Been Very Recently Watching ‘Star Trek: The Animated Series’; What Do Rest of You, Who have Watched At Least 3-Episodes, Think of The Series?

Submitted ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social⁩ to ⁨risa@startrek.website⁩

I dislike animated series, outside of animated comedy, & prefer live actors. Because of the awesome ‘Center Seat’ documentary (only thing I disliked was <I think was last 2-episodes> auction coverage, because just wealthy enough people to store away ‘Star Trek’; instead of just COOP & thus, accessible by all Museums) about ‘Star Trek’ universe’s from very beginning to the release year of the documentary, I know the only serious & mainstream award awarded (I think it was a Emmy) to any ‘Star Trek’ series has ever won, was this series for one of their episodes. I have yet to watch the Emmy winning episode, but still the stories are good to The Original ‘Twilight Zone’ already did that.
I am keep watching the series,

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lukecooperatus@lemmy.ml ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
I enjoyed it, there are a couple of very decent stories. The fact they could have more deviant species portrayed (like the cat people) is also fun.

The animation quality is horrible, and they often reused scenes very noticeably, and some of the voice actors sound like ridiculous Scooby Doo villains, but despite all of that it was a good run.

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- GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  I could not agree more with your comments.
  
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lemmy_acct_id_8647@lemmy.world ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
I think the hardest part for many, myself included, was getting over the poor animation budget. The stories are on par with a lot of TOS imo once you park your visual brain at the door. And they were able to do things in animated form they could on a TV budget. Getting to explore more aliens that didn’t just have slightly different forehead ridges is nice.

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StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
I loved TAS when I watched it as a teen when it first ran.

I was beyond the age Saturday morning cartoons, but was so happy to have more Star Trek.

I was furious that older fans campaigned against the show to the point that NBC canceled it before more than the first six episodes of the second season were in production.

It still stands as the only Star Trek show to earn a ‘Best Series’ Emmy.

I hadn’t seen TAS in many decades when we picked up the DVDs for our kids (who are now in their late teens).

Given all the CGI and generally better animation in children’s programming, I wasn’t convinced that they would like it. But they took to it right away and it was very successful as an introduction to the franchise for them — more than 35 years after it was made!

One point, the number of frames on the animation, the movement only in the mouths during speech as well as the reuse of sequences was the only way to stay in budget in the 1970s.

The art direction was top-notch nonetheless. The original drawings, including some of the gorgeous mattes for alien planets and some of the new aliens are fantastic.

(I have some images to upload but that function seems to remain offline.)

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- GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  Yes, they did win an Emmy, but I think it was for the whole, it was for just one-episode, according to ‘The Center Seat’ documentary.
  If you have not seen the documentary, then I could not recommend more that you give it a try.
  
  WOW, the younger people actually like the show’s visuals being so outdated!
  
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  - StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
    I did watch the Center Seat but your recollection is incorrect.
    
    TAS was nominated for the 1974 Outstanding Children’s Show Daytime Emmy Award and won the 1975 Outstanding Entertainment- Children’s Emmy Award.
    
    It also was nominated for Saturn Awards for the retro-release on DVD in 2007 and 2017.
    
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data1701d@startrek.website ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
Love it. Pleasurably campy, occasionally actually quite good despite its comically bad animation.

But honestly, what animation have you actually watched? Infinity Train is a solid piece of television, with season 3 being one of the best pieces of media I’ve ever experienced. I find it weird to broadly dismiss animation as a general storytelling medium; there are some things you can do with animation that just doesn’t look good in live action.

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- GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  Campy is the best way to describe it!
  
  ‘Infinity Train‘? What is it, never heard of it.
  
  “I find it weird to broadly dismiss animation as a general storytelling medium; there are some things you can do with animation that just doesn’t look good in live action.”
  
  I could not agree more with you, never completely dismissing animation, or really any way to visual aide in telling stories. Just for me, it only really works for comedies.
  
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  - data1701d@startrek.website ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
    Infinity Train is an animated sci-fi/fantasy anthology series with 4 seasons. It’s set on the eponymous vehicle that runs in a barren Mars-like environment; each car has its own self-contained, often-surreal miniature world.
    
    Each season focuses on a different person (or group of people) who has been transported to the train and their efforts to find a way off, but also usually contains some characters from the previous season. Kate Mulgrew of Star Trek: Voyager fame plays a recurring character throughout the entire series.
    
    Seasons 1 is still quite good but the most tween-oriented, while season 2 gets a bit darker but still maintains some of that focus. Season 3 is a beautiful dark tragedy. Season 4 is okay; it’s a prequel to the other seasons. It got rated TV-MA despite being much tamer than season 3; I’m guessing part of that is season 3 was nuts, but it’s also really suspicious that it got this rating when it is the one season where they vaguely hinted the protagonists were gay.
    
    Unfortunately, it got canceled and disappeared from most places for a while as part of the Warner Bros suicide for tax purposes a few years back; now, S1, S2, and S4 can be bought, but piracy is still the only way to watch season 3. Luckily, the whole series has been on Internet Archive for ages, and no copyright claims have been made against it.
    
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observantTrapezium@lemmy.ca ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
It’s pretty nice if you keep in mind that it’s a product of its time and meant for a younger audience (or at least inclusive of a younger audience).

I’d rank The Animated Series close to the bottom of Trek, but significantly above Discovery and Picard.

Lower Decks, which was an excellent animated show definitely geared toward adults, took quite a few elements from TAS. And since it’s such a short show (like 8 hours in total?) I recommend sitting through it before Lower Decks.

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- GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  Oh, I like-love younger audience programming, but I not think this series is exclusively for younger audiences. The stories are to mature, remember they did want to be on Sat. mornings, with cartoons.
  
  Like Picard, best Captain & not even close, but not about there retirement years & too many other better ‘S T’ series out there.
  
  Yet to watch Lower Desks, again animation problem, but love forever the idea of moving ‘S T’ to the lesser seen/ranked, but equally important characters. Thisvwas such a awesome story idea that should been done with real actors in real scenes & on a huge network.
  
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  - GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
    By ‘T A S’ you mean ‘The Animated Series’, right?
    
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usernamefactory@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
Between the very limited animation and run time, and the disengaged voice acting from some of the cast, the series is really best enjoyed in the form of the Alan Dean Foster novelizations.

But it is worth enjoying one way or another. There are some stinkers, but also some very strong concepts in there. Strong enough that future Trek mined from them directly, like The Motion Picture cribbing off One Of Our Planets Is Missing.

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- GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  Who is Alan Dean Foster?
  
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  - usernamefactory@lemmy.ca ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
    He adapted all the animated series stories in his Star Trek Log series back in the '70s. Also known for the novelization of the first Star Wars film among others, and credited for the story of The Motion Picture.
    
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yyyesss@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
I found I enjoyed it more when I treated it like a radio drama (or podcast), never actually looking at the bad animation 😁 but yeah, as mentioned elsewhere, I rank it way above Discovery

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- GreatWhite_Shark_EarthAndBeingsRightsPerson@piefed.social ⁨2⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  Interesting, I thought of experiencing it that way. Not sure, this visual dominate person can.
  Remind me, what the ‘Discovery’ series?
  
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