I haven't seen an episode of Discovery yet, and probably won't. Nothing I've read about it makes me think that I'd like it, and I'm certainly not planning to pay for access to a show that doesn't sound very appealing.
But some of the reviews are ... mystifying.
I was watching a review yesterday, and the reviewer was going over the problems with the show: unlikable main character, stupid premise, ignores previously-established Trek continuity, etc.
So far, I was thinking, "Okay, all valid reasons not to like the show." Then, from seemingly out of left field, the reviewer said that he doesn't like Discovery because it's so popular with the "Social Justice Warriors." Huh? He went on to say that he's tired of people pushing the "demonstrably false notion that Black people are systematically oppressed in this country."
Wait, seriously? Just how out-of-touch with reality do you have to be to say something like that with a straight face? As far as I can tell, the term "Social Justice Warrior" means "someone who supports the notion that it's wrong to discriminate against people based upon their race, sex, religion, etc." And someone who thinks that's a bad thing isn't someone whose opinions I'm inclined to take seriously.
So maybe I should make an effort to watch Discovery after all ...
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“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
I was watching a review yesterday, and the reviewer was going over the problems with the show: unlikable main character, stupid premise, ignores previously-established Trek continuity, etc.
Yeah, that reviewer single-handedly changed me from thinking, "Discovery doesn't sound too appealing" to "Hmm ... maybe I should check it out after all."
Probably not the reaction he was shooting for ...
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“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
Hypothesis, I wonder if we are getting fans that have become fans through references like Family Guy and the TNG movies, as there are plenty of reviewers and alleged fans that are bitching about how social justice warrior* the socialist federation utopia is in a series where they had their black captain fight 20th century racism and prejudice not once but twice.
*I especially think Family Guy and South Park fans as 'SJW' is often used by people who think caring about anything is uncool and that everyone must be a selfish asshat doing it to make themselves feel better.
My impression is that the show is based partly on previously established events concerning conflict between the Federation and the Klingons. But the details being filled in might not fit what people would've expected. I'm not a big Star Trek person, I've mostly only seen TNG, and a few movies (TNG+reboot), so I might be wrong.
I also saw a spoiler-y theory about what's really going on on the show
That the show depicts the origin, or at least early days of Section 31.
The science on the show is kinda dumb, but TBH there's little basis for complaining about it as being ridiculously soft sci-fi after you've already established various crap about the Vulcans (mind meld, katras, even the nerve pinch) and various other things in the series. Star Trek has never been hard sci-fi.
You could complain about the science on the basis of something other than realism, I suppose. And certainly given that it's a prequel it could create questions about why these discoveries were not utilized by Star Fleet in series set later in the timeline, which they may have to address later. Other complaints would really just be complaining about the story. The magic science is invented simply to enable the story they want to tell.
They'll need to do some kind of big reset to explain why the science stuff in TOS is so far behind what it is in this prequel. Also why Spock, in TOS, says there's never been any mutiny in Star Fleet, when his own half-sister while serving as first officer on a ship in this prequel, was convicted of mutiny and starting a war with the Klingons.
There's also some seemingly stupid stuff that, AFAIK, they've not bothered to explain yet such as why sections of Discovery's saucer rotate in opposite directions when it's about to jump to high speed.
Discovery has a drive system that allows it to travel faster than any other star fleet ship in any other Trek series, but no one seems at all interested in installing similar drives in any other Starfleet ships - even though everyone is relying on this one ship to win the war - that seems rather odd too.
1. the other ship that was researching the same system had a catastrophic malfunction killing most of the lifeforms onboard. The risks of the technology are established as high.
2. the drive was utilizing an alien creature which they established as newly discovered and not scientifically understood. While they could try to capture more, obviously we would assume they don't just have herds of them at the ready.
That explains the first few episodes. I haven't seen the last episode, but at any rate, they'd be on only two episodes without construction of drives in other ships given that the new method was only discovered three episodes ago. But given #1, they'd be wise to be cautious in deploying it across the fleet.
While I'm probably not going to watch this crap, it's good to know that it's well within the long-standing Star Trek tradition of making shit up that doesn't make any sense.
I was watching a review yesterday, and the reviewer was going over the problems with the show: unlikable main character, stupid premise, ignores previously-established Trek continuity, etc.
Bullshit.
Bullshit.
Not sure.
I've been enjoying it
The main character is one of the strong points of the show. She's great!
The show has plenty of problems but I think it's picking up steam and getting better week after week. (Remember Series 1 of TNG? )
One thing I don't really get is how someone can claim to be a fan of Star Trek and yet object to Discovery because the lead is an African-American female. I mean, does such a person not understand Trekat all?
Pretty-much the whole point of Star Trek is that we can -- and should -- outgrow such petty bigotry.
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“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
In the latest episode, the character Mudd carries out an elaborate, and nearly successful, attempt to capture the Discovery and sell it to the enemy. His plan is eventually thwarted and his "punishment" is for him to be handed over to his girlfriend who promises to keep him out of future trouble.
I haven't seen an episode of Discovery yet, and probably won't. Nothing I've read about it makes me think that I'd like it, and I'm certainly not planning to pay for access to a show that doesn't sound very appealing.
But some of the reviews are ... mystifying.
It comes back to your earlier post about "conservative Star Trek fans". Discovery has women and minorities in more than just background roles - it even passes the Bechdel Test, for god's sake - and some take that to mean pandering.
I can't imagine the screeching they must have made during Voyager...
One thing I don't really get is how someone can claim to be a fan of Star Trek and yet object to Discovery because the lead is an African-American female.
Racism is a hell of a drug.
You are talking about (what I assume are) the same people who were upset that an African-American girl was cast to play a character described in the book as having "dark brown skin" in The Hunger Games.
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I mean, does such a person not understand Trekat all?
Agreed.
The thing is, this discussion isn't new to many fans so the sudden outrage seems strange. Star Trek has had their racist and sexist episodes and themes, as well as anti-racist and sexist episodes and themes. Often pretty blatant ones on both sides. Sexism played a role behind the scenes, as well as fighting sexism and racism. In some ways the casting of Avery Brooks as Sisko was atonement for earlier sins (Brooks being proudly African American; Sisko's collection of African artifacts was Brooks own). Thinking about and dealing with social issues like this shouldn't be new to any fan of TOS, TNG, DS9, VOY. Like are these the fans that watched TNG's Code of Honor and found nothing wrong with it? Because otherwise I'm not sure they've actually paid attention to anything beyond the dun-buggy ridding, motorcycle jumping movies.
Given some of the word choices by the discovery captain I would be surprised if they weren't section 31. Some of the ideals and even phrases mirror Sloan so well that I assume it's on purpose.
So there's a bunch of things I like about this, to the point that I would consider this the true "Abrams style" version of Trek. But that may because I haven't watched a motorcross race set to rock yet. (Yes I won't let that sequence of kick ass motorcross that has nothing to do with Star Trek go!)
LOL! Did they really name the space fungus scientist Paul Stamets? For those not in the know Paul Stamets is a world renowned fungus expert and psychedelic mushroom stoner child.
In the star trek universe (ignoring threshold) there is some precedence for a blink drive, or instant gateway to other places. I do wonder if they will eventually get to the Iconian gateway technology as it's the only well know variant of transport anywhere you want in their universe.
Also, while the reading is still annoying (generally I like my films all subtitle or not subtitle) the inbetween doesn't work well for my brain. The Klingons have grown on me, or at least the klingon main characters have. I could see worf having blood wine fueled religious debates with the albino.
For those interested in some of the more behind the scenes of VOY, TNG and DS9, a youtube channel has been uploading snippets from this year conventions that have been amusing.
I'm not sure how caught up I am on this, or even remember where I left off (I'm watching it through "alternative" means, because fuck you, CBS, you have already gotten PLENTY of my money), but here are some things so far, in no particular order.
I'm not putting spoiler tags because this is all old news by now, so tread carefully if you haven't seen it.
I think having the "main character" be somebody other than the captain (and in fact someone with no rank at all) is a bold departure from the Trek formula. Same with the choice not to introduce the titular ship, the real "main character" now that I think about it, until the third episode. I have no strong opinion one way or the other about that, but I felt it was worth a mention.
During the first 2 episodes, the prologue as it were, I was thrilled to see 2 women of color at the top of the chain of command. It was hard to miss that the ship was not called Discovery, though, so I knew the ship (and probably her captain) was not long for this world. Still, I thought our protagonist, Michael, would get command of Discovery, based on aforementioned Trek formula. Super disappointed that it's not just a white dude, it's a hostile, entitled, untrustworthy white dude with anger issues. Because the world needs more of that. Also, way to kill off the lady security chief like 3-4 episodes in.
People have called this series grittier or darker than previous iterations, but I think in general the Federation at war has been consistently gritty since the beginning, so I'm not really on board with that analysis. Again, no strong opinion about whether it will be good for the show.
I am also tired of reading subtitles. And I feel like the Klingon language sounds weird and different now. Lots more throat stuff at the end of every word than is strictly necessary. Then again, maybe that's just a function of hearing a lot more Klingon spoken and not having them switch to English after a few lines.
It took me way to long to figure out what the "Disco" t-shirts meant, and in fact I never figured it out, I read it on AV Club.
I love Rainn Wilson as Harry Mudd, and I love time-loop episodes in general, so that was win, even the stupid romance subplot and the silly ending. The romance subplot reminds me a little of the relationship between Worf and Deanna Troi. He saw in a different timeline that they were together and it was working, and that's why he decided to pursue her. I don't know, I just feel like there's a bit of short-circuiting the relationship. We don't have to do the work because alternate versions of ourselves already did it.
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Originally Posted by Ari
LOL! Did they really name the space fungus scientist Paul Stamets? For those not in the know Paul Stamets is a world renowned fungus expert and psychedelic mushroom stoner child.
I know, right?!
I'm sure there's more to say, but I'm woogy from lunch, so ...
It's also soooo slow! Looking up fans/nerds who've learned the language it seems like Discovery got it pretty right, almost as if it was developed to sound cool when shouting one or two commands on a bridge in battle or something.
It did make for a rather cool appearance of the universal translator, which I hope marks a turning point for how they deal with the language. It reminds me of behind the scenes SG1 where they mention we are to assume that in the non-compressed-story-version Daniel is translating dialects and other badass language sciencing but they quickly decided that actually showing this would be extremely boring, thus all aliens speak english so they can skip to the good parts and explosions.
That being said, I still give it a 'good try' since I have a soft spot for language barriers and how to cross them in sci-fi.
I posted this earlier, but I think the slowness is partly because the language is difficult to pronounce (intentionally) and maybe partly intentional to make it seem more alien.
It would require more work on the part of the actors to be able to pronounce it quickly and still pronounce it correctly.
I posted this earlier, but if it sounded like this, it would sound pretty much like a human language: