Do any of you watch Star Trek?

[Dave Gray]

I never liked Trek as a kid.  Slow and boring -- I just didn't understand it and I wanted it to be Star Wars.  With the Abrams reboot in 2009, I really liked the characters and went back on Netflix and watched about a season and a half of the original series.  I got the jist of it and watched the important ones.

In 2013, I wanted to try out The Next Generation, so I watched a selection of the most important episodes from the first 2 seasons (so I wouldn't be lost) and then moved on to the best stuff from season 3 and on.  I finished the remainder of the 7 seasons and enjoyed it quite a bit.   It's not all great, but there are some really thought-provoking, moving, and philosophical episodes.  But the show is pretty much all one-offs....there is no overarching storyline.  Each episode stands alone.

I have now just started Deep Space Nine.  It's much more serialized, though I'm only a few episodes in.

I assume that I will move on to Voyager and Enterprise after this, if it keeps my interest.

I have run across several secret Trekkies in my life -- people who you'd never expect to be into Star Trek.  Is anyone here?

[Tenshot13]

Just the new movies.  The only thing older that I liked, a high school teacher made us watch and some how tied it into his lesson plan.  It was the original episode that featured Khan, and the Wrath if Khan movie.

[Sunstroke]

I am not an extrovert-Trekkie, but I have seen every episode of the original and Next Generation, plus all of the movies. I really enjoyed the original show when I was a kid...it was one of my earliest sci-fi influences. If you had asked me when I was a teenager who the two most manly men in the world were, I would have answered "John Wayne and Captain Kirk."

My favorite character in Next Generation is, by far, Commander Data. Never has an artificial life form taught others so much about humanity. The episodes where he was featured are among my favorites of all-time.

[Dave Gray]

I agree.  Data is also my favorite character in all of Trek.

[Buddhagirl]

I may or may not have owned a red TNG uniform. And I may follow both Wesley Crusher and Geordie Laforge on Twitter.

[Dolphin-UK]

I've watched all the new series and a number of episldes of the original series...

TNG gets better in the latter seasons once they get a bit more mature with some of the story lines.

DS9 struggles early because the stories have to come to them. Again once they find their feet the latter seasons get pretty good and probably my favourite.

Voyager is reasonably good early... New races and tensions in the crew the only downer is that I can't really take Janeway seiously as a captain. I found the early seasons better than the later ones I won't give anything away but found it became a bit formulaic.

The star trek reboot movies are good action films but I don't rate them as star trek films.

[Sunstroke]

I may or may not have owned a red TNG uniform. And I may follow both Wesley Crusher and Geordie Laforge on Twitter.

If you follow Ensign Crusher on twitter, you're a Trekkie.

TNG gets better in the latter seasons once they get a bit more mature with some of the story lines.

I agree completely. Seasons 5-7 are the best TNG.  Temba, his arms open...

The star trek reboot movies are good action films but I don't rate them as star trek films.

I'd be interested in hearing why you don't.

[fyo]

I'll admit to having watched pretty much every episode of the original series -- and that's probably my least-watched (and least-favorite) Star Trek series.

[Spider-Dan]

I've seen every episode of TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, as well as Star Trek II, IV, all the TNG movies, and the two new ones.

DS9 is my favorite series by far, though TNG is also really good.  DS9 is where you get to see a little more depth in the Star Trek universe; Starfleet (and by extension, the Federation) is not as squeaky clean as it appears in the other series.  If you've seen the new Battlestar Galactica, the head writer for that show (Ronald D. Moore) took control of DS9 around season 4.  There's a lot of similar themes and complex moral issues.

One of my favorite episodes of DS9 is during the Dominion War; it is not going well for the Klingon-Federation alliance and Starfleet is hoping that the Romulans will join the "Alpha Quadrant" alliance.  Garak convinces Sisko to go through a complicated set of actions (involving several highly illegal deals) to create a fake holo-recording of a high-level Dominion meeting where the invasion of Romulus is being planned.  He manages to secretly invite an anti-Federation Romulan senator to DS9 (with the idea that if he's convinced, anyone else on Romulus should be easy).  SPOILER ALERT  The senator discovers that the recording is a fake, and on his way back to Romulus, Garak sabotages his ship to explode.  Among the wreckage of the ship is a badly damaged but barely functional holo-recording rod, and after much forensic examination and recovery, the Romulans are able to piece together part of what appears to be a Dominion plan to invade Romulus.  The Romulan Empire declares war on the Dominion and joins the alliance.

Captain Sisko is furious with Garak, but also believes that ending the war (and the thousands of lives being lost every day) justifies the means.  After explaining all of this to the viewer (the episode is told as a narrated personal log), the final scene is Sisko deleting the log entry.

It's one of my favorite sci-fi episodes ever.

[Sunstroke]

DS9 is near the top of my list of old TV shows to catch up on...as is Battlestar Gallactica.

[Dolphin-UK]

I'd be interested in hearing why you don't.

I should clarify my statement because on re-reading it came out a little wrong...don't get me wrong I like the films they're good movies but they're not really what I expect from a star Trek film (is that statement any different?!)

I think because I associate more with the TNG/DS9 era I find the new films focus too much on the swashbuckling Kirk, there's too much hand to hand fighting, lots of running around and punching people...the fact that there's a starship involved is almost superflouous to the plot other than to act as cannon fodder each film. As I said, I find it more of an action film staffed by Star Trek characters rather than a Star Trek movie. Given that they've rebooted the franchise I'd much rather have seen a film around the tensions with meeting one of the new power races (Klingons/Romulans) than the supervillan type story line. I suspect that's where we'll go next now they've set up the characters.

I think perhaps because my exposure to the original series is limited it's actually a little more true to that era than TNG/DS9.

All that said I'm concious that it's a blockbuster movie and a Picard style character solving a diplomatic negotiation in a meeting room probably wouldn't draw in the punters!

[Cathal]

I've seen every episode of TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, as well as Star Trek II, IV, all the TNG movies, and the two new ones.

DS9 is my favorite series by far, though TNG is also really good.  DS9 is where you get to see a little more depth in the Star Trek universe; Starfleet (and by extension, the Federation) is not as squeaky clean as it appears in the other series.  If you've seen the new Battlestar Galactica, the head writer for that show (Ronald D. Moore) took control of DS9 around season 4.  There's a lot of similar themes and complex moral issues.

One of my favorite episodes of DS9 is during the Dominion War; it is not going well for the Klingon-Federation alliance and Starfleet is hoping that the Romulans will join the "Alpha Quadrant" alliance.  Garak convinces Sisko to go through a complicated set of actions (involving several highly illegal deals) to create a fake holo-recording of a high-level Dominion meeting where the invasion of Romulus is being planned.  He manages to secretly invite an anti-Federation Romulan senator to DS9 (with the idea that if he's convinced, anyone else on Romulus should be easy).  SPOILER ALERT  The Romulan Empire declares war on the Dominion and joins the alliance.

Captain Sisko is furious with Garak, but also believes that ending the war (and the thousands of lives being lost every day) justifies the means.  After explaining all of this to the viewer (the episode is told as a narrated personal log), the final scene is Sisko deleting the log entry.

It's one of my favorite sci-fi episodes ever.

I have to admit, this is one of my favorite episodes as well.

mod edit: deleted visible spoiler from quote

[JVides]

I liked the original Trek enough, but even by the time I began watching, it was dated.  I hated the original Trek movie, liked Wrath of Khan, then didn't like any others until the last one (The Undiscovered Country).  TNG was must-watch TV when it was on, and I enjoyed their movies enough to go to them all (though only First Contact is rewatchable to me).  I could never get into DS9 as I felt it was too stagnant to start.  By the time all the fur started flying, I was long gone.  I casually watched Voyager (by which I mean I caught it when it crossed my dial) and really got into Enterprise until I realized I didn't like it much, despite my overall like of Scott Bakula and T'Pol's undeniable hotness.  

Also, I quite enjoyed the new movies.

I guess this makes me a bit of a Trekkie (Trekker?) though I don't read the books or otherwise follow any other canon.

[Dave Gray]

I do not agree with people on the quality of the movies.

I think that they're all a lot closer in quality than people want to admit and that the two most recent "reboot" films are so far and above the others.

I seem to be on an island in that I don't really like Wrath of Khan.  I don't think it's any better than the other films.

[JVides]

On the movies, I just wasn't thrilled with the stories being told.  With the expanded budgets, I would hope for more.  I just largely found them uninspiring.

The first one was just boring.  Wrath of Khan is dated, but had good action and some good emotional moments.  Search for Spock was OK, but I hardly remember it and, given I don't forget stuff, I mark my lack of recollection as telling of the movie's overall quality.  Voyage home...was that the whales one?  Yeesh!  Cute but not inspired.  Final Frontier I don't think I've even seen, but judging from the synopsis and its reputation, maybe I'm not missing anything.  Undiscovered Country was maybe a little dumbed down, but I enjoyed the action (Zulu was just a bad ass in that one!).  Generations was a little boring, I thought.  First Contact, as mentioned before, I really liked.  Insurrection had potential but I don't think it was met.  Nemesis was just plain ridiculous.

I'm not getting into plot in case there's actually someone here who intends to watch these flicks but hasn't gotten around to it in 30+ years (dating back to the first one).

While I agree they are similar in quality of visual effects and maybe even vibe, I just find the stories lacking in all but a few of them.  If the movie is meant to be thoughtful, then the thoughts should not be boilerplate stuff.  If the movie is meant to be all action, then make the action fun.  I think they were very hit or miss in both cases.