I wandered in the living room last night while SpazMan was watching his season 2 DVDs of ST:TNG. It was the first episode of the season and Picard was asking about Dr. Pulaski. It reminded me of a question I’ve had for a very long time.
“Why was Gates McFadden not in the second season?” I asked SpazMan.
“I don’t know. She just wasn’t,” he replied, engrossed in Picard stalking off to Ten Forward to yank the new doctor away from her drinks.
I realized that if I wanted an answer to my long-unanswered question, I’d have to ask someone who wasn’t, like me, all of eight years old during the second season of TNG. So I bring it to you, Cafe Society denizens: Why was Gates McFadden not in the second season of TNG?
Per IMDB she was on All My Children during the time she was off Next Gen. Whether her absence from Next Gen was her choice or not (the trivia section just says Crusher was “written out” but not by whom) I don’t know.
My memory is that the producers thought her character wasn’t going anywhere so the writers were instructed to write her off.
I remember in an interview Gates McFadden being very angry about the official press release, which said she wished to persue other interests, when in fact she had no desire to leave.
The official explaination (for why McFadden’s contract was not renewed) was that the producers “wanted to go in a different direction”, blah blah blah.
The real explaination seemed to be that McFadden made a few, relatively reasonable requests as far as perusing other projects in parallel with her work on TNG and having a child that didn’t set well with the very controlling producer. Similar issues were involved in the kill-off of Denise Crosby’s (admittedly grating) character, and the later reduction of Wil Wheaton. Wheaton has a sob story about how they forced him to bow out of a film project (Valmont) on the strength of needing to develop his character more deeply, and then basically hanging him and the character of Wesley Crusher out to dry. Pretty shitty, really, but that sort of thing goes on all the time in television production, from what I’ve heard; it’s a very narcissistic, ego-driven business, as much so (or perhaps even more) for the people behind the camera as those in front of it. Note the treatment of the above characters in the Next Generation films; they barely even register when they do appear.
At least they brought her back and even occasionally gave her a central role in an episode; she was, aside from Stewart and Spiner, the only one of the main cast who was a capable thespian, as opposed to a line-reading hack. (Okay, LaVar Burton is competent.)
And I have to admit that I watched the show not because I was a Trekkie or Trekker, or whatever you call people who go to conventions in spandex jumpsuits, but because I thought Gates McFadden was about the sexiest woman on television. I haven’t had much use for the entire medium since.
And am I the only one who thinks that, as annoying as Wesley Crusher was, it was a result of the way the character was developed rather than something especially wrong with the concept or the actor? There was a lot of potential, almost completely wasted by the need to utilize him as a fulcrum for the technobabble solution of the week resolution to the plot.
Oh, absolutely. I don’t know many Trekkers (at least the ones who don’t live in their parents’ basements) who hate Wil Wheaton. I know MANY Trekkers who hate Wesley Crusher. The character (and thus the writers) was almost entirely at fault.
I have to second that Gates Mcfadden was absolutely gorgeous!
There was one scene in particular where Her and Counselor Troy were doing stretches in spandex leotards or something similar. It was quite pleasing to the eye.
I also thought Pulaski was much more interesting that the terminally bland Dr. Crusher. Like many of the other characters, she was badly underwritten and had nothing about her that was even slightly interesting.
As for Wesley, I have had a great deal of respect for the character and Wil Wheaton after Wheaton got online on GEnis during the first season and said, basically, “all the actors think the show and characters suck, but until the fans aren’t willing to accept any crap released by the ST franchise, the producers aren’t going to do anything about it.”
I haven’t had much use for the entire medium since.