TNG was produced in the eighties and set centuries into the future. Given the technology, budget, and foresight available at the time, what they produced did su

TNG was produced in the eighties and set centuries into the future. Given the technology, budget, and foresight available at the time, what they produced did sufficiently convey "future spaceship" in a way that was comfortable and relatable to (then) contemporary audiences. TNG is one of the most tastefully done, IMO. The Expanse is only good because it's set in the immediate future with technology only slightly more advanced than today. But also the technology, materials, and SciFi corpus is so advanced now that it's just as easy to create an extremely convincing 2050's set as it is a 3050's set. Today's space opera is so incredibly egregious. What is the ratio of lens flares in a single modern trek movie compared to all 20th century trek? The Expanse definitely suffers from this kind of overproduction when you look closer, but because it's so close into the future we tend to overlook a lot. ST: Enterprise did this extremely well, IMO, and for the same reason as The Expanse. It's in the immediate future and built around contemporary technology. Personally I adore the horrendous passive matrix LCDs everywhere in that show. It just adds to the scrappiness of Earth's first exploration ship.