Next Generation runthrough

Jan_de_Bakker

I did a next gen. runthrough about 10 years ago when I got the DVDs,
now I might watch them again (most - I may skip some bollix episodes about Troi and her mother - or kids) on Netflix - They are the same HD source as the bluRays yes ?

Cos the DVDs always looked a bit dodgy..

pixelburp

Jan_de_Bakker wrote: »

I did a next gen. runthrough about 10 years ago when I got the DVDs,
now I might watch them again (most - I may skip some bollix episodes about Troi and her mother - or kids) on Netflix - They are the same HD source as the bluRays yes ?

Cos the DVDs always looked a bit dodgy..

AFAIK yes, the Netflix version is the blu-ray version with the remastered footage & SFX.

Related note: apparently that remaster cost $20 million to produce, and the underperformance of sales is quoted as the reason we're unlikely to get a similar DS9 / Voyager remaster .

I personally don't understand the whole remastering things with Star Trek & whatnot. These are very much of their times shows. You can remaster it all you want and make it shiny, but you can't take the late 80s/early 90s out of it.

pixelburp

Deleted User wrote: »

I personally don't understand the whole remastering things with Star Trek & whatnot. These are very much of their times shows. You can remaster it all you want and make it shiny, but you can't take the late 80s/early 90s out of it.

I think it's a double-edged sword: the new FX really add some polish & with the remastered picture the colours and depth really pop. The era doesn't feel that obvious when the picture is as crisp as the Next Gen remaster.

On the other hand, high definition tends to emphasise any shoddiness in the sets & props of these remastered productions; stuff that originally wouldn't have come up on SD televisions & so the production team didn't really care. So the use of office carpet is really obvious now

pixelburp

pixelburp wrote: »

I think it's a double-edged sword: the new FX really add some polish & with the remastered picture the colours and depth really pop. The era doesn't feel that obvious when the picture is as crisp as the Next Gen remaster.

On the other hand, high definition tends to emphasise any shoddiness in the sets & props of these remastered productions; stuff that originally wouldn't have come up on SD televisions & so the production team didn't really care. So the use of office carpet is really obvious now

That was absolutely the case with the first season of TNG. I think I mentioned previously, but you could really see how shoddy the Klingon makeup was at that point - I'm about 99% certain you could see where Worf ends and where Dorn begins - right at the neckline.

Goodshape

Deleted User wrote: »

I personally don't understand the whole remastering things with Star Trek & whatnot. These are very much of their times shows. You can remaster it all you want and make it shiny, but you can't take the late 80s/early 90s out of it.

Wouldn't want to lose the 80s/90s look and feel of it. They're of their time, as you say.

But the TNG remaster was well handled I think. Any effects that were redone were redone faithfully. It's just a case of a sharper image, more even colours, better sound, etc.

The TOS remasters – while I do like them – actually went ahead and updated the special effects, added in new backdrops, generally tarted things up a bit. Not quite as bad as Star Wars "special" editions but along the same lines. And they did a pretty good job in fairness, but I'd probably prefer if they kept the original effects. Maybe that wasn't even possible with the way these things were originally added.


Nothing wrong with the TNG remaster though. They're fantastic.

Inviere

Goodshape wrote: »

The TOS remasters – while I do like them – actually went ahead and updated the special effects, added in new backdrops, generally tarted things up a bit. Not quite as bad as Star Wars "special" editions but along the same lines. And they did a pretty good job in fairness, but I'd probably prefer if they kept the original effects. Maybe that wasn't even possible with the way these things were originally added.


Nothing wrong with the TNG remaster though. They're fantastic.

Going from memory, I think the TOS blu-ray remasters allowed you to select the new effects, of the old ones.

Remasters all the way though, why view them in appaling 80's/90's resolution, when the master copies themselves have a far, far high resolution? Yes it can highlight some imperfections, but if done correctly, it's the only way to watch them - as they were intended really.

Evade

One thing the ST remasters got right was not trying to change the aspect ratio from 4:3 to 16:9.

Jan_de_Bakker

pixelburp wrote: »

AFAIK yes, the Netflix version is the blu-ray version with the remastered footage & SFX.

Related note: apparently that remaster cost $20 million to produce, and the underperformance of sales is quoted as the reason we're unlikely to get a similar DS9 / Voyager remaster .

The under performance in sales is probably more due to physical media dying and the rise of the cloud then anything - pity if this is the reason DS9 won't get the same treatment.
Actually amazon has TNG BluRay for €68 - im tempted !
https://www.amazon.es/Star-Trek-Generation-Complete-Edizione/dp/B00NQXC2YU/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1489001925&sr=8-1&keywords=star+trek+the+next+generation+blu+ray

Goodshape wrote: »

Wouldn't want to lose the 80s/90s look and feel of it. They're of their time, as you say.

But the TNG remaster was well handled I think. Any effects that were redone were redone faithfully. It's just a case of a sharper image, more even colours, better sound, etc.

The TOS remasters – while I do like them – actually went ahead and updated the special effects, added in new backdrops, generally tarted things up a bit. Not quite as bad as Star Wars "special" editions but along the same lines. And they did a pretty good job in fairness, but I'd probably prefer if they kept the original effects. Maybe that wasn't even possible with the way these things were originally added.


Nothing wrong with the TNG remaster though. They're fantastic.

I loved the TOS remasters , especially the scenes of the enterprise orbiting planets !

Looked fantastic.

donspeekinglesh

I'm currently about halfway through watching them all again. (The joys of a newborn who likes to stay awake all night!)

The amount of set reuse is so obvious. Never noticed it before.

Bacchus

donspeekinglesh wrote: »

I'm currently about halfway through watching them all again. (The joys of a newborn who likes to stay awake all night!)

The amount of set reuse is so obvious. Never noticed it before.

Ha! My little one saw me through 2 seasons of DS9 and a backlog of movies I'd been meaning to get round to watching

Jan_de_Bakker

Last night I watched 1x24 - Conspiracy - It's actually a great episode .
I really liked the way the planet (Dytallix Picard had a secret meeting with some starfleet heads was orbitting a Red Giant star - Mira https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mira.

When Data was going through the data on the system he was saying the planet is in a tidally locked orbit around Mira - one side always facing the star, and there was 5 other planets in the system.
Reminded me of Trappist and the fact that lots of planets orbit red giants in tidally locked orbits - and closeby.

You see lads Star Trek is true !!

So in this episode at the end, it was revealed that Remmick was sending a homing beacon to an unexplored part of the galaxy - setting
the seeds for a future threat - never kicked off though.


Then I watched 2x12 The Royale - always liked this episode.

and yeah regarding the HD, it's great but my God you can really see the makeup and the use of doubles ... jesus ... they never thought of future HD back then !!

So far DS9 is the only series I watched as it was intended - watching each episode. However what I found myself doing with the likes of TNG, Voyager, & Enterprise is looking up what the best episodes are and watching those by themselves.

This is why I love Netflix - the fact that we have the option of doing just that!

Evade

Jan_de_Bakker wrote: »

So in this episode at the end, it was revealed that Remmick was sending a homing beacon to an unexplored part of the galaxy - setting
the seeds for a future threat - never kicked off though.

I think it was supposed to be a signal to what became the borg.

degrassinoel

I thought that was a dead end story too, it could have been done really well if they went on with it though - thinking of the 1982 classic remake, The Thing

Goodshape

Evade wrote: »

I think it was supposed to be a signal to what became the borg.

Is that your own head-canon or is there a source for that?

I guess it's not bad for head-canon, although those little slugs look nothing at all like Borg tech (also they retconned the sending of the Borg signal into an episode of Enterprise, afair).

I think the story arc was just dropped tbh. Was a cool episode and intriguing idea, but feels out of place when compared with what the show became after season two.

Evade

Goodshape wrote: »

Is that your own head-canon or is there a source for that?

I read it somewhere years ago but I can't find any source for it now. The borg were originally supposed to be an insect hive, but were changed to what we know now for budgetary reasons (source), so that's probably where the speculation comes from.

pixelburp

Yeah, I always got the impression it was an arc that was either forgotten or just dropped. It had good potential from a 'Body Snatchers' storytelling point of view. I'm going to just presume the homeworld of the slugs was gone by the time the signal reached its destination; maybe it was wiped out by the Borg

There were quite a few storylines that got dropped-- like the Borg babies.

Goodshape

[Deleted User] wrote: »

There were quite a few storylines that got dropped-- like the Borg babies.

I've head-canon for the Borg babies though, which covers a few other things too.

In that first episode, Q Who, the Borg were destructive but didn't care for the life forms – they were only interested in assimilating technology. Locutus aside, I don't think we see an actual assimilation take place (double injection in the neck) until First Contact, so we might assume they had not yet developed that technology in Q Who or BoBW. At that time, they incubated their young.

Something changed after meeting the humans (perhaps coincidentally) and they realised the benefits of assimilating life forms. Hence, no more Borg babies, suddenly we see Borg from different original species (from First Contact onwards), and also could explain the change in appearance from smooth white skin to a dirtier grey blotchy complexion.

Evade

Goodshape wrote: »

I've head-canon for the Borg babies though, which covers a few other things too.

Or Crusher just assumed they were Borg babies and not recently assimilated children in maturation chambers.

Elemonator

It was an unbelievably wooden act for some characters. Patrick Stewart made it in my opinion. But it had its good bits.

DS9 took many Next Generation people and made them into real characters, especially Chief O'Brien. It remains my favourite series to date. While humanity had supposedly moved on from many of its faults of today, seeing that we were still people and not infallible to human nature emotion etc in DS9 brought a new perspective to Star Trek that had been lacking in the days of Gene Roddenberry.

Goodshape

Elemonator wrote: »

DS9 took many Next Generation people and made them into real characters, especially Chief O'Brien. It remains my favourite series to date. While humanity had supposedly moved on from many of its faults of today, seeing that we were still people and not infallible to human nature emotion etc in DS9 brought a new perspective to Star Trek that had been lacking in the days of Gene Roddenberry.

Could be argued that it lost some of the science, exploration, intrigue, and mystery, in favour of a more charter driven soap opera style saga of personal life aboard a space station.

Not that I dislike DS9 – they are good and interesting characters in an interesting setting – but i don't think it's a failing on TNG's part that it wasn't that type of show. The characters were good enough.

Goodshape

Evade wrote: »

Or Crusher just assumed they were Borg babies and not recently assimilated children in maturation chambers.

True, but the babies are only part of it. I originally conjured the idea up to explain the change of appearance and suddenly​ seeing different Borg specious in First Contact.


Voyager probably contradicts the idea anyway? Was 7 of 9 supposed to have been assimilated prior to BoBW?

But still, I like my idea. Voyager was rubbish anyway :-p

Evade

Goodshape wrote: »

True, but the babies are only part of it. I originally conjured the idea up to explain the change of appearance and suddenly​ seeing different Borg specious in First Contact.

But how would you explain the Borg that assimilated Seven and her family being the green veiny kind?

Goodshape

Evade wrote: »

But how would you explain the Borg that assimilated Seven and her family being the green veiny kind?

Sorry, check my post again. I edited it to mention Voyager probably ruined everything as usual.

Goodshape

Goodshape wrote: »

Could be argued that it lost some of the science, exploration, intrigue, and mystery, in favour of a more charter driven soap opera style saga of personal life aboard a space station.

Not that I dislike DS9 – they are good and interesting characters in an interesting setting – but i don't think it's a failing on TNG's part that it wasn't that type of show. The characters were good enough.

It definitely didn't lose any of the mystery, that's for damn sure. Especially given how a lot of it was spy driven. Same as intrigue and science. The only thing it lost was exploration, but even then you could argue it kept that as it did venture into the Gamma Quadrant quite frequently.

pixelburp

On the subject of ageing well or otherwise, one thing I eventually noticed and is of the era was the Aspect Ratio of 4:3. It's easy to forget now that 16:9, 16:10 is the standard & allows for much more cinematic compositions, but without the extra screen width it's amazing how often characters would be standing all huddled together in shot.

Often you'd find Picard & Riker looming behind Data at his console on the bridge, simply because they had to squeeze all the actors into that smaller frame. A few times you'd see an actor intentionally shuffle closer up to someone else, obviously missing their mark. Once I spotted it I couldn't stop spotting it & kinda made all those serious conferences a little hilarious. Number 1, you're somewhat in my personal space.

The_Valeyard

[Deleted User] wrote: »

It definitely didn't lose any of the mystery, that's for damn sure. Especially given how a lot of it was spy driven. Same as intrigue and science. The only thing it lost was exploration, but even then you could argue it kept that as it did venture into the Gamma Quadrant quite frequently.

Until it became to dangerous and explody with the Dominion.


But loved DS9, when u did my re-watch as an Adult of it, really only grasped how good it was and sub plots I missed as a kid.

The_Valeyard

The_Valeyard wrote: »

Until it became to dangerous and explody with the Dominion.


But loved DS9, when u did my re-watch as an Adult of it, really only grasped how good it was and sub plots I missed as a kid.

I still think it kept a lot of that when the Dominion arrived. Look at the whole thing with the Romulans and "In the Pale Moonlight".