** out of ****
Star Trek: TNG was one of my favorite TV shows growing up. Space adventures always appealed to me, but it was the cast and the concepts the show explored that often won me over. After having seen the pilot episode, a two-parter entitled Encounter at Farpoint, I see many of the qualities I enjoyed about the series, but this is a fairly subpar episode that's only occasionally compelling.
Set some 80 years after the original Star Trek (thus placing it, if I'm not mistaken, in the 24th century), the new crew of the starship Enterprise is headed by Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart). The crew's assignment: to investigate Farpoint station, but before they can reach their destination they're intercepted by a god-like entity who calls "himself" Q (John De Lancey). Q has deemed the human race savage beasts and puts the Enterprise crew on trial. Their test is Farpoint and if they fail to uncover the dark secret of the station, then well...they'll assumingly receive a dreadful fate.
The first part of Encounter at Farpoint is pretty good, the characters are nicely introduced and mostly well-played by the cast. Patrick Stewart immediately stands out as the stern but well-meaning Picard. Brent Spiner is fantastic as Data, and Jonathan Frakes makes a likeable first officer as Commander Riker. Noticeably different from the original Star Trek is a larger female cast. Marina Sirtis, Gates McFadden, and Denise Crosby are all fairly attractive (Sirtis would later be a full-blown hottie by season two, and McFadden is actually the best-looking of all the Star Trek ladies right now, talk about aging gracefully; sorry, Jeri Ryan and Jolene Blalock just don't do it for me).
Unfortunately, the plot, while initially intriguing, ultimately doesn't really go anywhere and there's the certain feeling that fitting the whole story into two parts is really stretching it out. A lot of the material, obviously played for introductory purposes, could still have been cut out. In fact, all the stuff focusing on the mystery behind Farpoint barely adds up to a half-hour, excluding the really lengthy climax, which is just plain boring. When the secret of Farpoint is revealed (which you'll probably figure out before the cast does), all the conjecture and facts are messily spouted in one of those silly coversations where each character continues the sentence after the previous speaker has finished.
But Encounter at Farpoint works adequately enough as an intro to one of the best sci-fi television series, right up there with Stargate: SG-1 and the first two seasons of Sliders. Watch for Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa as Q's bailiff.
Star Trek: TNG was one of my favorite TV shows growing up. Space adventures always appealed to me, but it was the cast and the concepts the show explored that often won me over. After having seen the pilot episode, a two-parter entitled Encounter at Farpoint, I see many of the qualities I enjoyed about the series, but this is a fairly subpar episode that's only occasionally compelling.
Set some 80 years after the original Star Trek (thus placing it, if I'm not mistaken, in the 24th century), the new crew of the starship Enterprise is headed by Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart). The crew's assignment: to investigate Farpoint station, but before they can reach their destination they're intercepted by a god-like entity who calls "himself" Q (John De Lancey). Q has deemed the human race savage beasts and puts the Enterprise crew on trial. Their test is Farpoint and if they fail to uncover the dark secret of the station, then well...they'll assumingly receive a dreadful fate.
The first part of Encounter at Farpoint is pretty good, the characters are nicely introduced and mostly well-played by the cast. Patrick Stewart immediately stands out as the stern but well-meaning Picard. Brent Spiner is fantastic as Data, and Jonathan Frakes makes a likeable first officer as Commander Riker. Noticeably different from the original Star Trek is a larger female cast. Marina Sirtis, Gates McFadden, and Denise Crosby are all fairly attractive (Sirtis would later be a full-blown hottie by season two, and McFadden is actually the best-looking of all the Star Trek ladies right now, talk about aging gracefully; sorry, Jeri Ryan and Jolene Blalock just don't do it for me).
Unfortunately, the plot, while initially intriguing, ultimately doesn't really go anywhere and there's the certain feeling that fitting the whole story into two parts is really stretching it out. A lot of the material, obviously played for introductory purposes, could still have been cut out. In fact, all the stuff focusing on the mystery behind Farpoint barely adds up to a half-hour, excluding the really lengthy climax, which is just plain boring. When the secret of Farpoint is revealed (which you'll probably figure out before the cast does), all the conjecture and facts are messily spouted in one of those silly coversations where each character continues the sentence after the previous speaker has finished.
But Encounter at Farpoint works adequately enough as an intro to one of the best sci-fi television series, right up there with Stargate: SG-1 and the first two seasons of Sliders. Watch for Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa as Q's bailiff.