is because the way a lot of the episodes are written they have more than just a single problem to solve or only one thing going on. Instead you gain insight into the realistic fact that this is a Starship with a compliment of over a thousand people. Everyone will have problems of their own to solve and sometimes run into the main characters. It really pulls the viewers in because you usually have an external problem where the ship faces some unknown in the universe, but there's also an internal problem on the ship that people also have to solve. This doesn't happen in every episode, but I noticed it is a very common element to the way The Next Generation is written. Frankly, I like the style because it adds a bit more mystery to the whole series.
I think the bridge crew they chose to have represent the Enterprise is absolutely perfect. I don't think they could have chosen a better Captain Picard than Patrick Stewart, I always think he's an excellent actor. My other favorite character is played by Brent Spiner as Lieutenant-Commander Data who gives us a very convincing performance as an android. Those are probably my two favorites; however, I also like Dr. Crusher, Commander Riker and Lieutenant Yar's character a lot too. I don't think they had Commander Worf or Commander La Forge in there enough to really get to know those characters, but I get the sense they'll be building on them a bit more. Counselor Troi also played a critical role throughout the season as well. Wesley Crusher made a few appearances as well, and I'll admit at first I thought he seemed almost too annoying, but as the season went on I got used to him.
There were some parts of the show I wasn't big on, like the death of one of the bridge crew, because I thought the way they died was just poorly done. Though it showed that no one was technically safe in this show and I do like that kind of unknown element. Regardless I just think it could've been by something more interesting, though I realize the point of that episode was to show people can die for no real reason, like in real life. That doesn't change my thoughts that it should've been by something at least "cooler" or more intimidating. The other part that I think was happening to fast was that there are episodes where they try to give Commander Riker his own ship to captain and they try to bring Captain Picard into the higher echelons of Starfleet. I thought this was annoying at times because it felt like it was happening much too soon. For instance, Commander Riker first reported to the Enterprise in the pilot episode and already they want to make him a Captain partway through this series? I'm sorry, I'm just getting to know these characters I don't want them to disappear all of a sudden so I can get to know a knew one! That never happens, but the threat of it was sort of annoying at times. I can understand this coming up a few seasons in, but in the first season it seemed a bit soon to me.
I think that's enough about the episodes, I'm not going to go in depth about them, because most people have seen The Next Generation and many have done more in depth reviews on this show, so I will content myself with a fairly broad overview. In terms of a DVD release, I really like this box set. The show is actually quite long and spans six and a half disc. Most shows only span six discs in content. You get about four hours of show per disc (really 45 minutes each), so four episodes each except the first one because the pilot was two hours on television. The seventh disc has the final two episodes and then bonus material for the remainder half of the disc. I like the box because I prefer the gatefold structure for some reason, but I will say this box is quite nice and fairly well designed in my opinion. One misgiving is that sometimes it's kind of hard to slide the gatefold part out of its case, other than that it's pretty well done. All in all a very strong start to this new show and I simply can't wait for more!
STAR TREK THE NEXT GENERATION- COMPLETE FIRST SEASON THE BEST SEASON OF THE SERIES AND THE BEST OF ALL THE SEQUELS OF ALL THE OTHERS AFTER THE ORIGINAL.
Like a comfortable shoe I recently ordered all 7 seasons of TNG and started at the beginning. Im not a trekkie, but was an avid fan of this series from the start, and have also seen it many times in reruns over the years. However, hadnt seen any startrek in at least 5 years and had built up a craving for it.
There's something very comfortable and sentimental about watching TNG. It might be part nostalgia, but whatever the reason its a nice feeling to come home from work and watch an episode or two of this show.
The first season (like many first seasons) isnt perfect, and there are some pretty bad episodes, but also some really strong ones as well, and even the weaker episodes are still entertaining in their own way.
Definitely recommended.
christmas gift this is for my daughter in law for xmas it was in great shape and arrived fast. thanks
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