Star Trek: All Good Threads...

[Werthead]

I didn't realise that Picard was staying on Amazon Prime in the UK for the time being, so the first episode should be available tomorrow.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

8 hours ago, Werthead said:

I didn't realise that Picard was staying on Amazon Prime in the UK for the time being, so the first episode should be available tomorrow.

It's already on Crave in Canada. The first episode was OK. 

[Corvinus85]

Someone once told me that time was a predator that stalked us all our lives. But I rather believe than time is a companion who goes with us on the journey, and reminds us to cherish every moment because they'll never come again. What we leave behind is not as important how we lived. - Jean-Luc Picard, Star Trek: Generations

What more must be said about time? The first episode was fine for the most part but I don't feel at all excited about the overall plot of this season. Mirror universe without calling it that.

[Werthead]

Yeah, that was a solid first episode with some really good stuff (the new Stargazer, Guinan, Q) and some fairly meh stuff. This is how Season 1 opened, with some good, promising stuff that degenerated into a messy and incoherent ending (also see: Discovery Season 1 and 2). Still, if you're going to steal ideas from earlier in the franchise, stealing from Yesterday's Enterprise, Past Tense and Tapestry and sticking them in a blender to see what comes out isn't the worst idea.

I did pick up Discovery Season 4 and must admit the opening run of episodes is probably the best yet, though once again the Mysterious Mystery That's Destroying Everything feels somewhat tedious.

[RumHam]

Glad to hear the premier was ok. After paying extra to watch four seasons of mediocre live action Star Trek Paramount+ will get my money when Lower Decks returns and not before. 

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

S4 E11:

What a slog. I'm just not feeling this season of the show. 

[Werthead]

16 hours ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

S4 E11:

What a slog. I'm just not feeling this season of the show. 

I am feeling this is the best season of the show. They had two whole episodes dedicated to political debates and diplomacy rather than action, and have remembered the other bridge characters existed and given them actual shit to do. Burnham has only inexplicably cried once, I believe, and is only whispering around 10% of her lines rather than 40%. Also, Burnham also somehow works better in the captain's chair, as a sort of line-straddling maverick like Kirk, then she did as a subordinate officer. The evolution of the conflict between Burnham and Book is reasonably convincing, and I really dig Shawn Doyle as a villain (?)  with a well-thought-out motivation and backstory (Doyle was fantastic in the first three seasons of The Expanse and is even better here). There's also a huge amount of proper SF ideas flying around here, with the anomaly and the hyperfield feeling like very big, Peter F. Hamilton/Iain M. Banks-style ideas.

There is still a lot of typical Disco WTFery though, like a lot of touch-feely stuff even by the show's previously enormous standards, some very mixed VFX (some of the video wall stuff is utterly fantastic and some it looks really obviously like they're standing in front of a big video wall) and a weird sense of urgency, like risking some of their very short amount of time poking around a random planet in the hope that something turns up before proceeding with the mission.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

5 hours ago, Werthead said:

I am feeling this is the best season of the show. They had two whole episodes dedicated to political debates and diplomacy rather than action, and have remembered the other bridge characters existed and given them actual shit to do. Burnham has only inexplicably cried once, I believe, and is only whispering around 10% of her lines rather than 40%. Also, Burnham also somehow works better in the captain's chair, as a sort of line-straddling maverick like Kirk, then she did as a subordinate officer. The evolution of the conflict between Burnham and Book is reasonably convincing, and I really dig Shawn Doyle as a villain (?)  with a well-thought-out motivation and backstory (Doyle was fantastic in the first three seasons of The Expanse and is even better here). There's also a huge amount of proper SF ideas flying around here, with the anomaly and the hyperfield feeling like very big, Peter F. Hamilton/Iain M. Banks-style ideas.

That's fine but it's done in a way that, to me, distracts from the main story, negatively impacts the overall pacing of the series and and destroys any sense of urgency. There were a few episodes in the middle of the season that amounted to side quests. I can remember sitting there saying, "Isn't there a planet eating something-something out there that needs attention?" 

I've been watching the show week-to-week. Maybe it hits different if you binge it in larger chunks. I don't know. But watching an entire episode that alternated between two meetings and only one of them was mildly interesting; that was a slog. 

5 hours ago, Werthead said:

There is still a lot of typical Disco WTFery though,(1) like a lot of touch-feely stuff even by the show's previously enormous standards, some very mixed VFX (some of the video wall stuff is utterly fantastic and some it looks really obviously like they're standing in front of a big video wall) and a weird sense of urgency, (2) like risking some of their very short amount of time poking around a random planet in the hope that something turns up before proceeding with the mission.

1. I think that's the thing that's bothering the most and I've touched on it a few times. It's distracting as hell. Also characters that behave in an oddly casual way in situations where they never did previously. It's like they're hanging out in ten-forward all the time. They even incorporate it into the narrative when the Federation President chews out that guy for too many "negative waves". Yeah, no shit. 

2. I'm on the fence about that. What was totally weird are the extended conversations in the shuttle bay, for the same reason. They're not behaving like people who are in a rush. 

They've been hitting the whole, "they are going to be really alien to us" concept pretty hard, so it makes sense to do their homework. but this would be true for any first contact.  

That said, I liked the first episode. Also the emerald chain planet episode. 

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

For the record, Here's a compilations of the Disco comments I've been posting in the "watching" threads. I can only laugh, though I'm slowly dying inside.

Quote

 

Star Trek: Discovery S4 E1. I've said it before; In terms of visuals and production values, this is more cinematic and visually interesting than anything I've seen out of Star Wars recently. Not much to be gleaned from the first episode other than mysterious threat, something, something. It also featured aliens that:

Spoiler

used butterfly wings to fly that were made out of actual flying butterflies.

Madness.

 

Quote

Star Trek Discovery S4 E3.

Boring. Probably the least engaged I've been with an episode of this series. Too little energy dedicated to pushing the main plot in favor of some really uninteresting sub plots.

I really hope we don't go yet another season without seeing a single klingon. 

Quote

Star Trek Discovery S4 E6: I've been a big defender of the first 3 seasons of this show; but Jesus Christ this season is tedious. So many, "Thank yous" and sincere looks and reassuring, life affirming conversation. Even the goddamn ship had a nervous breakdown in this episode.

Quote

Star Trek: Discovery S4 E7: When I thought it couldn't get more tedious, here comes an episode where everyone's in a meeting... for the entire episode. It's not all bad though; stuff starts happening in the last 30 seconds. Fuck my life. 

 

[DaveSumm]

Picard; eh, OK. Felt like an awful lot of work just to get Picard where he was at the end, you could pretty much just not do the ‘48 hours earlier’ thing and actually get the plot moving somewhere. It does feel like well trodden ground though. 

And I could swear that someone behind the scenes is trolling us, they throw in so many careful deep cuts to prove their Trek chops and then think “OK now to off-set it somehow… hmm, smoking and drinking on the bridge, and everyone ignores Captain’s orders?” (“Don’t shoot”, 3 or 4 times he gave the order, no one gives a fuck).

Also does a Picard that long retired just immediately have his rank reinstated and become the ranking officer of any ship he steps aboard? 

[IheartIheartTesla]

Lets talk accents. The original TOS had stereotypical Scottish and Russian accents, while TNG had a fake French accent (although Sir Pat gave us classic British most of the times). After that, I'd say DS9 maybe had Bashir speaking in some sort of pseudo-Brit accent, but its pretty much been standard American most of the time. Am I correct in this, and Disco/Lower Decks continue this fine tradition of assuming everyone in the 24th century and beyond has succumbed to American cultural hegemony? I am struggling to think of any deviation from this norm since the early 2000s, to be honest.

[williamjm]

18 minutes ago, IheartIheartTesla said:

Lets talk accents. The original TOS had stereotypical Scottish and Russian accents, while TNG had a fake French accent (although Sir Pat gave us classic British most of the times). After that, I'd say DS9 maybe had Bashir speaking in some sort of pseudo-Brit accent, but its pretty much been standard American most of the time. Am I correct in this, and Disco/Lower Decks continue this fine tradition of assuming everyone in the 24th century and beyond has succumbed to American cultural hegemony? I am struggling to think of any deviation from this norm since the early 2000s, to be honest.

Picard does have Laris who appears to be from the Irish part of Romulus.

Speaking of Irish, I think O'Brien has to be on your list of non-American accents.

Discovery has Georgiou who doesn't sound American.

[IheartIheartTesla]

Yeah, and i think Book has some sort of non-American accent which I cant quite place but is probably from some big city in the UK. Otherwise it is quite depressingly non-representative of the state of the world as I imagine it in the future (keeping in mind I love all things Trek).

[DaveSumm]

Owosekun* is played by a Nigerian actress who still has an accent to my ears. Admiral Vance is Israeli but I can’t remember how Americanised his speech is. Book is English.

Older series, Troi very gradually seemed to give up on her accent and gradually became English. Enterprise had Malcolm, again English. Voyager was uniformly American I think. So not a great showing since TOS, no.

*I’ve seen three seasons of Discovery, had to google her name and literally doesn’t even ring the tiniest of bells.

ETA: of course there’s the can of worms of what the universal translator is doing, and why it delivers certain accents sometimes. Is Chekov speaking in Russian and being translated? Star Trek 09 seems to indicate no as he struggles with certain words. 

[IheartIheartTesla]

Owosekun has a slightly bigger role in Disco S4, in particular the later episodes. And not to spoil anything, but there is a little bit of discussion of the Universal Translator later on. Maybe too much to hope for a Darmok redux?
 

Spoiler

Burnham and Species 10C at the Galactic Barrier

Burnham, her voice a whisper

etcetra...

 

[sifth]

I'm honestly not sure I can watch any more Trek made by Bad Robot, except for Lower Decks. There's just something so dam charming about that show. I might give Strange New Worlds a try, but I know it's three head writers have not made any decent products in the last decade or so. I'm a bit worried on the shows quality for that alone.

[Werthead]

I am liking the huge lengths they went to to improve the "identikit" ship problem from Picard Season 1. The new Stargazer and the new Excelsior are excellent designs.

I also like how in the ~30 years since First Contact, the Sovereign class has become pretty ubiquitous.

Not a huge fan of the Ross class, though it looks like an anemic Galaxy.

 

 

On 3/7/2022 at 12:34 AM, sifth said:

I'm honestly not sure I can watch any more Trek made by Bad Robot

Bad Robot doesn't make any of the Trek shows. That's JJ Abrams' production company, so are only involved in the Kelvin timeline movies he produced or directed.

[Ran]

While I haven't watched this show at all, always have a fondness for Federation star ship designs. So cool that the designers are allowed to share so much of their design work online.

I've long thought the (original) Excelsior was perfection. I can see how they've updated the design here to match the more recent aesthetics, and it's good to actually create new designs rather than trotting out the same 3D models again and again... but I think this new Excelsior design is not as good as the original. In particular, the neck connecting the saucer to the main body is ugly as sin -- so squat and thick! The nacelles are nice, I guess.

The Ross looks like a successor to the Galaxy-class, I guess? But with some definite Sovereign-class language. Prefer the Galaxy-class myself, but it's not bad. Think the Stargazer is my favorite of the designs, maybe in part because it most clearly draws from the older, 80s aesthetics.

Neat stuff.

[Werthead]

The OG Excelsior's windowless neck was a weak point in the design and slightly out of keeping with the rest of the franchise. Given the neck is so huge, you can actually put stuff in there (unlike the Constitution, where the neck is really only wide enough for a couple of turbolifts) and there should really be signs of that.

I think the new design streamlines and adds some grace and balance to the Excelsior design, which always felt-rear heavy, though agreed, the stretched neck feels a bit odd. I hope Eaglemoss do an XL version.

[Jaxom 1974]

Okay...the new Stargazer? It looks awful...implementing Borg tech into it...just eye rolling...

However, while I have no idea how this show is going to play out, the general sense of the set up was good. Putting the characters out and around Starfleet, it makes sense. Giving the two year gap some depth.  But we'll see if things make sense by the end...

The whole vibe of the (alternate?) Borg ship and the fight with the Federation...it felt far too much like the aesthetic of the Bad Robot movies, rather than the one you'd get from TNG, DS9, Voyager...I think that's something that bothered me about the previous season also...

Menacing Q is always the best Q. His dialog is always the best at that point...

And Guinan...we'll see her for more than just that drive by, right?