Star Trek Discovery: The Bryan Fuller TV reboot

star trek is optimistic; the expanse points out that all this shit is so difficult as to be almost pointless

Yeah, I don't mean it's better as a sci-fi trope, it's just fun to see bullets zip through one side of the hull and out the other with everyone going "oh shiiiiit"

Having recently watched TOS it’s now v amusing how Burnham is like Kirk turned up to 11 in terms of being the first to go on offworld missions for any and everything, the more ill advised the better

I do enjoy Disco but I dont approach it like Other Trek, to be sure.

Kind of want Saru to stay where he is, and have a fleshed out storyline on his world.

https://intl.startrek.com/news/star-trek-discovery-season-four-lands-on-paramount-pluto-tv-internationally time to find out what pluto is

And here I was thinking they landed on Goofy.

Thank you for this information stet

Look forward to renewing my acquaintance with this silly show

Pluto is cool. This show is cool. "Let's Fly" as the captain's catchphrase order is not cool at all.

we're four seasons in and i *want* to like this but 50 minutes of 'people grieve in different ways' is just terrible

and every time they reference burnham growing up on vulcan simply makes a joke of how everything she does is weepy emotional

at least that one guy (bryce?) got to suggest something?

make grudge the center of the show imo

oh no! my dead soulmate is going to blah blah blah reincarnate! but what if i can't measure up to them! oh no!

This was probably my favorite episode, largely because of how much it made me laugh -- sometimes intentionally, sometimes less so: the random flame jets on the bridge, fr'instance.

That said, yeah, I do wish that not every episode has to involve some galaxy- or identity-shifting inflection point.

Haha yes once again I have the gripe I had last week. When the ship was getting battered by those grav waves, why was there... like, literal rubble? All over the deck? The hell?

Losing gravity suddenly was a cool thing to happen and they dont do that much on shows like this so that was cool.

Burnham is becomign a freaking hypocrite. Last week she was being accused of taking too many risks and she got all huffy and defended it... then she goes and accuses book of the same thing!

But man, this anomaly better turn out to be some giant space alien/actual enemy because do not sit here and tell me this season is them going to war with Space, that is just ... NO..

mr veg has been joking about the rubble, like are they building with concrete in space?

also pyro budget must be sizeable, sparks & fireballs like the bloody wizard of oz

Just starting S2 and by god I will get through it this time but man I miss Sisko playing baseball with his idol and bridge crew string quartet shows. Grimdark is probably a bit extreme as a description but it's getting close.

Yeah stakes being pushed to such extremes means that all the side characters don't get fleshed out, in addition to the very shallow way the main characters are all overachieving Dunning Kruger idiots.

The Ba’ul sentry ship CGI was Doctor Who level crappy.

hi, i'm a qowat milat. i get to completely change my morality from time to time based on how i feel like defining the word 'hopeless'. (maybe someday one of us will take up the 'lost cause' of the confederacy!) it's *possible* that a mysterious space anomaly *could* turn in my direction at any time, giving me license to murder at will. i can use spaceships and transporters, but if you even ask me detailed questions about my actions -- let alone interfere with them -- i must regretfully kill you with a sword, because thousand-year-old stun technology is beyond me, as is bothering to hide my identity. i am a lone wolf who cannot seek help, except for when i'm attacking other peoples' spaceships and need accomplices in non-speaking roles. i live my life with absolute candor but see no contradictions in any of this.

fuckin romulans, man

This episode bugged the heck out of me. A good half of it felt like wasted "I have feelings and I dont know how to deaaaalll with them" rambles that did not service the plot. The whole discovery and rescuing of the entirely new species was almost an afterthought. They didnt even mention First Contact directives, cmon guys you're trying to restore the Federation can you not maybe follow its rules? No lets just boondoggle a fix for a massive, long broken ship in 10 minutes flat and then go "ok theyre good to go lets take off". Buh?

yeah i had similar thoughts about this one
show definitely weights emotional journeys over actual plot / things happening

i appreciate that (some of!) their experiences have future consequences -- remember when picard spent 50 subjective years with a family on a dying planet in 'the inner light' and it apparently didn't change him at all? and the characters *should* be pretty fucked up emotionally!

but having everyone tilt their heads at each other and blurt platitudes like 'i'm here for you' and 'everyone must grieve in their own way' isn't very compelling to watch either

Tilly with her therapy babble this week was really pushing me over the edge

Yeah Tillys character is starting to grate on me. She has a shipmate who just lost his whole family, race, and planet and she has to talk about how she fits in. Read the room lass.

This show moves sooooo slow. I can't tell if we've been on Sad Spock for three episodes or six.

for me this show is just a wait station for the Captain Pike show

I have hopes for the Section 31 show, Yeoh is great but they're going to have to make her more than the Joker in Space.

oh i forgot abt that- that oughta be good too

I've been thinking that Disco is a deconstruction of TNG-era Roddenberryism, where humanity has leveled up, everyone is a hyper-competent professional, and there aren't (supposed to be) interpersonal conflicts -- all edicts which the writers hated. I wonder if Disco is trying to show how unrealistic that idealism is, and that's why all the main characters constantly overestimate their objectivity, ability to compartmentalize, etc. Except in Disco, the characters never seem to learn their lessons and keep making the same mistakes, which compounds the "Being so emotionally invested in the situation makes me the PERFECT candidate for this mission" kind of emotional stuntedness that really bugs in this era of nu Trek.

that is a good observation!

i think Disco just has bad writers tbh

'deconstruction' might be giving the writers too much credit but it's absolutely a *reaction* to everything that roddenberry (and perhaps more importantly, berman) got wrong

but there are so many unearned moments! there was like a five-minute wake for mirror-georgiou, who was a complete asshole no one liked! it's typical trek that we only learned anything about airiam in the episode in which she was killed, but being haunted by her loss *forever* only works if you'd established her earlier

also it's nice that stamets is kind to adira and/or grey -- and that his partner is available to supply platitudes about the universe at large -- but suddenly, at certain times, they're his family? fucking earn it

100%

I think after a certain point, the audience understands that the characters have an emotional bond and they could just show us a silent clip of someone sitting at a bedside or holding a hand

I was just boggling at the scene following Booker’s mind meld where he’s obviously in much better spirits, having resolved some of his guilt via mind meld, and Stamets is like “I’m so sorry we put you through that. Reliving it, blah blah..” and I’m like, are you completely face blind or what? Booker’s had this emotional denouement that the viewers witnessed and you’re rewinding the vibe back to fifteen minutes ago here

Even when they give a character an inner life, and the actors successfully portray it, someone else has to jump in and fuck up the resolution

I swear to god if they spend any more time talking about Gray’s character evolution in terms of how risky the separation was, instead of moving on and maybe giving Adira a very brief subplot about feeling lonely, I’m throwing a shoe at the tv

The Gray download was sp badly written too! Like, they only bothered mentioning the dangers the minute they're about to start it. If you're going through the process of making sure you have informed consent, you'd damn well would mention at the way before they're going under the knife (so to speak), but then the writers worked have had to plan ahead instead of making up the story as they go.

A real missed opportunity would be exciting the very idea of consent when the individual in question can't communicate with the outside world, because Gray was totally at the mercy of Adira. We could've gotten a chewy sci fi thought experiment, instead of more sentimentality and narcissism.

I’m wondering if they did the ridiculous thing a lot of shows seem to be doing in the binge-times where they plot the entire season out, have one main plot they just kind of slowly progress in each episode, and the season’s emotional bonding has just been extremely front-loaded

In any case, that’s a terrible fit for a show that’s released weekly, and most of these episodes just don’t stand on their own. And the integrity of the whole thing is wrecked. There’s been enough repetition in the last two weeks that you could skip either of the episodes and lose nothing. Give me one A-plot that advances a character or two, a B-plot that services the seasonal arc, and 80% more Grudge

yeah they don’t really grapple with ideas much like previous shows

and yeah the gray download “story” this week (such as it was) was really a nothingy afterthought, oh just have adira worry and handwring a lot, hold their hand aaand they’re back. like ER coma-patient stories have had more drama!
why even DO it if that’s all you are going to do

should have mixed it up, had a different trill symbiote personality pop up in the new body first

yeah that could have been interesting

I think it's telling that posters in this thread tossed off some ideas that would've light years more interesting than what we got.

yup :(

A real missed opportunity would be exciting the very idea of consent when the individual in question can't communicate with the outside world, because Gray was totally at the mercy of Adira.

This is an amazing idea. A la the TNG ep where Data had to fight for his right not to be taken back to earth and dismantled. We could have had Adira being selfish and insisting Grey would be moved into the synth body but see him protesting "no! This isnt what I want shes lying!" or something. Though, its been established their relatioship doesnt seem the type that'd happen in but it would have been a great knotty ethics story.

should have mixed it up, had a different trill symbiote personality pop up in the new body first

hell yes imagine the android waking up possessed by joran dax

lol

Star Trek: You Got This

oh look, Tilly is leading a survey mission with cadets! surely nothing will go wrong

*two seconds later*

i swear to christ the next person who says “you got this” needs to be thrown out an airlock

mm and yes lets really do some more in-depth conflict resolution now in this perilous moment on this iceplanet while giant spiders are coming to eat your flesh, definitely a great idea. honestly sometimes im just WHAT the fuck IS THIS SHOW

ok i am caught up now and my most pressing question is what was that shit with the ice boots?

anyway this show is very daft but i still like it

holy shit @ the Georgiou eulogy scene - she was a genocidal maniac, actual Space Hitler! Mirror Saru immediately forgave her for eating his people and was willing to die for her - after the change main Saru was a raging asshole for four episodes, he would have shot her himself.

These are like 22 minute sci-fi stories plus 20 minute of unearned sad monologuing. Stamets and the Trill non-binary scenes were so badly written it undermined them (and it's Trek, there have always been non-binary species!).

The Starfleet Admiral having to get in a "oooooh, you bad boys used that unauthorized tech to do the thing I told you to do" moment every episode, yeesh.

Need a series where Pike, Book, Grudge and Emperor Georgiou galavant across the galaxy.