I recently started streaming Star Trek: The Next Generation. I was reluctant because I thought I remembered that it wasn’t that good until the third or fourth season. But I started, and it’s not that bad. I know I’ve said this before in other posts, but this time I have something of an explanation. In TNG, there was a lot of disappointment because fans so fondly remembered the original Star Trek and would probably have preferred it to be revived with the original cast. Meanwhile, the producers didn’t want the new series to be exactly the same. They updated the ship, put a Klingon on the bridge, and deliberately had no Vulcan at the science station. Instead, they added Wesley Crusher.
Fans at Star Trek conventions in those days absolutely hated Wesley Crusher. My feelings did not run that deep. He wasn’t my favorite character, but I tolerated him. The fans’ animosity seemed to derive from the fact that the boy had saved the ship too often. Actually, by the end of the first season, he had only saved the ship two or three times, although that is probably too many times for a 15-year-old aboard a ship of competent Star Fleet officers. No matter how smart he is.
In the second season, Wesley stopped saving the ship. Good for him. But also, Riker grew a beard, Worf became head of Tactical, and LaForge Chief Engineer. The producers felt they needed some changes, and they were all for the good. Instead of redoing or relying heavily on old Star Trek episodes (e.g., “The Naked Now”), they moved on and made TNG its own series.
As an ex-psychologist, I know the impact that expectations can have. Like I said, Star Trek fans wanted everything the same. But that wasn’t going to happen. That couldn’t happen. The new show had to succeed on its own. The characters grew, the plots achieved their own momentum, and the show came into its own. It gained a new audience, as well as pleasing the old. What else could anyone ask for?