r/startrek: The Next Generation
Star Trek news and discussion. No slash fic...
Maybe a little slash fic.
New to Star Trek and wondering where to start?
Rules
1 Be constructive
All posts/comments must be thoughtful and balanced.
2 Be welcoming
It is important that everyone from newbies to OG Trekkers feel welcome, no matter their gender, sexual orientation, religion or race.
3 Be truthful
All posts/comments must be factually accurate and verifiable. We are not a place for gossip, rumors, or manipulative or misleading content.
4 Be nice
If a polite way cannot be found to phrase what it is you want to say, don't say anything at all. Insulting or disparaging remarks about any human being are expressly not allowed.
5 Spoilers
Utilize the spoiler system for any and all spoilers relating to the most recently-aired episodes, as well as previews for upcoming episodes. There is no formal spoiler protection for episodes/films after they have been available for approximately one week.
6 Keep on-topic
All submissions must be directly about the Star Trek franchise (the shows, movies, books etc.). Off-topic discussions are welcome at c/quarks.
7 Meta
Questions and concerns about moderator actions should be brought forward via DM.
Upcoming Episodes
| Date | Episode | Title |
|---|---|---|
| 11-21 | LD 5x06 | "Of Gods and Angles" |
| 11-28 | LD 5x07 | "Fully Dilated" |
| 12-05 | LD 5x08 | "Upper Decks" |
| 12-12 | LD 5x09 | "Fissue Quest" |
| 12-19 | LD 5x10 | "The New Next Generation" |
In Production
Strange New Worlds (2025)
Section 31 (2025-01-24)
Starfleet Academy (TBA)
In Development
Untitled comedy series
Wondering where to stream a series? Check here.
If you find old shows charming, start with the original series and just roll with it. The original series is iconic, and it's fun to see where it all came from.
If you want a little more substance, start with Star Trek: The Next Generation. It's peak Trek in many ways (in terms of the whole Trek philosophy and world building).
This is what I usually recommend, too. Also I ususally say don't feel bad about skipping most of TNG Seasons 1&2 if it's not hooking you right away. Algernon_Asimov had a good guide at Daystrom ranking which episodes could be more or less skippable.
Blasphemy warning…
I’d probably start with Strange New Worlds. Then go back for TNG, DS9, and Voyager.
Not blasphemy at all.
ToS isn't good. It was decent for the time, but it's not good.
TAS, see above but for kids. Think the Scooby-doo show from the 60's.
I liked Enterprise when I watched it on tv, but not a lot of people liked it.
Other than SNW the new Trek shows aren't really "core trek" either. They each have their own style which appeals to different people.
I wanted to like Discovery, but it seems to want to be a CW show about 3/4 of the time. We made it through the first two seasons and stopped.
Picard: I also wanted to like it. He's my husband's favourite captain after all. I burst out laughing when Dahj is jumping around like a superhero in the first episode That's as far as I got.
Lower Decks: Not a fan of the adult-comedy-cartoon genre.
Prodigy: I am not in the right age demographic.
So I don't want to "well ackchually" you but I was curious about your claim about TOS so I looked it up and you were wrong, it's actually really good.
Opinions will differ.
This sub has a wiki guiding you where to start. I followed it and decided to go with TNG first.
It depends entirely on your tolerance for and/or exposure to the different style of older TV shows. If you're accustomed to a slightly slower pace and a markedly lower production value, I'd recommend starting with The Next Generation or Deep Space 9 and just start binging. If the kitsch of 60s TV appeals to you, The Original Series is great, just very different in style.
Once you've got a dozen episodes under your belt, you'll know whether a given series is your bag or not. But you might not like TOS and adore DS9, and so on.
Be prepared for some real stinkers at the beginning, and scattered throughout but just know that's part of having 20+ episodes per season.
If you'd rather just catch up with the most current series, I'd say start with season 1 of Strange New Worlds. You really can't go wrong starting there.
You can start anywhere you want! I often recommend starting with Star Trek: The Next Generation, since it's aged a little better than the original series. You might prefer to jump ahead to season 2 or 3 to get to the really good stuff, but even season 1 is worth watching.
Up until Enterprise season 3 it's pretty much all episodic (or in DS9's case, mostly episodic with a subset of the episodes forming a series-long story arc), so you can pick a random episode or movie with a cool-sounding description and start there if you want. That's how I got into Trek, just picking random TNG and Voyager episodes.
Permanently Deleted
Or watch Strange New Worlds, a great modern series riffing on the old formulas. If you like it, go back and start with the earlier stuff.
Sorry for butting in but my pet peeve is when people misuse "campy". "Camp" refers to a style that is intentionally melodramatic and "cheesy", TOS is just old-fashioned in a way many find amusing, but it's not camp.
Permanently Deleted
I am very new to star trek. Started with TNG. Fell in love sometime around season 2 or 3. After finishing that, I am now enjoying Voyager. I have watched a few episodes of DS9, in the meantime, will get back to it after Voyager. Also loving Lower Decks and SNW. Fun fact, I actually watched couple of seasons of Discovery before watching TNG and found it so so. After falling in love with TNG, couldn't stand it.
If you start with the new it will be hard to go back to the old. If you are not Trekkie / nerdy person, start with voyager and go newer. If you like well written intelligent shows and don’t mind it sometimes being slower, next generation is definitely the best starting point and go forward.
I’m gonna get flamed for this but I would personally skip deep space nine. Everyone loves it but I couldn’t get into it. Requires numerous episodes to be watched to latch on potentially.
Newer shows aren’t bad, but they lose alot of what made the originals great. Strange new worlds is good. Picard is ok, way different than the other shows but good. Discovery is new age and just not that great, it’s really odd after watching all the others.
Enterprise is forgettable but worth watching.
The original series is really only for the die hards at this point.
Deep Space 9 is a different animal. It's fantastic if you like a political drama. There is less space adventure than the other series.
See that’s the thing. Political drama isn’t bad. Take Andor for example. That was a slower heavy politically infused and that show was amazing. I think it was extremely well written, not to say that ds9 is badly written, it’s not. It’s just missing something in my eyes to keep me captivated, can’t quite put my finger on it.
Liking Trek means being good at coming up with and or accepting established fan cannon explanations/excuses for why stuff happens, as often it makes infuriatingly little sense otherwise.
DS9 is the strongest of the older shows in my opinion and gives a really good grounding for the politics of the Federation and unfederated alien races involved (and for new trek shows like Disco and Lower Decks), while having enough plot and action to be interesting.
It still has a lot of bad acting and poor writing (especially in the first few seasons, ugh) and it's practically a radio play for seasons at a time though, so be warned.
I would recommend The Next Generation or Deep Space 9 first.
The Original Series is pretty campy and low-budget. I don't think Star Trek really became Star Trek (as we know it) until Roddenberry had a second crack at it, which was The Next Generation. Be warned, both of these series start out pretty rough.
The first 2 seasons of TNG is a little corny, although they have some very good episodes, like one planet they visit which is a matriarchal society, and they show the male-female gender roles reversed. In my opinion, their 1940s nostalgia episodes (played out in the holodeck) really did not age well, fortunately they stopped doing that in season 2. Dr. Polanski gets a lot of hate, but I thought she was a fine character. I think season 3 of TNG was by far the best, with some of their boldest political statements. One episode, Picard is accidentally seen as a God by a pre-industrial society, in another, Commander Data is judged by Starfleet to be a person of a race of a single individual, and is granted personhood. In yet another episode, Mr. Data creates a child for himself which Starfleet deems to be their property, and results in one of my favorite Picard quotes of all time: "Hold your ground Mr. Data. (To the admiral) Order a man to turn his child over to the state? Not while I'm captain." By season 6 and 7 they clearly start running out of ideas though.
In my opinion, Deep Space 9 was the hardest to start, but probably the best series of all I have seen. The first 17 episodes were so boring I could barely get through it. But starting with Season 1 episode 18 (titled "Duet") and every single episode after it was consistently very good. They also, I think, make many more, and much bolder, political statements than The Next Generation ever did.
The original series or next generation depending on your taste. Although be warned that TNG's first season is rough, so if you're not committed to watching everything, maybe pick a few episodes to try first.
Personally I watched through the entirety of TNG and then moved on to DS9, and I really enjoyed both shows. DS9 is also a direct follow up to TNG in a few ways so they make a good pair. I wouldn't recommend watching DS9 first though since it's so different from "normal" star trek.
Voyager, TNG, DS9 Have watched these dozens of times. TOS for the history of it. ST - The Animated Series and Lower Decks.
Why did you put them out of order? TNG -> DS9 -> Voyager
Just my preference.
Alternate suggestion to what you might be getting: if you have an antenna for your tv, check the local antenna channels. We have one that does a block of episode of each of the first 5 live action Star Treks. Pluto TV also has a Star Trek channel that alternates between the different series. Most Star Trek is serialized so you can watch episodes out of order and not be lost.
Watch Next Generation or a few episodes of OG Star Trek & then seeing Wrath of Khan movie.
Starting with Next Generation isn't a bad option I think. The beginning is rough at parts but has some really good episodes in it. The series got much better after season 2. You could follow a skip list to skip over the episode that are deemed horrible on your first watch to make it all easier. It's worth going back later to watch them though.
Deep space nine follows up an event that occured in Next Generation, so that show might be confusing till you watch NG.
Voyager is pretty much self-contained since that's a big part of the story lol. Only thing that could be confusing would be a character that's sorta important later on that is from NG. It isn't much but just something to state if stuff like that bothers you.
Enterprise is a pretty okay show I think. It's the earliest show in the timeline and mankind's first exploration. People don't like it for some reasons that are completely justified but it's never been anything to stop me from enjoying it. Might be best to watch this after others because it is different.
OG Star Trek is a fun series to watch. Really episodic so you can find some of the best episodes and try just watching those. Watch 3/4 of the best (including the one was Khan) and then watch the movie "Star Trek 2 Wrath of Khan".