Perhaps a new take on SW vs. ST

Smalleyjedi · Post by **Smalleyjedi** » 2002-07-14 10:39pm

Every argument I see is who would win in a war, would this person beat this person, would this ship beat this ship. Never have i seen an argument about the quality of the two stories. Lets start one like that. Which has better movies? Which one has better supllemental material (I know in ST all episodes are canon, but we will for the purposes of this debate put them at the level of SW EU). I am just getting into ST and I am told the movies are quite good. I am about to rent all nine of them, and if i like them, i may try to get ahold of the TGN episodes. Could be difficult with how many there are.

David · Post by **David** » 2002-07-14 10:43pm

The movies are better than the episodes, and BTW, you won't understand some parts of the movies or get the jokes without watching the episodes first.

Smalleyjedi · Post by **Smalleyjedi** » 2002-07-14 11:05pm

That is what i have been told...that without watching the umpteen thousand TOS episodes the movies aren't as good, but They will still b good im sure. I am also told that the seven seasons of TNG were the best episodes.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-14 11:10pm

I would rate them thus:

Movies.
TNG.
TOS.
DS9.
ENT.
Anything else on the face of the earth.
Hot poker inserted into brain.
Death.
Voy.
Star Wars Holiday Special minus Cartoon. (Arg it was horrible)

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2002-07-14 11:21pm

On the quality of the stories:

It's hard, to compare them. Star Wars is one man's full, huge story, with a massive background series of stories in the form of the EU, inspired and grown from the immensely detailed universe. Star Trek is many stories, all happening at once. To be sure, some of the movies were great movies. I especially enjoyed The Journey Home, and The Undiscovered Country was very nice. The Wrath of Kahn? A wonderful story. First Contact was a great action movie.

The odd-numbered movies, however, generally stank like all hell. TMP didn't engage me, I never saw ST3, ST5 was just daft, Generations was annoyingly dull, and Insurrection was flat out preaching to the audience.

As far as the series goes, I preferred TOS over all of the others, followed by DS9's adventuring, TNG's strange politics, Enterprises sense of adventure, with Voyager coming last only because there's nothing else. I admit I enjoyed some episodes of Voyager, although the series as a whole was an insult to Star Trek fans in general.

The bit I dislike the most about Trek is the insistance that you must resort to technology for plots, instead of the characters. It is perhaps this which makes people think a tiny federation of planets can defeat a galaxy-spanning empire, which I think is pretty bad.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2002-07-14 11:51pm

I'd have to say that TOS is the best (and there are only 79 episodes, Smalleyjedi). Those were the days: when men were men, women were women, space was the old west, and the moral was in black and white.

"Journey to Babel" and "Plato's Stepchildren" are the only episodes that I haven't seen in their entirety.

TNG is quite good, but the first two seasons are (IMHO) not very good, and rather primitive compared to the rest of the series. But Picard, Data, and Riker can't compare to the trio of Kirk, Spock, and McCoy.

I've seen maybe about 30-35 episodes.

DS9 was just too damn boring early on in the first and second season to keep my interest. It was either simple mellodramas, mind-numbingly boring political/ethics debates, or just dumb and one-shot "Alien-Of-The-Week" shows.

I lost interest.

Unfortunately, the whole Dominion War thing was a little too late, and the multi-season nature of the storyline made it so that if you missed a bunch of episodes, you might as well not even bother trying to catch up during the then-current season/s.

Again, I lost interest. But due to local syndication, I've seen more of DS9 than any of the four recent series, I'd say close to half of the entire series.

Voyager was hardly even worth the bother to watch. As the series went on, it was all too evident that TPTB were loosing interest in keeping the series up to snuff. I watched it from time to time.

Total, I've only seen about 20-30 episodes.

Enterprise just isn't worth the bother to watch, as the only channel that carries it barely comes in. I've only seen two partial episodes.

I've seen all the films except for Insurrection, and ST6 is my personal favorite.

une · Post by **une** » 2002-07-15 12:20am

Every argument I see is who would win in a war, would this person beat this person, would this ship beat this ship. Never have i seen an argument about the quality of the two stories. Lets start one like that. Which has better movies? Which one has better supllemental material (I know in ST all episodes are canon, but we will for the purposes of this debate put them at the level of SW EU). I am just getting into ST and I am told the movies are quite good. I am about to rent all nine of them, and if i like them, i may try to get ahold of the TGN episodes. Could be difficult with how many there are.

In terms of films, Star Wars wins. The originals are great films full of depth and personality, and even the new ones are fine examples of visual story telling, even if sometimes the story falls flat, and do hold some depth.

In terms of what you consider 'supplemental' material, Star Trek easily wins. The Star Wars novels kinda lost the point. Moving Star Wars away from it's fantasy roots into the area of pure sci fi. Star Trek on the other hand has always sustained the same feeling in it's movies and films, you never feel like your watching two different franchises when you watch a Trek film in comparison to a Trek series, because Trek keeps that same type of arua about them no matter what they do. This most likely has alot do with the fact that the same people that work on the films also work on the TV shows.[/quote]

Smalleyjedi · Post by **Smalleyjedi** » 2002-07-15 12:27am

hmmm, this is just the answer i expected to get, and the answer i expect to come to myself after i delve into a new universe.

SCVN 2812 · Post by **SCVN 2812** » 2002-07-15 12:38am

I personally prefer the ST movies over the SW movies because they are based on the series that I have watched and loved all my life. I don't hate the Star Wars movies, but to me personally they seem a bit bland and over the top (and the acting is often horrible, but then again if great acting was all that mattered to me, I wouldn't be watching sci-fi) but it's a nice story to watch, and also the more I think about it, the more it makes me laugh at the Warsies who mock Star Trek's optimism about the future and humanity because guess, what? At the end, Star Wars has a happy ending. Anakin is finally able to overcome the darkness plaguing his soul and break away from the Dark Side and transcends to whatever you would call the not-dead but not-alive either ghost Jedi, Luke wins back his father from the dark side, the Ewoks dish out a humiliating and hilarious defeat to the Emperor's finest troops, the Second Death Star was destroyed, the Emperor killed, ect. ect.

But I feel like the majority of the Star Trek movies, with the exception of The Motion Picture and the Fifth one that's name I can't remember right now, are written better and more interesting to watch.

I agree with une about the expanded universe, they don't have the feel of the movies, most Star Trek novels also suffer from that flaw of not feeling like they could actually be an episode or movie. The Expanded Universe is too bloated and incomprehensibly complex and this is represented in every new book that is written and it makes them damn hard to read when they are constantly making vague references to something that happened in another book that you didn't read and didn't particularly feel like reading. It makes it very inaccessible to new or selective readers.

Master of Ossus · Post by **Master of Ossus** » 2002-07-15 12:39am

Star Wars movies are so far beyond the ST movies that any comparison there is an insult to Star Wars. Believe it or not, that is not a knock on ST movies. I really enjoyed many of them (STFC, Voyage Home), but Star Wars movies are perhaps the best symbollic films ever made, and the story itself is wonderful and compelling in spite of the premise.

As far as the background material, comparing across mediums is extremely difficult. I very much enjoyed much of the material that went into DS9 and TNG. They had their flaws, but so do all works of fiction. I would tend to rate SW books like Heir to the Empire, Star by Star, and The Courtship of Princess Leia as the best of the supplementary works (in large part because I enjoy reading so much--this is a stylistic choice), and TNG, DS9, and some of the weaker ST movies after those. We then have the abysmal SW books like the Black Fleet Crisis, The Approaching Storm, and many of the comics, but the most offensive supplementary materials are the Holiday Special, for its horrible writing/voice acting/premise and Enterprise for its egregious lack of plot, continuity, and believability.

TheDarkling · Post by **TheDarkling** » 2002-07-15 12:51am

By and large ST books beat SW books hands down, it could be that SW books try to ape star trek and thus fail to be as good.

As for the films the SW films cant be touched the OT is up there with the best of them then the trek films comes in and some of them are good aswell but the OT stays ahead.
The new trilogy however just doesnt have the magic - they are good films but they rank below star trek just because they dont have that spark the OT had.

All discourse enclosed above is pure opinion and TheDarkling bears no responbility for resulting upsets.
Here endeth the disclaimer.

SCVN 2812 · Post by **SCVN 2812** » 2002-07-15 02:10am

I like the Kirk movies the best, Starfleet and the Federation seemed a lot more real than it does in the 24th century shows, while the 24th century Federation is an ideal to aspire to, it doesn't have the feel of Kirk's Federation and Kirk's Star Trek. You really felt like things were happening out on the frontier and the Federation, while still idealistic, wasn't quite so streamlined and overwhelmingly perfect. That's also why I like Insurrection, more than I do any of the other TNG movies, it shows the Federation in a bit of a different light, the corruption that comes with a massive, swollen beauracracy is there and while his motives are noble, Doherty's actions are far from so. I would like to see something where Starfleet and the Federation are taking greater notice of the fact that things aren't as perfect as they tell themselves and others and do something about it.

ST books are nice because you don't have to have read a dozen others in order to understand them. The same with episodes of ST, while there are recurring themes and subplots, each episode can be enjoyed without full knowledge of the series.

His Divine Shadow · Post by **His Divine Shadow** » 2002-07-15 03:52am

SW, I lub you....

Cpt_Frank · Post by **Cpt_Frank** » 2002-07-15 04:09am

My favorites are of course the SW movies, with Empire strikes back at the top (this could change with EIII coming out).
I also enjoyed most of the ST Movies, especially Wrath of Khan.
But ST5 and Insurrection were just crap, and I'm afraid the new STX won't be much better.
Anyway, TOS is the most enjoyable ST series, and I'm glad they're re-running it here in Germany at the moment so I can tape all Episodes.
the rest is:
TNG (some Episodes were cool, some awful)
Voyager (mostly crap)
and the last
DS9

Since I haven't seen Enterprise yet, I can't say anything about it, but I'm afraid it won't be any better than Voyager.

Moonstone Spider · Post by **Moonstone Spider** » 2002-07-15 04:24am

Every argument I see is who would win in a war, would this person beat this person, would this ship beat this ship. Never have i seen an argument about the quality of the two stories.

That's probably because this is a vs. Forum who's point is to debate who would beat the pants of who (Wars does the beating, partly because Trek doesn't wear pants). This is kind of like a games forum being about games, or a football forum discussing football all the time.

Lets start one like that. Which has better movies? Which one has better supllemental material (I know in ST all episodes are canon, but we will for the purposes of this debate put them at the level of SW EU). I am just getting into ST and I am told the movies are quite good. I am about to rent all nine of them, and if i like them, i may try to get ahold of the TGN episodes. Could be difficult with how many there are.

I like reading a lot, so I prefer books to movies or TV. Trek Books tend to contradict each other horribly and thus are hard to read. Unfortunately a lot of Wars books do the same thing, particularly gargbage written by KJA. Issac Asimov's books are better to read and his Foundation Federation would smack down the Galactic Empire and the Federation at the same time, probably in a few hours. Thus I prefer Asimov to either one. Did I have a point? If I did I've forgotten it. I need some sleep, g'night all.

Crazy_Vasey · Post by **Crazy_Vasey** » 2002-07-15 10:15am

Star Trek books, good?

Nah I got sick of em when I realised every series went off on its own little tangent and wasn't actually part of continuity.

I'd take any SW film 'cept maybe TPM over any ST film 'cept maybe Wrath of Khan, that film really kicked ass especially looking at the amount of other Trek films that were utter drek.

The original series of Trek was pretty good and I really enjoyed it even if I wasn't alive when it first came out. TNG was boring, too much moralising and shit. DS9 and Voyager well no comment needed there me thinks. So I'd take TOS other most of the EU but TNG and co can take a running jump as far as I'm concerned.

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-07-15 06:24pm

Watch Wrath of Kahn. NEVER EVER EVER LAY YOUR EYES ON STAR TREK V: *title censored*

StarshipTitanic · Post by **StarshipTitanic** » 2002-07-15 06:26pm

Gotta love ST5...

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-07-15 06:27pm

StarshipTitanic wrote:Gotta love ST5...

I really need to find the ban button.

StarshipTitanic · Post by **StarshipTitanic** » 2002-07-15 08:07pm

I'll screech at you!

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2002-07-15 08:09pm

StarshipTitanic wrote:I'll screech at you!

I'll edit your posts

Needa · Post by **Needa** » 2002-07-15 08:50pm

NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! I hate you!

I've almost forgot ST5. Now is going to haunt me again in my nightmares!

Romulan_nemesis · Post by **Romulan_nemesis** » 2002-07-15 09:00pm

Good for you! I'm sure you'll enjoy them. But, keep in mind, it is said that all the even numbered movies are the best.

Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
Star Trek IV: The Voyager Home
Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country (my personal favorite)
Star Trek: Generations wasn't that bad.
Star Trek: First Contact (A kick ass, "Holy shit the borg are on the ship, break out the phaser rifles and blow the bloody hell out of them" good time!)

I reccommend those. Watch the moives and tell me what you thought.

Rommie