Going More Boldly Than Ever

Tonight, I went to attend a special screening of two episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation on the big screen of a movie theater. This was a one night only event to sound the release of the newly remastered Season 1 of the series on Blu-ray, hitting stores tomorrow.

This remaster is a truly epic effort on the part of the studio. Star Trek: The Next Generation was shot entirely on 35mm film, including all the model work for visual effects. But because it was the late 80s (and early 90s), and the finished product was destined to air on everybody's 480p standard TVs, all that film was transferred to video tape before editing. Nobody would have been able to see the original quality, so why bother with that effort? And so every episode was already a copy of a copy, a couple generations degraded.

To create a version worthy of Blu-ray, the studio invested the money, resources, and people to go back to the original film canisters -- every single one of which had been preserved in a vault. People went through all the footage, every take, every camera, matching up the material used in the aired episodes with the 35mm original film. Those films were then scanned digitally into modern editing software and reassembled to create new episodes worthy of 1080p.

I worked on the Star Trek Trading Card Game at Decipher for many years. In the course of that work, I watched many episodes of the different Star Trek series virtually frame by frame, looking for the perfect stills to illustrate cards. So I know exactly what these episodes originally looked like. And I can tell you these remasters look better than the show ever has before.

I heard about this special theater screening several weeks back, but had originally not planned to go. I already knew I'd be buying the Blu-ray, and would want to watch the entire season again to enjoy the remastered versions. But then I got to thinking to back in the days when I was attending Star Trek conventions as a fan, during the original airings of some of these Next Generation episodes. One of the highlights of each convention was when they took the newest episode fresh off the satellite feed and broadcast it in the main event room, where a crowd of screaming, adoring Trekkers would watch the new episode together. Thinking that that would be a fun experience to revisit, I decided to go to the screening.

On the up side, I had a lot of fun watching the two episodes they screened tonight. (I'll get to them in a moment.) But on the down side, I didn't really get that fun crowd experience I was looking for. The theater was reasonably full for a Monday night, but the crowd was quite sedate. No cheering, no excitement, very little laughter. (The biggest laugh came from an unintentionally raunchy line Wesley spoke to his mother regarding Data's android power switch: "I heard you know how to turn them on.")

I was confused, but the friend I went with pegged it exactly... it was the after effects of the Aurora theater shooting. He'd been checking movie theater attendance all weekend as part of his job, and was finding quiet audiences all over the Denver area. I imagine going to a theater will be that way for a while.

But, on to the episodes themselves. Two were screened, both from the first season: "Where No One Has Gone Before" and "Datalore." Mind you, the show didn't really find its footing or voice in that first season, so these episodes weren't truly great. But they were good choices from that first season. Not coincidentally, I think, they were both directed by Rob Bowman -- a then new director who did some of the series' best episodes before his career expanded. They also were both scored by the TNG composer I love the best, Ron Jones.

"Where No One Has Gone Before" is the episode that introduced The Traveler, a strange alien who takes the Enterprise to the edge of the universe, where the thoughts of the crew members begin to come to life. "Datalore" introduced Data's evil android twin Lore, who tries to destroy the ship by summoning the Crystalline Entity that devoured all life on Data's home planet. Both episodes featured good character moments, and were spectacular showcases for the new remastered visual effects.

This is the first time I've watched any Star Trek episodes -- of any series -- since my days at Decipher. And it had obviously been a good while before that since I'd watched any of the episodes purely for recreation. These two were quite interesting. It made me feel old to realize this, but these first season episodes of The Next Generation are 25 years old -- older today than the original Star Trek series was when TNG was airing brand new for the first time! And they have aged.

In some cases, they've aged gracefully. Most of the core cast give great performances, even though they were still finding their characters this early in the run. Patrick Stewart and Brent Spiner are particularly strong in these two episodes, but there are also great moments for Jonathan Frakes, Michael Dorn, and Gates McFadden. The ideas behind these episodes are compelling. "No One" lets the scifi flag fly proudly, positing a place where thought and reality merge. "Datalore" mines the proud TV tradition of the "Evil Twin" in a fun way.

But in ways, the show definitely shows its age. Though the stories are fun, the actual writing is sometimes quite melodramatic. Poor Marina Sirtis is stuck with some truly awful "Troi senses" monologues. Picard pontificates in a way that, while true to his character, can only feel close to realistic in the hands of a master like Patrick Stewart. And for the most part, the guest actors are pretty horrible. "No One" in particular, which features well over a dozen different minor performers each with a few lines, shows how bad the 1980s Hollywood acting pool was.

Still, warts and all, these episodes were just a hell of a lot of fun to watch. It made me really look forward to picking up the Blu-rays and working my way through the entire series, as each season is released. Star Trek, the show that ultimately set me on my career path, is back in a big way.