Two of the production department heads on the Star Trek: Discovery “Visionaries” panel at WonderCon were the makeup and prosthetic effects duo of Glenn Hetrick and James MacKinnon. Glenn Hetrick is probably best known for the SyFy show Face-Off. He is a life-long Trekkie and co-founder of Alchemy Studios with his Face-Off collaborator, and Trek creature and character designer, Neville Page. James MacKinnon is a Trek franchise veteran makeup artist, who has been part of the makeup crews on TNG, DS9, Star Trek: First Contact, and Star Trek (2009).
Following the panel, TrekMovie sat down with these makeup gurus along with other journalists at a roundtable interview where we talked about the design of the Klingons, and the day-to-day process of working on a new high definition Star Trek show.
James MacKinnon and Glenn Hetrick at WonderCon 2018
Redesigning the Klingons
What was your inspiration, where did you get the idea to change the Klingons so radically but then also keep the texture of who they are?
Hetrick: Early on, because we were on the show for almost eight months before we actually took over, so this was a looong discussion. With Bryan Fuller and the other producers, there was always this desire to create a new Klingon look, because we felt like it was something that had happened between TOS and Next Gen, it happened between TOS and the films. So, it was a natural step to take in the Star Trek universe when you are coming up with a new show. That and the fact that this is really the first Trek where we are dealing with the problems that HD creates. And those problems, combined with sophisticated audience eye means you have to come up with something even more hyper-real to make people believe it.
So, we wanted to do this with a keen eye on honoring the integrity of everything that’s come before us. I grew up on and loved the [veteran Star Trek makeup designer Michael] Westmore versions and James worked on those versions. So, we wanted to keep enough of it there that it resonated and felt like Klingon, but to take it as far as we could in the realm of realism and evolve the design to it’s next step.
Can you talk more about the different Klingon designs on Discovery?
Hetrick: One of the things I look forward to unpacking more as we move forward: I created a cultural axiom document for all the houses. It doesn’t mean it will be written into the show, but when we make design decisions and we show a House, and there’s lots more to show, there are all these cultural axioms I created to give us design impetus as to which planet of the Empire did they grow up on? In the past we’ve always seen a homogenized look to the Klingon with the wardrobe and the hair, give or take. We’re trying to make sure that all the houses feel like their own unique thing, because why wouldn’t they be? If you look at the cultural patina of all of our cultures, with our architecture, our food, our fashion or music, on just one measly planet that’s not even space faring yet, what would the Empire’s culture look like? And we’re really diving into that and will be as we go further.
James MacKinnon applying Klingon makeup to Mary Chieffo
Inspiration for updating the Tellarites
What can you say about the new look for the Tellarites?
Hetrick: [Tellarites were] a tall order, if you go back to TOS. There were some awesome versions on Enterprise, that’s a cool way to evolve the Tellarites. They were kind of a minor thing, just a little bit. We went back to the original, and how can we try to get that “thing”, that feel back into this but not make it look like it did then. So I really looked at Stan Winston’s work on The Island of Doctor Moreau, now almost a lost film, the Val Kilmer version. So many of those anthropomorphic forms, animal heads, were so beautiful and that is where we took our inspiration.
The updated Tellarite makeup from episode 11
A collaborative and detailed design process
Do you guys get a brief that gives you that information and then you work from that?
Hetrick: When I said in the panel it’s the most immersive, generous, and inclusive, creative environment I’ve ever worked in, that is nothing but short of the truth. So, it is not common in our department to get this much immersion. Aaron [Harberts] and Gretchen [J. Berg] and all the writers and producers from Day One–and we started working almost 8 months before we were physically on set—that’s unique. So yeah, they share ideas before they’re even beat boarded, before they’re outlined, before they’re even scripts. And then they ask for— and actually mean it, which is a strange thing in Hollywood— your input. They’ll give us where they’re headed and some thoughts they’re kicking around in the writer room phase before it’s even beated out, and we’ll start throwing stuff back at them and they’ll grab some stuff that they like and that feedback starts to happen as Nev[ille Page] starts into the digital world.
Someday I hope all you guys get to see that, I think there is inexorably going to be a book, if not a documentary. [Creature designer Neville Page’s] design process is quite massive, so we work in the digital, not just because we’re 3D printing things, but for everything. So, there are digital designs that come from those conversations then he and I will talk about it. He’ll bang out versions. Then we’ll start taking the ones that are most likely and maybe doing some physical tests and looking at materials and colors. For instance, for the Orions, we just looked at raw silicone samples. We took this demon face that is not part of Star Trek and ran different translucent blue colors to see what the base tone was that really gave it an angelic, almost heavenly glow so that when light goes through it and bounces back to your eye it doesn’t look like a dude in blue paint. James can speak to that. The problem is, we can do all those things in the lab, and make all those cool techniques work, but he’s got to figure out how to get it to blend with the skin.
MacKinnon: It [Orion makeup] was four colors we have to spatter and spackle on there just to give it life and depth. Just so it’s not a solid blue, solid green, solid any color character, because that camera is gonna pick up every detail. Also, the prosthetics that I get now, with the camera being so sharp — like Mary [Chieffo] had a 5 piece prosthetic on, my goal is for you not to see all the seams that I have to hide with stippling and coloring.
Is it still a process of discovery as you go day in and day out?
MacKinnon: Oh sure. I mean my makeups change throughout the whole season in ways that I learn every day of doing it a little differently. You guys will never see it, but I see ways of shortening the time, putting the paint a little to the right which will hide something… those are little changes that I’ll see that make my job easier, that make production’s job easier because they get the actor on camera for more time. The less they’re in my chair the more they are on screen.
Hetrick: HD is this technological land mine. No one knocked on the doors of all the makeup effects people and said you know, in a few years from now you’re going to have to change the way that you do everything because they’re going to invent a new camera. When he says HD is not good for us—it takes away all our secrets. So on shows like CSI: New York where we’re doing all this high end forensics stuff (which we also worked on together) we had to literally throw away all the molds for the pieces that were in foam because they just no longer worked. Day one of the season when we changed to a Red [HD] camera, we were like “that’s it!” — we had to go all silicone for everything because you could see every edge. So it takes away a lot of our tricks. So it is a process of discovery and each character carries with it it’s own challenges, no matter how many makeups you’ve done, the next makeup is the first time you’re doing THAT makeup, so everything has to be figured out for that person and the way their edges work.
Neville Page with Glenn Hetrick and Mary Chieffo (Photo: Robert Hanashiro, USA TODAY)
Designers would love to update the Borg
What kind of aliens from previous iterations of Star Trek would you like to see on Discovery? Is there anything you’re dying to make?
Hetrick: You know Klingons would have been the first answer. We luckily got to do the Andorians and Tellarites, so awesome going back to TOS. But Borg!
MacKinnon: Yeah Borg!
Hetrick: We’re DYING to do Borg. Because with 3D printing… no single species is better suited to the way we are approaching using technology now and immersing ourselves in 3 D printing than the Borg. So we’re just dying —I don’t know when or if that would even happen in this series, but that’s just our wish list.
MacKinnon: I did First Contact, so I got to do that version of it, which was all foam latex. Now it would be all 3D printing with silicone. It’s cool.
Borg drones from Star Trek: First Contact
More TrekMovie WonderCon 2018 coverage
Interview: Jason Zimmerman Talks USS Enterprise And 5,000 VFX Shots For ‘Star Trek: Discovery’
Interview: Mary Chieffo Talks Klingon Sex And L’Rell’s Future
Full Star Trek: Discovery Visionaries panel video
‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Showrunners Confirm Number Of Episodes In Season 2, Give Production Update
7 Things We Learned About ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Season 2 At WonderCon Visionaries Panel
WATCH: ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Bonus Scene Reveals A Familiar Storyline For Season Two
Star Trek: Discovery is available exclusively in the USA on CBS All Access. It airs in Canada on the Space Channel and streams on CraveTV. It is available on Netflix everywhere else.
Keep up with all the Star Trek: Discovery news at TrekMovie.
“With Bryan Fuller and the other producers, there was always this desire to create a new Klingon look, because we felt like it was something that had happened between TOS and Next Gen, it happened between TOS and the films. So, it was a natural step to take in the Star Trek universe when you are coming up with a new show…”
Sorry, but this is singlemost elusive statement I have EVER read. Why is it supposed to be natural to take an iconic race and change it when this version had been around from 1979 to 2005 and had become THE ultimate Klingon appearance, deeply embedded within Trek lore? The version that Worf was based on, one of the most important characters on two shows and four movies?
Of course there was that first redesign but that had posed an issue for almost 30 years before they FINALLY solved that continuity gap on ENT. And then, 12 years later, they flush that out of an airlock just because… well… why? Because it had happened before! I don’t get it, it’s beyond me.
This is the one bit of DSC I will never be able to dig, no matter how often they try to justify it… They can change ship designs, armor, fashion, uniforms as much as they want but Klingons have HAIR… long warriors’ hair, bushy eyebrows, prominent beards… You, Mr Hetrick, look more like an actual Klingon than any of those creations of yours on DSC…
I agree it’s totally idiotic and they have essentially killed the Klingons.
I am not sure why such a backlash exists – it’s almost as if people are looking for holes in Discovery just because they don’t like it. I just finished watching an episode of DS9 with Kor, Kang and Koloth. They look ABSOLUTELY NOTHING LIKE THEY DID IN TOS – but I don’t recall any massive fan outrage against DS9 because the makeup was different than what we saw in the 1960s. And no, it didn’t bother me the least or make me enjoy DS9 any less – the characters just looked different to align the Klingons with the makeup capabilities during the late 1990s. Now in 2018, those capabilities are even further enhanced. Btw in the episode titled Blood Oath, they actually are looking for an albino Klingon, sound familiar Discovery fans?
Oh please. Can we stop pulling minor canon inconsistencies like Blood Oath and use it to try and pass this off.
You don’t understand that after 10 movies and FOUR spin off TV shows, three of which had Klingon lead characters, the ridged/hair/beard look had become THE look and the culture and design by then we deeply developed and 99.5% consistent, even if occasionally you had a Blood Oath issue.
Your argument is “well, 0.5% there was a slight canon inconsistency so that means we just throw everything else out of the window”.
Has it occurred to you that there are some fans devoted to that well developed culture and race and this just feels like a slap in the face…and what about equally the slap on the face to all those who worked on prior shows and movies to try and develop the culture and make it what it had become before Discovery?
The saddest part is it’s so easily dealt with. Either they could have made the make up the same, just with more development and detail, or they could have had their new race and just included a few of the older ridged Klingons in the show as well to say the new look is just a different Klingon species (as they claimed originally). But no. They just don’t care enough. They just keep feeding the older fans BS and hope they buy it, and if they don’t the attitude, reading between the lines, is “tough, we don’t care, we’ll do as we please”.
I’m amazed that they did this to the Klingons. Thinking of the good old days with Michael Westmore and his team. The new bloke with the neck tat looks like a drug dealer! I don’t like the people who made this show. I don’t like the lack of respect or continuity for the Star Trek franchise which has been passed to them to respect and continue. They’ve just flushed everything I respect down the toilet and they don’t give a damn!
Also, ENT’s brilliant 2-parter that canonically explained why TOS Klingons look different from TNG Klingons, would also explain why Kor, Kang and Koloth look different in TOS than they do in TNG (despite being the same characters):
Cranial Reconstruction
With the Disco Klingons, producers decided to throw out 50+ years of history, and completely redesign them (again), but even throwing in additional… parts, to the redesign, which makes no sense whatsoever: If Worf had 2 dicks (as implied that Klingons do, in Discovery), surely Jadzia or even Ezri would’ve made some reference directly or indirectly? Unless of course, Discovery’s producers simply ignore everything that came before, and try to pass this travesty off as their version of “Prime”.
Maybe Klingons just have two urethra openings?
“That was an ongoing writers’ room debate. According to canon, Klingons have two organs, they have two of everything, right? So we had this debate. When we say two of everything, does that include the penis? I think this was something that [director Akiva Goldsman] really liked the notion of. He just kept joking, ‘Klingons have two dicks, Klingons have two dicks.’ And then he finally went ahead and showed it on television.”
Nothing about those ENT episodes were brilliant. It was an answer to a question no one was asking. Even the no ridge Klingons still looked nothing like the black face Klingons from TOS. It was pure stupid, a sure sign that the show was grasping at straws near the end.
I’m glad Disco deleted it from canon.
They didn’t delete it from canon any more than TMP deleted the TOS Klingons from canon.
While it is nice to maintain some kind of continuity,I think the look of the Klingons is secondary to the mediocre to outright bad scripts STD has delivered us.
Agreed.
Blood Oath makes me puke. They should have never done that to Kor, Kang, and Koloth.
Let’s be frank: 90s Klingons were all drunken space Vikings with bad teeth. They were almost ridiculous.
John M. Ford (The Final Reflection) had the best explanation between TOS and TMP+ Klingons by far.
Klingons had no honor in TOS, and Romulans did. TNG flipped it for some odd reason.
I like DSC Klingons because they are truly ALIEN!
And not only that, but hair was important to Klingon myth. Didn’t TNG say that Kahless forged the first batleth by cutting a lock of his hair and dipping it into one the volcanos?
It was pube hair.
Trimmed from right in-between Kahless’s two dicks!!
Damn Right.
This is the aspect that doesn’t make sense to me either, how does not having hair make them somehow more realistic? If they added hair to the new design I think people would be far more accepting of the change.
Yeah the no hair thing makes no sense. Its completely part of their mythology as a race.
@Garth Lorca – The Klingons have always changed. Why can’t you get that?
@HN4 no not really. They changed significantly twice, from TOS to the TMP, and from TMP to TNG.
From there are on out they were essentially the same, with improvements in the application of the makeup.
@Garth Lorca
And now they have better improvements. Like they said before, the old makeup wouldn’t work in HD. It was already looking bad in SD. It’s a fail when you can recognize the actor behind the Klingon makeup.
I’m sorry… How exactly is that a “fail”?
It’s not, it’s just somebody striving to justify his POV with hot air.
If you say so. But abandoning hair hasn’t got anything to do with technically improving the makeup.
This isn’t improvement in make up technology. It’s just a rubber head redesign for not other reason than “because we can”. Stop making their excuses for them.
“They changed significantly twice, from TOS to the TMP, and from TMP to TNG.”
No, they didn’t. It was changed once. There was no SIGNIFICANT change between TMP and TSFS/TNG. Yes, the ridges looked a tad different, but that’s a detail, not a complete makeover.
Appliances aside, the Klingon costumes from TMP were essentially unchanged in TSFS, TFF, and so on.
Praetor Tal,
Re: Klingon costumes from TMP were essentially unchanged in TSFS, TFF, and so on
And by so on, am I to take it you mean to include the Klingon costumes in GENERATIONS including Worf’s non-Starfleet accoutrements that he carried into the rest of the TNG films, if I recall correctly?
I think what he’s saying is that the over many, many episodes and movies the Klingon culture was extremely developed and that included their non-physical design aesthetic as well.
Wasn’t Worf’s TNG sash originally a version of that worn by Kor in TOS? But yeah, there’s a design lineage. The movie- and spinoff-era uniforms even had design elements from the TOS Klingon uniforms. With Discovery,* other than the occasional Klingon logo and the use of Klingon language, there’s very little to remind us we’re looking at Klingons. Which is a first for the franchise.
*Edited
Worf had a cranial change during the TNG run… I know, I know, that is a much smaller change. But it still changed from one season to the next.
Yet strangely I like the TMP Klinks best of all the ridged Klingons! Perhaps it was the fact they weren’t acting like drunken space Vikings.
Valkris and Vixis were cool. Hell, Klaa was cool… None of them had those bad teeth appliances they gave the Klinks in TNG+!
Yeah. It’s like taking away Superman’s “S” and cape giving him a “T” and skirt and then just coming out with a ludicrous justification like “the skirt works better on camera now”.
The way I see it, the change from TOS to TMP etc., was less of a redesign and more of an enhancement. All they did was add forehead ridges, bad teeth, and forget to cut their hair for a few years. They still had the reddish, darker skin tone, bushy eyebrows, and dark unkept hair. It was just one change, really, as far as their physiology goes. And it’s an addition, not a removal of existing iconic features. This new change removes EVERYTHING that defines Klingon physiology from TOS, and most of what defines them in the remaining canon. The only thing left is the ridges. And they ignore things that are important in Klingon culture, such as the importance of hair, especially facial hair. So this is just bad no matter how you look at it.
Yeah. I agree. It’s like removing bumps from a Dalek. Some things are a change too far to the extent the thing becomes unrecognisable.
In retrospect, it’s pretty clear that the makeup change was done primarily so as to accommodate the “plot twist” of Voq and Ash being the same person. And since this was the least surprising plot twist in the entire history of television, I call that a failure of concept.
This sounds VERY plausible. It does feel like it was done mainly to hide the silly Voq/Ash storyline. Of course, that could have been dealt with by just hiring another actor to play Voq…
The bottom line is very, very simple.
They ignored the fan base and are now in an impossible situation.
They made a gamble to bring in the existing trek fanbase by cramming it so close to TOS that they have no creative freedom to do anything beyond what the fan productions have done. They thought that the fanbase would want a reboot because, at the time of greenlighting it the reboot movie franchise hadn’t flopped.
Now they are paying the price of that gamble. They’ve boxed themselves in where they not only can’t stay true to what the fans expected, but also have no freedom to do anything else. They are in an impossible situation with the fanbase, so they are going to have to make a very difficult decision in season 2.
They either backpeddle massively, and I mean rebooting again either in-universe with the overused timetravel copout to the extent of shifting the crew to an entirely different ship and do their best to undo the damage they have done, or they disregard the fanbase completely and just make a show for new viewers.
I don’t see either as being a viable option. No one is going to be happy with the compromises they have forced themselves to make. This talk of Borg just goes to show how poorly they have learned their lesson and taking nothing from it.
If they don’t have the budget to make an engineering set, it’s clear that they have no where near as much financial support from Netflix this time round, so they can’t even go down the new ship route.
We’re stuck with it, and the number of people who would be sad to see it cancelled is dropping every day that they are sat around figuring out how to get themselves out of this mess.
There comes a point when you have to ask yourself if another 10 year hiatus would be a better option than continuing down this route. It was what, 2 years since Disco was announced and the bad news started pouring in, it’s going to be at least mid to late 2019 before any more of it is coming. That’s nearly 4 years to get one botched season, and then another one trying to undo it to get back to square one again.
They want to f*ck over the Borg now.. oh dear me.
Well, I’d love to see their take on the Borg! I always thought the Borg had that certain HR Giger touch and since these guys are heavily into HRG, their version of the Borg could be awesome! Plus, since most of the Borg look is based on technology instead of biology, it’s feasible to accept a visual reboot a lot easier as with those Klingons. Technology can change quicker than biology, so why not. We haven’t seen any 23rd century Borg yet!
I think it would be a tremendous mistake to include Borg on STD. That said, it means it is likely this show would do it eventually.
I felt the same way with Enterprise but when I watched their episode, it worked for me.
That episode was “meh” for me. But they did have an in canon story. I don’t trust the STD group to do that, however.
Which is exactly the issue here. The Discovery creative team is acting like they have the secure trust of the fanbase, and they’ve done NOTHING to earn that trust. In fact, quite a LOT of what they’ve done has only undermined it.
Yeah, I would love to see a new version of the Borg.
I would be curious what they came up with but unfortunately canon stops them from doing that. But who are we kidding? If someone REALLY wants to do the Borg, the Borg will be included. I actually would like to see them for the next Kelvin film (if it happens) since they can actually use the Borg.
Garth Lorca,
Re: We haven’t seen any 23rd century Borg yet
You mean something like someone later infected by something overlooked by Picard’s cleanup crew in FIRST CONTACT?
Paramount actually had talks with Giger for FC but wouldn’t pay him enough — they probably would have chickened out on going through with his stuff anyway, since they backed away and largely ignored their own guy Ricardo Delgado’s designs in favor of the much simpler stuff seen in the film.
I’m usually pretty open minded. I’m not in love with but definitely ok with the new Klingon look (My only wish for them is to have some hair back). However Borg on Discovery would be apocryphal for anything other than a jump into the 24th Century or beyond. Love the Andorians and Tellarites though!
Andrew SD,
So what you are saying is that it is absolutely impossible that Picard and company from FIRST CONTACT could have missed something that might rise again to haunt old Earth via infecting new sentients into Borg drones. Or that the time traveling Borg themselves could not have left some sort of Borg poison pill that had to be dealt with later?
And keep in mind, in the many times that I saw FIRST CONTACT, Cochrane and company were never mind wiped of their knowledge of the Borg.
I think it’s easier to redesign the board because they are constantly evolving and updating their tech and they use multiple races. You can’t apply that excuse to totally different looking Klingons.
No Borg.
This is why Discovery should’ve been set post Nemesis. All the toys and aliens of the franchise would be free to use with no problem.
Agree 100%. They’re boxed in now.
YEah, exactly. That’s a good point. In a post Nemesis show EVERYTHING is open to you. In a pre-TOS one you are much more limited than what you can use. Enterprise did use a few things and did it in a way to stay true to canon but still got slammed for some of it. But the Borg episode was actually one of the better ones.
And Enterprise had a LOT more wiggle room setting themselves 150 years before TOS. Setting STD mere 10 years before does indeed severely box them in corners. Better writers might be able to do something with that. The STD crew do not seem able.
It’s two guys who want to work on the Borg because, like us, they are nerds. It means nothing to the show itself.
Well I’m MORE than sure there are people proposing all kinds of things, Borg included. And let’s not forget its a show that has a magical spore drive that can take them to literally ANY part of the galaxy. How hard would it be for them to suddenly end up somewhere in the Delta quadrant just like it was to end up in the MU?
Honestly its not THAT hard if they really wanted to include the Borg for an episode or two. Their own technology has made it possible.
But TOS and TNG are HD due to having been on film. So that reasoning is invalid.
They are available in HD but seriously, have you looked closely at those Klingon make-ups on TNG in HD on a big screen? You can see it’s fake from a distance. So yes, their reasoning IS valid to some degree.
The SD TV make up from back then is now completely dated and they had to evolve stuff, just not in that particular direction. Making Klingons bald and egg-shaped has NOTHING to do with adapting to the HD / UHD era.
That’s why you update the makeup.
I was okay with the DSC Klingons up to their skulls pointing out in the back like eggs or crystal skulls. The bobblehead effect on many of the extras is also grating visually.
What we got wasn’t an update with a touch of the artist, like we got with the Klingons in Into Darkness which IMO are the best of the franchise, we got a complete overhaul to something that is barely legible as the same species.
The STID version and the DSC version are both equally extensive departures from the established looks. I think the STID Klingon could easily appeare on DSC without changing much. Both versions are lacking the most pivotal feature: hair!
For a warrior, losing your hair is like dishonor, castration, disempowerment… they used to shave hair of overthrown kings and sent them to convents back in medieval times. TNG Klingons have clearly adopted that mythology. Worf’s hair was a pivotal part of his character development. Even Chang had a mustache and a tiny little pony tail at the back of his head.
It was an era of Klingon head lice. So they all shaved for a few years. No biggie.
The STID ones do have hair and beards, just not the one who takes his helmet off. the STID ones are much, much closer to post TOS ones than Discovery. The one you see is in essence a “Chang” style one”.
They could, at a push, have fitted into the Post TOS era. The Discovery ones are just totally irreconcilable unless they make it canon that they are another species and even then they’re pushing it given that the more normal versions are nowhere to be seen in the higher echelons of power on the show.
Although I despite Into Darkness as a movie, their Klingons were easy to take because if you remove the face jewellery and stick on a hair and beard (which some of the masked ones in that scene still have) then it’s basically a more detailed version of the post TOS ones. I think fans would happily have settled for something like that on Discovery. But like you say, the baldness, the egg heads, them being blue, purple or white. It just doesn’t make sense. Why no just give Vulcans horns and colour them orange if you’re going to do that?
They wanted the Klingons to look like aliens and not like a bunch of guys from a comic con.
The Klingons from Into Darkness do look like an aliens and they also look like Klingons.
They looked like plastic action figures.
How? How do they look like Plastic action figures any more then the DSC Klingons?
Voq and T’kuvma look like they’re made of rubber.
This looks like a bunch of guys from a comic con with rubber heads that most of the actors can barely talk and act through. So if their objective is as you say, they failed.
People, even we hairy humans have cultures that go into fads of removing hair like women are currently going through with their legs.
And I defy any of you to prove that the Ancient Egyptians were ineffectual warriors because they shaved it off stem to stern.
Ahhh, the excuse making.
These Klingons don’t shave. They have no hair, full stop. If you’d followed the articles on this site as well as one would think you’d recall that they said design of the Klingons incorporates sensory glands and orifices and it’s where hair would be on an old Klingon.
These guys aren’t bald because they went for a haircut. They’re bold because the designers have completely reworked the biology.
El Chup,
Ahh, the retconing.
First, you can’t claim the perfectly coiffed beards and mustaches of the hairy Klingons that you so adore is because Klingons are strangers to shaving.
Second, hairs are perfectly naturally occurring adjuncts, enhancements, and/or essential functioning parts to sensory organs. There is absolutely no logic to claiming all humans are bald because their skin is a sensory organ. If your auditory sensory organ functions, you hear because the hairs within it sense the vibrations.
Because the Klingons have sensory organs in their skin
is not a necessary and sufficient reason for these Klingons to be hairless no matter who’s putting that out. Shaving is one possible explanation why, on screen, they appear to so be. But this is the future, so I suppose if there’s a religious superstitious dedication to being hairless in this era for them, a sonic shower depilatory isn’t entirely out of the question? Or, these are Klingons, after all, so I suppose there could even be some sort of ritual, akin to our circumcision, where they scar off the hair follicles of their newborns at birth?
’nuff said.
No retconning and I am not talking about skin as a sensory gland. I am talking about the fact that previously the show makers specifically said that the new Klingons have previously never before seen sensory organs running down the back of their heads and they is why they are bald, not because they choose to shave. It’s because they don’t have hair full stop. So no, shaving ISN’T an explanation. Before mouthing off at other fans you should be aware of what the showrunners have said in the past.
El Chup,
re: what the showrunners have said in the past.
I have been with Trek since the airing of the first series. I am more than aware that the show runners even back then say many things, but they aren’t canon because it never made it on screen.
Before mouthing at other fans you should check the meaning of what it is exactly that you are attempting to comment upon.
They looked fine in Ent, which was 1080p HD in season 4. The texturing was fantastic.
It was broadcast in SD and the show was filmed for SD.
HN4,
This is one area where you and I agree. And the show was filmed on 35mm for the FX and live acting masters, and edited to be distributed on 16mm film reels for SD US television exhibition.
Once CBS replaced all the filmed 35mm FX elements for HD rerun syndication, I just don’t get all this nonsense about a “preserved visual continuity”. No it wasn’t.
The HD upgraders got it set in their noggins that they weren’t just going to merely preserve the original art digitally touching it up to make it look better than it ever could have, but instead, were going into the subjective area of “fixing” mistakes.
Once we as consumers bought that there was no turning back.
Besides, its canon that even the 23rd century Karidian Shakespeare Troupe used 23rd century materials available on ship to construct their sets and props and didn’t stick with those only available to Shakespeare. How can fans expect any current actual Trek production to do any less?
35mm is higher definition than pretty much any digital system, even now, so no, it was not filmed for SD. Now if you look at DR WHO, then that claim is valid. But your statement is not just wrongheaded, it is plain idiotic, given that you could factcheck yourself before wasting space posting incorrect information.
kmart,
re: 35mm is higher definition
Indeed, but it wasn’t used with intent for exhibition in HD but exhibition on television of an era that wasn’t technically even SD if we regard the show’s use of color significant.
A television production in the 60s used 35mm not with intent towards exhibition in 35mm but more to hedge and resist generational losses in editing and duping for distribution which was ultimately on 16mm color. That was my point.
Yes those 35mm elements can be put to use forward for current HD age, but in doing so it requires re-editing with an eye towards the new medium of exhibition, or at least so CBS believes. This takes it out of the arena of archiving the art of the 60s and into the realm of creating something different, which CBS most assuredly did — ergo, the idea that there’s some constant static visual continuity to the art that’s been preserved is a misnomer, a fantasy if you will.
I wish that it were different, but once they did that I eventually made peace with the idea that what would see fruition in DISCOVERY was coming and a certainty.
Once again, the time period they chose to place the show in bites them in the a*s. Ten years before Kirk, Klingons supposedly looked…brand new? And then went back to looking basically human by Kirk’s time? That’s what we’re being asked to accept.
And if they use the Borg in this show, my personal canon will be further confirmed. Alternate universe, not Prime.
If they had simply set this show post-Nemesis, they could have updated whatever species they wanted and hardly anyone would have complained. Again….why is this set 10 years prior to TOS?
“Again….why is this set 10 years prior to TOS?”
Because TPTB considered the TNG era spin-offs irrelevant at this point and wanted to recreate the TOS era as a visual reboot for a new generation. They believe the original Trek is the only publicly recognized version of Trek and want to base it on this well-known iconic TV show / movie series.
The spin-offs are considered below radar for the general public. Yes, TNG and DS9 have their fans, but the Next Gen movies failed and TNG has been off air for 25 years now.
On the other hand, the TOS-based KT movies have made considerable money and quite logically, they wanted a 23rd century show to cash in on the timeless popularity and iconicity of TOS…hence we got Sarek and Spock’s stepsister.
In a nutshell, that’s the explanation. People who are heavily into the TNG era are not amused and flock to watch The Orville instead. The irony in all of this is that we are living in a day and age that sees a heavy resurgence for 1980s movies and TV shows… without 80s nostalgia, there would be no Stranger Things or Ready Player One and IT wouldn’t have become the most successful horror movie ever! Maybe in a couple of years, there will be a NextGen revival of sorts…
That reality is completely understood. But I don’t think it precludes them for setting the show post TUC.
I think that theory is pretty silly, at least with respect to TNG. We see TNG memes all the time online (arguably even more so than TOS memes) and references in shows like FAMILY GUY. The Borg, “resistance is futile,” and so on have become popular culture catchphrases. Patrick Stewart continues to be an extremely bankable star, more so than Shatner. It is perhaps more true with the other spinoffs.
It’s popular to the guys making Family Guy. One of them even made a show just so he could play Captain Kirk. I guess he’s out of his I want to be Frank Sinatra phase. Anyone remember that?
I personally agree. But that’s not what they are rolling with. After the KT movies, it would have been time for a return or revamp of the 24th century as a playground for new tech, villains and places. But I also understand their reasoning, which may be flawed.
That’s one of the reasons I consider the DSC / Orville rivalry so exciting. In a way, we ARE getting both, only that one of those is just a well-intended spoof…
Yeah, you’ve just got to see how many it is still in re-runs to understand it’s still widely popular….and that’s even with it now looking dated. There is arguably no other show from the eighties that remains as popular.
Anyhow, the idea that anything post Nemesis would resemble TNG anyway is faulty logic. They’re free to update anything going into the future.
The popularity of this show proves that’s not true given everything about it is basically new except the references to Spock and the Enterprise later on.
The public knows Star Trek, the name and a couple characters, that’s about it. They don’t really know discern by era and I don’t think anybody cares as long as the show is good.
TOS is only popular because of the recent movies but TNG was a huge phenomenon, amongst fans and non fans alike.
As long as it has the familiar elements, a vulcan, a captain, a space ship, and crazy aliens and is well made people will flock to it.
Well, the popularity of DSC proves them right from their POV… The TOS era comes with the advantage that there wasn’t much politics elaborated on.
Set it after VOY / NEM and some people would expect them to explain the Dominion, Cardassians, Ferengi, Borg, the entire Delta Quadrant, the Q, you name it… and they THINK that this stuff wouldn’t be of any interest to new viewers… they THINK it’s simpler to begin with well-known Klingons… the only spin-off adversary worthwhile might be the Borg.
We really don’t know how ‘popular’ Discovery is though. I don’t know anyone in the real world actually watching it which is why I’m here so much now. There is no Discovery merchandise anywhere like the TNG days when you walked in a toy store and there was all kinds of stuff. The spin offs reached a lot more people for A. Actually being on TV and B. Because it became a big shared universe with all the shows connected and movies every few years. And Discovery feels like its just for the same people whose been watching Star Trek forever. My guess is they have picked up some new fans but I would be shocked if more than 10% of them are new viewers to Star Trek. But maybe that goes up much higher if its fans who only watched the Kelvin films.
I mean, in case you’ve been sleeping through the headlines, there’s this thing called “data science,” and companies mine subscriber data for every nugget they can clean. I’d say that’s a tad more scientific than the “I don’t know anyone who voted for Nixon” approach.
Again though none of that says how ‘popular’ it is. WE don’t have any of that data. We only know enough people watched it enough to get a renewal, it doesn’t mean its a huge hit. It could be cancelled next season, its hard to know (although I don’t think it will).
And my point of saying I don’t know anyone who watches I’m talking about actual Trek fans, some for decades. People who watched one of the other shows but haven’t watched this one yet because its on AA or there doesn’t seem to be a huge pull to watch it yet. I have one friend who swears he will watch it but was waiting for the season over to binge. Its now over and he hasn’t done it yet. I found out two people at my job several weeks ago has never any heard of it. To me I don’t see this big popularity out in the mainstream for it. Maybe it is, but it doesn’t feel like it at all.
Yeah, I don’t know anyone who watches it or even talks about it outside of Trek and genre forums. I’m sure they are out there, but it’s not like a show like Game of Thrones where you know just about everyone has heard of it and seen at least one episode even though it’s on a premium service.
Exactly. Thats what I mean. Even if you don’t watch GOT you know what it is. You know someone who is watching it. You see it being referenced in other parts of media, etc. And GOT is not on regular TV as you said but a premium channel. But I know people who have signed up for HBO just to watch the show.
With Discovery I feel none of that. Outside of the usual Trek and genre sites, it feels like the show doesn’t exist. It doesn’t feel like its being discussed LIKE a hit show. Again, let me make clear, I’m not saying the show is failing or a dud, I’m only saying this idea its a big runaway hit is questionable since there doesn’t seem to be any big discussion around it in the mainstream. Again its why I come to places like this a lot more lately because there is literally no one I can talk about it in the real world sadly.
You’re watching it and you still hate the show.
If you truly hate the show you wouldn’t stop watching it. Your giving the producers exactly what they want. Viewers. If you feel so passionately about how this show is so terrible and hn-Star Trek, you would stop watching and you would not feel the need to attack it at every opportunity.
“We only know enough people watched it enough to get a renewal, ”
And even that doesn’t mean enough have downloaded it for that. Often with streaming shows they get two seasons nearly automatically. The short seasons often make season two a financial necessity. Not saying that is the case with STD. But it has been quite the norm for most everything else. It was pretty early in the run when the season 2 announcement came. So early that it certainly feels like it was preordained.
Hmmmm. I’ve been watching since pre-TNG and Discovery doesn’t feel like its made for me. It feels like it’s made for the newer generation who are more interested in dumbed down, generic dark and gritty action soap opera sci-fi the requisite cliffhangers and other tropes of modern TV.
Case in point… I had to tell friends of mine about the arrival of STD. Friends who watched and enjoyed Star Trek over the years. They had no idea there was this streaming show. None. On top of that I had to present a pretty good sell job to find two others willing to share an account with me. And in the end I was told by both they were not interested in sharing for season 2. Unless someone has access to what people are streaming on CBSAA we have no idea whatsoever how popular or unpopular this show really is.
The fact that they can’t afford to build an engineering set tells you how much money netflix isn’t giving them anymore.
Set it after Nemesis and this tiny vocal minority would still rage about the show. They are complaining for the sake of it to fill their empty lives with something they can consider meaning.
AdAstra, if it were set post Nemesis but still the same plot and story and writing then yes. There would still be complaints about it. Only the “it doesn’t fit in the time frame they say it is” arguments would cease.
“The public knows Star Trek, the name and a couple characters, that’s about it.”
“TOS is only popular because of the recent movies”
Sorry, but this is a silly statement. TOS is a pop culture icon. Sure general audiences may not be familiar with canon, background characters and so on. But I think they know a bit more than you make out.
I don’t buy this excuse. For starters everything about Discovery is completely new with a new crew and ship. The only attachment to TOS is the fact it takes place in the same era (oh and Burhnam is attacked to the Spock family), but its NOT TOS in the slightest. Its another spin off like the rest of them. If you are a Kirk, Bones and Spock fan, you’re not watching Discovery to watch them, you’re watching it to watch Burnham, Saru and Tilly. So what’s the difference?
And the spin offs are all very popular today. MILLIONS watched these shows for nearly two decades. All those fans are still around. Every Trek site they are still there, certainly on Reddit. And those shows had some of the highest ratings at the time. Enterprise got cancelled because it fell to 3 million viewers and my guess is Discovery probably doesn’t get more than that in terms of subscriptions because I don’t know a single person watching it. There are still tons of people who never even heard of it. Maybe that will change in the future though.
But they could’ve made it any time period, the fans would watch. New fans don’t care, its all new to them. I think CBS decided its an easier marketing hook but I don’t think the show is any more popular because its in the TOS era. Especially since a TOS film, Beyond, bombed. And that was during the 50th anniversary of TOS.
The human Klingons never made any sense. How come Kirk and crew never noticed the change of the Klingons in the movies? I think Kirk would have noticed.
The first Trek movie was the first visual reboot.
HN4,
Re: The first Trek movie was the first visual reboot.
Actually, strangely enough, if you consider the first Trek movie that went into pre-production in 1977, PLANET OF THE TITANS, where McQuarrie designed that ship, one could consider Discovery to be still a part of THAT first visual reboot.
I don’t get that argument that people would have complained less about changes to the alien design if they had set the show post-Nemesis. It doesn’t make any more sense in-universe for alien species to suddenly change looks 10 years after Nemesis than it does 10 years before TOS. A redesign is a redesign in any time period. Aliens had been redesigned on TREK long before Discovery came along. Until that Augment story on ENT they never explained any of the redesigns in-universe, and they didn’t have to.
They tweaked the Cardassians for DS9, they upgraded the Borg for FC, and yes, the Trill were also changed. But those changes were made BEFORE most of these species became iconic lore. We had seen the Trill once in a standalone TNG episode, the Cardassians twice I think and yeah, the Borg a couple of times more, but still, none of these previous appearances can be compared to the Klingons as they were presented from 1979 to 2005…
They had dozens of Klingon-centric episodes on TNG, DS9, VOY and ENT. Worf was a main character on two shows for 11 seasons and four movies, B’elanna for another seven seasons! The Klingons appeared in every TOS movie except TWOK. The Klingons were a pivotal part of ENT from day one.
Bring in the Borg!
…where are the Borg?…there ought to be Borg…well, maybe next year.
I really would love to see the Borg, but mostly because this is the only time period we haven’t seen them exist in yet.
I get and understand they would want to do a new take on the Klingon look. But IMHO what they ended up with was a way too radical departure of what we saw before. I would have thought a more subtle change could have worked. Some sort of hybrid between the TOS and movie Klingons perhaps? Or how about slightly different looks for each of the houses? Just spitballing here… Ultimately, I a not happy with the nu-Klingon look but even if the new look was awesome the show would still have been less than stellar. Conversely if the show had been executed perfectly but the Klingons still looked the same then complaints about their new look would have been lessened.
Yes!
Finally, the Borg have been mentioned and about time too.
The Borg are a major villain and have only featured properly in one movie a dozen episodes. Let’s give them a proper updated return to form!
That’d be the most asinine thing ever… But of course they’re gonna do it. They shoehorned them into an episode of ENT, back in the day – so why not do the same thing again. Ugh…
I pretty sure that none of the people who shoehorned the Borg into ENT (the producers and writers) are involved in Discovery so “they” won’t do it again.
Will the Discovery showrunners do a Borg story? It’s possible but it won’t be because they’ve done it before.
But how it was done on Enterprise made complete sense. It was actually pretty clever IMO. If First Contact didn’t exist then it would’ve been harder to do but they gave them their opening.
Wrong time period.
Wrong, Star Trek First Contact started it with time travel. So everything from first contact on had changed which justified the Borg on ENT.
Lets face it the Original TOS timeline changes significantly after Kirk and the TOS crew brought George and Gracie, along with Gillian taylor into the 23rd century.
And and the timeline changed again after Picard and the TNG crew went back in time after the Borg and encountered and had an impact on Zephram and Lilly in First contact.
And again with the temporal Cold War in Enterprise.
Please no. They’re one trick villains and Voyager already went to that well one too many times.
Did anyone get that? Cause that’s some weird “reasoning”… Basically: “We’re doing a pre-TOS show and the major Klingon redesign happened between TOS and the movies, so we’re just doing something completely different – YAY!”
Huh?
And let’s not even talk about “canon” here. It’s like they got the wrong memo and thought they were about to design Klingons for a post-TOS show or something.
Also you can bet your a$$ they’ll bring in the Borg at some point, cause the Borg have proven to be very marketable for some reason (remember when Netflix released that statistic about the most rewatched Trek-episodes and about 90% of them were Borg-episodes?)
He wasn’t talking about in-universe continuity, he was talking about production continuity. Discovery is a new era of TREK production even though it’s set in (almost) the same timeframe as TOS. ENT was set 2 centuries before the TNG era but it used many of the same crew so its Klingons basically looked like the TNG era Klingons (except for that Augment storyline).
That’s a negative on the Borg. They have been abused enough, without turning them into run-of-the-mill bad guys in Discovery. A really, really big negative on that.
BORG !!! Make this happen.
My theory for one reason, maybe the biggest reason, they changed the Klingon design: the Tyler/Voq “mystery.” Because, you know, it’s harder to tell if it’s the same actor if he was buried under lots and lots of makeup. They couldn’t do this with the old design.
Thoughts?
That’s absolutely the biggest reason i’m sure.
It doesn’t explain the awful egg points on the back of the head though.
Just trying to hide the shape of the actor’s head, I assume.
lol Are people going to really be able to discern someone by the back of their head?
We’re Trekkies. We look at EVERYTHING, hehe.
WHAT?????? lol
What, you’ve never admired the shape of someone’s skull? ;-)
I think that Shazad Latif would have been pretty unrecognizable even with the old design. Of course, you couldn’t have done it with a TOS Klingon but many of the actors playing Klingons on later productions could have played human characters without many people noticing.
Well, the voices were also changed a bit. Something they hadn’t done much before. I think they were trying to hard to make this switcharoo work, at least visually. The writing was another matter.
That very well could have been the case. Of course, it was not 100% necessary the same actor play both parts….
Yeah, I think you’re right. The Tyler/Voq deception maybe the main reason for the full facial prosthetics. But it does NOT explain the absence of hair. I don’t want to come off too obsessive about that, but it is a major letdown.
Aye. Even a little facial hair would go a long way to making them connect with the TOS style Klingons. Hopefully we’ll see that next season.
Yeah, but in that case it would’ve sufficed to have one Klingon (namely Voq) stick out. Remember, he’s an outcast – regarded as abnormal even by his peers. So, they could’ve given a very distinct look to Voq while still having the other Klingons look like… well, Klingons…
It would’ve sufficed, but they don’t seem to be shy about spending money on makeup and effects.
This show is going to end up like TAS–disavowed for decades and then finally only half-embraced. But unlike DSC, I don’t find TAS a jarring departure from what came before it, even with the medium considered. The producers could have added visual detail without substantially changing anything, chalked it up to the HD format, and brought in new fans without confounding or alienating old ones.
And if retro doesn’t cut it–and I think they’re mistaken if they don’t think there’s a market for retro-futuristic–why on earth would they choose the most visually distinctive era of the Star Trek chronology? Say “Kirk” and what immediately comes to mind are bright colors. The recent movies have tapped that association with the uniforms. This show wants to go deep dark, and they’re swimming upstream with the particular spot in the timeline they’ve chosen.
All this and they have still to say definitively this is a visual reboot. Just that this is the “prime timeline, honest to golly.” You’re just supposed to take the inference without them having to commit to saying anything. It’s like being stuck on the tarmac for hours and the flight crew insisting that everyone will still make their connections, don’t worry.
Well said, Tal.
Anybody can see that it’s a visual reboot. I don’t need confirmation from anybody about that. Their statement that it is set in the Prime timeline basically tells us that, yes, the James T. Kirk that we remember from TOS is running around in this timeline. The Sarek we saw on Discovery is supposed to be the same person we saw on TOS even though he’s played by a different actor now. They couldn’t blow up Vulcan on Discovery (like they did in the Kelvin timeline) because the other shows tell us Vulcan still exists much later in the timeline.
No one is saying this isn’t a visual reboot. But no one from the crew or network are saying it either. I find it disingenuous, and asymmetrical in that old fans have to make the connection but the producers don’t have to risk an honest statement. What I don’t get is why the cagey-coy stuff is necessary at all. They risk losing no one by owning the spade. But they risk annoying me at least by playing cute.
They have, in fact, said that. https://trekmovie.com/2018/01/13/ted-sullivan-talks-mirror-universe-uss-defiant-season-2-and-more-during-star-trek-discovery-qa/
Yeah, I saw that. Not what I was looking for. He insults TOS’ look and then has to walk it back. Doesn’t state anything definitively except that he holds TOS production values in high contempt.
I have to disagree. The fact that DSC starts out as dark as it gets, thematically and visually, has got a lot of potential for an ongoing visual development that will lead to TOS 60s style, just on a higher budget. And I guess that’s exactly what they are rolling with. Each season will be a step closer to the bright and colorful world of TOS…
BTW: that’s what they had tried to do in ENT Season 4, only 100 years too early…
And about three seasons too late!
I hope that happens, but I think the Enterprise redesign goes against that theory.
Aye
We’ve already made too many compromises. Not again! The line must be drawn here, no further!
The Borg are well beyond what’s acceptable for bending pre TOS canon. Enterprise tried and was scathed for the attempt.
I love this show and I badly want to see it fit into the prime timeline, but there’s only so much you can change.
No, they aren’t. DSC has spore drive and can easily pop up in the Delta Quadrant. They can encounter some Borg there without any major interference and return before any sustantial knowledge has been gathered. Of course, there cannot be fullscale invasion of Earth, but a tiny little Borg Sphere is always welcome…
Discovery is a science ship, its entire thing is sensors and figuring out things work. Even an hour with the Borg would be too much. They would figure them out. Any shorter an encounter and what’s the point in having the Borg show up?
Its explicitly stated that the Enterprise D crew, the Federation, and Starfleet Command have no idea who the Borg are, not even an inkling. Not even the Romulans, the information kingpins of the quadrant have heard of them.
If the Discovery interacts with the Borg there is no way that information doesn’t get back to Starfleet.
Furthermore can’t we just get new aliens? Its the height of laziness to just cram the Borg into a time we absolutely know they don’t enter into.
The redesigned Klingons DO NOT honour what came before. They throw everything that came before out of the windows.
They could have absolutely updated the make up and make it more detailed but still retained the core look of the post TOS Klingons that had become so developed and ingrained.
This is just another time their excuses for random “to hell with canon” changes stink. I mean, they can’t even get Vulcan ears right, they now look like elf ears from Lord of the Rings – and you’re telling me those ears and bowl haircuts are totally okay for 2018 but a slightly more developed Worf no longer cuts it?
Sorry, but I’m getting more and more tired of the lazy BS they keep trying to palm off us and the subset of easily pleased fans who just make excuses for them.
I wish they’d gone with the Abrahms design for the Klingons. That was updated but still recognisably Klingon.
Yeah I REALLY liked the Klingons designs in STID. That’s an updated look but still familiar with what came before. And they felt so much more menacing.
“we wanted to do this with a keen eye on honoring the integrity of everything that’s come before us.”
Get your eyes checked, because you didn’t honor the integrity of ANYTHING that came before.
“So, we wanted to keep enough of it there that it resonated and felt like Klingon, but to take it as far as we could in the realm of realism”
What you gave us had no resonance. It had dissonance. Fucking fix it.
The bottom line is very, very simple.
They ignored the fan base and are now in an impossible situation.
They made a gamble to bring in the existing trek fanbase by cramming it so close to TOS that they have no creative freedom to do anything beyond what the fan productions have done. They thought that the fanbase would want a reboot because, at the time of greenlighting it the reboot movie franchise hadn’t flopped.
Now they are paying the price of that gamble. They’ve boxed themselves in where they not only can’t stay true to what the fans expected, but also have no freedom to do anything else. They are in an impossible situation with the fanbase, so they are going to have to make a very difficult decision in season 2.
They either backpeddle massively, and I mean rebooting again either in-universe with the overused timetravel copout to the extent of shifting the crew to an entirely different ship and do their best to undo the damage they have done, or they disregard the fanbase completely and just make a show for new viewers.
I don’t see either as being a viable option. No one is going to be happy with the compromises they have forced themselves to make. This talk of Borg just goes to show how poorly they have learned their lesson and taking nothing from it.
If they don’t have the budget to make an engineering set, it’s clear that they have no where near as much financial support from Netflix this time round, so they can’t even go down the new ship route.
We’re stuck with it, and the number of people who would be sad to see it cancelled is dropping every day that they are sat around figuring out how to get themselves out of this mess.
There comes a point when you have to ask yourself if another 10 year hiatus would be a better option than continuing down this route. It was what, 2 years since Disco was announced and the bad news started pouring in, it’s going to be at least mid to late 2019 before any more of it is coming. That’s nearly 4 years to get one botched season, and then another one trying to undo it to get back to square one again.