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OK, well it’s been 41 days since I said I was going to do some more posting and I have posted precisely once. Not that anyone is waiting around for me to start doing some daily writing again, but this is a wonderful example of what happens when you set VAPID goals. I don’t really have a good excuse that doesn’t sound like an excuse (but it boils down to: lack of time & mental energy). Point is, I was serious that I wanted to get back in the habit of writing, but the execution has has been lacking. I do have a bunch of stuff half-written. And maybe once a day was ambitious even if I have no scope.

Well anyway I’m not as young as I once was and it may take this train a while to get up to speed. But on the agenda:

  • Lots of stuff about being 40, an age which I have somehow arrived at. Nothing like having a midlife crises or lamenting my lost youth or whatever, mostly like in the vein of: how is this possible? I thought I was like, 25.
  • Various thoughts before and after the August 21 eclipse. I’ve been excited for it for years, and will be traveling to see it.

And, yup,

  • Reviews of Deep Space Nine episodes. Just started watching. Because I have still not gotten around to confirming if there are already capsule reviews of Star Trek episodes online.

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New posts imminent. If I say I’m going to do it then I have to.

Goal: one post per day, whether it’s a three page screed or just a link to something.

Also: This counts for today.

And yet also: I swapped in a new theme. The previous one was so old it didn’t work on mobile. I like the new one except for the title font so I’ll change that when I get around to it. Just making it clear I do not stand behind this font.

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OK, time to wrap this thing up. First off, here are composite ratings for each season for me and Tor.com, who had two reviewers for each episode. They also use a 0-6 scale, where I used 0-5, so I scaled their ratings back to mine. I was going to include the AV Club ratings but they use a completely different grading system like report cards, giving out A, A-, B, etc. Only they never seem to give out anything worse than a B, at least for TOS. Seemed hard to figure out what meant what in comparison, so forget them. How much time am I really willing to put into this? Too much already. Anyway:

(Note: they used a different pair of reviewers in season 3.)

Some takeaways:

  • I am the most generous rater, giving higher ratings per season then the Tor reviewers.
  • We all agree that the show was best in its first season, OK in its second, and just bad in the third.
  • We even all pretty much agree as to the rate at which the series declined:

Josh’s Bottom 6

Here are the episodes I gave either 1 or 0 out of five.

Episode Name Rating
1×21 (21) The Return of the Archons 1
1×26 (26) Errand of Mercy 1
2×17 (46) A Piece of the Action 1
2×23 (52) The Omega Glory 1
3×18 (73) The Lights of Zetar 1
3×01 (56) Spock’s Brain 0

Maybe I was a little hard on “Return of the Archons”. It’s got a decent reputation. I just fell right asleep. And it’s typical of the kind of episode I don’t like, so, too bad, “Return of the Archons.” The other 1s are simply too boring, ridiculous, or irritating.

“Spock’s Brain” is easily the worst episode in the series. But you don’t need me to tell you that, INTERNET. The title was won as soon as Spock began narrating his own brain surgery.

Josh’s Top 17

And the 5 out of 5s:

Episode Name Rating
1×04 The Naked Time 5
1×11/12 The Menagerie, parts 1-2 5
1×13 The Conscience of the King 5
1×14 Balance of Terror 5
1×18 Arena 5
1×22 Space Seed 5
1×25 The Devil in the Dark 5
1×28 The City on the Edge of Forever 5
2×01 (30) Amok Time 5
2×03 (32) The Changeling 5
2×04 (33) Mirror, Mirror 5
2×10 (39) Journey to Babel 5
2×15 (44) The Trouble With Tribbles 5
2×20 (49) Return to Tomorrow 5
3×02 (57) The Enterprise Incident 5
3×11 (66) Wink of an Eye 5
3×19 (74) Requiem for Methuselah 5

These are all terrific, but the real top three are “The Trouble With Tribbles”, “Arena”, and “Amok Time”. Most people might swap out “Mirror, Mirror” with “Arena”, but I’m an “Arena” person.

Final Bits

I probably saw TOS for the first time when I was like ten. I watched them on TV and with my Dad here and there growing up. Then once in a while as an adult I’d catch a few and remember how great it was. Well, I think the lesson is, it IS a great show when you don’t watch it too much. When it’s fresh, it seems inconceivably original, fun, and stylish. But for sustained viewing in 2013-ish, frankly, it really doesn’t hold up. There are too many shaky or boring episodes. In some ways I don’t think it’s Trek’s fault, it can never escape its time. And in its time, you could have a boring TV show as long as there was some fightin’. There’s probably a lot of the same on now, only it’d be a lot better paced.

Anyway, overall there’s no real question I’d give TNG the nod as a better show. The characters aren’t as classic, but there aren’t so many throwaway episodes, and it’s generally a much smarter show: better writing, less reliance on tropes and conventions. There are some bad TNG episodes, of course, but nothing like TOS season three’s sustained putridity.

Down the road I’ll watch DS9. K is watching TNG right now and liking it, so I’ll probably save DS9 for us to watch together in a year or two.