Star Trek series, which is your favorite?

[iluv2viddyfilms]

Simple and straight forward question. Which series of Star Trek stands as your favorite or rank them if you will. I've watched almost all the episodes of "Next Generation" and have been getting into "Voyager" and "Enterprise" over the summer.

"Next Generation" is my favorite because I very much enjoy the Picard-centered style of the show and Patrick Stewart is great as the very authoritarian commander. On the other hand "Enterprise" is also great too, seeing where a lot of the ideas originated from. I have enjoyed watching Scott Bakula (sp?) since I was a kid growing up on episodes of "Quantum Leap" and his laissez faire style of leadership is a nice change from the other series. I'm only about 12 episodes in, but so far it's very good, even if a few things could be explained more or have more closure to them. THat' one thing that "Next Generation" did the best of all the series, providing closure and a meaning/lesson to the show's events.

"Deep Space Nine" I've probably seen a dozen or so episodes of over the years and I just cannot get into it much at all.

[Deadite]

TNG, by far. Never cared hardly for DS9.

Voyager was okay. Haven't seen a whole lot of TOS, either, but it's good. Only seen a handful of Enterprise episodes.

But TNG, I love. The characters and stories were always fun.

[Yoda]

Yeah, it's TNG. Picard's the best, and while there's plenty of throwaway stuff in it, some of the plot lines (particularly the more serialized stuff) are really, really clever. Like, good enough to base movies around. And of course, they did, and some of them were pretty good, too.

The Borg, in particular, are such perfect villains, both in the way they first encounter them (which is brilliant), in the obvious ways in which they are difficult to fight and scary and all that, and in the cautionary tale they represent for the Federation.

[Powdered Water]

I grew up with the original series so I'm hard pressed to say another one is better than that one, even if they are all better. I even went to see most of the original series movies in the theater. Those were good times.

I think in their own ways they are all quite good but as far as my enjoyment goes, I'll always have a warm fuzzy feeling when watching Kirk, Spock and Bones in their original setting.

[JayDee]

Got to go with TNG. Absolutely love that show, probably in my top 5 shows ever. It had my favourite Captain in Picard and also had the loveable Data. Just a great show.

After that it's close between The Original Series and DS9 for second place, followed by Enterprise and finally Voyager.

And yeah got to agree with Yoda about the Borg being just an incredible enemy. Just a shame though that they ended up being defanged rather on Voyager.

[Deadite]

Data is one of my favorite characters ever, and Brent Spiner really did an extraordinary job bringing him to, um, life. My other huge favorite is Q, but all those TNG characters are great.

[Yoda]

I think he's probably a lot of people's favorites, yeah. When, in Nemesis...

...he died, I told my dad that we hadn't seen that many nerds cry at once since Carrie Fisher got married.

[honeykid]

TNG and it's not even close. There again, I don't really care for any of the others, though I've always found the original and DS:9 watchable. But I wouldn't make time to watch them.

[iluv2viddyfilms]

I'm really starting to dig the Tripp engineer character from "Enterprise." The character is a good bridge from our present to the sci-fi that we know and love from the rest of "Star Trek."

[Sedai]

Had to go with the original series including the films, as it is just so iconic. I watched the originals growing up in the 70s, and it;s just such a huge part of my childhood. I really, really liked TNG when it first aired, and I still like some of the episodes, but that show is getting REALLY long in the tooth, especially the lighting and sets. That character set rivals the originals though, and I don't think I can say that for any of the other shows.

Re: DS9 - It's an odd duck, and the first season is pretty damn weak. However, it is the most epic of the series once you get a couple seasons in and they ditch some of the characters that didn't work. Watch the last couple of season - I think you will like it.

I also REALLY like the final season of Voyager, which is by far the best final season of any of the shows, IMO. Voyager also has the most compelling Borg stuff once Seven joins the crew.

Enterprise had a fun cast too, but I hated T-pol.

[JayDee]

Re: DS9 - It's an odd duck, and the first season is pretty damn weak. However, it is the most epic of the series once you get a couple seasons in and they ditch some of the characters that didn't work. Watch the last couple of season - I think you will like it.


It is an odd duck. :yup: In terms of characters and writing I think it certainly has a good shout to be the 'best' of the Trek shows. It also had some of the most intriguing, well-developed characters of any of the shows, people like Gul Dukat and Garak. Oh and I was a big fan of Quark, found him really entertaining.

[akatemple]

DS9 is a great show, it get's more into the personal lives of everybody on the show, that's what I really enjoyed about it. I also think it had some of the best characters some were from TNG, but all the new ones were great and very well written.
Enterprise was great also, but that was pretty much because of Jolene Blalock. Hottest Star Trek character EVER!!!

http://cdn2.maxim.com/maxim/files/2008/02/13/jolene-blalock/jolene-blalock2-gm_l2.jpg

[Grover T. Smumpus]

I must admit I'm a Voyager guy now. I grew up with reruns of TOS, new episodes of TNG, but I love the crew interactions on Voyager. Kate Mulgrew's "Janeway" is a main reason. I loved the mother figure struggling with all she had on her plate. Plus she could play one stone cold witch! Another plus is any sceen with a combination of Neelix, Seven, Tuvok & The Doctor. Oh man now thats comedy! But I love them all, even the animated series. But never DS9. That will be my "hell", strapped to a chair forced to watch DS9. lol

[iluv2viddyfilms]

I finished the first season of "Enterprise" and am well into the second season. I actually like the character of T'Pol as much as any character in "Star Trek" except for Picard of course. She's a nice stand in for tolerance and learning another culture, that whole thing. She's also smug enough which makes her a more cynical Spock like character, but with a nicer can. Isn't smug an emotion?

Porthos and the captain stuff is kind of cool. I also enjoy the running "movie night" bit. I may have missed a couple but so far they've watched: A Farewell to Arms, Sunset Blvd., Wages of Fear, and The Day the Earth Stood Still.

[SamsoniteDelilah]

DSN, but I haven't seen several of these. I loved Data and Q, and while the original is awesome camp, DSN did a great job of making it still fun and a little less campy.

[Sedai]

Since this got brought up again, I have been back into watching some Star Trek here and there. I must say, many of the TNG episodes I have revisited haven't played as well as they did back when they first aired. Some of the season two episodes were so bad, I couldn't finish them. Also, I caught a season 6 or 7 episode that was a blatant Anne Rice rip-off, and a poor one at that. TERRIBLE. I mean just downright awful. Troi was a bad character, too. What did she um, do again?

"They are angry, Captain..."

"Really? I noticed, what with the explosions and phaser fire and stuff."

I sure wish Whedon wrote some of those. ;)

Anyway - Picard is definitely the best Captain, but I like Kirk just as much, goofy style and all. That said...I am all about Janeway! She channels Hepburn to the best of her ability, and that's just fine with me.

I have gravitated towards Voyager lately, which also contains some of the worst Trek has to offer, but I feel also some of the best. The Voyager episode "Distant Origin" is written with a level of intelligence and skill that surprised me. I'd call it one of the best Trek scripts of the bunch. Not tricky like "All good things..." and not as groundbreaking as "The City on the Edge of Forever", but great, solid writing and performance. I think it speaks to the core of trek and science fiction in general.

Also Blink of an Eye, The 37s (fun!), Timeless, Scorpion (Borg, Shmorg), Year of Hell, Future's End, Equinox... all top notch Trek episodes....

The comedy is fantastic here, too, with Picardo's Holographic doctor just slaying it left and right. The episode with him and Andy Dick, (!!!) is HILARIOUS.

I like Voyager a lot, and it's my favorite to watch lately. Like DS9, it's at its best when the content is more character driven and human and less "alien of the week". I still don't like Kes much, though...Janeway, Torres, Chakotay, Tuvok, The Doctor... all great. Don;t miss Brad Dourif as Lon Suder too - creepy!

http://ecdn0.hark.com/images/000/032/405/32405/original.jpg

A review I read recently of the entire series had this to say:

"Voyager was so great because it truly put its protagonists into a situation that they could not extricate themselves from. For the first time since the original 1960's series, Star Trek characters truly went where nobody had gone before, discovering new races and acquiring knowledge. And they couldn't call on the federation to save them."

I tend to agree.

[Kitsch]

It is hard to choose between TNG and DS9, but I ultimately chose the latter because of better storylines and, in part, a more engaging cast.

[nebbit]

Have to go with http://jerzygirl45.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/16079star-trek-crew-posters.jpg

[honeykid]

Troi was a bad character, too. What did she um, do again?

http://files.g4tv.com/ImageDb3/45444_L/deanna-troi-star-trek-the-next-generation.jpg
http://www.millionaireplayboy.com/mpb/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/deannatroi.jpg
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Nno6l79XfSA/Tj7VqEAwBtI/AAAAAAAAAkY/7QCWOqdOy08/s1600/troi2.jpg
http://www.hollywood-diecast.com/marina%20sirtis.jpg
What the hell else did you want her to do? Personally I thought she was both of the best characters on the show. ;)

[Sedai]

Something of substance, rather than sit around stating the obvious and infecting the show with her terrible mother character? Pretty much everyone rags on this clown - I am not alone here. Here's the deal, TNG had several middling actors on the show, in Crusher, Riker and Troi. I feel that, on the whole, Voyager has more solid acting across the board. Janeway is clearly good, with Shakespearean training, just like Picard. She isn't better than Pat Stewart, but few actors on Star Trek come close to that guy - he's fantastic. She's damn good though. B'Lanna Torres is also a strong actress. Just watch Faces or Dreadnaught for examples of her range. Ethan Phillips is an accomplished actor and Jen Lien has chops to spare (although i don't particularly care for what they did with her character). Kim and Paris are the weak ones here, although Kim pulls off the everyman just fine. Paris doesn't do much right, and he followed Frake's footsteps as he now sits behind the camera.

Not sure what all the pics are for, I don't really find Sirtis all that attractive, beyond the obvious. If being hot made great characters, T-Pol would be the best Star Trek character of all time...

Also, the Voyager premise is probably the best of the bunch, and the most "Star Trek" at its core.

TOS and TNG are the best, I do concede that, but I really like Voyager too....

[honeykid]

Acting!?!? Who give a **** about acting? It's a soap opera in space.

And, as for T-Pol... Whatever floats your boat, I guess. The Troi pics were merely to illustrate why she brought to the show. If you didn't like it, then that's why you don't like her.

I always liked when her mother turned up. :D

[Sedai]

I...care about acting - good shows have decent acting and stuff, while bad shows have bad acting and stuff. Why is this even a question? ALL serialized shows are soap operas... all of them.

Why WOULDN'T it matter? Just what exactly do you look for in your entertainment?

[honeykid]

I look to be entertained. However, both good and bad can be entertaining. Despite this, I can't think of anything I've ever seen that I only liked because of the acting. Good or bad.

I love Gosford Park. For me, that's a acting masterclass from some of the best actors around. However, I don't like it because I think it's an acting masterclass.

Likewise, I love Blood Feast, which has some of the worst acting I've ever seen. But, again, I don't like it because the acting's bad.

I love both of them because they entertain me and I love watching them.

[Sedai]

Ok, you've got that right. Here's some entertainment: Check out the Voyager Season 2 episode Threshold. This has to be THE WORST episode of anything, ever. Definitely the worst Trek episode I have ever seen. It's so absolutely, ridiculously stupid, I was stunned someone even thought of it. I can't imagine the poor actors as they had to work through this shoot...

I'm a worse man for having seen it. My quality of life actually went perceptibly lower as I watched it.

[Blix the Goblin]

I like Voyager a lot, and it's my favorite to watch lately. Like DS9, it's at its best when the content is more character driven and human and less "alien of the week".I laughed. Not only is Voyager most definitely an "alien-of-the-week" series, but it's basically a poor man's version of TNG. To compare it to a brilliant story arc and character oriented show like DS9 is beyond idiotic.

[The Rodent]

Voyager was awful. Janeway's voice alone practically killed the franchise.

Enterprise was awful too.
Deep Space Nine was bearable but got too much into politics and turf to be entertaining.

Original Series and TNG are the better ones. The Original films outrank TNG films... but TNG series is better.

[Blix the Goblin]

Deep Space Nine was bearable but got too much into politics and turf to be entertaining.You should give it a re-watch, it's far better than "bearable." Unlike the other Trek shows, it actually explores its characters and gives them depth, there are consequences to actions instead of of a magic reset button, and it has some of the most well-written pieces of science fiction out there, especially the eps written by Rene Echevarria. Other writers like Ronald D. Moore, Hans Beimler, Ira Steven Behr and Robert Hewitt Wolfe also contribute a great deal, and together they make up a writing staff that is leagues ahead of either TOS or TNG.

[j751]

TNG remains my favourite.Patrick Stewart is possibly the best actor in all the Star Trek movies and shows.The supporting cast is fantastic too,with the exception of Wesley Crusher.

[Guaporense]

TNG has the magic of Star Trek in it's purest form. It's not one of my favorite Science Fiction series because I watched some true masterpieces in science fiction TV.

[j751]

I liked TOS,particularly the Spock McCoy banter. However,the budget of the series was too limited and the sets too basic.That spoiled it.

[j751]

Enterprise had good visual effects,but that was the only good thing about it.
The third season,the Xindi saga was the worst season in all of Star Trek. After that,I didn't watch the fourth season.

[j751]

I liked Voyager.It is a very underrated show.Splendid cast,with two particularly memorable characters,the doctor and seven of nine.Yes,there are some mediocre episodes but the good ones more than compensate.

[j751]

As for Deep Space Nine,I was looking forward to it after reading all the rave reviews. But it wasn't a compelling series.Better than Enterprise,though.

[gbgoodies]

It was a tough choice for me between TOS and TNG because I love them both, and I voted for TOS as the best Star Trek show, but I think Picard is the best captain. I love the banter between Spock and McCoy, and while some of the episodes were pretty bad, I think the ones that were good, were very good.

I also liked Voyager, but it wasn't my favorite. I thought that Janeway was a good captain, but not the best, and I really liked Chakotay, but Tom Paris and the Doctor were my favorite characters.

I was never a fan of DS9. I just couldn't get into a Star Trek show where the best character on the show was a Ferengi. (Quark)

I've been a big fan of Scott Baukla since I first saw him in Quantum Leap, and I was really looking forward to seeing him as a Star Trek captain, but unfortunately it just didn't work. I don't consider him to be "the man who killed Star Trek". I think the writers did that. I tried watching Enterprise when it originally aired, but I just couldn't get into it. It just seemed like every week we were getting beaten up by a different enemy.

I decided to give it another chance after it was cancelled, and it seems to get better as the show goes on, but I guess it was just too little, and too late to save the show. However, I really liked Tripp.

I think Q was my favorite recurring character. I wish they would have had more stories with him.

[Sedai]

Several more years have passed, and after I tried and failed to get into Star Trek: Diversity Discovery, I decided to re-watch a couple of the series, namely Voyager and Deep Space Nine. In the interest of full disclosure, I am still working my way through DS:9 as I write this, and I am just starting season 5.

Voyager, on the whole, still holds up fairly well for what it is. Alas, it suffers from the same problems I have with TNG. It is mostly episodic, and it leans heavily on the reset button, in that events from previous episodes have little to no lasting effect. The series contains some great episodes, fairly good character arcs, but as I noted earlier in this thread, perhaps some of the worst episodes of any Trek series. It's a good cast, with Janeway and Seven getting the best overall arcs, while Harry Kim easily comes in dead last in that regard. Poor Harry. Voyager's later seasons deliver some of the best Borg content, but the show's over-reliance on the Borg can also be listed as a shortcoming. Voyager was never able to elevate its own antagonists (namely the Kazon and the scavenger race, whose name escapes me at the moment) to a level that did them justice. Unlike...

Deep Space Nine. DS:9, while having perhaps the most uneven season 1 of all the programs, steadily improves over time, culminating in the fantastic (from what I recall, as I am not yet there on this re-watch yet) Dominion War, arguably Star Trek's finest serialized run of episodes ever. I recall back when this series first aired, my Star Trek watching friends and I found the serialized format annoying, as we were all young and super busy wasting our time in other ways, so we couldn't dedicate ourselves to catching every episode. The show also flew in the face of what made Star Trek, well, Star Trek at the time. There was no ship (although a ship, the Defiant, eventually shows up), no actual Trek to speak of, and at first, the cast came across as abrasive and in the case of one character, annoying and melodramatic. This combination had us dropping the show entirely pretty quickly.

Fast forward to 2019, and the format problems are actually more in line with television today. As far as serialization, the show was truly ahead of its time. Also, it's Not so Trekkieness has also proven to be a boon, as after Voyager and Enterprise, the whole crew on a ship exploring space thing has been done to death. This fact alone would be enough to keep it interesting today, as its whole frontier town on the edge of hostile territory format would keep it feeling fresh, this isn't where DS:9 stopped with its unique attributes.

Ben Sisko is perhaps the least archetypal, and therefore most human of the captains. His emotional aspects are primarily driven by a tragedy (the loss of his wife at the hands of Picard, no less), and of the two primary roles he ends up taking on, that of the Federation Commander of DS:9, as well as the B'joran Emissary, he doesn't actually want either role. In fact, due to the machinations of his wife's demise, he views the Federation with a modicum of disdain. Sisko is a man of duty, however, so he does his job when asked. Alas, he is a far cry from Picard's dedication to flag and station, or Janeway's almost over-the-top, I can solve any problem instantly Uber Captain. For this reason, Sisko comes out of the gate with plenty of depth, something that only deepens as the show moves along.

The rest of the characters range from good to great. From Odo, the sort of town constable, to the nationalist Kire Nyres, the gruff, slightly xenophobic Miles O'Brien, wise-cracking and tough Jadzia Dax, and Mr. starts weak but is eventually great Dr. Bashir. Let's not forget Armin Shimmerman's excellent turn as Quark, and last but certainly not least, Cardassian tailor Garek, who is more than he seems...or is he? ;) TNG alum Worf eventually joins the cast in season 4, where he slides right in and becomes a great regular cast member.

DS:9 is also the only Star Trek show to actively involve both commerce and religion into its mythos, with a fair amount of the content involving these concepts. Time and time again, the show subtly presents multiple points of view when conflict arises in these arenas, and then let's the viewer decide what to think about it. This is pretty much the opposite of what I have seen in ST: Discovery, which hammers its viewers with current day political issues, usually presented from one point of views, and then insists there is only one correct way to approach the issue. Remember, back when they aired, the Star Trek shows were considered outspoken progressive programs. Today, they seem more center right on today's political compass.

Add to this the introduction of the Jem Hadar, and the Founders, along with a fully realized and multi-dimensional fleshing out of the Cardassians, and Deep Space Nice emerges as the most well-written and most fully realized show in the Star Trek universe. I don't know about anyone else, but DS:9 has won me over as the best of the bunch, standing the test of time, and still delivering thought provoking and interesting science fiction ideas. The sands of time have not been kind to TNG and Voyager, but these years later, for the best of Trek, make mine Deep Space Nine!

https://starloggers.files.wordpress.com/2016/08/star-trek-deep-space-nine-cast.jpg

[Citizen Rules]

I'm in the middle of a re-re-watch of Deep Space Nine season 4. I love that show. I love all of the ST series up to and including Enterprise, though the last season of Enterprise was horrid.

[Citizen Rules]

@Sedai (http://www.movieforums.com/community/member.php?u=3422)

I enjoyed your DSN post and agree with what you wrote. DSN has always been my fav ST series and that's because the overall writing in DSN is the best of any of the ST series. And I believe that had to do with the passing of Gene Rodenberry which then released the writer's constraints, he had imposed on them. During TNG, Rodenberry had it written in stone that humans in the future were perfect and Star Fleet was perfect too...So there was never any real conflict between the crew. That resulted in the writers needing to go outside of the crew to find their drama, hence the alien of the week or disease of the week.

With Roddenbery's absences and the casting of non Star Fleet main characters DSN was able to achieve much more internal conflict than TNG. I recently heard just how many secondary characters DSN had and it was a lot! And that allowed the show more depth of character and back story development too.

I love that the writers weren't afraid to paint the Federation as naive at times. We see that in the two parter Home Front/Paradise Lost. We learn the Federation president has high morals but isn't equipped to handle the upcoming Dominion threat. At the same time we see not all Star Fleet officers are as moral as we've been lead to believe...and Quark is always knocking the Federation, Quark's a fun character! DSN is a much more diversified and better written show than TNG, that's why it's my favorite.

[Sedai]

Citizen Rules

I concur! I read an interview with Ron D. Moore, during which he went into quite a bit of detail about how the writing team approached Deep Space Nine, and that they were constantly pushing the boundaries as far as what had been done before on Star Trek, creating a rich mythos and universe in which to unfold the stories. He was initially excited for Voyager, as well, but that got handed to a different crew, and when Moore did eventually get brought over, he quickly realized that the Voyager creators were on a totally different page, and Moore quickly grew frustrated with the (lack of) creative direction and risk taking, and he now speaks very poorly of the whole Voyager production.

It's a shame it went down that way, but then again, it's not, because Moore's frustration drove him to create the Battlestar Galactica reboot, which is excellent. Many of Moore's ideas he had for Voyager, such as the dwindling resources, failing technology, and a crew that was breaking down both mentally and physically over time all appeared in BG.

[ynwtf]

Where's Farscape? Ah frell. Wrong list.

:D

[ynwtf]

TNG is a keystone for me. I learned so much philosophy from Picard's character in seeing him always try to empathize with those around him. He never tried to just bulldoze through an issue. Instead he studied it, deconstructed it and tried to approach a problem from several directions until learning not just how to solve it but why the problem existed to begin with and resolving a greater issue upstream for it.

Sometimes he comes off too liberal even for me, but he never jumped blind and hot headed.

[average joe]

TOS is my sentimental favorite because there were no others when I first saw it, at a time when I was just getting into science-fiction (Thanks to Star Wars.). I also like the characters best. But I find ST:NG more watchable. There are TOS episodes I have no interest in seeing again. When TOS was good, it was very good, but when it was bad, it could be very bad. I think the worst ST:NG episodes are just mediocre. Also, it was truly an ensemble show, which allowed for a greater variety of stories.

I think the criticism that the crew got along too well is valid to a point, but they were in a military setting and behaved in a very professional manner. If you watch them again, you'll see the conflict was often between the Enterprise and the alien guests of each episode, with Picard often raising his voice to them. The conflicts among the cast of "Deep Space Nine" and the ongoing stories turned me off at the time, but I may consider trying it again, thanks to streaming services.

I liked the "lost in space" concept of "Voyager," but after a while its creators seemed less concerned with that, and the idea that part of the "crew" was anti-Federation, and just seemed to be recycling NG stories. I haven't seen much of "Enterprise" (It was aired by a network not offered by my cable company.) and none of "Discovery" or "Picard" yet.