For all you sci-fi fans: Doctor Who or Star Trek?

I randomly wanted to start a new series today, and since I'm all action-ed out right now, I decided to revisit my love of sci-fi (besides Star Wars and Mass Effect). Both of these series are recommendations from friends, but I'm not sure which I want to jump into.

For reference, I'd be starting with the original series for Trek and the 2005 quasi-reboot for Who.

So which franchise do you think is more worth watching?

Star Trek for me.

Never could get into Dr. Who. And I've tried a bunch since the 80's.

I like both but Star Trek wins for me.

Its a weird comparison because, despite both falling under the banner of scifi, the shows couldnt br more different.

For what its worth the Doctor Who run from 2005 to 2010 was pretty consistently excellent, where as I'm sure most people would recommend you cherry pick episodes of the original run of star trek.

Trek, although I fully accept that it is mostly due to which side of the Atlantic I'm on.

I was never able to get into Star Trek myself, despite part of me always kinda wanting to, but I quite like the recent run of Doctor Who.

They are very very different shows though, so this really comes down to a matter of personal preference and not a statement on quality, or lack there-of.

Honestly, you should probably give both a try and see which is more your style. I can't give any advice on Star Trek, but I'd watch at least up to like episode 6 of the "new" Doctor Who to see if its your thing. (Even though the next few seasons with David Tennant are generally much better.)

It depends on what you're looking for in sci-fi. I never got into Star Trek.

That said, and despite my avatar, if you're looking for "pure" sci-fi, I think I'd stay away from Doctor Who. It's more an... adventure show with sci-fi elements. And rubber monster suits.

Take a holodeck episode of TNG. Make a series where Piccard takes a random red shirt or two to the holodeck for a season and at the end of the season, that redshirt dies. In one out of maybe ten episodes, Piccard has a ten minute scene where he's doing something star shippy. Then, Piccard trips on a rock, hits his head, dies, and... cliffhanger, and a year and a half later, the show continues but Piccard has been replaced by Janeway cept for the episode where Janeway travels back in time to help Piccard because fan service.

Expect to be yanked around from ancient Stone Hedge, 1800's France, modern day Arizona, 1920's New York (LAAzLooowh), to future New New New New New... New New New York, to the end of the universe and the end of time.

If you do start up Doctor Who and find yourself wanting to fall off the wagon during the first season, at least watch "Blink". It's somewhere in the second season of the reboot. They also did a quasi-re-reboot with the 11th Doctor in 2010. It was meant to be a new, fresh starting point.

I'd maybe watch a few of both and see how you feel, they're very different.

In the end I'd do both though! Love both series.

Both. Because as others have already said, they aren't really comparable. Yes, both Sci-Fi, but not the same type of sci-fi. In a video game sense it would be like comparing an action rpg with a strategy rpg. Wouldn't make much sense. Both are rpgs, but also very different.

Star trek is what most would considered grounded. Its not very out there. Most things are plausible in the realm of actual science and science theory. Its also more about ideals and how people should live their lives. Lots of politics. Its like fables wrapped in sci-fi. Not as many season long story archs in the early years. Lots of single episode stories. Tries to be very logical at all times, and does the tv show trope of over explaining things to the viewer a lot of the time.

Doctor Who is more whimsical. The fantastical leaps in belief. While also about morals and what have you, its also more ham-fisty and more emotional overall in its story archs. Its also more TV drama typical. You have urgency in every episode and a mystery. More season long stories, while still having lot of what appear at first to be single episode stories. Massive amounts of call backs through the series.

I personally love both. They bring different things. I'd recommend picking one and see how it goes. If you don't like it, switch to the other. Or if you do like it and watch it, then watch the other.

Star Trek, I tried watching Doctor Who and never saw the appeal but I'd say Fringe, Farscape, BSG, and a few other sci-fi shows are better than them both.

@zelyre: I believe "Blink" is in the 3rd season (David Tennant's second season) due to his companion at the time. But yes, "Blink" is a real good episode of TV. And a solid standalone one too, so it would be easy to skip to if you were so inclined. Actually, now that you mention it, I'm pretty sure that's the exact episode I used to get my brother into the series.

@deathstriker: Man, Fringe is such a good show. I should re-watch that. BSG is also pretty good.

If you like serious scifi then star trek, if you like a bit of humour and often more fantasy scifi then doctor who. I am a fan of both.

I would also recommend farscape and battlestar Galactica reboot if you haven't watched them already. With farscape you have to buy or find a way to watch the mini series to get the ending so be aware of that as the ownership is with two different parties.

I like Doctor Who, especially Delia Derbyshire's music. But even at its best it's kinda just a goofy fun sci-fi show with monsters of the week and deus ex machinas all over the place.

Star Trek at its best is something really special and visionary for me. On the monster of the week level there are a lot of comparisons to be made, but defeating those monsters are rarely the point of the episode, even those times when they inverse the tachyon emitter flows as their equivalent of a timey wimey deus ex machina, Star Trek feels like it's centered more on the cause and the process of reaching a solution (or ending up discussing their place in the universe).

@nicksmi56: Star Trek, but if you bounce off The Original Series you should give The Next Generation the old college try before writing the franchise off. TOS is really '60s television, and while that's not inherently a bad thing, it's definitely not going to appeal to everyone. Personally my favorite Trek shows are the Kirk and Picard-era movies, but I realize they rely a lot on the characterization from their respective tv series. The general fan consensus is that TOS gets worse the later you get into the show, whereas TNG is considered to be "just getting good" around season 3 when Wesley finally leaves the spotlight (and Riker grows the beard).

Dad (also a diehard trekkie) really liked the old Dr Who, and he got into the reboot for a time, but fell off on it after awhile. I personally could never get into it. It wasn't the dry British humor, but rather the zany approach to the "science" part of the scifi.

I never got into Dr Who. I have watch the first season on the original show two years ago, but while growing up I caught a few episodes of the 1970s Tom Baker Dr Who. I caught a few eps of David Tennant too, but it never grabbed me.

I think the issue really came down to watching Boston PBS for Monty Python and Masterpiece Theater instead of Dr. Who. There is only so much you can see so that is what I choose. I have probably see more Red Dwarf and Blake 7 than Dr Who.

I have a healthy respect for Star Trek, I've watched sporadic original cast films and TNG epsiodes, I've seen a couple of Voyager episodes and I've seen the recent movies except Star Trek Beyond which I probably won't see?

But I'm a Whovian (hey I didn't choose the fandom name okay?) for life, specifically when it relaunched with Christopher Eccelson as the 9th Doctor onwards. I can't wait for this year's Doctor Who Christmas Day special.

I wasn't able to get into either the 2005 reboot of Dr. Who or TOS. I grew up on TNG (Picard is my TV Dad) and while I think the TOS movies can be good (Wrath of Khan and Undiscovered Country) I just can not stomach the TOS TV episodes. I should try skipping into the second season of Dr. Who and start from the David Tennant era.

I've been a fan of both shows. I had watched the original Star Trek on reruns in the 70's then jumped on Doctor Who when it was shown on our PBS station during the 80's. Then Doctor Who went off the air in 1989, so I jumped on to ST:TNG. Then ST:DS9 and Voyager. The Doctor Who movie came out in 1996 which I got me interested in the show again. But that series wasn't picked up. So, I jumped back into Star Trek with Enterprise in the early 2000's. I enjoyed that but it was cancelled in 2005. Well what do you know! Doctor Who was brought back and rebooted in 2005 and is still on today. All while there hasn't been any Star Trek on TV at all.

I have always loved Doctor Who. The first 26 seasons are considered the 'classic' run and began in 1963. Those first six series are in black and white and demonstrate the growing pains of TV, Sci-Fi and the show in general in the early years. It grew with the times though. New Doctors, new methods of filming, 60's fashion, 70's fashion, CSO overlays, etc.... Then the 80's came and definitely showed the 80's cheese. All of these early stories may be lacking in the production values but were quite acceptable for the time.

Star Trek is indeed a great show but I felt it was quite restricted in what they could do or where they could go. The Trek stories were harder Sci-Fi then Who but Who was often a lot crazier and outlandish. Doctor Who often changed 'companions' every year or two and the 'Doctor' every few years. They could travel in time, space and pretty much have an open canvas on what and where they could go. This resulted in really crazy stories sometimes.

I like Star Trek and glad it's back on the 'air' but wasn't really the reboot I was looking for. The new series of Doctor Who next year has a new female Doctor (the Doctor can regenerate after death----keeps things fresh) and always look forward to what new villain, monster, planet or time era the crew will travel to. So, I would say start with Doctor Who 'Rose' from the 2005 reboot and go from there. Another good jumping on point is the 11th Doctor's first episode 'The Eleventh Hour' from 2010. If you like those then venture back to the beginning and watch the very first episode from Nov 23 1963 'An Unearthly Child' which is really great.

Both are great but Star Trek has overall probably been more consistent. I love classic Who, but there's some real clunkers in there. And NuWho kinda went off the rails when Moffat took over as the show runner, the plots haven't been interesting at all to me in a number of years. Hopefully the new Doctor and writing team can breathe some new life into the show.

On the Trek side, I haven't seen all of Voyager or Enterprise but the quality seems like it is overall higher across all the different shows. DS9 remains one of my favorite TV series of all time, despite it taking a couple seasons to build up steam. Also I started watching Trek at a younger age, so it's been a part of my life for a very long time. Going back and watching TOS is rough though, a lot of those episodes just don't hold up AT ALL. Especially that third season.

Classic Who blows classic Trek out of the water, but taking all the different series together the choice has to be Trek for me.

Definitely Star Trek. I tried watching the Matt Smith Doctor Who. I watched the first season of it and it was OK but I didn't get super into it and never continued.

I haven't seen much Doctor Who but what I have seen doesn't touch Star Trek: TNG for me.

I'd say Star Trek easy, but I'm probably not the fairest judge since I've seen literally every episode of every Star Trek series and not much of classic Who.

Take them with a grain of salt, but Max Temkin's Next Generation and DS9 guides are fun to peruse.