Today Canada’s Space channel hosted a Star Trek: Discovery cast panel at Fan Expo Canada in Toronto, located conveniently in the same city where the show is produced. On hand were Sonequa Martin-Green (Burnham), Doug Jones (Saru), Anthony Rapp (Stamets), Mary Wiseman (Tilly), Shazad Latif (Voq/Tyler) and Anson Mount (Pike)…and TrekMovie was there too.
While it may seem cliché, one cannot help but notice the camaraderie this group shows and how they really seemed like a family unit, with the new addition of Anson Mount fitting right in. Much of the discussion was along the lines of the two other big Disco cast panels this summer, covered by TrekMovie at San Diego Comic-Con in July and Star Trek Las Vegas in August, but there were a few things worth highlighting from Toronto’s panel.
Martin-Green teases juicy storyline with Spock in season two
One of the biggest bits of news that emerged over the summer was that the second season of Discovery would include the character of Spock, to be played by Ethan Peck. When a fan asked Sonequa Martin-Green about how she felt about her character being connected to Spock, the actress effused, and teased what was to come:
It’s incredible. I think it is genius to have us be set where we are, 10 years before TOS and to have Burnham be connected to that institution, which is the family of Sarek and Amanda and Spock. I am just so appreciative of it. It is so full. It is wrought with everything. I end up being two-degrees separated from Captain Pike and that is really interesting too, to be able to have that sort of connection to the canon. I really love that. One of the things we are doing on Star Trek: Discovery is being our own thing, but also keeping that connection with the canon and having that connective tissue. So, I really appreciate it, and it is juicy!
As Martin-Green wrapped up talking Spock, Doug Jones and other members of the cast jumped in to tease Ethan Peck’s appearance with the following exchange:
Doug Jones: And wait until you see Ethan Peck as Spock, okay!
Martin-Green: Yes!
Anson Mount: Hot Spock!
Anthony Rapp: Hot Spock-et!
Anson Mount just getting into the Pike groove
Anson Mount, who described the role as “literally a lifetime dream” as he is a fan of Trek, also talked about how he is trying to make Captain Pike his own:
I am a big thief. I love stealing. I steal from Nicholson all the time. Maybe I have stolen from Shatner in the past? But, for this one, I felt it was important to make a character that is already established not just a replica of a previous performance. Mad respect for Jeffrey Hunter, but I needed to come at it from my own way. It’s hard to establish a character in the second season. It has been a dance between me and the writers figuring it out. I feel I just got into the groove of this character, this last week.
More Badass Tilly for season 2
Actress Mary Wiseman talked about how she sees her character’s arc flowing from season one into season two:
It is a continuation of her journey. She grew a lot over the first season from being based on the ship and meeting Burnham and kind of having her priorities and values shuffled around. So, that arc will continue and a little more…“Badass Tilly.” That will start to grow and we’ll explore it, which is the part that interests me because that is what makes her complex and three-dimensional.
Stamets facing life after the Spore Drive
A major part of season one was the Spore Drive, based on the research of Lt. Stamets, which was pulled offline at the end of the season. Rapp talked about how in season two, his character of Stamets now has the time to deal with all the changes, including what his role will be:
There wasn’t really time to process the cataclysmic events of season one, because we had to get through it. So, I am really grateful in season two I get to really deal with the aftermath of the loss of Culber and the question of what is next now if the Spore Drive isn’t going to continue as is, what is there to do? I think that is a really interesting, human experience for people who experience loss, that is what they go through. I am very grateful for the writers for giving time and space to grieve and what growth can come from it and what is possible.
Jones ponders a life without fear for Saru
Doug Jones discussed how he has enjoyed seeing how Saru can rise above the Kelpien’s fearful nature and pondered where he could go in season two:
What season one taught us about Saru is he can push his threat ganglia back in, to carry on. That is a life lesson for me personally. I have learned so much from Saru. Season two? I would love to see more of that evolution and is there a permanent solution to our fears, or is it something we do have to be haunted by the rest of our lives.
Family photo
Anthony Rapp shared this “Starfleet family” photo following the panel.
I love these people. #StarfleetFamily #fanexpocanada pic.twitter.com/u2Vn7TZWXF
— Anthony Rapp (@albinokid) September 1, 2018
More Fan Expo Canada to come
There was also a Star Trek: Discovery production design panel held Saturday. Look for that report here at TrekMovie.com.
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.
The first season of Star Trek: Discovery will be released on Blu-ray and DVD on November 13th.
Keep up with all the Star Trek: Discovery news at TrekMovie.
When not acting as our Toronto con reporter, Angie Korporaal is a graphic designer and amateur prop builder. You can follow her as @korps on Twitter and Instagram.
Thanks for the report :) If Mount is just getting into his groove as Pine at the end of filming season two, I do hope he gets a future opportunity to play that role before they shuffle him out. Wouldn’t want him to stay too long into season three though because I love the idea of a new captain every season.
I don’t want him in season 3 at all. I want him in his own series!
Oh, yes. I would love to see a Pike series.
Pine? You must’ve had new Trek movie in your head when writing,lol! Looking forward to season 2,but also new Trek movies and I hope they get Pine back.
Looking forward to that final ep of this season when we find out if Chris Pine (played by Anson Mount) ends up signing a deal with Paramount for the next Trek movie.
;-)
ROFL!!
Juicy tissue.
There is “keeping that connection with the canon” and then there is manipulation and forced retcons because you are desperate.
I feel the fans of this series and its characters will get the short end of the stick. I love Spock but he is unnecessary and I smell the season will be more about him and Pike than the main characters of this show.
I really don’t get why trek writers have to constantly ruin new things by trying to get reluctant old fans on board, especially when history has already proved how counterproductive it is. It’s so hopeless anyway because the old fans who dislike discovery, or the movies for that matter, won’t watch this show now just because Spock is there. If anything, you give those people even more pretexts to complain about how much you are not respecting canon. And more pretexts to dislike your main character who is great.
I have to agree. But it’s the lazy way to do things. Your show is not bringing in the viewers, bring in everyone knows and loves, ie, Spock and Pike. But every major franchise does that when they feel they have to generate buzz somehow, so I get it even if I don’t like it.
It’s just sad it happened this soon. Give DIS 2-3 seasons for their own characters to develop before you shoe in others. I don’t mind seeing Pike at least. I’m still very hesitant with Spock but we’ll see. It just feels like they don’t believe enough in the show and its characters to get more people on board first.
I have my issues with Discovery, but its new. Every Trek show took time to get its training wheels off. They didn’t shoehorn Spock in the second season of TNG or Scotty on the second season of DS9 or Data in the second season of VOY. They gave those shows their own time for those characters to grow and develop without gimmicky casting for an entire season. And they were all the better for it.
I think the difference is that CBS is using Discovery to anchor a new streaming service, so they don’t feel that they have time for the show to find its feet; they want lots of viewers NOW. I understand the financial reality behind their desperation, and it makes financial sense that they’d pull out their big gun — Spock — early on.
I do wish, though, that CBS had trusted the fandom enough to give us great new characters and great new stories and rely on those to bring in viewers, instead of relying on Spock. But Spock always gets the tough jobs. :-)
I think you’re right Corylea!
To give CBS credit, AA is new and there are probably trying to figure out how to make it competitive in an already competitive marketplace. And they probably expected DIS to give the site more buzz. And it did, we’re all talking about it lol, but no I don’t think it reached the level it wanted and why they feel they have to add these characters.
And I think the fear is because this is the first Trek show you have to pay for it’s easier for people to simply ignore it. Even if you thought TNG, DS9, VOY etc sucked at the beginning, but because it was on regular television, it was easy to just turn on the channel, watch an episode and see if it improved or not.
That’s not the case with something like AA. It’s a commitment. Yes only a monthly one but if the show isn’t grabbing you tell yourself you’re not paying for it and move on. That’s the challenge no other Trek show had to deal with before. And especially on a site most people don’t particularly like or want so it’s even harder.
So I get it! But like you I just wish they gave the show the chance to come into it’s own before sticking all these gimmicky appearances so early on. But if it gets more viewers then I can’t fought them for it either I guess. And probably why the Picard show is coming.
@Tiger2
Dude, if they gave you the keys to Star Trek you would run it into the ground. Leave Star Trek to the professionals.
@ HN4
“@Tiger2 Dude, if they gave you the keys to Star Trek you would run it into the ground. Leave Star Trek to the professionals.”
I don’t mind him stating this opinion, but he has said this like ten times already at least here. It’s like, “hey man, we heard you the first nine times; we get it now, OK?” Sheesh, no offense meant to him, but it gets so tiring as a reader to see the same opinion written from him over and over and over.
All the regulars here repeat their opinions regularly. You are no exception.
That person is an extreme case, who posts like 40 times per day here, much of it repetitive. You and I and most of regulars are far less repetitive, but sure, we do that at a lower volume…much, much lower, which is my point.
Wow, 40 times a day? That’s a lot! Like, maybe you over-counted by about 37.
Lots of people say things here repeatedly. It’s their own particular axe they like to grind.
If you don’t like seeing Tiger’s posts ….
SKIP … ON … DOWN.
Bring some onboard and then we’ll see.
So Michaal Chabon is not a professional?
SERIOUSLY ?????
Not in the screenwriting/filmmaking capacity, at least as demonstrated to date, so far as I know. But even the ones onboard with actual film/tv track records haven’t offered up the level of craftsmanship I would associate with quality product in this day and age. The results to date have been staggeringly unimpressive, in storytelling and (for me at least) in the technical areas as well.
As professionals they should be able to give the show its own direction and service their own putative star (Burnham). The first season of TOS gave us not only the whole Star Trek concept, but such story/character elements as Romulans, The Guardian, The Gorn, Khan, the First Federation and Balok, Trelane (Q), the Horta, The Klingons, Gary Mitchell, The Organians, Ruk, Harry Mudd (also reused), by inclusion Pike and many, many others. Discovery spent an entire arc revisiting the Mirror Universe concept from 1967. I don’t know what the viewer numbers are because they haven’t been released, but utilizing Pike and Spock does not suggest confidence in the new format.
While I agree that the first season of TOS was awesome and did more, it’s also true that the first season of TOS had 29 episodes. Of course they can get more done if they have twice the time. :-)
29 eps at around, what, 47min each? So about 22 hours. Now the new show COULD have delivered 15 full hours for its season, but they had at least one under 40 min. So you have the potential, going by lots of other current series, to do closer to 2/3 of what TOS did in a single season, if we’re just talking gross hours (and yeah, with DSC, there is pun intended with the ‘gross’ part.)
And the insanely overlong title credits that have padded Trek tv from TNG onward (1:50 for titles, are you crazy!) contribute to giving you less bang for your so-called hour too.
But… Given that a streaming show has absolutely ZERO time constraints, a 2 minute title sequence does not seem unreasonable. What IS unreasonable is the amazingly SHORT episodes. Almost as if they were trying their best to conform with the current 40-42 minute hour long over the air TV format. Wasn’t streaming supposed to set them free of constraints like that? It feels like all the streaming did was allow them to drop two F bombs.
“Give DIS 2-3 seasons for their own characters to develop before you shoe in others.”
STD is not about a bridge crew, it’s about Burnham and how perfect she is. By the end of the first season no one knows the name of each officer on the bridge because none of them were allowed any character development.
But it was also supposed to be about her redemption. Yet she seemed perfectly redeemed 4 episodes into the run of the show. So that was a huge failure as well. Or was it just a lie or misdirect on the part of the showrunners?
She started the war and helped ending it. I guess this could be some kind of redemption but she also brought the Empress from the Mirror Universe into the prime one for no reason other than “she looks like her dead captain”. The Federation’s reaction was really disturbing, they dropped the charges and gave a medal to Burnham and Mirror-Georgiou was never arrested.
Yeah, their reaction was odd. The thing I think they should have done was just extradite her back to the MU. Let her be THEIR problem. Instead, they channeled a little bit of STID and decided to let their new found “space Hitler” help them with their losing war.
Wow.. You said what i couldn’t articulate. You are so right. The old fans are stuck on hating Discovery and they are not going to change so concentrate on new fans and forget about them.
“The old fans are stuck on hating Discovery…”
Please stop making broad generalizations like this (and there is no need to interject ageism either). I am an “old fan,” and I love DSC, and I have a lot of ‘old fan” friends to like DSC as well.
When you say this, you are really meaning the 15 to 20 of you here on this site who have these negative opinions on DSC that you continually reinforce to each other, to give the illusion that this must be some massive “group think” opinion among all “older” Trek fans. But really, it’s just a few of you who continually post to each other on one web site, and through quantity of posts and reinforcing each other, you make grand conclusions that attempt to speak for many — that is a logical fallacy.
I’ve adored TOS since 1969 … and I’m also enjoying Discovery. Not as MUCH as TOS, but then, there’ve only been 15 episodes so far.
@ Corylea
Yep! That broad generalization of us older fans rejecting DSC is just DOA – it doesn’t pass the “bullshit filter”
To be honest, it’s not the old fans that dislike Discovery. I’m an older fan and have enjoyed every Trek they put out. Some more than others, some at the bottom of the list…much like the movies.
I feel it it the TNG fans that have this utter disdain for Discovery. These are the ones that keep bringing up the change in the Klingons and how the show should have been set post Nemesis.
Older TOS fans are more forgiving. We saw the Klingons change from TOS to TMP to TNG. We are more tolerant of change. That’s my 2 cents.
Captain, I agree — good points!
@Capt. — Excellent summation of the situation. Paramount likely shot themselves in the foot leaving Berman and Braga in charge of the franchise as long as they did, forcing others out like Ron Moore who went on to do amazing things with the experience he gained pushing Trek forward. I’m hard pressed to think of a franchise that ran as long as TNG did with the same cast, staff and crew, for as long as they did. Even DOCTOR WHO changed pretty dramatically over time. TOS fans had to face the changes fresh ideas and new technologies, and an aging cast brought over 20 years. TNG era fans really haven’t until the Kelvin films and now DISC. That’s a long time to go without anything to challenge their repetitive viewing of the old shows.
I just don’t think it’s that simple though. Its not ‘fresh ideas and technologies’ that’s the issue and more so just not lining up with canon in the era that they are telling.
Now I AGREE there are plenty of people who simply don’t care about being in the 23rd century again and many (like me) wasn’t fond of it being a prequel in general. Many of those will probably never get on board no matter WHAT you do.
BUT if you are going to do it, then do it RIGHT! Stop with the silly double speak. Don’t say it’s ‘canon’ although nothing looks like it belongs in that period. Then of course people excuse it as ‘visual changes is not the same as canon’. Uh OK? But then the producers tell everybody over and over again to just wait and the visual changes will fit canon later. Uh what? So if it’s all going to ‘fit’ later it means its not in canon now? So are people complaining correct? Or are they just trying to stop the backlash and making changes accordingly? Which is it?
DIS simply doesn’t look or feel like the era it supposedly takes place in. It feels like any generic sci fi show on today. You only know it’s before TOS because they told you.
Or simply call it a reboot and do what you want! I have said that many times. People just want CONSISTENCY. Especially Trek fans.
It’s not an issue with ‘TNG fans’ or any group of fans in particular, Discovery’s principle issue is one that arises from logic. Chronologically the Discovery sets are supposed to be pre-Kirk era but actually appear to be set after everything else due to how advanced all the tech appears to be. When the reasons for this are not to do with the story, timeline or setting you know you have got problems that people are going to notice.
That’s not to say Discovery is bad – some episodes were, some were actually really good – and the show has much promise, especially with Pike and crew getting thrown in to the mix.
Another problem the first series had was the acting, as some of it was awful, but then you’d get a scene where Ash Tyler was struggling with PTSD-like experiences and end up really feeling for the guy. But then the writers pretty much threw his character away and you’d be left wondering… why did they do that? It makes no sense. And that is how Discovery first series was for me. Or you’d get way too much time listening to the Klingons jabbering away in their language about nothing in particular and be wondering… will this scene end soon? So in places it was awful, illogical and didn’t feel like ‘proper’ Star Trek… yet in other places it was really good. Here’s hoping it finds it feet in season two :-)
@CuriousCadet, TOS fans had to face the changes fresh ideas and new technologies, and an aging cast brought over 20 years. TNG era fans really haven’t until the Kelvin films and now DISC. That’s a long time to go without anything to challenge their repetitive viewing of the old shows.
Seems to me you’ve hit the nail on the head here. Thanks for this. It’s the extremely long gap that makes for the attitude.
Because it has puzzled me for a long time, how the “objector” TNG fans dislike the new show as much as some “objector” TOS fans do. TNG was much more diplomatic in tone than TOS: Picard the negotiator and Kirk the sometime cowboy.
I’ve loved Trek since its inception. I remember thinking, “Oh Lawdy, here comes this new show with a wanna-be human [Data]. I hope I don’t hate it.” And I gave it a chance, through two seasons of some awful re-treads of TOS episodes, with some good fresh stuff, and then along came Ronald D. Moore in Season 3 with an episode that knocked my socks off.
I’d say, “give Discovery a chance” but there are apparently folks who have hardened their hearts against it, and that’s okay; if they pay to hate-watch it, it’s all the same to CBS.
I don’t think it falls down to TNG and TOS fans. I don’t see that pattern. I see both TOS and TNG people not liking STD. And many of their reasons overlap. A lot of people have complained about the look from both TNG folks to TOS folks. But I think the main issue with most is that the show overall just wasn’t much to talk about to begin with. Both TOS and TNG people were hoping to see something good and didn’t get it. All the production stuff like the Klingon look and the advanced ships didn’t help things, however.
Of course you don’t see it that way ml. But if you look at the biggest complainers, mostly TNG fans. Fans of TOS are more tolerant of changes. We have seen them through the years with everything. TNG fans had basically the same esthetics from TNG through to voyages. Enterprise was different, most TNG complained. Discovery is different, most TNG fans complain.
I expect to see something different AND good…and I got it.
Trekmovie should do a poll. I bet it would come to the same conclusion that I did. Just judging by the responses, I’m not far off the mark.
“Of course you don’t see it that way ml. But if you look at the biggest complainers, mostly TNG fans. Fans of TOS are more tolerant of changes.”
No offense, but this is grand generalization at its best! WHERE are you getting or assuming this? HOW do you KNOW who is a ‘TNG fan’ vs a ‘TOS fan’??? Unless someone just comes out and SAYS ‘I’m strictly a TNG fan that thinks Discovery sucks’ then you’re just generalizing.
For one thing, you responded to ML31 who we ALL know thinks Discovery SUCKS! Guess what else he thinks sucks? TNG lol. He’s made it clear on multiple occasions TOS is his favorite show and probably grew up with it. So that right there goes against your argument.
You have accused me in the past of not liking Discovery either. Guess what, I TOO grew up with TOS. I watched it in the 70s. I only watched TNG because like I’m guessing most here watched TOS. I considered TOS my favorite Star Trek show by a MILE until the early 90s when TNG finally won me over.
But TOS was obviously still the show that made me fall in love with Star Trek in the first place. And it’s probably still the show I seen the most of all of them because I was watching it for years in syndication before others appeared and its only 79 episodes vs the other 150+ episodes of the others.
BUT I will say this Ransom and say you probably ARE on to something in the sense many fans of the TNG era doesn’t have a lot of interest in this show. In fact, I’m guessing that’s the ENTIRE reason why the Picard show is coming!
I think CBS went out and did it’s research realizing while probably most Trek fans are willing to give Discovery a chance there is probably a LARGE segment of them that doesn’t want to watch the show because it’s either a prequel or in the TOS era. And because of that has no interest of watching AA. I think they figured out ignoring a very big part of that fanbase when Discovery weren’t delivering the numbers they wanted had to find a way to cater to them directly. The Picard show was the solution.
I’m going to say NONE of us probably thought we would ever see another TNG based show or film again. Maybe a REBOOT, but not a continuation of it. And my guess is neither did CBS. I knew we would get another 24th century show SOME DAY but I was thinking YEARS away lol. Certainly not after one season of Discovery.
But I think that’s why. This announcement was SUDDEN for a reason. I don’t think anyone ever planned to put a Picard show on until they realized a HUGE segment was not turning in to Discovery because they wanted something TNG again.
And here we are!
Now who is generalizing.
Uh, can you elaborate lol. Generalizing what??
And as I said, you may not be completely wrong about how a lot TNG era fans has maybe ignored Discovery because it’s not like that show and why we are getting the Picard show. BUT I think that’s a separate issue with people who ARE watching the show but still have issues with it. Are some of them TNG fans, of course. But there is no evidence or proof anywhere it’s one segment of people who have issue with the show because they grew up on TNG. You are talking to two people here in fact that were hardcore TOS fans first and yet STILL has problems with Discovery.
My issues with Discovery has zip to do with TNG and everything to do with Discovery. The biggest problem being it simply doesn’t feel connected enough to TOS or the era! Which I have said many, many times here. Correct? That’s me speaking AS a TOS fan.
“The biggest problem being it simply doesn’t feel connected enough to TOS or the era! ”
That’s a problem of mine as well. But to me the bigger problem was that the plotting and writing just were amazingly terrible. From the Klingon war we barely saw to the idiotic connections to the MU to the amazingly dull central character who makes Capt. Archer look layered. The entire thing was badly slapped together.
Yeah I agree the biggest issue is the writing of course. I just meant why some can’t accept it as a prequel to TOS because it looks nothing like TOS.
I have a different theory, Tiger. I think STD under performed so very badly that CBS decided they NEEDED something familiar to grab audiences with. So two things happened. They incorporated Pike and Spock into Discovery. And they went out to grab Stewart to entice him back to playing Picard. My theory is that it was not about the era or the fact that it’s a prequel. It’s that Discovery by itself was not enough of a hook to get people to subscribe. In this sense, I really think that had it been on a more traditional outlet (Even Showtime) the show would have a lot more viewers. Although since it was of low quality the show may have lost those viewers anyway…
Yes, I agree. And I also think people are just adverse to using AA as well (which of course what ALL of this is about). If it was on Netflix and Amazon the show would easily be given a chance by a lot more people even if still not super fond of it. But the fact is two things seem to be happening: AA is still not seen as streaming site people want on it’s own and that Discovery still isn’t strong enough to lure more people to AA.
And to be fair I don’t know if ANY one Trek show would bring in more subs because I really do think a lot of people just doesn’t want to pay for another streaming service if they are only interested in one show on it. Of course I’m the idiot who is still paying for it lol.
And no it may not be about the era itself BUT you would think they would just spin off something from Discovery for the next show if that was case. But then yeah if you want a Star Trek vet to appear then that era no longer works since the TOS cast who served that period are just too old. And there are tons for the 24th era around.
But I do have a feeling the era is part of the reason too because an article I read specifically stated they wanted to do a TNG type show again and why they approached Stewart.
“Fans of TOS are more tolerant of changes.”
Captain, seeing how much hate the reboot gets from tos purists who can’t accept changes, not even in an alternate reality, I have to strongly disagree with your assertion and find it out of touch with the reality. Tos fans are the issue as much, if not more, as the fans of the other series. The childish ‘I hope he dies he ruined my childhood!’ ott comments made over posts (twitter, Facebook etc) that wished JJ happy birthday recently were made by so called tos fans who preach about Roddenberry ‘vision’ and ideals without truly getting them themselves. Coincidentally, it usually is people who complain about tng not being real trek either. Their hatred for anything that isn’t tos is a default thing.
Exactly Jemini, it’s not so black and white others are making it out to be. The Kelvin films are actually a prime example of that. I mean look at the people who went ballistic over Khan in STID. Most were naturally the ones who knew him and fans of TOS and TWOK. They had EVERY right to be upset about it (as was I), but it also proves they aren’t just accepting of liberal changes either. Clearly the STID producers thought they would be OK with it and my guess is if they could go back in time now and change it they would.
And yes TNG itself proved that wasn’t the case as MANY TOS fans didn’t even consider it as real Trek for years, dismissing it entirely. There are still some TOS fans that only see TOS as the only ‘real’ Star Trek today in fact. I’m sure they are in the vast minority but it proves there is a lot of generalization and revisionist history happening here. TOS fans don’t seem anymore or less accepting of changes just like any Trek fan.
Captain, Tiger asked what I was going to. How do you know who is a fan of what? The reason I don’t see it is because I am not clairvoyant enough to make that determination. And for the record, I prefer TOS to TNG. And I found STD very lacking in both overall quality of writing and plotting as well as the extremely poor production design. Add to that I’ve always said that the bad PD could have been overlooked had they been better with the plotting and writing and the characters.
It’s easy when you actually read what people have been posting over the years. You can see what shows they prefer.
That gets you a handful at most. Hardly enough to make such a sweeping generalization. For example, I prefer TOS. Yet my opinion is that STD is not good. And I know I’m not the only one.
Well that is the basis of polls.
So you don’t like Discovery…when continue to watch and comment about it? Glutton for punishment? Self torture? Trolling? Shit disturbed?
That is a tired worn out comment mostly used by people who are uncomfortable hearing opinions that do not line up with their own. Here is the answer for the umpteenth time. It’s called being a fan. I don’t abandon my favorite ball club just because they are sucking at the moment. I hope they get better. But I’m not going to say how good they are when they are clearly terrible, either. I like Trek. It’s sucking at the moment. I will talk about it with other fans and continue to watch hoping it gets better. It’s what fans do.
ML31, Please tell me you are NOT one of those ball fans who stand up at games and yell at players you hate, “YOU SUCK!”
Maybe finding what’s good in the show and mentioning that along with your comments about bad writing, etc., would help folks like Ransom understand why you keep watching. Because I, too, am puzzled by this. When the Washington football team sucked in the ’70s and very early ’80s I just stopped watching, until they began to improve — and won the Superbowl! Without Theismann! Then again, there are those Red Sox fans who watched their team lose over and over and over until that recent, triumphant year.
Marja.
I have yet to yell at a player telling him he “sucks” or anything of that sort. I generally just facepalm at the latest blown lead or defensive miscue. The team being terrible is indeed a team effort. I continue to be amazed that some do not understand the concept of being a fan. One of the teams I follow is the worst team in the league this year. Yet all summer long I’ve tuned into the matches when I am home just to watch the latest tire fire. Hoping beyond reason they will magically get better. It’s what many fans do. Some are fine abandoning the team until they are good. I call that “bandwagoning” but there are many different kinds of fans. Trek is on a similar level. I will watch because I’m a fan and I do not abandon something I like just because those in control are not doing a good job at the moment. In most cases, they are trying their best to produce a good product. Even if they are failing. Like the current STD people.
I’d love that if TM did a poll!
And this is an excellent point about the homogeneity of Trek’s sets and designs and Starfleet ethos from TNG – VOY.
That could well be why there was so much dislike of ENT, I have no idea really, the show is pretty good. At first the sets [pre-TOS, yet still looking more advanced] raised my eyebrows, but I got over it.
I guess since I’ve been through the Trek culture shock a number of times and survived, still liking the show, I’m really flexible concerning my Trek :^) And I’m glad, because there’s that much more for me to love.
Marja, I am like you but with Hockey. I’m a huge Montreal Canadiens fan…used to watch every game when they were winning. The last few seasons, I didn’t watch many games. As they get better, I’ll start watching more. I love my team but I’m not going to watch them lose game after game. Just like TV shows… I’m not going to watch if I don’t like it. I was a fan of the CSI shows. I stopped watching CSI Miami after the second season because it was bad. I tuned into the first couple of episodes of CSI Cyber but didn’t continue. But I still was a fan of the franchise.
I watched the first season of Orville, found it excruciating to watch and hated the horrible acting and writing. I’m not going back for season 2.
This old Trekkie is loving DSC. Especially the retconned look of the Enterprise that is a more believable predecessor to the TMP refit, which is my favorite Star Trek ship of all time.
Now bring on “Hot Spock”, Captain Pike, and the new Klingons. I can’t wait to see them.
I will agree that the TMP-WOK-SFS Enterprise is the best version of the ship we ever got.
I am really curious of what the new Klingons will look like too! I just want hair lol. Give me hair and I’m fine mostly. That and speaking less Klingon.
I’m a tos fan too and I guess I qualify as ‘old’ though I wasn’t born in the 60s. My original point is about that side of the tos fandom that, quite honestly, had always hated anything that isn’t holy tos, lol – tng, the reboot.. discovery is no exception. If writers want to bring those fans on board they are hopeless, and the only risk they are taking is alienating the fans of their thing. Just like it happened with the reboot when it started to pander to its haters. Like with stid, they think bringing back iconic characters (see khan) is a good idea but it will backfire. In the end, messing up with Spock may alienate even the old fans that DO like discovery and its characters.
I would rather they’d left Spock alone, but we ARE getting a new Spock, whether we like it or not. So I’m trying to think positively. :-)
When I think about what Leonard Nimoy’s reaction was when Abrams wanted to reboot Star Trek, I realize that his response was to be thrilled that Spock wasn’t going to die with him. He put a lot of time and energy into playing Spock and also into guarding the character from being written badly. He didn’t always win the battles he fought on Spock’s behalf, but he did fight a lot of them, and he won enough of them to matter. He didn’t want all that energy to go down the drain; he wanted Spock to live on after him.
So, here’s to Leonard — he invested a lot of time, energy, and work in creating and maintaining Spock, and three years after Nimoy’s death, Spock is still a part of new Star Trek. I have to think that Leonard would be tickled. :-)
But Spock was written and played for and by Quinto very badly…
@Thomas W.
Whatever, YMMV. I loved him. It was more the scripts than the character people objected to, I think. The actor has the obligation to bring what is on the page alive in a character. Actors are not responsible for what is written, they just do the best they can with it. Once they become “big names” they can do things about the writing, but still pretty minor things, I think.
Corylea
that is the point, Nimoy left Spock in Quinto’s hands. He’s the guy he personally helped shape his Spock as the new official iteration of the character. .he’s the one he has passed the torch to. And then he died, and now discovery’s team decided to add another Spock just because they can and wasted no time using the character more than they already did. (and man, Sarek wasn’t dad of the year before this series but now he really is hypocritical scum towards Spock). This after promising they would never recast Spock.
Frankly, it isn’t just tos nostalgia here. My impression is that they want to be JJ trek so much TOO.
And it’s not unusual to see fans describe Spock as ‘hot’, and he certainly was called like that in previous versions by both Nimoy and Quinto… but the purpose of the character surely isn’t looking conventionally hot so you need to find a gorgeous guy to achieve that.
Quinto’s Spock is attractive too but where he was described as sexy/hot it was because of his charisma as Spock. It’s something subtle and hard to explain.
Here discovery’s cast seems to speak to fans telling to them ‘our Spock is hot too! Please watch!’ . I mean, the actor is a beautiful guy too so it’s kind of a given he’ll make a hot Spock too? But making it the whole point seems cheap.
Jemini,
Re: Nimoy’s imprimatur
I think, if you check, you’ll find that the 2009 release began filming in 2006 and that Quinto and Nimoy weren’t the only actors in it playing Spock. It’s been 12 years. Jacob Kogan is over 23yo now. Then there’s all the actors Nimoy personally cast as Spock in the first picture he directed. The field of “approved” candidates for the role is not nearly as singular as you imagine it to be.
While I am certainly on the side of preferring Spock not to appear in Discovery (but not against it either) I don’t have an issue with recasting Spock at all. This is just how the process works. No one owns these roles, eventually they are going to be recast. While it was nice Nimoy ‘approved’ Quinto, that’s all mostly PR stuff to get the fans to accept the new movies at the time. But the studio was going to get WHOEVER they thought fit the role, regardless of what Nimoy personally thought. I don’t think Shatner had any decision of choosing Pine to play his role. I mean I’m sure he likes him but it wasn’t going to be the deciding factor he got the job one way or the other. Nimoy just happened to be in the movie so it was different. But if he wasn’t though?
The reality is Star Trek is not going anywhere. So there will be quite a few actors replaying this role as I imagine someday there will be a rebooted TOS show and they can even recast as soon as a few years from now if the next Kelvin movies don’t work out and decide to make more films but with a different TOS cast.
And as you said, plenty of actors have played Spock anyway. No one should take these decisions so personally. It’s all a business at the end of the day and iconic characters will always get recasted again and again.
I was against their putting Spock in DSC, but the showrunners have decided to do so. I can’t make them stop, so I’m trying to think positively.
One of the things I love about TOS Spock is that he’s totally gorgeous without being conventionally handsome. Every person who found Spock attractive felt as if they were discovering some sort of secret, even though it was a “secret” shared by millions. :-) I’m sad that they’ve cast a conventionally attractive guy to play Spock, because Spock is supposed to be hot kind of in spite of himself, not hot in an in-your-face sort of way.
I’m disturbed, though, that they keep talking about how “hot” Spock is. Spock is supposed to be extremely intelligent, wonderfully ethical, emotionally controlled, devoted to science, and devoted to his captains. His being hot in TOS was more or less an accident. :-)
What I want them to tell me is that the actor can keep a Vulcan demeanor while still showing us what’s going on under the surface. Leonard Nimoy was able to show us many emotions but in a very subtle fashion, so he didn’t seem wooden or robotic but did seem cool and controlled. I think about his face in “The Deadly Years” after Kirk says that he never wants to look at Spock again, and you can tell that Spock’s heart is breaking, and yet it’s not overdone; it’s very low-key. So few of the people who’ve played Vulcans could do that — most of them were simply robotic, while some of them were too emotional. That ability to suggest an emotion without playing it too clearly is what we need in an actor who’s playing Spock, not some level of “hotness.”
And here I thought “Hot Spockets” was just a cheezy joke about a food product.
There were a lot of “conventionally handsome” actors on TV in the 1960s. Nimoy was a surprise because he was not “conventionally handsome.” He also gave rise to less homogeneous casting in television, because the production staff was amazed at how much fan mail Nimoy got. And thus TV began to see “Hot Guys” who were a little different, a little off-beat, and way sexy.
Quinto is not what I’d call “conventionally handsome” by any means, I think the reason he was cast was partly because of his resemblance to Nimoy but also his intensity as an actor.
Marja, agreed. Quinto is hot and handsome but, fitting with Spock, he isn’t conventionally beautiful like the Chrises are considered for example. He’s dark and mysterious. You gotta watch him for a while before you realize how handsome he is (he does still fit in Hollywood’s beauty standards more than guys like, idk, Adam Driver ).
The funny contrast is with Kirk who is conventionally pretty and a ladies man, while Spock is the nerdy man with charisma and he kind of steals the show. And he gets the girl, lol
In the reboot, they subverted the hero’s sidekick and ‘introvert nerdy men are ugly, awkward and unpopular’ tropes all the more by acknowledging an aspect that was firstly touched on with Nimoy himself. It is a testament of how much time changes some things and, in a way, makes fictional characters less one dimensional. In real life, nerdy guys can be attractive and work in relationships so it is nice when fiction acknowledges that and stops to make some things mutually exclusive.
To be honest, these ‘hot spock’ comments about discovery come across as, once again, them trying to imitate the most recent trek iteration that is JJ’s movies thus telling us that their Spock is hot TOO. Because Quinto’s Spock was called hot and sexy when the first movie came out, but for the reasons mentioned above, not because it’s the character’s purpose. It’s unknown if they get it though.
I, too, think they should have just ignored Spock, Pike and the Enterprise. I think STD would have been better off for it. But they didn’t. Producers felt the show was never going to bring in the subscribers as is. So we get the Enterprise, Pike and Spock. Don’t be surprised to see Kirk eventually too.
@Jemini
OK, now that you’ve explained this better, I do know some fans like that, but I don’t think they are close to a majority of TOS fans. Thanks for the clarification.
BorgKlingon
No, they aren’t the majority.. but they pretend to be because they are the most vocal online. The writers may make the mistake of thinking they represent the trek fans as a whole.
Good point!
And right along with you, I sure hope the DSC writers don’t make that mistake! I imagine they do see a lot of social media, and if those vocal critics are vociferous, you’re right, that could happen.
I’m an old fan…a fan of Star Trek when that’s all there was…the series that built a phenomenon. I think Discovery is an abysmal mess in dire need of quality writing and story-telling. It’s not just bad Star Trek, it’s badly constructed serialized television with 0 positive buzz in the sci-fi community (outside of CBS and people involved with the show) and a mass audience of casual tv watchers who couldn’t care less about it…assuming they even know it exists. Can’t say gimmicky tricks like adding Spock and Pike are going to help…but the suits are desperate…sure can’t hurt.
I’m curious Jonboc will you even give second season a chance? And I’m NOT trying to start a fight but I’m guessing you could’ve said this about other Trek shows in the past in their first seasons as well?
But I do agree with you this show has zero buzz, at least in America. There are people who I know never even heard of it and I live in L.A. So I guess I can understand why they are adding Pike and Spock but it seems like they can find more original ways to get the show some attention.
Sorry Tiger, not ignoring you…wrote a long post but it went to moderation or the Twilight Zone. I’ll try and answer you again when I have a bit more time.
LOL that’s OK, I understand. And yes that has happened to me here plenty of times as well. I’m now always super alert about what words I use here to make sure that doesn’t happen. But don’t feel like you need to type it all out again if it never shows up.
” with 0 positive buzz in the sci-fi community (outside of CBS and people involved with the show) and a mass audience of casual tv watchers who couldn’t care less about it”
Which of course explains how the vast Huge Hall H at Comicon was nearly filled up for the DSC panel…WHOOPS! LOL (And incidentally. I understand the size of the audience for the DSC Panel was about 8 times the size of the audience for The Orville panel.)
Furthermore, in it’s February 16th article, IGN wrote:
“The debut season of Star Trek: Discovery has wrapped up, and despite the stellar line-up of shows that have aired alongside it, CBS’ Discovery is the most talked about TV show online last month, beating out the likes of The Walking Dead, Altered Carbon, and Stranger Things.” Again, WHOOPS! LOL
I get you don’t like the show, fine, but you are just pulling stuff out of your ass when you say the show has no buzz. That is just factually wrong and moronic to say that, no offense intended.
Work-wise, I still haven’t even met anybody else who has seen DSC (and I mean both my day job and the people I interview about films and TV.) My wife was mildly interested, enough to watch the whole thing during a free offer, and I managed to watch nearly all of it with her, but we both feel it had zero rewatchability.
Whereas with THE ORVILLE (which she initially hated — I just disliked the first ep intensely, or maybe the first two), we’ve rewatched most episodes once (mainly for the Bortus moments and the downer endings, to show how seemingly incongruous aspects can somehow be compelling, even amid all that anachronistic dialog that SHOULD have me bitching and rolling my eyes.)
Neither of them hold a candle to FIREFLY or TOS or DS9, but at least ORVILLE has some kind of charm, whereas DSC seems to ooze an arid kind of anti-charm.
Yeah I said this before but I don’t know a single person who has watched DIS yet. And that includes people who grew up watching all the spins off like TNG, VOY, etc. No one either seem too interested in the show in itself or don’t want to pay for AA. You can now binge all the episodes with the free week offer and no one STILL doesn’t have a lot of interest. It’s weird.
But I also don’t know anyone watching The Orville either but honestly I never even talk about that show. My one good friend who is a big TOS and TNG fan and no interest to watch DIS doesn’t want to watch Orville either. He thought the show would be ‘making fun’ of Star Trek. This is when the show just came on and he didn’t know much about it. I don’t know if he ever tried it because I haven’t talked to him but I think he would really like it now.
As for DIS, I have FINALLY started rewatching some DIS episodes (about four episodes) last few weeks and I can honestly say I have liked them more than when I first viewed them. BUT I only seen the more standalone stories. I have no interest to rewatch the heavy Klingon ones at all. Sadly those episodes doesn’t interest me to rewatch at all. I’m hoping they cut waaay down on Klingons next season and will probably like it a lot more.
OK, but you and the other poster here are essentially giving “day in the life” anecdotal examples of people you know. I pointed out a filled Comicon hall and a news article which is based on web traffic buzz for DSC — those are both actual data points that highlight the buzz for this show in contrast to the two of you saying. “trust me, no ones watching it,” which are obviously questionably subjective statements.
A full room at a Comic-Con is hardly indicative of positive buzz…merely curiosity by genre fans who flock into any panel they can get into.
I was gonna say, Comic-Con is not a general audience, more like polling republican diehards to see what percentage of citizens are in favor of impeachment and then declaring that to be a good valid nationwide figure.
At least that and the internet buzz piece I mentioned are quantifiable, in contrast to your “trust me, people at work and my wife don’t watch it and therefore it has no buzz” silly proclamation.
Get back to me when you have something more concrete.
It’s a general audience of many fandoms. Fandom is more widely accepted now than just 10 years ago. Many more shows are being produced with fannish desires in mind, so many, many shows were represented at ComicCon.
That Trek DSC got a big, filled hall for its event at ComicCon signifies.
The comicon hall attendance and the internet buzz piece I mentioned sure as hell sound more convincing then your, “trust me, it has no buzz because I declare it must be so” completely subjective nonsense, no offense.
I wouldn’t necessarily say that, Jonboc. I was at DragonCon this last weekend [80,000 attendees] and the Trek actors panels were on at the same time as LOTS of other interesting panels, talks, costume shows and so on. I was there because I WANTED to be. I could easily have chosen other events to attend. I chose Discovery.
Just sayin’. ComicCon is a REALLY HUGE event. Sounds to me like Hall H is a pretty big deal.
When I was a kid in ’88, I hated that TNG barely ever mentioned TOS. Now that I’m older I admire how courageous TNG was for not relying on TOS as a crutch. I wish we could see that spirit again.
I like this new cast a lot, but the last several years of tribute-Trek have made me think we might have had enough winking nods to green Orion women. I miss when Captain Pike was just the guy you saw if you put on “The Menagerie.”
(In contrast, I don’t miss the time that the 1701-D dug up the mission files on Captain Kirk’s encounter with the virus from “Naked Time.” My favorite TNG was brave enough to go to new worlds and not back to Psi 2000.)
I’m hopeful these characters get some fresh new things to do. Too much encroachment of canon and they could end up as the 2010s equivalent of the ENT guys being upstaged on their last voyage by Riker and Troi.
LOL I think this was the plan all along. I am really looking forward to this storyline and this season.
They could get this reluctant old fan on board by simply telling good, intelligent stories and not redesigning stuff for the sake of it. I don’t need TOS characters recycled. Doesn’t remotely appeal to me. Only the most shallow older fan is placated by that sort of gimmick in my opinion.
Agreed!
Just tell better stories! Adding Spock and Pike doesn’t automatically do that. And as I said in the past, I don’t mind them showing up! I expected that. But do Pike need to be in EVERY damn episode next season??? You’re telling the world you don’t think your own original characters can carry their own show after one season and that’s a shame.
@ Tiger2: They killed off their captain during season 1 so a new captain was always in the cards for season 2. That captain happens to be Pike. Contrary to Lorca, Pike will probably survive the season, but he will still leave Discovery by the end of it. At that point, they may bring in another captain. That’s how the show was set up from the beginning.
But Pike ALREADY has a ship lol. That’s the problem. We already know it’s just to get him on the show since he’s obviously not leaving the Enterprise for good. It feels very forced for that reason alone. Don’t get me wrong I don’t mind having Pike there and was fine with him taking over when I thought it was going to just be a cool 2 parter adventure for the premiere. Do your nostalgia thing for the fans and then let the DIS crew do it’s own thing. Once I realized it was more than that is when I felt a little more cynical about it. But I’m still excited to see what they do with it at least. Pike looks like he will be fun to have around.
I just wish they created a new Captain and develop him in the long run. Pike can still be there, even all season if they must, but he doesn’t need to be the Captain.
But if Discovery is just going to make the Captain someone new character every season then I guess that’s OK. I really hope they don’t go that direction though and at least find a permanent one in season 3 or somewhere in season 2.
Tiger2,
Re: Pike ALREADY has a ship
And he did in Kurtzman’s movies too, but he already set the precedent there of it being a ship that Pike doesn’t spend a lot of actual time personally being on it.
Yeah but we did see him in charge of the Enterprise in the first film. He just got captured by Nero. The second film they killed him before he even could take back the Enterprise.
But I get your point, we haven’t exactly seen Pike in the chair all that much lol.
So you are saying, Diginon, that the plan for STD was to have a revolving door for a captain every 10-12 episodes? That’s idiotic. So I guess it makes sense from the bunch that created the show. I would hope that Kurtzman would see the folly of such a thing and just TRY to focus the show back on Burnham, if that is even still remotely possible. It may no longer be after the S1 screw up.
I can see the point of those complaining that the emergence of this young Spock was more a business decision. And yet, perhaps we should wait and see what they do with the character? Discovery has made some new staff hires, we really don’t know what’s in store, aside from that brief trailer.
Same here, El Chup. Same here.
Blah, blah, blah. The show is great. The connection to cannon is great. Chill.
I agree, Jemini but we also have to accept that it’s a business and they are trying to bring in subscribers. What they did didn’t work. So they are going the easy route of bringing in the familiar. Which can be fun but if it still is of low quality, people will continue to tune out like they did with S1 of STD. It is also the reason we are getting a Picard show. They don’t want to take a risk of something new. Best we can hope for is the familiar stuff is good and someone MIGHT decide later to try something new and different.
I don’t really buy this idea that a new actor needs to make an established character their own. Shouldn’t a skilled actor be able to capture the gist of the character’s personality and deliver it consistently in a new setting, and avoid looking unnatural while doing it? And I’m not talking identical, in this case there are like 3 years of plausible character evolution. Making a character one’s own sounds to me like an excuse for not being confident to be able to do that. But what do I know :)
I agree. See: Karl Urban (Bones in TOS is my favorite character, btw). Urban did a great job of honoring and making his own.
This is a troubled show if they’re already dragging TOS main characters in. This is not a show that can stand on its own–too many cooks spoiling the broth, perhaps. It can be argued they did the same when they pulled O’Brian and Worf over to DS9, but it wasn’t out of desperation and didn’t radically alter the premise of the show. Discovery is skirting a lee shore–hopefully someone can grab the rudder before it runs aground.
I’m REALLY hoping they do it in the second season, get all the TOS stuff out of their system and focus on DISCOVERY as a show. I don’t know if the show is in trouble or not. I think it’s personally doing OK if not great. I think the REAL problem is just AA itself and that while Discovery at least pulled in other subscribers none of the other shows has and so now the show has to pull the weight of the site. If ‘One Dollar’ for example was getting a lot of buzz and pulling in it’s share maybe they wouldn’t feel they have to add Spock next season or create a Picard show.
But I have a feeling they know the only way the site will get any buzz is through Star Trek and so they are going to beef it up. So I don’t think Discovery is in trouble SO MUCH as AA is not attracting the viewers they wanted, even if DIS is still not pulling in what they want. But they probably feel it can and why they are doing this for all the people still on the fence about the show.
But yes I agree with others it’s sad they even have to go this route to get more attention for the show.
It may have been their plan all along to get several Trek shows onto CBSAA.
I wish they’d gone the Netflix route in the US as well. I’d have been happy to pay a little more for Netflix to see it. I hope, if CBSAA turns out not to succeed, that they will sell televised Trek to Netflix.
@Marja — it seems like a good idea for the consumer now, to have one subscription fee to get everything. Unfortunately, Netflix is becoming something of a monopoly and their programming is starting to suffer by their blanket their offerings with an endless, and unsustainable supply of original programming which customers mindlessly binge watch. Their business model, paying 2-3 times the industry rates to hire talent and executives from other studios is doing irreparable harm to the industry when it eventually implodes. This won’t be good for the consumer in the end. It’ll be worse than the cable industry, because not only will they be in charge of the delivery method, but also all of the programming on it.
I agree. The show is definitely troubled. The production issues before shooting the first season sorta torpedoed the show it seems. Then the Berg crew did nothing to right the ship. So they go and add Spock and Pike in a desperate attempt to save it. It is pretty obvious I think that whatever subscribers CBSAA got when Trek started jettisoned the service when the show ended. In much larger numbers than CBS anticipated. Hence, adding Pike and announcing the Picard show. CBS obviously cannot afford to give the show time to straighten itself out. They need subscribers NOW. So this is the result. Mining TOS and bringing back old TNG characters. Does anyone think there is any creativity out there still?
I am one of those who grudgingly subscribed to A-A while the show was airing (streaming), but dropped it with a certain relish when the season was over. I vaguely recall Seth MacFarlane pitching ideas that we ignored–hence The Orville. If they could have gotten him and some of the same talent writing Black Mirror, we could have had a series to compete with the best of TNG or DS9. Instead they went with the movie crowd, choosing to cultivate a younger audience instead of an intellectual one–Trek’s historical demographic–hoping the earlier sort of fan would still tag along out of loyalty and nostalgia. It’s a model that may work, but not well, and frankly awful to behold.
Well put, Praetor. And same here, CBSAA only lasted for me for as long as it took to binge season one and drop it.
I agree to a point. Fun fact… TOS got low overall ratings but in the 15-25 group it did VERY well. In those days, however, such demographics were taken but that age group was not coveted by advertisers. Had the show been made 15 years later it probably would have lasted longer as advertiser attitudes changed over the years.
Given the quality of the third season, would we want a fourth? Oh, of course we would. And that’s what CBS is counting on. Bad pizza is still pizza. Bad sex is still sex. Bad Trek is still Trek.
Yeah, the 3rd season did have the worst ratio of good to bad episodes. But I would argue that it was still a better ratio of good to bad than TNG got in ANY season. And yes, even bad pizza is good. Point taken.
Yes, it is pretty funny they are basically trying to create as much nostalgia as possible now by adding a ton of TOS characters and then bringing in the big guns by making a continuation of TNG. There will be SIX TOS based characters on DIS in just two seasons. And that’s what we know of. It may work but it’s still not the same as the original actors playing those characters, but we’ll see.
But I have NO doubt the Picard show will easily bring in more subscribers than Discovery because they will be using the original actors and people want the 24th century again. That said, it still may not be enough.
As for if there is still creativity, these are the same guys that has a Khan show on the table, so no lol. But maybe they will surprise us and the show after Picard will be something truly original and no one is related to anyone.
Tiger, I sure as hell hope they leave Khan alone. UGH. Bad enough they used him in STID.
Yeah, that is honestly the WORST idea these people could have. I give Kurtzman and company more leeway than others here but if that idea comes to fruition, especially after the STID debacle, it’s only going to convince others they don’t have one real creative bone in their body and setting the franchise back in the saddest way possible.
It will be like current Star Wars, all nostalgia, nothing else.
Praetor, “O’Brian” and “lee shore” … might you be a fan of O’Brian’s Aubrey-Maturin series of books?
Colm Meaney played Chief O’Brien :^) … but I’m glad to see another O’Brian fan here.
Marja, how quick you are! “O’Brian” was a typo, and I’m a sailor, so “lee” is a term I’ve oft had occasion to use, but yes, emphatically, I love the Aubrey-Maturin novels. They’re all I would take to my desert isle exile. Well, for pleasure reading at any rate. After seeing Survivor, I wouldn’t mind a DIY emergency dentistry manual…
I have no problem with Pike being reinvented. He was in a total of one hour of television, and a few AU movies. We don’t really know him well in the first place.
I agree. Prime Spock on the other hand….
Completely agree. The guy was in one episode of an unaired pilot from 50 years ago lol. Yes do something different with him. We know zip about him outside a few lines of dialogue.
Pike is not really the problem. As has been said, his character has grown to be huge but he got more time in two KU movies than he ever got in TOS. The problem is STD felt the need to go to that character to begin with.
It amazing how in the off season Discovery has totally lost all interest for me. That is sad as I am one of the most die hard Trekkies you could ever meet.
Me too to a certain degree. It’s really amazing. Maybe this has something to do with the short length of the season? I remember watching the seasons of Enterprise for half an year each time and then waiting desperately for the conclusion of the cliffhanger an half year later. Now that first season was wrapped up in 4.5 months including a break of 2 months which makes only 2.5 months of watching. And then we have to wait over a year for the next episode, which is the conclusion of an episode which didn’t not really end on a cliffhanger.
I love many things about Star Trek, from the science fiction to the morality plays to the optimistic future painted by the Federation. But the MOST important for me has always been the characters. If I love a character or find them intriguing, then I’m eager for more. If the characters are meh, then I don’t really care much.
There was no one on Enterprise that I really liked or cared about, so I stopped watching after a season and a half. On Discovery, I’m not as intrigued by Michael Burnham as I’d hoped to be, but I love Saru and am eager to find out more about what Kelpians are like and how and why Saru became a Starfleet officer. I like Tilly, too, and Stamets is interesting, but the reason why I’ll be tuning in again when Discovery resumes is for Saru.
I’m wondering if we are going to wait years to get the Burnham payoff … or rather, that folks sticking with the show will wait that long (like waiting till DS9 to see an interesting Ferengi.) To me, she has practically been Troi-like in her inability to engage or convince, a total reverse from TWD, which makes me think it is not just the casting or the writing, but a superfailed alchemy of these key elements.
Only a few guest players on VOYAGER ever interested me, and nobody except Shran did it for me on ENT. Characters are key, and why TOS and DS9 are ‘the ones’ for me, even now.
Kmart, it very much looked like the Burnham payoff came by the 4th episode. At that point she was pretty widely accepted by everyone. At least as far as being the pariah who was solely to blame for starting a war is concerned. Was there supposed to be a different kind of payoff with her? That was all the producers ever said about her. That her journey was to earn her place back. Well, that box was checked very early on. Now what?
I generally agree. I think it was a mistake making Burham pseudo Vulcan. With respect to Sonequa I don’t she has the ability the past Vulcan actors have had, especially Nimoy, to portray humanity through the cool exterior. I think her character would’ve worked better without the vulcan element. But right now I just find Burnham bland, stiff and boring. In contrast, Saru has displayed a lot more depth, and not just because he is an unknown race, but because he has a bit of an arc as being unsure of himself. I am far more interested in his development.
I agree, El Chup; I think it was a mistake making Burnham quasi-Vulcan. I haven’t seen Sonequa Martin-Green in anything else, but those who have tell me that she’s an engaging and likable actress. Sadly, the role she’s been given in DSC doesn’t seem to play to her strengths, and I’m not finding Burnham all that likable.
We should have been greatly moved watching Burnham interact with Mirror Georgiou … but I wasn’t. I don’t know if that was the writing or the actress, but it wasn’t the big, emotional moment it should have been.
Leonard Nimoy must have been a freaking GENIUS, because no one can play a Vulcan the way he could.
I notice that the actors who are mostly normal-looking in real life and who mostly act under latex because they don’t have Hollywood-style looks — Doug Jones and Mary Chieffo — can act their SOCKS off. Pretty people are nice to look at and all, but I’d much rather the showrunners hired the best actors. In 1966, Leonard Nimoy was considered to be not nearly handsome enough to play a leading man … and women swooned over Spock, anyway. Robert Picardo was a balding middle-aged man, nowhere near as pretty as Robert Beltran, but The Doctor was way more popular than Chakotay, because Picardo can ACT.
Saru is interesting partly because the writers have given him an interesting arc, but also partly because Doug Jones is Just That Good. Jones is the Nimoy of the DSC cast. When will the showrunners stop casting people for their looks and start casting the strongest actors? It makes SUCH a difference!
Agreed. In fact I made a post on here today about Mary Wiseman and how she was a bit frumpy, chubby and average looking and for that reason her casting was more inspired. Turns out that Tilly is a far more engaging character than the “pretty” characters, and I think that’s because she was obviously cast on the base of her ability not looks.
I actually LOVE Wiseman’s looks — I like women with curves way better than skinny women — but I take your point. Funny that we were making the same point in different posts at roughly the same time! :-)
Yeah I don’t love Tilly like the others but that WAS inspired casting for sure. I think the character is great, the comedy sometimes feels a little forced, but I love that we have a woman character that doesn’t have to look like Troi or 7 of 9 and can just be a regular person on top of it.
Tilly is one of the few ‘every man’ characters in Star Trek. Trip felt that way to me on Enterprise as well and why I love that character too.
“the comedy sometimes feels a little forced, ”
There was comedy somewhere?
What’s sad is they ONLY made Burnham a pseudo Vulcan so they had a reason to drag in the Spock family. It’s pretty obvious because they have done NOTHING with her Vulcan heritage. We have seen 15 episodes an d the only time you even remember she was raised on Vulcan literally her entire life is when Sarek shows up for a chat.
Yep. I actually thought a human raised by Vulcans (no reason it had to be Sarek except fan service) could be interesting. Yet the show did NOTHING with it. Total missed opportunity.
That was one of my biggest disappointments with Burnham. I thought we were going to see more conflict with her Vulcan side. I thought they were going for a modern day analogy of how being raised in a different culture had to learn to adjust once they were back in their own culture. Like a black kid raised by a white family or an Asian person raised in America and decided to move back their country of origin.
They even did that a bit with both Worf and B’Elanna. B’Elnna rejected her Klingon heritage because she wanted to feel more human while Worf desperately tried to hang on to his Klingon roots even though humans raised him. It was a nice flip of the coin.
I HONESTLY thought that’s what they were going for in her case too. Instead it was never even raised as an issue. It’s pretty obvious now it was just to get the Spock family a reason for being there but they could’ve done a lot more with it.
Yes, Tiger. That. I also think that a fully Vulcan family would have made the situation more interesting, too. Amanda being there would have likely been of great help to little Michael in helping her adjust.
I have thought the Spock-Burnham connection was a mistake from the first I heard it. It totally felt like they did just to link her to TOS and no other reason. There really was no reason (apart from one episode, ironically the best episode) in the first season she needed that Sarek-Spock connection. However, they did it and in S2 they are milking it for all they can. Why? Because STD was not working on it’s own. So perhaps that connection was their safety net?
Wow we agree again Corylea lol!
Enterprise was the first show I stopped watching completely after the first season. It didn’t do anything for me, the first Trek show that happened to me. Now LATER I rewatched it and now I love it. But it took a loooooong time to get there lol.
Discovery I do like a little more for sure. And until the Picard show shows up, this is it. I DON’T want Discovery to be another Enterprise and why I’m sticking with it even if I still don’t love it. But the potential is there. It’s early, I GET that and why even with my issues with it I suspect it will improve like every Trek show before it. The danger is this is the first Trek show most people have to pay for and if it’s not grabbing them from the beginning they can just stop caring. That is a GREAT danger no Trek show has had to face before. So Discovery probably doesn’t have 3-4 seasons to win over fans like TNG and DS9 did. So I hope it improves a lot next season.
But even if it doesn’t, I’m sticking with it! At least until Picard lol.
The good news is that it’s on Netflix in most of the world, so outside of the US and Canada, people can see it as part of a service they already subscribe to for other reasons. I’m hoping that will carry Discovery for long enough to find its feet.
I live outside the US and Canada, and I didn’t watch Discovery because I already had Netflix. I got Netflix to watch Discovery.
No doubt there are some like yourself out there, Diginon. But I would wager they are in the extreme minority.
The fact that it is essentially a pay show is indeed a handicap for it. I agree that most will not give it another chance due to the subscribing nature of it. It really did need to be good right off the bat. That being said, I still think the Star Trek brand and that CBS is trying hard to get in the streaming market will mean it will be given more chances that your usual streaming show. Most come with 2 short seasons automatically. Trek will undoubtedly get at least one more.
I’m with you there, too. That was why I found it so difficult to latch onto TNG. The characters were just not interesting. Only Stewart’s charisma (and the fact that it was new Trek) kept me watching from week to week. Discovery suffers from that. The characters just aren’t interesting. The main one is dull. The producers figuratively castrated the most interesting character when they revealed he was just a boring evil twin. That pretty much leaves Saru who was the only character who got better as the show moved forward. And here is the sad part about STD… They could literally replace every character with a new one and a different actor and the show would not skip a beat.
After the generally low quality of the show in the first place, I think the short season plays a huge role in that. There is a great length of time between seasons. I would forget what happened at the end of previous seasons of The Americans or Hell on Wheels. (And both of them were far better than STD) THAT is how long the break was! Previously, we would wait 3-3 1/2 months before the next season resumed. That was how long we waited to see the result of Riker saying, “Fire.” Now it can be more than a year. IMHO that is asking a great deal from the audience.
I agree, ML31, the short seasons and the long wait are a detriment.
Great show with artistic integrity, a break of fresh air in a seriously stale room.
I am not going to San Diego anytime soon and I have not gone to STLV but I do live in Toronto so I was happy to check out FanExpo Canada which incidentally has become a massive show. In addition to the two Disco panels, the Shatman was there and there was also a Klingon panel later in the day that I missed. During the cast panel, Wiseman was asked what character she would like to work with from other Trek series and she immediately said she would love to interact with Jean Luc Picard – which of course brought down the house and led to much teasing from her cast mates. Wiseman has a knack for appealing to the audience and she comes across as a humble actor who really appreciates the opportunity she has. Easily one of my favorites from the Disco cast.
I like Wiseman’s casting because there is an everyday quality to her. She’s not a supermodel type. She’s not the most active in a Hollywood sense. She’s a bit frumpy and a bit overweight. She’s like a regular, run of the mill person rather than the super sexy Hollywood idols we’re constantly seeing.
She also is a product of Juilliard and the New York stage, so it is not like she just fell off the turnip truck.
Frumpy and overweight? Wow. I bet she’s MAYBE a size 10 or 12, possibly even as small as a size 8. That the norm in Hollywood is a near-skeletal size 0-4 signifies here. Mary is *closer* to the average American woman, but she is no size 14 [the American average].
She’s a very good actress in addition to being curvy and delightful with wonderful hair. I just love her, and I love Tilly.
Btw I am never too sure about the popularity of Discovery but if the turnout for the cast panel is any indication, I am sure CBS and Space Channel were pleased with the crowd, which was much bigger than last year. Those familiar with the Toronto Convention Centre, I went to lineup about 45 minutes before the start of the panel and the line up went all along the lower floor up to the main floor along the north side wall, back along the west end of the hall and half way down the south wall of the north hall. The moderator said there were about 3000 in the room – not bad for a panel that due to the late confirmation of both Disco panels – was not even given front page billing on the Fan Expo website.
Interesting. There’s so much consternation about Discovery turning off longtime Trek faithful, but it sounds like it is bringing in new fans.
I just checked, Sonequa Martin-Green has 660K Twitter followers. In December 2016, she had 520K Twitter followers. So, data!
“Hot Spock”
Ugh.
That’s not at all new. A big part of Spock’s popularity in TOS was because the female audience thought he was “hot.” There’s a whole subgenre of fanfic about that.
Yes, but that was an unintended occurrence. When casting Spock the sexiness of the actor should not ba a consideration, these comments combined with Peck’s quite notable pretty boy look suggest it has been.
Exactly!
One of the things I love about TOS Spock is that he’s totally gorgeous without being conventionally handsome. Every person who found Spock attractive felt as if they were discovering some sort of secret, even though it was a “secret” shared by millions. :-) I’m sad that they’ve cast a conventionally attractive guy to play Spock, because Spock is supposed to be hot kind of in spite of himself, not hot in an in-your-face sort of way.
I’m disturbed, though, that they keep talking about how “hot” Spock is. Spock is supposed to be extremely intelligent, wonderfully ethical, emotionally controlled, devoted to science, and devoted to his captains. His being hot in TOS was more or less an accident. :-)
What I want them to tell me is that the actor can keep a Vulcan demeanor while still showing us what’s going on under the surface. Leonard Nimoy was able to show us many emotions but in a very subtle fashion, so he didn’t seem wooden or robotic but did seem cool and controlled. I think about his face in “The Deadly Years” after Kirk says that he never wants to look at Spock again, and you can tell that Spock’s heart is breaking, and yet it’s not overdone; it’s very low-key. So few of the people who’ve played Vulcans could do that — most of them were simply robotic, while some of them were too emotional. That ability to suggest an emotion without playing it too clearly is what we need in an actor who’s playing Spock, not some level of “hotness.”
Well said. I don’t know what’s worse about the people behind Discovery…the fact that they don’t “get it”, or the fact that they honestly think they do.
“I don’t know what’s worse about the people behind Discovery…the fact that they don’t “get it”, or the fact that they honestly think they do.”
That is a very appropriate line. Mind if I use it?
By all means…feel free! 🖖
I’m hoping that the “hot Spock” stuff is from the actors — which is who we usually see on panels at conventions — and that the showrunners have a deeper understanding. It may be a forlorn hope, but it’s what I’ve got…
I think it’s also a wink and a nod to decades of fanfic about Spock. A “sub-genre,” LOL!
Looking forward to season 2, the characters are all introduced (mostly) and we can jump right into the story and further character development. I think Mount is pretty inspired casting as Pike, and love that this character we barely got to know in the original series is getting to be featured in a Trek show.
The anti-Discovery crowd have all made their points by now, and are just repeating themselves over and over again, wasting both their and my time. We get it.
I’d imagine that if the Internet existed in its current form back when all of the TNG onward shows premiered, the first seasons would not have been well received by some fans, and some portion of the fan-base would be unaccepting and negative as often as they could be.
All of those shows now have big followings. Yes, even Voyager and Enterprise, which seem to get bashed the most.
I LOVE this crew! So amped for season 2. And “Hot Spock?” Yes, please!