My wife and I are watching through TNG, on S3 now, and I kinda like Wesley.
My wife and I are watching through TNG, on S3 now, and I kinda like Wesley.
What's the opinion on his character these days? I know he has a reputation of being very disliked.
I think my problem with wesley is that he got such a preferential seat on the bridge of a massive ship that probably countless other people had worked their whole careers to get on. It feels unfair to all those people to put a kid on the bridge instead of an adult in the middle of their career.
Wesley as a character is fine! I know Whil Wheaton had a weird interaction with the fediverse and in my hazy memory of it I don't really blame people's reactions, but in his ready room show for star trek he honestly has been great. He seems like he really loves star trek.
The one thing is, "shut up wesley!" became an internet meme, and understandably I don't think Wheaton finds that meme that funny after a couple of decades of hearing it. When the kneejerk reaction fans greet you with is to tell your character to shut up... when your character wasn't a villain... but just kind of an awkward kid who really was never characterized as anything other than someone who just wanted people to like him... it just feels like punching down for no reason.
It feels unfair to all those people to put a kid on the bridge instead of an adult in the middle of their career.
It’s partially a testament to what a prodigy he’s supposed to be, but it’s also an artifact of Picard’s friendship with his mother and late father, and a soft character progression for both of them because up to that point no children were allowed on the bridge with him at all
Trek fans in that era got hung up on some weird stuff for sure. I knew several people who hated Neelix for basically the entire Voyager run mainly because of that one early episode where he acted jealously even though he got over it by the end of the episode lol
He definitely improves as the series goes on. I think most of the hate comes from Season 1 where he's a genius kid who knows more than all the senior staff of the flagship. He gets a lot better when his stories aren't just him whining about how no one recognizes how much of a genius he is.
We did skip a lot of Season 1, so maybe that helped my perception of him.
I like him, never understood the hate.
I agree, I really like Wesley. And not only because Wil Wheaton seems like a really lovely person.
@Janin @Takeshidude me too!! I figured it was subconscious jealousy. He was living the life we all wanted.
I kinda feel like Wes was the enlightened 24th century child who is validated, supported, and taken seriously by people who want him to succeed.
Except for when the writers just have the rest of the bridge crew be mean to him ("shut up, Wesley"). He makes a really good point in "Datalore" (S01E13) when telling Picard that if he was any other officer and not a teenager, his concerns about Lore impersonating Data would have been taken seriously.
He's alright. No love, but no hate either. What bothered me most was the 'Leave it to Beaver' presentation in the early years.
I never had a problem with Wesley, and the actor (Wil Wheaton) gained more of my respect after I heard about the emotional abuse he was dealing with at home while the show was being made. To go through that and still put on a good performance is to be commended imo.
He wasn't my favorite character, but I always liked Wesley. He was just a brilliant but awkward kid. They handled his character poorly early on, but finally developed his character over time, and developed the other characters more (to a point where they would interact with him), which helped. At first, the other main characters were so prejudiced against him for his youth that they couldn't accept that he really was a super genius who really did have valuable input.
At first, it was like if Einstein happened to be on your star-ship at age 14, and you just told him to shut up all the time. Always made me cringe, and really showed a social prejudice/flaw that still exists in the TNG era oh-so-enlightened Federation culture: Ageism.
You have to pick one to be your roommate, Wesley or Kes. Which do you pick?
If you don't know Kes (as this is a different show) please come back to this question later in your life.
Wesley. Kes is boring
Wesley, any day. He won't eavesdrop on my thoughts, he can help with my homework easily, and he is a genius who invents cool things and sees things in groundbreaking ways that I might learn from.