Sonequa Martin-Green And Alex Kurtzman See Gene Roddenberry’s Vision In ‘Star Trek: Discovery’

(Photo: CBS)

Following the Instagram livestreamed Star Trek: Discovery Emmy “For Your Consideration” panel on Sunday, there was a brief Q&A session. Audio for that and the panel itself was released today via Variety’s Remote Controlled podcast. This extra bit from the event had a few other interesting moments, highlighted below.

Kurtzman and Martin-Green on Discovery’s connection to Roddenberry’s legacy

Discovery co-creator Alex Kurtzman spoke glowingly about Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry’s vision and how it was still relevant today:

I think Roddenberry gave television history – our history – such a gift in creating a world in which diversity of all kinds – color, sexual preference, was an assumption. His greatest contribution was that it never had to be addressed, because it just was, as it should be. You are an officer first. You love who you love. There is no judgment. That has been removed from the equation. There is no need to talk about it to the degree that we obviously need to talk about it a whole lot today because in the future that he wanted to envision – and the future that we all want to believe in, and really want this show to be about – there should be no strife over these things. There should be no question about it.

In a world that is so divided, Star Trek has always presented the most beautiful, optimistic vision of hope. And I think that is why it has endured for over fifty years because we need hope now more than ever. And I think the reason we bring so much of ourselves to the craft of everyday work, and why even with its challenges it is so rewarding, is because there are very few shows that get to so organically talk about everything we are dealing with on a day-to-day basis without ever having to bludgeon you over the head with it.

Show star Sonequa Martin-Green picked up on Kurtzman’s comment and talked about how it is still important for a diverse group to see themselves in Star Trek’s future:

It’s about being able to see yourself being your highest potential. And it is about being able to see yourself in positions of authority. It is about seeing yourself taking ownership of the role you have in the greater whole, in the greater community, and seeing how important you are. I know for me being the first black woman to lead the show, whenever I think about the youth it brings tears to my eyes, but to be able to see yourself. There are so many representations of self on the show. And you can see yourself leading and guiding and fighting and sacrificing. Because it is not always pretty.

You also get to see us – you get to see these people – who are diverse, yet equal, true indivisibility. You get to see us failing and falling and getting back up and pressing forward and digging into ourselves and each other. And so, I think that is what is most powerful about it. And that is Roddenberry’s vision. That is how you have a legacy of equality and diversity, that these people are allowed to be their full authentic selves. They are allowed to make mistakes. But we see them be champions and their own heroes, individually and collectively. And that is the most powerful thing. And in that way – which is so incredible – we become part of the solution, when we are surrounded by the problem.

Rapp on how playing Stamets has changed his life

Anthony Rapp, who showed up after the main panel wrapped up, but just in time for Q&A, talked about what it meant to him to be cast in Discovery;

It has been one of the great privileges of my life and I have Aaron [Harberts] and Gretchen [J. Berg] to thank because they just gave it to me. I didn’t even have to audition. So, thank you. It has changed my life in really amazing, incredible ways.

Trek almost did have some kind of someone at some point probably be openly gay, I guess, or they were trying to or thinking about it, but they never made it happen. So, the fact that that it has been able to happen and that we have been able to be part of that is really meaningful.

Wilson studied for tenchnobabble

Many Star Trek actors have struggled with the shows “technobabble” dialog, inducing Tig Notaro who will appear in Discovery Season 2. At the FYC event, actor Wilson Cruz revealed how he did some research to help him retain some of the more difficult bits of dialog:

It was really hard at first because the medical jargon and the science jargon and the futuraristic jargon was a lot. At first, I was “I am just going to memorize these words,” and that wasn’t going to work. I figured out…work out what the root of these words were and maybe and figure out what this means, because I was not a science person. I know this is a shock to you. And once I understood what the science was – what the words were based on real science – I was “Oh, I can memorize that.” I can memorize the concepts and then get to the words.

Doug Jones is grateful for so much dialog

Actor Doug Jones responded to a question about how he felt about having more to say in Discovery than he’s had in other roles:

The writers already know, the less dialogue I have, the more I am happy. I keep begging them to kill me off [laughs]. The best part of the layers of character are revealed so much through the verbal dialogue. I have spent so much of my career creating visual dialogue for characters, that Saru has been a glorious blend of visual and verbal dialogue, come together like I have never been able to play before. I am very grateful.

Discovery FYC around LA

In addition to events, online videos and screeners, CBS also has an outdoor campaign going in Los Angeles to attract Emmy voters. This includes a custom mural in a popular coffee house in the hip Silverlake neighborhood.

And if you are driving down Melrose Blvd in Hollywood, you can spot a special Discovery billboard aimed at Emmy voters.

Voting for the nomination round the Emmys began yesterday, June 11th. Nominations will be announced on July 12th, which will be followed by another round of voting, with winners announced at two events in September.

Listen to full panel and Q&A (via Variety)

 


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.

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Cart before the horse once again

Are they only able to talk about sexualty and diversity? When are they going to talk abut how good the scrips are? Hoo… wait, maybe due to the fact that there is no good scrips on S1 and the only “merit” was to put diversity on a show like Stre Trek, a show that nearly invented diversity.

The scripts were great fun. The first two episodes were killer and had me on the edge of my seat (that nerve pinch and betrayal). Harry Mudd’s return was masterful in the time-loop episode. Burnham’s relationship with her foster father is moving, as is her struggle with finding what it means to be human after growing up on Vulcan. Tilly is adorable and driven and we’re all rooting for her to climb that ladder to command her own ship. Saru is vulnerable, complex, flawed and so human despite not being human. Sure, they haven’t written anything that can touch the brilliance of TOS’s “Spock’s Brain” or the TNG clips episode (previously on the first two seasons of Next Gen!) “Shades of Grey,” but I have high hopes that this team will be able to whip up a classic like Voyager’s “Threshold” where the main cast turn into salamanders after breaking the warp 10 barrier ;) The show is great, even if we did all see the Voq/Tyler “twist” coming 10 kilometres down the road. Also, as a gay guy and life-long fan, I’m finally glad to see the diversity of the show catch up to representing the real world. It is meaningful that there are gay characters. It is meaningful that the cast is so female in a present-day world where women are still demeaned, undervalued and under-represented. It is powerful that the main character is a black woman. The cast and crew deserve to take a victory lap for what they have created in terms of diversity, story and craft… it’s more impactful, nuanced, and valuable than repetitive negative comments tapped out into a keyboard by people who likely couldn’t make the cut to contribute to an actual TV show. So hats off to Discovery’s talented team for sharing their craft and creativity with us all ;)

Why do people defend Discovery by reeling off the titles of stinkers in the old shows? Yes.. We don’t deny they stink or claim otherwise. Does the fact they stink excuse poor writing on Discovery? No. The show exists in a new golden age of cable shows and needs to be consistently well scripted if it expects to be inducted into the new pantheon.. Just being better than Spock’s Brain alone won’t cut it.

All true about prestige television. That said, given some of the outright hysteria you see in these parts–you’d think that first season was a crime against humanity, as opposed to just a let-down–putting the show’s failures into their proper perspective might not be such a bad thing.

“Hysteria”. You mean comments you don’t agree with…. ;)

Interesting how you responded immediately and defensively to that. ;-)

It’s true though. There’s a lot about that show that I don’t like myself, but the constant lambasting of every minute aspect is getting tiresome. I for one think that there are “seeds” of good writing in many episodes, which have been buried under the weight of stacked-up plots (maybe not even the writers’ fault, but a conceptual issue). Hence I will usually refer to the writing as “unbalanced” rather than downright “bad”. And that’s not even saying that there were no aspects that I did regard as plainly bad, because there are (certain instances of expository dialogue, characterisation etc.).
Still, acting like there’s absolutely no chance that the show might redeem itself (and like every single quote by Kurtzman, Harberts, Berg or whomever is an indication towards that) would indeed be be kinda hysterical.
Michael called it “putting […] failures into their proper perspective” and I wholeheartedly agree with that notion.

Michael, I was going to chime in about you being right on this, but then I scrolled down and got very upset reading some too-familiar refrains in defense of DSC and wound up writing a huge critical reply. So at least for me, the show’s disappointment is one thing, but what really sets me off is folks defending it like they got vision and the rest of us are wearing bifocals.

Yeah, kmart. That is irritating too. I know this particular thing was a hype your show event. But they really weren’t even doing that in these clips. I haven’t listened to the audio so I hope that at some point they speak about how good their show is rather than praise themselves for being “visionaries” in a time when everyone else in their business has had such “vision” for years.

I remember s1 TNG having the same kind of self-hype, with the actors making noises like stories about planets with diseases related to AIDS, when that was really stretching.
Of course I also remember Frakes saying he thought they were getting too edgy for a family show, mentioning that they had him call Q a sonofabitch in HIDE & Q (something that obviously never made the final edit.)

I honestly do not remember much flack from TNG season one. But back then there was no social media and it was a lot harder to get a read on such things. All we got was Starlog magazine and the like.

ML31,

Re: I honestly do not remember much flack from TNG season one

Well, I sure do. Because it was MORE than obvious that Roddenberry wasn’t interested in continuing STAR TREK as he had in the animated series, so much as using TNG to get the ideas shot down in GENESIS II, THE QUESTOR TAPES, and even SPECTER not being picked up to air those episodes filmed and unfilmed script concepts.

Also, the Letters To The Editors Page of STARLOG and other magazines, was a part of the social media that indeed did exist back then. It was slower, but just as effective. How did you think Bjo herded all us wild Trek cats into getting it back on the air? Smoke signals? It was different, but communication media nonetheless and social.

As I recall, in 1987 TNG season one had a similar mixed reception to Discovery S1. It was the first new Trek on TV in nearly 20 years and I loved it, faults and all, but a large minority didn’t. Their complaints are already well documented, and I have to say with hindsight I think almost completely justified. I dont think I could sit through much of TNG pre season 3 again.

True that. I did hear that Roddenberry was doing all sorts of things he was forbidden from doing in TOS. That was well known. Anyone remember male crewmembers in the background wearing skirts? Roddenberry’s idiot idea of “equality”. That ended pretty quickly. The thing is, the vast majority of those Roddenberry ideas were pretty bad and they were denied for very good reasons. But as far as overall negative flack during season one? Didn’t get that much. Most of the response was more “we are happy to have Star Trek back” than any real critique of the show. That didn’t happen until it had been on for a while. THAT was when we started to hear things like, “yeah that Justice episode was pretty bad, wasn’t it?” Although that was the episode that cemented Wesley as 100% worthless to me and my buddies. :)

@ML31, Justice, planet of the joggers, oh dear haha. A low point to be sure, but redeemed, as it will at some point be grist for The Orville’s mill no doubt.

I see the whiners are back to whining. Yawn.

Enough Already,
Aren’t you the same guy who ducked out when I called him on his posts a month or two back? I’m sure I’ve seen your postings before, you are the guy who keeps writing yawn over ml31’s posts, right?
Useless snipe-posts.

And you’re another whiner I’m guessing. Have no idea who you are, but from your post I can see you are another whiney fanboy. Geez, we all get it. You don’t like Discovery. Move on already. Watch something else. You fanboys are like broken records.

@Enough already.. And there you stand revealed in all your glory..

If all you have is the ability to continually follow people around, who are not remotely insulting you or harassing you, and call people whining fanboys over and over and over I would politely suggest the problems lies with you, not them and that it is you who needs to accept not every Trek fan likes Discovery, but every Trek fan DOES want what is best for the franchise. Take your bullying somewhere else.

I think that’s what irks me coming here. We, as people with some criticism are painted as irrational and hysterical “haters” and “whiners” who all want 1960s cardboard sets or a carbon copy of TNG, when it reality there is probably only one or two of the regular critics who fit into that category. Most provide articulated, no combative explanations of why the show, and the showrunners, are frustrating them.

In contrast many of the Discovery-can-do-no-wrong crowd are aggressive, patronising, insulting and generally unfair. They need to stop it, get a grip of themselves and realise many of us have been invested in the franchise just as long, if not longer, than they have and also want the best for it going forward. They feel Discovery is serving them well in this regard, we don’t. As long as we provide calmly articulated reasons we should not be dismissed out of hand as “whiners” because the fact is that the more unified the fans are behind Discovery the better support it has going forward.

It’s only a few of you whiners and it is constant complaining about the exact same thing every single article. Yawn.

The exact same thing can be said about the “defend STD at all costs” folks. Yet you don’t hear the critiquers ripping on them for their constant whining and complaining. More on that side seem to get that everyon’s opinion gets to be heard. In fact, I welcome and listen to the defenders and think they should do the same to their opposite numbers.

@Enough already I’m really trying not to descend to your level so hopefully I’m not indulging in a moment of schadenfreude when I reiterate that the showrunners of the show we’ve been so critical of have just been fired. It will take time to come out of course but rest assured it’s likely to be revelaed that CBS and Netflix are not happy that they got a Game of Thrones wannabe (2nd rate), not the Star trek show they paid for.

You sound like a broken record. You repeat the same whines article after article. We get it already!

It’s fine once. Maybe twice. But you whiners complain about the exact same thing article after article. Same gripes. Same complaints. Do you just cut and paste your whines into each article and then several times in the same article? I say again. Yawn.

They have to do it because they know Discovery has nothing that comes close to City On The Edge Of Forever, Yesterday’s Enterprise, The Visitor, Far Beyond the Stars and so on.

Says it all that in approximately 800 hours of Trek they have to focus on a handful of poor episodes.

Also, I had to laugh at Luke’s insistence that as a gay man he is finally being represented. He is obviously oblivious to the fact that while there was no gay character per se, Trek was addressing sexuality back in the 90s in excellent episodes like TNG’s The Outcast and DS9’s Rejoined – and I’d argue that in an age where homophobia even now is still very prevalent those episodes were more beneficial to the audience in terms of having the think about non-heterosexual relationships and what it means to be gay than Discovery, which has just offered up a couple of gay men and done little with their sexuality other than the occasional bit of affection. Kurtzman saying they don’t need to is lazy. Of course they do. As long as homophobia is as prevalent as it is having two gay characters affords the show a chance to truly tackle prejudice as Trek has always done and so far they haven’t even tried.

“They have to do it because they know Discovery has nothing that comes close to City On The Edge Of Forever, Yesterday’s Enterprise, The Visitor, Far Beyond the Stars and so on.”

All of those episodes (and FBTS is way overrated, if you ask me) came midway or towards the end of their series. The sole exception, City, still came late in TOS season 1, and I suspect DISCO still has air-hours than TOS did at that point. Though not perfect, DISCO has been far better than season one of both TNG (my favorite Trek) and DS9.

Not sure about better. More consistent in quality perhaps. Never going as low as the worst of early TNG and DS9, but never reaching as high as those series’ best during those years – Measure of a Man, Q Who?, Duet and so on.

DSC Season 1 is light years better than TNG Season 1…and it’s not even a contest.

You need to re-watch TNG season 1….It has character development, follows established canon, and contains episodes with morals and values….three things that do not exist in Discovery.

TrekFan72Dayton,

Re: {TNG season 1) follows established canon

The only way that claim can be made with a straight face is if the conceit that GENESIS II’s PAX is actually a part of the first TREK series’ WW III aftermath. And even at that, still difficult to choke down as Kirk and his contemporaries NEVER acted as if that anti-being-responsible-for-any-death-except-sacrificing-one’s-own valuing over all else dogma that Picard would pontificate about, so much it seemed as if he did it ad infinitum, ever ruled. Spock, and certainly no other first series Vulcan EVER commented how admirable it was the Earthers had turned to to never accepting being responsible for the death of another, pacifists after WW III.

Lol

I think you are confusing production value with quality of story/character/themes etc etc

Check out the DS9 first season episode “Duet” and then come back to me. If that episode doesn’t move you in 42 minutes more than the entire first season of Discovery, then I don’t know what will.

Probably the best episode in the first two seasons of DS9. And that actually means quite a lot! Rewatching DS9 after many many years, I was actually surprised how consistently good the writing in the first two seasons was. Sure, the pacing was “meh” in many cases and there were a few instances of early-season-silliness (“Move Along Home”? — “Move Along Home”! … I actually still kinda liked that episode — Alamarain, muhf*ckas!) but overall I’d find it really hard to point out a “terrible” episode there.

Oh boy. Google TOS season 1. Where no Man has Gone Before, Naked Time, corbomite maneuver, all are early stand out episodes in TOS seadon 1 production. So it is possible to produce excellence from the get go..

It was all in the writing and characterization in TOS season one, DPrescott. Top-notch sci-fi writers of the day, the likes of which do not exist today, imo, and acting/gravitas by the cast, so sharp we felt like we knew these characters inside out after only a few episodes. So far separate and removed from what Discovery has offered, this conversation is actually ridiculous, to me.

You are exactly right about there being top notch sci-fi writers, I miss those days when people like Harlan Ellison, Theodore Sturgeon and Richard Matheson wrote for science fiction and fantasy shows. Of course for the first two seasons of TOS,we should also acknowledge the immense contribution of Gene Coon.

Yes, the more I have learned of Coon’s involvement in Trek the more I started thinking that he contributed more to the legacy than Roddenberry ever did (after creating the concept, that is).

Spot on. Discovery season 1 vs. TOS season 1? Like comparing an MLB team to a high school baseball team.

Balance of Terror, The Devil in the Dark, Space Seed, Court Martial… all TOS season 1.

and rewriting tons of them too … though I think you’re wrong about BoT, I think that was done before he got there.

LOL the average position of this laundry list of great episodes you mention is about 3.5 seasons into their run, with the earliest of these being City, which was episode 28, which is 13 eps later than DSC’s latest so far.

So whoopdie do, you picked eps from Trek in which those Trek series had already hit it’s stride, which is a completely unfair comparison.

So of course you get the answer you wanted. Fake Trek News! :-)

How on earth have we descended into a “my show’s first year is better than your show’s” argument? It’s as if we can’t hope or expect for quality and consistency because “Shades of Grey” exists.. The simple fact is scripted shows are better written now.

Nice deflection attempt…well, not so great actually. ;-)

The obvious point here is that El Chup picked eps from Trek Series that had “hit their stride” versus the DSC series that is just beginning. So that is a blatantly unfair comparison.

Imagine if by contrast, I claimed that we already know that DSC is hands down better than TNG because Season 1 of DSC is better than TNG Season 1…would that be a fair comparison? No, of course not, because TNG Season 1 was the worst first season in Trek history until Enterprise.

Tell El Chup to get back to me in 2 years and make his case, then we will see.

Nope. You just underlined my point ;)

Nope, you underlined mine.

Didn’t

Tos hit its stride from the Pilots- hit the ground running. They pumped out 24-28 episodes a season on time, similarly for TNG/DS9/VOY so they can be excused for a few weak episodes.
Discovery only had 15 episodes & had more than 6 months delay time to perfect their scripts so they have no excuse for Really Really bad writing & plot holes & inconsistencies & dropping themes & issues raised & promoted then abandoned, flipped for a stunt or killed off for shock value.
STD is just bad & time will not uphold the PR they are paying for to market the series now.

I agree Trekboi89. TOS had deadlines and other restraints of being a network show and STILL hit the ground running. TNG didn’t have network interference but still faced deadlines and other restraints. STD had delay after delay and all sorts of behind the scenes drama. No deadlines. No accountability. Lots and lots of time to make sure they had exactly what they wanted. And they only had to produce less than 2/3 of what those other shows had to make. They also asked people to pay extra for a new service for the privilege to even see it. So yes, there is no excuse for them to be this bad in their first season. None whatsoever. It is completely unjustified to compare their first season to any other Trek first season.

Truth.

The irony of all this is that the reason we were given for Discovery being put back was that they wanted it to be the best show possible. But the showrunners must’ve meant the quality of the sets, SFX and so on, because the second half of the season feels like it was rushed out on the back of chewing gum wrapper while the writers sat in the pub downing a few pints.

But, El Chup, the decision to make Lorca the one dimensional MU villain was made way before all of the production drama took place. And it STILL happened in the final result. That was the biggest bad decision they made but there were others. Most of which I think were mapped out way in advance and still nothing was done about them even though they had lots of time to fix it. Hence, I have little to no faith in the people who remained after the pre-production shake up.

ML31, with respect you can’t say that. The decision that he was MU may have been taken early, but that doesn’t mean he was rendered as a one dimensional moustache twirling joke from the start. I suspect what really happened is that they had decided a basic outline for the show and characters, and then the writers were asked to build upon it.

Chup, because we did not know who he really was, they successfully fooled us into thinking he was a genuine nuanced and flawed captain. Which I found endlessly fascinating. That was pretty new for Star Trek. But then we were duped because he was only that way because he was really opposite boy and wanted to get back to evil doppelganger land. Which also sort of flies in the face of what Spock surmised about savages lacking the ability to fit into civilized society. But let’s forget about that, too. This was all part of their plan from the beginning. It’s why they hired a guy to play the part who knew he was not committed to a series. So I think my conclusion is a pretty safe one.

The ‘on time’ part of that remark is important too. Even with the huge time-lag when doing vfx optically, TOS did make its airdates … though the one time it looked like that would not happen, the result was THE MENAGERIE. So they took a bad situation and got a Hugo Award for it. I don’t think you can put the DSC Harry Mudd bottle show on that same high shelf, even if they did that for equally desperate dollar reasons. (now watch, some DSC ep will win a Hugo, thus proving that Hugos are as ridiculously populist as they were in the 80s when pap like BACK TO THE FUTURE could win one.)

90% of everything is STILL crap, Prescott. There’s just tons more outlets, requiring a greater volume of product, so the number that makes up the remaining 10% is higher now.

And what is good these days is very very good indeed, but a blanket ‘scripted shows are better written now’ just doesn’t fly without some significant annotation. It could well mean that in the history books, that David Simon and David Milch will be thought of the way Reginald Rose was for his work from 60 years ago, but that doesn’t reduce the hackwork that populates the majority of network and basic cable offerings.

And if you’re trying to suggest the writing on DSC (thus far) is superior to what came before on TREK, then I imagine you’ve only watched AbramsFlicks, ENT and VOYAGER (and only the very worst of those latter series.) The ‘newer is better’ argument is like the ‘new tech is always better than old tech’ argument … and it often doesn’t hold water, as anybody trying serious preservation has found with digital storage instead of film storage (and with some issues relating to CG vs traditional vfx … the smart (not necessarily cost-effective) approach is to use the tools that do the best job, not the one-size-fits-all solution. I still think having more freelancers is a better fit for most series than having them all staff-written, too (though there are some glorious exceptions.)

@kmart. “Suggesting the writing on Discovery is superior to what came before” Are you even replying to the right person??? Jeez Louise no wonder the pro Discovery crowd get their panties in a bunch if your trying to be representative of those us on the critical side. How patronising your comment is… Really annoyed.

Hey Prescott, you’re the one claiming that ‘scripted shows are better now’ – a blanket unsupported statement. And I’d rather come off as patronizing than as somebody who drops his opinion — one that with regard to trek seems a nonsensical one in my view — without even trying to back it up.

Hi Kmart, I really haven’t the slightest clue in blue Hades where you’re getting the idea that I endorse Discovery as great scripting.. I don’t… Never have.. It doesn’t hold a candle to the good subscription scripted TV shows, GOT being most obvious. scripted shows are better now, but sadly Discovery is not part of that new pantheon..

If I took that last sentence out of context, then I apologize for that.

kmart. No problem really, mate. I’m over it.

About that “gay thing”: Almost 800 hours of Trek… 2 episodes that dealt INDIRECTLY with homophobia… meanwhile those 800 hours had ZERO gay people in space. Zero. 50 years – and no LGBT people. None. Since we all know LGBT people exist, intentionally NOT including them is a little thing called “homophobia.” Again, 800 hours. That’s a ton of screen time to only be heterosexuals in space and that’s a huge statement to gay people that they are not “normal” or welcome. So breaking that with Stamets and Culber (and Sulu) was HUGE. I agree with Jonathan Frakes that the casting of a biological female as the love interest of Riker in “The Outcast” was a missed opportunity – and commenting on a societal problem while at the same time submitting that same problem and letting it prevail. DS9’s “Rejoined” was much better for sure. But simply having gay characters matters. It’s as silly as doing a 2 hours of stories (allegorically) about racism out of 800 hours of a show that was actually racist itself by never having any people of color actually on the show – and then wanting to be described as a show that tackled racism because of those 2 hours of metaphor out of 800 with just white people. As you can see, Trek’s track record prior to Star Trek Beyond and Discovery was pretty crappy. But it’s not just the diversity that makes Discovery great… it had the best 1st season of any Trek yet produced. Can’t wait to see what’s next. Love it :)

I don’t disagree that Trek should have featured gay characters sooner. But times were different even 20 years ago. I don’t know who old you are but even in the nineties being gay was a lot more taboo than it is now and The Outcast and Rejoined were a lot more progressive than you think when you view them in the context of their time.

Plus I think my point still stands. Both of those episodes tried to address prejudice. In contrast I don’t feel that Stamets or Culber have been capitalised on – and the killing of Culber so casually was extremely disappointing.

I also would say that the show isn’t remotely more diverse as previous shows. You have two, now one, gay characters and the lead is a black woman. But the rest of the main cast are pretty much all white (or in the cash of Shazad Latif playing white), American and feature just one alien. Given that the previous casts have all been multi-ethnic and featured aliens and different nationalities as well, I don’t think the Discovery diversity is leagues beyond them. Featuring gay characters is really the only true move forward it has made in that regard, and they’ve already killed one of them off. Otherwise Discovery is mostly on par with past Treks when it comes to diversity, especially when you consider the times in which the various incarnations of Trek were being made.

I don’t know “what 90’s” you lived in, but in mine I had gay friends and gay co-workers and it was no big deal.

So did I, but on television it was a different story, especially in America.

I see you deliberately missed his point there.

Funny how so many of your posts point to TOS comparisons to DSC that you are critical of, yet when someone puts in a comparison you find it inconvenient to hear, all of a sudden your are complaining about it.

What are you talking about? I never just focus on TOS.

I think you are confused.

You should know haha

The first season of Discovery beats every other Trek’s first season easily. You might only argue that the uneven first season of TOS was on the same level of quality. This is just the first season – and because it did so well it was renewed right away :)

Oh dear..rolls eyes. Google the list of TOS first season episodes.

I think you may be over-reaching a bit with that, but it’s certainly much much better than TNG Season 1, Enterprise Season 1 and Voyager Season 1.

I would rate TOS Season 1 and DS9 Season 1 as better than DSC Season 1.

Balance of Terror is light years ahead of anything DSC has done so far.

I could say so much more, but I’ll just leave it at that.

We don’t need to defend the Prime Star Trek series.
History has accurately recorded them & their worth.
Once STD has been cured & the Marketing money they are spending to try to elevate this mess is gone, the show will slip into it’s place far behind all the Prime Universe Star Trek series.

Discovery is Prime.

@Palisades — to be fair there’s no way to actually confirm that, thanks to the confusion Orci created over ST09. That said, as there’s no canon explanation to the contrary, all Trek should be assumed to be Prime until specified in canon. To date there have been no story points which conflict with canon, or at least can’t be reconciled with canon.

Oh dear. Look up anachronism in the dictionary. The producers claim it’s prime but it’s full of anachronisms imho, invalidating that claim. I think it’s up to the individual now to decide if they accept the prime claim.

Is it really? We’re going to go from a present day where computer speech is nearly indiscernable from a real human, to one where it says “WOR-KING. A-NA-LY-SIS COM-PLETE” with the sound of gears and printing going on in the background?

From touch screen smartphones with enough power to create realistic augmented reality experiences, to a future where the Holodeck and 3D communications are ‘impossible?’

Where computer terminals are not iPads, but bulky trapezoidal boxes painted blue with a Connect Four game board and some marbles glued to the front? And instead of having some sort of shipwide cloud server you carry, basically, floppy disks around to insert into the front?

It’s the opposite of anachronistic, it’s what TVTropes calls Zeerust (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Zeerust).

A prediction of the future that has been surpassed by present-day technology, or was too rooted in contemporary styles, and today looks quaint and dated rather than futuristic.

For instance: In 1966, nearly nobody used computers for work. In 2018, nearly everybody uses computers for work. We know what they look like, what they ‘feel’ like, we’ve experienced several generations of them, we even have “retro” period drama shows like Halt and Catch Fire to compare 1981 to 2018 and see how far we’ve come.

If you mean storytelling anachronisms i.e. ‘they didn’t have this gadget yet!’ or ‘how come we never heard of [insert x] before,’ well, I mean, writers are gonna write. They have done an admirable job of staying in the lines AND giving us something fresh, rather than being constrained by knowing how it all turns out in the end.

50 years from now, if there are still people, they will inevitably do another Star Trek entertainment program, set in the Prime timeline around the time of TOS, and they will not feel particularly burdened with making it look either like a show from 100 years before, or from 50 years before (though cranky middle-aged farts, who are but children today, will complain).

Those future show creators’ understanding of what technology looks like, what aesthetic style may influence them, what imaginary worlds they create, what future real-world scientific breakthroughs will inspire them, we cannot yet say.

I would, however, predict the following:

There will be a plucky captain, a brave crew, and a beautiful ship.
The uniforms will have a Starfleet delta on them.
The ships will go as fast as the story requires them to.
Technology will be a MacGuffin in the service of telling stories about people, not the other way around.

Up to you whether you want consistency with your Canon or not, yes.. but it would be a foolish person who claimed that there’s nothing at all that needs updating from the 60s, that’s true I just think that updating can be done and still leave Canon intact.

I agree with that DPrescott.

I think that’s why it’s a big beef with me though. It should have just been about updating production values. Give The Enterprise more surface deal. Their TOS uniforms more detail. Give an in universe explantation for why Starfleet aren’t using The Cage uniforms. Explain why the Klingons aren’t consistent. Just upgrade the Klingon makeup from the TMP era.

What I have a problem with is when they don’t upgrade. They just flat out change change for the sake of it.

Another agreement with DPrescott. This has been said ad nauseum but the “STD must be updaded to the point where it has zero resemblance to the TOS look” crowd seem to think this is an all or nothing situation. The reality is it can be updated for a more modern look but STILL retain the TOS feel. And it would be believable as taking place in that time frame. TPTB in this show just didn’t WANT to make the extra effort. I guess they had their reasons and we can only speculate what they were. I think they were either just lazy or they did it hoping the argument over it would create a “buzz” about the show.

Possibly, this may explain why the two discovery camps are so polarised.. because the pro side takes the critical side’s desire to respect Canon to mean we want everything to be identical with TOS, right down to stilted computer vocals, beefcake captains and cardboard rocks. Well no, that isn’t the case. So by all means update for modern production values, just respect the canon. I know that’s what they say they’re doing but many of us are not seeing it that way. If you want to make a Star Trek that’s completely your own creation and design and not have to contend with canon then my suggestion, set it in another era/timeline

” If you want to make a Star Trek that’s completely your own creation and design and not have to contend with canon then my suggestion, set it in another era/timeline”

That is indeed that obvious thing to do. Want to do your own thing? Fine. Set it sufficiently far enough removed from any era we already know and you can do nearly anything you like.

ML31,

Re: …obvious thing to do.

No it isn’t. Because it perpetuates a myth about fictional histories that not even actual real recorded history adheres to:

That known history is somehow permanently static, always the same, and not fluidly subject to change.

Disinvited, I think you are making this more complicated than it needs to be. There is an established look and feel that has been reinforced in other parts of the franchise. It is reasonable that any new production try to at least echo that look and feel to make it “authentic”. Obviously within reason. What the STD folks did was make up an entirely new canvas for whatever reason. Which in and of itself isn’t a bad thing. But the franchise is rich and full enough to do that in a different setting that no one would complain about such changes. It really is as simple as that.

ML31,

Re: established look and feel

But you see back when we fans first created STAR TREK canon, we didn’t have affordable video recording tape or 16mm film dupes from which to construct any such sort of a visual canon. All we had was cheap audio reel recordings of the soundtracks which were transcribed and the spoken dialogue broken up into bits on 3 x 5 printed cards and our visual memories from seeing each episode at most, twice – that’s the origin of Trek’s canon. The look and feel was always a secondary concern which is why there were no such debates about the animated series’ artwork being inadequate to the task of rendering the ship and all the other technologies with the exact level of precision and detail as it had been represented in the prior series.

Disinvited,

That’s all well and good and I do not disagree entirely. It just doesn’t really explain away STD tossing away more than 100% of the look and feel of the era they claimed their show was in.

ML31,

Re: tossing away more than 100% the look and feel of the era

The observation is important because “the look and feel of the era” wasn’t a part of the canon that was created and being preserved by the fans. Heck, the first Paramount “official”, a dubious distinction at best, canon reference manual published contained absolutely ZERO photographs of any kind, let alone even attempt to preserve 100% of the look and feel of the era for reference as you contend was always being done. It, in fact, only contained black and white renderings of hand drawn art, of which the only drawings which were 100% on screen accurate, to my eye, was: the animated art, if a black and white image of something that was rendered in color can be regard as 100 percent.

If you insist on making this “visual continuity” was and is essential to canon debates argument, the animated art is the only rendition from which to start to make such precedent claims as it was the first and only accurately preserved in the first canonical reference work.

” “the look and feel of the era” wasn’t a part of the canon that was created”

It kinda is. Future shows have cemented the look at accurate. Even Enterprise, a show set before it looked like it could evolve into what we saw on TOS. We all get that it needs to look better. That does not mean chuck away the entire thing and start fresh unless you were doing a reboot. You want to set in in that time frame, make it at least FEEL like it belongs in it. Discovery looks like a ship of the far future. And again, this would be less of an issue if the show were better just on its own merits.

ML31,

Re:It kinda is.

And it kinda isn’t as CBS undid all of that by reimagining it, yet again, making it inconsistent when they released the first series in HD syndicated reruns.

@FredJ
If you’re responding to me, I’m sorry I should have elaborated further. By light years ahead of DSC, I meant the story writing (and the previous posts were discussing quality of episodes). I could give a rat’s behind about the tech – all the tech is meaningless without real drama and a good story.

50 years from now, if there are still people, they will inevitably do another Star Trek entertainment program, set in the Prime timeline around the time of TOS, and they will not feel particularly burdened with making it look either like a show from 100 years before, or from 50 years before (though cranky middle-aged farts, who are but children today, will complain).

Those future show creators’ understanding of what technology looks like, what aesthetic style may influence them, what imaginary worlds they create, what future real-world scientific breakthroughs will inspire them, we cannot yet say.

I would, however, predict the following:

There will be a plucky captain, a brave crew, and a beautiful ship.
The uniforms will have a Starfleet delta on them.
The ships will go as fast as the story requires them to.
Technology will be a MacGuffin in the service of telling stories about people, not the other way around.

–Fred Javelina

Brilliantly stated. This is at its core the issue being discussed. Core fans either like it, or they don’t. In the end, it shouldn’t make any difference to the stories being told.

” In the end, it shouldn’t make any difference to the stories being told.”

Correct. It shouldn’t. But if the stories being told are being done so in a VERY bad way because of writing or plotting or what have you, then those other issues will become front and center for what is wrong with the show along with the bad writing and whatever…

@fred
(stands up and applauds)

Enterprise is in an alternate timeline. We know that because instead of using the Roddenberry-canon defined XCV330 as the correct predecessor Enterprise, the went with a new design not in Prime canon.

Borg, there is nothing that officially says that Matt Jeffries design was a direct predecessor of the NCC-1701. In fact, it does appear as a background painting in an episode of Enterprise in Admiral Forrest’s office. One could argue that ship design pre-dates the NX-01.

Um, are you payed by CBS cause there wasn’t a single good episode in STD’s first season. Not one. The closest was the Harry Mud fail because it copied older Star Trek episodes but it was undermined by their ridiculous ending, letting a sociopathic Terrorist/killer off with the slap on the wrist of spending the rest of his life with a woman was punishment was sexist & may have almost worked in 1967 but this is 2018 & this series is supposed to be “Woke”

I wish STD was good, I would love some new Star Trek with a big budget- STD was neither.

I liked Lethe and felt it was good. The Mudd episode was a distant 2nd for me. The rest was slightly below mediocre to downright terrible. For the record, the person who wrote “Lethe” left the show. Doesn’t bode well for their future unless they’ve added quality we have yet to hear about….

See I actually think that a quiet a few stages in the first half of the season where you can see seeds of Trek. I remember as each episode was coming out I would sit there hoping for the big pay off later in the season when it was go full on Trek. Instead it crapped the bed and become full on dumbed down trash. I think that’s what annoys me the most.

Discovery is like a chess board. The pieces are in place, but the players, the writers, are rookies who simply aren’t good enough to play well.

” and because it did so well it was renewed right away :)”

If that renewal happened after all episodes aired you might have a point. But the announcement came very very early. That means the decision was made before any episode was streamed to the public. Many of these short season cable and streaming shows get at least two seasons from the get go. It’s just economically feasible to make that commitment. Make no mistake, it was not renewed based on just a couple of episodes made public. Now the 3rd season is a little different story. STD will likely get one as it is likely it is the most viewed content on all of CBSAA. (Guessing, of course since CBS does not release that info but it seems logical). But that tells more about how it is doing compared to other CBSAA offerings, not against what is viewed on other services.

Netflix International pays 100% of the production costs. CBS essentially gets the show for “free” as the rights holder and uses it as the tentpole for their US-only streaming service to draw in viewers inside the US. The renewal was made after viewer data came in from both Netflix and CBS from the first couple episodes. The numbers we so good from that that it justified spending tens of millions on a second season. It’s a business. No one is spending millions and millions on content that people don’t want to watch.

While possible, that would be atypical of that end of the business. As I said, it is quite common for shows of this nature to start off with two season orders. I still think it VERY likely STD had such an order. Further, it is impossible for outsiders to know what the viewing numbers are since they are never made public. It is also foolish (although I wouldn’t put it past CBS even still) to renew a show based on the numbers of a pilot meant for streaming but aired on the CBS over they air network. If they did it based only on the first two streaming numbers (which is very doubtful) they are just as foolish.

Hey, DPrescott! My point in my response exactly! Let’s compare the best two episodes of Discovery to the worst episodes of the other shows! That’s an awfully low bar. Further, given the short season and the nature of how it is viewed Discovery really shouldn’t have more than ONE bad episode. And that is being generous.

Well said!

It’s nice that you love the show but come one.. You are absolutely reaching when you feel you need to compare the best of Discovery to the worst of the other shows just to make it appear better than it is.

Bravo Athus. Loved what you wrote. The show has such bad writing. Diversity should be there regardless and should go without saying. They keep mentioning it to divert from the fact it’s an ill-conceived prequel that nobody asked for. Ashamed of it’s own legacy… Yet constantly talking nonsense about how faithful to canon they are.., Discovery is a joke. I’m gay – I don’t give a rats arse about any of their ‘progressive’ elements, all that should be in Trek anyway. I find the production team beyond patronising.

Yes, they really are patronising and it saddens me that so many fans are willing to take this dumbed down writing as good Trek.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Discovery works as a fun weekly sci-fi actioner. It doesn’t work as Star Trek, the bar for which was long ago set higher.

“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again”

And again. And Again. And again……..

And here you are following around people who are critical of the show challenging their every comment…. ;)

““I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again”

And again. And Again. And again……..”

Pot, meet kettle.

I’m glad you see it that way. I take gay people in stride as part of our culture. I think they’re trying to hard to beat the diversity drum.

Well put, Martin. Diversity has been front and center in nearly every successful television show in the past decade, people here keep seeming to forget that. Bravo for Trek for being so ‘diverse’ now, but shows like True Blood (one example of many) were doing it in 2008. A little late to the game, Discovery. More like, “Look how diverse we are!! (and please ignore how bad our writing is)”

“Look how diverse we are!! (and please ignore how bad our writing is)”

Truth.

Well Said Martin.
Can’t believe they keep going on about diversity, they buried their diversity & representation? They represented their black frmale lead as a war mongering convict then tried to make her a savior- Mary sue Burnham.

What does CBS’s payment methods to their employees have to do with this? I would imagine the CBS company scrip is just fine, and that DSC employees can easily transfer it to currency with their banks. CBS is probably paying in scrip because they have both US and Canadian employees working on DSC.

Relax, the scrip is just fine and people are making decent wages.

Nail on head

Spot on, Athus.

They are praising their own diversity more than they are praising the quality of their show. As if they put more thought and focus there than they did in putting together a quality program. There are other better shows out there with diverse casts that don’t say a word about how wonderfully diverse they are.

You do know that they are asked questions on this, don’t you? It’s not like they go on stage and start talking about it. They are lead to talk about it by journalist or people in the audience.

@Enough already. I suspect some people are unimpressed with their answers, it’s not the questions.

Enough already,

Re: “journalists”

There’s no such thing as Entertainment Journalism or Entertainment Journalists. If there were, Weinstein would have been routed out decades ago.

The studio PR machine control these things and the supposed “journalists” toe the line so as not to risk losing access to studio perks. Not to mention as assuredly as the studios have been caught making up reviews for their ads, they plant “journalists” to ask questions, the answers for which they want to get picked up by the other gossip prints.

Dis,
I’m as paranoid as the next guy (probably a lot more in fact), but I wouldn’t sum up ALL entertainment journalists in this fashion. For myself, I don’t get any studio perks — the last time I got anything from anybody while writing a story was back in the 20th century, and it was a T-shirt from the vfx house PDI, which was really nice and I wore it for at least six years.

I do provide my finished draft to the interviewees so they can make sure I didn’t make any errors or use a quote from them that will get them in trouble, but I don’t send these to PR departments. Occasionally an interviewee will do that, and that usually creates problems (I remember on STUART LITTLE that Sony demanded we use a phrase like ‘the world’s first fully-credible CGI character’ or words to that effect every time the character is mentioned, and the publisher just couldn’t stop laughing while he shook his head and ignored this, which was plugged in about 30 times throughout the article.)

I have run afoul of PR departments before, which is one reason why even though I mainly cover visual effects, I don’t cover ILM at all, because I ticked off ILM’s pr guy when he botched or withheld an interview about TREK 09. I called him on what he had done, and was told to never contact the office directly again. He has personally wrecked at least a dozen stories and impacted the reporting on at least as many more, and cost ILM coverage on probably two dozen features in industry mags, but I’m sure he’s happy with the situation anyway. (basically, I’m just saying, don’t try to group me in as a toadie journalist.)

Occasionally I’m told something off-the-record, and when that happens I never use it, or even mention it, until enough time has passed that it is no longer an issue, like the one star taking out restraining order against another star during filming of RED PLANET nearly 20 years back. I mentioned it generally without stating the title while talking to a cinematographer last month and he couldn’t stop laughing, because he had been a lowly camera operator on the film and was now able to go into much more detail than I had heard back in 2000.

kmart,

Well, I’ve always regarded your work as actual journalism and more along the lines of the nuts and bolts in my Engineering technical journals than the “Entertainment” news “journalism” that could have and should have unmasked Weinstein long ago.

And correct me if I recall wrong, but the kind of perks that I was alluding to were the free luxurious resort located advanced screenings, that I recall you often lament not getting access to in the form of even the barebonesiest disc mailer? Which is the type of treatment that I was pointing out, that those who dare to do actual journalism receive from the studios when real journalists fail to toe their line.

I’ve always had the highest regard for your journalism. I learned so much from it.

Not getting mailers is really pretty crummy, but at least they occasionally send links now, at least for some streaming shows. But the problem is you don’t get the whole season (I’ve still only seen three eps of LOOMING TOWER, which I thought was fantastic.)

But the blatant disregard for folks covering films is still really high. It took me almost a month to find somebody at Fox PR to talk with about THE PREDATOR, and then more than a week later, I hadn’t heard anything back. So I ask when they are going to let me start doing interviews, and get a single sentence, ‘sorry, we’re passing’ from them. Well that would have been nice to know when there was still time enough to do a replacement story! Also, the ‘why’ of ‘we’re passing’ would be useful, too, so I can figure out if they are having issues with the particular magazine I was writing it for, or some other factor. I covered LEGION last year and after months of hassle, got a decent article on THE ORVILLE out of Fox as well, so I don’t think it is my end that caused the problem. Well, for all I know, maybe the release is getting bumped back again, that would probably mess it up, who knows!

EA, I know the subject was broached by a moderator. A moderator whose subjects were told to the panel in advance. If they didn’t want to dwell on it they would have told them in advance not to bring it up. But they didn’t. They WANTED to talk about it.

Of give me a break. You have no idea how these things work. I write for an entertainment publication. We are given “hot topic issue” questions by our assignment editor. Since diversity is a hot topic in media these days, you will see interviews with actors and actresses and producers and directors driven by these in junkets.

A post from you that doesn’t include the word ‘whiner’ in it? What is this place coming to? Will all those exhibiting troll-like behavior start posting actual content now?

No. That is EXACTLY how those things work. No one goes on a very public panel where the moderator asks questions where they do not know what subjects will be broached in advance. Audience questions… That’s another story.

Great article! This team has created great work and my favorite incarnation of Trek to date (although, I’m not a fan of the Discovery exterior ship design for sure). I really can’t wait for the next season and see how they tie in with stories and characters that I’ve loved since childhood (Spock! Pike! Enterprise!). I like how this newest addition of Trek feels like it grew up with me and is more “adult” in it’s story complexity, time given to delve into character and the overall look that is so much more detailed than we’ve had on a TV incarnation of Trek (I also love the Tilly/Stamets F-bomb and how that made these characters feel even more real, grounded, natural and human and not like “safe for TV fakes”). Things like the Andorians, Tellerites, classic sound effects (Tricorder, Transporter, Sickbay bio-bed, and that “ping” on the bridge have me freaking out in each episode and bring me right back to the future world that I obsessed over as a kid). I cried when I saw the 1…7…0…1 appear didget-by-diget on the bridge monitor at the very end of the season finale. I hope they integrate why these Klingons have no hair into the next season, but as far as the Enterprise being different (and amazing) I’m very OK with that. The ship has been refitted so many times in its prime timeline history that this is just a refit model we had yet to see on screen. Can’t wait for the new episodes… and the new tradition my husband and I have of eating blueberries while watching the show just like Saru and Burnham snacked on them in the 3rd episode. Live long and prosper Disco!

My favourite incarnation is DS9. I feel DS9 did much of what Discovery is patting itself on the back for, but 25 years ago. The wonderful thing with DS9 is, however dark it gets, however much it drifts away from Gene’s vision of a utopian future, it still respects and honours the rich 50 year tapestry that is Trek. Discovery acts like it’s ashamed of that legacy and doesn’t have my respect. A selective visual reboot with some very stinky writing. The bomb under the planet’s crust was a laughable conclusion to a series long war arc. If this is genuinely your favourite incarnation can I please lend you my other boxsets.

Spot on, and this is why I don’t get all the excuse making from Discovery lovers. Trek at it’s best never needed to compromise any of the key elements and DS9 is a great example because it really should have been what Discovery aspires to be, but in nonetheless retained the social commentary and ethical dilemmas that made it’s predecessors what they were. Discovery is far too invested in serialised plot twists than it is in intelligent storytelling that explores contemporary themes and dilemmas.

No need to lend me your box sets to bring me up to speed. I’ve seen every episode of Trek multiple times, wrote for Paramount’s Star Trek: Communicator magazine and used to hang out on the sets in the 90s as part of my work. I’d gamble my understanding of Trek is pretty informed as I’ve sat in the captain’s chair, hung out on 10 Forward, been in many of the cast’s trailers and attended premiers and studio screenings and knew many of the creative team as friends. All that, and I think Discovery is the best so far. Just an opinion.

Is that a rather groan worthy way of saying your opinion must have more validity than his?

So just because you did all that you are better than all of the other fans? I am sorry to say, but that sounds pretentious as hell.

Stop being mean. Jeepers.

I am not being mean, I am being honest, he comes off as pretentious.

He’s not saying he’s better than other fans he’s just reinforcing his opinion and highlighting that it is based on years of being invested in Trek.

Exactly. That’s what I took from it as well. Personally attacking Luke is uncalled for.

Yet the aspect that gets my dander up here is how you and Luke repeatedly hit the same notes again and again in (desperate?) defense of the show, plus that the elements you defend are often the very ones that we are citing as being why the show is so unmemorable and mediocre.

Specifically, just because the show deals with certain issues … is that enough to make it more adult? Come on, THIRTY-SOMETHING dealt with gay people in a couple scenes on a semi-banned episode nearly three decades back better than this show could dream of doing. You don’t get brownie points for trying in drama, unless you deliver (this example is fresh to my mind because I actually read the teleplay to that episode yesterday afternoon … very impressive writing on that series.) But if you really buy into this safe level of daring, then STAR TREK V should be your favorite film because it at least tried doing something challenging with the God aspect (in addition to delving deeper into the three principal characters than previously.) Yet outside of myself, I don’t see a crowd of folks defending TFF ever, and even there, I’m still a big critic of the important flaws in the film, while still loving the rest of it enough that it is always among my top three with TMP and TWOK.

The fact Luke has seen every episode multiple times is enough to make me see his judgement as suspect; I have no idea how a person could sit through most VOYAGER or ENT episodes more than one time, or even once all the way through in a lot of cases. That doesn’t reinforce his status as an arbiter of taste at all. And writing for COMMUNICATOR doesn’t shore it up either. Shoot, I’ve written and sold more about TREK than anybody here but I certainly hope I never claimed that as a defense for my opinions, unless it has to do with some arcane bit of knowledge I came by while interviewing people.

Well, chalk me up as a huge fan of TFF and indeed TMP. Both have flaws but you are absolutely right all counts about the characters and concept in TFF and in terms of story I think TMP deals with the loftier themes that Trek is when it is at it’s best and transcends mainstream entertainment. Also, agree with you about sitting through Enterprise and Voyager more than once.

Here’s one for you: I like TFF better than TUC! And, no, I’m not trolling!

Love TMP, too.

Interesting. I think TUC is without question the better film, but I also find that I watch TFF more when I just fancy a bit of Kirk, Spock, Bones as they should be.

I think there is a great deal about TFF that is overlooked by most fans but which greatly influences who the TOS characters are going in to TUC.

I think TFF is one of the worst features (Not THE worst but it is down there) I do think it was one of the best in showcasing the Kirk/Spock/McCoy trinity. So at least it had that going for it.

Why so angry and personal? Lighten up.

Come on guys be honest with yourselves, he came of as pretentious. I am not an angry guy, I just don’t like pretentious people. I don’t care if you are Gene Roddenberry yourself, everyone here on this site has as much invested in Star Trek as others. Stop trying to be better than others.

Again, it is not a pretense if it is true. Suggesting that I don’t know much about Trek… when I used to write for a Trek magazine that Paramount put out and was so obsessed that I parlayed my love into access to the actual making of the shows behind the scenes is just silly. Someone can love Discovery and not be ignorant of previous shows and their quality. Pretty simple. Suggesting that my positive opinion of DISCO is rooted in ignorance of Trek history, begs a response that shows that I’m not ignorant. :)

It is not pretentious if it is true. In that case, there is no pretense, just facts. I’m pushing back on the insinuation that I’m not a fan or somehow not knowledgeable of Trek because I like Discovery. Pointing out that not only do I know the shows from what appeared on screen like everybody can know them, but also what was going on behind the scenes kinda puts to rest that I must somehow love Discovery because I’m ignorant in some capacity, when in fact, it is quite the opposite. ;)

I don’t doubt your knowledge of Trek, in fact I don’t doubt anyones knowledge who visit this site. After all we are all Trek fans here. What I don’t like is trying to be better than others. This is pretentious. No one is better than each other here. Star Trek needs to be an equal community, because that is what the root of Star Trek is. We can criticize what we don’t like, but in the end we should come together for our love of Trek. No one loves it more or less, no one here is above others no matter what they did. Like I said, I don’t care if you were Gene Roddenberry himself, you don’t get to be pretentious.

…you never sat in Kirk’s captain’s Chair…therein lies the disconnect… 😉

True. I only sat in the Defiant captain’s chair and the captain’s chair on the Klingon bird of prey from Generations. But I did play with bridge panels and buttons from the original series Enterprise while Mike Okuda was working on the components for the bridge recreation for Trials and Tribble-ations ;)

Perhaps instead of taking selfies in the captains chair & feeling superior to fans who never got on the set you should have paid attention to what those shows were about.

No one took selfies in the 90s. Also, taking pictures on the set was a no-no and there was no way in hell that I was gonna draw that kind of attention to myself and risk my access. Production was wary of crazy fans and you had to keep it in check.

People have been taking selfies for as long as cameras could macro-focus, Luke.

kmart,

Pish-posh, the photographic self-portrait dates to 1839:

https://books.google.com/books?id=Q8Lc2WJankUC&pg=PA24

and then there was the remote controlled shutter release which I recall a version used air pumped through a rubber tube in a manner much as used to pump up sphygmomanometer for a blood pressure reading.

I was actually going to cite the shutter-release too, but figured that pre-dated the phrase selfie, so it might confuse things. Have been seeing people misunderstand historical references here lately (as in, not recognize them at all), and hate the idea of having to put footnotes into my comments to ‘explain’ them. I used to use the remote release for time-lapse cinematography, like shooting the sky during a lunar eclipse.

kmart,

I always thought it was obvious “selfie” was new age slang for “self-portrait”? The root seemed obvious? And if we’re constructing educational footnotes, the term predates photography.

I did pay attention to what the shows were about, Discovery fills a niche that Star Trek has always had lacking, it does the production and action right, and has enough story chops to be in the same universe. If I want a Picard speech, I have a Picard. If I want Sisko lamenting war, I have Sisko lamenting war. If I want really bad acting I have Shatner. If I want a completely mishandled and poorly planned Trek experience I have Voyager. If I want more really poorly realized ideas there’s Enterprise (I really hate late Berman and Braga era Trek) If I want continuity and edge of my seat and stuff like PTSD and more mature stuff they didn’t talk about much on the other shows, I have Discovery.

That all being said, do I wish they took a tiny bit more time with the characters in Discovery and a little less constant forward momentum? Yes, but I’ll wait to see how S2 does it.

Don’t see much ‘constant forward momentum’ at all, just a lot of thrashing and twisting. If you want PTSD and more mature stuff, then look at THE DOOMSDAY MACHINE … or OBSESSION, or probably WHOM GODS DESTROY. But every time DSC tried to do something relevant (in that ‘mature’ category you cite, they seemed to mess it up. And not in a ‘just throwing it away’ approach, either, which can be very effective dramatically. They just don’t seem to be able to write coherently. I’ve never seen any of these people’s previous work, but really do wonder about how bad that stuff is, because this is mostly just lamentable.

Even a show like THE EXPANSE, which I watched for a season but did not ever connect with (which may be due to casting/filmmaking issues rather than a storytelling one), is so many leagues above in both ambition and execution than DSC, which seems to take a scattergun approach, firing off in all directions but not with any followthrough. It is like they are shooting wild to keep everybody’s head down, but not actually pursuing a kill, instead just claiming victory when they run out of ammo or night falls.

For the record, I watched the first season of Expanse. Thought it was good. Agree it was better than Discovery. But I wasn’t all that interested in catching season two. In fact, I forgot it was even happening. One of the hazards of short season shows.

” If I want a completely mishandled and poorly planned Trek… ”

To me, that is Discovery.

I don’t know how someone can call Discovery poorly planned and mishandled when it’s not done yet. Voyager had promise that it never lived up to.

I mean, there was a continual story, something even DS9 or TNG never did in their first seasons (and which TNG never did well).

Because they had a season long story arc that had a beginning middle and end. And that story arc was mishandled and poorly planned. I’m not going to compare STD to other Trek shows because it is so very much different. In fact, STD is more like the feature films than the other shows so while not exactly the same it is more appropriate to compare season one to the films.

Dead on Martin. DS9 was my favorite of the sequel series for all the reason you stated. STD feels like they want to be DS9. But STD is the AA ball player who dreams of making the bigs but just doesn’t have the talent to make it that far.

“I cried when I saw the 1…7…0…1 appear didget-by-diget on the bridge monitor at the very end of the season finale”

I cringed. It was such an easy thing to do. Such a wimp out. It felt like it was trying to appeal to a teenage fanboy/girl. They’ve already shot their load and you just know it’ll divide fans even more if they recast Spock in the Prime Universe. It was a cheap shot and Star Trek should be about intelligent storytelling, not cheap nostalgia. Discovery should be able to stand on it’s own without any need to rely on The Enterprise.

I’m really glad you are enjoying the show and getting so much out of it. It least people like you may keep the franchise alive long enough for a return to good quality storytelling. But personally I am baffled how you can excuse so many badly written episodes. So many of the second half episodes were dumbed down actioners without moustache twirling villains and ridiculous plot contrivances (space Hitler handed the fate of the Federation and allowed to then escape for instance). At least the first half of the season set up things that could have been concluded in a truly Trek like way. But that second half just had me with my head in my hands.

I am hoping the writing team will do a better job on Season 2. As I think about it, my favorite episodes are mostly in the first part of Season 1.

Still, maybe DSC is still finding its “space legs” and will improve season by season.

What I want is more intelligent writing and stories that properly explore the themes Trek is good at. If the show does that I can reluctantly swallow the visual reboot and messing about with canon. It’s the storytelling that is the most important aspect of Trek for me and I very much hope it improves. The cheapness of wheeling out the Enterprise though doesn’t inspire me in that regard, but nobody will be happier than I if the writing evolves into something more sophisticated and the show goes on to improve and impress. Right now though it reminds me a bit of Voyager. The pieces are in place and the potential is there in terms of the concept. But so far the writing hasn’t matched up and it’s not fulfilling it’s promise.

I think the Enterprise reveal would have worked much better after 2 or 3 seasons. After we really got familiar with all the Discovery characters and got more attached to them. For now it doesn’t feel earned. It feels a bit like the Enterprise finale where the Next Generation characters stole the thunder from under the Enterprise characters.

@alphatron — which happened at the end of Season 4! Which I think goes to prove that it doesn’t matter when it happens for the fans. For new audiences, it’s just a “development”. As long as they keep the focus on Burnam and the DISC characters, then the Enterprise, Pike, et al are merely guests in the show. What ENT did was make Riker the focus of the show, and that’s the true failure of that infamous chapter of Berman’s Trek.

Lets hope they can keep the focus on the main characters, but I still feel like it was not earned. It is a way of showing that the producers don’t trust their main characters fully that they have to resort to such a stunt. Give them a chance to develop more and then have at it. Although I guess they just wanted to address the Spock in the room.

@alphantrion — well, it really boils down to whether you like the Burnam/Sarek story, and whether it justifies setting DISC in this time period. I personally have really enjoyed it, and for me, justifies setting the series in this time period, with all of the complaints about visual continuity and potential canon conflicts. So, for me, introducing Spock is a natural progression of that story, while doing a little fan service. We’ll see what they do with it.

That said, this could very easily be the setup for a Pike driven spinoff with the Enterprise, and of course Spock linking the two shows with Burnam and Sarek. The best case scenario would be we get DISC for 13 episodes a season, and Pike/Ent for 13 episodes a season, thus getting a full season of Trek. Who wouldn’t be happy about that?

I would absolutely enjoy a Pike series, and knowing the caliber that actor Anson Mount can reach, it should be a blast. By the way, people shouldn’t judge Anson Mount by looking at Inhumans, that was an unfortunate mess from the start. If they want to see how good of an actor he is they should check out Hell on Wheels, an absolutely excellent show and Anson Mount is phenomenal in it. Also I want Chris Heyerdahl in a Trek show.

I’m not so sure I want to see a Pike centered series. I’d rather see a show in the TOS era set on board another star ship to be honest. We know too much about the science officer for one thing.

@alphantrion — yes, I think a Pike era Enterprise story would happily fill the desire for more TOS era shows, which we sadly never got, without necessarily retreading on those well defined coattails. Spock is an iconic character that virtually everyone knows, whether they are a Trek fan or not, and could help expand the audience, whether he is the primary focus of the series, or not (and I don’t think he should be). It also allows the brand to get back to basics.

I’d suggest making the focus more on Number One and her relationship with Pike, a character we sadly never got to know that well. We infer a lot from his depiction in The Cage, but the reality of it is, he’s likely cut from the same cloth that Kirk was, and would serve to provide a similar experience, which Trek has been sorely lacking for a few decades. Let’s see the characteristics of a Captain who invoked such loyalty in his Science Officer that Spock would risk Court Martial — and death — to save him.

We know Sulu and Scotty were already aboard the Enterprise when we first meet Kirk, maybe they show up first under Pike and we get to find out more about who they really are too?

It also would be a significant enough departure from DISC such that the two would compliment each other. I think it would be a win/win for the future of the franchise.

The thing is, in the Burnham/Saerk relationship the Vulcan does not NEED to be Sarek. That was done solely for fan service. Thus far, they could have made up any Vulcan and placed it post TUC. Therefore, the TOS connection was not justified.

ML31,

Re: …the Vulcan does not NEED to be Sarek.

It does require Sarek, if we are to accept that the Vulcans are behaving, logically. What other Vulcan at that time could be MORE logical to rear a human? T’pol???

@Disinvited. Wha? There are Vulcans other than the ones we’ve seen..! A planet full by my reckoning..

Disinvited…

“What other Vulcan at that time could be MORE logical to rear a human?”

Pick one. Make one up. There are a LOT of Vulcans out there you know….

ML31,

Re: Make one up.

How? In canon at that time, Sarek is the one Vulcan with the most experience in negotiating humans and their humanity, and in rearing what a large amount of Vulcans under canon regard as his “human” child.

There doesn’t appear to be any way for some other Vulcan to take on such a task logically without recourse to Sarek at some point, i.e. at some point, Sarek is going to become involved if the setting for the rearing is Vulcan – it doesn’t make logical sense for him NOT to be?

T’Pol came to mind because she was the only one in any Trek that had mentally prepared herself for the possibility of raising a child with human characteristics. But Sarek’s actual successful rearing experience would’ve trumped that to their logical way of thinking? Wouldn’t it?

I have, indeed, been trying to actually come up with some Vulcan that could give Michael the Vulcan underpinnings that Kurtzman wanted her to have on Vulcan, but I just don’t see any path for it to happen in that setting, logically, without Sarek being involved in the process of choosing whoever this alternate Vulcan might be, at the very least.

As humans, we might think Sybok, as this would be before he went off the deep end, would be ideal, but how do we find the logic where any Vulcan would decide assigning him the task of her rearing is the “logical” thing to do, and that Sarek would concur?

It seems Sarek is your go to guy if you want a Vulcan. Fair enough.

DPrescott,

Re: Sarek is your go to guy if you want a Vulcan.

No, it’s not that. It’s just that it seems he’s the most logical which is what we’d expect Vulcan councils or whatever government body they have for child protected foster care assessments to go with.

Now, if you want to argue that perhaps this is a time where Sybok has yet to go too far and has fired up a reasonable debate to the point that they gave serious consideration to his rearing Michael, then I’m all ears. I just think Sarek would step up and argue against it, but I suppose it could be interesting if somehow Sarek didn’t prevail.

@Disinvited — as usual you have made a valid argument, which based on what we know from Star Trek, that Sarek is the most logical Vulcan to take on the rearing of a human child.

I find it hysterical that the same people who object to justifying something being plausible because it was never mentioned in canon, are now taking exception with the most logical path taken directly from canon. Of course any Vulcan could have done it, but canon, and logic, suggests Sarek was a very likely Vulcan.

Since there’s no reasonable debating with these #MTGA folks, there’s really no point in it. I applaud you for doing so.

Curious Cadet,

Re: I applaud you for doing so

Thanks. And I see that you are right, there’s no point in continuing the exchange.

Disinvited, Sarek is your guy only if you believe there are only a handful of Vulcans (the ones we have already seen in a Trek episode) in the entire Star Trek universe. Seems logical to me that there has to be at least ONE other Vulcan who would be willing to take on the care of an orphaned human child given the circumstances. Make one up. Obviously that was way too creative a thing to do for the STD folks.

“I cried when I saw the 1…7…0…1 appear didget-by-diget on the bridge monitor at the very end of the season finale”

I cringed too. Yikes.. Even today your messages don’t drop in one letter at a time.

Maybe THAT aspect of the communications system is what has broken on the ship and requires outside assistance. Or their streaming is being messed with by aliens.

(to be honest, I didn’t even remember that the ID was revealed in this fashion … I think I WOULD have remembered if you just slapped a big ‘incoming from 1701’ on a monitor fullscreen and let it stay there with a music cue under it as a 60s style dramatic moment, but then again I often prefer shock to suspense, unless the suspense is handled very masterfully.)

kmart,

It’s another made up historical “fact.”

Even today, on the audio radio traffic, pilots, such as Harrison Ford, STILL identify their aircraft one character at a time to the tower when in crisis. It goes something like this:

Pilot: “Control, this is Tango Foxtrot Delta One Niner. We have complete loss of engine power and are descending rapidly. We need some place to set her down…”

DPrescott,

You’ve got to be kidding us? Even today, I see ticker taping ads in page and pop ups on web sites, and on marquees on the streets where I live.

@Disinvited Ahhh, so the 1701 message was being streamed by Google Ads. That is a genius level of sub text that slipped completely under my radar. Bring back Harberts and Berg immediately..!

For occasions like this then, they open the specially reserved sub space dynamic channel so the message pops up dramatically :-))))))))))))

I could go on, but I’m done.

DPrescott,

The point was that the technology exists and is in every day use.

And in states of emergency when the more elaborate methods of communication, which you admire so, can’t be relied upon, today’s pilots do, in fact, identify their aircraft to the tower serially, one character at a time.

““I cried when I saw the 1…7…0…1 appear didget-by-diget on the bridge monitor at the very end of the season finale”

I cringed.”

If my eyes rolled any further back at that moment I would have been looking at the back of my skull. It reeked of “jumping the shark”.

And “space Hitler”. HA! That was just terrible. Evil Georgeau being in this show is right up there in great character creation with Data’s evil twin.

“I cried when I saw the 1…7…0…1 appear didget-by-diget on the bridge monitor at the very end of the season finale”

Me to. A seminal moment now in 21st Century Star Trek. Just awesome!!!

And that knowing look between Burnham and Sarek. Loved it! Can’t wait to see the Enterprise again and how they keep weaving this tapestry picking up threads for over 50 years ago. :)

Hyperbole much?

Troll much? (just kidding!) :-)

I really like the Discovery ship design. What we see now, so much more than earlier concepts.

The early Discovery concept we so ugly. I find the design now to be almost ugly. Feels frail, out of proportion and complicated with the rings in the saucer section. It’s my seat favorite part of a show that I really love.

Wow Luke. Just be sure… I think you are saying you like the show. Am I reading you right?

A lot of cool statements I agree with. Still I hope the show itself improves next season.

I wonder if they alternate arms when patting themselves on the back so often, you don’t want one bicep bigger than the other.

I definitely see Irwin Allen’s vision in Star Trek: Discovery… also Stevie Wonder’s vision.

I hate to admit it, but sometimes I do find you hilarious, mister

Excellent! This is what Star Trek would be like if it were made by Irwin Allen. GREAT call!

Innervisions, man.

Awesome album! Second in Wonder’s ultimate winning streak from “Talking Book” to “Songs in the Key of Life”. A bit like post-“Rubber Soul” Beatles or I-IV Led Zep, in that it’s really hard to tell which album should be considered the best.

If the show is going to live up to Roddenberry’s vision they really have to get in some new writers who can write intelligent stories. The current lot think they are smarter than they actually are. They think throwing in a black female lead and a couple of gay characters makes them leaders in diversity. They think that the occasional line about Federation values satisfies the optimistic future of the Federation. But in reality it’s lipstick on pig as really the show so far has been little more than a weekly action show with cheesy “modern” plot twists and generally ridiculous writing (especially in the second half of the season).

I’m convinced that Kurtzman has only seen TOS and maybe a few of the TOS movies and thinks that’s what Trek it, without also considering the many great stories to be told in subsequent series.

Oh, and Kurtzman is absolutely wrong that diversity was just there and not addressed. It shows he fundamentally doesn’t have the brains to understands Trek. Sure, we never saw any issue made of having Black, Asian or Russian crew members, but Spock was a target for racism and issues relating to race, and in subsequent shows gender and sexuality, were often explored through the prism of alien races and cultures. There is NONE of that in Discovery. Not truly intelligent social commentary. No intelligent ethical dilemmas. Having a diverse cast is pointless if your actual storytelling is run of the mill sci-fi action stuff that never really tries to deal with loftier themes.

How about some new material?

What do you mean “new material”?

You take things like exploring social themes and ethical dilemmas and it ceases to be Star Trek.

If you want pew pew pew go watch Star Wars.

El Chup, I think BK may have meant your complaints

Well, if he does he’s talking out of his backside as that particular comment I’ve not made before.

Yea, exactly, Marja.

El Chup flew too close to the sun with his self-impressive comments such that his wings of pontifcation melted and he did not even notice. ;-)

That’s funny, cuz I just accused you and Luke of the same repeat excesses above, that you keep hammering away with a perspective that seems way off to me, and that you just keep returning to it time and again. Difference is that El Chup’s argument could be applied to any series and therefore has a lot more universal relevance, so I’d say his viewpoint bears repeating, so that makes it something apart from yours. (Not trying to berate or instigate, just making an observation.) So in conclusion, I find your one-line snipe about ‘new material’ isn’t exactly serving your argument or scoring you any points.

I’m not sure I ever remember Roddenberry addressing sexual orientation. Are they reaching a little far here?

He didn’t. He was an old straight guy. Blocked David Gerold’s AIDS and gay storylines on TNG. These DISCO guys are picking up buckets of water he should have carried but didn’t. Progress :)

Gene was all for gay characters. Gerrold has said this himself. It was Leonard Maizlish, Gene’s infamously meddling lawyer (see Shatner TNG’s documentary) who Gerrold got homophobic abuse from and whom he believes sank Blood and Fire. Plus Rick Berman got cold feet. It came down to a for camp and against camp and Gene was part of the former. In fact Gene stood up against production people trying to reject gay characters according to Gerrold. But in the end the against camp won out.

In contrast, Richard Arnold simply says it was shelved because it wasn’t a very good script and that the gay characters were portrayed in a very stereotype reliant way. Whether that’s true or not I don’t know.

You can watch the New Voyages episode on you tube. They filmed a revised script. Gerrold directed.

No.

I took 4 years of German in high school and still can’t make heads or tails out of that … something about turds and the world, then ‘planet of dogs’ and black behinds?

Oh, wow. More “we’re so great,” and even more “look how diverse we are.” Zzzz. Meanwhile, nothing of substance. I’m sorry, too hard to see through all the smoke here to get too excited about season two. They’re very good at blowing their own horn, though, I’ll give them that.

Some of you people are in dire need of a dictionary to look up the true definition of a phobia. Then again, that wouldn’t jive with the Left’s obsession with group identity politics. Categorize everyone into groups so that they’ll be too busy arguing to focus on anything substantial.

Uh, I think you’ll find it’s the right wing who are the ones quite literally claiming ‘identitarian’ reasons for becoming literal torch-bearing mobs. Or are busy demonizing entire swaths of their fellow citizens as MS-13, welfare queens, thugs, out to destroy families and children, while instructing their forces to rip children away from parents at the border without a shred of irony.

The left in the USA, which is hardly unified enough to deserve a capital L, is in fact boringly centrist and reasonable and just wants things that other advanced industrial democracies have had for over 50 years. Things that boringly, centrist-ly, save money for the society in the long run and prevent it from fraying at the edges.

it’s just that the Overton window of American politics has shifted so far to the right that the center looks like the left; the true radical left (like the DSA) is almost outside the frame altogether.

Of course this is strictly in the _perception_ of spectrum; in reality, when polled, most Americans support policies that are fair and progressive and align more closely with center-left than hard-right. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/01/opinion/democrats-economic-policy.html

Nicely stated, Fred.

As a British centrist I think you couldn’t be more right. So many right leaning Americans I know cannot fathom that I am anything other than a left winger because of some of my views. Hyper partisanship in America is of course a major issue, but with Trump you have the far right emboldened and far right political ideology slowly but surely replacing traditional, moderate conservatism in American political discourse. It is very alarming to watch as an outsider.

“I think Roddenberry gave television history – our history – such a gift in creating a world in which diversity of all kinds – color, sexual preference, was an assumption. His greatest contribution was that it never had to be addressed, because it just was, as it should be. You are an officer first. You love who you love. There is no judgment. That has been removed from the equation. ”

So I think we all want to live in this world where these are all non-issues. As a viewer of the show, I would like them to be non-issues on the show as well. That also means that the cast and crew and writers need to shut up about these aspects and just get on with delivering some cool story lines. Let the series speak for itself through its characters and stories. They’ve got Pike and the Enterprise under their care for a bit now, so I would say to them: forget the politics of today, let’s leave those behind… go show us the future. Go show us how amazing humanity can be, against the backdrop of a thousand stars. It’s what we’re watching the show for.

Well put, Recursion.

@The Recursion King — Or, perhaps you could just ignore them, and let those interested in their process otherwise learn about it?

First off, I don’t know if it ever has been an issue on the show itself. I never once heard Stamets/Culber have to defend their relationship, or Captain Georgious defending her right to be a Captain despite being a female (and the horrible canon that was Turnabout Intruder).

“forget the politics of today, let’s leave those behind… go show us the future.”

That is pretty much impossible to do, you literally have fans on the reddit or here talking about how there’s no ‘strong male characters’ and then scoff at people bringing up Stamets, Saru, Ash, or Culber. You have people dismissing strong male characters because they are non-white, non-heterosexual, or non-human. So I’m sorry, the reason the producers make it a point to talk about is because people make it a point to talk about it. But it was never in the show afaik

I am a little bothered by how hard this cast and crew are fishing for an emmy. To be honest they don’t deserve one at all. I see nothing so bold as they claim. Nothing so new and fresh in the effects that I have been blown away. They better put in their dues as far as this fan is concerned.

It is coming off as pretty shameless at this point, and you’re not alone in them needing to pay their dues – competition as to quality television content is stiffer than ever these days. People will simply go elsewhere to watch something better, and in the U.S., likely to a service they’re already paying for anyway, not CBSAA, which for a lot of us, only has this.

They seem to be desperately seeking validation, where there is none. Up your game, Discovery…you’re nowhere close to producing award winning drama. Stop self-congratulating yourselves and focus on the task at hand…making a second season that doesn’t SUCK.

They are not “fishing for an Emmy” they are doing their job in promoting the show. EVERY show has a PR budget for awards and it is in the contracts that actors get promoted by the networks for awards. It’s part of the standard promotion of the show and the promotion of the actors and key crew positions. It’s business. It’s not a sign that these people are desperate for validation. These events, ads, billboards, etc. are paid for by the network out of a promotional budget. All shows do it. Welcome to Hollywood. Find out about the TV business maybe a little bit more before you attack other people out of your ignorance of the TV business. By being more knowledgeable you might be happier as you won’t have to assign negative motives to other peoples actions which you don’t understand :)

But the paradox thing is, the more they praise the show, the more I dislike it. For example I wished for a gay character for years and I agree that they created a great character with Stammets and he and Culber are an appealing couple. That is all good and fine, but why do they call it an “epic love story” every time, their backstory couldn’t be more mundane. They made that intentional to bring home the point that a gay relationship is just as normal as anything else. But you can’t be epic and ordinary the same time. Nobody called Miles’ and Keiko’s love epic only because they were interracial. I would call an openly gay person a hero in the redneck parts of today’s US, but not in the context of Star Trek’s future.

I find some of that rubbing off on me. The more I see these guys praising themselves for their less than mediocre work the more I find myself disliking the show. I know that is not logical and it really shouldn’t matter. But that is the effect it is having on me. Sorry. I’m human and imperfect but striving to be better…. :)

“They are not “fishing for an Emmy” ”

At those “for your consideration” things that is LITERALLY what they are doing.

Kurtzman, “In a world that is so divided, Star Trek has always presented the most beautiful, optimistic vision of hope.”

Interesting that the script writers then write a season where they divided the Vulcans by race, divided the galaxy between Human and Klingon and then divided the human race with prime and mirror universe. And then when they killed off a beloved gay character, went out and begged forgiveness from the LGBTQ community. Divided old school and new school trekkies with the look of the show. I’m sure there is more but my point which someone else stated above, let the show speak for itself. Quit speaking for the show. Don’t make things so obvious and out front that it takes away from the quality of show you are producing. I think the acting, production and direction of this show is the best in the business. The script writing is lacking and needs to improve or the show is doomed.

@Spiked Canon — and as I pointed out above, perhaps you should just ignore them?

Because we all want better for what we love?

@Spiked Canon — but the show does speak for itself as you claim you prefer above. Given that, why not just discuss its merits, or lack thereof in your opinion — thus expressing your love — and ignore the off-camera statements?

For all of Bob Orci’s behind the scenes pontificating about current science, and relevant theories of multi-verses — in the end, the movies speak for themselves, and Bob Orci even admitted his statements were ultimately irrelevant as he intentionally left things ambiguous for audiences to decide from the movies themselves.

“Star Trek has always presented the most beautiful, optimistic vision of hope. ”

Makes me wonder why their version was the near exact opposite of that. Not that I’m complaining. Dark pessimism can make for good story elements too. But if they want to claim their show lines up with that…

-Strange,i’m a trekker since my childhood and i don’t see anything from Gene’s legacy in Discovery.Maybe the new actors and the new producers have a new sense which can make them to see things very different.lol

I just love this cast. I love this show. I’ve re-watched it so many times over the hiatus. I know this is just a random industry junket but it is nice to hear them all together again before session 2 starts.

Agreed! :)

To quote Sonequa Martin-Green, “I think…”
Notice how often she prefaces her thoughts and sentences?
Just saying.

Notice how her thoughts and sentences are carried by the media and yours are just typed out in the comments section of some random article about her? Just saying. (How about you try being respectful and kind, it might make this a nicer place for all fans to come and talk about something we are passionate about and make it different from the troll-infested nasty corners of the Internet.)

Luke, I think perhaps Bryan meant that in a positive way? That was my take on it at least.

Yeah, that is how I took it too.

Eventually, someone was bound to see “Gene’s vision” in this debacle of a Star Trek show! It might as well be these actors!

Discovery is how Star Trek should have been from day one.

lol

If Discovery had been the first Trek there would be no Star Trek, and therefore no Discovery, around today for you to enjoy! It is too generic a show and doesn’t stand out as unique, which is what TOS did and which is why it built up the following it did during it’s original airings and then re-runs.

Genau so.

“His greatest contribution was that it never had to be addressed, because it just was, as it should be.”

… do you mean like Tilly didnt adresses that Michael has a male name? Yeah, sure, you know what you are talking. ;)

…beautiful, optimistic vision of hope…” (???) On the show featuring betrayal, mutiny, and insubordination. Riiight. LOL

@Dr. Image — I see a series about a young woman who learned a valuable lesson for which she paid dearly, and holds firm to her morals and principals, and those of the Starfleet and the Federation, when darker forces swirling around her make others waver in their faith and execution of those principals. I can’t think of a more optimistic symbol of hope reflective of the reality around us.

We even saw the same show? I only saw a show about a mature woman, that was so perfect that she always was correct, she knew everything, she is the definition of a Mary Sue. What lesson did she lern? Not to mutiny again? That was the 101 class on the starfleet academy, or Vulcan Academy.. lol

Agreed, Dr. Image. IMO, there was nothing inspirational about season one at all. Dark, depressing and preachy is more like it.

Don’t all those smiling faces seem fake now that the abusive show runners are gone just days later…

Absolutely.