Star Trek: The Next Generation
| Name: | Star Trek: The Next Generation |
| Abbreviation(s): | STTNG |
| Creator: | Gene Roddenberry |
| Date(s): | 1987-1994 (the TV show) 1994 Star Trek: Generations (seventh film) |
| Medium: | Television series, movie series |
| Country of Origin: | United States |
| External Links: | |
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| STUB | This article is a stub. Please help us out by expanding or adding to it. |
Star Trek: The Next Generation was similar to the original Star Trek concept: a large, diverse crew on a ship called the Enterprise travels the galaxy, meets aliens, and spreads goodwill. This time, the ship was even bigger, and there were more aliens.
The main members of the TNG crew were:
| Name | Position | Species |
|---|---|---|
| Jean-Luc Picard | Captain | Human |
| William Riker | First Officer | Human |
| Geordi La Forge | Conn Officer; later, Chief Engineer | Human |
| Worf | Chief of Security and Tactical Officer | Klingon |
| Beverly Crusher | Chief Medical Officer | Human |
| Data | Second Officer | Android |
| Wesley Crusher | Conn Officer | Human |
| Natasha "Tasha" Yar | Chief of Security and Tactical Officer | Human |
| Deanna Troi | Ship's Counselor | Half-Betazoid (mother) / half-Human (father) |
Q, an alien with god-like powers and a rather flouncy and queenly mien, was a frequent guest star, especially in later seasons.
Fans spent hours deciding the exact one-to-one relationship between the original Star Trek characters and the TNG versions of them.
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TNG Meta
Paramount wanted to make more money off of the Star Trek concept. Fans were...cautiously optimistic. Star Trek had been ahead of its time in many ways; fans expected TNG to update that image, and continue to make statements of its own, but TNG was a profoundly conservative creation. One place where that became very obvious was homosexual inclusion. Gay SF fans organized a national letter-writing campaign to urge Paramount to acknowledge a queer presence in the 24th century future represented on TNG. Roddenberry publicly committed himself to do so shortly before his death, but the producers never made good on that promise.[1] Another reason TNG was not taken very seriously by many SF or media fans was the way the show didn't seem to realize that Wesley Crusher was a horribly obvious Mary Sue character.
TNG Fandom
Much TNG fanfic was posted on ASC and, later, ASCEM. Picard/Crusher and Riker/Troi were popular het pairings, with a number of communities such as BONC and the Imzadi mailing list developing around them. The Data/Yar pairing also attracted some fans, including some who usually considered themselves slashers.
TNG was a less popular slash fandom than its predecessor, although there was some f/f fic, especially Crusher/Troi and Tasha/Troi, and some m/m fic, including Data/LaForge and Picard/Riker. The relatively small amount of slash may be a result of the fact that two of the central male characters, Picard and Riker, had well-developed romantic interests in canon, Crusher and Troi, respectively. Late in the series, a Picard/Q fandom also started to develop.
Notable TNG Zines and Stories
Several TNG fanworks considered among the best by some fans are actually crossovers with other fandoms, including:
- In The Dark series by Kellie Matthews and Julia Kosatka, an X-Files/Highlander/TNG crossover with Duncan MacLeod and Guinan becoming lovers.
- Married Dance by Jane Carnall, a novella-length slash Highlander/ST:TNG/The Persian Boy crossover -- a deft mix of three fandoms, marred only by, in some Highlander fans' views, the author's too-evident disdain for Duncan. (See Hero Bashing.)
One novel that is still searched for as a used zine is Pulse of the Machine by Jean Kluge, a Data/Tasha novel gorgeously illustrated by both Jean and Marty Siegrist.
In the early '90s, SF fans who'd heard of het and slash Trek fic, brought out a ST:TNG zine called Science Friction, which highlighted the gay subtext of the Borg episodes. Most long-term media fans disliked it a great deal. This led to much discussion about the difference between erotica in media fandom vs. professional erotica/pornography of the time.
Picard/Q was probably the biggest slash pairing:
- A famous pair of early netfic stories -- His Beloved Pet & At the Centre of Things by Ruth and Atara -- was published on alt.startrek.creative.erotica back in 1996. They told a love story with a very heavy s/m dynamic, featuring Q as top, Picard (relaxing from the cares of command) as bottom, with chains, whips, collars, and leather all over the place.
- The King Who Would Be Man was a P/Q zine story by M Fae Glascow in an Pæan to Priapus #2 (1990). Q decides he wants to experience sex after "Deja Q" (the episode where he becomes human). He picks Picard to experience it with; Picard patently refuses to cooperate and Q starts shape-shifting trying to push Picard's buttons.[2]
A Picard/Data story that is still recommended is Mental Traveler, also by M Fae Glascow, in Concupiscence, a Manacles Press zine.
For more TNG zines see:Star Trek: The Next Generation/Fanzines
TNG art
When TNG came along, Jean Kluge had already been a fan artist for years, but she fell hard for Tasha Yar/Data, and it's possible that her art for that pairing is her best ever. One of her Tasha Yar/Data pictures was used for the cover of Textual Poachers.
TNG vids
- Tapestry by Mary Van Deusen, a sad Tasha Yar vid, that told her whole first-season story through a frame of Data putting away her things.
- I think I'm a Clone Now by ? On one level, a profoundly silly vid to Star Trek and TNG clips; on another, a lovely commentary on how much TNG ripped off original Trek.
- Kandy Fong's classic Riker vs. Kirk vid, "Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better", a rare early vid with professional video effects
Archives
TNG mailing lists
References
- ↑ Jenkins, Henry. "'Out of the closet and into the universe': Queers and Star Trek" in The Audience Studies Reader, ed. by Will Brooker and Deborah Jermyn, p. 172.
- ↑ The King Who Would Be Man, on the Oblique Press site, in pdf
