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Star Trek: The Next Generation - Complete Series

from: Paramount

: Star Trek: The Next Generation - Complete Series
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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: DVD
Brand: PARAMOUNT PICTURES
EAN: 0097361311746
Format: Box set, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, NTSC
Label: Paramount
Manufacturer: Paramount
Number Of Items: 49
Publisher: Paramount
Region Code: 1
Release Date: October 02, 2007
Running Time: 8085 minutes
Sales Rank: 6773
Studio: Paramount
Theatrical Release Date: September 26, 1987



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Product Description:
Nearly two decades after the cancellation of the original STAR TREK television series creator Gene Roddenberry launched the first of what was to be four phenomenally successful spinoffs with STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION. Set in the 24th century (nearly 100 years after the stewardship of Captain Kirk) the series introduced an all-new cast of intergalactic travellers exploring the farthest reaches out of outer space on a mission to chart new planets and alien civilizations. Ship commander Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) anchored the crew of the Starship Enterprise-D with a sensitive reserve that marked a distinct contrast to his trigger-happy predecessor whose role was assumed by the Kirk-like second-in-command William Riker (Jonathan Frakes). Rounding out the cast were the Spock-like android Data (Brent Spiner); blind officer Geordi La Forge (LeVar Burton); Klingon officer Worf (Michael Dorn); ship doctor Beverly Crusher (Gates McFadden); her teenage son Wesley (Wil Wheaton); and psychic psychiatrist Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis). THE NEXT GENERATION was considered one of the best STAR TREK spinoffs for its intelligent writing and superb sci-fi special effects. This collection presents the series in its entirety.System Requirements:TRT: 7722 mins.Format: DVD MOVIE Genre: TELEVISION/SERIES & SEQUELS Rating: NR UPC: 097361311746 Manufacturer No: 131174

Amazon.com:
After Star Wars and the successful big-screen Star Trek adventures, it's perhaps not so surprising that Gene Roddenberry managed to convince purse string-wielding studio heads in the 1980s that a Next Generation would be both possible and profitable. But the political climate had changed considerably since the 1960s, the Cold War had wound down, and we were now living in the Age of Greed. To be successful a second time, Star Trek had to change too.

A writer's guide was composed with which to sell and define where the Trek universe was in the 24th Century. The United Federation of Planets was a more appealing ideology to an America keen to see where the Reagan/Gorbachev faceoff was taking them. Starfleet's meritocratic philosophy had always embraced all races and species. Now Earth's utopian history, featuring the abolishment of poverty, was brandished prominently and proudly. The new Enterprise, NCC 1701-D, was no longer a ship of war but an exploration vessel carrying families. The ethical and ethnical flagship also carried a former enemy (the Klingon Worf, played by Michael Dorn), and its Chief Engineer (Geordi LaForge) was blind and black. From every politically correct viewpoint, Paramount executives thought the future looked just swell!

Roddenberry's feminism now contrasted a pilot episode featuring ship's Counsellor Troi (Marina Sirtis) in a mini-skirt with her ongoing inner strengths and also those of Dr. Crusher (Gates McFadden) and the short-lived Tasha Yar (Denise Crosby). The arrival of Whoopi Goldberg in season 2 as mystic barkeep Guinan is a great example of the good the original Trek did for racial groups--Goldberg has stated that she was inspired to become an actress in large part through seeing Nichelle Nichols' Uhura. Her credibility as an actress helped enormously alongside the strong central performances of Patrick Stewart (Captain Picard), Jonathan Frakes (First Officer Will Riker), and Brent Spiner (Data) in defining another wholly believable environment once again populated with well-defined characters. Star Trek, it turned out, did not depend for its success on any single group of actors.

Like its predecessor in the 1960s, TNG pioneered visual effects on TV, making it an increasingly jaw-dropping show to look at. And thanks also to the enduring success of the original show, phasers, tricorders, communicators and even phase inverters were already familiar to most viewers. But while technology was a useful tool in most crises, it now frequently seemed to be the cause of them too, as the show's writers continually warned about the dangers of over-reliance on technology (the Borg were the ultimate expression of this maxim). The word 'technobabble' came to describe a weakness in many TNG scripts, which sacrificed the social and political allegories of the original and relied instead upon invented technological faults and their equally fictitious resolutions to provide drama within the Enterprise's self-contained society. (The holodeck's safety protocol override seemed to be next to the light switch given the number of times crew members were trapped within.) This emphasis on scientific jargon appealed strongly to an audience who were growing up for the first time in the late 1980s with the home computer--and gave rise to the clichéd image of the nerdy Trek fan.

Like in the original Trek, it was in the stories themselves that much of the show's success is to be found. That pesky Prime Directive kept moral dilemmas afloat ('Justice'/'Who Watches the Watchers?'/'First Contact'). More 'what if' scenarios came out of time-travel episodes ('Cause and Effect'/'Time's Arrow'/'Yesterday's Enterprise'). And there were some episodes that touched on the political world, such as 'The Arsenal of Freedom' questioning the supply of arms, 'Chain of Command' decrying the torture of political prisoners and 'The Defector', which was called 'The Cuban Missile Crisis of The Neutral Zone' by its writer. The show ran for more than twice as many episodes as its progenitor and therefore had more time to explore wider ranging issues. But the choice of issues illustrates the change in the social climate that had occurred with the passing of a couple of decades. 'Angel One' covered sexism; 'The Outcast' was about homosexuality; 'Symbiosis'--drug addiction; 'The High Ground'--terrorism; 'Ethics'--euthanasia; 'Darmok'--language barriers; and 'Journey's End'--displacement of Indians from their homeland. It would have been unthinkable for the original series to have tackled most of these.

TNG could so easily have been a failure, but it wasn't. It survived a writer's strike in its second year, the tragic death of Roddenberry just after Trek's 25th anniversary in 1991, and plenty of competition from would-be rival franchises. Yes, its maintenance of an optimistic future was appealing, but the strong stories and readily identifiable characters ensured the viewers' continuing loyalty. --Paul Tonks



Customer Reviews
Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating: 1 out of 5 stars - Twenty minutes of reading to find out that the product is not worth buying
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Rating: 3 out of 5 stars - Great product, crappy package
I love this star trek series, but the package it came in was badly made and the bright green plastic ... Read More


Rating: 3 out of 5 stars - More on STTNG Case
THE FIRST THING I WAS FORCED TO DO WAS REMOVE THE DVDs TO 8 CASES (1 EA SEASON THAT HOLD UP TO 8 DVDS ... Read More


Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - Star Trek: Next Generation Complete Series
This is freakin' awesome. I am in love with old t.v. shows and have found that t.v. today just isn't cutting ... Read More


Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - Star Trek: The Next Generation
I've been a Star Trek fan since the original, back 100 years or so ago and when Next Generation came out on DVD ... Read More

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Copyright ©2003, Mark Carey.