Faith of the Heart is great. the arrangement is a little weak but the tune itself rules and the words capture Archer so well i was shocked to learn it was a cover and not purpose-written for that
The Wrath of Kahn is just ok. it’s less Star Trek and more an action movie celebrating the characters that we love, which makes it just the same as the later movies everyone hates. the only ones that are really feature-length Trek are Motion Picture and The Undiscovered Country. Into Darkness would be listed there too if the plot didn’t keep getting hijacked by Wrath of Khan nostalgia baiting, ironically
the soap opera vibes in Discovery make sense in universe. they never really got a chance to be a peacetime exploration vessel and then it turned out their captain was secretly a space Nazi. compare and contrast how Pike treats them and the Enterprise crew- he seems to be aware of this and treats them with kid gloves. whether or not that was intentional and/or if it makes for good TV is left as an exercise to the reader
Dear Doctor was a good episode. they didn’t condemn those people to die, they offered them a multigeneration treatment that just kicked the can down the road. it’s not about the decision so much as the decision to not make a decision (which granted, Rush tells us is still a choice). it’s messy but that’s the point. Cogenitor is the episode that deserves the hate. it may very well be the single worst episode in all of Trek
The problem with Dear Doctor is that the premise is pure gibberish. Evolution isn’t an intelligent force that makes decisions, it’s not a predetermined path, species don’t go extinct to benefit others, and evolutionary changes don’t affect the entire population simultaneously. However, every one of those is treated as true for the episode and then they made it clear that the events were the inspiration for the creation of the Prime Directive. If not for that last part, it would probably be dismissed as yet another bad take on evolution from Trek, but that it’s specifically intended to be one of the most important moments in Starfleet history is what makes it stick out.
I would argue that Insurrection also qualifies as a feature-length Star Trek episode. It has good moral quandaries, an interesting sci-fi premise, all the hallmarks of classic Trek.
oh boy. here we go.
Faith of the Heart is great. the arrangement is a little weak but the tune itself rules and the words capture Archer so well i was shocked to learn it was a cover and not purpose-written for that
The Wrath of Kahn is just ok. it’s less Star Trek and more an action movie celebrating the characters that we love, which makes it just the same as the later movies everyone hates. the only ones that are really feature-length Trek are Motion Picture and The Undiscovered Country. Into Darkness would be listed there too if the plot didn’t keep getting hijacked by Wrath of Khan nostalgia baiting, ironically
the soap opera vibes in Discovery make sense in universe. they never really got a chance to be a peacetime exploration vessel and then it turned out their captain was secretly a space Nazi. compare and contrast how Pike treats them and the Enterprise crew- he seems to be aware of this and treats them with kid gloves. whether or not that was intentional and/or if it makes for good TV is left as an exercise to the reader
Dear Doctor was a good episode. they didn’t condemn those people to die, they offered them a multigeneration treatment that just kicked the can down the road. it’s not about the decision so much as the decision to not make a decision (which granted, Rush tells us is still a choice). it’s messy but that’s the point. Cogenitor is the episode that deserves the hate. it may very well be the single worst episode in all of Trek
The problem with Dear Doctor is that the premise is pure gibberish. Evolution isn’t an intelligent force that makes decisions, it’s not a predetermined path, species don’t go extinct to benefit others, and evolutionary changes don’t affect the entire population simultaneously. However, every one of those is treated as true for the episode and then they made it clear that the events were the inspiration for the creation of the Prime Directive. If not for that last part, it would probably be dismissed as yet another bad take on evolution from Trek, but that it’s specifically intended to be one of the most important moments in Starfleet history is what makes it stick out.
A few quibbles.
I would argue that Insurrection also qualifies as a feature-length Star Trek episode. It has good moral quandaries, an interesting sci-fi premise, all the hallmarks of classic Trek.
Code of Honor is the worst Trek episode.