The early TNG writers’ room was filled with turmoil and bad blood

As many Trekkies can tell you, Gene Roddenberry created “Star Trek: The Next Generation” out of spite. When “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” was released in 1979, it was a huge flop, taking a hackneyed sci-fi series and turning it into a massive $44 million space opera. The film was about a giant and dangerous space cloud that appeared from the universe and began to descend on Earth, its mission unknown. The film ended with humans merging with an indescribable machine intelligence beyond our understanding. The film was powerful and great, and closer in spirit to the “2001: A Space Odyssey” film released in the previous decade than to the contemporary “Star Wars” film.

But when? The Motion Picture did not make as much money as Paramount wantedRoddenberry was unceremoniously removed from any further involvement in any sequel. A new creative team took over, producing three sequels from 1982 to 1986, all of which were more successful. Roddenberry resented having control of his creations taken away from him, and decided to one-up the established figures by creating a new “Star Trek” series of his own. This time, he leans more towards the ideal themes of his original show, and most importantly retains full creative control over it. In 1986, he had gathered most of what he needed to make “Star Trek: The Next Generation,” a series set a full century after the original.

Of course, as detailed in William Shatner’s 2014 documentary Chaos on the Bridge, the first two seasons of The Next Generation were chaos behind the scenes. Roddenberry would regularly rewrite scripts without the other writers’ knowledge, and there was much debate about who should really be in charge. Roddenberry has butted heads with almost everyone and will micromanage everything into oblivion. These tense sentiments were recalled acutely by Ronald D. Moore, one of the most famous writers of “The Next Generation,” which began its third season. on A recent episode of “The Sackhoff Show” Moore said he joined Next Generation in 1988 amid a lot of animosity and “bad blood.”

Most Trekkies will also be able to tell you that the first two seasons of The Next Generation are a bit rough. As the show found its way, it produced some pretty terrible episodes backed by some pretty terrible ideas. “Code of Honor” (October 12, 1987) is often referred to as the “racist person”, while “The First Angel” (January 25, 1988) is the “sexist person”. In previous interviewsMoore talked about his start on “Star Trek” while giving a tour of the set during season two. He delivered an unsolicited script to a friend who was working on the show, which eventually led to him getting an agent and getting hired.

But he entered into a state of chaos and turmoil. He noted the constant staff turnover and the firm control that Roddenberry exercised over the series. It was a bad atmosphere, and a lot of people hated each other. He doesn’t call out anyone by name, but non-Trekkies may want to look up characters like Maurice Hurley and Leonard Mizlish, who appear to have contributed to the chaos. As Moore said:

“The show was in turmoil. The first few seasons of this show were in epic turmoil. (…) In the first two seasons especially, before I got there, there was a lot of bad blood behind the scenes. (…) Gene was still alive. Gene was firing scripts and fire writers and hiring others. And the writers were backbiting each other. There was a lot of internal turmoil and division over what the show was, and what it wasn’t. The offer. Just a lot of worry and anger thinking. People come and go.”

A lot had changed when Season 3 started. Michael Piller took over as showrunner, and several new writers were hired, including Moore. The show’s direction changed, as it began to focus on individual characters in each episode, rather than the entire group at a time.

Moore said that expediency and desperation were the workplace tenets of the “Star Trek” offices when he came on board, and that the show’s previous writers had all become jaded. He described the tone of his new workplace as follows:

“I came on board for season three, and a couple of (the writers) were veterans from the previous year. And they were sarcastic. ‘Yeah, it’s all good until it all blows up, kid.’ Well, here we go.” But we were also in this. (…) We were never more than one script ahead. We were preparing outlines and preparing rhythm sheets. (…) In the writers’ room, while writing, you just had to move fast, desperately trying to get the pages out the door.”

Moore said he had to learn on his feet, and that the tone of the workplace was always one of panic. The entire show seemed to be constantly behind schedule, and the pacing did not allow for careful thought or attention to the story. Moore realized he was only appreciated at first because everyone was desperate for more help. As he put it:

“Part of their welcoming me was essential. ‘We need a body! Can you write? Go write that scene!” And you’ll just write, hand it in, and do it again. You’ve built up this muscle memory of being able to write quickly and do it today. It has to be here tomorrow. Something is shooting. It had to be done. You can’t have writer’s block. You can’t have fear. You just put something on that page and then hand it in. And that was the atmosphere of the first season. It was a crucible…but I “I loved it.”

Moore ended up staying with the series during its seventh and final season, and even co-wrote the “Star Trek: Generations” films. And “Star Trek: First Contact.” He also worked extensively on “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” and the final two seasons of “Star Trek: Voyager.” It is clear that the chaos has finally ended.