BLU-RAY REVIEW: Star Trek: The Next Generation Season Three Remastered
BLU-RAY REVIEW:
Star Trek: The Next Generation
Season Three Remastered
By Rich Handley
When Star Trek: The Next Generation hit the
airwaves in 1987, I was hooked. "Encounter at Farpoint," despite some
cheesy dialog, weak acting and typical Trek
clichés (not to mention a blatant ripoff of the Decker/Ilia relationship from The Motion Picture), was a solid story featuring
some great new characters and impressive production values. And so I kept
tuning in, happily devouring each week's new episode, and grateful to finally,
after more than a decade, have new Star
Trek on television, 13 years after the animated series' cancelation.
By the end of that first season, I knew something special had arrived, but felt that it hadn't yet lived up to its potential. Despite some gems, such as "The Big Goodbye," "11001001," "Heart of Glory" and "Conspiracy," the season was also putting out embarrassing clunkers like "Code of Honor," "Justice," "Angel One," "When the Bough Breaks" and "Skin of Evil." Still, I'd had one hell of a ride, and looked forward to what the following year would bring.
By the end of that first season, I knew something special had arrived, but felt that it hadn't yet lived up to its potential. Despite some gems, such as "The Big Goodbye," "11001001," "Heart of Glory" and "Conspiracy," the season was also putting out embarrassing clunkers like "Code of Honor," "Justice," "Angel One," "When the Bough Breaks" and "Skin of Evil." Still, I'd had one hell of a ride, and looked forward to what the following year would bring.
Frustratingly,
a writer's strike nearly torpedoed the series during year two, resulting in
outings that were just as weak, if not weaker—"The Child," "Where
Silence Has Lease," "Time Squared" and "Up the Long Ladder,"
for instance, as well as stories entirely derivative of prior episodes, such as
"Unnatural Selection." After only two seasons, TNG was already beginning to seem stale. Wouldn't it ever prove
itself worthy of the Star Trek
mantle?
Then
season three began.
And fans collectively sighed. Now THAT's more like it.
And fans collectively sighed. Now THAT's more like it.
Whereas
the first two seasons of The Next
Generation comprised a variety of mediocre to bad episodes with just enough
unexpected gems thrown in to keep us coming back for more, season three
completely reversed that trend. Almost every episode of the season was great, while
many were downright masterpieces. Consider this episode list:
• "Evolution": Nanites escape
Wesley's lab and form a collective intelligence.
• "The Ensigns of Command": Data
must persuade a colony to evacuate, in order to save them from dangerous aliens.
• "The Survivors": The Enterprise finds two people living on an
annihilated planet, with only their garden and house intact.
• "Who Watches the Watchers": Two
primitives from Mintaka III glimpse a Federation observation team and conclude
that Picard is a god.
• "The Bonding": A mysterious
entity comforts a boy when his mother dies in an accident.
• "Booby Trap": When the Enterprise is caught in an ancient starship
booby trap, Geordi consults a hologram of Federation engineer Leah Brahms—and
falls in love with her.
• "The Enemy": Geordi and a
Romulan soldier must work together to survive on a hostile planet.
• "The Price": Troi falls for a
charming negotiator bidding on a newly discovered wormhole (and providing story
fodder, years later, for an episode of Star
Trek: Voyager).
• "The Vengeance Factor": Riker
must stop an assassin from carrying out an ancient blood feud amid peace talks.
• "The Defector": A peace-seeking
Romulan officer defects to warn Picard of his Empire's invasion plans.
• "The Hunted": A genetically
modified soldier reveals social problems on a world joining the Federation.
• "The High Ground": Terrorists
kidnap Crusher to help them, as their technology is detrimental to their own
health.
• "Déjà Q": The Continuum
strips Q of his powers and leaves him aboard the Enterprise, a mere human.
• "A Matter of Perspective": With
Riker accused of murder, the holodeck reconstructs events from various
perspectives.
• "Yesterday's Enterprise": The Enterprise-C
arrives from the past, altering reality and resurrecting Tasha Yar.
• "The Offspring": Data creates
an androids daughter, but an admiral tries to claim her as Starfleet property.
• "Sins of the Father": The
Klingon High Council declares Worf's father a traitor and a Romulan
collaborator.
• "Allegiance": Aliens replace Picard
with a duplicate so they can study the Enterprise
crew.
• "Captain's Holiday": Picard
takes shore leave and becomes involved with a beautiful treasure seeker.
• "Tin Man": A neurotic telepath
comes aboard to help establish first contact with an unknown vessel.
• "Hollow Pursuits": Barclay's addiction
to using the holodeck as an escape from reality interferes with his duties.
• "The Most Toys": An obsessed
collector tries to add Data to his private collection of unique items.
• "Sarek": As Spock's father suffers
from an incurable disease, Picard must mind-meld with him to complete Sarek's final
task as ambassador.
• "Ménage à Troi": The Ferengi
kidnap Deanna, Luwaxana and Riker, and force the women to remain naked.
• "Transfigurations": The Enterprise rescues a humanoid with
amnesia and incredible healing powers.
• "The Best of Both Worlds": Picard
is kidnapped by the Borg as a precursor to an invasion of Federation space, culminating
in the Best. Cliffhanger. Ever.
That's
quite a list, and it contains some of Star
Trek's best episodes of any series—"Yesterday's Enterprise," my personal favorite Trek time-travel tale (yes, even better than "The City on the
Edge of Forever"), which surprised the hell out of me by finally giving
Tasha Yar (a character whom I never enjoyed) a fantastic storyline; "Sarek,"
which brought back Mark Lenard (always a good move) for a powerful and
emotional Sarek sendoff; "Déjà Q," easily my favorite John DeLancie
vehicle (alongside "Tapestry"); "The Offspring," with Data exploring
procreation, and providing several tear-worthy moments between father and
daughter; "Sins of the Father," a brilliantly written tale about
Worf's Klingon heritage; and "The Best of Both Worlds," which needs
no explanation. It's "The Best of Both Worlds." Its brilliance is
right there in the name.
But it's
not just the brilliant episodes that define TNG's
third season. It's that even the average stories are above-average. In prior
seasons, episodes that focused on Geordi, Troi or either member of the Crusher
family tended to range from "Well, that wasn't so bad, actually" to "Meh,
it was an episode" to "Please kill me now before I accidentally watch
this again," with the unifying factor of their being disappointing for
simply not centering on Picard, Riker, Data and/or Worf.
Season
three, however, elevated every character's
arc. As Wesley stories go, "Evolution" was actually very good.
Despite being Troi tales, "The Survivors" was quite touching, and "Ménage
à Troi" was one of the funnier Ferengi episodes (you know it's a great season when the stunning Marina Sirtis spends an episode nude, and yet I'm focusing instead on the episode's humor). "Booby Trap" gave Geordi his most endearing
romance, while "The Enemy" was one of the character's finest moments.
And Crusher's spotlights in "The Hunted" and "High Ground"
offered relevant social messages to chew on.
The
season contained some truly brilliant work, particularly in "Who Watches
the Watchers" (which the writers of Star
Trek: Insurrection clearly enjoyed, since they used parts of its plot for
that film), "The Defector" (one of the best Romulan episodes ever
written), "Tin Man" (featuring a mesmerizing performance from Harry
Groener as Tam Elbrun) and "A Matter of Perspective" (any episode
that gives Jonathan Frakes a chance to step outside Riker's usual veneer is
always worth watching).
In
fact, I'd go so far as to say that season three didn't have a single bad episode. Sure, some were better than
others—but all of them were worth watching. Even what were basically filler
episodes, like "Allegiance" and "The Price," had some
wonderful moments in them. The writers were at the top of their game that year,
and it's no surprise that many consider this The Next Generation's finest season, and one of the best in Trek's near-50 years.
Some
have attributed this to Gene Roddenberry having been too restrictive on the
writers during the first two seasons, until Michael Piller joined the team as
the writing staff's creative director. Piller built a solid group of writers,
and also accepted unsolicited scripts from outside his staff—an unconventional
approach in those days, to be sure. (And it's a good thing he did, too, as
Ronald D. Moore was among those hired.) Apparently, he knew what he was doing,
as the results are undeniable: Season three is strange new worlds above seasons
one and two.
Last month, the remastered Blu-ray of season three hit stores. I was quite impressed with how the first two seasons were handled, despite some problems with the second set's remastering (see my reviews here and here), and so I very much looked forward to this third release. As my favorite TNG season, it was the one I was most excited about seeing in stunning high-definition. A lot was riding on this release, as the studio change left some reviewers disappointed with season two's remastering, compared to the brilliant job done on season one. How would season three fare?
I'm
happy to report that season three's remastering is fantastic. The effects and
sets look amazing, just as they did on the season one set, and the show has
never sounded better. What's more, the bonus features are great fun,
particularly an hour-long roundtable discussion between writers Moore, Brannon
Braga, Rene Echevarria and Naren Shankar, as well as Family Guy creator and unabashed Trek fan (not to mention controversial Academy Awards host) Seth
MacFarlane. This special offers gratifying insight into how the writing team
crafted such amazing stories, week after week, but also touches on some of the
frustrations they faced in doing so.
I can't recommend this set highly enough. It's simply fantastic, and a huge step up from the quality of the recent video game release.
A variety of documentaries, scattered throughout the set's six discs, offer surprisingly honest commentary from cast and crew, giving us rare insight into what went on behind the cameras. It was sometimes a bumpy ride for those involved (as evidenced by the firing and re-hiring of Gates McFadden as Beverly Crusher), and it's fascinating to hear them reminisce. On a melancholy note, the set also includes several cut scenes of the late David Rappaport, an actor best known for his work on Time Bandits and The Bride, who committed suicide during the filming of "The Most Toys" and had to be replaced by Saul Rubinek in the role of Kivas Fajo. Rappaport was a wonderful talent, but an apparently unhappy individual, and while it was enjoyable to see the scenes he'd filmed for the episode, it was sad to be reminded of his unfortunate passing.
On a more upbeat note, I highly recommend watching the blooper reel, which (as with all TNG blooper reels) is hilarious. I frankly don't know how Frakes and Michael Dorn ever got any work done on the set, considering the amount of laughing those two did while trying to get through their scenes. It reminded me, once again, of why The Next Generation was such a wonderful series: because the relationships between the characters weren't merely manufactured—they were genuine. This cast loved (and still loves) each other, and it showed onscreen, week after week.
When you watch TNG's season three on Blu-ray, I guarantee you'll love them as well.
Labels: review, Rich Handley, Star Trek
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