‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Update: Jason Isaacs Says Lorca Was Created By War + Doug Jones Talks Uniform Canon

Star Trek: Discovery is on hiatus for another month, but the show is still making some news. We have gathered the latest bits from around the web to keep you up to speed.

Isaacs talks Lorca’s war

CBS has released another new character video, this time with Jason Isaacs talking about Captain Lorca.

Here is what Isaacs had to say:

This whole story takes place in a time of war and people reveal themselves under that kind of duress….They reveal the best and worst sides of themselves. I think it is no surprise to see how well Lorca handles war. He has been around it for a long time and he has been damaged and created by it. I think it says a lot about his personality and his devotion to his crew although he doesn’t show it. He is not sentimental; that he decided not to have his eyes replaced or repaired after burning them watching his crew explode. He wants a physical reminder all the time to make the right decision and to not let that happen again…We find out that he lost his entire crew and I am sure in his mind he could have made different decisions to save him. You understand where his ferocity comes from.

Jones: No clues in the uniforms

Speaking to actor Doug Jones, Den of Geek posited that there may be clues that Discovery is set in a different universe due to differences in the show’s uniforms. However, Jones repeated what producers have said, that the show is set in the prime timeline, and the Starfleet uniforms are different because it isn’t the 1960s anymore:

Every Star Trek series, no matter where they fall in the overall timeline, they all look different. All the uniforms look different. In some ways the Klingons even look different in some way. So I think when you’re doing a show that’s set 10 years before the original series and yet the original series was on TV in the 60’s and ours in on TV in 2017, well, you have to appeal to a modern audience…I think there are enough accents and there is enough adherence to canon to satisfy the 1960s-lovers as well.

Sometimes a uniform is just a uniform

The Twilight Zone producers officially announced

Last month CBS CEO announced that All Access would be rebooting the classic sci-fi anthology series The Twilight Zone, but gave no other details. Today CBS officially confirmed the show will be produced by CBS Television Studios in association with Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions and Simon Kinberg’s Genre Films. Jordan Peele (Get Out, Key & Peele), Simon Kinberg (X-Men franchise and Star Wars: Rebels) and Marco Ramirez (The Defenders) will serve as executive producers for the series and collaborate on the premiere episode.

In a statement CBS All Access Executive Vice President, Original Content Julie McNamara said:

“The original ‘The Twilight Zone’ bridged science-fiction, horror and fantasy together to explore human nature and provide social commentary in a way that audiences had never seen before,” said Under the auspices of Jordan Peele, Simon Kinberg and Marco Ramirez, and with the creative freedom that the CBS All Access platform affords, this is an incredible opportunity to bring today’s audiences a modern reimagining of this iconic series.”

No release date was given. The Twilight Zone joins other upcoming genre dramas coming to All Access including Strange Angel from Ridley Scott and the just announced dark fairytale Tell Me a Story. And of course CBS has a second season of Star Trek: Discovery on the roster as well.

More Disco Bits

Here are a few links about Discovery for this week:

Den of Geek: How Star Trek: Discovery is inspired by Star Trek VI

KCAL: CBS Stars (including ‘Discovery’) bring the holiday Cheer to Children’s Hospital LA.


Star Trek: Discovery is available on CBS All Access on in the US and airs in Canada on the Space Channel. It is available on Netflix outside the USA and Canada.

Keep up with all the Star Trek: Discovery news at TrekMovie.

104 Comments
oldest
newest
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments

Mary Cheefu, (Chiefoo?) I forget, but she is the prettiest actress I’ve ever seen play a Klingon female. In fact, she’s gorgeous, and I’m in love.

Shame she is covered up in all that heavy make-up. She’d actually make for a very good TOS female Klingon, or even someone along the lines of Valkris from STIII.

At least a little hair would go a long, long way.

Really? Hmm. That’s not a stance I’d expect anyone to take. She’s cute, don’t get me wrong. But the prettiest? In a universe containing Mara, B’elanna, and K’Ehleyr?

Some of us are. . . intrigued by an attractive woman who looks like she could break you in half without working up a sweat. 😍

As long as they get a batch of good writers for the new Twilight Zone, I’m in!

Jones isn’t lying about the uniform changing, the difference being the uniforms changed with time, in other words just a progressive change from one era to another.

The problem with Discovery is these uniforms completely contradict canon that no others did because this takes place during The Cage era and we know what those looked like, basically like TOS, just a bit more simple. The changes with TOS movies, TNG, etc were simply new uniforms in new time periods. Why they were accepted.

This is suppose to be 10 years to TOS and not 100 years like Enterprise was, so for some people it just feels wrong because there is no comparison between the two. For anyone to say other wise is just stretching the craziest way possible. Jones doesn’t even go for that lame excuse.

I still don’t get why they couldn’t just update the TOS uniforms like the Kelvin films? They used them in those very modern films literally a year ago, so why would these same uniforms feel outdated now? At least make them have the other colors like TOS did.

But once again, another reason why I hate prequels. Why call it a prequel if you ignore most of the iconic parts of that era?

They nailed an updated aesthetic for the Kelvin, these uniforms fall quite a bit short of that.

@Tiger2 – one year or five years or ten years from now, we can have a thread here where we examine how well Discovery fits into the timeline of Star Trek.

Do to it now is akin to picking up a book, reading the middle chapter and announcing it doesnt make sense.

We KNOW the writers/producers have said they will inch closer to TOS as they go so we owe it to them to see that before we judge it.

Im a canon junkie. So I would go nuts when things dont make sense. But I am also open minded. There is nothing that says the Cage unis and Discovery unis didnt co-exist. We shall see if that ends up being the case.

Also, the majority of Discovery that LOOKS “wrong” for 1960’s era TOS, works quite convincingly as extrapolated evolution of Franklin, Enterprise and Kelvin.

But that would seem a bit silly to me. You mean they are going from these dull militaristic uniforms to women wearing bright colors, mini skirts and go-go boots? How does that evolution even happen? Maybe they will explain they simply both exist at the same time but I don’t get how since the two feel like they belong in completely different eras.

But yes I try to be open minded too but the uniform thing just doesn’t make sense at all. The Kelvin films had the right idea. We actually saw them wear different uniforms too in STID for instance but they were used in a different setting. I just wish they at least tried to combine the TOS uniforms to Discovery instead of just completely ignoring them.

Nahh, Tiger, I just feel like screw it, the uniforms in “Discovery” are a gorgeous blue, form-fitting, and great looking. And unisex.

The difference in the uniforms’ appearance between “The Cage” and TOS Season 1 is bad enough. If they had just changed the powder blue and weirdass gold tunics to the primary colors and left the styles pretty much alone, that would have been great. The women’s tunics had a nice, soft, face-framing collar. The men’s tunics did look better as designed for episodes after WNMHGB, with the smoother collar band. What I liked the most about these uniforms was, NO mini-skirts.

But then some ol’ horn-dog executive, or Roddenberry, said, “how about mini-skirts” and off we went to Star Trek A-Go-Go. Bleah, pooh!

Marja,

Actually, miniskirts were considered empowering for women, by women, in those long-ago days. (No, I’m serious here! Check it out!) And while Roddenberry and his cohort of leches no doubt approved, the designer of the minis, William Ware Thiess, was gay.

The Motion Picture is set about 5 years after the TOS and the uniforms changed from red/blue/gold to pastel. And TWOK is another 10 years later and everything is red. So why is it not plausible for the uniforms to change from blue to red/blue/gold in 10 years?
Or you could just accept, that the uniforms look different because otherwise you couldn’t tell the movie and tv show apart.

When I saw the TMP uniforms, I thought, “If I served on this starship with only these bland colors around me, I’d want to kill myself”

LOL they were horrible. I have liked most of the uniforms (although yes the TOS uniforms definitely were of the time) but TMP were just plain awful. It really is a good thing they took Roddenberry off those films when they did.

The TMP outfits were Robert Wise’s call. Not Roddenberry, who would’ve been fine with the originals.

Ok I stand corrected, thanks.

Yes AFTER TOS. Thats a progression. I get how that works.

The problem with these uniforms is they occur DURING The Cage when the first version of the TOS uniforms appeared. Why does this little fact constantly gets ignored?

And for the record, I don’t want the Cage uniforms either but you can’t keep saying the show is in the same timeline as TOS if you blatantly ignore every element of the show that identified as TOS. The uniforms being one of them.

That answer about the uniforms is dumb, as is the answer about the Klingons. The Klingons as they appeared in the movie era onward, looked fine. They don’t look dated. Now, they look like a different species.

As for the uniforms–they chose to set it in the same universe as a 1960s show, which means that they should have similar uniforms. If they didn’t want that, if they wanted to appear modern, then they should have set the show after Nemesis. The “it’s 2017” excuse is a lazy way of saying that they didn’t feel like dealing with canon. So yeah, if they want a pass, it should be in another universe, not the prime one.

Seems like there could be a retcon explanation though. The Klingon War proved the uniforms lacked mobility or durability, it could be a post-war austerity measure, etc. They could also add details to TOS-era uniforms (and hardware) that plausibly wouldn’t have been seen in low-D resolution, yet brings it up to date. I was pretty convinced by the retcon offered in one the Enterprise novels, that Federation technology went back to physical circuits and buttons to harden their ships against Romulan tele-hijack efforts. Unfortunately, Discovery’s computer interfaces would seem to rule out that elegant solution.

Non-sequitur: It occurs to me I’ve been reading and posting here for 10 years now!

I wish they’d just admit they actually want to think up and design their own sci-fi series but feel they have to use the name Star Trek to gain an audience only to go on and throw everything overboard that actually made Star Trek popular.

Bingo.

So you already have their prepared confessions written-up and ready for signature, regardless of whether the principals would actually agree with your charges or not? Because that’s in essence what you’re doing, telling us what other people “actually want” without providing any evidence.

Which is why the show would just make a lot more sense if it was in a post-Voyager era. They could design it how they liked (within reason) and just be an evolution of Trek like TNG did. But here, it feels like a complete reboot of TOS.

I still don’t get why they could’t just put the show in another era? Nothing about this story line couldn’t be done later on.

The Sarek/Burnham relationship, and its ties to Spock, could not have been done in another timeframe, much less one in the Voyager era. Whether or not you like what’s been done with that aspect of DSC, or if it was truly worth all the fuss of making this show a prequel to TOS, that’s what the creators wanted. Why you and others keep beating this particular drum I just don’t understand.

Yes but the Sarek/Burnham just feel like nothing more than complete fan service. ANY Vulcan could’ve been Burnharm’s foster dad. It adds nothing major to the show, especially now that we know Spock will never show up which kind of feels like a cop out.

And we keep bringing it up because the show feels completely out of place in this era. Honestly if it wasn’t for Sarek showing up you could put this show in practically any era. Thats why the drum gets beat.

Simply does not make any sense this Sarek/Michael relationship. Fool´s gold to makes believe (?) that this is Star Trek.

Tell you what, Tiger, when you write YOUR Trek show… YOU can put it in whatever timeline or universe you want. Until then, THIS is what the producers wanted. No use spending the next 7 years whining about it.

I thought I would not like DISCO, but it surprised me.

I hope we get seven years to whine, or applaud, as the case may be :^D

I happen to think that Burnham’s background and its impact on the show’s events is one of the more interesting things about it, but that’s just me. Many disagree, that’s for sure.

Its interesting for sure but you didn’t need Sarek at all. She could’ve been Tuvok’s foster daughter you would still have the same character. And I was hoping if anything we see more of a struggle between being human and Vulcan. She basically all human now outside of throwing in Vulcan phrases here and there.

I kind of wish they go a little stronger on that aspect and see her having issues being with a (mostly) human crew but it looks like its just about her being a mutineer now and trying to get back on good terms again.

Again, the producers wanted to Spock/Sarek tie-in. Tuvok would have worked in terms of Burnham’s messed-up psyche, but it wouldn’t have provided the ironic revelations about what we though we knew about Spock’s and Sarek’s estrangement in “Lethe,” which for my money is still the best franchise fan service moment Discovery has done so far.

And I agree that there is a lot more they could do with this. Burnham spent her first ten years or so as a normal human child, the next seven or eight repressing her emotions as a Vulcan, and then the next seven learning how to be human again. My biggest complaint about this show so far is that the producers seem to constantly get distracted by the latest shiny object (e.g. Ash/Voq) from some really interesting thematic material, and I hope that isn’t the case with Burnham’s background and the whole Vulcan issue in general.

I get that, the problem is its just set up for fan service and nothing else. With this set up is that the producers have made it clear they are never going to even bother reconciling the fact Spock or Sarek never mentioned having a sister or daughter. They basically going to throw it all in as a back story, which is not the end of the world but it does feel a bit lazy to me if this connection is never brought up in the bigger universe. Its just a way to please TOS fanboys and say ‘see, this show does connect to TOS although nothing about it looks or feel like TOS or the fact you will never see any of the main characters pop up on the show. But Sarek is there so we hope thats enough to keep you watching.’

And I LIKE Sarek on the show but there is really zero reason for him to be there.

“With this set up is that the producers have made it clear they are never going to even bother reconciling the fact Spock or Sarek never mentioned having a sister or daughter. “

Where are you getting this? I’ve never seen any such statement by the producers (and I do keep up). Akiva Goldsman has said that Spock will never be seen on DSC, but that’s hardly the same thing as the issue of Burnham never having been mentioned previously not being addressed. In fact, I strongly suspect that it will be by the end of the series’ run, if perhaps only indirectly.

For me, the revelations of “Lethe” (and perhaps more to come) were interesting enough to justify Sarek being on the show. As for his inclusion being just a sop to the fanboys: well, if that’s the case it certainly backfired spectacularly, as many like yourself only seem to endlessly complain about it.

If they said Spock is never going to be on the show how would they reconcile it? She’s going to get a letter?

I just don’t see the point I guess. It just feel too much like fan service and no strong reason for it. But I do like Sarek at least.

Well, why not a letter, or any other reasonable means of explaining why we hadn’t heard of Burnham previously? You might argue with some justification (though I wouldn’t) that the series owes us such an explanation, but if there’s any definition of fan service for my money a Nimoy-less appearance of Spock on Discovery would definitely be it.

LOL, this is exactly my point. It all feels forced because they have already said Spock (or any main character from TOS) will ever appear on the show. Spock never had a sister until now. They seem to want this to placate, someone, but it all feels unnecessary since they will never even put the characters in the same room according to the producers. I really didn’t mind the idea of Sarek being a mentor to her for example and would work great. She and Spock could’ve had a relationship through that but once you turn her into a sibling all kinds of questions arise.

While I thought Lethe was a generally decent episode, all I kept thinking throughout it is ‘how come Spock isn’t doing anything to save his own father’ or ‘how come Burnham hasn’t contacted her brother about the situation? Are they not on speaking terms?’ It just feels a bit too lazy how its being handled for me. They are siblings, both working in Starfleet but they don’t ever communicate to each other or ever acknowledge the others existence, even in the worst of times as Burnham is going through. Thats why the whole thing just feel like fan service instead of a real story reason to have it.

But maybe they will try and do something with it in season two.

Tell YOU what Captain Ransom, you can make an internet site where you can bar opinions you don’t like. The rest of us will keep saying what we do and DON’T like about it. That sort of how it works on the internet.

The fact so many bring this up (I was just responding to someone else for instance) shows how distracting this is for some. For the record I like the show, but making it a prequel was a mistake IMO if they threw everything out to the point you would never know it was a prequel to TOS. In that case, why bother?

How about you stop watching if you don’t like it Tiger. They aren’t gonna change it because you don’t like the era it’s set in. They made their choice toset it this that time period and have their plan to tie it all together. You want all the answers right now! You’re probably the kind of person that skips ahead when reading a book because can’t wait until the end to find out what is going to happen. We are halfway through the first season… have a little patience. You whine about the exact same thing on every freaking post.

I already said I like the show, that doesn’t devoid it of any criticism.

You sound like a fanboy who takes any issue to heart. Not my problem.

And if you haven’t figured it out Einstein Jones only brought up the uniform issue because he sees the complaints from fans about it. That should tell you this stuff isn’t in a bubble. Is it the end of the world, of course not.

But fans naturally call them out when they keep saying it’s all canon…and yet constantly ignore Canon.

I only ‘whine’ when the article is about these issues. If you don’t want criticism do yourself a favor and get off the internet.

And that’s the crux of it. Aside from the look, how are they ignoring canon?

The Klingon war for example happened during first contact with Starfleet that went on for decades which Picard cited in First Contact (the episode, not the movie). I found this out last month. But on Discovery the war happened a hundred years later and the Klingons basically isolated themselves that entire time. Of course you can really blame this on Enterprise since it was them that avoided that piece of canon (and I’m not blaming them, I can understand why they would want to avoid it) but yes that is definitely ignoring canon.

But its also why I hate prequels because they spend just as much time retconning canon as they do enforcing it.

Well, there have actually been much more egregious canon slips than what you’re citing over the years than a throwaway line in a fairly goofy episode. (If there was ever a Trek outing that could virtually function as an episode of The Orville with very minimal changes, “First Contact” would be it.) If that’s the extent of your gripe, I’m not sure what all the shouting is about.

And for the record I didn’t like the era it was set in BUT I assumed if they set it in this era then it was for a really good reason that I would understand, like Enterprise. But so far it doesn’t seem like any strong reason outside of squeezing in Sarek and Mudd for fan service (and I like them both). But it’s certainly not to emulate TOS in any way, that’s for sure.

Calastir, I wish you’d admit that you aren’t really a Trek fan and only come here to whine and moan.

I stopped watching Discovery. Not worth the subscription. Mushroom warp drive, overall vibe etc. I’ll wait to binge stream one of these days. However the Orville has be excited every week!!!!

Glad The Orville does it for you, and that you can take Yaphit more seriously than a spore drive.

If you have tuned out (which I am sure you haven’t) why are you bothering to come and read about it?

Me too. I watched Discovery 5 episodes and it was painfull. To be awfull, Discovery must get better.

I know this might be controversial for some here, but I’ve long since chosen NOT to look on the original ‘prime universe’ TOS show as actually showing a possible future for mankind in the first place!

It’s just another ‘alternate universe’ show scenario as far as I’m concerned, which just happens to include certain ‘doppelganger’ elements and names that are very similar to our own actual Earth’s past…but which is actually set in a totally separate, ‘alternate universe’ to our own.

The whole STAR TREK concept was made decades ago of course, so things are bound to look dated in many ways nowadays…so I just use this way of looking at it to help smooth out all it’s implausibilities, and to explain away the technological incongruities.

And I like to imagine the DISCOVERY show just happens to be set in yet another ‘alternate universe’ to TOS etc. in the scheme of things, where things developed/evolved differently despite what the makers claim…so the uniforms and silly ‘spore drive’ etc. don’t bug me so much now. ;)

It is in the same universe. It is what has been said over and over again. If you don’t like that… then go ahead and make up your own stuff. Whatever gets you through the day.

That’s EXACTLY why I’m making up my own stuff Captain…

…the numerous inconsistencies that the likes of the new DISCOVERY show’s makers have come up with just don’t make for a logical fit…no matter what they like to claim!

Perhaps you can be patient and wait. Or are you one of those people tht need answers NOW.

@ CR – I’m certainly patient and interested to see how things pan out in DISCOVERY. But merely getting to a point in the next season where the uniforms look more ‘THE CAGE’-like from what they look like now will not undo everything else that’s a totally misfit with the TOS show era.

But if it somehow turns out that they actually ARE in a different universe after all, then happy days!

Why do they have to change the uniforms next season? This is 10 years before kirk and spock. You do know they have had 2 different uniforms at the same time. In TOS alone they had 3 differnt uniforms styles.

Excited to read all the posts in reply to Doug Jones saying its Prime Timeline replying “yeah but…” No, its Prime. lol

Just because Doug Jones says something, it doesn’t make the inconsistencies vanish.

I’m enjoying Discovery and have no issue with where they are creatively. That said, I think it would have been just as acceptable to a modern audience to have a uniform design that harkens more to the TOS/Cage aesthetic than to the Enterprise aesthetic from 100 years before. If the JJVerse films were able to pull it off, I don’t see why it could not work here.

I agree, not being crazy from the first about the DSC uniforms. (Though I do like the re-work of the insignia.) But the tech updates would have been just as controversial, regardless.

It also doesnt make it “not Prime”. It is. Period (unless creatively, they alter that, but until such time as they do that, it is what they say it is, and they say its Prime).

For myself what makes it Prime is the story, and not how it’s visualized. Do Kirk, Spock et al still have the same biographies in the DSC universe, even if they would have to be played by different actors if we ever saw them? Then it’s Prime. Not so complicated.

Exactly. In Discovery, Captain Pike is still out there in command of the Enterprise, Spock is still his science officer.

That´s why they should use Pike´s period time uniforms.

Same for me. I’ve always liked Gene Roddenberry’s honesty about the Klingons having a different look in TMP from TOS. It was still the same Klingons, i.e. the same story; it’s just the way of telling it that was different.

Yep. No elaborate rationalizations, just “We didn’t have the budget for decent Klingon makeup before, and now we do.” Simple, and spoken at a time when the Trek fan base (and its creator) mostly considered the show to be inspirational entertainment and not Holy Writ. But, in truth? There were freakouts back then, too.

Lame excuse for the uniforms. Apparently he has never seen the last three movies. They used the original series uniforms as inspiration and they look fine. He’s unwilling to simply admit and be honest they don’t care to stay true to Star Trek.

Nice that you can state with such certainty what total strangers care and don’t care about.

I understand and appreciate what Jones said about the uniforms and it being 2017 and not 1966. I get it and understand and can go along with that. But at some point it has to feel like it will lead into even kinda sorta like what we saw in TOS. I think Enterprise succeeded. It looked different because it was made in the early 00’s but it also was far enough ahead of TOS that we could see how things could evolve into what we saw on TOS. This one is just way too close for such radical redesigns. I get that it’s 2017. It MUST get updated. But what Discovery has certainly doesn’t look like it can lead into TOS in a mere decade at all. And it certainly bears zero resemblance to the archaic TV tech from what canon dictates the Enterprise looked like 5 years before Discovery was built. Yes, it needs to be updated but even the KT timeline made more sense. And they kept the basic TOS uniform styles. The problem here is the bad decision to be set a mere 10 years ahead of TOS. Thus far it totally feels like this could have been set 10 years after the events of The Undiscovered Country and they would have the exact same show without all the Trek fan complaining about the look and feel of the ships and uniforms and the like.

100% agree, Kirok. And something else interesting about this thread thus far, are all the people saying they (at least) got the look of things ‘right’ in the Kelvin Universe. In comparison to DSC, they certainly did. I haven’t heard such kudos for the KU in quite some time.

Well, you can count me out. With the exception of the uniforms (which were okay, but could have been better) I think the production design of the KT films went wrong in just about every way possible, and much prefer the look of DSC.

You mean you didn’t like the Budgineering set? :-)

I always had problems with the look of the Kelvin era. The proportions of the nacelles on the ships always bugged me (they reminded me of the not very good drawings I used to try to make of the Enterprise when I was a kid). Too many sets looked like 20th century locations with a few doodads added in. The Art of Star Trek book that was released after the first film had some very interesting and more futuristic designs that were never used (the original concepts for engineering looked quite good) and it’s too bad because they felt far more 23rd century than what JJ ended up liking.

Forced to admit that using a brewery for engineering NEVER looked good. Not one bit. It didn’t look futuristic at all. I spotted it as looking like a brewery from the instant I saw it. Engineering on the Kelvin looked better and more advanced than engineering on the big E. But I enjoyed the film so that’s more of a minor nit pick than anything else.

The brewery was stupid. You can tell Lin wasn’t in love with it for Beyond because it was totally ignored.

I have that art book myself, and totally agree that many of the designs are superior to what eventually wound up on screen. Earlier sketches of the Enterprise are much closer to its TMP appearance (and thus much more graceful), and Engineering, while still industrial, looks suitably futuristic and nothing like a Van Nuys brewery.

The only aspects of Discovery that recall the Kelvin films for me are the Vulcan “learning pods” and the bridge viewscreen now being more of a window with sophisticated HUD capabilities. I have no problem with those (or the occasional Dutch angle or lens flare), since those were design touches in the films that I actually liked.

You forgot the flares.

They got the look of some things right. Everything up until they flash forwarded to angry Kirk bar fighting looked good. The Kelvin was great.

The Enterprise was awful.

Because they did.

Yes it was more advanced but it did try to feel TOS. Discovery could be anywhere franky.

They have said it will inch closer to TOS as they go. So we can stomp our feet now and argue that the people making the show dont know what they’re talking about and risk looking foolish later or we can let the story play out and judge it in its entirety later.

Agree as well Kirok!

I think Enterprise was smart to set it so far apart from TOS and it really felt like it’s own thing. I liked it felt current enough to our time but still less advance from TOS (although the ship looked more advanced).

Discovery just feels out of place completely. It doesn’t remotely feel close to TOS and it would be weird if everything got LESS advance to suddenly fit that era like the Star War prequels were super advance and then everything felt ancient and outdated In the OT later.

Honestly I rather they didn’t.

And anything outside time travel or yet ANOTHER universe wouldn’t explain all the changes. I hope it’s neither of those but what else could they do that doesn’t feel like a total stretch?

This is not Star Trek. It’s just another space opera tv show and not a very good one at that.

Agreed, this show is severely lacking in execution. The disregard for what has come before is glaring. I find it difficult to believe that the same group that has issues with the Kelvin Films have no problem with this show. As far as I am concerned the Orville is THE new Trek.

I hated the Kelvin films for the most part, and while I do have some issues with DSC in terms of style and narrative ambition I have seen much to like and admire, and vastly prefer it in any case to the occasionally-fun-but-always-disposable Orville. To each his own!

Then stop watching. Go watch Orville then. Go post on those boards. If you are done with Trek… stop posting about how much you hate it.

I had some of the same issues for the Kelvin films but it was easier to accept being in a different universe and all (although Khan just made no sense period).

But yes I agree how people who complained about the KT films but have no issues with the one is weird. But I guess because they are told it will be explained in time. But the KT films WERE explained and people still complained about them.

I’ll take the uniforms from The Motion Picture over these any day.

ST:TMP is still my favorite Trek movie and I will always love the production design from that one. To me, it still looks fresh and not at all dated, even today.

@ Sybock\’s Other Brother – Agreed. Although they were blandly beige, at least they looked comfortable!

It’s just so hard for me to accept the uniform explanation when I’m so invested in canon. Agree with lots of the comments here: if they had just set the series post-Nemesis, all these arguments would have fallen away. I think they were forced into Fuller’s 10-years-before-Kirk framework and chose to develop their own sci-fi show with the Star Trek brand attached. That said, I still like the show.

I think the Discovery uniforms might be easier to take if they were a little simpler. Maybe if they didn’t have the Buck Rogers flair on the sides. That’s a bit much.

I do think that is the other issue with these uniforms, they just feel too busy for me. I do like they actually have pockets though.

Pockets are good.

The uniforms also look a little snug and uncomfortable. Are skinny jeans still popular in the 23rd century?

Well, Kirk and Bones do wear jeans while camping out in TFF…

How about Star Fleet changes to TOS uniforms when it decides to start sending ships on deep space missions and need more comfortable unis. Give it time people!!

Also, keep in mind they reportedly created TOS style unis for Discovery and changed their minds.

One could speculate the reason was avoiding confusion with the JJ films. And also, creatively, if the plan is to inch towards TOS, the unis is an easy thing to introduce later to signal a transition to what came before (or after).

Pisscovery should reboot itself to be decent but it seems that the writers are completely lost in their own stupidity. Without the CGI there is nothing in this miserable series.

“Pisscovery,” eh? Cute. Tell you what: the next time I need critical analysis from an apparent six year-old, I’ll ask for it.

Let´s discuss Pisscovery as you wish .Well, there are so many issues regarding Discovery that is hard to remember all of them, but I can point some 1- The “spores” engine technology. What are they talking about ? Did this subject create interesting plots ? What´s the point of it so far ? 1- The “invention” of Michael as Spocks´sister is problematic. Why did the writers did it ? Merely to remember us that they are talking about Star Trek ? Sarek never cared about much about Spock because his part-human “personality”. Why should he spend time with Michael ? Does it make ny sense ? Or was it a cheap trick to gain our simpaty ? 3- Michael´s personality. She studied in Vulcan and it seems that she learned nothing. All she does is wrong and emotive. Doe make any sense the main character be such a jerk ? 4- If Discovery is not Sector 31 project, I´m sorry, it´s really not Star Trek. ST always teach us how important is to be tolerant. A fine crew is one of the most precious things a starship has. What do we see in Discovery ? 5- Lorca´s personality. He is a psicopath. Even you don´t agree with me, why did he murdered all his former crew ? Klingons don´t take prisoners, right ? What we saw in the next episode ? Mudd and a human male arrested for 6 months in a Klingon ship as prisioners ? WTF ! It does not make any sense !

Continuing….6- The Discovery´”spin” movement. C´mon, it´s hilarious, ridiculous ! Are we talking about Star Trek or not ? Does not make any sense. 7- The way the Klingons talk is so irritating. It seems that the rubber mask don´t allow them to speak normally. 7- The Discovery and the other ships CGI . To me it looks like a PC game. 8- The other ships are horrible. The Klingon ship looks like a chicken ! What these designers have in their minds anyway ?? 9- Most of the cast is awfull, there is no charisma at all. The only good actors are Jason Isaacs and Doug Jones. But Anthony Rapp and Mary Wiseman looks like amateurs.10_ The Vulcans now have superpowers. In Star Trek, the mind meld demands extreme efford and now they can communicate through space ?!!

The Discovery uniforms did not surprise me, nor did they indicate to me that Discovery’s timeline is different from that of TOS. Discovery is set in wartime. TOS is (basically) set in peacetime. Compare early 1940’s fashion with early 1960’s – both men’s and (certainly) women’s fashions were more austere during WWII than in the JFK era. So one could say that TOS’s women’s crew miniskirts – and men’s crew Nehru jackets – reflect more relaxed peacetime fashions. Now, why the TOS women’s crew uniforms objectify women’s crew members’ bodies as they do is harder to explain, but compare Rosie the Riveter to go-go boots, and you start to understand. Discovery’s wartime setting explains a lot.

This makes no sense. The DSC uniforms were around for many years before the Klingon war even started. Battle of the Binary Stars made that clear in the flashback. That and the fact everyone was actually wearing them when the war started. It has nothing to do with ‘peacetime’, and more to do with the producers simply changing the look like they changed the look of practically everything in this show when compared to TOS.

I get people want to constantly try to rectify things in-universe why so and so looks different. But once again the problem is this show takes place AFTER The Cage where the TOS style uniforms were already being worn and established. Its simply a change for the sake of it or they would’ve found a way to either explain why the uniforms are different OR at least show someone else in Starfleet wearing the TOS uniforms in this period as well. They haven’t done either.

And to make this clear they don’t HAVE to explain anything but then in all honesty they should simply call the show for what it is: a reboot. I mean thats all this is. They keep saying its suppose to be in the same timeline as TOS but how would anyone know???? Besides the phasers and a couple of sound effects (which I found out on Reddit they use both TOS and TNG sound effects as well) you wouldn’t know. I know I always harp on the prequel bit but I would actually be more fine with if they just said it was a reboot and they were simply going their own way instead of constantly trying to reconcile two very different shows as somehow being part of the same timeline. We have eyes.

Hello, Tiger2. I agree with you fully as to the Discovery 2-part opener (Vulcan Hello/Binary Stars), where the uniforms, to be “true” to the timeline, should have been like those in TOS’s The Cage. The Shenzhou was a science vessel, as was Pike’s Enterprise. The crew should have been wearing Cage-like peacetime uniforms. But by the time we see Lorca in command of Discovery in Context Is for Kings, the Federation has converted what was to be a science vessel into a military vessel – and, thus the military uniforms. It is in that sense that I wrote that the Discovery uniforms did not surprise me, nor did they indicate to me that Discovery’s timeline is necessarily different from that of TOS.

Now, I am sure that the Discovery producers/writers/costume designers didn’t think about having the Discovery (and certainly not the Shenzhou) uniforms in synch with the timeline of TOS at all. They just wanted more modern (in the 2017 sense) uniforms. But for people to think that simply because the Discovery uniforms aren’t like the uniforms in The Cage, Discovery cannot be in the timeline of the TOS, is more than a bit silly to me.

OK, I understand. This was a well thought out answer by the way. I am not suggesting because the uniforms are different it doesn’t mean its not the same timeline but yes I think as others been saying it would at least help if they showed the other uniform in some instance because other wise it feels like the timeline is simply being ignored.

And for the record I HATE the Cage uniforms lol. I am happy they are not part of the show and understand why they were changed. But it doesn’t take a lot to at least acknowledge they at least existed in this time which is the big head scratcher. These writers know Trek fans are fickle and how important canon is to them. They have decided to put this show in a timeline where things looked a certain way. I definitely agree I want a more advance and updated look, that is not the problem. But you can still at least acknowledge what came before and not completely overwrite all of it like its a reboot, which is what this show feels like and why many question if its in the same timeline, even if it is.

not cannon at all

Once again, the Discovery novelization retcons this by noting that Starfleet is constantly beta-testing different uniform styles simultaneously. The Constitution-class ships (so far unseen) have the TOS/Cage style, the bulk of Starfleet has the blue and metallic style which can be seen as an evolution from the blue / gold, high-waisted Kelvin-era uniforms of the 2230s.

I don’t get why people say ‘Enterprise looked more advanced than TOS’.

Audiences in the 2000s grew up watching NASA moon missions, the Space Shuttle, the ISS.

I’ve visited the Johnson Space Center and there’s decades of differences between the Apollo/Gemini mission control and the ISS room. The 1960s NASA had bulky purpose-built control stations with CRT displays, built-in dial telephones, a million physical switches, and also, they sent messages around the place using pneumatic tube capsules!

The ISS control room looks like a cross between a LAN party and a call center, except for the big front-of-room displays. The furniture looks like slightly bigger office cubicles, the displays are standard LCD flat panels, they seem to run everything off standard PCs on a network, and they have some specialized gear like touchscreen comms systems.

Anyone who’s travelled between cities in the last 20 years has probably flown in an Airbus commercial airliner with an all-glass cockpit – multiple LCD displays with side buttons, instead of bulky analog instruments and switches. The same kind that are scattered all over Enterprise’s bridge!

And home game consoles are powerful enough to run incredibly realistic simulations, including virtual reality. Why couldn’t a 23rd century ship have primitive holo-simulations or (as seen in the Kelvinverse films) transparent displays and eyepiece HUDs?

At this point, Enterprise is 134 years in our future. The fact that its bridge looks only like a slight extrapolation of modern-day NASA aerospace gear is actually interesting, because I would expect it to look FAR more advanced, when you consider the leaps we’ve made in the last 50 years. I guess the Eugenics Wars / WWIII knocked things back a bit, or they wanted to be conservative in giving audiences something they could understand as being recognizably human in origin, but much less advanced than the touch panels and voice interfaces of TNG, DS9 and Voyager.

You can make the argument, then, that TOS is *still* more advanced. Those blinky colored panels could be some kind of LCARS panels, except for the fact that 1960s TV sets couldn’t show that level of detail so they never bothered rendering it. The consoles are cleaner, more ergonomic, the space is more open, less cramped (certainly, the hallways are more spacious, with a hint of a high ceiling); the doors are elegant and simple, not bulky and “rugged”; there are larger displays above each station that can be seen at a distance (something carried over in the JJPrise, using seamless bands of high-resolution displays); crew cabins are less spartan.

For Discovery, if we ever see a Constitution class, you could rebuild the bridge set more or less as-is, keeping the colour scheme and shapes, but subtly upgrading the detail of the consoles and inserting LCDs behind the panels to provide detailed motion graphics, and that would give us a believable transition from the DSC era to TOS.