Star Trek: Generations

[FordTaurusSHO94]

We've got a Nemesis thread, so why not?

I like Generations and have it in my top 5 for Star Trek movies.

Some things I like:

The Enterprise B scenes
The new Enterprise D bridge and the way the ship looks in HD
Leaving right before the shock wave reaches the ship
Stellar Cartography
Enterprise D crash

Some things I don't like:

Soran's rocket leaves the planet and hits the star in about 5 seconds. Is it traveling at warp 9?
You can leave the Nexis at any time you want and show up anywhere in your past? Picard should go back to where he can save his family from the fire and Kirk should go back to the E-B and and tell Soran to do whatever Kirk was doing to get zapped by the ribbon in the first place.
Why did Kirk have to be in the end at all? I don't hate him, but it's a TNG movie.

The thing that I would have changed in this movie is that they defeat Soran and both captains warp back to the Enterprise in time for the Klingons to open fire. If Kirk needs to die, have him die on the Enterprise D by saving the rest of the crew somehow.

[Lethal Babydoll]

yeah, the whole Nexis thing is messed up, but the movie has a lot of good stuff.

I like:
Picard's grief. Very moving.
The line, "They say time is the fire in which we burn"
Data losing control of his laughter
Kirk's regret at choosing Star Fleet over love
The way Picard apologetically tells Kirk he's the captain of the Enterprise
The way Riker says "That's the mission where James Kirk died"

[daveg]

I enjoyed Generations. It put closure on TOS --> TNG.

Some quick memories:

What's a stunsil?
Stellar cartography - same as OP
We are DE-CLOAKING !!!!
All hands --- brace for impact
The Picard Guinan scene discussing Soran
Data finds Spot
Plenty of other letters in the alphabet

[friedo]

It was worth it to hear Data yell "Oooooooh shit!"

[bafaa]

I enjoyed seeing the TNG crew on a big screen for the first time and there were parts I liked but overall I thought it was just OK.

Here is a great review of it. It is mostly tongue in cheek but some good points are made and I think I enjoyed the review more than the actual movie.

http://www.youtube.com/user/RedLetterMedia#p/u/0/h06WKYFYdlo

[AWB]

Things I liked:
- Data losing control of his emotions: laughter, fear, happiness.
- Crusher getting thrown into the holographic ocean.
- Deanna finally gets to drive, and the ship crashes.
- The Duras sisters realizing they're about to die. Better than the "5-4-3-2-1" countdown in ST III.

Things I didn't like:
- Kirk dying. He's supposed to be immortal.
- Riker not knowing about trilithium, even though it was the basis of a TNG episode "Starship Mine".
- Enterprise-D crashing. I'm surprised the Federation isn't broke. A Galaxy-class ship should've been in use for decades, not just years.
- The inconsistancies of the Nexus. A poorly-executed Deus ex machina, IMO.

[chrisk]

I've always liked this movie, though I do think the nexus is about 55% plot hole, which does make it at least big enough to fly a Runabout through.

I saw it in the theater on opening weekend with my mother and brother, they took me to it as a birthday event. One moment I'll always remember was when the Enterprise, beleaguered by the Klingons, managed to cloak and torpedo them - being a typical matinee crowd, most of the audience cheered this moment, even before Data went all emotion chip and shouted 'GOT 'EM!'

And the cheers in the audience just sort of got strangled as the other bridge officers cast disapproving glares at Data, clearly conveying the sentiment "We're Federation officers, and we don't gloat in killing our enemies - we shoot to kill when we have no other way to defend ourselves, but we don't like it.' It was almost as if most of the teenage viewers felt that Riker and Troi would have given them a lecture if they'd seen the reaction. :)

[The Hamster King]

I really enjoyed the part where the Enterprise crashed and all the Next Gen crew were killed.

Then they rewound time and made it not happen and I was sad ... . :(

[Nars Glinley]

I liked the movie but hated Kirk's dying words. Oh my.

[FordTaurusSHO94]

Didn't Shatner script his own dying words? I might be wrong, but I thought I read that somewhere.

[DSYoungEsq]

It was a stupid movie, with a stupid plot, made worse by having Shatner in it far past his prime. First Contact was a much better movie.

I rank only a couple movies below it out of the 11 that were made (there is no such thing as a reboot movie, I will firmly deny it to anyone).

[sparky!]

I never saw it, but this thread got me to rent it on iTunes. I'll post what I think in about 2 hours.

[Bosstone]

Life, forms
You tiny little life, forms
You precious little life, forms
Where are you?
doo-doo-doo-doo doo doo doo, dodododo!

[The Tooth]

It looked and felt like an episode of the show, and not a very good one. It was all downhill after the opening credits, which promised a pretty good movie. The original cast members spouting the overblown technobabble so favoured by Next Generation writers didn't feel right and the threat wasn't really threatening. I wasn't feeling the tension the writers wanted me to feel, and the jokes weren't funny.

I'd have liked to see what Cameron was like as the captain of the Enterprise-B, though.

[cochrane]

Didn't Shatner script his own dying words? I might be wrong, but I thought I read that somewhere.He did. He wanted to convey the impression that as Kirk was dying, he caught a glimpse of what lay beyond and was experiencing a great sense of awe. The undiscovered country if you will.

[Bosstone]

It looked and felt like an episode of the show, and not a very good one.This is pretty much how I've always felt. First Contact, by comparison, has a much stronger cinematic feel to it.

[Odesio]

They included Kirk because the movie represented a passing of the torch from the old to the new. Sadly, Generations just wasn't that good. I'll take it over Insurrection and Nemesis any day of the week if only for the Klingon cleavage. First Contact might be the only decent TNG movie. I can't think of another one that was any good.

[Lightnin']

The problem with the Nexus is, once you go in, you can never get out. Sure, you'll think you're out- remember, it always gives you what you want- but it's an illusion.

Picard never left it.

[ZPhobiaZ]

I wonder why no one has said it yet?

BRING BACK KIRK!

This nicely sums up my feelings on the movie.

[FordTaurusSHO94]

The problem with the Nexus is, once you go in, you can never get out. Sure, you'll think you're out- remember, it always gives you what you want- but it's an illusion.

Picard never left it.

Part of you stays in it, but Guinan is proof that you can leave. The method of leaving is what I don't care for. Picard and Kirk could easily leave to whenever and where ever they wanted, but Guinan and Soran were ripped from it.

I did like the way it looked as it rolled over Soran while he stood on top of the mountain.

[Jim's Son]

Pretty mediocre but then TNG movies are (First Contact was okay). I haven't seen it since it came out but isn't there a scene early on when Kirk, Scotty and Checkov are followed by media types-about the first time we've seen such people in a Star Trek universe?

Everybody except Paramount knew that if you had Kirk and Picard in a film, you want a "buddy-buddy" film. But I guess they wanted to establish the TNG franchise in movies.

Nice scene: Data with emotions singing "Life Forms...you tiny little life forms" when scanning a planet".

[randwill]

Apparently, to leave the Nexus and go anywhere/anytime, you have to ride out of it on horseback.

[Icerigger]

Check out Confused Matthew's review of Generations, needless to say he doesn't like it.;)

http://www.confusedmatthew.com/Star-Trek-Generations.php

[Bearflag70]

He did. He wanted to convey the impression that as Kirk was dying, he caught a glimpse of what lay beyond and was experiencing a great sense of awe. The undiscovered country if you will.

I heard Patrick Stewart was laughing at or critical of Shatner's acting here. True?

[ZPhobiaZ]

I heard Patrick Stewart was laughing at or critical of Shatner's acting here. True?

No, this wasn't in the movie. Whatever he may have thought or said offscreen, he acted very serious and professional during the film. Picard looks genuinely moved when Kirk dies.

[carnivorousplant]

Things I didn't like:
- Kirk dying. He's supposed to be immortal.


Damn straight.

[cochrane]

I wonder why no one has said it yet?

BRING BACK KIRK!

This nicely sums up my feelings on the movie.You want Kirk back?

I got your Kirk right here. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJHANrzMSlk)

[Pushkin]

The thing that I would have changed in this movie is that they defeat Soran and both captains warp back to the Enterprise in time for the Klingons to open fire. If Kirk needs to die, have him die on the Enterprise D by saving the rest of the crew somehow.

I agree that Kirk's death should have been more epic.

Kirk was there, so I thought, to act as a bridge between the generations. Which is a little lazy. Given that he was there at the start of the film itching to command, that he was always described by friends and foes as a great Captain, why not send him out as a great Captain? The Undiscovered Country did that already, but this is Kirk being sent out and killed off, why not make it as fitting as possible?

If you were Picard (and you weren't still stuck in the Nexus...) would you not ask to be brought back in time with Kirk to somewhere he would be most useful? On the bridge of the Enterprise? Wasteful given what a good Captain Picard already is, so he just asks Kirk to start punching Soran. Really? He didn't want to fetch someone else more capable at ass kicking to help him out? And he didn't want to go back and maybe save his family in France, not take Soran to the observatory in the first place and sort things out from there, where less people die?

It just didn't make sense I'm afraid.

[Meros]

Didn't Shatner script his own dying words? I might be wrong, but I thought I read that somewhere.

Not long after Generations this (http://www.amazon.com/Return-Star-Trek-William-Shatner/dp/067152609X/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1266853642&sr=1-10) novel came out (note the author).

The general plot was that a group of Romulans aligned with the Borg to create a Kirk-borg by downloading Kirk's consciousness at the moment of his death (hence, according to this novel, the reason for the "Oh my").

It wouldn't surprise me if Shatner did, in fact, script that line, and did it with this in mind.

[cochrane]

Everybody except Paramount knew that if you had Kirk and Picard in a film, you want a "buddy-buddy" film. But I guess they wanted to establish the TNG franchise in movies.
But, wasn't Generations pretty much of a "buddy movie" (or at least of a cooperative bent) as far as Kirk and Picard were concerned? And Paramount was certainly aware of the need.

From Memory Alpha: (http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Generations#Development)

Initially bandying about ideas involving the two Enterprise crews battling each other, Moore and Braga quickly abandoned the concept. Ron Moore explained in 1994:

"...The best possible poster you could ever hope to have for this picture would show you the two Enterprises battling against each other. We all tried our best, but we were never able to come up with any scenario that made both crews look heroic. No matter how we played around with this thing, somebody was gonna come off looking like the bad guy. So then we returned, a little more solidly, to the "mystery that spans two generations" idea that would allow Whoopi Goldberg, as Guinan, as the tie that binds the two."

You can criticize the final product, but Berman & Co. did abandon the adversarial concept of the script and focused more solidly on a cooperative type of Kirk and Picard adventure.

[BigT]

Kirk dying. He's supposed to be immortal.

I don't mind him dying, but he was supposed to die alone. And if he's gonna come back to help Picard, give him an ending better than Tasha Yar's.

[Mississippienne]

I like Generations, although not as much as First Contact (the best TNG movie), but the biggest problem with it is the Nexus itself. It's so clearly a deus ex machina and the writing is so inconsistent about it -- first, Soran and Guinan's ship is rescued from the Nexus, but then for some reason Soran can't just fly another ship into it, he has to come up with some supervillainish plot to destroy a planet to return to the Nexus. WTF.

Favorite quote is from Riker: "Speak for yourself, sir. I plan on living forever."