Star Trek

Bit late but I would watch the shit out of a spinoff staring the two Temporal Investigation guys from DS 9.

There's no test like that. You're still one of us even if you like the new stuff. It's not even just a matter of It'sDifferentSoItSucks, it's the way it's different. Abrams Trek is in another Universe entirely, and it steps closer to Star Wars than actual Star Trek. It's fine for what it is (it's not really worse than the other movies, but that's ALL it is right now.) but it's not close enough to the other stuff to keep die-hards interested. And Discovery . . . it hasn't earned its place yet, so to speak. It kind of started to with the last few episodes, but it's too early to see yet. Maybe next season will improve things, but we have to wait and see.

edited 16th Dec '17 2:38:10 PM by Journeyman

Again, they've had their own book series if that catches your interest. Don't know if it's any good, but it's out there.

I, like I think a lot of us, was excited about the first two episodes until the end blew up everything it seemed to be establishing. Then the next two or three were full serial slowly establishing a story I wasn't sure about. But then once the Spore Drive was fully integrated into the status quo, it got into nearly standalone episodes with a strong sense of continuity between them, which is exactly what I like best in television right now. When a head writer or someone has time to look at all the episodes assembled, tune the order they go in, and set them up in advance so you don't get episodes that begin with "Data's been so secretive these last two months!"

edited 16th Dec '17 3:33:40 PM by TParadox

They also had their own arcs in STO and were heavily involved in the Iconian War and the Temporal Cold War among other places.

They also integrated all the elements of the novel series as well as brought in who the founder was, Admiral Chekov, who created the unit after Generations to actually get a handle on the stuff like the Ribbon and basically set the foundation for the Temporal Accords (the current timeline is canon, don’t mess with anything and fix everything otherwise ust observe For Science!.) and Temporal Prime Directive in addition to kicking Temporal Liberation Front ass.

edited 17th Dec '17 7:02:05 AM by Memers

I really enjoyed the Department of Temporal Investigations novella I read.

To be fair, the Kelvin line/Abrams films do get into the more Utopic spirit at some point, especially the third one, or it felt like it.

Discovery is, by all means, not Star Trek. Nor in spirit, nor in looks, nor in style, nor in narrative. That’s not a bad thing per se, but one has to wonder why they bother. They could took the Star Trek part off and call it “Discovery”, change Federation for Republic or whatever, change Starfleet for Spacefleet or whatever, change Klingon for… well you get the idea, and would have no effect at all in the plot, and still the series would be great, with great quality and probably attract a lot of sci-fi fans and viewers including Trekkers hungry for a space opera adventure. So why bother to use Star Trek copyrighted material if they are not going to really use it for any purposes and everything original they think like the spore has to be buried to keep the status quo?

And if they are going to make it a Star Trek, fine, but why a prequel? It makes no sense if they are going to make it look that futuristic, make it a sequel a hundred years after TNG-era or something. Klingons can became enemies of the Federation in the future is that what they wanted, but then again all original concepts like the spore can be explored without problems in the continuity and hidden under the rug to avoid disrupting too much the canon. There are many baffling decisions about this show in particular.

In any case, the show started to feel a little more Star Trek-like once it abandon the Story Arc and went for the more episodic self-contain type. I notice is a common complain among sci-fi fans, for a while I thought it was just me. I mean I enjoy series with interesting arcs that keep you glued to the screens (that what I liked from Sons of Anarchy or Breaking Bad or Game of Thrones) but for some reason I like my sci-fi to have one adventure in every episode like The Orville. Is not that they can’t have arcs (Babylon Five is a good example of it, and indeed Star Trek have it too with the Dominion War arc in DS 9 as other example) but part of the charm of the sci-fi is to explore different scenarios in every episode, like reading an anthology book of Niven, Asimov and Bradbury.

edited 25th Dec '17 3:23:09 PM by Luppercus

Sci-fi is fiction, and shows like Star Trek are on the softer side of that scale. There's very little to connect it to the real world around us. Every effort to connect it to the real world so far has fallen flat as the Future History stuff falls apart. We didn't get Eugenics wars in the 90s, and as bad as things are right now, we probably won't fall into the cities for the homeless that they had in DS 9's past. I think they were called Sanctuary Cities, but that has its own meaning in the real world.

I don't get attached to the characters near as much as the toys. The tech, the economy, the worldbuilding. That's where it is for me. And that kind of thing tends to do better in an episodic, but callback filled, show. Give me small arcs and minor persistent changes, not a major season-long story arc that overplays the characters.

I felt like Michael's moral compass and the excitement Stamets has for scientific discovery made the show feel like Trek to me.

To me it seems that Discovery had a lot of good ideas, but then backpedaled on them or failed to use them properly.

Like: a show centered on one protagonist, instead of an ensemble show. That could be good. However, they don't really do that much with Michael. She got very emotional on the first episodes and helps starting a war, so she is a pariah... except that she has already understood what went wrong, and after the first three "regular" episodes (excluding the two-part pilot) everybody trusts her and she's a member of the crew in all but name. And by mid-season final she's the one doing the most crucial mission. I think it was said that the series would have been "a journey of discovery" for the protagonist (something like that), but so far what she's discovered is that Sarek is a jerk and that she shouldn't hate Klingons.

Or: a series without focus on the main crew. Good, interesting. Yet, the captain, the first officer and the chief engineer are all main characters. The doctor is not the main doctor but it is like he is (he is the one curing Sarek).

Or: a story about the problems two cultures find living together, and how we can try to work around seemingly incompatible values. Very topical. But why doing it with the Klingons, for which we know the problems will be eventually (mostly) solved? Why inventing a completely new, never spoken about, side of the (arguably) most-known alien culture in Trek?

I can go on: the spore drive is a nifty concept, but does not mesh will being a prequel. A great war... that you start and finish in half a season. A small ship... that is one-of-a-kind and fundamental in the war.

You can take the main theme as a symbol: it is quite good, but it is almost destroyed by the original theme near the end, which is just out of place. It is frustrating that the only episode which I really enjoyed while watching is the time-loop one, which is one of the episodes with most plot holes in the whole franchise.

After the first five episodes it stopped feeling like a full serial and went to just being "episodes that have been passed through a writer's room so they all fit together, foreshadow each other, and have lasting consequences". Which I like much better.

So, what complaints would everyone still have about Code of Honor if it was possible to remove the racism? Because I'm thinking about what I remember of it, and I remember bad racial stereotypes, but also Tasha actually getting to do something for once, one of the best results of a cheating death scene, and a great Geordi and Data scene.

edited 30th Dec '17 6:21:25 PM by TParadox

I used to think the episode was awesome until I came here and read the complaints. So it COULD be awesome with a more varied race.

Even years after the last time I said it, I still think they should have split tactical from security and kept Tasha on. Real life wrote that plot, and it was stupid.

Yeah, combining shipboard security and ship to hostile tactical was a bad move. And then on top of that, they put communications in the tactical department, so Tasha and then Worf spent a ridiculous amount of time just running the switchboard.

edited 31st Dec '17 9:14:54 AM by TParadox

It was obviously an attempt to cut down on cast costs.

Well it's interesting in that the original series didn't have those positions so iron clad. Spock was both first officer and science officer, while at any given time Sulu alternated between helmsman, weapons and operations. Chekov was whatever the plot demanded. All later series were a lot more strict on the roles in the Command Roster.

The original had a shoestring budget for what it was, didn't it? It would make sense for them to have a smaller on-screen crew that did more per episode.

In a military setting with enough resources, you don't get that. Everyone has one job in the military, because they need you to be the damn best you can be at doing what you do. Though I'll admit in some cases there are two jobs. Every U.S. Marine is a marksman on top of what they do, so they can jump in and fight in a pinch.

It's not really the budget, but that the original series was not the ensemble show that the later shows were. Kirk, Spock and McCoy were front and center in every episode, and even episodes that gave the supporting characters something to do tended to focus on Kirk or Spock anyway, like "Wolf in the Fold." So at any given point they would just pass on a specific role to one of the regular supporting cast instead of going through the trouble of a new character and actor.

In fact, my understanding was that most of the supporting cast were considered day players rather than actual cast members, and they actually liked it that way because they were paid more.

Well, there were a lot of smarting egos because they were told they were going to be playing roles that acted more like a real ensemble, but then they ended up mostly being there to say "aye, sir" and press buttons.

Tonight's Disco episode was fanservice at its best. Like they even got Riker to direct.

• Fuck yes, mirror universe.
• Oh wow, I never would have guessed that Tyler was Vo- Wait WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO TO CULBER I HOPE YOU FUCKING GET AGONIZER BOOTHED TO DEATH VOQLER!!111
• Captain Sylvia "Killy" Tilly. I find it amusing that the first character to say "fuck" in Star Trek has trouble being mean.
• Let's be honest: Lorca deserves that.
• LONG LIVE CAPTAIN BURNHAM! LONG LIVE THE EMPIRE!
• Thoughts on who the Emperor is? My guess is that he's Mirror!Stamets. Not that many male human characters to pick from.

• Edit: So looks like this might not be the end for Culber if Wilson Cruz isn't messing with us.

edited 7th Jan '18 6:50:14 PM by lrrose

Snapped necks aren't what they used to be in the future. Cornwell had a broken spine and was paralyzed, but they said the starbase will be able to heal her. I expect that if he gets found and treated within a few minutes, they can fix him, or at least keep him alive until they get somewhere with better medical facilities.

Sooo... Bury Your Gays at its finest?

'Chief engineer' Lorca with thick Scottish accent was hilarious.

Really hoping Culver isn't actually dead. I've been dreading him or Stamets being killed off all season and I am so, so tired of Bury Your Gays. Also, I think Tyler works better as a soldier recovering from PTSD rather than Voq-in-disguise, plus he's one of the only times I've seen Double Standard Rape: Female on Male averted with a major character.

As far as the Emperor's identity goes, there's an interesting theory floating around that it's Mirror!Georgiou, which could be interesting. I don't think they specified the Emperor is male but I could be misremembering.

Hardly anyone actually knows the Emperor well enough to describe them.

You know, for once, the Mirror Universe isn't sexy. They aren't wearing cutoff vests and hotpants, they aren't wearing leather catsuits. They're wearing more militaristic, vaguely armor-ish twists on the uniform.

I like this take. This isn't "ooh you know they're evil because they're so sexy and everyone is a Depraved Bisexual", this is "a world where it's kill or be killed is actually really freaking horrifying". This is non-romanticized Nazis in space.