Once again the CBS All Access series Star Trek: Discovery is going through a shakeup at the top with the second change in showrunner for the series. First reported by The Hollywood Reporter and confirmed by Variety and Deadline, executive producers Gretchen J. Berg and Aaron Harberts have been let go.
Discovery’s co-creator and executive producer Alex Kurtzman will take over following a planned production hiatus after episode five of the second season. THR also reports that executive producer and Kurtzman’s right-hand man Akiva Goldsman has not returned for season two.
CBS confirmed these changes to in a statement provided to the trade press:
“We’ve made some producer changes at Star Trek: Discovery, the series continues under the creative vision and leadership of executive producer and co-creator Alex Kurtzman. Discovery remains on course for season two in 2019 with new and continuing stories that build on its successful premiere season.”
A troubled writers’ room
The ousting of Berg and Harberts is said to be due to leadership and operational issues, and not based on their creative work. According to THR’s sources, the pair were behind tensions in the writers room. From the THR report:
Berg and Harberts became increasingly abusive to the Discovery writing staff, with the latter said to have leaned across the writers’ room table while shouting an expletive at a member of the show’s staff. Multiple writers are said to have been uncomfortable working on the series and had threatened to file a complaint with human resources or quit the series altogether before informing Kurtzman of the issues surrounding Berg and Harberts. After hearing rumors of HR complaints, Harberts is said to have threatened the staff to keep concerns with the production an internal matter.
THR is also reporting that the premiere episode of season two went well over budget, and that subsequent episode budgets would likely take a hit due to the overspending.
Star Trek: Discovery writers during season one, with Aaron and Gretchen seated with a visiting Michelle Yeoh
Moved up after Fuller exit
Berg and Harberts were originally brought as writers for Discovery’s first season by co-creator and executive producer Bryan Fuller, after having worked with him in the past. The pair were tapped to take over Fuller’s showrunner duties after he left the series in October of 2016, following clashes with CBS over budget constraints and deadlines.
Both Berg and Harberts have writing credits on three episodes of Discovery’s first season. They co-wrote the one episode (“Context is for Kings”) which CBS recently submitted for consideration for a Best Writing Emmy. They have also been highly visible faces for promotion of the show with multiple appearances on After Trek and a number of panel discussions, including one just a few days ago.
Aaron Harberts and Gretchen J. Berg (second and third from the left) were part of last weeks Emmy FYC panel in Los Angeles
Goldsman not returning
In another departure, executive producer Akiva Goldsman has reportedly not returned for the second season of Star Trek: Discovery. According to THR, Goldsman was said to have “a management style and personality that clashed with the writing staff.” It is unknown whether or not he will retain an executive producer credit for the second season.
Goldsman was brought on after Bryan Fuller’s departure as an executive producer and directed two episodes in the first season, including the season finale.
Akiva Goldsman at Discovery writers panel at Star Trek Las Vegas 2017
Kurtman taking the helm
After production woes overshadowed much of the show’s early days, some fans were hopeful that a fresh start with a committed leadership team in season two would give Discovery a clean slate. It remains to be seen how this news will affect the second season’s storyline. CBS are said to be pleased with what they have seen so far, and Discovery is currently in production on the fifth episode of the second season.
Co-creator and executive producer Alex Kurtzman, who directed the first episode of the second season, will take over as sole showrunner of Discovery starting with episode six, which comes after an already planned production hiatus. Deadline reports, it is possible for another showrunner to be recruited down the road to help.
Alex Kurtzman directing Star Trek: Discovery
Season two coming in 2019
The second season of Discovery began production in April and will consist of thirteen episodes. It will pick up right after the end of season one, which featured the introduction of the USS Enterprise. Anson Mount has been cast to take on the role of Captain Pike, commander of the USS Enterprise and comedian Tig Notaro has also joined, playing Denise Reno, chief engineer of the USS Hiawatha.
A premiere date for season two has not been officially set, but the statement from CBS notes it will be in 2019.
Star Trek: Discovery is available exclusively in the USA on CBS All Access. It airs in Canada on Space and streams on CraveTV. It is available on Netflix everywhere else.
Keep up with all the Star Trek: Discovery news at TrekMovie.
Season 1 didn’t work for me on any level, so maybe this is good news.
Actually, other than some questionable aesthetic choices that were too disconnected from previous Trek incarnations, I really enjoyed Season 1. It’s amazing it turned out as good as it did given the poop storms taking place behind the scenes. My fingers are crossed that Kurtzman can clean up the mess…
It’s very forgettable. It’s not something I’d rewatch over and over like every other Star Trek
It’s only Trek series video struggled to get through and it’s first Trek I am walking away from.
Ended with Enterprise for me.
It’s sad, I am a trek fan all my life and I can’t like this but I guess if you like, then you are s better man than I
Hypothetically speaking, I think that a “better man” would just walk away from it then and wouldn’t bitch and moan about it every week on a fan web site.
A better man wouldn’t constantly follow around those he accuses of bitching an moaning with the express intention of trolling them over and over. ;)
Ain’t that right? Talk about the irony being lost on him…
Exactly!
You bringing up trolling behavior is the funniest thing I’ve heard all year. I love irony – thanks for that!
Lol
Well said. Season 1 was very good. The best Season 1 of a Trek series since DS9.
Season 1 was awesome.
Trolling?
Everyone, even the fans know it was flawed & inconsistent even if they liked it.
Have you tried to re-watch season 1 and 2 of TNG recently? It’s mostly cringe.
But in the 80s it was groundbreaking and the best on TV. Discovery was dumb mainstream schlock.
The first two seasons of TNG were regarded as mostly terrible at the time. They weren’t groundbreaking *or* the best on TV. Yeah, it won a Peabody for one episode.
I mostly quit watching after Season 2 (and caught up later) but started again toward the end of 3.
It started getting better in Season 3, but the real turnaround was Best of Both Worlds.
@Jack — that’s almost exactly my experience as well, except I just stopped bothering to tune in during season 2 — If I happened to be free when it was on, I might watch it. But it ceased to be must see TV for me. What’s interesting is that was right around the same time the TOS VHS tapes started to become available, and I had begin my collection a year earlier, so if I needed a Trek fix, I’d more than likely just pick a VHS to watch, than tune into TNG. That changed after Season 3.
I gave up on it late in s2 or beginning of s3, and only started watching again when I heard they now had an open submission policy in place (I had actually went through an illicit back-door approach to get some of my stuff to story consultant Hannah-Louise Shearer near the end of season one — mailed directly to her house — on the off-chance she would read it, but she was an upstanding WGA member and called me, saying she admired my resourcefulness but couldn’t read the material.)
Right after I resumed watching, I saw THE TRAITOR and was like, WOW, this is GOOD! Though there were a LOT of beats that seemed taken from one of my favorite Pocket TREK novels, MY ENEMY MY ALLY. So I was jealous that it was so good, but also a little concerned that it had too many points of similarity with the Duane novel (I still have issues about it, in fact.) And then the next couple times I watched, I liked it; and when Yesterday’s E aired, I was like, hey, I kinda-sorta like this now.
No, early TNG — actually nearly all of it — didn’t hold a candle to THIRTYSOMETHING or MOONLIGHTING or ST. ELSEWHERE. I think I liked the two eps of CAPTAIN POWER better than most s1 TNG.
Jeez. That was 30 years ago!
“Jeez. That was 30 years ago!”
Seriously? Aren’t you the guy who mentions TOS (which was like 52 years ago!) in like every other post?
No offensive meant, but in my opinion this is very hypocritical of you of all people to say this.
Sorry Borg, I seem to have started a vendetta with you and it’s evident you trawl through these post looking for ammunition which I seem to have inadvertently given you.. Well all I can say (to paraphrase Shatner) is, get a life…
Case for the defense:
1. The great episodes of TOS are important and I will extol their virtues incessantly, true. Try stopping me.. (Oh, hold on, you just did..)
2. Using the fact that TNG’s S1 & 2 were less than stellar as a reason for why Discovery should not be great is just stating a precedent, it’s not an excuse. The quality of scripted TV in general has improved immensely in 30 years. Discovery is not one of today’s great scripted shows. That’s my position and I will maintain it..
Hope that’s clear enough now..
Again Borg, I can see my “jeez..” reply has become a bit distanced in the thread from the comment to which I was responding which was “Have you tried to re-watch season 1 and 2 of TNG recently? It’s mostly cringe.”
DPrescott,
Re: to paraphrase Shatner
Actually, you’d be doing nothing of the kind as the words are Robert Smigel’s, who is the gent that you’d be paraphrasing. Shatner couldn’t even come up with the proper way to say the line Smigel of Triumph the Insult Comic Puppet Dog fame, wrote until Robert took pity on him and showed him how it was done.
Appreciate the correction, thanks.
Being unecessarily belligerent towards me in a personal manner just so you won’t get your views challenged is pretty lame. I was simply pointing out, as Dr. McCoy would say, that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. :-)
But thanks for just indirectly admitting that you do use references to both 30 and 50-year-old Trek shows — thus illustrating that it’s OK for others to do that as well given you do it yourself all the time.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. :-)
I admit I saw red at the hypocrite remark.. My mistake BorgKlingon as with you, sorry to say, it is simply a pointless argument. I could once again try to make the point that it’s nonsensical to say that because TNG S1 & 2 were poor 30 years ago, that excuses Discovery for the same charge now, but you won’t hear that and will simply post I’ve proven another charge you’ve levelled against me. I’m done.
Your mistake wass not just saying, “good point, I stand corrected,” and moving on. Instead you first you tried to personally attack me, now you are playing the “poor misunderstood victim card.” This is all just so lame.
This is getting very old and stale, so I’m done with this conversation as well.
That’s new, okay thanks.
I’ve rewatched TNG remastered and I still love it. I esspecially love season 1. A lot of Mindfuck and phylosophic stuff. Discovery was lacking good writing and plot.
TNG was, and stil is, important. Some dodgy moments, but that’s true of all sci fi shows, I guess..
TNG is crap. I never watch it now.
I was one of those weird freaks that didn’t hate the first two seasons like everyone did. I agreed it was definitely the lowest point of the series but I didn’t mind most of the episodes and of course you do have to remind people some of the best episodes and characters actually did come from those two seasons like Q, the Borg, Lore etc. A lot of those stories ended up getting bigger arcs in the future and it was a season 2 episode that earned the show its Peabody award, The Big Goodbye. I just recently rewatched Elementary Dear Data and its better than I remembered it which of course got a sequel years later with Ship in a Bottle.
Of course I’m not trying to revision history here I get it was more bad than good but they weren’t ALL bad and oddly some of the more classic episodes came from those seasons.
We all have our likes. I’m one of the few people, if there are any more, who liked Heart of Glory from the first season.
Oh yeah that was a good episode, a final a worf episode,next gen got good towards the end of season 1 I. Feel if the writer strike had not happen then season 2 could of been so Much batter
Not to be pedantic, but BIG GOODBYE was middle of s1, not in s2. Torme was in the doghouse with production by middle of season 2, they would have peed all over the script and made it too clumsy to win anything if it had aired in s2 (nearly all of his s2 stuff was really trashed by other people rewriting — though to be honest, I didn’t find GOODBYE all that great, though the moment when the holo cop wonders what will happen to him after Dix leaves really really worked, and gave the whole thing a nice mournful quality, that I wished they’d ended with.
Big Goodbye is a pretty lame episode. The whole Picard/Dixon Hill thing never worked for me, and this is another in a series of lazy writing Holodeck episodes.
I hated the Holoeck on TNG; stories relying on it showed a lack of imagination IMHO.
I don’t think I really liked a holodeck show till HOLLOW DREAMS, the Barclay episode. And I remember liking SHIP IN A BOTTLE, but that may just be due to some really nice ‘in space’ vfx, it has been a l-o-n-g time since seeing it.
Then again, I never understood why it seemed like Dr. Crusher put on her plays while using conventional building materials instead of setting them in a holodeck that could have displayed a full environment; was the thought that stage drama HAS to be done with a minimum of verisimilitude?
Ah, that Barclay ep – yea, that was an exception – I agree.
Oh… Well you just took a step too far. The Barclay stuff was terrible too.
See, I found Barclay very easy to relate to. And when Picards slips and says broccoli, it is a nice moment.
In fact, building on the Barlcay love, I really wanted a ‘misfits of Trek’ series, perhaps with Dukhat when he snatched that Bird of Prey, with the idea being he would be his own thing, a la FIREFLY. Bring aboard Tasha Yar’s sister, maybe that Vulcan Maquis chick, Barclay — the folks who didn’t fit well with Bermania. When I first thought of this, Eddington was still alive, and the idea of Eddington and Dukhat in an uneasy alliance on the same privateer vessel would have been like BLAKE’S SEVEN gold to me.
It was way worse on Voyager. Like seriously. The holodeck can take you anywhere and any time as long as it’s programmed and they only ever used it to play pool in Sandrines every time. Every time. Was the holodeck broken ?
It costs money to make different sets. Why not reuse the one you have? Why do you think Janeway went to DaVinci’s place all the time?
ML31,
Re: It costs…
Not to mention, one assumes as, in story, they were constantly rationing everything, that they often couldn’t spare the largess of an unknown quantity of energy that would be consumed to create something new that the holodeck had never manifested before? And yet, the Hirogen considerations seemed to throw that idea, that the holodeck had energy consumption (not to mention others) limits, right out the window?
In an effort to be positive… I agree. There are certain subjects in TNG where one knew it would be a lame episode. Among them, any episode where Wesley was the A or B story. The Troi centered episodes. And any episode involving the holodeck.
So bad, even when it was made, but the spirit of trek was there
“Have you tried to re-watch season 1 and 2 of TNG recently? It’s mostly cringe.”
Irrelevant. The circumstances surrounding both shows couldn’t be more different. Plus, the same could be said of STD where one of the 15 episodes had merit. Written by a man who quit before this regime change.
TNG is crap now.
HN4. “TNG is crap now”. Amazing comment. It conjures up s vision of TNG slowly deteriorating over the last 30 years..
So we can’t compare DSC to TNG, but you get to compare DSC to The Orville?
“ML31 — Michael, I would agree that Discovery did indeed aim higher than Orville did. Even with that being the case, if I were only allowed to watch one of those two, Orville would win every time simply because I find that Orville works much better than Discovery does.”
And yet you gave the rationale for your rejecting Rel’s comparison to TNG as, “The circumstances surrounding both shows couldn’t be more different.” … which is exactly the same case with The Orville comparison you allow yourself to make — we all would agree I am sure that the circumstances for The Orville series couldn’t be more different than the circumstances for the DSC series.
So again, you insist on your usual unfair proclamations here regarding others where you apply a different set of rules to the rest of us in terms of the menu of items we can discuss, versus different options that you yourself get to use.
It is so hard for you to simply acknowledge that the general consensus opinion among the majority of Trek fans is that TNG’s first two seasons were considered kind of boring and forgettable at best, if not outright awful at worst…and also that it is perfectly OK for people to bring this up in comparing it to DSC’s first season and other Trek series’ first seasons? Like, duh, this comparison can be made, regardless of your proclamations to the contrary, and especially given you did it yourself with the Orville.
Why do you need to use these “debate tricks?” Surely your views would still have merit if you have to “play” them on a “level field,” right?
“but you get to compare DSC to The Orville?”
Only in the sense that I “compare” every show to decide if I want to take the time to view it.
“And yet you gave the rationale for your rejecting Rel’s comparison to TNG as, “The circumstances surrounding both shows couldn’t be more different.” … which is exactly the same case with The Orville comparison you allow yourself to make”
This is not making logical sense here. I’m not sure you have understood the comment you are referencing. Perhaps if you could re-word your thoughts to make things a little more clear?
“It is so hard for you to simply acknowledge that the general consensus opinion among the majority of Trek fans is that TNG’s first two seasons were considered kind of boring and forgettable at best, ”
I wasn’t really confirming or denying that.
“and also that it is perfectly OK for people to bring this up in comparing it to DSC’s first season and other Trek series’ first seasons?”
One can but it is different circumstances. Comparing a streaming show with no deadlines and no time constraints that only needs to produce less than 1/3 of the product their 30 year old counterpart did? Seems a little disingenuous to me. Comparing it to a modern counterpart… A show with similar number of episodes but one that still has more restrictions than STD has… Not completely even but that’s still a little more fair in my book. And even with those disadvantages, Orville succeeded better at what they were shooting for than what STD was shooting for. It is really that hard for you to acknowledge the obvious differences?
Regarding “debate” tricks… Such terms are normally reserved for use only by folks who have been bested by reason and can not support the counters to their points.
“Only in the sense that I “compare” every show to decide if I want to take the time to view it.”
That’s all you needed to say. Thanks for confirming this. Now please just relax and let others make their comparisons, and it’s perfectly fine if they have their own view on what circumstances they want to make those comparisons on — you don’t get to be “Comparison Sheriff” of this site.
But I do get to weigh in on the discussion. And if someone says something that doesn’t quite ring right, I will decide if I want to enter in the fray and mention it. In this case, comparing if a show is worthy of giving it attention is not he same thing as comparing the production circumstances of one show to another with different circumstances more than a generation earlier. Which I thought was self evident but I guess not to you. Also, I noticed that you completely ignored my request for you to clarity your disjointed comments. Which I suppose I should be thankful for.
Well “Star Trek” in any iteration is no “Mad Men” that’s for sure
;^)
I don’t know. I watched the first season of Mad Men some time ago and thought it was amazingly overrated. It wasn’t BAD. But it sure wasn’t great. And it wasn’t interesting enough to get me to catch the 2nd season.
Really? We rewatch MAD MEN pretty regularly, and wind up going through the whole run, even when we think we’re only going to watch s1. I really dislike the change in look as they switched to shooting digital (taking an available-light look does a real disservice to the period feel), but the material stayed mostly strong throughout.
Funny you should mention that. When I first re-watched TNG to see the re-mastered episodes, I was mostly watching from a technical perspective — it was amazing to see how much better they looked than when I originally saw them in the 1980s. I was still stunned by how badly they were lit in some cases, and how low the production value was. Much of those sets, props, makeup and costumes, don’t hold up under HD scrutiny.
Lately I’ve been re-watching them in the background as they come on during the time I happen to be home with nothing else on TV. I started watching them cropped to see how well they framed to 16:9 (as TOS is almost 99.8% perfect when cropped that way). I discovered much of TNG is poorly framed, but as I sat down to watch certain episodes, I found it increasingly difficult to watch the first couple of seasons. They are uniformly bad. So bad, that despite there being little else on to peak my interest, I just have to tune away from them. They’re almost unwatchable.
You watch tos CROPPED? Do you just like not having to see Shatner’s hairpiece or something?
I can’t imagine watching anything that isn’t original aspect ratio, but then again, I have never seen it as bars around the image, as I embraced widescreen laserdisc 30 years ago and never looked back (and why should I? Looking back would be to trying to watch 2001 on NBC, and realizing very early that this movie makes no sense in 4:3. Much like RIVER KWAI, which had a shot with two guys at a table in which for minutes, all you see is their hands go in and out of frame, without seeing the actors themselves.)
Great point. It’s nearly unwatchable. The worst two seasons of any Trek series to date…even Enterprise was slightly better.
If fan who comments how much he likes a show on a forum about that show is a troll, what do you call someone who hates that show and continually regurgitates the same stupid complaints?
Marvin
Having a comment section is really doing a disservice to this website. Just imagine how many trek fans stop coming here because of the losers that post here.
HN4 you put down Star Trek just as much everyone here. You do what everyone does, you defend the shows you like and put down all the others but in your weird case you claim to now hate all of them except Discovery. So you are discouraging people to like the franchise just like you are accusing others. Saying TOS/TNG/ENT etc is crap isn’t any better than someone saying Discovery is crap lol.
You know I love ya @Tiger2, but why do you keep taking this troll seriously? I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, there’s no bigger troll on this website. Trek fans can have reasonable disagreements about which Treks worked and which didn’t, and why. That’s the beauty of a comments section among (virtual) friends.
@Holden Cry me a river dude.
Why would I do that? You seem to be drowning well enough on your own.
I just hated the hypocrisy in his statement and called him out. But yes maybe that was the point. I’m not even sure he even loves Discovery as much as he claims anymore, its just sad a 40 year old guy acts like this on the internet.
@Tiger2 I only say that to piss off the losers.
I hope we can all agree that someone who admits they only post certain material in order to “piss off” people is the textbook definition of a troll.
[scrolling down, scrolling down]
“Everyone,” by definition, already included “the fans.”
That’s the point of using an all inclusive word like “everyone.”
It worked for me in stray moments; I liked most of the cast, and the effects, and some of the design aesthetic. That’s about it.
I will not miss any of these departees. (Especially Hollywood Hack Akiva Goldsman, who ruins one project after another and just gets way with it over and over again.)
Isn’t he the one who laughed and said “Klingons have two penises! Haha! Klingons have two penises!” The guy’s a perfect fit for old TV/Holllywood production …
Also was it he and Lindelof who suggested STiD’s villain “should be Khan because everybody knows Khan”?
Everyone responsible for that “two penis” klingon debacle needs to be fired if you ask me.
I have nothing personal against the guy but that was just so dumb.
Have a look at what this guy wrote and / or produced over the years and say that again! :-D
I’ll happily say it again: I hope I never have to see another thing Goldsman wrote or worked on. He’s done SOME good stuff, yes; presumably by accident.
“Discovery” is not one of them.
I think you’d find that most Goldsman stuff that was good featured a ton of input from other writers, credited and uncredited. Pretty much the same is true with John Logan; his solo work is mostly abyssmal, ranging from BATS to NEMESIS and even his taking somebody else’s idea and running it into the ground, like SKYFALL.
I was about to say that anything Goldsman had his name on that had any kind of merit was due to the other people who had a hand in writing it. Unlike Logan. Who HAS been involved in some good stuff. Like Nemesis, Gladiator and Skyfall.
Well, might be a good time to clean up the house and hire new and good writers!
I Agee completely!!
Yeah,but the writers stay. Those who said the writing was crap leave.
Oh where you got that Haberts and Berg said the writing was crap?
They where in charge and greenlit everything!
Am I to understand your comment as: “By abusing the writing staff, Harberts and Berg were saying the writing was crap”?
With any luck!
Welcome back Ahmed! It’s been awhile I think. Or I just missed some of the threads you been posting on.
@Tiger2,
Thanks, I’ve away from TM for a long time. ‘Discovery’ dampened my excitement about Trek in general but now with two possible new movies and rumored new shows I’m a bit optimistic about Trek.
Yes me too! I have been more positive about Discovery second season but I am more hopeful we can get Trek that feels like Star Trek, ie exploration. Crossing my fingers.
This is the TNG staff revolving door all over again. Then, it was season 3 before it settled. Does anyone want to take my bet that Bryan Fuller will return by end of Discovery S2?
Fuller won’t return. He has a bad record with many shows over the past couple of years.
@DPrescott,
Highly doubtful. Fuller was fired from his last 3 projects ‘Star Trek: Discovery’, ‘American Gods’ and ‘Amazing Stories’ and all that within 2 years.
He also left or was fired from “The Vampire Chronicles” earlier this year.
LOL he’s been let go of The Vampire Chronicles too??? I had no idea. Oh man I was really excited he was doing that. What is WITH this guy? How do you lose four high profile jobs in two years? Three of them in pre-production. After awhile you have to admit its not them, its YOU!
Maybe its isn’t him- maybe it’s the system & he keeps standing up to it (& getting knocked down lol)
Apparently he left American Gods because he wanted more money per episode even after the first season went $30 million over budget.
A real revolutionary. ;D
He got fired from Amazing Stories too. News to me. That guy needs an intervention.
He didn;t get fired from ST:D, he left after Moonves told him to make it more like the garbage received, than Star Trek.
troll
Fuller couldn’t successfully show-run himself out of an episode of Barney.
This is the best way to look at it. DISC is still finding its identity behind and in front of the camera . . . and that’s a good thing! I didn’t have major issues with the showrunners’ creative direction, but was frustrated by their inability in interviews to reflect thoughtfully on the show’s imperfections as well as they enjoyed verbally celebrating their successes. It struck me as artists who weren’t interested in growing. And it sounds like their ego got the best of them behind the scenes as well.
I’d take that bet. Talk about easy money
Won’t place any bets re: Fuller, but the BTS chaos of early TNG is exactly what flashed through my mind when I heard this.
Douglass, what occurred to me also, is how the TNG churn in writers impacted negatively on what ultimately appeared on the screen in S1 & 2. Once Michael Piller brought some harmony in season 3, the OVERALL quality improved quite erm.. dramatically. Let’s hope for the same here.
If you mean the show became bland & stagnant & you couldn’t tell one episode from another, with a few exceptions each season, than yes.
And yet it’s one of the most successful TV shows of all time.
Well, there’s harmony and there’s harmony. Piller is the one who seemed to go out of his way to creatively hamstring Melinda Snodgrass, to the point that she was happy to escape TREK (an odd spot for a true devotee) when her contract was up. What he did to THE HIGH GROUND was unforgivably stupid, destroying what has always sounded to me like a classic-in-the-making, and I guess he messed over what I call the MORK&MINDY episode, the one with Data down on a planet with a long-haired brunette girl while Picard is off in space trying to remember a legalese filled speech to give to some alien.
S3 on screen was probably as good as TNG could ever get, but I think part of that was because they didn’t have time to rewrite a lot of the scripts into mediocrity.
Piller was a net gain for the show, to be sure, and I imagine his open-submissions policy created some significant careers, but it did happen at some cost.
@kmart “Melinda Snodgrass, to the point that she was happy to escape TREK (an odd spot for a true devotee) when her contract was up”
Contract up? Not fired or resigned then. I take that as proof the TNG writers room was no longer the chaotic wild west in S3! I don’t doubt for a second that Piller and maybe Berman too reserved the right to make the final rewrite. If Snodgrass thought she’d written a masterpiece, yeah, I agree she’d probably be bummed.
In the case of HIGH GROUND, they basically threw out her entire premise (she called it having her hands tied behind her back and then being told to write) in favor of the IRA rehash. Originally it was a planet that was in the throes of something like the American revolution, and Picard was basically backing the British while the Romulans were aiding the Americans — and it took most of the story for Picard to realize he was on the wrong side of the fight. That sounded to me like it had Q WHO level growth potential for Baldy, but instead it is back to another thing with him talking down to perceived lessers, which is one of the most infuriating parts of TNG for me. When Kirk talked about enriching worlds, there was a bit of PeaceCorps in his delivery that made me believe that he believed it and believed in it, but with Picard, there was often this imperial King aspect that clashed with the benign power.
Kmart. I hear you indeed. Sadly sometimes great art gets squashed in it’s production by committee methodology.. Ultimately TV is about selling advertising or subscriptions.. Sometimes I marvel that we get any great art at all..
I just came across a post on trekbbs that goes more into detail on s3 turnover (I always thought Moore’s 1st script was actually sold and produced in s3, but this indicates otherwise):
Ira Steven Behr: asked by Michael Piller to join and help supervise the writing staff. First job was performing a “major” rewrite on The Hunted.
Hans Beimler: wrote for the show for the first 3 seasons, starting with Coming of Age. Left after season 3 partly because of personality clashes with Michael Piller.
Richard Manning: wrote for the show for the first 3 seasons, starting with Coming of Age. Left after season 3 partly because of personality clashes with Michael Piller.
Melinda Snodgrass: sold the first unsolicited script for TNG (Measure of a Man). Left after season 3 partly because of personality clashes with Michael Piller.
Richard Danus: Worked on the first 10 weeks of season 3’s production. Contract not picked up. Later wrote for DS9.
Ronald D. Moore: like Snodgrass, sold an unsolicited script for the series sometime during season 2. Wasn’t asked to join the staff until season 3.
Michael Wagner: staff writer for the first four episodes of season 3 before leaving production.
Hanna Louise Shearer: wrote for the show since the first season. Last credit with the series was episode 308, The Price.
Ah, so Ron Moore came on staff in Season 3. Too bad they lost Snodgrass.
Damn, kmart, that would have been a good episode!
As it was, “The High Ground” at least had some interpersonal conflict Crusher/Picard. That was a dramatic thing.
back to another thing with him talking down to perceived lessers, which is one of the most infuriating parts of TNG for me.
I think this is why I’m not so interested in watching it now. Plus some of the moral subplots and sensibilities are much of their time; Troi sounds like a psychology column in a magazine in therapy sessions.
He also brought in Ron Moore as a contributing writer [I don’t think Moore was on TNG staff].
Sweet Jesus, another bumpy ride, eh?! Though if – contrary to their public personas – Harberts and Berg weren’t too nice, this is probably for the best. Let’s remember TNG went through writers and producers in seasons one and two like they were going out of style before settling
Tensions behind the scenes are nothing new for Star Trek. Heck, I think the Kelvin Timeline movies are one of the few cast and crew that didn’t have at least some bitterness or drama.
Well remember they did fire Orci after the guy already had the script approved and planned to direct.
Do you think Kurtzman will give Orci a call?
@Mike C — doubtful. He’s reportedly burned a lot of bridges.
Which one has supposedly burned bridges?
For Orci, posters on this site, for one. He used to post here and went off on fans a few time.
Not crazy about Kurtzman either but. Whaddya gonna do…
Just wish they’d release a Blu-ray.
I have a feeling Orci may have teed off a lot of people. Especially once he had the momentary glory of being slated to direct ST3 then having it taken away. He may have burned some bridges after that, and I imagine it stings to see his former writing partner Kurtzman running a Trek show. I read something that said R.O. is short-tempered.
This sounds like good news, but he big question is will Kurtzmann be better relative to the creative side? I think he loves Trek, so that’s a start. But a shake up was in order, and I’m surprised it didn’t happen before the start of production. Funny that we’ve been griping about the leadership in the writers room over the last few day in another thread, then this happens. I’d feel sorry for them, but it sounds like they were A-holes on top of the production issues, so good riddance if that’s the case. Doubt this has a substantial impact on season 2, so we’ll see, but that’s one way to get me excited for a new season!
This is now officially Kurtzman’s show and, truth be told, Discovery may have had one-too-many showrunners. Kurtzman knows how to deliver a show on time, on budget and how to keep a writer’s room focused and positive.
Still, Harberts and Berg, after months of discussing diversity and inclusion, failed at creating a non-hostile work environment, negating anything they may have said over those many months. They’ve let a lot of people down.
The irony in that is flat out astonishing. If true, then good riddance.
Agreed.
I’m not sure ALL the reasons behind their firing have made it out into public yet..
I’m guessing we just hit the tip of the iceberg with this. This stuff tends to come out in sprinkles.
But same time you do have to wonder if they were so much trouble first season why didn’t they just fire them after that wrapped instead of waiting so long to do it in season 2? My only guess is something big happened that finally caused CBS to act.
Nope. Give it a year and then we’ll start to get the full picture.
Innit though?
Kurtzman directed Season 2 Episode 1. It’s been his show; this may have been an effort to position himself as someone who delivers, not sits in the production office. Trust me, there’s a LOT of “office politics” with CBS.
And on a different note, don’t expect Roberto Orci to show up by Kurtzman’s side any time soon, if ever. This is now Kurtzman’s show to keep… or lose.
They were the driving force behind the show, not Kurtzman. They were pretty much guiding the ship but, man, they should have known that even though this isn’t on CBS it’s a CBS show and they were at their mercy of the network, especially in the current environment. You can’t abuse your staff. I suspect that the suits looped in with Kurtzman to verify or it was Kurtzman who went to CBS with his concerns.
I wouldn’t be surprised if he is just temporarily running the show until they can bring someone to takeover. That might be one of the things that comes out of that planned hiatus. They don’t want there to be a disruption now before the hiatus – that’s what causes a bigger story. “Show X gets shut down to figure out a path forwards” sounds a lot worse.
It’s possible. I know Kurtzman work pretty closely at this point since I have watched a lot of his shows (but I only liked two of them) and I don’t think he’s ever been a show runner on any of them. It sounds like he and Orci would get the ball rolling and hiring others to work on the pilot and then after that leave it to others. He is pretty connected to Star Trek right now and oddly he’s probably done the most for the franchise since Rick Berman as he’s been involved with two films and this show.
But like Berman and everyone else, this guy has gotten a lot of abuse over the years. Being a show runner makes it worst if people don’t like it. But I guess after The Mummy he can handle anything lol.
I could actually see him take on a role similar to Berman with another showrunner being brought in for Discovery but Kurtzman being an overseer for the whole of the TV side for CBS. It seems to me that Trek is an important factor in building and maintaining a customer base for All Access and a year+ wait between new content is too long. Nobody wants to see a rushed product so the logical next step is to develop a second show.
Yeah thats true I can see that happening too.
As far as Discovery it will probably OK in the long run but this show is costing them a LOT and it sounds like we are already getting another delay. I too think they will put on another Trek show and in fact Kurtzman mentioned that before Discovery came on air. But I’m really curious just HOW well this show is doing in terms of getting new subscribers to AA?
CBS has been very quiet about it and has released zero information on it. I have a feeling Discovery is not really getting them the subs they want BUT its probably the only show that is getting them any subs at all so its probably safe for now.
its difficult to say as it’s normal for streaming services to be a little coy in terms of revealing the actual metrics. On the one hand Discovery seems to have been a critical success and Netflix seem to be happy with it but there is no denying that the show has been divisive. Also I suspect that the Netflix partnership complicates matters in terms of developing spin off shows as they would realistically have to be on board with any new series. I guess this gives some credibility to the popular notion that Pike and the Enterprise are being introduced as kind of a back door pilot for a new show, similar to how Daredevil season 2 introduced Frank Castle to gage the viability of a Punisher spin off. A Pike era Enterprise show could be modern but still embrace Trek staples like exploration and there’s already evidence that they are going with a look that at least honours the classic designs.
Nick Meyer had a new Trek show in development. The debacle relationship between CBS and Viacom has delayed it, possibly even killed it..
” I have a feeling Discovery is not really getting them the subs they want BUT its probably the only show that is getting them any subs at all so its probably safe for now.”
That has been my working theory on why they will likely get a 3rd season. It might even get them into season 4. But if CBSAA continues to be a very low level subscription service I wouldn’t bet it goes more than 4 seasons tops.
You do know that CBS doesn’t pay for the show at all, right? Netflix International pays the production costs and CBS gets the show for “free” to serve as the tentpole for CBSAA in the US only. It’s stunning that so many negative haters have their “theories” (that they make up self-serving rationals for) but don’t pay attention to relevant facts.
Its funny you mention that Luke because I was lurking on Trekcore this morning (sorry TM ;)) and someone actually said there is a rumor going around Netflix doesn’t want to pay the same price for season 2 as the reception of season 1 didn’t get the reception they expected and in dispute with CBS.
Of course this is 100% rumor so it can be taken with a grain of salt but if even somewhat true I wouldn’t be really surprised. I don’t think the show was that big of a hit on Netflix either, at least compared to their other hit shows and they don’t even own this one but paying a lot for it.
Netflix pays 6 million per episode, CBS pays out the other 2 million per episode plus marketing, etc. Netflix offsets the cost but CBS is still putting out a lot of cash.
But thats crazy though. How does Netflix pay MORE for a show they don’t even own??? Does this apply to season two as well?
I guess it just shows how badly Netflix wanted to be in the Star Trek business to make a deal like that. But then again they do get to keep all the old shows too so maybe its worth it. But it seems pretty crazy to me.
Because Netflix distributes it all over the world except US and Canada. I imagine they’re getting a fair number of subscriptions out of that because they also have the complete TrekTV catalog [at least in the US they do, along with CBSAA].
Still though that’s a lot to just distribute the show but I guess Netflix has been dropping that kind of money all along. I can’t even imagine what they paid Disney to exclusively run their movies. That’s also why they are now making so many of their own shows because they are probably sick of paying so much money for shows and films that will go away the second they stop paying.
I suspect Netflix ramped up their original programming some time ago because they saw a time when companies that let them stream their stuff were going to cease to start their own services. If Netflix doesn’t have original programming they would eventually not have much available to bring to their subscribers.
That’s what I been saying all along. Netflix is great now but once all the other studios get in the game and like Disney they have decades of material to mime and throw on their own site places like Netflix and Amazon are going to be left with a big hole in time. At least with Hulu and AA its not great stuff but they are putting out their own shows and films so they are not paying literally hundreds of millions of years to keep their site running vs Netflix who is paying that much to license that content on top of paying for their own shows.
Netflix probably has the most subscribers and a better known product, but I have a feeling they are also paying the most to keep all those customers too.
I’ve actually cancelled Netflix. It was great in the early days, with some good anime, Disney classics, the US version of the office and loads more. I liked their early shows, but Orange is the New Black stopped being fun by season three, the so-so Hemlock Grove sputtered out in its second year and, while I loved the first wave of Marvel shows, I was bored by the the time of The Defenders and gave up. My wish list has been decimated by all the films they’ve lost the rights to. I still have Amazon Prime for the quick delivery service, which also gives me a streaming service, so I’m not too worried.
My understanding was that Netflix paid PART/MOST of the cost, but CBS coughed up some money.
Could be wrong.
Marja,
Well, Les did say that once Netflix and the Canadian deals were sealed that Discovery had turned a profit, so that’s how I’d read it, i.e. they arranged financing for production but once they signed Netflix as both co-producer and worldwide distributor got every cent back and started making money.
I agree ML31, I said many times even before the show started I saw it getting to season 3 no matter what due to the situation it was in. But come season 3 and its still not where they want it to be then MAYBE the show will be cancelled because it is an extremely expensive show and they only get more expensive in time although shows have cut budgets to stay on the air when the ratings is that strong. Enterprise did that in season 4 even though the production itself still looked pretty good.
Tiger2, and due to the short season, STD could end up being the shortest lived Trek show ever with only some 54-56 episodes or so. Less than the three year run of TOS.
Yeah I have a feeling no matter its probably going to have the lowest episodes of any Trek show unless it runs 6+ seasons and stays at 13 episodes to match TOS. And I just don’t see this show going six seasons for some reason.
Well personally I hope it does. I really like the cast.
Haha ML31. I posted something similar. I suggested topping out between 40 and 50 episodes. Let’s have a bet..
LOL! What do we think the over/under will be for STD? I think I will go with 58.
One possibility, Tiger, is that many people signed up, binged the show, and dropped their subscription after a month. That’s what I did. Either way yes, you have to wonder how many people actually pay for CBSAA every month.
Oh yeah I think a LOT of people did that lol. I actually still have AA believe it or not but I have not watched anything on it since the season finale. I keep saying I will rewatch the first season over again and there are a few other things I want to give it a try, including the new AA show which sounds interesting. But yeah I’m wondering why am I keeping it now since its been months and I am not motivated enough to even rewatch the show.
And its just too much competition out there. There are way more things I’m interested to watch on Netflix but I really want Discovery to succeed even with my issues of it so I keep it.
My guess is WAY more did that than CBS ever anticipated. They hooted and hollered about the number of subscribers they got last fall. But since the mid season break, not a peep.
“My guess is”
Exactly
Says the person who rattles off his opinions as absolute facts.
I’ve been re-watching Season 1 of DSC. I particularly enjoy the Lorca episodes before #13 … I hope they find a way to bring Isaacs back. He made a good main-though-not-central character.
I like the idea that the show is coming from a perspective of the people in the level below captain. I think Martin-Green is a strong lead.
I think “another show” will be Pike’s Enterprise. Or, who knows, the Hiawatha. Where the heck does it come in?
I suspect Nick Meyer’s show was to have filled the gap. But it’s been s*it canned due to in-fighting it seems..
I think if Discoverys problems become too much to bear for CBS, they can spin off Captain Pike to his own show with brand new showrunners and producers and just quietly shelf Discovery.
Alphantrion, that is possible. I would like nothing more than to get a different Trek show with different writers and producers and let the Discovery debacle fade into oblivion. That said, a Pike centered prequel is NOT my first choice for that. I don’t mind the TOS era setting but I’d like it to be a different ship mainly because we don’t need a “young Spock” show. And you just know a Pike show would be centered on Spock. They need to move away from the safety net the original characters give you. Why not have a Lt. Kirk show while you are at it?
I would not want a Pike centered show either. That just sounds like the wrong direction to go in and it will just be the Kelvin films all over again where people will pick it apart to death because it doesn’t stand up to the show from 60 years ago. I mean have people NOT learned their lesson with this yet?
I still hope “Discovery” goes forward in time to after TOS before TNG.
I don’t see why a Pike show would necessarily be dominated by Spock. They hired Anson Mount to play Pike, and he was lead of a popular show for five years. They needed a strong lead.
Because Spock is SPOCK.
@Dprescott Agreed. I think this was being developed when it seemed a certainty that the merger was going to happen. They should take a similar approach to HBO with Game of Thrones and develop multiple shows/mini’s/event series. They don’t need to produce them all but they might find a diamond in the rough.
sound reasoning, Corinthian7
Looks like we were both right lol!
You may be right. He’ll ride out the season, build a new team, hand off the show for season 3.
If Alex wanted fresh eyes, I would do it for free for my friend. But I am sure he has things well in hand.
You don’t have fresh eyes.
Your movies are stale and don’t make money.
Wouldn’t the WGA then fine you up to 130% of the work’s value?
A lot of times people who talk a good game about loving humanity can have a real problem regarding how they treat individual humans. Washington and Hollywood stand out here.
@Dennis C. You’re second paragraph is the most insightful one on this thread. Talking about diversity and inclusion while fostering a hostile work environment is a profound contradiction. I imagine at “8.5M” per episode and clock always ticking on production and a room full of creatives it would be next to impossible for a writers’ room to be devoid of drama. But obviously this was enough that the writers threatened to quit and Kurtzman and CBS took action.
Beyond that, I would say we should be careful not to conflate that some people here didn’t like the general narrative direction of the show and this seemingly workplace drama/harassment. There is no indication that this was about creative issues, but instead a management issue.
And of course, many of us would not mind if they offered Ronald D. Moore oogles of money to join as a showrunner. A kid can hope!
Hi Eric. I think CBS would certainly want to downplay any animosity the show has generated, however small the numbers. How better to do that than by… simply not mentioning it!
Spot on. Not about the direction of the show but how the show was being handled.
Dang Ron Moore would be a great choice. Isn’t he busy with something else now? But, Yow! That would be cool.
Maurice Hurley, all is forgiven! 😋
Unless you are Gates McFadden.
That guy cracked me up on Chaos on the Bridge. Listening to him talk about the show and how crazy he thought Roddenberry’s ideas were you have to wonder how he got the job? He seem to resent the show he was putting on.
I’ve read what he did was play ‘drinking buddy’ to GR after almost getting fired for his 1st rewrite of WHERE NO ONE … and that essentially led to his escalation. By way of comparison, CFQ indicated that Bob Lewin, who was probably one of the better writer-producers there during s1, wound up getting moved further and further upstairs at the Hart, removing him from interaction.
CFQ?
Yeah a lot of craziness was happening during that time with all those producers and writers. I read somewhere there was a turnover of 30 people in those two years which is crazy. Its sounding like the Trump administration.
CINEFANTASTIQUE magazine. They’d do double-issues on many seasons of BermanTrek,and I think you can find some decent discussion of the first couple years in their season 3 coverage, which also gets into the Snodgrass stuff, though there is a typo where the magazine erroneously has her saying something nice about Rick Berman when she meant Ricky Manning, or whoever Beimler’s cowriter was. That’s also where I found out from director Rob Bowman that Stewart was very pissed about the Picard/Q climax of Q WHO and didn’t want to do it, which makes me think the star mentality had already clouded the vision of this fine character actor.
Oh yeah I use to LOVE that magazine! I remember reading so many of their Trek articles back in the day. That’s pretty funny about Stewart and Q Who.
Honestly though I can’t blame him, it would take a LOT for Picard to tell Q he was right lol. Man that was probably some of the best acting Stewart ever done knowing that now.
Why bring politics here? (sounds like TDS to me)
I would love to see Chaos on the Bridge. Still waiting for it.
Waiting for it? Where?
There is actually a bootleg version of it on Youtube if you really want to see it. I have it on Netflix (which I didn’t even know it existed, it just popped into my queue one day, clicked it on and watched history unfold lol).
It is a really good documentary and even if you aren’t a Trek fan its just interesting to hear all the pitfalls that can happen in a TV production.
When I do a search on my Netflix account it doesn’t even come up. But then, a number of their own produced material hasn’t been showing up on the disc side of things. The lag is getting longer and longer. But if it’s on YouTube, I will be able to check it out. I’ll look there. Thanks for the heads up.
Definitely worth the watch. There’s a fine Keystone Cops aspect to how the first season was run, for sure!
I would send you the link on Youtube directly but I don’t know if TM frowns on that and I don’t want to get booted. But if you type Chaos on the Bridge Star Trek it will come right up. And it says ‘Watch Chaos on the Bridge 2014 Full Movie’ and it’s exactly 49:30 mins long. NOT a great video version though but its free lol. You can’t miss it.
I saw it over the weekend. The movie was only in the upper left corner of the screen (with some sort of starfield in the rest) but it was still watchable. Fascinating stuff. It was edited in sort of a rushed way. Things came at us at warp speed. But still interesting. Some of those things were downright funny.
Ok great! I’m glad you got to see it and yes it had the cropped screen and the odd star field around it. I assume that’s to keep it around but I don’t see how that helps lol.
Anyway that was the first time I actually heard directly about the problems from that documentary. Until then I just heard anecdotal stuff but to hear people who were actually there telling their stories was an eye opener. The crazy lawyer is something out of a sitcom lol. But I seen it about five times now and its just very watchable. I loved the animation scenes in it as well.
But the show survived and actually only got better so even with Discovery’s speed bumps and behind the scenes drama I still think it can improve in time. They just need the show to have a real direction and some better writers IMO. Maybe we will get that? I don’t know if it will ever be on a level like TNG or DS9 for me but we’ll see.
Both shows had behind the scenes issues but from what I can tell STD’s problems are much higher up than TNG’s issues were. I think STD has a lot more to overcome.
Worst Season 1 episode script/direction: Akiva Goldsman.
I will not miss his work on this series.
As for Berg and Harberts, wish I could say “told you so”. These two were pulled into the vacuum left by Bryan Fuller’s departure. They delivered Season 1. Good for them, but they lacked experience and professionalism. And I believe these antics went far deeper than is being reported from the writer’s room.
Let’s hope Season 2 continues to progress well.
These two were blown into the vacuum, not sucked
Hmmm. Fringe became great once Akiva Goldsman took over. I’d had high hopes for him on Discovery, knowing not much about him.
Season One was shaky, but I blamed a lot of that on the arc — can you start and finish a galactic war in a dozen-odd episodes, with time for two Harry Mudd episodes, the mirror universe, a Klingon sleeper agent and a captain with a secret identity? (and can you do it coherently?). This show couldn’t.
This is semi-unrelated, but I’m also not a big fan of After Trek — i wish the Discovery folks would just focus on the show and stop talking so much about it.
Exactly, they should have just focused on one single plot arc and have that through all the season, instead of taking weird detours. It seemed like they threw everything but the kitchen sink in the episodes. They needed to be more focused on the story.
I watched a few minutes of, like, two episodes of After Trek and pulled the ripcord. It made me actively uncomfortable, it seemed so forced. Never again.
It got much better as they went on with it.
It did get better but yes its still probably better in small doses. I just like the interviews of course but I find myself fast forwarding through some of it.
Matt Mira, nice guy that he probably is, made me uncomfortable with his sort of “fangirling” and laughing too much. Sorta like that SuperTrekFan who now works for E! Scott Mantz?
They are retooling it.
Yeah Jack, you hit it on the head. There were two or three seasons worth of plot in those 15 episodes. Surely they, could have found time for some traditional Trek storytelling and spread the over arching plot around that. Maybe that was the problem, the first series was just plot driven.. I think the producers wanted to do Game of Thrones, not Star Trek.
That has been my one big issue: too much serialization. The best episode of Discovery season 1 was the stand-alone “Magic…” (To a greater degree I have the same issue with Westworld, and in this second season its best episode to date has been the most recent one, which was the most stand-alone of all they have made).
Ometiklan. I look back at my comment and i think I just described DS9?!
You’re right to: best episode of Westworld this season.
” I think the producers wanted to do Game of Thrones, not Star Trek.”
I think that is exactly what they wanted. They didn’t come up with an organic story. They came up with the MU captain and thought that would be a great “fool the audience” kind of reveal. And worked backwards from that. It felt like the Klingon war was devised ONLY to further hide what they thought were “gotcha moments.Nearly every creative decision on this show was a failure. Easily the worst Star Trek series ever. And it’s not even close. Voyager looks like TOS compared to this mess.
I agree this is the worst Star Trek series (although I adore Voyager, so can’t roll with the swipe at it).
If they really wanted to do a “Game of Thrones” style series, they should do something set on Vulcan before the rise of logic and away from emotionalism. I’d watch the mess out of THAT series.
It’s funny that you say that. All those time travel episodes and movies that went to Earth I always felt it would be more fun to go back in time on Vulcan. Let the humans learn to adapt rather than Spock. Let’s see some of Vulcan’s past. I always felt TNH had more potential if they went into Vulcan’s past and did almost the exact same movie. Would be interesting to see Vulcans driving cars and walking around on city streets of 1986. Make up some Vulcan animal THEY hunted to extinction and you get the same message with a bit of a sci-fi twist instead of the LTBYLB kind of thing they ended up with.
That was the problem for me, it was just TOO much going on. It just felt like a soap opera after awhile. No wonder why the Section 31 stuff was moved to season 2 it was already bloated enough. They could’ve skipped the entire Voq/Tyler thing for starters.
Maybe if they had a 22-24 episode season?
At least 20. Part of the reason why I was disappointed in the Lorca subplot is we waited literally ten episodes for this guy to finally reveal himself and make his move only to die in the next episode. I wanted to see him actually take power but it was clear they didn’t have anymore time because they had to go back and wrap up the Klingon war so it felt anti-climatic. If they had more episodes, even just three more, they could’ve fleshed things out better.
Tiger2, Couldn’t agree more. It would’ve been nice to see the new Emperor Lorca fail in his initial goal and concede that maybe Terran racism had to take a back seat to a more inclusive approach.
Watched Ep 15 yesterday, and yeah, rush rush rush. Really too bad.
Yeah nothing says how rushed it all felt with that finale. I haven’t been able to watch it since the first time. It really left a bad taste in my mouth frankly. I don’t know what’s worse, having too many episodes where it starts to drag just trying to fill time but then too few where you cut or run through stuff or wrap it all up at an absurd level.
But it was obvious the season either wasn’t that planned out or they changed a lot of stuff later because so much of it felt pretty lacking or half done by the end.
You know I partly blame the producers for this, if they had realized that things were being rushed, they should have asked for at least a few more episodes from CBS. I think CBS would have been inclined to give it to them because they wanted this to be their flagship for AA. Even 18 episodes would have sufficed I think, or maybe get to have a movie length finale or something.
Failure either way, Tiger and the blame is placed on the producers first and tends to trickle down from there.
“Choose Your Pain” was not exactly a Mudd episode, Jack. The time-loop one, yeah, but not CYP.
Hmm……imagine that…
What a mess. On the plus side, the sequel to “Chaos on the Bridge” should be fascinating. ;-)
The thing about Chaos on the Bridge happened during a time when there was no internet. Today EVERYTHING gets out eventually and everyone talks about it once it does. I think that was one of the easier things back in the day that the studio didn’t have to worry about the public hearing all the constant turnover and drama days after something happened. If they did it was usually years after wards. Unless someone gave an interview why they left it was easy to keep stuff more silent. That has become less and less, especially in light of the #metoo movement.
Tiger2,
News via the phone system and live or nearly live Entertainment and SF talk radio & TV, and news programming simply didn’t spread as glacially as your mind conjures up back then.
If it had, there simply would have been absolutely no way Bjo could have organized two snail mail letter writing campaigns in time to get NBC’s documented notice of them prior to deciding to renew.
And the script for THE WRATH OF KHAN had to be rewritten just about as fast to include a Spock death fake out when the producers realized the fans knew their secret that Spock was a goner, as the INTO DARKNESS rewrite when those producers realized the Ericson antagonist’s name had blown their Khan secret.
Disinvited can you take the snark down a few notches.
A public letter writing campaign is not the same as trying to cover up a
studio controversy, especially since it was easier to get PR people to persuade journalists not to report on a story back then. Today all that can be bypassed and leaked directly online, ie, what happened with Orci and being fired from Trek 13. That was never made public until it was leaked on the internet (although obviously we were going to hear about it).
That was the point I was making. Not the fact news was slower, but the fact it was easier to keep the more controversial news out of the headlines vs today because the internet is a more direct medium and requires no middle man. But thanks for missing my point as usual before commenting. Always a pleasure.
I have no clue what TWOK reference has to do with anything but you seem really obsessed with that movie as it always shows up in these odd discussions lol.
@Disinvited: Roddenberry himself was suspected to leak the information about Spocks Death. Nowdays you don’t need a vip to leak something, anyone on the set could do it. Even for completely new movies everyone has to sign nondisclosure agreements, but 30 years ago that was different.
It took a long while, but Bennett confirmed GR as the leaker, I think by the late 90s, at least so far as the E going ka-blooey in SFS.
Regarding Spock’s death, early comment from Bennett talked about a trustworthy woman going to a con in the UK and publicly announcing Spock’s death, so I still don’t know if he was just lying outright or vaguely indicating somebody like Susan Sackett spilled the beans.
One version I heard was the original concept was Spock getting killed up front and the rest of the movie was “let’s get that bastard who killed Spock!” So the rewrite put his death in the end and included the joke of “Aren’t you dead?” up front as a wink to that leak.
The Enterprise explosion reveal was purely a screw up in Paramount’s PR department. They had successfully kept secret the E’s destruction but then, unbeknownst to the movie makers, there it was in the TRAILER!
PPpp and kmart,
I never bought that Roddenberry leaked Spock’s death. It was well known from the Phase II TV production failed attempt that Nimoy was fed up with being asked about if he’d make a television show appearance and had lobbied Gene to kill off Spock to end those TV queries. There was simply no logic to Gene getting outraged about the producers killing off Spock when he had every reason to suspect rightly, or wrongly as Nimoy would have us believe, that it was coming from Nimoy and not them from his first hand experience in dealing with the actor. This is not to say that Meyers hasn’t documented many other things Roddenberry definitely was outraged about and far more likely to have been the source of those leaks.
Besides, that “Roddenberry leaked dead Spock” debate is rendered moot by the fact that it was the actual producers of INTO DARKNESS that leaked the materials with Ericson’s name on it as I recall?
PPpp,
You do realize that your argument basically boils down to:
30 years ago it was far easier for determined fans to sleuth production secrets and now, with quadruple NDA secured production secrets the existence of wireless phones with television studios built into them with internet access, it’s just as easy.
Tiger2,
Re: TWOK
It’s relevant because the studio absolutely did not want things to get out, such as Roddenberry being neutered of all creative input, but it got out just as fast as your Orci’s snip.
Fine I get it now reading the other posts but as usual you missed my real point, which wouldn’t have been a big deal if you weren’t trying to sound like a jack… about it thinking you had some kind of ‘point’ when you were never even close to it.
So, the man behaind the munny 2017 now is the only one in charge of Star Trek Discovery?
At least, with Berg and Harberts out, we may see an end to all the Social Justice Warriors bs, hope so..
Let’s not get our hopes up with that one. Hollywood has a social justice agenda and they’ll push it until there are no more people watching anything after everyone gets fed up with it… and the whole industry will tank. Don’t see that happening anytime soon…
Id like to see an end to your SJW bs, though not in the way you mean.j
I suggest not calling them social justice anything, that’s their framing of the issue and allows them to pretend they are actually concerned about others. I think I can speak for most when I say it’s not equality or civil rights we object to, but their narcissistic, self-righteous culture war crusade.
I suggest we call them by the Chinese term “baizuo”, which refers to a class of affluent white concern trolls who only pretend to care about others in order to elevate themselves as “woker than thou”.
warning for political trolling.
Thread closed.
Please bring in manny coto….
YES! I was thinking that exact same thing having read this!
All in favor…
Aye!
Aye for sure!
Aye. They sure could do a lot worse. And I think he’s proved that not only is he a fan but very capable of running the show properly.
Might be time to tap Jonathan Frakes on the shoulder!
That would be great. And easier now that 24 was canceled. He’s probably working on something else but I would love to get people who know what they were doing back.
If history is anything to go by then we could probably assume that Coto would find a way of reconciling the different look for the Klingons!
Well, he didn’t write those episodes but he was running the show when they were.
“Please bring in manny coto….”
That would be great, but I thought the same when Bryan Fuller was attached..
Judging by his first 2 episodes, he went for pure camp. Bryan Fuller is great for camp, not the way CBS wanted it to go. I think Manny would be up to the challenge to bring this back around like he did Enterprise in S4…
No, Ira Behr…please!
Imagine a world where they would actually consider bringing in Ira Steven Behr and Ronald D. Moore … too bad they’re both still busy doing “Outlander”.
If Ira were attached to Discovery in ANY way, I would hand over my bloodied beating heart as an offering.
I could live with that – first DSC needs fixed (Coto – he did a good job with ENT even though it got canned – S4 was acceptable). THEN Ira Behr comes in and gives us a kickass series? I’d be down with that!
Yeah, fine. Manny Coto allready did some training to fit the job profile by telling Linda Park to STFU and go back to work.
Never heard this story. Do elaborate!
I tried to answer you with a link, but I think that it is “verboten” to link on this site. Speaking German probably is verboten too. What is the english expression: not allowed? Maybe it is also to political. My English is far too poor to explain complex subjects. But you can find the story on the Trek BBS.
Schweineschnitzel….
ich denke nicht, dass es verboten ist einen link zu teilen.
But all the evidence we have of that is a screenshot of a FB comment he wrote in response to her posting of an article about Shervin Pishevar proposing that California secede from the US. It can be construed as abuse towards Park or a comment towards Pishevar’s idea. Not sure if the context was ever properly expanded upon.
Yes. Manny Coro was lit.
…to do an entirely new series after cancelling this one?
Agreed!
“…to do an entirely new series after cancelling this one?”
Chuckle
Funny. But… Yeah.
I’m 100% behind this idea, I always felt he should have taken the reigns of Trek following the Berman era.
Where has he been for the last few years? He could be an inspired choice given the great work that he did on Enterprise.
Yes! Yes! Yes! After last year’s divisive debacle, this significantly raises the chance of me checking out season 2…. from zero.
The most hilarious part of course is that these most “woke” soldiers of the thought police are fired, out of all reasons, for ABUSE. Oh, the hubris! The revolution is eating its children! Of course this reveals their year-long political campaign as exactly what it was, cheap marketing and propaganda for the more easily agitated viewers, at the cost of vilifying the other half of the audience. I could very well imagine that the endless tiresome and one-sided virtue signalling in the show and behind the scenes was another reason for this second forceful reboot. Apart from adding fire to the fuel in an already aggressive atmosphere, which runs directly counter to 50 years of Star Trek being inclusive entertainment for the whole country, it is simply bad business to shut out millions of potential viewers! These kind of bombshells do not happen out of the blue but grow over the time, with the most recent cost overruns surely being the straw that broke the camels’ back.
Now that the witch(es) are dead, maybe the writing team can finally be rebuild around REAL, intellectual diversity instead. As we see from these two sorry figures, even body-positive women and gays are but mere, fallible humans, who are by no means superior showrunners, team leaders and thoughtful writers. Who would have thought? ;-)
Knowing you, VS, you’ll still find a way to be disappointed and offended by S2. Oh the irony here of the “more easily agitated” . . .
Yes, that’s definitely true–looks like two liberal writers failed to live up to their principles, and may in fact have acted like real a$$holes besides. What a great comfort it must be to you, then, that such embarrassments never happen with conservatives in charge!
I don’t know what he thinks will change . . . the lead character is still a black woman. The gay guy’s not going anywhere. Lorca’s still evil . . . and still dead. All his triggers are still in place.
warning for political trolling, thread closed
Holy crap. Definitely an unexpected turn of events. Wonder how much we’ll see a change in tone once we get through watching episode 5 whenever that time comes in late 2018/early 2019.
Enter Bob Orci ???
I wouldn’t mind seeing that.
I would. Sorry, but Bob just doesn’t get it IMO.
I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing what he’d do with one episode. But showrunner? Not at the moment, no.
I think Bob gets a bad rap from some fans unfairly as it’s clear he was working to a studio mandate to reboot the series as a popcorn movie franchise. Nevertheless, he always did his best to enrich his scripts with lots of Trek lore and I believe he is on record as being opposed to the most decisive creative choice in the Abrams movies i.e Khan! I agree with @Holden, it’s not the time to bring him onboard as show runner as too many fans would not give him a chance. However, if Bob was willing to return to Trek and write I personally would be delighted and who knows maybe further down the line he could be a future Star Trek show runner.
@COrinthian7 — If that’s the best we can say about Orci’s contribution to the scripts, I wouldn’t say I’m eager to see him pepper DISC with bits of random Trek lore. In that dept., they seem to have no trouble. Indeed, based on Orci’s own rantings, I would assume he’d be far more destructive than helpful. My takeaway was always that his Trek lore were empty offerings to take an otherwise banal story and brand it as Trek, without necessarily living up to it’s ideals. If true, that’s not going to help DISC at all.
Just to be clear, I am not advocating this. I am just wondering if given his relationship with Kurtzman, if this could happen?
I think it could work provided that Bob has grown up a bit now that he has been knocked out of the big time for awhile — can he get back to creative writing and also move on from all of his 911 truther and conspiracy nonsense?
Everyone deserves a second chance.
But wasn’t Kurtzman part of all of that as well? THey wrote those two films together and it sounded like it was Kurtzman who was fighting to bring Khan into the movie. In fact it sounded like Orci was the sole hold out but oddly became the one most people blamed for it since he defended the decision.
I think it is hard to say who is responsible for what when scripts are made by various people. People got on the writers case for the shot of Carol Marcus bikini shot when we found out it was Abrams who actually came up with it.
If you listen to any of his commentaries – he clearly knows a lot about film making and writing . I’m convinced he wrote good scripts then paramount or whoever just re-wrote them to be dumb set piece movies. Nobody who talks that coherently about film and film making could write scripts that bad.
PLUS – the actual dialogue itself in ST2009 and INto Darkness is actually pretty good – the character interactions. It’s the story themselves which are paper thin.
@David Oakes — Oh, I don’t know. Being passionate about film doesn’t necessarily make someone a good screenwriter. There were a lot of hands putting the dialogue into those mouths, and there was some truly poor moments. Download the transcript from ST09 and STID and try reading it sometime if you haven’t. The cast helped sell a lot of those moments.
Orci came off to me as the ‘Sarah Sanders’ of Trek’s self-proclaimed “Supreme Court”. He relentlessly defended and rebuffed any complaint against the team as if it were his own, against all reason, no matter how ridiculous he often sounded. That more than anything explains his ability to sound knowledgeable about film making and writing, while simultaneously failing in his own work, if that’s the case.
I agree about Orci. I think sadly he gets kicked in the teeth moreso than the others because sadly he was the one who tried to reach out to the fanbase, mostly here. The others got their share of ridicule but not like Orci because he became the face of those movies more so than Abrams did in a way because Abrams would make one, promote it but then move on to something else as most of them did. Orci was the only one who was still talking Star Trek between the films, even after leaving the film he was suppose to write and direct.
And yes he said Khan wasn’t his idea and even opposed it but because he was literally the ONLY one willing to discuss it and defended the decision it only riled up more people.
Even though I myself has certainly been critical of various Trek products including Discovery I try not to get too much on the case of people who run it in the sense they don’t always have complete control and they have bosses too. I’m sure there are a lot of things they disagree with as well but they do as they are told and then speak the party line. It doesn’t excuse them of all the mistakes of course but I know they want Trek fans to like it and they want to do a good job if nothing more than it will get them another job. But fans get way too emotional with this stuff and start painting people villains who try their best to deliver something good and fun even if they fail at it times. The crazy dust up in the Star Wars fandom right now says it all. I’m sure George Lucas is happy he doesn’t have to deal with the constant wrath of it anymore. Who would?
BorgKlingon. Imho, I would prefer none of the Kelvin producers on board.. I just don’t think the new movies are a good template for a TV show..
The Bob Orci who once went on a rant about “sh*tty fans” on this very site when it turned out that a couple of people didn’t quite like “Into Darkness”? – No, thanks.
that is a misrepresentation of events
If I recall you compared Star Trek fans to children acting out against their parents, intimated that Trek 09 and Into Darkness were the best Treks ever and boasted about being pals with Harrison Ford. You than politely rounded it off by telling at least one fan to F off. I remember it well because I couldn’t believe what I was reading.
Not exactly your finest hour and an event that definitely soured your relationship with some of the fans. Shame as I think you had most people on side until then as most saw you as the Trek fan member of the JJ Trek creative team and but for that incident it’s possible more people would be open to the idea of you working on Discovery and “saving” it.
El Chup,
Re: You than politely rounded it off by telling at least one fan to F off.
Not quite. What Bob precisely did was agree with Simon Pegg who had told fans to F off about their opinions about what they believed they were entitled to expect from STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS. However, Bob did so in a manner pointedly aimed at one particular fan posting here at Trekmovie.com with which he was particularly irked, and then Bob quoted Pegg which Entertainment “journalists” turned into click bait reports of Bob Orci telling Trek fans to F off.
Perhaps, but I’m sure I’m not only speaking for myself when I say that it’s the prevalent interpretation in many a fan’s mind. And far be it from me to deliberately take things out of context:
I remember the context quite well, because I had a hard time believing what I read as well and the part I paraphrased was the low point of a discussion regarding an unfavourable review – a review (on a fansite!) lamenting the great number of TWOK-references in STID and the way they were twisted around, but also other aspects, which then unfortunately fell completely out of focus.
Now, to clarify my position here: It wasn’t even the “sh*tty fans”-part that got to me then, since that was actually directed at one specific user whose choice of words I certainly wouldn’t have shared. What got to me, just as it got to El Chup, was the part about “kids acting up against their parents” (paraphrasing here), since that was directed towards people who may have loved Star Trek for a long time (most of them adults, I’m certain) and who may have had issues with parts of the film.
I had singled out the “sh*tty fans”-quote because it was the culmination of that discussion and to me it was well in line with the other comments I pointed out above.
I apologise if I’m making too sharp a point here, but that doesn’t equal misrepresenting facts.
JAGT,
Re: “kids acting up against their parents”
As was I, and that particular scolding was being directed to the TrekMovie article topic, itself, and its author, Joseph Dickerson, as well.
It wasn’t clear at the time Orci said it, but as Orci continued the exchange, it later became obvious that he had Pegg on his mind. And Simon was being raked over the coals in the press for his remarks about the poll that rated STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS as the worst Trek film and began dissembling them by trying to throw the reporter, Mike Ryan, that printed them under the bus by suggesting the reporter showed up on his doorstep early in the morn and ambushed him:
“Can I just please point out, following a few recent headlines of ‘Simon Pegg says ‘f**k you’ to Star Trek fans,’ I was doorstepped by a journalist very early in the morning who told me that Into Darkness had been voted the worst in a poll or something.” – Simon Pegg
“Learned today that I showed up on Simon Pegg’s doorstep early in the morning to ask about ‘Star Trek’. This was actually said in an interview
I suppose ‘doorstep’ equals a scheduled interview at the Waldorf Astoria and ‘early in the morning’ equals 3:45 pm. So, sure.
Seriously, actors in movies realise that we actually *record* interviews with audio devices, right?” – Mike Ryan
My point being just to remind that we know Orci is a fierce defender of his fellow Trek movie collaborators, and isn’t it interesting that everyone associates Pegg’s poorly quoted comment by Bob with Bob and not Simon, who lit the fuse?
Creatives that care about fans deserve some slack from any perceived misunderstandings – boborci is one of the best.
@Allenburch — if true, too bad it doesn’t reflect in his work, or personality.
You are the reason that “the court of public opinion” is – thankfully – not just one individual.
Well … let’s just hope that the story writing and story telling improves and becomes more sensible and coherent. Can’t see this as anything other than a positive move!
The show needs new leadership, but Kurtzman doesn’t exude confidence, at least not to me. I remember Into Darkness. Please don’t let Lindeloff or Orci anywhere near the show.
There were a lot of hands on the hot mess that was STID. Let’s not automatically dump it all on Kurtzman, or assume he can’t have more success in a different context.
Which is precisely why I mentioned Lindeloff and Orci.
And Abrams.
I don’t want to revisit the angry days from 2013 to, er, whenever we got distracted by Discovery and rehash beefs against Bad Robot.
I’ll give Kurtzman the benefit of the doubt here.
BTW, anybody else ever wonder what Greg Berlanti might do with Trek? Early Arrow had some substance.
I guess you beat me to it, Jack. STiD is ancient history at this point, and Kurtzman, as with others before him, deserves an open mind until proven otherwise.
“Kurtzman, as with others before him, deserves an open mind until proven otherwise.” Er.. the Mummy not withstanding of course..
Haven’t seen it still, but your point is well taken.
But Kurtzman overseeing a writers room full of talent, and hopefully trusting their judgment, is a different situation.
How does Greg Berlanti even remembers all the shows he has on the air, much less write and produce them all? Some people just have a gift I guess.
@Jack — turn it into a musical? ;-)
Right. But you singled out Kurtzman first as not inspiring confidence. The others are neither here nor there, re: DISC, until proven otherwise, so they shouldn’t be lumped together anymore.
That said, I’m with you on all the reasons STiD didn’t work. JJ’s part of that conversation too.
I second that. Fortunately Lindelof is far too busy with the WATCHMAN pilot over at Warner Bros. (with KUNG FU in development right behind it) to even possibly consider it. Who knows what Orci is doing, but it’s unlikely considering his split with Kurtzman and CBS that he’d be coming back anytime soon.
But most people put Kurtzman in the same box with those people.
Oh yea… please keep Lindeloff out of this….
There is some connective tissue bridging currently between DSC and Lindelof … the production designer for first half of s1 DSC left (reasons Unknown, though the quality went WAY down afterward) and is now doing Lindelof’s presumed desecration of WATCHMEN.
Lindelof did a great job with The Leftovers.
Leftovers, what an Excellent show, especially the last two seasons. Loved it.
Leftovers = better than Discovery imho
Far and beyond better, agreed.
Better than that, even.. Haha
Leftovers. Never heard of it.
ML31. Pilot great, if clunky, but afterward some of the finest storytelling ever in TV imho.
Where can it be seen if it still can be?
It’s an HBO show originally, ML. Still available there. Not available on Amazon Prime yet, but oftentimes older HBO shows are available there at some point. Also available on dvd, of course. Definitely worth checking out.
Looks to be available on Netflix. Will decided if I want to add it to my cue or not later.
@FLB — I wasn’t a fan. Interesting concept, but not particularly well executed. I could tell you some stories if it weren’t for my NDA. ;-)
Welp, if anyone thought they’d stop coming here because of the mirror to today’s politics, there is no longer any escape.
Wow, almost 2 years between seasons, and only half the episodes of a typical Star Trek series. Forget franchise fatigue, now we have hiatus fatigue.
Hahah. The first season finished filming in October 2017 and finished airing four months ago. The second season started filming April 2018 and will probably start at the beginning of 2019. Where the heck are you counting two years?
Let’s wait and judge the comment on when the show ACTUALLY does start streaming.
welcome to television today. Long hiatus on off network shows like walking dead, the 100, etc. That’s the new reality. Even network tv series have shorter seasons.
But thats why so many people like working on cable and streaming sites because they have less episodes to produce and more time to make the ones they have.
And I think thats a good thing overall although yes the Trek boy in me miss the days of 26 episodes a year and that’s not counting when two Trek shows were on at the same time. Soooo much Trek back in the day.
So you are saying they like having to do less work for the same pay? I wish I could do that too!
LOL no not quite. And I think they are usually paid by episode so in probably many ways they make way less if you go from a network show of 22 episodes to a cable show of 10. But its not like any of these people starve, they still get paid very well, just less.
Yeah, I know. I was trying to be a little light. Doesn’t always come across that way.
LOL no worries!
Makes you miss the old days of TV when you would get a steady schedule for the year. Premieres in the fall, short break starting in december and coming back in January, then a season finale in May.
It would be pretty shitty for them if they decided to air in the Fall of 2019 instead of Jan 2019
I kind of agree with this.
Usually though when shows do this it’s because they’ve released the ENTIRE SEASON on streaming to binge watch.
Trek is weekly – there shouldn’t be this long of a stretch. Film the first bunch of episodes, release in the fall, do a winter break to rewrite/fix/film the rest, release the rest and end at the beginning of Spring.
For a weekly, there’s too much time – especially for a PAY-SUBSCRIPTION weekly to boot…
…and not so good for CBSAA, one would think, Toyko. Exactly.
Agreed. The break is far too long and too few episodes. It’s almost like a reboot each season rather than a continuation.
This is truly great news. These people were the very cabal that were rubbing me the wrong way from the start. They were too strongly opinionated, and quick to infuse their own twisted ideology into the writers room. They claimed they weren’t messing with cannon while simultaneously messing with cannon. (Sounds like projecting to me.) “Oh, it will all make sense in the end,”they would often claim, but that sounds too much like the last episode of ST: Enterprise. Guess what? The whole series was nothing but a virtual simulation of what history” recorded- supposedly.
I have no respect for the Discovery production team. No faith or trust in them at all. They said that they wanted to show the Klingon race as being diverse and that it was silly they should all look the same… but guess what, just lies to justify their visual reimagining. Cone head, bald Klingons with 4 nostrils. And no diversity. Just lies. Lots and lots of lies.
YEah they really dropped the ball with the Klingons. I don’t mean the way they look but the fact that they made such a big deal of how they were going to ‘explore’ them no other way the previous shows did. THey made such a big deal about the whole House thing that I thought we were going to get a more complex look of how each one operated, social dynamics, etc.
Instead none of that happened. They felt like one dimensional villains who wanted a war with the Federation, just because. There wasn’t even a real reason to do it other than to get them all united to fight. Dumb. L’rell was the only one who was fleshed out and seem like she had her agenda but even that went nowhere because they basically just held her in the brig for five episodes and just let her go in the end to ‘rule’ the planet.
I didn’t care about another Klingon story line but it would’ve been nice if they actually made the Klingons more diverse and dimensional they kept talking about.
I really think the Klingon war was a misdirect. Designed to get people off the Lorca thing. That, I think, was REALLY what season 1 was all about. How else does one explain leaving the way they relegated the war to B story status while they spent 1/3 of the season in the MU? I don’t think they ever had any intention of “exploring” the Klingons beyond the one character they focused on.
Well Bryan Fuller did discuss the Klingon war originally and I know the Lorca subplot didn’t come until after he left. But according to one of these show runners the Mirror Universe stuff was suppose to happen sooner when Fuller was in charge so maybe they pushed that out longer to make Lorca more mysterious before the big reveal.
Tiger2. I have to wonder if Fuller is being made to carry the can for some questionable creative decisions.
Honestly I don’t think so. Fuller stated when they hired him they had no clue of what the show would even be about, they left it to him to come up with everything. He even said they didn’t care what era it took place in, he decided it would be a prequel.
This was clearly Fuller’s show although they may have rejected some specifics but the overall vision really does sound like it was his.
From what I had read, the Lorca thing was always in the cards from day one. And it never changed even after all the changes in personnel and delays.
We can all now be hopeful that the show will (finally) be more Trek and less one groups politics. This is a good thing!
As the saying goes, too many cooks spoil the broth. Or, similarly, a camel is a horse designed by committee. I may have some reservations about Kurtzman, but it’s probably for the best that they start shedding some of those 19 executive co-producers.
So how are the Discovery-can-do-no-wrong crowd going to put a positive spin on this one?
Kurtzman on his own is NOT good news. One look at his back catalogue will tell anyone that.
Make no mistake, this is a disaster for Discovery and for me personally it feels like my hope that the show would improve and be ore Trek like has just flown out of the window.
The franchise deserves better.
Go read about the shit that went down during the first few seasons on TNG and get back to us.
I know all about what went down during the early years of TNG. That show improving doesn’t mean Discovery automatically will so your comment is meaningless. Kurtzman’s track record is awful, from the atrocious Transformers films to Cowboys & Aliens, Amazing Spider-Man 2, the crappy Now You See Me films and the inexcusably bad The Mummy with Tom Cruise. I hesitate to mention the astonishingly awful Non-Trek movie that was Into Darkness. The guy has very little good quality stuff to his name, especially when he has been flying solo.
You can pray he turns it around all you want, but I am not inspired given the truck full of manure that is his resume to date.
The poster is trolling. Don’t take the bait. They’re someone who has openly bashed TNG in the past.
Noted.
Careful with how you justify that, Holden. I’ve openly bashed TNG plenty of times too, but I usually back up my criticisms. HN4 posts are just bait, you’re right about that, all you have to do is see the lack of content, but don’t make this into a ‘he doesn’t like our show’ kind of thing, which just confuses matters.
Correct, kmart. It’s not the opinion. It’s the lack of content and antagonistic nature of his posts that makes him appear to be trolling.
@Kmart. True. I’ve called that poster out for a lack of context in the past. Maybe I get tired of pointing out in detail the same hypocrisies.
yeah, I’m exhausted by him/her too.
I agree. I have ceased responding to HN4 for the time being. The 2nd poster I have put on a personal “ignore”. Funny thing, the first poster I did that to, also gave him a 2nd chance which he tossed aside immediately, doesn’t seem to be around anymore. Which IMHO is for the better.
You would love me if I was a perpetual hater like yourself. Just sad.
I agree it doesn’t and while I’m not the biggest Kurtzman fan either but I know he really wants to make it a good show. He was the one who got Trek vets Bryan Fuller and Nic Meyer involved from day one. But yeah that didn’t go so well so we got Fuller’s lackeys. But I have a feeling new blood will come in again and hopefully someone who really knows and understands Trek.
I really don’t see Kurtzman running the show or the very least running it alone.
Totally agree that the comparison to TNG is irrlevant as TNG was made a lifetime ago in different circumstances when television was much different to what it is today. What’s happening seems similar on the surface but it’s no guarantee that DSC will improve at all.
As for Kurtzman’s films, the transformers films don’t do much for me beyond the first one, I’ve not seen Spider-Man or the new mummy. I actually enjoyed cowboys and aliens despite thinking it was the daftest thing I’d seen since “battleship” and I enjoyed the first “now you see me” but not the second.
As for “into darkness” I nearly walked out of the midnight showing of that when I first saw it – when it got to “my name is Khan” (spoiler alert). But over time I’ve leaned to loathe that film less. It’s ok if you ignore much of the Khan stuff and the story. I thought “Beyond” was much better.
So I think I’m about as cautiously optimistic about s2 as I was before. Well, with the exception of the makeup team talking about wanting to redesign the Borg.
Dr C. True what you say the TNG situation is a lifetime away… yet here we are, with history seemingly repeating itself..
Yeah but its repeating itself in a very different way though. I mean Roddenberry had lots of problems but most of the issues with TNG was mainly creative issues and trying to please Roddenberry sense of vision. They went through a lot of writers and staff because they couldn’t figure out what the show was early on and that lead to a lot of bumps in the road.
Discovery’s issues doesn’t seem to be about that. I always said while Fuller got the boot its pretty clear they stuck to his vision of the show. I’m amazed if you go back and listen to every interview he gave detailing the show, what it would be about, the characters, etc it was all included in the show which is why I don’t really think he left for any real creative reasons, just that he couldn’t deliver the show on time and they finally got fed up and fired him. But Berg and Hasbers clearly followed his original roadmap for the show. We know some of it changed later but it doesn’t seem like it was the same issue with Roddenberry. Fuller sounded like he could’ve made the show he wanted given caveats.
Berg and Hasbers just sound like they were stressed trying to deliver what they were now tasked to do and took it out on the staff when things got behind. This isn’t exactly a new problem. I’m sure there were plenty of creative conflicts since clearly the fans felt those conflicts existed too so there was probably some challenges to where it was going. But not like TNG where Roddenberry literally had his lawyer going into writer’s offices and editing their scripts. That was just bizarre lol.
Hi Tiger. There’s a huge turnaround in the writers, just like TNG. We’re getting leaks as to why this is happening on the new show as you state.. But the clear truth is still some way off imho. I think of TNG. David Gerrold, DC Fontana and Bob Justman were all there at the beginning.. and were gone in after a very short term. This is VERY similar to what’s happened to the new show with the exodus of Trek veterans..
Yes some left but I think for very different reasons thats all. I’m saying it doesn’t sound like it was an issue of Berg and Harberts firing people left and right because they disagree with their vision like Roddenberry did but that they just didn’t lead their staff more civilly.
As I said I’m sure there was some creative conflicts but I don’t think that was the MAIN issue. It sounded like they just treated people badly and what caused the low morale more than anything and what got them fired. And the studio doesn’t seem bothered in the direction the show has gone in where as Roddenberry basically left because so many people just couldn’t write the type of stories he wanted and why early TNG was so bad.
But yes I agree it is sad people like Joe Menosky and more than likely Nic Meyer left. There are rumors they basically rejected Meyers script and why we heard nothing from that guy about the show ever since.
On the surface, I agree. Let’s hope the outcome is the same and DSC gets better like TNG did (although there’s much to enjoy in TNG s1 for me – moreso than Discovery).
And always remember, when history repeats, listen to and follow the suggestion of Commander Riker:
Blow the main shuttlebay and watch the Bozeman (“I’m listening”) sail harmlessly by.
Dr. C, I agree with you about STID. I think they were trying to do the right thing. Kirk needed to earn the Chair. I think they succeeded in that but they did it in an absurd fashion linking their movie WAY too much to WOK. And by “too much” I mean that they liked to it at all.
“So how are the Discovery-can-do-no-wrong crowd”
Never heard of these crowd before…
I see this crowd all the time. While the showing was airing last fall, they were on facebook Star Trek groups claiming EVERY new episode of Discover was “The best episode yet” and how much they “absolutely loved it!!”, regardless of the actual quality of the episode. If I didn’t know better, I’d say they were studio plants.
Oh God, that Facebook group is insufferable. You can’t even say offer a mixed review without being pounced on.
It will be interesting to see where these people go & what they say after the series is finished & there’s no more Marketing money to pay for such fans.
There ARE definitely some of those people here, one troll in particular but I think most people here seem more objective than that. Even the people who really like Discovery has admitted it has faults here and there. I think they are just bothered by the people who put it down all the time thats the issue for them.
Except for the final season, I would say that Fringe is a good argument for Kurtzman running a tv show (as compared to a movie).
I couldn’t agree more El Chup. Because of his back catalogue and affiliation with the JJ-verse tripe, Kurtzman was my main suspect for why Simon Fuller had left and why Discovery has deviated in style and tone from the Star Trek universe we were all so invested. People using the first two seasons of TNG as an example as missing the point. It’s 2018, there are some incredible quality shows out there – Discovery should have been better planned, and written much better. To quote El Chup yet again, the franchise deserves better. Shows like Orange Is The New Black, GOT, Walking Dead… Discovery breaks no new ground. What is has done is break it’s ‘exploration and discovery’ formula – for the sake of creating change, they have destroyed the point of why we watch Star Trek. I don’t want murky, dimly lit war arcs that are resolved with a magic bomb under a planet’s surface. Discovery is so lame, so patronising, so ‘slap it’s self on the back’… This latest development is a huge red flag for me. Good luck Discovery… I hope you turn yourself around, iron out the continuity issues and reconcile with the tone of what made Trek great. Modern audiences expect diversity – you needed to do A LOT more to make your show good. Fools.
As far as the exploration thing it is kind of sad the ONE episode we got just a hint of exploring with the Phavo planet only happened because it was the studio that told the show runners they needed an episode with people beaming down on a planet and doing exploring stuff.They admitted that in an interview. This was already a red flag these show runners were not tied into Star Trek OR just wanted to be different when we would’ve gone an entire season and not one episode of just meeting some new aliens.
Yeah for a lot of people thats what Star Trek is. I get and accepted the season would be based around a war but if you still leave out the basic elements you’re going to get push back.
What is great about Trek is that its MANY things and you can do so much with it but the basics of the show is why people still tune in, the whole explore strange new worlds and seek out new life and new civilizations bit. I REALLY hope we get more of that next season and less Klingon stuff.
It’s not all that Star Trek is, but it speaks volumes that DS9 did more exploring every season than Discovery has managed so far and it was a show about a space station!
The “Trek” in Star Trek is missing with Discovery. What’s more it was obviously called discovery to reflect the double idea of personal discovery and literal discovery. So not only have they blown the “trek” element, but they’ve also blown the discovery element.
I couldn’t believe we got to the end of the season and had only visited one new planet. Embarrassing.
Yup. Trek survived for decades because it was unique. It offered something a bit different. By making Discovery just another dumbed won, dark and gritty actioner of the week it has lost what Makes Trek unique. The saddest thing is that we live in an age where Trek’s positivity and exploration of ethics and social issues is very much needed, just as it was in the sixties, eighties and, to a lesser extent, the nineties. Discovery needs to be that show and not a show that just reflects the contemporary base level zeitgeist and is Trek in name only. It needs to stand apart.
“So how are the Discovery-can-do-no-wrong crowd going to put a positive spin on this one?”
Probably similarly to how CBS spun it.
“Kurtzman on his own is NOT good news.”
I agree, but it is better than him WITH the other two. Baby steps. I’m holding out hope that more changes are still to come.
I wish I had your positivity, but I want Kurtzman gone and a whole new showrunning team brought in. True fans who understand Trek.
So do I. But I am thinking the only way we are going to get that is if an entirely new show is started. Discovery, I think, was DOA and not relivable.
Change is good. TNG had tons of shit going on behind the scenes during the first couple of seasons.
Yeah TNG had its problems but even that said they still managed to get 26 episodes done on time which is truly an accomplishment in itself even if a lot them sucked.
Discovery is the show that literally got delayed THREE times in its first season in a 9 month period. Now its sound like more delays is happening because of the chaos behind that show. But man I have to admit I was fooled. I see these people show up on the After Trek show and believed everything has been smooth sailing. They clearly bit more than they could chew with Trek and yes sometimes it did show even if the production was a strong one.
Maybe Kurtzman can right the ship but that guy seems as hated as Brannon Braga with most of the fans.
26 crappy episodes. You couldn’t pay me to watch TNG again.
..Said nobody ever.. TNG is one of the very best shows ever made
No……… Just No………..
I tried to actually enact a real discussion with you for once and I see I wasted my time yet again. Won’t make that mistake anymore. TM needs an ignore button for trolls.
Seconded, thirded and fourthed!
Kiss
Fifthed
God Bless Alex Kurtzman.
And Transformers the animated series. I now know my beloved Trek is in good hands…
Can’t exactly say that i am surprised… nor worried. What’s with all the thread closures? LOL, the whole topic was political (at least, peps are not swearing, Anthony)…
~Pensive’s Wetness
*Star Trek* is political — and always has been.
It would be nice to have a happy medium with the monitoring — we’ve either had months of people saying all sorts of insane, offensive, insulting nonsense with nary a peep, or else speedy shutdowns of anything political.
The social justice discussion is essential to Star Trek, I figure.
Bring in Frakes to run it.
You old timers need to move on.
I would love to point out the irony of a troll (and I use that word carefully) just finishing a lecture to someone else about the importance of studying TNG’s production history . . . who then immediately turns around and calls a fan of Jonathan Frakes an “old timer [who] need[s] to move on.”
Ha! Burn.
Move along Pops.
I’m not your “Pop,” thankfully. And ironically it sounds like I’m younger than you. So take your Daddy issues elsewhere. Troll.
Give me some money Pops, I got a date tonight.
Yep. There it is.
A near 40 year old man has a ‘date’. I hope you didn’t pay upfront.
Maybe it’s a date with his wrist?
@Tiger2 Tiger2 sounds really jealous. Hmmmmmm.
She was a 27 year old Chinese woman. I only paid for dinner.
If you want old-timers, how about TOS’ Ralph Senensky? The guy is still alive and is the only trek director in history whose work was ALL ‘winners’ in my book.
Half the writers who started when the show was in pre-production has been writing Trek for decades: Nic Meyer, Kirsten Beyer, Joe Menosky and Bryan Fuller, the guy who CREATED the show? HN2 if you want to be insulting at least don’t sound like a hypocrite since some of these people had a direct hand in the show you claim to love so much. And Frakes directed one of the best episodes of the season. He’s doing two more this season.
You’re getting older every day, HN4. Just a reminder.
@Danpaine Speak for yourself, I plan to live forever.
The guy is now 40 but sounds like a 14 year old. It really says a lot sadly.
@Tiger2 In actuality I’m only 25, still living forever though. I have a 1000 year plan.
Nice try old man. I guess you don’t remember this exchange you had with me:
“HN4
@Tiger2 – I’m 39 and I have always thought that TOS and TNG was crap. You couldn’t pay me to rewatch TNG. I recently watched the whole of TOS for the first time and the majority of the episodes were pretty forgettable. No surprise the show got canceled.
DS9 was the best, and I stop watching Voy after DS9 ended. Love Kelvin and Discovery. It’s great to hear they they are bringing in new fans.
March 26, 2018 5:45 pm”
So um, yeah. So were you lying then or are you lying now? I’m going to say the latter. But if it makes you feel any better your maturity level around here certainly makes you seem much younger than even 25.
But this just proves you’re trolling and for someone close to 40 and calling everyone else ‘old’, its sad and deluded, especially when you have to lie about your own age. I don’t think you even like Discovery like you claim. I think you’re just a bored middle age guy who does this for kicks and I doubt many would disagree. Don’t feel bad, you’re far from the only one on the internet who does it. Still sad though.
@Tiger2 So your a fan of my online persona. I’m touched and honored. The little people like you make what I do worth it.
Your ‘online persona’ says it all. Trolls are a waste of space. This proves it. You really should be banned since you offer nothing of actual substance here and just lie about anything since you are clearly that bored in real life.
@Tiger2
I guess you prefer the endless hate from the old losers here that have been hating this show since it was first announce.
How Sad….. :(
I’ll pray for you tonight. Our god is an Indian that turns into a wolf.
He probably values the relevant discussion points brought up by us old losers, because there’s some content contained in there. Your views — largely just insight-free unsupported snipes and the aforementioned penchant for trolling — are by comparison, valueless. (and yeah, valueless is something Spock once said, but here it is the correct word to use anyway.)
And I agree that this self-admitted trolling should be grounds for banning, but then again, I’d figure the endless stream you’ve vented is just more-of-the-same and evidence in and of itself, so if that didn’t get you banned, I can’t imagine what would. (be happy to be proven wrong about that though.)
There’s no “need” to at all.
They could do a lot worse.
I think that’s a great idea. But it would mean Alex moving to one side and I just don’t think he would. Really don’t trust the guy. Don’t know what it is.
Personally, I’m hoping for somebody new. For TNG-era staff, there’s still the Orville.
Problem is, we want STAR TREK – not a parody/tribute show. The fact that people are flocking to The Orville is very sad for the state of Trek. I like Discovery – “But not for the reasons you think,” to directly quote Lorca.
@TokyoGaijin — it strikes me as being more sad for the Trek fans who prefer ORVILLE. It’s fine to take a stroll down memory lane, but that’s what ORVILLE is. DISC feels like the right step for the franchise.
I think Discovery is a better show than Orville overall but the reason why Discovery gets slammed because it ignores a lot of why people like Star Trek in the first place. I mean the show is called ‘Discovery’ and yet there was an entire season without it. I can’t think of one thing that made me look at something in a unique way like so many Star Trek stories have done before other than finding out the Captain is secretly evil from another universe or that the security officer is secretly a Klingon or that the dead Captain double is an evil Emperor from the other universe. Its a lot of crazy twists and turns, but there was little to no wonder about any of it. It felt like twists for twists sake like what happens in soap operas (and I LIKED the Lorca twist but understand why others didn’t).
Thats why I like Orville they actually do try to bring back a sense of exploration and understanding more about yourselves because of it.
Can I just say I am personally sick of the “Orville is Trek” nonsense. I am a huge fan of the Berman era but I have zero desire to see a return to the look and feel of it. I don’t watch The Orville as a result.
Discovery doesn’t need to go backwards and be another TNG. That’s not where its faults lie. It does however need to retain the basic storytelling hallmarks that make Trek what it is, and that’s where its biggest failure is IMO.
@El Chup
There were a lot of things I loved about the Berman era. DS9 from season 3-onward, later half of TNG, I admit I loved Voyager, ENT season 3.5-4 were great… but I agree, Orville is NOT Trek.
It’s not even a suitable replacement.
I like The Orville for what it is, but I don’t think it’ll ever replace Trek – it’s not even a substitute. Discovery has a lot that needs to be worked on – I liked what season 1 brought (and hated some things about it too) but with not as many episodes in a season, it needs to be epic, bigger and better going forward.
Well it can’t replace Trek, CBS would sue. ;)
I get what people are saying obviously and it just feels like a show thats about exploration where as Discovery doesn’t. End of the day thats what this really seems to be about. That and that they look at social issues the way the old shows did where Discovery doesn’t seem to do any of that either.
But I agree with you Orville has its place but its still not quite Star Trek. But I also think why it stands out because its not cynical like so many space shows today are, even if they are good like the Expanse, Lost in Space and Discovery. Those shows are entirely based on conflict or a crisis. Lost in Space is not as heavy as the other two being a family show but its premise is still based around struggle and hardship.
Orville feels like Trek of old where people are out in space because they just want to learn more about the universe they live in and not just because they are forced to be out there over some danger or need. There was always constant conflict on Star Trek but it was never a show based on conflict although I guess you can argue DS9 came closest.
But now that the war is over Discovery could go back to that direction like the other shows. The question is will it?
I agree Jack. That would be ideal. Someone who understand the legacy. Star Trek fans want modern television, we love good writing, we love grit and edge, but we also invested in a 50 year rich tapestry and we can to revisit it, feel that escapism again. That doesn’t mean recreating the past, it does mean moving forward, but it also means preserving a tone and a style – not a showrunner reinventing the wheel to stroke their own ego.
Orville is crap, it just a very expensive cosplay show for MacFarlane’s ego.
I really enjoy Orville. The story lines are sweet, the comedy inoffensive enough. I’ll happily buy the boxsets and support The Orville. I like it and I like what it stands for.
I still haven’t heard about a blu-ray release for it. The VFX guys will not be happy if it doesn’t happen, the work is supposed to look better than we saw on broadcast.
Sounds like Star Trek The Next Generation Season 2 All over again so the Show might actually find is place in season 3 like TNG did
This Guy is Good for Star Trek Discovery Hell he was EP on Transformers Prime and it was the ONLY Transformer Show that WON a Day Time Emmy for Animated Show
He won an Emmy for a Transformers cartoon?
Oh, well, all my fears have suddenly been washed away!
So now we equate Trek with transformers… Love it..!
That was my first thought too. Transformers? Ugh.
LOL! Oh how the mighty have fallen…
Wow! Thank you so so so much G1Convoy. I was feeling nervous but as you’ve bought Animated Transformers into the equation suddenly I’m feeling far more assured. I think of incredibly poetic and thought-provoking episodes of Trek, like DS9’s ‘Far Beyond The Stars’ and now I think of those charming animated robots, maybe one of them is a truck and then it changes into a giant robot that can shoot torpedos out of it’s eyes and I feel better about the future of Trek. Thank you.
Harberts always stuck me as an angry guy with a surface covering of learned civility. Additionally, it was clear to me that they were writing a dystopian action sci fi show like all the others today, but not Star Trek. I’m glad they are out, but I wish it was also because CBS realized they weren’t writing Star Trek. At least in my view. Unfortunately, and I really don’t want to be negative, Kurtzman gives me no reason for hope either. His work on “Transformers” etc. is consistent with how the JJ movies stripped Trek of any philosophical message/social commentary and turned it into another action movie with things blowing up every five minutes. It seems I am left hoping that the show will pick writers/showrunners who understand Trek better. Fingers crossed.
Aren’t most of the writers still around?
agreed with the first part but Bad Robot created a Star Trek that the studios would fund because it would make money. They saved Trek and opened the door for Discovery. Then we are back to the first part where they bumbled DSC
LOL oh boy! It really does prove no matter how many times people can smile and pretend everyone is a close-knit family and loving all the work everyone does, underneath it all is pure chaos. Now I’m not too surprised why Joe Menosky jumped ship after this. This show is making the TNG early years seem like a vacation.
I don’t know if this is good or bad news to be honest. I didn’t have anything against them but I didn’t like MANY of their decisions. But Alex Kurtzman running the whole thing? Eh, I don’t know. I just wish they can bring in some of the writers from DS9 but I know.
And 2019? Jesus its May! I thought maybe October or November the latest before we see the first episode. But with more chaos I guess things get delayed (again).
It’s worse than you realize. It’s actually June! ;-)
LOL I went back in time for a moment! ;)
Haha, no problem. I’ve done that too.
It’s TNG and VOY all over again. Been there, done that. Now, they have 5 episodes in the can, so whatever true changes the show experiences, we might notice by then.
Now would really be the time to bring in Ira Steven Behr or Ron Moore as a show runner.
How wonderful that could be..
DS9 and BSG04 were both excellent and are 2 of my favourite shows so that would be very welcome news to me.
But… I doubt they’d bring in players of an older era sadly. Shame though cos Ron D Moore knows how to write characters.
Unfortunately he did not know how to write story hence season 4 of battlestar sucked beyond belief.
I actually enjoyed s4 of BSG and I’m one of the tiny minority who loved the ending… but life would be boring if everyone liked what I like! So say we all etc. ! :)
The ending was immensely predictable. But still better than what STD gave us.
I loved the ending, and I didn’t see it coming either.
@Dr C The campaign for Ron Moore starts here.
It’s got my support :)
Mine too!
Wow it just hit me, these were the same two people whose been all over the Emmy panels talking up the show and the great creative vision they been bringing to it. Well maybe second season the show has a shot for one. Its no way its winning one outside of make up or acting since their names will be all over it.
” and the great creative vision they been bringing to it” Hmm.. You must have been watching something else
I was saying how THEY talked about it. ;)
The writing staff seems to have a lot of power.
You can’t make any Trek without a script.. so, they do..
Until they get a staff (sic) infection.
What a great day. This now means that everyone responsible for writing one of the worst hours of Star Trek ever (“Will You Take My Hand?”) has been terminated with extreme prejudice. (Aaron, Gretchy, & Akiva.) Yes yes, there is still The Kurtzman Factor. But for now, let us celebrate and drink of the black label blood wine. [And to quibblers, “Will You Take My Hand?” is, in fact, more offensive than “Threshold” and such; though I will allow that it is marginally easier to sit thru than “The Lights of Zetar.”]
Is the black label blood wine 2309? There is no finer vintage!!! I’ll take 3 barrels.
I’ll take 6!
Qa’Pla!
Say that with a mouth full of marbles and you’ve got Discovery Klingons down pat.
everyone just tried it and found out…ur right ;-)
I thought it was great to see the Orion area and the bit of Michal/Ash backstory we got after he was gambling. the ending was rushed as fuck though.
Still, Threshold is better? You’re completely off your rocker there. Next you’ll tell me Will You Take My Hand was worse than Shades of Grey.
“Next you’ll tell me Will You Take My Hand was worse than Shades of Grey.”
I’ll say it. A clip show would have been better than that idiot finale STD gave us.
As clip shows go (and I’m old enough to remember SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN and BUCK ROGERS), I don’t find SHADES all THAT awful, especially compared to most of the rest of s2 TNG. At least we got a ton of VFX explosion clips towards the end, though to be honest I haven’t seen for something like 28 years.
The worst part for me was the coming attractions trailer, when the narrator goes extreme with ” … and it’s attacking his brain!” or words to that effect.
Hey, Jan Shutan’s legs were okay as I recall, so ZETAR isn’t totally without merit.
I’ll see your “Will You Take My Hand?”
And raise you “These Are the Voyages” and “Broken Bow”‘s dialog…
My god, you are mad
Now the Disco writers’ tweeting of their Sad Cake makes more sense. Looking forward to more analysis of the Sad Cake and other foreboding clues of the abused, soon…
Galt you must be loving this.
I am loving this. Does that make me mean? Star Trek Discovery’s production team have been so condescending and patronizing. I’m really happy to see them with their pants down.
NO it doesn’t. Of course I’m happy they are fired if they really did those things. It was a shock to read the headlines here but yes even I have to admit I knew it was going to be fun to talk about lol.
There just seems to be something about Trek that makes people want to abuse people for not sharing their view. And here was me thinking this was just something restricted to internet message boards! ;)
Good point.. Respectful, unless you can make your reply hilarious of course ;)
I thoroughly dislike Discovery and ignore comments that wax lyrical about it. It bothers some people to see any criticism of the show, and there have been some really ugly names thrown around. As it is, I’m a gay man, from a middle eastern background, with parents who are practising muslims. This show does nothing for me. I find it patronising and preachy. Yet saying that, I’ve been called homophobic and sexist, etc. Discovery does nothing DS9 didn’t do 25 years ago. Trek was late to the party and shouldn’t be patting itself on the back. Instead, they should be trying to tell exciting stories about exploration and ‘discovery’ and provide escapism for the viewer – not a headache.
Hearing this news makes me understand why people like Joe Menosky and Nick Meyer left the show while they had the chance. To be perfectly honest I am not going to shed a tear for these two. If you can’t have a positive working environment, that is your fault more than anyone else. I have a feeling these guys and Bryan Fuller are made of the same cloth, hence Mr Fuller also being fired from so many shows. I just can’t understand, is it so difficult to show a little less ego? You have to be open to all points of view in your writers room. I also think we should give Alex Kurtzman a chance, because he has nothing to lose. I know his previous work doesn’t inspire confidence, but it is his show now and he will either sink or rise with it and I have a feeling if he sinks this show, it will be the final nail in Hollywood career. So I think he is aware of the importance of this work.
Maybe what I’m about to say is a product of having binged-watched HBO’s Rome in a week (PERFECT series for anyone who’s interested). But in my mind, the person who comes out victorious is often the person most ruthless and undeserving. Bryan Fuller, in my mind, was a hard-core Trek fan. They get rid on him. Menopause and Meyer are ousted… and now Alex is left, standing solo, can bully who he likes, take the show where he likes. If we’re to speak about egos, there’s only one left. Perhaps his was the biggest?
Agree HBO have this TV thing down to a fine art now.
Thanks DPrescott, they really do. The more I think about it, had HBO produced a Trek show… I imagine I would have been very happy indeed. As much as I miss visual continuity, it’s the bad writing that bothers me most about Discovery – something I don’t tend to see from HBO’s output.
Glad it was said again. The visual continuity could have been handled fairly easily had the show itself delivered interesting plots with compelling characters.
Cry me a river.
Agreed ML31. HN4’s comment pretty much sums up the Discovery ethos – shut down criticism. I dislike the show, and dislike the kind of people that like it.
For all the blather about the showrunners being social justice whatsits, they sure seemed very Trump-like with that shut down criticism angle.
I have a self imposed “ignore” order on HN4. I see the name and my eyes skip the post. Not as good as an actual “ignore” feature, however. But it’s all we got at the moment.
Yeah, but HBO has had a bad habit of killing shows in their prime — I’m still immensely sore about DEADWOOD and CARNIVALE, which were probably, along with the WIRE, the best shows of that whole decade.
Good news. So season 3 might be watchable? Maybe even the lst episodes of season 2?
Let’s hope.
And please be aware of PR spin – of course they were fired for (at least partly) creative reasons; though I don’t doubt they were abusive (every time I saw Harberts talk, he seemed phony and shallow). The budgetary excuse seems less plausible, considering Kurtzman directed the premiere and oversees Aaron & Gretch. There are enough talented people in the industry who want to work on Star Trek, that there will likely be no reason to continue the voyages of the USS Disco Disaster past the doomed second season. Nuke Disco into oblivion and start a Trek series from scratch, without the prequel baggage and with clever producers. If nothing else, Discovery has shown there is a large global audience willing to give a Trek series a chance. For those comparing STD to TNG, please stop – there is no legendary Patrick Stewart thespian here nor a Michael Piller waiting in the wings. The argument I keep seeing, that Trek shows magically get better after the first season, is delusional.
Having a field day there, eh? Can’t say that I’m sad about the decision either, but man, you just go on and on. Well, someone will feel irritated, no doubt about that, but you could’ve left it at one post.
Who are you to tell people how many times they can post? If you don’t like a post, ignore it and move on. Discovery is cringe worthy and not good television. As an addition to the rich 50 year tapestry… it’s an insult. Star Trek only in name. Passionate fans are allowed to voice their objections, criticisms and general waffle – without being shot down by the post police.
I’m not teliing people how many times they can post, I’m telling Mirror Galt that he doesn’t need to ramble on and on to elicit the reaction he desires. Whole different story right there.
I deemed nothing he said “wrong” by the way – but the wording suggests he’s waiting for the “squad” to arrive.
I AGREE! Thanks Mirror Galt for, as always, saying what most are afraid to say. The ‘TNG had a ropey start’ excuse is nonsense, nonsense in 2018, when there is so much quality programming about. Star Trek: Disaster should have been better planned, better written, better produced. It was ill-conceived. Yet another prequel nobody wanted. Breaks no ground. Pats itself on the back for things it should be doing anyway. Garbage. Here’s to a 5 year gap and like you say, more worthy and CLEVER creatives handling our beloved franchise.
With you Mirror Galt. I suspect CBS expected more positive buzz for this show. If they can, by Herculean effort, reach some sort of acceptable creative plateau then I can see them stretching to say 40 to 50 episodes, enough to get a streaming package, then they try again. So 3 or 4 seasons.
Hey, the first time Peter Lauritson directed TNG he went way over budget, and he was Berman’s main hatchet guy to keep directors on time and budget, so bosses do get away with this. Stars too … Don Johnson directed a MIAMI VICE episode that cost way over 2 mil – more than 30 years ago!
Some ways I kind of feel sorry for the actors because we all know this is going to be brought up every time between now and when the show comes back. They have to sit and pretend everything is fine or maybe some will really spill but my guess is CBS won’t let them.
Although I will say I was surprised how candid a lot of the actors in Solo was over that situation over losing the first directors. I guess it was no good way to spin it so they just let everyone say what they thought about it. Of course that didn’t save the movie, but still.
THANK GOD GOLDMAN IS OUT!
Yeah and Haberts and Berg too… this is a great day.
I have more fate in Kurzmann…. oh shit!
“Production hiatus” — Oh my. If this were Doctor Who, we’d all run screaming at the sound of those words!
I took from the article that CBS is very protective of the writing staff, and i like it. I think they delivered some great episodes.
I’m just not sure about Kurtzman being the Showrunner, but i guess time will tell.
NO! NOOOOOOOOO!!! [smashes a display case in anger; Both pause, shocked] I will not sacrifice Star Trek. We’ve made too many compromises already, too many retreats. They wrote terrible scripts, and we fall back. They abused workers, and we fall back. Not again! The line must be drawn here! This far, no further! And I will make them PAY for what they’ve done!
I want to blow on Alex’s arm and watch the little hairs move.
Not surprised, I knew the dark nasty themes & elements bleeding into Star Trek had to come from some negative place & I think their abusive behaviour to staff is a symptom of this.
Kurtzman can’t be that bad, as much as I had issues with the JJ films being More action orientated they were way better than STD & couldn’t be worse than STD season One.
Agreed, Trekboi. Before DSC I was never a huge proponent of the KU, but those films have grown on me (except STID) since DSC was released.
Me too Danpaine. Embarassed to admit it. But me too.
LOL at people trying to spin this as good news…show is a total mess.
It is a shuttle crash for sure.
I agree. The crud going on behind the scenes from day one have not ended. The results seen in season one provided huge evidence of that. And now we see this. This show feels like the Vengeance crashing into Alcatraz.
I don’t know if they are spinning it as good news so much as if you didn’t like the show and blamed them for a lot of the problems then maybe it could improve.
That said Alex Kurtzman took over who seem to fall directly in line with their vision and he did help create the entire premise so yeah I think nothing will change all that much in terms of the direction although I’m HOPING they were already changing it in season 2 anyway. Thats why I stay optimistic and I didn’t hate first season but was disappointed by a lot of it.
It is potentially good news if they replace them with some competent storytellers. If not, more mess, as you noted.
I am hoping that this is Ted Sullivan’s show now.
Yeah, I was wondering why his name didn’t come up. I think he should have run the show.