The VHS Corner: Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Collector's Edition "Encounter at Farpoint" (1990/1991)

 Hey everyone! How were your weekends? Mine was good. I was out with Brad on Friday at a flea market and I bought a ton of VHS tapes while I was out, including the one I'm here to talk about today. If you read the title of this post you know which one it is, but, I'm also revamping the VHS Corner to be about the tapes that I currently own. I'll still talk about the ones I used to own from time to time, but it's obviously easier to talk about the ones I own than ones I don't. And that includes the digitized Teddy Ruxpin tapes I have, as well as others I think of. Today though I'm talking about a very special tape. It's the pilot episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, "Encounter at Farpoint" from the Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Collector's Edition series that came out between 1991 and 1996, though the packaging is dated 1990. So let's get into it.

This tape is the first Star Trek thing that I ever owned on VHS when I was a kid. My grandmother got it for me through the Columbia House Video mail-in offer program. This is how I remember watching "Encounter at Farpoint" for the first time since I was nine months old when the episode originally aired back in 1987, and Nana hadn't picked up the Paramount Home Video retail release yet, which we'd kept at her and Grandpa's house. Of course, like with the rest of our VHS tapes, my parents got rid of this one about ten to thirteen years ago. So you can imagine how shocked and thrilled I was when I came across this tape while I was out with Brad on Friday. They had three rows of these tapes, but I only picked up this one, because it's the one that means the most to me.

Naturally, as soon as I got home and got my new acquisitions unpacked and put away, I put this tape on and as the Columbia House Video score played and the logo came on the screen, I was filled with nostalgia for watching this tape when I was a kid. Sometimes on an endless loop, depending on how many times my mom let me watch it. One thing I noticed, particularly in comparison to the episode on the season 1 DVD boxset is that the black screen after the title sequence is shorter on the VHS tapes than it is on the DVD. I don't actually know why that is but I do have a theory. I think that on the VHS it's just the single fade to black and then fade into the episode, but on all of the DVDs the episode appears on, and most likely the Blu-rays too, they include a separate fade in almost as if it was the broadcast version, where there'd have been a commercial break between the title sequence and the start of the episode. Because the shorter black screen is also on the Paramount Home Video retail VHS release. But, like I said, it's just a theory as I haven't been able to find any information on this. It's just something I first noticed when I first watched the episode on the Star Trek: Fan Collective - Q DVD set about fifteen years ago, while I was in college, and then I noticed it again when I got the season 1 DVD set back in 2009 or 2010.

The packaging is a bit misleading. Like all of the Columbia House Video TV show VHS releases, the TNG tapes all have the same packaging, even if the episodes on the tape are from other seasons. So the front cover with the season 1 looks for all the characters on the front is fine for the season 1 episodes, but is misleading for the rest of the seasons. Especially since Tasha Yar is killed off at the end of the first season, Doctor Pulaski replaced Doctor Crusher for a season in season 2, and Wesley Crusher leaves the show partway through the fourth season. Not to mention Worf's hair gets longer as the show goes on, both he and Geordi La Forge get gold uniforms when they moved from the Command Division to the Operations Division, Riker gets a beard, they all get new uniforms, and Troi gets a new look almost every season. Same with the back cover, which shows Picard and Riker from season 1, and Data (or is it Lore?) in the Operations Divison Engineer's coverall uniform rather than his standard duty uniform, and screenshots from "Lonely Among Us" (the main cast on the Bridge), and "Hide & Q" (Geordi hiding behind a boulder on an alien planet). That's how the packaging looks for all seven seasons of the show. At least the packaging for the Original Series Collector's Edition releases have screen shots from whatever episodes are actually on the tapes. I've never seen these releases for DS9 or Voyager in person, but from what I've seen of the packaging on EBay, they also include the corresponding screenshots with whatever episodes are on the tapes. So I don't get why the TNG line didn't have that. Don't get me wrong, I love the cover art for this tape, afterall it's nostalgic, but, they could've done a better job with the packaging after season 1.

What's interesting about this release is that, according to Memory Alpha, the original version of the tape had the episode split up into two parts, the way it's aired on TV since it first re-aired following the premiere. If I remember correctly, the episode was cut right after Q appears on the viewscreen and tells Picard that he and the crew have 24 hours to solve the mystery of Farpoint Station or they'll fail the test and be sentenced to death, or "summary judgement" as Q put it. Anyway, Gene Roddenberry himself requested that Columbia House Video re-released the tape with the episode in its original 92 minute (2 hours with commercials) version, and the two part version was taken out of circulation. Any time I've come across this tape, between other people showing it off online, and my own copies, including the one I got on Friday, it's been the original 1987 premiere version rather than the rerun version, though both on the spine and on the back of the cassette box, it lists the episode as "Encounter at Farpoint Part I" and "Encounter at Farpoint Part II". But that's probably because they didn't have time to change the labels on the box. It might also explain why the packaging copyright is dated 1990 rather than 1991, when the tape is shown to have been released. 

Of course, "Encounter at Farpoint" isn't a great episode, but it's one I enjoy alot. I really like the slower paces of the pilot episodes for TNG, DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise, because it gave me, as a member of the audience, time to get to know these new characters a little bit before seeing them in action. Particularly in TNG, since the cast had to live up to Shatner, Nimoy, and the others from TOS, and DS9, where the characters are more nuanced. This episode also shows us who Picard is from the moment the Q energy barrier appears until the very end where he's figuring out WHY the alien "ship" was attacking the Bandi city on Deneb IV, but was careful not to hit Farpoint Station.

Unfortunately Tasha Yar, Worf, Geordi La Forge, and Doctor Crusher don't have a whole lot to do in this episode. Worf is understandable since he was a last minute addition to the episode, as his character wasn't in Roddenberry's original concept for the show. Which is hard to believe since Worf is such a beloved character now. The rest though, it really comes down to Tasha just not being given anything to do in the whole season up to the episode, "Skin of Evil", where she was killed off. La Forge and Crusher are a puzzle though. I mean, sure they were introduced much later in the episode, but so was Riker, and Riker does alot in this episode. He is the First Officer afterall, but, I guess it was a chance for the writers to establish that Picard and Crusher have a history together, though we won't find out until later in season 1 that Crusher's late husband, Jack, was Picard's closest friend, and he was there when Jack and Beverly met. 

I'm always surprised at how sinister Q is in this episode. After this, he becomes much more of a comedic character, particularly once we get into the later seasons of TNG, as well as the episodes of Voyager he appears in. But here he's downright villainous, which is kind of what he became again in season 2 of Star Trek: Picard. John De Lancie played Q so well in all of his appearances, but he does extremely well in this episode, where he's going toe to toe with Picard for the first time. Especially in the courtroom scene. Which is actually a pretty intense scene. I also find it interesting that in subsequent episodes, Picard keeps claiming that Q promised never to appear again when he disappeared at the end of this episode. Except, he didn't. He told Picard that he "will not promise never to appear again". So why does Picard keep insisting well into the third season that Q promised to stop bothering the crew after Farpoint?

One of my favourite scenes in this episode is where Data and McCoy walk through the ship. While TOS is not my favourite Star Trek series, McCoy is one of my favourite characters, so to see him essentially passing the torch from his crew to Picard's, instead of someone like Kirk or Spock doing it, is pretty great. I also really like the first exchange between Riker and Data. Just Data in general is great in this episode.

Overall, I'm really happy to have this tape back in my collection. I mean it's one thing to watch the episode on DVD, but to pop the tape into the VCR and watch "Encounter at Farpoint" the way I originally watched it when I was a kid is a different experience altogether. Again, I was so surprised to see this tape at all on Friday, since I haven't seen any Star Trek VHS tapes, outside of the movies, at any thrift store, convention, second hand market, or flea market in the four years since I started collecting VHS tapes again. So of course I wasn't going to pass up an opportunity to own this tape again after so many years. 

Alright my friends that's going to be it for me for today. After this week, The VHS Corner will be posted on Tuesdays since that's when VHS tapes, particularly for movies, were released, and it's also when DVDs and Blu-rays are released. I just happened to do a rewatch of this tape this morning and decided to talk about it today. I'll be back on Wednesday for my review of the season premiere of Superman & Lois season 3, which airs tomorrow night. I'm really excited for it since it is one of my favourite modern shows. So until then have a great evening and I will talk to you all later. Take care.