Introduction

As part of my research, I analysed a piece of media relating to the subject which I researched in my Subject Research blog post. The subject that I researched was “discovery in science fiction” and the piece of media that I chose to research in this blog is the first episode of the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Star Trek: The Next Generation is the third series the Star Trek TV franchise. Airing from 1987-1994, it ran for 7 seasons. The show features captain Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the USS Enterprise spaceship as they explore outer space and encounter several hostile alien species.

Title Sequence

The series opens with an establishing shot panning through our solar system. It is accompanied by a high pitched score on string instruments. This is setting suspense for viewer as the solar system is left behind.

The shot now continues panning into deep space as the viewer hears the non-diegetic voiceover for Jean-Luc Picard’s opening monologue: “Space… The final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise. Its continuing mission, to explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life and new civilizations. To boldly go where no one has gone before.”

As the opening monologue is being delivered, the music builds slowly into a full orchestra and the Starship Enterprise enters the continuous exterior shot. The audience can now hear diegetic sound of the starship flying through space, similar to the sound of a jet engine.

As the monologue ends and the music reaches its climax, the Enterprise quickly moves past the camera, which pans to the right to follow its motion. With a loud audible boom and a white flash, the Enterprise warps off into the distance in the right of the frame, and the triumphant main theme of the series plays. In a motion graphics sequence, the words STAR TREK in blue enter from either side of the frame. “The Next Generation” appears underneath it to form the main title card.

The main credits sequence plays, accompanied by shots of the USS Enterprise flying quickly past the static camera until it warps into the distance once again, ending the title sequence.

This title sequence serves as an introduction to the show for new viewers. Building up the suspense with music and a bold, heroic sounding voiceover draws viewers into the show and once they hear the main theme, viewers who are completely new to Star Trek will associate it with Sci-Fi media they have enjoyed before – Star Wars being a main example, as Return of the Jedi released 4 years prior and the Next Generation theme song is similar to Star Wars’ main theme.

The show’s main theme sounds like a traditional military song, with a trumpet fanfare – I think this is because the USS Enterprise is a Starfleet ship, the space exploration and defence service for the United Federation of Planets. It is a ‘navy’ ship and so military fanfare introduces it to the screen for the opening titles.

Here is season one’s main title sequence:

First Scene

Another short scene plays in the interior of the Enterprise as the credits are rolling – a monologue from Jean-Luc Picard explaining that the ship’s destination is the planet Deneb IV – the furthest explored planet in the galaxy. Picard’s orders are to investigate a starbase built on the planet by its inhabitants.

Instead of a cut, the camera pans around Picard as he enters the bridge of the ship. The camera is now positioned in front of the bridge’s window at a wide shot, looking into the room at the ensemble cast of characters each at their positions on the ship’s controls. They are all wearing different coloured uniforms – black leotards with colour accents, and a pin badge of the Starfleet symbol on the left side of the chest. The red uniforms signify the commanding Officers, gold signifies the security and engineering officers and blue signifies the science and medical officers.

The colours of the uniforms also connotate to themes and emotions that the audience might associate with the characters – Red for combat, authority and war; yellow/gold for danger, prestige and influence and blue for cleanliness, wisdom and calm.

The lighting in this scene is high-key. The bridge of this ship needs to be brightly lit for the characters to be able to see the controls clearly, but the bright lighting also shows the audience that the crew of the enterprise are the good-guys, and the white colour of the lights shows that the enterprise is a neutral and controlled space for the characters to work and interact in.

With different lighting and some music, this scene could make the crew of the enterprise look evil – for example the death star’s control room and the emperor’s throne room in Star Wars are dimly lit to make the audience associate those locations with darkness and sinister power.

The camera cuts to a close up shot of Picard as he sits in his chair and talks to Data, an android second officer, about the mission. The editing is not particularly fast or slow paced here, cutting from one character to another at the pace of the conversation. Currently the protagonists are being established, and are at the beginning of their story in a zone of comfort.

The audio in this scene is in two parts – the ambient room audio and the characters’ voices.

The ambient sound is a slightly high pitched constant beeping sound – it sounds like the various machines and instruments in the room working passively, as well as fans from air conditioning. This is to further establish this location as the bridge inside of the Enterprise, which is a comfortable and neutral zone.

Jean-Luc Picard’s voice is particularly significant. The actor, Patrick Stewart has a background in theatre and Shakespeare specifically – he has a strong, commanding voice that he could give to a Shakespeare character like Othello or Macbeth. This reinforces the sense that he is in control of the situation, the ship and its crew. It also gives the character a stable and important quality.

Ideology

I chose to analyse a Star Trek series because of the emphasis placed on space exploration and the characters being confronted with unfamiliar and bizarre situations that they have to adapt to. Part of Star Trek’s appeal is the sense of adventure and I wanted to tap into creating that for my own animation. Some themes that appear in the show exist to express an ideology. The holodeck (a virtual reality device) malfunctions in some episodes of the series, causing a character to become addicted to the reality they see in the device – this shows the dangers of technology or becoming addicted to an illusion.

Genre

The Next Generation is a very conventional show in the Sci-Fi genre. It includes the typical plot structures of space travel, alternate universes and time travel and clearly has a strong Sci-Fi visual style with colourful costumes and environments and dated VFX. My animation will also be conventional in its plot structure and visuals.

Representation

In science fiction, minority groups have often been underrepresented. This Star Trek series has a diverse cast including black actors, women and other underrepresented groups in film. Star Trek has frequently made efforts to include everyone in their casts – in the show’s universe of the future, racism, genocide and other forms of prejudice and hatred have been left behind by humans, and the 20th century is seen as a time of barbarism and stupidity.

Audience

I think that the audience of Star Trek is broader than other Sci-Fi media because of its representation and diverse cast. Despite this, I still think that the main audience of Star Trek: The Next generation as well as older Star Trek shows is an early teens – adult male audience. This is because this is the general audience for Sci-Fi media at the time, and so fans of other related media would be Star Trek fans also. Similarly, I think that the audience for the animated series which came before The Next Generation could have carried over to this series when it released – people could have watched the animated series when they were younger and watched The Next Generation as an adult.

Institution

The Next Generation was released by Paramount Domestic Television in 1987, which is now Paramount Television Studios – the TV branch of Paramount Pictures.

Economical

The budget per episode for The Next Generation was 1.3 million USD, which is worth 3.4 million today. After the release of Star Wars in 1977, paramount initially decided not to make any Star Trek competitor movies as sequels to the original series, which ran from 1966 to 1969. However, they changed their minds, and made the first three out of four original Star Trek movies. 20 years after the original series, Star Trek had retained its popularity, and Paramount executives decided that it would be more profitable to start a new series with new actors than to produce the fourth Star Trek movie. The fourth Star Trek movie, The Voyage Home, was made however.

Conclusion

Researching a Sci-Fi adventure series and picking apart some scenes has helped me to think about what to include in my own animation for the project, and how I might create a sense of curiosity and adventure in the same way Star Trek does.