I bailed after season 1 as well. It seemed that they did not have any resolutions to their stories. They'd get caught by something which would let them go at the end. Often "Q" did it to teach them a lesson. I had really looked forward to a new Star Trek show and was sorry it did not pan out. A couple of years later, an old friend asked me if I was watching Star Trek TNG. I explained why I did not. He told me he agreed, but that the show really kicked in around the third season. I started watching reruns of it and agreed with him. There were actually several good second season shows, but the third (with the season-ending "Best of Both Worlds Part 1" cliffhanger) was really good. I stuck with the show for the duration after that. Sure there were some crappy episodes along the way, and some where the left-wing Roddenberryisms were over the top; but over all it got to be really good.
I also dislike the lady who plays Janeway.
Janeway was on Star Trek Voyager (the one with the sexy Borg chick). I never watched that one.
Thanks for your explanation. I will give my thumbnail overview of my main problems with THN:
1. Wesley Crusher was Lost in Space’s Will Robinson, only Billy Mumy was more convincing. When he didn’t keep off the grass and was to suffer the death penalty on the pleasure planet with selective enforcement, Picard should have demonstrated his commitment to the Prime Directive.
2. Troi was elevated to the same level on the bridge as the Captain. She was essentially a walking mood ring (Ferengi: “ “Heh-hehhh, Captain, I believe we can make an arrangement that will benefit BOTH of us! hee-hee!” Troi: “I sense deception, Captain!”)
3. Q puts the members of the Enterprise on trial for horrific crimes, and as a good liberal, includes McCarthyism as worthy of being included in his top ten. Then he mentions barbaric Capital Punishment. Picard: “We did away with that Barbarism eons ago!” Oh really! Wasn’t Spock up for the death penalty for a Code 4 violation with the death penalty the consequence (he was helping Captain Pike). Botching basic continuity in EPISODE 1 to score cheap political points told me much. If a casual watcher as myself can pick out such an obvious contradiction, it was done on purpose.
4. The Holodeck was a cheap device to compensate for the lack of new plots (and to cut down on the number of recycled plots). As in TOS, happy coincidences put the action into settings for which Paramount had sets. I’m surprised someone in the holodeck didn’t wind up in Laverne and Shirley’s brewery.
5. Brief glimpses of skinny male members of the Enterprise briefly seen wearing mini-dresses in the background. Those belong to Janice Rand. Don’t take her clothes!
6. They go to all that trouble to have a separate flyaway deck for family members and rarely incorporate it into the story. It was mainly an excuse to have Wesley the Pest in the story. Inexcusable when we know the Enterprise’s history of near disintegration on an almost monthly basis. It is tantamount to putting your wife and children into a sidecar of a WW I motorcycle, knowing you could release it before you hit the Maginot Line.
Again, these reflections were formed after only a handful of episodes, and a college pal and I watched it with pizza and beer to give it the MST3K treatment, taking a break from another Mothra movie.