Insurrection is like Final Fantasy 8. It had two issues: it was a more nuanced personal adult story and it came directly after First Contact or FF7. In my childhood I was less impressed by insurrection, but as I grew up it became much more something that I appreciate it. Not sure what it is maybe achieving some kind of emotional maturity or epiphany and looking forward and looking backward, because that’s what insurrection seems to be about.
While I don’t agree with your general assessment I don’t think that there is any reason to really argue or go over the top on the particulars. I do think that first Contact is probably the best Star Trek we have and they always be so. There’s definitely a strong separation between the two subsets.
I’m currently watching '90s Trek with my SO, and weaving the movies in has been an absolute delight. Watching first Contact after starting season 3 of deep space nine, watching the undiscovered country part of the way into watching Voyager, watching insurrection towards the beginning of the Dominion war, it really just feels so natural.
Funny you bring up Final Fantasy, because I’m in the process of playing all the classic entries (I have the pixel remasters and 7-9 on the Switch), and I didn’t know 8 was considered that weak. I guess I’ll find out once i get to it.
But part of the problem with Insurrection was that it wasn’t ambitious enough compared to the “bad” TOS movies.
TMP is spacious and filled with great visuals; it isn’t a plot that would work as an episode.
The Search for Spock is the middle of a great trilogy and sets up a personal grudge for Kirk that pays off in Undiscovered Country. The movie pushed characters along; the closest in Insurrection is the eventual marriage of Riker and Troi but it doesn’t play out in the movies.
The Final Frontier has Kirk yell “What does God need with a starship”.
I just realized it was written by Michael Piller, the guy who saved TNG and created DS9. So kinda weird the one Trek movie he wrote was so bland and forgettable. And it was directed by Jonathon Frakes, who is a great director IMO so even more bizarre.
He wrote a book about making it. The section on studio interference implies that it was all egregious, but it lists Paramount trying to fix most of the problems that were still in the final film.
I don’t know I think the motion picture is exactly what an episode of Voyager feels like. A strange anomaly shows up they can’t do anything about it and all over it and figure it out the end.
I think that saying insurrection is not ambitious enough sort of is exactly my point about appreciating it more now that I’ve gotten older. It wasn’t a phasers first story it wasn’t a horror story it was a story of personal reflection and juxtaposition of one’s own values. And you cannot discount the ‘how many people’ exchange. Peak Picard just like line drawn here. And I think the biggest thing for me is that until the Trek resurgence I always assumed that Picard would retire and go live with the Baku.