Wired's Underwire blog recently got the chance to talk with Ronald D. Moore about his experience on Star Trek: The Next Generation. They cover the full gambit of Ron's time on TNG and it's a fantastic interview that's sure-to-please any TNG or Ron D. Moore fan. We grabbed a quick excerpt of our favorite part of the article, where Ron describes one of his first encounters with Gene. You can check it out below. Be sure to read the full article here.

Wired: I remember that it felt like a literal passing of the torch, as Gene Roddenberry passed a couple years after The Next Generation finally found its rhythm and place.

Moore: I was there when he was still on the show, and even worked with him on a couple of episodes. He didn’t pass away until, I think, the fifth season. When I came in during the middle of the third season, he was still coming into the office every day, throwing out scripts, insisting on changes and being the boss. Gene was the great bird, and we all respected that, but his health declined in subsequent years.

I only had one real story meeting with him, on the Season 4 episode “Family,” which he didn’t like at all. In fact, he wanted to can it. We were in a meeting in Gene’s office with Rick Berman and Michael Piller, and he basically felt that in the 24th century, the quarreling Picard brothers would not have this kind of conflict. He thought it meant they had bad parents, and that humanity in the 24th century was just better than that. He thought it said something wrong about Earth and its people, and that Picard’s family wouldn’t stand for petty bickering. He just didn’t buy the concept.

We all argued about it, and he was pretty adamant. I was pretty shell-shocked when we all walked out of the room, thinking, “OK, now what?” But Rick and Michael just kind of looked at each other in the hallway, as something passed between them, and then told me to just go write my script and they’d take care of it. Which is what happened. I have no idea what they did! [Laughs]

(Source: Wored)