The Doctor Who vs. Star Trek scorecard puts the top two science fiction TV franchises of all time in a head-to-head competition of characters, plots and bad guys. I couldn't just take a single Star Trek series against the whole Doctor Who series - that wouldn't be a fair fight - so I lumped in every Star Trek spinoff and let two the competitors at it with a full range of resources.
Dec 25, 2001 - UPDATE!!!
Q: "Did you forget about 'Star Trek: ENTERPRISE' ('ST:E')?"
A: Nope. ST:E features some crappy easy listening music in its title sequence. That alone disqualifies it as a real Star Trek series. (The music also kept me from watching so much as a full episode, and I had thought the six episodes of Voyager I watched were the franchise's nadir.) Until Berman goes, the universe of Star Trek shall consist only of elements from the following set:
ST:TOS, ST:TNG, ST:DSN, ST:V, ST:TMP#1-7.
Questions? Comments? Complaints? Send 'em in!
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Offered Jelly Babies to computers. Killed Daleks with his hat. Saved lives with his scarf. Easily Doctor Who's most popular incarnation. |
Later became the most popular of the movie captains, his original "five-year mission" was shortened to three when the original series was cancelled. |
If you take away Kirk, you still have Spock,
Scotty, the Enterprise and any number of other things which make Star Trek fun. If
you remove the Fourth Doctor, Doctor Who or its memories never make it |
Reintroduced the Doctor as something other than a kindly old man. More like a serious Moe from the Stooges, but also extremely smart. Almost got the TARDIS working before the Time Lords captured him and executed him to become the Third Doctor. |
Drove the toughest ship in the Federation fleet, the Defiant, and introduced rapid-fire torpedo launchers to deal with invading Klingons. Spent very little time messing around in the Holosuites - the Prophets gave him enough visions. |
Sisko nearly lost this category because his series finale was so horrible, but he makes up for it in earlier episodes by going toe to toe with every nasty in the corners of the universe. The Second Doctor's recorder thing gets old after a while, but he is always the ham during Doctor reunion shows. |
Exiled on Earth to keep BBC's budget in earthly bounds, this Doctor tinkered like a mad scientist in the lab. Watching a sixty-year old man do "Venusian karate" was pretty neat too. |
A serious man was needed to be Q's foil, although Picard grew out of Roddenberry's archetypes and managed a cast with new personalities to remember. |
While waiting for soldiers from the future to come and blow up the house he was in, the Doctor entertained himself with wine and cheese. Picard merely enjoyed dressing up like a sea captain. |
A reaction by BBC executives to try to reverse the ratings drop under the fifth doctor, this psychotic speciman tried to kill his companions and distance his friends. Under his watch, Doctor Who was cancelled, temporarily, although it never really recovered. |
Captain Janeway, Starfleet Woman just isn't my cup of tea. When it was announced a woman would be the Voyager's captain, I immediately started rooting for Sigorney Weaver. Instead we got someone's grandmother. |
No matter how bad the Sixth Doctor was, I never stopped watching the show. Not so with Captain Janeway. I have seen fewer than five episodes of Voyager, and then only because I was lured by gimmicks: the first episode, the Borg and Q. |
Suffers from the common metal-creature Doctor Who affliction of not being able to climb stairs. However, does sport a laser blaster in his nose. |
Brainy and strong android who spends most of his time wanting to be human. |
In the series, Data spends a lot of time in the holodeck interacting with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle novels. In the movies we learn he must have been an Arnold Schwarzagger fan as well. An how many times can he possibly get the gift of emotion? I like K-9 because he is the one robot who stays a robot. |
The Fourth Doctor's companion - with their pet K9 they made kind of a intergalactic yuppie couple. |
Perhaps even more famous than Kirk is Spock, the
pointy-eared Vulcan who drove two |
Although the chemistry between Kirk and Spock was
good, I don't think you could call it romantic. |
Routinely handled, prepared and used high explosives. Wore an awful lot of leather and sunglasses. |
Original security chief for the Enterprise D. So popular she was allowed to come back as a Romulan. |
Tasha Yar found every man aboard the Enterprise lacking, so she went after the resident android instead. (Click here to hear what Data said when Tasha Yar asked him if he was fully functional!) |
The Doctor Who Role Playing Game has this much to say about Tegan: "Great legs" This former flight attendant now has her own fan club: TWA - Tegan Worshipers Association |
Paramount's way of attracting its core red-blooded male audience back to Voyager. The scripts say she isn't sure what to call herself, but I'm not sure anybody cares. |
While Tegan matures and questions all the death around the Doctor, the Borg Chick continues to slink around in a form-fitting bodysuit, letting the audience guess which crew member would get the first score. Apparanetly the Borg Collective was about to assign her to nursing duties before she was rescued. |
A scantily-clad savage. The Doctor spent a fair amount of time trying to civilize her in old British society, but I doubt that was what the audience wanted. |
A scantily-clad slave girl. Kirk and the crew seemed to enjoy her company but were in no hurry to free her. |
C'mon - Roddenberry was far too busy a man to give EVERYONE a name. |
The daughter of an aristocrat. Boarded the Tardis after being stricken with disease. Left after stricken with another disease. |
Starfleet forced her to trade in her miniskirt for pants after the first season. It still didn't help anyone take her seriously. |
Well, she's in all three of my favorite episodes, something no other companion or Doctor can claim. |
Almost 18-year old American. She has been filmed in a baret. Need I say more? |
Maximum lifespan is seven years, yet she is the friskiest character on Voyager for the first few years. |
There are entire sites dedicated to improving the resolution of images of Peri in various skimpy outfits. |
Android caught in a mind-control battle between the Doctor and the Master. Eventually destroyed by the Doctor. |
Not to be confused with Playdo. Living being from a race actually in charge of the same Dominion trying to wipe out the Federation. |
Odo's life and times were actually the focus of several episodes, while Kameleon was more of a pawn. Many of the cliffhangers from the Fifth Doctor's series ended with mad Kameleon about to strike the Doctor down. |
Could travel anywhere at any time by simply dematerializing and riding aboard the space-time continuum. Unfortunately, the Doctor had almost no control over where or when his old Mark 40 Tardis ended up. |
Always listed as the fastest ship in the Federation fleet. Most episodes took place on board the ship. The concept of transporters had to be manufactured before anyone could leave. |
Scottie earned his entire reputation trying to keep the Enterprise going. Every Trek movie blows at least a few shots to ogle the body of the latest and greatest spacecraft. Except for rare episodes like Castrovalva, the TARDIS is just a plot device to explain how the Doctor and his companions ended up where and when they are. |
![]() Best Episode: Castrovalva The Master sends a weak and confused Doctor towards a more permanent death by setting his Tardis coordinates to those of the Big Bang. After his companions help him escape the first peril by converting a quarter of the Tardis, including the Doctor's recovery chamber, to energy, they find themselves in an Escher-esce city which seems to fold back on itself - and is contracting. |
The invincible Borg fly straight toward Earth, but only after they capture and assimilate Picard, thereby draining his knowledge of Starfleet Tactics, and eliminate a 40-ship fleet set up as a last line of defense. Riker takes command of the Enterprise and must face "Locutus" and the Borg in battle or watch the Earth and Starfleet become the exclusive domain of the Borg. |
Best of Both Worlds was a great episode when it stands alone, but the full-length movie diminishes its impact. Also, if the Borg decimated the Federation fleet, where did all the ships for the DSN episodes come from? Castovalva added an important new wrinkle in the Doctor's personality - a perhaps permanent mental defect caused by the fall at the start of the episode. It also expands the Doctor Who universe to the Tardis corridors and redraws the Doctor character as someone who occasionally needs some help himself. |
![]() 2nd Best Episode: Terminus Perhaps forecasting the arrival of HMO's, the Tardis ends up on a derilict ship where thousands of "Lazars" afflicted with a Leper-like disease are treated with rays from a crack in the ship's power core. A large, furry dog-creature is there to assist in the treatment. |
The Enterprise is summoned to space station K-7A,
where a huckster peddles furry tribbles to anyone with a few credits. Uhura buys one and
takes it back to the Enterprise, not |
The tribbles have become a Star Trek icon in their own right. |
![]() 3rd Best Episode: Logopolis The doctor ends up on a planet where mental giants perform calculations necessary for the survival of the universe in their heads - at least until the Master starts shrinking them. |
Picard floats back and forth through time, trying to convince his first-episode, last-episode, and future retired crews to travel to an uncharted destination and risk life and limb to save Earth. |
Although AGT was better than any of the Star Trek movies which followed, you still knew the crew would live on. Logopolis marked the end of the Fourth Doctor's era and the peak of the chemistry between Adric, Tegan and Nyssa. |
![]() Worst Episode: Invasion of the Dinosaurs Dinosaurs invade London. |
Sulu goes apeshit. |
The Star Trek title at least makes you think there's a little more to it. |
![]() Best Parallel Universe Episode: Inferno In a parallel universe, a mad plan to tap the molten magma of the Earth's mantle goes horribly wrong and wipes out the entire planet in a blanket of lava. Can the Doctor stop the same experiment in his own time-line? |
In a parallel universe, the crew of the Enterprise is readying for a strike against a planet to take its mineral resources by force. Can Kirk stop the savage alternate Enterprise from carrying its reign of terror any further? |
At first glance, it's evil Spock in a goatee against facist Brigadier with an eye patch, but this isn't the evil twin category. (Otherwise Lor or Lt. Riker might get a shot!) If you have to sit down and watch the rest of the episode, Inferno wins. |
![]() Best Movie: (Forfeit) Unfortunately, none of the various Doctor Who movies are worth the celluloid they are printed on. |
The one thing which keeps casual Trekkers like me going back to the theaters: Will be be as good as II? |
"Kaaaaaahhhhnnnn!!!" |
![]() Brightest Kid: Adric Wore a gold star for mathematical excellence while saving the Tardis and its crew. |
Wore a rainbow tunic while saving the Enterprise and its crew. |
The BBC didn't just pull Adric off the show - they killed him! |
Manipulative Time Lord who enjoys trying to trap and kill the Doctor, his companions, friends and anyone else in the planet's general vacinity. |
All powerful being who enjoys dressing up in a captain's uniform and tweaking the nose of whichever captain is nearest. |
Q ends up being kind of a good guy, a tough-love protector against the ravages of the Continuum. The Master is just pure evil. |
Mutants in a hard cardy shell. Single-minded, predictable, but extremely fun to watch. |
Honorable race of warriors. Went to war with the Federation several times but eventually settled down into peace agreements. |
The Daleks were far less concerned with honor than killing people. |
Wore extremely tough armor to protect against small arms. Invaded human colonies. Killed anyone who resisted. |
Used personal shields to protect against small arms. Invaded human colonies. Assimilated everyone. |
The Cybermen were evil, but they were pretty vanilla in the Doctor Who universe, kind of wimpy Daleks who could walk. The Borg shook up the entire Federation, requiring Q to intervene in the first encounter and then inspiring the best-ever Trek episode and a fairly decent movie. |
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