Star Trek: Keeping Up With the Cardassians

[sifth]

So I finished season 3 of Discovery this past weekend. I have to say, this is the first season of the show I didn't hate. There were still many problems, but over all they did finally tone down the violence and finally allowed Michael Burnham to show some emotions. I know these are baby steps, but you need to walk before you can run I suppose. Now if they would just give some of the other characters some development, without Burnham solving their problems for them, I might actually start really enjoying this show.

[Denvek]

I was watching Lower Decks earlier this week, and came to the conclusion that Discovery needs a Season 4 because Jonathan Frakes hasn't cameod in it yet like he has in literally every other Star Trek since TNG.

[RumHam]

41 minutes ago, Denvek said:

I was watching Lower Decks earlier this week, and came to the conclusion that Discovery needs a Season 4 because Jonathan Frakes hasn't cameod in it yet like he has in literally every other Star Trek since TNG.

Maybe next time Michael has to make a hard decision she'll watch him on the holodeck. 

I would actually love a Trials and Tribbilations type episode but for TNG. 

[Werthead]

8 minutes ago, RumHam said:

Maybe next time Michael has to make a hard decision she'll watch him on the holodeck. 

I would actually love a Trials and Tribbilations type episode but for TNG. 

Trials and Tribbleations and Troubles: "Several members of the USS Discovery crew inadvertently find themselves on K7 in the year 2267 where they find themselves having to carefully dodge both the Enterprise crew and a visiting USS Defiant crew from the late 24th Century."

The 60th anniversary episode in 2026, no doubt.

[sifth]

I just wish Discovery would occasionally have a fun episodes. I know some will say, those were always the "space filler" episodes, of the Trek series of the 90's and early 00's, but I always found them very enjoyable. I want episodes of Trek like the TNG episode, where everyone lost their memory or the DS9 episode that had the crew play a Vulcan crew in a game of baseball.

[SpaceChampion]

Bryan Fuller describes how different the writer's rooms for DS9 and Voyager were from each other.

[Werthead]

10 hours ago, SpaceChampion said:

Bryan Fuller describes how different the writer's rooms for DS9 and Voyager were from each other.

Hahaha. Ron Moore had more on that as well. The people at Voyager didn't know a lot about science fiction and they seemed disdainful of Star Trek's past and continuity. They certainly had zero interest in internal continuity, in making the ship look beaten up or run down or keeping tabs on its resources. When he showed up after DS9 finished and suggested they start doing that, he apparently ran into a brick wall with the other writers being disdainful of DS9 (despite its colossal superiority to Voyager on every single level, from writing to ratings to characterisation) and insisting that they continue to hit the reset button at the end of every episode. He lasted barely three weeks and then quit. He then applied those lessons to the much better (well, for quite a while) Battlestar Galactica.

[Lightning Lord]

Better characters in DS9? What? You don't think Harry Kim is a masterclass of complex, engaging, logical characterization? What about B'elana Torres, who goes from short-tempered engineering genius with some identity issues all the way to married short-tempered engineering genius with some identity issues? Or, remember when Tom Paris got demoted and the entire show and crew dynamic was upended?

I was going to do a whole thing about the characters in DS9, but there were so many excellently-developed arcs that I gave it up. Holy crap DS9 did some things right.

 

I have started Lower Decks. Great fun so far. Can't wait to dive into more of it this weekend.

•  

[sifth]

22 hours ago, Werthead said:

Hahaha. Ron Moore had more on that as well. The people at Voyager didn't know a lot about science fiction and they seemed disdainful of Star Trek's past and continuity. They certainly had zero interest in internal continuity, in making the ship look beaten up or run down or keeping tabs on its resources. When he showed up after DS9 finished and suggested they start doing that, he apparently ran into a brick wall with the other writers being disdainful of DS9 (despite its colossal superiority to Voyager on every single level, from writing to ratings to characterisation) and insisting that they continue to hit the reset button at the end of every episode. He lasted barely three weeks and then quit. He then applied those lessons to the much better (well, for quite a while) Battlestar Galactica.

I often view Battlestar Galactica as the anti Voyager. The Galactica was so beat up from all the battles by the end of the show, the thing was practically falling apart. Even though I didn't enjoy the shows depressing tone, I did love the level of detail that was put into the show.

[Mindwalker]

I keep saying we need to see (and hear) more of the Federation (as opposed to Starfleet) and the civilian government in Trek. In this context, this part of the Fuller interview is interesting (and disturbing):

“Conservatives like Star Trek for a reason that is different than the way liberals like Star Trek,” he noted. “And that’s fascinating, because I feel like conservatives like the ‘quasi-fascist military regime’ ..."

[Caligula_K3]

I watched the first two episodes of Discovery season 3. Here is my perspective, as someone who's Trek experience is Discovery Season 1, the first two Abrams movies, Deep Space 9, the movie where Spock goes back in time to save the whales, and now a few episodes of TNG here and there.

MORN IS ALIVE!!!!

But why do the Ferengi not control the mercantile guild? And what's happened to the Cardassian Union? These are the questions I want answered.

 

[Werthead]

From this I gather we should anticipate a Strange New Worlds trailer of some kind during the Superb Owl Event?

[RumHam]

4 hours ago, Caligula_K3 said:

But why do the Ferengi not control the mercantile guild? And what's happened to the Cardassian Union? These are the questions I want answered.

Don't hold your breath for answers. 

[Rhom]

There’s been like a half dozen Paramount+ commercials during the Super Bowl and the Discovery Trekkers have featured prominently.

Are they moving from CBS All Access?

[Caligula_K3]

7 hours ago, RumHam said:

Don't hold your breath for answers. 

Tragic. I'll have to wait for the Cardassian Union Star Trek spinoff show about the Yamok sauce trade that I want so badly. The Breen can come too.

I'm enjoying Discovery season 3 so far though. It can be emotionally cloying (thank god for Georgiou) but the plot of the season is pretty intriguing. Plus Trill!

[Mindwalker]

I would have liked that kind of world-building, too. A sense of the political landscape. I already missed that in Picard. On his instagram, showrunner Chabon actually told us that the Romulan Empire had split up into 3 poltical entities. Would have liked to see that mentioned on screen.

[Werthead]

11 hours ago, Rhom said:

There’s been like a half dozen Paramount+ commercials during the Super Bowl and the Discovery Trekkers have featured prominently.

Are they moving from CBS All Access?

No. CBS All Access is turning into Paramount+.

I fear if that basic fact hasn't come across, their advertising was not very well-handled.

[Rhom]

3 minutes ago, Werthead said:

No. CBS All Access is turning into Paramount+.

I fear if that basic fact hasn't come across, their advertising was not very well-handled.

Nope... just thought it was a new service.   

[karaddin]

On 2/6/2021 at 11:35 PM, Mindwalker said:

I keep saying we need to see (and hear) more of the Federation (as opposed to Starfleet) and the civilian government in Trek. In this context, this part of the Fuller interview is interesting (and disturbing):

“Conservatives like Star Trek for a reason that is different than the way liberals like Star Trek,” he noted. “And that’s fascinating, because I feel like conservatives like the ‘quasi-fascist military regime’ ..."

Do you find it disturbing that conservatives would like that aspect of it, or disturbing that someone who was involved in creating a Star Trek show could describe Star Fleet like that? Because I think you could easily have a much longer explanation of how conservatives could see that in what we're shown that doesn't display a misunderstanding of the setting/organization. I think there are elements there which can lead someone to see the fascistic elements that they want to see in Star Fleet without thinking that Star Fleet is intended to be read as a quasi-fascist military regime.

[Mindwalker]

8 hours ago, karaddin said:

Do you find it disturbing that conservatives would like that aspect of it, or disturbing that someone who was involved in creating a Star Trek show could describe Star Fleet like that? Because I think you could easily have a much longer explanation of how conservatives could see that in what we're shown that doesn't display a misunderstanding of the setting/organization. I think there are elements there which can lead someone to see the fascistic elements that they want to see in Star Fleet without thinking that Star Fleet is intended to be read as a quasi-fascist military regime.

Definitely the latter! And I still like to believe that the Federaton has a democratically elected, civilian government, so not fascist, but I think they should flesh that out a bit more.

Yes, I think Steve Shives has a whole video about why Conservatives like Trek., I haven't watched it yet. I, too, can imaginemany things conservatives would like. That reminds me of something I once read about the viewership of Frasier. I would have thought it was mostly liberal leaning, considering the heroes were two adorably neurotic, liberal, inellectual shrinks (plus a kookie immigrant). But apparently it was quite evenly split. The conservative fans identified with the down-to-earth, more right-leaning Martin. In today's terms, he kinda often owned his lib sons...

Although I think on average, Trek fans are more progressive than the average American. but certain groups who identify as Trekkies are quite openly ... well, thinly veiled... anti-diversity and mysogynist. Youtube tries to peddle them to me whenever I've watched a Trek centered vid.