Star Trek: Discovery

[Leo656]

Originally Posted by CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy

I thought he was becoming badass in this final season?

And remember how he just dominated being a military general in Archer Vice?

Yeah, well... Wait and See, Mr. "I Don't Like Spoilers".

God gave Cyril a big dick to compensate for the fact that otherwise he's a total loser.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

I just want to see more Barry. A whole factory of Barry. That's gonna be awesome.

[Leo656]

It was pretty good. It definitely went to places I was not expecting.

[Spike Spiegel]

I know mod presence here is practically nonexistent, but it might be nice to get on topic.

I recently started watching the first season of this and, compared to Picard, it's actually kind of good. I've tempered my expectations, like I did with Lower Decks and Short Treks, and I'm actually getting some enjoyment out of it. Burnham has a reputation for being a Mary Sue and yet

Spoiler:

she gets kicked out of Starfleet for being a mutineer in the first two episodes.

She's a failure both as an officer and as a human LARPing as a Vulcan, and that makes her interesting.

As horrible and "SJW" as this show is supposed to be, it keeps getting renewed. I think the incessant bitching online is actually generating publicity for it.

Listen to what this guy says at around the 3:48 mark and tell me it's not something to be unironically mocked.

[Andrew NDB]

She's a failure, literally starts a galactic war, yet keeps getting rewarded with accolades. Not sure what the message is there.

If the reviews are to be believed episode 3 and so on will delve more into episodic hopeful Trek as we know it. I'm skeptical. I'm over here waiting to check the number of times people are screaming, Burnham crying, and explosions going off.

[Spike Spiegel]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

I'm over here waiting to check the number of times people are screaming, Burnham crying, and explosions going off.

If it's really that bad, why pay attention to it? Hate-watching it is still watching it.

I don't have the All Access app; I found the Blu-rays at the library so I'm effectively watching these for free. I don't expect it to be like TNG/VOY/DS9/ENT any more than people should have expected TNG to be like TOS. For what it is, it's fun and

Spoiler:

Tilly is kind of hot.

[Andrew NDB]

Dumb question. Because I'm invested in Star Trek for eons and I want to see it done right again one day, obviously. They jam packed a bunch of apologies into like the final 2 episodes of STD season 2 and now they're kind of unpacking that and getting us used to their new norm. Again, so far their basic misunderstanding that the Federation and Starfleet are not two different things is more than a little bit troubling... but also, the reviews say from 3 on they try something more traditional. We'll see.

[Spike Spiegel]

Originally Posted by Andrew NDB

Dumb question. Because I'm invested in Star Trek for eons and I want to see it done right again one day, obviously.

I dunno, man. Buying a TNG video tape twenty five years ago or watching TOS re-runs in the 80s doesn't entitle you to anything. Gene Roddenberry's been dead for almost thirty years. Star Trek is nothing more to the people who own it than an IP worth a certain amount of money. All your nostalgia means to them is that you might be more likely to buy a blu-ray release of DS9 or VOY if they ever decide to remaster them.

As someone who grew up watching Next Generation and TOS reruns, I hated Picard season 1, even after getting to the end of it, so I've personally decided not to watch any more. I won't buy the blu-ray. I won't read any reviews of the next season(s). I'm not interested in it, I think it's terrible, and I plan on ignoring it entirely. I feel the same way about Disney Star Wars and MCU Spider-Man. Why would you continue to rub your nose in something that brings you such intense displeasure? Why do you persist, Mister Anderson? In an era of Infinite Piracy in Infinite Combinations, you don't even have to pay to watch these things anymore.

At the end of the day, it's just entertainment. For me, the honest-to-God "good" Star Trek ended with First Contact. The JJ movies are awful and even Enterprise has some cringey parts, but I don't have the right to stop others from enjoying them because they don't appeal to my personal taste.

[neatoman]

Originally Posted by Spike Spiegel

I know mod presence here is practically nonexistent, but it might be nice to get on topic.

I recently started watching the first season of this and, compared to Picard, it's actually kind of good. I've tempered my expectations, like I did with Lower Decks and Short Treks, and I'm actually getting some enjoyment out of it. Burnham has a reputation for being a Mary Sue and yet

Spoiler:

she gets kicked out of Starfleet for being a mutineer in the first two episodes.

She's a failure both as an officer and as a human LARPing as a Vulcan, and that makes her interesting.

As horrible and "SJW" as this show is supposed to be, it keeps getting renewed. I think the incessant bitching online is actually generating publicity for it.

Listen to what this guy says at around the 3:48 mark and tell me it's not something to be unironically mocked.

I was actually subscribed to that guy for a while just figure out what his deal was, as he said things that seemed somewhat strangely motivated. When he eventually made a video where he claimed Ireland should effectively become a Catholic theocracy in order to reject authority figures... Well, let's just say I got my answer and unsubscribed...

There are certainly things wrong with this show, it's pretty easy to criticise the lack of cohesion with the rest of the franchise as well as some of the questionable storytelling, there's no shortage of that. Of course, having literal agenda driven theocrats complain about the presence of women and minorities, does kind of distract from more serious criticism.

[Spike Spiegel]

Up to episode three or four now.

Burnham is written to be overly good at just about everything to the point where it's comical. The other characters actually comment on it. The monologues on science sound like they were pasted from edgy Reddit replies.

This show isn't hyperbolically bad like people have said it is, but I don't know if I have the tolerance to finish it.

[Jester]

Today's episode is part of the reason why I still watch Discovery even when i find it to be sub-par Star Trek, because this was probably the best episode so far.
Saru is probably the most Star Trek thing in this show and it was nice to see him act like a flipping Starfleet Officer using diplomacy to attempt to solve the problems of the episode as opposed to going in phasers blazing. Everything with Saru in this episode (and to be fair in Discovery as a whole) is the best of Discovery.

[Andrew NDB]

I made it 2 minutes into episode 3 and Burnham is already crying again after crying through her whole last episode... *sigh*... I'll have to come back to this later. In no mood.

Anyone want to place any wagers on them never explaining the Burn? It'll be like the new Synth Ban, put in place because of "Galactic Treaty" (because the Klingons and the Dominion and all of the races in the Delta Quadrant would all agree to banning androids because of Mars).

[Jester]

I always assumed the Synth Ban was a Federation ban (or maybe even specifically Starfleet) but I could be wrong. What always bugged me was how the Synths were treated...as if the times Data's status were firmly established meant nothing. Unless Synths are a special case of totally a-ok artificial slave labor...oye.

And what of holograms? Aren't they synthetic just in a different way? Weren't they also treated as a slave class until The Doctor intervened?

[neatoman]

I'm assuming nobody here cares enough about spoilers regarding this show, so I'm not even going to bother with the spoiler tags, makes a response less likely and the thread harder to read.

I thought long term Human-Symbiont joining wasn't possible, as evidenced by the introduction of the Trill in TNG? I know DS9 pretty much ignored the TNG depiction of the Trill in all but the basic concept, though I expected that detail would be kept. Now I can accept that memories from a human host can be carried over (even if that would essentially mean there are three versions of Riker running around) but they've been pretty clear that Trill are the ideal hosts, as evidenced by Ezri being picked to join with Dax. I know this human host lives on a version of Earth that has cut ties with the Federation but you could get away with saying she's part of a small group of Trill living on earth as a Federation leftover, or if it was really necessary to have this be a twist, say she's a Human/Trill hybrid and that's whyshe doesn't have spots and/or an M ridge. Point is, she didn't need to be human other than for there to be a one episode twist, now they would have to come up with some more complicated explaination.

[Andrew NDB]

I'm assuming the human-symbiont thing isn't really a joining but just a temporary "hosting" until the symbiont can be put inside a real Trill. And it looks like they're going to Trill next episode. I bet this Admiral symbiont gets put into a Trill and we get to say hello to Dax.

Saw the episode. Funny that not even 2 minutes after Burnham was crying... what does she do in a new scene with Tilley? Cries again. Shesus, man...

So 3100 and there aren't any starships over Earth? And the Federation moved somewhere, super secretly? Meh.

Now that the big tree hugging scene from the preview has context I mind it less, but yeesh. How much more on the nose can you get? They're hugging a tree.

Originally Posted by Jester

I always assumed the Synth Ban was a Federation ban (or maybe even specifically Starfleet) but I could be wrong.

Early on Dr. Jurati explains to Picard it is a "Galactic treaty" about the ban, and gets into no more detail than that. But a galactic treaty would presumably be a galactic treaty and not, say, a treaty just within most of the Alpha Quadrant, or what-have-you.

The RLM videos roast them about this.

And what of holograms? Aren't they synthetic just in a different way? Weren't they also treated as a slave class until The Doctor intervened?

Since they aren't synthetic at all (without a mobile emitter, which probably was and should be banned, limited only to the Doctor for a variety of reasons) they're exempt. Must be, since we see them on the ship in STP.

[CylonsKlingonsDaleksOhMy]

It's 100% gonna be Dax.

[Jester]

Spoiler:

Those wacky xenophobic Trill...

Wait....

[Vegita-San]

stoooppp! It's already deeeeeaad!!!!!

[neatoman]

Remember when Riker was allowed to do the same exact thing as Adira does here and nobody batted an eye at it? Or how Curzon's memories was tranferred Odo in a symbiotic way and the Trill would have allowed it to continue if he wanted to? I get that it's 800 years later but I was never under the impression that the Trill were unwilling to disallow other races from participating in the Symbiont stuff, especially considering that the Odo/Curzon incident was the result of him (alongside several other non-Trill) officially taking part in a ceremony.

[Musashi]

Made myself laugh imagining the Discovery crew in some different timeline experiencing the events of The Wrath of Khan. The ship's just been phasered and crippled, and instead of fromulating an urgent response - they'd get to the remote command to lower the shields eventually, but not quick enough - they stand around discussing the emotional impact this is having on each individual one of them. Single tear rolls down cheek in close handheld closeup etc.

"The McGuffin...? He wants the McGuffin? Just give him the McGuffin..." Khan wins.