10 things I hate about Star Trek - TNG

One of my favorite television shows is a program called Star Trek – The Next Generation (or TNG for short). It is an hour-long sci-fi program from the ‘80’s that was well written and respected when it was originally aired. It is still being played in syndication here and still has a strong following even today! Most of the episodes are thrilling but some are tiresome and boring. As much as I love the show, here are ten things I hate about Star Trek:

10. Music – Hang on to your hats because this might come as a shock, but music doesn’t get any better in the future. In fact they revert all the way back to classical music for their listening pleasure. Okay, maybe that wasn’t such a shock seeing the music industry as it is today?

9. Commander William T. Riker – He should wear a t-shirt like Jerry Seinfeld’s dad that says, “Number 1,” on it because that is all he’ll ever be in his life. Commander Riker is tough enough to grow a beard yet he’s just not tough enough to become captain of a ship, or to bed down a proper woman. He just can’t seem to close the deal. He was even offered an opportunity to join the “Q” to become omnipotent, omniscient, and immortal; AND HE TURNED THEM DOWN!!! I guess he thought it would be more fun to play second mate to a grumpy French guy, grow old, and die.

8. The Replicator – This is an ingenious device that can synthetically duplicate almost any object, like a guitar, a cup of tea, reading material, and on, and on. I said “almost” any object because it obviously cannot replicate a pair of eyes for poor Geordi LaForge. They can’t even replicate a device that will keep Geordi’s glasses from falling off his head rendering him blind as a bat! When he is alone with the machine, in his quarters, I’ll bet he kicks the replicator.

7. Aliens – Is it me, or is it disappointing to find out that all alien species will have two eyes, two nostrils, two ears, a mouth, two legs, walk upright, and obey logic? Except for the markings on their foreheads and ears, aliens in the future really don’t frighten me that much. And you mean to tell me that in all the space travels they never once come across a planet full of dope smoking hippie aliens? “Yo, you dudes need to chill right here for a while. We got all the intergalactic space weed you can smoke. Replicate a bong and beam on over!”

6. Too Much English Spoken – And have you noticed that all the aliens have cool names that end conveniently in “ns”? Do they ever come across a race of species that doesn’t speak some form of grammatical English? Even here on planet earth we have a group of people in Africa that speak and communicate with a series of clicks, grunts, and whistles. Heck, even in places like Florida and Texas the road signs are in Spanish. Yet in outer-space everyone seems to speak English.

5. No Mexicans – The future does not bode well for my little, brown friends south of the border. No matter how hard I look I can’t see them anywhere on the spaceship? Did the Klingons eat them? Are they back on planet earth with the “REAL” jobs? I guess Gene Roddenberry never looked at the population predictions for the future. If he did he would have created a separate spaceship full of Mexicans that went from galaxy to galaxy illegally demanding free health care and education at the expense of the American taxpayers.

4. No Greed – In the future greed has been eliminated? Ha! I’d like to live long enough to see that! As long as there are human beings breathing there will always be greed. It’s what separates us from animals, I think? Besides, if there is no greed, how does one become captain of the Starship Enterprise? By accident? Luck? I mean if there is no greed how do you choose to risk your life in a coffin floating through space when you could be at home smoking intergalactic space weed and learning to play the sitar!

3. Nothing Is Shocking – These people float through space into unknown galaxies and new dimensions and never take the time to look at something in shock and amazement. Don’t you think that just once somebody on the ship would rush over to the window and shout, “Aw shit! Look at that! That’s fucking COOL!!!” Hell, I've seen mountains hundreds of times in magazines and on movies but every time I confront one I look at it in complete awe! I’m an idiot of course.

2. No bathrooms – Have you noticed that nobody ever stops to excuse themselves to go to the restrooms? Even in England they go to the water closet!!! Wouldn’t it be nice if just once the dialogue went like this, “Captain, the Klingons are appearing off the starboard bow.” To which the Captain would reply, “Okay, can you hang on two minutes while I go squeeze one out?” We all know the Klingons have a good ten or fifteen minutes of dialogue before anything exciting starts to happen. I promise that if a Klingon vessel ever appeared off YOUR starboard bow you’d want to get to the lavatory pretty damn fast!

1. Whoopi Goldberg – This is probably the most depressing thing about the future. My bartender is going to be an out of work, black-Jewish, liberal, with a bad standup routine.

Thanks for letting me vent.

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