Star Trek: The Next Generation : When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

When I first read that the series was to be set 80 to 90 years in the future from the TOS, I had certain expectations.

I kind of had in my mind a ship roughly the size of the Enterprise-A, but perhaps a bit more streamlined and certainly with smaller but more powerful engines (due to advancements in technology).

I was expecting some marvelous leaps in technology, such as being able to transport from much farther distances, perhaps even from system to nearby system (ie Gary Seven).

I was also expecting a starship that would be capable of intergalactic travel, even if only to nearby galaxies.

Instead we seemed to get a much larger ship with only apparently very modest improvements from the technology of the Kirk era.

It was like the powers-that-be decided to be adventurous by moving it decades into the future, but lacked the imagination or were just too plain lazy to deviate very much from what had come before.

I was left with the feeling of being cheated of all the events between Kirk's era and Picard's era.

if you were not going to advance the technology very much, then why bother with the roughly 100 year leap away from the era of Kirk if you were not going to show anything really new?

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

I thought they did a stellar job considering what TOS had! orange cardboard? what is this, the brady bunch set?

it really looked like how our current electronics look now -- touchscreens and ipads. and out of all the enterprise ships D was my favorite. I loved the light color combos.

Oh God. Fortune vomits on my eiderdown once more.

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

I remember being blown away by the look of the Enterprise during "Star Trek: The Motion Picture".

Obviously they had a much bigger budget for the construction of sets and the use of special effects than they did during the first TV show. Some special effects of the TV show were quite excellent given the budget and technology at the time, while others were a bit on the shoddy side.

Re-watching "Star Trek: The Motion Picture", I am less blown away nowadays because we got use to the higher budgets of the TV shows and the movies.

The TV shows still had to dumb down the special effects to a certain due to budgetary reasons.

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

i'm still blown away by the look of the Enterprise during "Star Trek: The Motion Picture" even today

"I don't trust anything that bleeds for 7 days and doesn't die"

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

I thought when the show was announced as THE NEXT GENERATION that it would be a new crew taking over the ENTERPRISE A. When I heard that it was so far in the future and saw the ship I was pretty pissed. My mom got THE ENQUIRER magazine and they had an article on it. Showed the ship and the cast...a bald captain? A guy with a big nose who was the hillbilly on NIGHT COURT as an android? Looked terrible.

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

I hate to say this as I have nothing against bald people (my own dad was bald) but watching the first episode I was struck by not only the bald captain, but also by the roundish, bald-looking top of the ship.

There was just too much domeness going on. If you are going to have a bald captain, then please don't have a bald looking ship.

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

Most of the biggest advancements in our technology has come as a result of war. Apart from a few dust-ups with the cardassians there doesn't seem to have been any major conflicts in that time. You see how quickly advancements come when Federation is facing the Dominion (quantum torpedoes, multi-phasic shielding, etc)

"He's dusted, busted and disgusted, but he's ok"

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

It was plenty advanced. What peculiar observations.

RIP Gene Wilder. RIP Barbara Hale. You were great in Perry Mason. RIP William Christopher.

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

The ship is a strange design and I hated it at first but it grew on me. But as a design it only has a couple of good looking angles whereas the original and movie version looked great from any angle.

The wood and beige bridge was weird. Like I said it grew on me.

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

I loved the look of it all. Great set, great model. Best looking Enterprise I've ever seen.

RIP Gene Wilder. RIP Barbara Hale. You were great in Perry Mason. RIP William Christopher.

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

it sure was. watching it today it looks awesome and luxurious

"I don't trust anything that bleeds for 7 days and doesn't die"

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

If you think about WW2, consider how much the US had it's back up against the wall.

There are technologies such as rockets, electronic computers, nuclear energy, etc that may have taken 200 years or so to come about or perhaps not at all without the massive backing of the federal government.

Some technologies need a quite massive scale and certainly the cold war pushed the US into a space race with the Soviet Union which required the talents of the very best in all kinds of fields to pull off.

I don't know if you saw the movie about Steve Jobs which showed one of his partners going to IBM I think it was because legally he was required to do so. He was required to take their tiny PC with him to see what the big computer company thought. The big company man basically laughed at him.

Even when a credible and world-changing device is presented, people may have no idea what to think of it. Could anyone really imagine tablets and smartphones when even the enormous potential of the PC was not recognized?

Re: When it first aired, where you expecting a more advanced ship?

That should be were not where, my bad, I'm kind of pooped out today.
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