Some promising new details on the just-announced series Star Trek: Strange New Worlds are emerging.
Self-contained stories, but with character growth
Both Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Picard share a highly serialized format, however, the new series set on Captain Pike’s U.S.S. Enterprise promises a return to classic Trek storytelling. In the announcement video from yesterday, Strange New Worlds star Anson Mount (Captain Pike) described the new series as a “classic Star Trek show that deals with optimism and the future.” Speaking to Variety executive producer Akiva Goldsman provided more details on the approach the show is taking:
We’re going to try to harken back to some classical ‘Trek’ values, to be optimistic, and to be more episodic. Obviously, we will take advantage of the serialized nature of character and story building. But I think our plots will be more closed-ended than you’ve seen in either ‘Discovery’ or ‘Picard.’ I imagine it to be closer to the original series than even ‘DS9. We can really tell closed-ended stories. We can find ourselves in episodes that are tonally of a piece.”
However, when it comes to the characters, Goldsman said indicated Strange New Worlds will not be hitting the reset button every week, saying:
I think what we would want to do is keep the characters having moved through and recognizing the experiences they’ve had in previous episodes, but to be able to tell contained, episodic stories.
As for when the show will begin production, Goldsman tells Variety he had “no idea,” due to the shutdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Ethan Peck is ready for the challenge…and pon farr
Strange New Worlds reunites Anson Mount with Rebecca Romijn (Number One) and Ethan Peck (Spock). All three are reprising the roles they played during the second season of Star Trek: Discovery, as well as the second season of Star Trek: Short Treks. Peck also spoke to Variety, revealing that he has been campaigning for this spinoff since last year. He also talked about where the show will find Spock:
It’ll be a whole new challenge for me as an actor portraying Spock because you’ve had this transformation. I can’t wait to see what we explore.
When asked if Strange New Worlds might show us Spock going through the pon farr, the instinctive Vulcan ritual of mating that takes place every seven years, Peck seemed ready to take on that challenge as well, saying “I really have no idea, but I would think it’s a strong possibility.”
Ethan Peck as Spock in Star Trek: Short Treks “Q&A”
Strange New Worlds writer/producers introduce themselves to Star Trek world
Once CBS finally made it official yesterday morning, many of those involved with the show jumped on social media to share the announcement, with some adding short messages. This included the three new writer/producers announced as part of the creative team. Henry Alonso Myers (The Magicians, Covert Affairs, Chuck) joins Akiva Goldsman as executive producer for the show and shared a link to the announcement adding “A little news about what I’m working on next…” along with a Vulcan salute. New writer and co-executive producer Davy Perez (Supernatural, American Crime) simply added: “To seek out…” with his retweet of the announcement. Another new co-executive producer Akela Cooper (Luke Cage, American Horror Story, The 100) got a bit more personal, explaining what a “profound moment” it is for her to be joining Star Trek.
For those of u who know me, or have seen my mom running arnd SDCC as a Klingon, u know what Star Trek means to me. To be joining this series is a profound moment in my geek life & I am humbled&grateful to @AkivaGoldsman & @alonsomyers for bringing me along to Strange New Worlds
— Akela Cooper 😈 (@AkelaCooper) May 15, 2020
New and old designs coming to Strange New Worlds
Prop designer Mario Moreira, who works on Star Trek: Discovery, picked up on executive producer and co-creator Alex Kurtzman’s announcement on Twitter, adding some detail on how he was actively “prepping, and getting new and old prop designs together” for Strange New Worlds.
Finally can tell you what we’ve been working on while in isolation. Actively prepping, and getting new and old prop designs together for whatever strange new worlds we go to!! #StarTrekSNW https://t.co/lnN0z7yRFV
— Mario Moreira (@Mario_Moreira72) May 15, 2020
Keep up with all the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds news at TrekMovie.com.
Wasn’t Amok Time his first Ponn Farr?
Ethan is just waxing lyrical with the interviewer’s questions I imagine. I wouldn’t take it for granted that we’ll be seeing Spock’s Pon Farr – yet.
I doubt we will ever SEE Spock’s Pon Farr… just TALKIN’ about it… ;-)
I agree tbh.
Unlikely. Spock experienced it as a teen on Genesis, likely a second first time for him. It’s every 7 years. If S2 of discovery was 9 years before TOS and Amoke Time was a year later than that, it should be by season 2/3.
that’s cuz he didn’t have mind disciplines, tsfs won’t count.
So maybe with this new approach, where the next set of eps will not “forget” what happened in the previous ep(s) — so for Peck’s eventual “Ponn Farr gone wrong” ep, for the next ep after that, Kirk catches Spock reading the latest issue of Romulan Maxim…thus showing how Spock is moving on from the previous week’s Ponn Farr gone wrong ep. ;-)
Spock: “Captain, I was reading it for the articles.”
Kirk: “Very logical, Mr. Spock (smile on face)”
_____
Also, poor Spock if Amok Time was his first Ponn Farr…dude was 60 years old!
His first was at 14, then every 7 years thereafter. He was likely 35 years of age and experiencing his fourth… uh …experience.
This is based on what Savik revealed in ST3 TSFS. Spock was experiencing his first Ponn Far at the Vulcan age of 14. Now, you may say the Genesis planet was accelerating everything, but it was implied Vulcan’s lose their ‘virginity’ at 14.
I think Spock and T’Pring got betrothed as children by their parents when they were 7 years old. And then normally among Vulcans the marriage gets fulfilled when the man gets his first pon farr. As Spock moved away from Earth and T’Pring obviously didn’t like Spock much at all they didn’t keep much contact before and hardly spoke to each other since their betrothal. If Spock would have had his first pon farr earlier than during the TOS episode, all the nastiness which happened then should have happened earlier. At least he shouldn’t have been bethrothed to T’Pring anymore at that time. Also he just didn’t appear while his pon farr happened on the Enterprise like a guy who went though this before a few times. He was clearly unprepared and seemed particularly insecure about it all. I think on Genesis everything was just screwed up, so I wouldn’t say his aging process was normal there.
I must admit I got the impression that it was his first Ponn Farr. On one hand he’s 35 years old which admittedly seems a little old in human terms but then Vulcan’s do live to over 200 years of age. Also Spock was bonded to T’Pring and Vulcan’s appear to be monogamous so if it wasn’t his first rodeo it does beg the question why wasn’t his marriage ceremony completed then? Of course if it wasn’t explicitly stated onscreen then they would have some wiggle room So to speak. If they do eventually go down the Ponn Farr route I hope they at least place it at a point in the series that lines up with the 7 year mating cycle. If I was pitching a Ponn Farr story myself I’d have Pike divert the Enterprise back to Vulcan so that Spock can resolve a ‘personal matter’ only for some sort of emergency to get in the way of this. Introduce Leila Kalomi as the love interest that Spock ultimately has to resolve his primal urges with when the emerging crisis prevents the Enterprise travelling back to Vulcan and have Stonn step up to ‘help out’ T’Pring.
Maybe Spock and T’pring came together in a similar way that T’pol and Koss came together — it was an agreement between families. T’pol clearly had no interest in Koss, and T’pring obviously wasn’t that into Spock. He was, after all, in some ways an outsider, this weird half-breed, and maybe she didn’t want to “do it” with him. Maybe Spock was, like many of us geeky kids growing up, a virgin for a while, not being wanted even by the person he was betrothed to.
Yeah it was confirmed in ‘Amok Time’ that Spock and T’Pring’s marriage was arranged when they were kids.
Hey … have you ever thought that adding an “r” in the word “pon farr” would have funny results?
I wrote a comment about it, but obviously my joke went too Pon far. 😂
Hell yes! After the blunders of Disco and Picard I like what I’m reading here. Mount is perfect for the role and hopefully everyone else comes back to the Enterprise with him for this show. So long as they keep the language and politics out of this I’ll definitely watch it. . .even if All Access is stuck in 2012 with no 4k or surround sound. Already cancelled AA, but willing to come back for this. CBS, give us more trek like this!
CBS All Access will be rebranded as something new since the viacom merger.
If you want your politics out of STAR TREK, you’ve probably never seen – or understood – STAR TREK.
Exactly. Lots of “politics” in Voyage Home, Undiscovered Country, Space Seed, A Private Little War, Let That be your Last Battlefield and more. And that’s just TOS.
The recent reboots of Ghostbusters, Charlies Angels, Terminator and Men In Black have tanked at the box office for some reason. And Disney has placed a hold on Star Wars films
Are you trying to imply something here, because i’m missing it. What do those have to do with this discussion? Do those tackle deep political issues, and drove away fans? Or were they just really bad movies?
As for Star Wars, you can blame Rian Johnson. Force Awakens was a terrific film that set all sorts of records, and after RJ fouled it up with a divisive film, Abrams was force to try and salvage it, and that was a losing battle.
Just that reboots in general seem to be losing favor. Indeed many posters here seem to want nothing at all to do with any more reboots, instead wanting to move forward. So it is perplexing to me to see this level of enthusiasm for a Pike series. And with Viacom stock in deep trouble it is even a bit more remarkable that CBS would go back to the well.
I’m unaware of any official Trek reboot. The KU films were close but they went out of their way to tell everyone it was not a reboot but a different time line. Is that splitting hairs? Possibly. One could argue that with all the continuity errors in STD regardless of what they said it really is a reboot. But they DID go out of their way to say it wasn’t. So that’s mixed messaging.
Most of those were simply bad movies. And I have no idea what was ‘political’ about Ghostbusters other than it was all women in the roles.
The next Star Wars film is still scheduled for 2022, even with the Coronavirus issues.
Certainly bad films for sure, but with Viacom stock in its’ current state it will be interesting to see how experimental they will be with a Pike show.
Well said! Trek has always been political and it will probably always will be.
True, Star Trek was always political. You know what it wasn’t, though? Preachy. Partisan. Judgmental. Divisive.
It was humanist, and as such, it was striving to appeal to everybody.
When a showrunner publicly admits that he wanted half of the audience gone because of their political beliefs, that’s the crux of the problem right there.
Star Trek wasn’t preachy? What show have YOU been watching? Wow. It has ALWAYS been VERY preachy.
Unfortunately these days a show that features a cast that reflects the human race as it actually is (diverse in race, gender, sexual orientation, etc…) and gives EVERYONE a voice IS considered partisan and divisive to a disturbing number of folks
@Jeff Obryant
Likewise, if having a diverse cast or a female lead drives audiences away, that says more about the audience than the studios wanting to push an agenda.
And besides, even casting women, minorities, LGBTQ, IS a studio pushing an agenda, what agenda are they pushing? Inclusiveness? Tolerance? Acceptance? Fairness?
OH MY LORD, HOW TERRIBLE!
“You know what it wasn’t, though? Preachy. Partisan. Judgmental. Divisive.”
I took it this is exactly what OP meant and I can only guess so many repliers misunderstand him because it’s incidentally THEIR politics these shows support and THEIR opponents these shows attack.
Let me just add that TOS, the frequently cited justification for these politicized arcs on Discovery S1 and Picard, was never like this. It was never a vehicle for the most extremist fringe wing of one party, what it stood for was the “progressive” side of the CENTER. And as we see by the dated parts of TOS TODAY, even Roddenberry knew not to go further than that. And that’s how it should be. You need to take your audience with you, your entire audience, otherwise you are just fanning the flames and adding to the division.
Both Discovery and Picard were built on the tacitly agreed premise that half of the audience should be excluded and that’s not OK! As Discovery S2 moved away from this dangerous proposition, I hope Picard does, too, and SNW will not engage in partisan mongering from the get-go. Make it so!
“I took it this is exactly what OP meant and I can only guess so many repliers misunderstand him because it’s incidentally THEIR politics these shows support and THEIR opponents these shows attack.”
No friend, they knew full well, they were just being arrogant and trying to fool people into thinking they didn’t.
Where is the center now, though?
There’s a concept in politics called the Overton Window, which represents the range of ideas that are politically acceptable to the mainstream population at any given time. This window shifts depending on many factors – the economy, war, societal changes, etc. https://www.mackinac.org/OvertonWindow
The center in 1966 is not where the center is today. Most scholars agree that the Overton Window in the United States has shifted far to the right. Where the center used to be is now seen as the center-left or even the deep (if not far) left. The formerly far right is now closer to the new center, and under a constant barrage of outrageous statements and actions, it’s hard to remember what used to be “normal.” Good Vox explainer video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_v-hzc6blGI
Arguably, this shift in political discourse in the United States has been aided by the removal of the Fairness Doctrine, the flood of corporate influence via Citizens United, the rise of “outrage” talk radio, and the creation of a cable news network by former Nixon political consultants, whose entire raison d’être was to explicitly support one political party, and over time, to distract / gaslight viewers into ignoring real issues, and to believe things which support their chosen party. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P74oHhU5MDk
Without serious checks, challenges or consequences for disseminating misleading narratives under the banner of “opinion,” these narratives shift the acceptable range of ideas. Legitimate news outlets bend over backwards to include the views of conservatives / establishment figures, lest they be called biased.
(In Canada, it’s amazing how many people call the CBC a ‘liberal’ network. Maybe in its entertainment offerings, but not in its news operations, and it’s been defunded so much since the 1970s that they have to kowtow to corporate sponsors.)
When people use words like “extremist fringe wing” to refer to ideas that, when polled, the majority of people agree with, this is a case of projection, and an attempt to create false equivalency. There is literally no left-wing or liberal equivalent of the ideas and policies of the far right, not in North America. https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2017/08/16/sorry-conservatives-theres-no-equivalence-between-the-extreme-right-and-the-extreme-left/
Terms like “politically correct” or “identity politics” are thrown at people who are asking to be recognized under the law as human beings, and ask to be treated not better nor worse, but equally. Or at efforts to reflect the actual makeup of society when inviting guests onto panel discussions, or casting television shows.
These aren’t fringe ideas, they are extensions of things baked into our societies in things like the US Bill of Rights or the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. (And “The Bible, the Code of Hammurabi and of Justinian, Magna Carta, the Constitution of the United States, Fundamental Declarations of the Martian Colonies, the Statutes of Alpha Three.” – Samuel T. Cogley)
I mean, I’m glad we’re getting a Pike show, and Anson Mount is awesome, but I cannot help but think that some of the enthusiasm for its announcement comes from people who find it easier to accept a traditional square-jawed white male lead and see it as a “correction” towards “how it ought to be.”
We love a TNG episode where a literally white (ok, silver) android replays the Dred Scott trial (with some of the uglier realities of slavery only vaguely implied, and with a better outcome) but it’s hard for some to imagine a show centered around a flawed, complex black human female whose actress IS the descendant of slaves – making you think about how the effects of slavery persist in the real world to this day, perhaps. https://twitter.com/SonequaMG/status/1233993656908025857?s=20
That isn’t to call people actively racist, but it seems to me that some portion of the audience doesn’t feel willing to question the narratives and systems that society has baked into them; they challenge anything that might ask them to shift their self-perception or give up privilege.
And the Overton Window shift has persuaded some to feel righteous about it.
TL:DR
Poster above basically says fans are racist and the real reason we’re happy about a Pike show is because it features the return of a white male lead. *rolls eyes*
These are Star Trek fans, we don’t care who the lead is for a new show, we care about good writing, I couldn’t have cared less when they announced a black female lead for Discovery, however the alarm bells did start going off as soon as I found out they named her Michael. And low and behold, Discovery ended up being trash, which has nothing to do with who the lead is.
Everyone supported Avery Brooks and everyone supported Kate Mulgrew.
That’s a bad faith reading of the previous post and an intentional reduction of a nuanced point about representation. These are Trek fans is not an argument, and you know that. The assumption of some kind of meritocratic race blind judegement specific to Trek fans in a racist country is an absurd one. If you don’t want to be reminded that women of color exist than be honest in that. That’s your business. But we’re all past this rhetorical shell game where you can’t fully grasp what the gripe is, and pretend erasure should be universally appreciated as the good ole days. That’s disingenuous. Own your biases. Also Mulgrew and Brooks were not widely accepted for their merits.
Well, it wasn’t partisan because there was still generally a postwar consensus; there wasn’t that much ideological distance between Republicans and Democrats before the Nixon and particularly Reagan eras, and the rise of cable “news” networks. (Eisenhower would be called a bleeding heart liberal today).
But was it preachy and judgmental? Yeah.
We don’t think so today, but episodes stating “racism is bad, y’all” flew differently in the 60s to an audience born in the 1920s-1930s who grew up with an assumption of white superiority, rather than today, when we take that as a foundational truth.
Those of us who aren’t a racial minority, and weren’t adult or born at the time, do not remember how viciously racist life in the United States was under Jim Crow (and tbh still is today: Watch Ava DuVernay’s documentary 13th)
So much so that one station down in the south refused to air the infamous kiss between Kirk and Uhura (a forced kiss, at that; the network would have exploded had it been a romantic voluntary kiss).
They *just about * tolerated an Asian guy on the bridge.
Star Trek came onto our screens at a tumultuous time in American history, dealing with the legacy of race, colonialism, nuclear armageddon *and* the space race.
The Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and 1968 (and the Voting Rights Act in 1965, the same year as the Watts riots), which came after decades of protest by African-Americans, were seen by many whites as the end of everything!
Brown V Board of Education? Remember that?
The Fair Housing Act in 1968 meant “they” could live next door and you couldn’t do anything about it. Society was crumbling! Run to the suburbs!
The Cuban Missile Crisis was still fresh in people’s memories and the Vietnam War raged on. Was war a good idea? Hadn’t we fought two giant ones and suffered tens of millions dead?
Star Trek addressed many of these issues with clever parables and allegorical stories that, of course, were subject to network approval and commercial considerations and censorship. It’s amazing they got to tell these stories on network TV at all.
But yeah, there was no both-sides-ism from Gene Roddenberry. At a time when the country was being dragged, in some cases kicking and screaming, into treating its citizens more-or-less fairly, those stories were saying “Yeah, we are *totally* judging you for your moral failings.”
“(Eisenhower would be called a bleeding heart liberal today)”
Conversely JFK displayed a number actions deemed “conservative” today.
It wasnt preachy, partisan or divisive? Right because Gene didnt have southern stations up in arms over an interracial kiss. You can go down the line and point out where Trek has been those things to certain audiences at the time. You “fans” and your rose colored glasses…
Star Trek was created to be a vehicle for political commentary and social change. Roddenberry tried to make political and social commentary on conventional shows, but the networks wouldn’t let him. So he purposely designed it Star Trek to be in outer space so that it could be a metaphor for political issues. This isn’it my opinion, this is a fact.
“So long as they keep the language and politics out of this I’ll definitely watch it”
And the eyeballs! For God’s sake! ;)
If you like Star Trek without politics, you probably don’t like the starships, the aliens, or the futuristic setting.
👍🖖
Seriously though: the political, preachy messages are a BIG part of the show, and what gives it appeal to the bulk of the audience. It was more than space battles and fist fights, it was a progressive show preaching tolerance, acceptance, and selflessness. DSC and PIC may have had a more grim tone, but it continued with that messaging.
As one poster put it, people who are critical of political and preachiness are just nostalgic for a time when they didn’t notice it. When they were younger, and all they saw were the fun sci fi stories.
I think you are wrong. I think when Trek was preachy it turned a lot of fans off. No one likes getting told how or what to think. But when they presented multiple solutions to a problem that involved multiple beliefs… That was good because even if the Captain opted for one way, they did not declare that way to be the way things ought to be. That determination was left for the audience to decide for themselves. That, I think, is what the bulk of the audience liked in Trek.
The poster you referenced is way off base. Trek was done very well when a younger person could watch it and just get a fun sci-fi show out of it but an older person could watch the same show and see a well thought out analogy that allowed the viewer to think for themselves. Also, I recall enjoying Trek as a child for the fun sci-fi stuff. And when I got older I enjoyed them all over again, almost as if they were new, because I saw deeper meanings in many of the episodes. This is something the SH writers seem to be challenged with.
I am not wrong.
It is very likely you are. People do not like being told what to think. When they are allowed to think for themselves… To come to their own conclusions… That is preferred.
I’d love to see a retelling of “..last Battlefield” but with Bele and Loki being half Red and half Blue.
then Pike spends the hour just slapping the shit out them for being so petty and tribal while their planet went up in flames
Or rather, one wears a face mask, and the other refuses to!
As someone once pointed out: “Art has always been political. You’re not nostalgic for a time before it was political. You’re nostalgic for a time before you noticed it was political.”
What matters is in how it’s handled, and Trek has long swerved wildly between subtle to obvious and preachy.
Picard and Disco were not blunders. Its for to appeal to other younger audiences.
AGREED!!! Snuggs speaks for me on this one too!!
Music To My (pointy) Ears.
Episodic and more optimistic. Literally the opposite of what they have done most recently. Sign me up!
Honestly, that was the biggest flaw of DS9 and Voyager: so often, characters never grew or changed. I loved Ron Moore’s idea that after Hard Time, O’Brien would spend the rest of the season dealing with the PTSD of his experiences with that episode. I’d have loved to have seen Kim grapple with the existentialism of his existence after Deadlock. But nope! Status quo every episode!
DS9 came closest, with Sisko really growing into and accepting his role as Emissary, and Kira slowly accepting that the Bajorans needed the help of the Federation.
Bashir matured a lot, too. Quark grew to put others first at least once in a while. And of course Cirroc Lofton grew up before our eyes.
The biggest thing about Bashir is that once they made him genetically engineered, they didn’t forget about it. It routinely came up and affected other stories.
Yeah lots of characters grew and changed on DS9. When that show started only one character was in a relationship, Miles with Keiko. By the time the show ended, all of them were with several marriages between them. Even Rom got married lol.
Ok Quark stayed single but it’s Quark. ;)
DS9 I feel had the most character growth from all the series. I hated Bashir in Season 1 but by the end of the show he was one of my faves. Same with almost all the other principals, Odo changed drastically. I haven’t seen DS9 in almost a decade and planning a rewatch soon, will see how much my recollections and assumptions hold up.
Episodic? Thank the sweet baby Jesus!
Sounds perfect to me, I think it’s a great approach for the series and honestly. Sounds similar to Ds9 and the Orville and even season 4 of Enterprise.
I think it may make people appreciate discovery and Picard too for what they are, a different kind of Star Trek. Maybe if this had come first and then the other shows fans may of been more receptive to the idea of discovery because they have had that need fulfilled for classic Star Trek that we’ve been be yearning for.
I don’t have issues with DIS or PIC because they are serialized and different, I support those things. They are just not told very well and a lot of people blame that on the serialized aspect of them.
I think with DIS the problems go MUCH deeper than that though as there are just a ton of problems with it that they have been trying to correct in season 2 (and now season 3). I think as a show Picard is mostly fine and they got more things right than wrong IMO. But yeah it definitely has its problems too, but many a lot more fixable since they don’t have to explain away why Picard never told us why he was actually Scotty’s great great great grandson but we know Picard never talks about his family so they could’ve gotten away with it I guess.
But all snakiness aside I do notice while a lot of people excited about the show, there are just as many cynical its going to be good. I guess after all the hype Picard got and many felt let down by that then I can’t blame them. But yes all TV shows can improve as Star Trek is famous for but it will be nice if this was at least decent out of the gate.
Is it funny or sad that some people are still hung up on the fact that they introduced a stepsister to Spock? You’ve had three years to process it by now. It’s been discussed ad infinitum that it’s well within established canon that Spock wouldn’t necessarily have talked about her.
If anything, people should be thankful that the producers introduced that family connection because it gave them the perfect excuse to bring in Spock, Pike and the Enterprise which has directly led to this new series which people seem so excited about.
As for getting all hyped up and then let down: It is my impression that many fans come up with all these expectations of what the show must do, what it can and cannot be. Basically, they develop a dream show in their heads and expect that this is what they are going to get. Hence all the hype because who wouldn’t like to see their dream show come true? And then they are disappointed when it doesn’t turn out the way they expected.
Obviously, the easy solution to that problem would be that people simply don’t go in with all these expectations but that’s easier said than done.
You know they could have found a more creative way to bring in Spock if they really wanted to. The family connection just seemed the easiest for the writers. He could have been a close friend, a mentor, or just bring in the Enterprise without any personal connection. Having a family connection doesn’t automatically endear a person to the audiences, writing good characters do.
I don’t think it was done to endear to the audience. From a character perspective, it certainly made her a lot more interesting that she was the human adopted daughter of a Vulcan, and I think it’s more likely they were interested in bringing in Sarek as a recurring character than making her Spock’s sister.
Spock showing up was just a byproduct of that choice. And largely, I think it works. I wasn’t in love with the way they worked Spock into Season 2, but the relation itself I have no issue with.
But the reveal that Sarek refused to get her into the science academy out of the hopes that Spock would go was one of the best moments of the show, so it was all worth it. Spock ultimately choosing Starfleet anyway made it all the more interesting, and certainly added more layers to the rift between Sarek & Spock that we saw earlier.
“ But the reveal that Sarek refused to get her into the science academy out of the hopes that Spock would go was one of the best moments of the show, so it was all worth it.”
This is a great example of Burnham actually enhancing canon. It would be nice if SNW could do the same for Spock’s other sibling!
It was actually the best episode in all of STD so far. But I stop short of considering that episode made the whole fiasco worth it.
Now you’re talkin, Corinthian! Sybok!
I don’t think it was done to endear her to the audience either. I mostly think it was done to create a “safety net” for the new show. If things look like the show is not performing, they can just bring in Spock and hype it up for subscribers. Which is what happened.
I do think the idea of a human raised by vulcans is intriguing. It’s just unfortunate the STD writers didn’t mine that element one bit. It was practically ignored the entire show.
Exactly! The show takes place in the same era as Pike they could’ve just brought Spock in other ways. I said it myself Sarek could’ve been Burnham’s mentor or something when she was at the Vulcan Academy and had a relationship with Spock.
The siblings thing just felt contrived and why there is now an automatic court marshal if anyone even brings up her name not to mention now being 900 years apart from each other.
I don’t know if it is something people are hung up on. Personally, I still say it was a bad creative choice from the start. Does that mean I’m “hung up” on it? I think not.
And they really didn’t need the family connection to bring in the Enterprise. There are plenty of reasonable scenarios for that.
Yeah, there is a difference between thinking it was a bad idea but still accepted it. That’s the thing for me, I still think it was dumb but I accept it just the same. I know end of the day its all just fiction and I’m not one of these claiming Discovery isn’t canon because of it. But it doesn’t change my view just because I do accept it. There really was just no need for it and only done to attach TOS fans to the character.
And how they ‘resolved’ it is comical. I wonder will Spock will ever mention Burnham or Discovery on SNW again. Based on the Discovery finale I’m guessing that’s a no.
While I thought it was a bad move to suddenly give Spock an adoptive sister, I still to this day do not say it was a canon violation. There was absolutely no need to “explain away” why he never mentioned her. None. It was already established that Spock would not reveal such information unless he deemed to to be relevant. The idea that TPTB on STD felt they “needed” to “fix” the sister thing is ludicrous. It was their decision in the first place to add her. They should have just owned it. And the situation really didn’t need fixing anyway.
Yes, the resolution is just as facepalm inducing as the way they dealt with the MU in season 1. This “classified” thing is.. Overused and lazy. Unfortunately with the MU I can’t think of another way to deal with except to NOT use it in the first place. But the Michael thing… They had a number of options at their disposal. But to tell them to never speak of it? Dumb. Just… Dumb.
Great News!
Great news! Look forward to watching this show!
Thank you, CBS! This sounds awesome.
Two things come to mind:
I recently said that I thought one of the Trek shows on the slate should be more episodic and secretly hoped we would get a Pike series and that that would be the one, though I’d really like to see the Georgeau Section 31 show be like X Files, monster of the week mixed with mythology.
I think they’ll have a better first season than most Trek because Peck and Anson are already established as the characters and have a head start.
I love Disco and Picard; I’m really excited to see what they do with this!
It’s still very very odd this show has been officially announced as happening while Section 31 has not yet to this day although they been talking about it for over a year now. It’s probably still happening but I do wonder at least if they are going to move SNW ahead of it and get it out first since they know that’s what most fans really wants?
My understanding is that they put section 31 on hold to fast track this one
Michelle Yeoh is also filming the Avatar sequels (or will be when Hollywood re-opens).
Good!
Where did you hear that? If so, most definitely the right move. Every time it’s brought up here and other sites I can practically feel the eye rolling lol. Very few people are excited about giving Space Hitler her own show. Especially one so cartoony at that.
Yeah. SH has two cartoons planned already. I see no reason to add a third.
That’s my understanding as well. They previously said that Section 31 would go into production right after Discovery season 3 finished production. Recently there were some links to some Canadian union website (don’t remember which union it was exactly) that mentioned Strange New Worlds as being under pre-production. At the time I thought this might be a code name for the Section 31 show but now we know it’s the new show. So it seems that production on Strange New Worlds was scheduled to begin really soon (before the shutdown, obviously). Unless they will be shooting both shows in parallel I guess this means that Section 31 has either been postponed or shelved completely.
Isn’t Yeoh still doing movie work as well? I imagine her schedule is less flexible than most of the SNW cast.
Given how responsive the producers have been toward the fans and their opinions, it seems likely that they heard the backlash to the S-31 idea and greenlit SNW because that’s what fans have been clamoring for
Yeah I agree. Sooner or later they are going to fill us in what’s happening with that show and if it is pushed back or cancelled then it will definitely prove Kurtzman has been listening to the audience again and going a different direction.
That’s why I really do support him even if I’m still not in love with the shows because its clear A. he DOES listen to the fans and B. he really wants to get it right. Literally every complaint I had about Discovery (and you know I had a lot ;)) has been acknowledge in some way with the changes or additions in season 2. The show still has problems for sure but you can see the changes in real time from just making the Klingons look more like classical Klingons again to making the stories more fun and upbeat or just seeing proper TOS unifroms again. And next season they are reboothing the show completely putting it in an advance timeline to really break it free from bigger canon problems (and where it should’ve been on day one).
As far as other shows, that was also clear they were listening to fans when the first rumors about new shows were coming and we heard about the possible Picard show, a Starfleet Academy show and a Khan show (ugh). Based off the rumors, there wasn’t a single doubt what most people were excited about and were pretty meh on the other two. And looked what happened? Picard was not only the first to get the greenlight, it was the only one that ever got announced because it was clear the other two didn’t have as big of a reaction for them. They still could happen but I’m guessing the Khan one has been dead for a long time now and clearly the Academy show is also on the backburner now if it happens at all.
So I wouldn’t be shocked if history was repeating itself and they decided to go with the clear winner and just ditch S31 completely. You could NOT get two very different reactions from both shows if you tried lol. Like Picard, they know every hardcore fan is going to tune into SNW at least the first season. S31 its very iffy, especially since Georgiou herself has not enamored herself with most fans. Pike has become as loved as much as every iconic character in Trek today after just 14 episodes, so that says a lot about his future.
What they need to do is look over ever bit of material Gene Roddenberry prepared in 1965 for the series…and take it from there. There is some good unexplored ideas and concepts in those early treatments that were good but never transferred to what became NBC’s STAR TREK.
IT will be interesting if we get Phil Boyce as CMO, or if they will use the character of Mark Piper. Also characters like Lt.Colt and Jose Tyler. (I wouldn’t mind seeing Chief Grace from the “Early Voyages” comic as Chief Engineer)
…and please, No Young Kirk,McCoy, Younger Scotty,etc…
I think Young Kirk is inevitable, the producers wouldn’t able to restrain themselves not to use the character. I heard they were casting for Dr Boyce too, but it could just be rumors.
Remember waaaaaaaaaaay back in 2018 when they were still telling us not to ever expect Spock on Discovery? That guy not only got a huge story line on there, he now has his own spin off show. It’s not ‘if’ people, it’s ‘when’. But the time all of this is done, I expect so see most if not all the TOS characters show up in some form. Same with Picard and all those characters.
If they allow us to see younger kirk, scotty or mccoy, they must do so and embrace canon not keep changing it like DISCO, DISCO’s mistake was they wanted to do some fan service by establishing Burnham as Spock’s sister and along with it plenty of canon issues. SNW should just go forward and establish new characters and stories, but if they do include other TOS characters and references, than embrace canon, don’t try to change it, then have to explain it. DISC suffered from poor story planning, Spore drives, Holographic communications, Klingon radical changes, none needed, it did not add to the story lines, and created canon issues. My hope is SNW will avoid all that. As far as the aesthetics and look. we accept that SNW will look more modern than TOS. let’s not spend time explaining that.
“we accept that SNW will look more modern than TOS.”
Yes but that look STILL needs to at the very least evoke the FEEL of the era they are supposed to be in. STD did NONE of that. Enterprise did it quite well.
Good treatment, Herb! Those 90s Marvel comics were fantastic. Heck, I even liked ‘Starfleet Academy’!
Lt. Colt HAS to be back!!
…and why not call it STAR TREK – because THAT is what it is – the closest to REAL Star Trek since 1969. Exploration, strange new worlds, new civilizations…boldly going.
…and who knows what Klingons will end up getting…anyone ready for A young Captain Chang? :)
Nothing but great news coming out of the mouths of the producers, the crew and the cast. Intentions to be more episodic is absolutely great news AND they won’t do what we saw in the past with TOS killing important life changing people off one week with no short term consequences the next. I know that SOME of the naysayers will point to their YT sites (haha we know who they are) as being gospel but one more time, let’s wait and see what happens. Patience ONE of your unfounded rumors will eventually be proven right. For now, I for one am extremely optimistic – we shall see if that is warranted.
Oh once again kudos to Ethan Peck for his perseverance in supporting this series and embracing the Star Trek fans. Can’t wait for S1 E1 of Star Trek – Strange New Worlds. LLAP everyone and stay healthy and safe. Enjoy the rest of the weekend.
Can it have coherent story-telling, with actual ideas, instead of tedious, generic space drama, interrupted by the writers stopping to give themselves a pat on the back every time they make a character say “f***”?
Sure! Discovery and Picard was chock full of it!
Chock full? I believe “f***” was used in one scene out of two seasons of Discovery, and twice in the first season of Picard. Hardly a sh*tstorm of f***s.
Chock full of tedious, generic space drama, interrupted by the writers stopping to give themselves a pat on the back every time they make a character say “f***”? Oh yes, it definitely was! That’s why it would be nice to have coherent story-telling for a change. You know, without constant backtracking to pad out the runtime, without glaringly obvious reshoots, without plotpoints that change twice in one season…
I wouldn’t get my hopes high, though: it’s still the same people sitting at the steering wheel. :P
Wow, it’s almost like we have different opinions of the shows. Imagine that!
I kept tuning in hoping there’d be a new writer who could write decent dialogue, or actually had some imagination.
Still. Next Gen took a couple of series before it got its wings. A lot of folk were fired though.
I totally agree with all of this. And the lack of actual (opposed to announced) delegating to new, outside people is disheartening.
I have limited hope for this particular show, though, because I can see episodic narration work much better for this particular set of writers, knowing their limitations in serialized writing (how ironic the producer duo then known, infamously, as the “Killer Bees” fared so much better in Enterprise season 3!)
It also fits with their fondness of cramming (too) many different ideas and plots into their season arcs – they will have even greater variety and flexibility with self-contained stories and who knows? They may take a liking and finally move the other shows in that direction, too.
There are some things to find hope. VS, your idea that perhaps these writers might fare better in stand alone episodes is one of them.
Some of the same team that was responsible for DISC will work on SNW, but I am hopeful in that what they did get right was giving us an interesting Pike. Otherwise did any fan really care to see what or who the “Red Angel” was. The story seemed to wonder aimlessly through season two.
Bollocks.
Short Treks is the closest we’ve come to episodic storytelling since Star Trek has returned and they’ve really been the most fun. The biggest drawback to a serialized approach to storytelling for is that it doesn’t repeat well and you can’t just jump into the show in the middle of a season or even a couple of years into the series, The approach they’re discussing is essentially what they’ve done with The Orville. There’s a new story each week but events in those stories have impacted the growth of the characters and the series itself. There can be connecting threads with standalone episodes and that growth and the impact of what they’ve encountered is the aspect that’s serialized in nature.
A writer can now go into the writer’s room and pitch a story idea for a single episode and we’ll get to see fresh new stories each week
They promised season 2 of discovery would be more optimistic. Then Picard. Now they’re promising season 3 of discovery (despite its bleak trailer) and this new show will be more optimistic. They keep lying because we keep falling for it.
Actually, S2 of disco WAS more optimistic than S1. And for large part, it was because of Pike’s “genuine good guy” personality and leadership. So regardless of whether you like disco as a whole or not (and I’m not a huge fan of it myself) I still loved Pike’s character and can’t wait for him to get his own show =)
Fully agreed.
I don’t know why everybody says S1 was too dark.
It may be just me, but while S2 started on a more optimistic note, it ultimately turned out more dreary, brooding and gruesome than S1. The “optimistic” mood was achieved largely by turning Tilly into a blabbering, grinning comic relief filled with flat jokes – which for me was particularly difficult to watch, because she was my favorite character in the first season.
Oh well. It doesn’t matter now, anyway.
s1 and s2 both feature the most evil person in the universe(s) and try to pass her off to one degree or other as something other than wholly despicable and utterly unredeemable. Hard to take the series seriously with that big of a hiccough.
In the Niven/Pournell novel INFERNO, Benito Mussolini turns out to be a pretty decent guy, but that is after who-knows-how-many eons in Hell. No equivalent in DSC for suffering to redemption arc.
S2 of Discovery was more optimistic than S1, this is true. But it was more optimistic in the way that thinking you are healthy and going to the doctor -and finding out you have stage 3 cancer – is more optimistic than finding out that you are in stage 4 cancer.
And they said Picard also was going to be optimistic. I have no reason to believe these people.
Fool me once, shame on me. . But two seasons of STD and one of Picard- fool me three times, shame on me.
I thought S2 of DSC and PIC were plenty optimistic. My fear now is that due to irrational fan feedback, they’ll course correct too far we’ll wind up with a saturday morning cartoon.
Unless that’s what fans want, who knows. I don’t even think a lot of fans here know what they want!
True, none of DIS or PIC had really an optimistic vibe. But hope dies last. So maybe this time we really will get a more lighthearted and optimistic series.
I think fans need to start separating “vibe” from “message.” The messages in both shows were spreading about peace, love, tolerance, and selflessness. Just because the tones and vibes were darker than the bright TNG/TOS feel, doesn’t mean they weren’t optimistic.
That wasn’t the message I got from any of those shows. Picard… I actually don’t know WHAT they were trying to say, if anything. But it sure wasn’t what you claimed.
Better have some sex scenes.
Let’s not go there.
I’ve never been a fan of graphic sex scenes in general. I have no real issue with them, but VERY rarely is there a sex scene that gives you any more info that a suggestive cut-away couldn’t accomplish. In some more adult shows, the way a couple has sex can say something about the nature of their relationship, but unless it’s necessary to get across information you couldn’t otherwise, I find it as little more than pandering. It’s the difference between using profanity as this Trek has (for specific emphasis) vs. just littering dialogue with it, as a lot of edgy 90s movies did to emulate Quentin Tarantino.
He’s just bitter its even happening. ;)
What he wants to see is Captain Pike making out with a Horta. Let it be a male horta too so his ‘modern sensibilities’ be satisfied ;)
I don’t think he’s serious, it’s just the same passive aggressive stuff he did when Picard became official and try to knock the show in some way. He seems really hung on the idea everyone should love Discovery and ONLY Discovery for some reason. It’s bizarre the things nerds get hung up about. That show will always has its fans, but it’s no longer the center of the universe now, especially not being in the 23rd or 24th century anymore which is obviously where the bulk of Star Trek cannon is.
This is all only great news. Even if many of us are afraid they may not hit out of the park like so many felt with Picard, its still amazing to have these shows regardless. They can all improve in time. I think this show will probably be more popular than even the Picard show is if it’s returning to Star Trek roots and about exploration again and on the ‘original’ Enterprise to boot with upbeat optimism like TOS/TNG.
Please don’t go there.
For real? I mean sure if the episode calls for it, but not “just because they can”.
I enjoyed self-contained stories that’s been a lost art in TV.
Even LOST did self contained stories within the series narrative from what I remember and that’s remembered I think as a purely serialized series. I’m pretty sure a lot of modern tv shows have taken it to a whole other level with regards to that.
I think The X Files model is the way to go. You have the mythology of a series but also you can have independent episodes which allow for fun and doing wildly different things which give its audience variety and excitement. With short seasons I guess it’s more difficult to achieve these days though.
Agree on your Xfiles example; that show did a really great job of having both kinds of stories (although the alien mythology kind of disappointed after a while).
The X Files is incredible. I don’t think that’s on TV anymore.
They had a brief re-run with new episodes a couple of years ago, but I don’t think the stars want to make the show anymore. It is a pity since I still see a big potential in X-files stories especially these days.
Season 11 ratings also dropped like a stone and the season was mostly panned save for a few episodes. I really loved the X Files (at one point almost loved it more than Star Trek…almost) but I think its done now. At least with the original actors. I’m sure they are going to try and reboot it one day.
Yeah, it was just too 90s to be able to effectively work for the modern audience. This is why I think Season 11 as a whole was panned. Chris Carter couldn’t really modernize it too much.
True but those shows all had longer seasons. Lost only shortened their seasons when they mapped out the end.
Just more awesome news!
The should just cancel The Orville now — it’s no longer needed.
The Orville should go on. It wasn’t Star Trek to begin with.
This is my personal opinion and I may end up being wrong, but I think there is a high probability that Orville will indeed be cancelled after its third season. It is moving networks and there has been so much time passed between its second and third seasons. These are never good signs for a momentum or audience retainability of the shows.
Now that The Orville has triggered the return of classic episodic optimistic Trek, proving to CBS there is an audience for such thing, you could say it has concluded its mission successfully :)
I suspect you are right. Moving it to Hulu just was not a good sign no matter what executives say. I feel similarly towards STD. Any times shows get that big a shake up it rarely bodes well for the future of the show. At this point, Discovery is reminding me a lot of Seaquest DSV.
Normally I’d say don’t be cruel to the show you’re mentioning in comparing it seaquest, but in this case, you’re being mean to the DSV. That show at least had one great episode (the Alexandria library one, which is practically TOS underwater) before it became a series of different dramatic disasters.
And no, ORVILLE should stay, and hopefully prosper. It showed that you can still do episodic SF and sometimes get it right, which puts them way ahead of everybody else, even with the groan-inducing aspects. At least I like ORVILLE most of the time.
I wasn’t being cruel to DSV or STD. Just saying their fates seem eerily similar at this point.
I’m also not saying what The Orville SHOULD do. Just saying that moving it to Hulu should not make anyone feel like the show is safe. But if I were to say what The Orville SHOULD do… They SHOULD embrace the comedy. Even more so than they did in season one. Without the comedy it’s just a tired TNG clone. The comedy made the show unique. And, most importantly, the bulk of the jokes landed. Too bad they all but completely evaporated in season 2.
We agree on this one. That would give it some badly needed originality at least.
Put a fork in Orville — it’s done because unlike Amazon Prime and Netflix, Hulu doesn’t have much sf content and serves other demographics better. I doubt that hardly anyone is going to sign up for Hulu to the The Orville.
If Hulu keeps doing stuff like THE LOOMING TOWER, they’ll get my business. That was superb.
I just looked that up and it does look very interesting. Thanks for the recommendation.
It is one of the best-cast projects I’ve ever seen, with really good actors in even the smallest parts.
The longer pause between season 2 and 3 has a lot do to with McFarlane and also the Coronavirus now. They had filmed about half the season when they had to stop filming. And in season 3 all of the episodes will be directed by McFarlane and the producing director Jon Cassar. Maybe he wants to write even more episodes himself this time, too. It is definitely a passion project of his and he obviously wants to be heavily involved in making the series in all aspects. That might make the production a bit longer than usual as he is just one guy and is also sometimes busy with other things.
On the TV channel FOX The Orville had it hard. The overall old skewing audience of the channel might not have been the target audience. And overall most scifi and fantasy related series have it hard on the big broadcast channels. I guess things like crime procedurals just work on them better. Maye on Hulu it will perform better in comparison to its new competition which will be other streaming series on Hulu. Hulu has also a much lower audience age than FOX and if they can get the scifi fans among them to watch it there, it might be enough to perform well enough for more seasons.
I think all of the current new Star Trek series would have likely performed on the CBS main channel also not well enough to get numerous seasons there. Only the CW has many scifi and fantasy series in their program and nearly all of their shows get less than 1 million live + same day viewers nowadays. They are only profitable because they have a low budget and they make money with them on streaming services and with selling rights for TV and streaming in other countries. So considering all this Hulu might actually be the better place for The Orville and maybe it can last there longer than on Fox.
I think it feels more like The Orville going to Hulu is the modern equivalent of moving a show to Friday night.
Yep. That streaming service has never been a space sf fan destination, and I don’t see them attracting many new members just to get The Orville. Amazon Prime would have been interesting though.
Wonderful news!
The problem with Discovery is; it began as one series then changed at the last minute into something different. Now it’s something COMPLETELY different from what it was first conceived to be.
Is it though? Early reports suggested that it might be an anthology show, a Star Trek version of American Horror Story or True Detective. Now admittedly things didn’t pan out this way when it was renewed for season 2 but by completely reinventing itself year on year you could argue that it’s at least kept to the spirit of what was originally conceived.
Discovery only changed because of so many complaints about it and my guess is they were seeing a lot of drops in AAs subscriptions as well.
But for me I WELCOME the change. I was one of the people who was really not feeling what the show was in the beginning. But I never thought they would throw it centuries into the future or anything but I’m a lot more excited for it now that they have. And it can just be its own thing.
I think SNW will be a much better fit as a pre-TOS show as well and it can be its own thing but ALSO a true prequel to TOS if it wants (although I hope they won’t just make it TOO fan servicy—but who are we kidding ;)). That was the other problem with DIS, it was sort of pushed in that direction because of the Spock/Burnham thing and it was forever attached to TOS because of it.
Not sure if they use subsciptions as a measure when they have a much better way to gauge interest in a series. After all streaming services know exactly how many episodes everyone watched. How many people stopped watching after the first few episodes. How many didn’t come back after season 1 to watch season 2. Things like this. Subscriptions are a less accurate measure as someone who stopped watching DIS might have kept his/her subscription because the person likes other stuff on CBS All Access.
This is PURELY speculation only. I could be completely wrong of course since they never have said the numbers of people watching the show. But I DO suspect there was a mandate to get more people on board after season one because they went 180 on their statement that we would never see Spock on this show. I remember they even said that AFTER the first season finale aired and was clear we were at least going to see Pike. I think CBS pushed them to get more fans onboard and of course my speculation only comes from either they didn’t bring in as many subscriptions as hoped or they saw more people dropping it afterwards and wanted a way to bring them back.
And when you cancel, there is actually a page you can fill out stating why you were cancelling and I’m guessing some did say why. I’m not saying it was all Star Trek related but I’m guessing many.
But I’ll state it again, it may not have anything to do with that, I’m just spit balling.
Tiger, I think there is enough evidence to support your theory. I share it myself. In fact, I think the appearance of the USS Enterprise was a last minute addition after seeing how Discovery unperformed in regards to subscribers. I really think the decision was made during that mid season break the show took.
And I still say the Burnham-Spock connection was done purely for a safety net for Discovery. If it under performed they would use it. If the show did as CBS hoped, we would have never seen Pike or Spock in season 2.
Like you, and pretty much everyone here, I have no special pipeline into the thinking of TPTB at CBSAA. But this theory makes complete logical sense given what information was released publicly.
Yeah exactly! I think a LOT of changes happened by the first season finale when the complaints started rolling in. All the hints of evidence proves it. The original show runners were saying they couldn’t even imagine jumping the show just 200 years into the future and why it made sense to keep the show where it was but then ALSO said the second season was going to explain the canon violations more. Well now we know all season two did was one long (convoluted if interesting at times) story to throw them into the future the original show runners said was never going to happen. Not only did they do it, they threw the show four times farther than the hypothetical one they thought was ‘impossible’ to do just a year earlier lol.
I think a LOT of changes went down between first and second season that was never planned until later just due to it not hitting its subscriptions. Some changes were just natural but this show has gone FAR beyond any show before even leaving its own original setting to do it.
I’ve always said though I give them MAJOR credit for all the changes they done, but we know it has to be more than just a small vocal group of whiners on the internet to make all the changes and additions they done so far. I think its more about the people who were voting with their wallets as well as haters typing dismissive ‘STD NOT CANON’ remarks on Youtube and boards like these.
I really really hope one day we get another Chaos on the Bridge doc for this show. Kate Mulgrew will narrate that one! Or at least a behind the scenes book of all the things that went down its first two seasons from Fuller being fired to Kurtzman taking control from the last guys. It will be a great read lol.
You are correct. I get so fatigued with people who just don’t like Discovery coming up with made-up crap like Midnight’s Edge silliness with like, “hey, Discovery must be losing viewers because most of the 20 regulars who I communicate on this site don’t like and we therefore conclude they are changing each because we bitch about it a lot.” LOL
And the very simple reason that they are saying things now that contradict what Fuller and others said three years ago is because they have cleaned house with the show-runners twice due to issues not related to the content of the series.
Obviously Disovery was a hit, as it’s success birthed Picard and now 4 other shows in development. I be we get 5 seasons at least of Discovery — yet you just watch — some people will have excuses still then and claim it wasn’t successful. ;-)
This is all the Trek Fandom equivalent of a Trump Tweet.
That’s a strength for Discovery, not a weakness. Enterprise and Voyager were large the “same ole shit,” but not as good, as TNG. Being flexible and mixing things up for a sf show is generally a good thing.
Let’s not feel free to dump on Voyager.
It stands up very well on its own two decades later. Many of us who’ve gone back to rewatch Voyager have found it to have some of the best moments in the franchise.
More to the point, its got the highest number of streams globally on Netflix of any of the older series. So, it really has been effective in the end in finding its own audience.
OK, I will grant you that. Not my cup of tea, but hey, IDIC.
.. what? Y’all mean we may perhaps finally actually get a real star trek series worth the subscription price?? No kurtzman, thank the gods of the celestial temple! As long as he and his other friend isn’t involved merely using the name of trek and roddenberry to feed what they think is a blind audience from their goblet of political bashing!
This is the second-best news possible. (The first would be World Peace.)
Yay!
Now if only they still accepted story submissions like in the TNG days. Yeah, I know it’s extremely rare in television and a legal minefield, but a fan can dream…
I’m just hoping they’ll take spec scripts from WGA members to start.
New ideas, new talent and the opportunity for writers to get a foot in the door of the franchise.
From what Goldsman has said, it sounds like they will fall within the episodic series requirement to take in spec scripts from WGA members and use at least a few a year.
“requirement to take in spec scripts from WGA members and use at least a few a year”
Finally! Diversity of ideas is back too at last :)
That’s interesting. I hope so.
Time to polish up the old specs (trek and other) and find myself an agent again! (tho I have a feeling it is still going to be nearly all staff-written, they might just buy the occasional idea to strip mine.)
Most likely it will be. It will probably be a short season so there will not be a need to find extra stories out there.
“classic Star Trek show that deals with optimism and the future.”
This sounds great. We haven’t had this since 2005. I really hope they get this show right out of the gate but at the very least they are going to avoid most of Discovery’s biggest blunders in its first season. In many ways bringing Pike on was a huge turn around in both tone and look and why he was so popular to begin with. He felt like the 23rd century version of Picard, just someone you can have a beer with too. ;)
And frankly I just want a show about actual exploration again. I have no issues Picard and Discovery isn’t about that (and DS9 is still my favorite show and it was never about that), but it will be nice if ONE show is actually seeking out new life and civilizations.
So all sounds great so far, but yeah Akiva Goldsman….sigh.
I’m glad this show will be more episodic and optimistic. Discovery and Picard are missing that.
There was certainly SOME optimism in both shows (well in DIS season 2 at least) but not in the way like the other shows, where it felt like it was ingrained in them. I know many people here felt let down by Picard because they wanted a more TNG tone of the universe, but Picard still had that belief and that speech he gave to Rios in episode 8 proved that. But hopefully SNW do what TOS and TNG did from the beginning and just showing a crew out there who is trying to make the galaxy a better place.
I’ve been watching the Picard S1 finale with my spouse.
With a long hiatus from seeing episode 8, it fares much, much better.
Much of what I objected to seems to be rooted in how jarringly different in tone it seemed to be, and a great deal of that was the direction and the editing. But, that doesn’t mean it wasn’t good, it means that it was too different in tone.
As much as Chabon and Goldsman are friends, they have very different takes on Trek. Goldsman seems to love the strange, trippy elements of classic Trek.
More, it doesn’t sound like Doug Aarnowski (the supervising director) had much scope to hold Goldsman to the Picard style.
But when I take a step back and think, Goldsman’s style could really work for SNW. I’ve thought that Discovery was the trippiest Trek ever, but I could be happy if we got a bit more Farscape-like weirdness in SNW. Just stop with the eyeball stuff : it was a trope in Farscape, but at this point in New Trek it’s beyond overdone.
So, I’m going to think positive thoughts and reserve judgement, hoping that TPTB (and Anson Mount) put some boundaries on how dark things have to be to show the eventual light at the end of an episode or two or three.
“But when I take a step back and think, Goldsman’s style could really work for SNW. I’ve thought that Discovery was the trippiest Trek ever, but I could be happy if we got a bit more Farscape-like weirdness in SNW. ”
I like your idea, and what I’d welcome is a show that focuses on the Twilight Zone-esque elements and episodes of TOS in particular, and I think the title STRANGE New Worlds strongly hints at it. As Q put it to Picard in his speech, to truly appreciate the dangers and wonders of space we have no idea about! I want to feel that wonder again that space exploration entails and really only entailed in TOS and the first seasons of TNG (in Enterprise S1 too, in a very minor way). Remember that episode where the Enterprise got hurled into a region of space so far beyond that imagination and reality became one? That’s the kind of show I want to see. And keep out the politics indeed, the ficitious space politics as much as the real world one. Let this show, at least, be the great unifier for a broken humanity and an inspiration for the new generations!
Exactly VS, that’s the stuff I miss too! I’m ALL for politics though but you can do other things as all the shows did and why they were fun to watch because one week would deal with terrorism or racism, the next week is meeting your clone or finding yourself in a new dimension.
“As much as Chabon and Goldsman are friends, they have very different takes on Trek. Goldsman seems to love the strange, trippy elements of classic Trek.”
Thats the thing, I LOVE that stuff too. My favorite episodes from TOS, TNG, VOY (especially VOY) are the weird, time paradox, strange anomolies, what is real, kinds of stories. That’s Star Trek to me as much as just finding a new planet somewhere. But Goldsman version of that is just, ugh. Maybe I’ll have to watch S1 finale of Picard again (its literally the only episode out of the season I watched once) but
That’s partly why I’m excited for this show, I’m hoping we are going to get more of those trippy episodes again that we really didn’t get much in Picard due to its story line and as you suggested, maybe not what Chabon really wanted. That’s why I love the moniker ‘STRANGE’ New Worlds, I’m hoping we are going to get stuff like Blink of an Eye, Shore Leave, Ship in a Bottle, Mirror Mirror, Cause and Effect, Shattered. All Good Things and on and on.
I’m hoping stuff like fighting with Klingons is less of that stuff and we just get fun and crazy story lines again. Like you of course I’m going to think positive and Goldsman can deliver stories like those, I’m all for it, but what we seen so far, not overly confident.
“I’ve thought that Discovery was the trippiest Trek ever”
Wow! Even trippier than Season 3 of TOS with bizarre episodes like “Spectre of the Gun”, “And the Children Shall Lead”, “Spock’s Brain”, and “The Way to Eden”?
I think of Goldsman as a less-talented version of Braga, my least favorite trekvet. Doing weird stuff was Braga’s thing, and maybe there’s an occasional place for it, but making it a go-to just dumbs the whole mess down. Unless you can really create a wow moment, the ‘strange trippy’ stuff doesn’t often sustain. You can get a neat ‘Troi is a cake getting knifed’ moment, but that doesn’t make for a whole show.
That’s not saying it can’t happen … there is one moment in TFF when Sybok starts talking about God and Kirk tells him he’s mad and Sybok is just, ‘am I?’ where everything just about works for me (full disclosure, I love TFF warts and all, it and TWOK and TMP are the only Trek movies I can say that about), especially through when Spock later says he is no longer in control of the shuttlecraft, so you KNOW something is happening.
I just think weird stuff works best when it has a scientific underpinning, because working within some limitations when doing weird keeps it from becoming a ‘throw up your hands at what you’re watching’ thing.
I would take issue with calling Pike a 23rd century Picard. Pike seems more like Kirk, than anything. And Kirk and Picard were VERY different.
That’s fine, but people do compare him to Picard though, certainly on Reddit. And yeah it’s just how I see him too. But If you don’t that’s cool. And I don’t see him and Kirk all that much a like, but he hasn’t ripped his shirt yet lol.
You seem him like Picard? I don’t see it. Picard is FAR more seasoned. Pike is far more likely to get his own hands dirty (like Kirk). Picard rarely did. Picard was more of a diplomat. A wordsmith. Kirk even admitted he is a “soldier, not a diplomat”. Pike may not be a soldier-y as Kirk but he certainly would not be able to negotiate like Picard. Not even close. So try as I might, I just don’t see it.
In terms of his strict code of following of the rules, bringing up Federation values and how much the Prime Directive should be maintained, definitely. Not so much with Kirk with the last one lol.
But it doesn’t matter man. We (the collective we I mean) get into these tedious useless nerdy arguments on these boards all the time. I don’t want it to be a ‘nun un, Pike is totally like Picard!!! No he isn’t! Yes he is! No he isn’t…”
It doesn’t matter, just how some people view him. You can personally view it however you like and leave it at that.
As long as it doesn’t devolve down just plain contradiction I can handle it.
People compare him to Picard because, as he was originally pitched by Gene Roddenberry and portrayed by Jeffrey Hunter, he was. I believe he was originally supposed to be more of a stoic. Discovery has made him a lot more like Kirk. I’m OK with that.
Pike, Kirk and Picard were all pitched by GR. GR’s version is the version we saw in The Cage. Kirk was very much like Pike. He was cast in the same era. Kirk came along only because Hunter was unavailable. Picard had some Kirk like elements but he was created by an older and different GR. They are VERY different. They do share some characteristics. They both seem to garner respect but their command styles are drastically different.
I’m very excited about this new series – optimism is much needed! I personally found Star Trek: Picard too dark and violent (took me a month to work up the fortitude to actually finish the series after the season ended.) This is a great cast- Anson Mount has quickly become one of my favorite actors in the Star Trek universe – give me more of that southern hospitality! More please !
Kudos! CBS might actually get my money on this one😂😂😂🖖
Episodic and optimistic storytelling is what we need right now. Those classical Trek values is what makes Star Trek great. The COVID-19 pandemic will pass. We will survive together.
My older brother graduated from college today. We had graduation from home. It was a virtual graduation. He majors in statistics with a computer science and economics minors.
University of Minnesota class of 2020.
My high school graduation is on June 5th.
Class of 2020
Congratulations! The sudden, near universal excitement about episodic television in 2020 baffles me, though as a long term proponent I welcome it of course. Welcome to my world :)
It is just a complete turnaround from the situation in 2017 before the launch of Discovery. I wonder how much the pandemic has changed their minds regarding this (and optimism/exploration in Trek) as much as it has changed their world and lives?
The bleakest times are the time for some good old escapism filled with a sense of wonder!
Vulcan Soul I’m going to the University of Minnesota this fall. It’s a great school. Minnesota is my home so I have to stay close to my community.
Congratulations! Especially for being a Trek fan in an era where Trek hasn’t been that popular! Do your peers consider themselves Trek fans?
Well done — CONGRATS to you and your brother!
Special guests we need to see in SNW: Commodore April, Lieutenant Kirk, Prime Lorca.
Older versions of Archer and T’Pol and a young Scotty (I remember a DC annual showing Scotty as part of Pike’s crew, and yes I know this would not be considered canon).
archer died in 2245 a day after the 1701 was launched so he would not be able to be in it and t’pol would be a very very old grey haired and have lots of wrinkles by 2258
and scotty came aboard the 1701 in 2265 same time as kirk and sulu
I’ll always plug Robert Patrick for the role of Commodore April.
I think it would be cool if they saved Kirk for the series finale, when he takes over from Pike.
I’m sure I’m not the only one hoping we get the old ‘Space, the final frontier’ in the intro!
Also I see this being done perhaps in the way season 4 of Enterprise was done, a few different 2-3 episode story arcs through the season.
First… I’m heartened that Akiva mentioned the episodes will be fairly self contained with some elements of an arc in them. That is what Enterprise did in the first half of season 3. I’m wondering home many episodes this season will have. The more the better.
Regarding Kurtman saying “we heard you”. Great! Did you also hear that we want fresh people running this show? No? Selective hearing…
At least they gave us what we want. They did hear us. The people running the show are just fine.
Partly. There is a large contingent of fans that would like to see completely new producers of SNW. That part they seemed to not hear.
You mean the 25 fans who post here and on a couple of other Trek fan sites 24/7 with multiple posts per day..that “large contingent” of fans? ;-0
Going by that theory then one could say that those happy with the results of Kurtzman are the 10 or twelve here and a couple of other sites. This door swings both ways.
You will be surprised no doubt that I am telling you here that this is a fair point you are making.
The man can’t fire himself, for Pike’s sake! He was personally appointed by CBS to oversee all things Trek. He has a five-year contract. And, in CBS’s view (the only one that matters, since they are his employers), he’s doing a fine job. So get over it. If you don’t want Kurtzman’s take on Trek, come back in about 15 years. By then, maybe there’s another guy in charge.
Salvador,
That’s hardly an ‘optimistic’ approach for anybody with taste who despises what these creatives have done to date. Are you suggesting that people who don’t like Trump should just wait and come back when another guy is in charge?
Being into Trek values isn’t exactly about putting up with an unsatisfactory status quo, otherwise there never would have been multiple letter-writing campaigns to keep TOS on the air. It’s about wanting to ‘summon the future’ — which mandates change in the present.
Put your dollars in Mando’s pocket (if he has one) at Disney or your kid’s college fund or in costlier healthier food choices rather than in CBS coffers. Quit endorsing mediocrity and supporting incompetence (in all things that matter to you.)
“Are you suggesting that people who don’t like Trump should just wait and come back when another guy is in charge?”
Does 6 months work for that, hopefully?
Don’t delude yourself, he’ll win in November, Dems shot themselves in the foot by not backing Sanders. He’s the only one who would’ve had a chance.
Actually, Dems should thank the current pandemic. It’s effect on the economy is their opportunity to take down Trump. If the economy doesn’t turn around by November, that will be their chance. Before Covid19 I’m afraid no Democrat had a chance in Hell.
Good point
If he wins, it will be because he uses the COVID as an excuse to suppress voter turnout. That’s his only chance, because I can tell you for a fact that my handful of Independent and right-leaning friends who either didn’t vote or voted for Gary Johnson because they didn’t like Hillary — they have had enough of Trump and are voting Biden. None of these would have voted for “let’s cut everyone a check Bernie.” Biden needs to do just 2% better than Hillary and he wins — no problemo!
It’s over unless he cheats. You can take that to the bank.
The guy cheats like regular humans breathe, it is whether he gets away with it, which is also like other people breathing. The fact this country can turn a blind eye to its own checks and balances in the face of such overt and appalling displays almost makes me question whether we deserve this horrorshow@1600, because there’s no way it should have been permitted to go on anywhere near this long. Elected Republicans everywhere (but esp in Senate) have got an awful lot to answer for, and not just at polls but in courts, assuming those haven’t all been flipped into being kangaroo courts.
The bottom line is people tend to vote with their wallets. I think you are letting your personal feelings influence your conclusions. What I have been picking up, not just from people I know but from what I have been able to glean from media stories from various outlets, is that before the pandemic a lot of moderates who refused to vote for Trump the first time have been won over mainly due to the economy. It was a matter of “I still can’t stand his personality but the economy is really moving so I’ll suck it up and vote for him next time around.”
I’m not a fan of the man. But I don’t hate him to the point where I am not going to think straight. How economics are are going in the fall will influence the national vote. Period. If he wins again, it will not be due to “cheating” that many of his most ardent detractors might wish were the case. And if he loses, it won’t be because of “cheating” like he himself might whine about either.
If it really is about economics to the degree you say, then I have to conclude I just don’t have a valid informed opinion. The whole definition of economics doesn’t seem to track anymore, since it seems now (always?) that it is about perceptions and trends and stock markets instead of reality and hard numbers.
I don’t know anybody who votes based on national economics, not since my mother died anyway, but then again, I’ve never circulated in ‘economically viable’ circles. Maybe the more wealth you have, the more you fight to protect and increase it, especially when it rises and falls based on perception?
A great deal about the economy is perception. Stocks rise and fall based on confidence. Similarly, most national elections are based on the economy. Although there are measurable things that can indicate how things are going. A lot of people see this even though you and the people you know seem not to. And it typically is not people being selfish as you just inferred. It’s about how things are going, or perceived as going overall. Believe it or not, people tend to prefer it when unemployment is low and the market is strong. Even if they themselves don’t gain one cent from such goings on. Most realize that is a good thing and history has shown that is often how votes are cast in national elections.
I actually spent a couple hours looking at what seemed to be reputable sites to study up on this yesterday, and I’m even more confused than when I wrote the post above. My (hopefully wrong) takeaway is that the economy is good when enough people just say it is — sort of like accepting a movie is good because it ranks well on rotten tomatoes.
My gut-level on unemployment has in normal times been that when it is low, it is because we’ve gotten more people into low-paying jobs — that aren’t enough to live on instead of on the dole — which is hardly improving things in an appreciable way, outside of legitimately pushing stats in a ‘good’ direction.
I suppose my other takeaway on this going forward is that it does explain a lot of voting in my lifetime that I could not for the life of me comprehend on an intellectual or ethical basis, going back to Reagan.
OK then. Regardless of how important economic factors are to you… It remains a factor in national elections. Like it or not. That was my point. If the election were held tomorrow Biden would have a real chance only because of Covid-19. That was all I was trying to say.
What Kurtzman could do, however, Salvador Nigeria would be to open things up a bit more and pull back from editing the shows himself.
His strategic vision is incredible, and he has been amazing in terms of engaging talent.
That said, acknowledging he’s been accountable for the Star Trek brand overall, I’m beginning to wonder if some of the issues with coherence has been the amount of material that’s been cut out in editing, instead of the scripts being locked down before shooting.
It doesn’t seem as though the showrunners and supervising directors have the control they need to in such heavily serialized series. At the same time, other than Short Treks, there hasn’t been a path for new ideas from the outside. The flexibility and play that Kurtzman has permitted by allowing scenes to be shot first and then assessed in editing hasn’t been working as well as he’d hoped.
The editing isn’t the problem, the material is the problem. Putting more stuff into this wouldn’t make it better, just make it seem more endless and undramatic.
Yes. He has a 5 year deal. But that doesn’t mean that he cannot at least TRY and think outside the box. Who says he HAS to work with Akvia and all those folks? Why not do what he was hired to do? Be in charge overall but let other people run the individual shows? There is no reason he could not hire, for the sake of argument, Manny Coto as show runner for SNW. Alex would still be the top dog but would allow Coto the creative freedom to put the show together he things will be best.
Besides… If CBS is not happy they pretty much can terminate the contract and buy him out at any time. Or just not extend it when the time comes.
Well said, Salvador. I think he’s doing a great job, and for the most part, he doesn’t try to micromanage the creative folks.
Such great news to hear that we’re getting a Pike-focused show at last!
I’ve not commented around here since just before season one of PICARD begun in January, so please allow me a little indulgence.
As well as getting a chance to binge on a variety of streamed shows I previously missed, one of the advantages of my recent ‘lockdown’ was being able to treat myself to a nostalgic re-watch of all the classic TOS episodes and subsequent movies over a number of days.
During this time, I resolved to DITCH my long-held ‘head canon’ which separated various instalments of the ‘Star Trek’ franchise into totally ‘alternate universes’ to smooth them into a better fit for a re-watch….as I realised that I just didn’t want to include certain stuff for a future re-watch whatsoever again!
What spurred this radical change of heart? Well, the woefully underwhelming conclusion of the ‘Star Wars’ sequel trilogy did actually. As a long-time fan of that franchise too, the way the ‘saga conclusion’ was handled just made me decide to write-off the entire sequel trilogy storyline and it’s characters altogether. What a wasted opportunity of getting the characters of Luke, Han, and Leia back together onscreen after all those years…and I’ve now consigned those movies to the same waste bin that I’ve stuck the prequel trilogy storyline in.
My point is, that no matter what ‘franchise’ I’ve held in great affection over the years, I’ve finally realised that’s it’s much better for me to totally ignore the instalments that frustrate me, and only revisit the ones that I truly enjoy.
So just as I’ll stick to the original trilogy of A NEW HOPE, THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK, and RETURN OF THE JEDI (‘Despecialized’ versions) as the only ‘Star Wars’ saga I’ll ever need, I’ll equally end any re-watch of the INDIANA JONES movies on the ride into the sunset at the conclusion of THE LAST CRUSADE, no KINGDOM OF THE CRYSTAL SKULL required afterwards thanks.
And getting back to my recent ‘Star Trek’ re-watch, I have forever ditched the uneven ‘remastered’ TOS versions for the original ‘retro’ look of the classic episodes (which include my preferred look for the ‘doomsday machine’ for instance)….and then finished off my nostalgic re-watch of those characters with THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY movie storyline…before completely discarding the GENERATIONS movie altogether….then went directly to the FIRST CONTACT movie to round things off for myself with the NEXT GEN crew’s encounter with the Borg. And No J.J. ‘Kelvin Timeline’ shenanigans will ever be involved again for myself whatsoever either.
As far as the DISCOVERY and PICARD shows go, they have merely been a one-watch-only distraction for me while I hoped for something more akin to the kind of ‘Star Trek’ I prefer to come along eventually. The news of a new show set aboard a starship I actually like the look of, featuring the characters of PIKE, SPOCK, and Number One, is a big step in the direction for me at this point. And the fact that it this show will mark a return to some self-contained, individual storylines is another big step in the right direction, and hopefully turn out to be something that I’ll be happy to re-watch someday.
Great title for this show by the way….now if they can actually give it a rousing theme tune over some good introductory credits this time, then that would be a great help. Oh, and can we leave the profanity out of this particular show please, as I’d actually like to be able to introduce my younger family members to this crew this time around.
Star Wars means a lot to me. The sequel trilogy was nice. I really liked Kylo Ren as a villain. Luke, Han, Leia and other original trilogy characters was a wasted opportunity.
Discovery and Picard are shows I will not rewatch anytime soon.
Glad you’ve checked back in Cervantes.
I hope you don’t mind an equally long response.
Reading through your new personal approach, I’m hoping that you’re more in sympathy with Kurtzman’s strategic approach of a menu of Trek series designed for different target audiences.
I’ve also recently been thinking quite a bit about JRR Tolkien’s essay that he wrote for a reprinted edition of the LOTR trilogy (and which appears in the copy I had as a child), and what it proposes for shared universes.
Beyond Tolkien’s theological discussion of the propriety of ‘subcreating’ his own fantasy universe with its own gods (a significant consideration for him as a devout Roman Catholic Christian) as well as an excellent rebuttal of moral relativism and what we would call grimdark (but he called nihilism), Tolkien was very clear that he viewed his novels as just one version of an imagined or ‘subcreated’ history.
So, Tolkien expected and wanted others to interpret that history and retell it in visuals, theatre or literature. He expected differences in interpretation or even retelling much as we see in historical works.
For Tolkien, the ‘canon’ would have been in the overarching story and in the fundamental values and messages. He and the other members of the Cambridge Group (e.g. CS Lewis) were consciously pushing back on the darkness of thought during the second World War.
I think that they would have understood the struggles that Star Trek creatives have had in bringing optimistic and aspirational stories to life in the post 9/11 era, and the pressures to show the grim to get to the virtues.
By the way, my own path to seeing The Cage when it became available in the 80s, was because a friend with an interest in CS Lewis made the case that there was a direct line of development from Lewis’s novel ‘Out of the Silent Planet’ through the 1956 movie ‘Forbidden Planet’ through to ‘The Cage’. So, I watched the film and then The Cage, neither of which I’d seen previously.
Coming at it from that perspective, it made the unfulfilled potential of Trek’s “lost pilot” all the more saddening.
But having SNW move it forward now during a global pandemic, with Mount’s very morally centred Pike, is in so many ways the best possible outcome.
@ TG47 – Thanks for the welcome back.
As far as Kurtzman’s various crop of ‘Trek’-branded projects for different audiences goes, I remain hopeful that there’ll be something that sticks to the wall that I’ll eventually love, out of what’s being flung at it. Certainly, STAR TREK: STRANGE NEW WORLDS looks like being the best possibility of something that hooks me more than other recent follow-ups or interpretations of the original source material have done so far.
That equally goes for the various ‘Star Wars’-related material that’s appeared over the years too. Despite my love of the original movies and characters, there’s been a lot of dross released which I’ll never re-watch again in that franchise either. I look forward to the 2nd season of ‘THE MANDALORIAN’ tv show however, and also hope that some future movie storyline and plotting will enthuse me once again.
By the way, my own preferred method to re-watch the original TOS show nowadays, is to start off with the otherworldly vibe of ‘THE CAGE’/Pike storyline…and then begin the Kirk era episodes in production sequence with the ‘WHERE NO MAN HAS GONE BEFORE’ storyline first…before eventually finishing the season 3 run by swapping around the ‘TURNABOUT INTRUDER’ episode with ‘THE SAVAGE CURTAIN’ storyline instead, before moving onto the TOS movies. I find that to be a much more satisfying conclusion to the show for myself.
Also, I DON’T include 2-part ‘THE MENAGERIE’ storyline episodes whatsoever these days, as I’ve already watched the purity of ‘THE CAGE’ storyline to kick things nicely off for myself anyway. :)
I would like to introduce my family to Star Trek. This is the right show to introduce my parents and brothers to Star Trek in the right way.
Discovery and Picard are not family friendly. The return to optimism is what we need in the COVID-19 era. Picard has people saying the F word out loud so not for kids. Help us get through a pandemic.
I’m currently rewatching DS9 and that is great. I would love to rewatch this in the future.
So this is excellent news. Having watched Hell on Wheels and being introduced to the excellent acting of Anson Mount before he was on Discovery, and now especially after seeing the main trio in Discovery I am very optimistic about this show and the acting talent behind it. With talent like these I highly doubt even a guy like Akiva Goldsman can fail (hopefully, but lets not forget, we are talking about the guy who wrote Batman and Robin here) (and I am sure someone is gonna remind me that he also won an Oscar with A Beautiful Mind, well rare and unexpected things can happen in life.) What I am wondering more though is how many episodes this show will have each year. I think that episodic format works best with 20 or more episodes a year shows but I highly doubt CBS would give them that. I am thinking 13-15 episodes a year.
When Discovery season 2 ended Anson Mount talked in several interviews about how long it took to shoot the show. Based on those interviews I don’t think he’d be willing to do 20 or more episodes. Probably even shorter than Discovery.
Agreed and considering the fact that it would be filmed in Canada, I don’t think Anson Mount would want to stay away from his family for long periods of time. Although if I am not mistaken Hell on Wheels was also filmed in Canada and that had like 13 episodes season, so I think this would be the maximum number of episodes.
Mount met his wife while working in Alberta (while they were walking their dogs as I recall).
I’m not sure whether she is Canadian or not, but it doesn’t sound as though she’d object to Toronto in principle.
I’d wondered though if it’s a matter of their having established a life in New York State, and perhaps her relocating and restarting her own work there that is the concern. They have a farmhouse, barn and some land. Could also be that, if she’s not a US citizen, she’s at a stage in the US immigration process that she needs to stay in the US.
What’s more likely the issue is the amount of time planned for production on a sound stage. Mount has said at Cons that he missed filming outdoors, and that Discovery was almost all done inside for him. So, I’m wondering if part of the ‘creative conversations’ with Mount were about having a higher proportion of location shooting and perhaps some episodes or production blocks where he is mainly absent. Having a more episodic format would be much more amenable to shooting on location, and perhaps Number One will be doing more of the bridge scenes while Pike is on an away team.
If the new show really does explore more strange new worlds I’d be surprised if they did them all on stage or in CGI. They should do more location shooting.
I don’t think they could even afford to do 20 episodes, not on these budgets. I suspect it will be around 10 episodes like Picard. Could be a bit less or a bit more but I don’t see a huge swing one way or the other.
They should do at least one episode of short trek at one of those fanmade bridge sets, just to see how that would work out.
They already have a 1701 bridge built, it was used on DSC (and is shown in the image in this article), so no reason to use a fan made TOS recreation.
Hmm.
So they heard “us”…. Sure?
they brought in Pike, spock, no. 1 and the enterprise and never had a Plan for this Show? And now they pretend its All because of the Fans?
I dont know. But anyways.
if they would care they also would rethink the fanfilm restrictions and learn a lesson from Star wars.
I mean, this SOUNDS like the kind of Trek series I’d love to see, but … I’ll be in wait/see mode, arms crossed, eyes squinted, face frowning slightly until I get a reason not to.
But it does sound promising, no doubt about it.
I don’t necessarily agree about the face frowning part but I’m definitely in the wait and see camp. I just don’t think it’s a good idea to formulate all these expectations because they will never be met exactly so it sets you up for disappointment.
John Slattery as Boyce, please!
Fewer F bombs would be nice too. As much as I liked Picard I felt those weren’t necessary along with Icheb’s gruesome death. In fact, when the admiral did it the first time it came across as forced.
Funnily enough, in Star Trek it always comes to me as forced because these are supposed to be much more enlightened people. They should be above swearing. I am not trying to belittle the people who swear here, but there should be something more than swearing. Language changes and I believe the swearing will also change in 200-300 years.
Swearing is part of the way humans in most cultures express themselves. Substituting ‘blazes’ or ‘tarnation’ or ‘sufferin’ succotash’ isn’t a genuine distinction, except that they sound more silly to most western ears.
Yeah, I agree, I think using “substitutes” is more juvenile than swearing. But the distinction is professionalism. In most Starfleet contexts, I don’t think there should be swearing. Interpersonally, I think swearing is acceptable. But if you’re gonna swear, make it feel natural, not emphasizing it as like “omg he just said the f bomb what!!!” THAT is the most juvenile writing of all, and that’s exactly what current Trek writers are guilty of.
Disagree. Nobody in DSC or PIC were swearing haphazardly. They swore for emphasis. The military is full of swearing, as far back as you go. There’s a famous quote from Patton:
“It may not sound nice to some bunch of little old ladies at an afternoon tea party, but you can’t rule an army without profanity.”
No issue with it, not in realism, not in appropriateness. Many of the swear words we use today have been in common use for hundreds of years– “damn” goes back as far as the 14th century, even as a swear. The “F-Word” goes back as far as the 18th century, and there’s no indication it is going away any time soon (I think we’d all agree it’s more prevalent now than ever before as it’s usage has become more accepted). Perfectly believable it will be around in 200 more years.
In fact, if you want to argue over whether it would be used in the 23rd century, you could probably argue that by then it would be EVEN MORE COMMON, and possibly not even considered an egregious swear.
I take umbrage with the notion that enlightened = not swearing. Some of the most enlightened people swear like sailors.
“Some of the most enlightened people swear like sailors”
I have to disagree with this. They might be enlightened but they would be more enlightened if they would stop it. One of the priniciples of Enlightment is not to make your fellow man feel uncomfortable and treat him with respect.
You can disagree all you want, but you’re wrong– not swearing doesn’t make someone more enlightened. If swearing makes someone uncomfortable, than an enlightened person would be smart enough to not use it around that person.
But it doesn’t mean they don’t swear at all.
Of course, in the future, maybe we’ll all be so enlightened that swearing doesn’t make us uncomfortable, and we’re all a lot less puritanical.
You swear because you are angry. If you are angry that means you are not in control of your emotions. An enlightened person would be guided by her mind not temprament. But Enlightment came just before before Sturm und Drang. Maybe they are Sturm and Drang people in the future!?! They would swear like crazy
Ah, I see you’re problem. You’re starting from a false premise: that one only swears when they’re angry or out of control.
I think you have a fundamental misunderstanding of what we colloquially refer to “swear words.”
You are probably right your language and culture and mind set is alien to me. Sorry. Our word for it is Fluch or in other context it might be Beleidigung or Beschimpfung.
Whereas T’Pol’s Beard, in my professional environment only severe emotional distress would mitigate a reprimand for disrespectful and unprofessional conduct, and likely not even then (if it were viewed as a problem controlling anger).
We’re talking fairly extreme consequences to a career, and ones that one’s union rep (if one not an executive) would be of little help in mitigating. If one is in management, one might find oneself on a lengthy track to dismissal. Seriously.
So, please take a step back and understand that in many workplaces in North America this language is absolutely not acceptable.
Good self-regulation is viewed in many large organizations as an essential part of creating a respectful workplace, and use of vulgarity is seen as not sharing these values.
I believe that usage is a lot more cultural than I think many people realize, and therefore so is how people interpret their impact.
Given are many places where the social and professional sanctions are heavy (even some military workplaces), assertions along the lines that “it’s just the real world” are quite simply ill-informed.
Yes, it’s some parts of the real world, often those workplaces where creativity is prized over the risk of permitting abusive or hostile environments, but it’s naive to argue that it is acceptable everywhere.
I’ve been an executive for 25 years and things seemed to have shifted around 2005 or so. These days, every office I work in has more swear type words thrown around. Only when entertaining new clients do we curb our language at all, but it usually relaxes by the end of any meeting once we get acquainted. There’s never been any reprimands for the use of strong language.
TG, I think you also have a fundamental misunderstanding. There is a difference between swearing and vulgarity.
I don’t think that I misunderstand, but as you say, the norms are changing.
The English words that we’re referring to (the F-word, and sh–) are vulgarities. Swear words historically have involved religious references. Which would make Bones saying “Damn-it Jim” swearing.
Not so long ago English speakers used heck and darn or drat to avoid religious swearing. Learning to work in a bilingual workplace with Francophones, I came to understand that many of the classic French swears are still deeply religious in meaning, even if they seemed relatively benign to me (and Francophones in Canada are more and more secular).
So, even the usage of the expression ‘swear words’ has changed for English speakers (Anglophones).
In terms of workplaces, I can say that when I was in the US as a grad student, I found that there was much less use of vulgar language than I was used to as an undergraduate in my part of Canada, and I toned down my language to accommodate my peers.
But in a professional workplace in Canada, it’s just not done. Every once in while, we’ll have someone at a workshop talk about how freeing up language helps with innovation and creativity, but there is no permission given for it.
Rather, the general trend has been to requiring increasingly polite, respectful behaviour in the workplace. I’m very aware of colleagues who have suffered lengthy and serious consequences from verbal outbursts, with the use of the F-word considered the point-non-plus, even with an apology given.
And, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere, the consequences for kids here are serious. When our kids were little, my spouse convinced me that I’d better clean up my language or they would pay the price for imitating me. I’d actually cleaned it up a lot from my undergraduate days, but having kids meant learning not to say the f-word even when something drops on my foot.
Basically, it’s just not our reality, and I’ve noted some folks from the US saying here it’s the same in their professional environments. Perhaps it works in certain industries, but not others.
What’s more uncomfortable, to drop a hammer on your toe and NOT yell out Fred Uncle Charlie Katie or to let yourself feel uncomfortable because you’re hearing somebody in pain yell out Fred Uncle Charlie Katie?
That is to philosophical for me.
Then sign up for CBSTrek, where philosophy is just a word.
In Star Trek swearing comes out as forced and unnecessary. No F bombs at all would be nice. People don’t need to swear in the future.
Yes pleeeeeease!!! I’m ready for this show and a return to form with an episodic series and a positive tone!!!
If anyone is reading this I know that one thing I want is STRANGE. Not alternative Earths… etc. Just saying we loved those episodes growing up. But not sure we need one now. No Alt Romes, etc…
TOS is the only show that ever did that and that was clearly to save money. The only other show that ever did that from what I can recall was Enterprise with North Star (which is a great episode) but clearly more of a homage to those stories.
But its why I always thought it was funny when people bragged TOS they never went back to Earth like the other shows did. Well you don’t have to when every two episodes you’re running into a fake Earth every dozen episodes. ;)
Well… In the Trek show bible for writers one of the rules was they never went back to Earth in their own time frame. Even though they went to Miri-Earth, Nazi-Earth, Roman-Earth… It was NOT THEIR Earth. I think the main reason for that was they didn’t want to spend the money to show a future looking Earth.
Exactly. It was most likely just a money reason. Don’t forget we DID actually see them go back to Earth twice, but they just time traveled to present day Earth. So it really wasn’t about not wanting to go back to Earth so much as it was probably not having the money to show a more futuristic one. In reality they probably would’ve went back quite a few times if they could.
Ironically every single TOS movie showed off Earth, so it was never really about not wanting to show it.
I love these episodes. I alwasys wanted them to find an Amish planet. That would be so paradox.
question: i like the kelvin version of events of how everyone met on kirk’s enterprise… and in the mirror mirror universe pike’s killed by kirk and kirk takes over the enterprise… but is there any cononical info on how the kirk crew (uhura, scotty, sulu) is put together in the prime timeline? i mean do they bring the enterpsie back to space dock after pike is promoted and ditch the old crew and put a whole new crew on board for kirk? or do uhura scotty etc eventually end up on pike’s ship then kirk just takes over an existing crew?
Most of them weren’t even around yet during Kirk’s first episode. Chekov didn’t show up until season 2. I think the origin of the Enterprise crew is pretty unexciting. They were all just assigned to the Enterprise over time.
There is no canocal information of when the TOS characters joined the ship, the only show that didn’t form a new crew from the outset. So they have the freedom to literally put any of them on Pike’s ship minus maybe Chekhov (although it’s been basically retconned he was there from the start or at least like the first year) and Kirk of course. That’s the only character who would be a non starter.
Chekov would be 11 or 12 in the SNW time frame. So doubtful he would be on the Enterprise.
But I still say it’s OK to have an Ensign Uhura or Scott. But they really ought to limit when crew members were around for Pike. Hell, in The Managerie non of them mentioned they were there under him. Of course that doesn’t mean they didn’t. But it would still be a bit odd that no one mentioned it.
I don’t mean in the beginning, but he very well could show up before we hit TOS (assuming this show got that far in the timeline).
And I agree they shouldn’t go buck wild with it, but one or two TOS characters would be fine if they did decide to go that way. And I think the Menagerie thing could just be excused that none of them served with Pike as much time as Spock did. They like and respect him but not as close if they only served a short time with him vs Spock where his entire career started under Pike and considered him his mentor.
And it’s been well established at this point plenty of people seem to not mention quite a few things lol. I’m still trying to wrap my head even now that Starfleet knows thanks to Discovery the Defiant is going to have a mutiny where the crew kill themselves and the ship will disappear into the Mirror universe in the next decade; but apparently no one ever thinks to gives that ship a heads up for some reason. Reason #47 why I’m not a huge fan of prequels but at this point I’m willing to roll with anything.
Nope, that’s not how it works. As Damar said ^ people joined the crew over time, and in TOS in particular even the main cast seemed quite interchangeable; there were plenty of other helmsmen and navigators, comm officers etc. In real life, unless a ship is new, they wouldn’t just replace the crew wholesale
wait so the first episode aired with kirk is the man trap… sulu, uhura are there and of course mccoy spock and kirk… but the kirk pilot (where no man…) is the third aired but first shot and it has scotty and sulu but no uhura or mccoy because of a different dr in the pilot… i think we can all assume uhura is there just not seen… so they are all there to begin the 5 year mission even if we don’t see them… the main crew is all there even checkov is retconned sort of… mccoy though i don’t know how they explain him.
so question: is canon timeline based on episode aired or produced?
i would think there’s a good chance one or more (uhura, sulu, scotty or even rand) would be on the enterprise under pike later on… this is fun new ground because this will be important canon issues leading into kirk and piss everyone off. or they just dont attempt it and have the pike crew just all leave and empty the ship and start all new like when flight attendants and pilots deplane and the new crew goes on.
Well I think your first idea works fine because the Pike crew could’ve just been transferred, killed etc by the time Kirk comes on. The Cage happened over a decade before TOS started its timeline so you can just buy a lot of the people we saw in first season could have served with Pike as we literally saw Spock did. Others just may have joined much later.
But that’s what I’m saying, not only does it not stop them from including more TOS characters it would actually make sense to do it because you can believe a lot of them would be holdovers from Pike’s time.
Spock and Number One is the perfect example. When he joined he was just an ensign but by the time Kirk showed up he had advanced to first officer on that ship. So where did Una go? Most likely she just got promoted captain to her own ship years ago. Or maybe something more tragic and killed on duty and Spock replaced her. Maybe Boyce got reassigned and McCoy replaced him. Maybe Sulu showed up a year before Kirk did as well.
That’s the beauty of this show and could be a true TOS prequel because nothing stops from doing these things. I don’t they will at least not right away but it’s all feasible within canon.
We only know that at the beginning of the series Mccoy and Kirk are old friends and Spock and Kirk just recently knew each other.
That’s what I gathered. I’m not 100% sure but I think it was in the writer’s bible that Kirk and McCoy had a bit of a past together. Could be wrong though. It’s been a very long time since I’ve read stuff about that.
Yeah I agree I think Kirk and McCoy were supposed to have been friends prior to TOS and why they call each other by nicknames or first names. Kind of funny but EVERY Trek show followed that same tradition with the Captain and had a prior relationship with at least one main character:
Picard and Crusher
Sisko and Dax (sort of ;))
Janeway and Tuvok
Archer and Trip
And more interesting most either called each other by their nicknames or first names like ‘Old man’, ‘Trip’, ‘Ben’, ‘Jean Luc’ etc.
I always wondered was that on purpose or it just happen to work out that way?
+ Burnham and Georgiou
& Picard and Raffi
Sorry but Burnham and Georgiou doesn’t count. We clearly saw her meeting Georgiou when she was Captain of the Shenzhou already and Burnham took on a position. They weren’t ‘friends’ before then and Burnham looked up to Georgiou more like a mother figure, not like a buddy or a close friend like the others did.
I guess you can sort of include Saru and Georgiou as an example since they knew each other before she took command of the Shenzhou but again it was still seen more of a mentor/teacher relationship and not really friends per se.
Picard and Raffi, AFAIK they didn’t know each other until he took command of evacuating the Romulans and she just became his first officer, but yes they did end up becoming friends after wards.
I mean … that’s the exact same thing that was said before Discovery Season 1, 2 and Picard. Maybe not the Episodic thing but all of them were supposed to be finally more like Star Trek … and it got worse and worse every time …
I mean, I’ll watch the pilot. It’ll be on a streaming service, I’m already paying for anyways. But being disappointed a fourth time isn’t something I look forward to …
Worse and worse TO YOU. I enjoyed them tremendously, and think both are very Star Trek. Maybe this will disappoint you, too. I’m sure i’ll enjoy it. Maybe that makes me a sucker, as I’ve been accused, or having no standards, but at the end of the day I like what i’m seeing.
And no one can and should take that away from you. However I‘m also allowed to have an opinion … at least that‘s how I feel 😁 — and it‘s not like I‘m the only one, who feels, that the shows were subpar on a general writing level and failed as Trek shows especially. You need different opinions to have a conversation.
I just meant, it’s weird, that they feel the need to effectively say „we‘re getting it right this time guys. This time it‘ll feel like Trek“ before every new Series/Season. There would be no need for that if they felt, that’s what they did with the Seasons before.
I don’t think they said they go classic with Picard. They explicitly said they tried something new. They did this and in my oppinion they failed but at least they did something they belived in.
I believe, they said, that they wanted to tell a different story than TNG because, Picard himself is a different Person after all the years. However they were adamant that what they’re telling is very much a Trek story at heart.
Fans expected a show set in the TNG universe, following one of the characters later in his life.
And it was nothing like that.
Yeah, it is strange. Judging from what they say on panels I think they get what Star Trek is, but from what they put on screen I don’t think they get it at all.
Please NO Jeff Russo, please.
I really like the new theme that Nami Melumad composed for the Short Trek Q & A.
It seemed just right for Pike, Number One and Spock. I sincerely hope that they use it for SNW, and that they put Melumad in charge of music.
I couldn’t agree more!!
Yes. That end credits theme – totally fits the new show! Hope they use it.
Glad someone’s saying that out loud. There are a lot of good things about Discovery and Picard, but the music ain’t one of them. The season-2 Short Treks had way better scores, mainly because Russo wasn’t scoring them. I particularly liked the score for Q&A – is it possible that they already introduced the Pike theme?
T’pol….please! And Archer…,!
T’pol is always possible but Archer would probably be long dead by now. I still think we will see Archer again in SOME form though. Maybe not in any of these shows given their time periods but many raised the possibility of a Short Trek in the future.
You think Archer will still be alive at 195 years old?
I think Archer would be alive. He is alive in the Kelvin timeline which is even a few years later than SNW.
Well, they inferred he might still be alive which I thought was a tremendous stretch. Worse, they mention his Beagle. Which unless veterinary science has lengthened canine lifespans considerably it was yet another huge stretch. Is it possible Archer just like Beagles? I guess. But it feels funny that he would CONSTANTLY own a Beagle. So I took that bit with many grains of salt.
archer died a day after the enterprise was launched in 2245 un command of capt robert april who pike replaced in 2250
and by 2258 t’pol would be as old as she was in that enterprise season 3 episode e2
in season 1 she was already in her mid to late 60’s
T’Pol is definitely in play for this series. She would be 164 to 169 years old for Pike’s five year mission.
T’Pol would be in the neighborhood of 205. Enterprise established she was approaching 66. Enterprise was said to take place 150 years before TOS. SNW will be around a decade before TOS. (Presumably). The math is pretty simple.
Actually you’re a bit off by a few decades. Enterprise is only about 100 years before The Cage, so would be a bit over 110 years by TOS. Remember the Klingons disappeared in the 22nd century for a 100 years until they showed up again in The Vulcan Hello. Timeline wise, they essentially disappeared a year after Enterprise final season (yes, someone calculated all of this lol). And Admiral Cornwell confirmed that herself when she mentioned Archer was the first Starfleet Captain to make history to be the first to go to Kronos a century ago. So T’Pol would be around 167 by then. Still no spring chicken or anything but probably still doing her thing. ;)
My calculations were not based on anything said on STD. It was based on what the creators of Enterprise said about their show. If STD contradicted that then I guess we will never know for sure what the time line is. As it would be yet another thing they opted to change.
Well we do know for sure. It’s around 100 years between Enterprise and the Cage. that’s canon now. And since anyone who would decide to bring T’Pol back would be the people making Discovery, then it wouldn’t be an issue age wise. Not that it ever was because it’s fiction and someone can decide Vulcans can live even longer. Just because Spock and Sarek died at 200 doesn’t mean they can’t live much longer. We only have two examples.
I’m actually not a huge fan of changing things around just because it suits a show’s creator. I consider that to be very lazy producing and writing. It’s harder to accept the existing limitations and work within them. The Enterprise people said their show was 150 years before Kirk. But then the STD people decided, no let’s call it 100? Sorry. That irritates me a bit.
LOL man, have you not been watching Discovery? ;)
That’s kind of what they been doing since day one. The show has retcon tons of things, from having a major war with the Klingons to giving Spock a sister or discovering the MU a decade early. This is not remotely different than anything else and moved some of the dates around. It’s all retconing former established things.
But to be honest with you, I never heard Enterprise was set that much farther than TOS, I always heard it was about 100 years before that show. You could be right but I never personally heard that and always assumed it was about a century ahead, give or take a decade I guess.
But this should be easy to figure out since Enterprise actually use Earth dates and TOS has basically had Earth dates created around its timeline for decades now. I’m just too lazy to look them up. ;)
I’ve never heard the hundred year thing until just now here in this thread. I’ve always been working with 150 years because that is what the producers said. I guess we could just do the math from Memory Alpha. But like you I’m too lazy to do it. That data, however, gets altered when the shows and movies decide to change things up. So my guess is it might have been changed to reflect the STD thing mentioned above.
Sorry dude, but you’re just wrong on this one. Looking up all the dates, its clear now ENT was always around 110 year before TOS because it fits exactly the date Enterprise was always set in. Even looking at other evidence like when the Federation was formed lines up with everything we know prior which was always 2161. TOS couldn’t have been 140 years after that, it would place it too close to TNG, which was also about 100 years after TOS or 80 years after the movies. And since Archer help found the Federation when he was still Captain then that alone tells you the dates are aligned correctly.
Discovery didn’t change anything.
Actually now that I thought more about it, the 150 year thing doesn’t make a lot of sense just based on simple math. Enterprise takes place smack dab in the mid 22nd century. That was ALWAYS established as 2151. That date was important because that was ten years before the Federation was founded in 2161. But based on what you said here, that would imply TOS had to be around the year 2300, give or take a few years, hence the 24th century. So that can’t be right man. Your math is simply just a bit off in this case.
Edit: I finally stopped being lazy and looked up the dates on Memory Alpha. Enterprise took place in 2151 and TOS was 2265, so a little over 110 years as I originally said.
The Discovery writers actually got it right…for a change. ;D
Then the Enterprise creators were incorrect when they said 150 years before Kirk.
Or man maybe you just heard it wrong? As I said I NEVER heard Enterprise was suppose to be set 150 years before TOS, certainly no one from the show itself. You’re the first one I ever heard claim this. I always heard it was about a century. I never knew the exact dates, but since all the dates do in fact line up to that, then yeah.
Or maybe someone said something in an interview that was speaking in general or could’ve misspoke. Or maybe at one time that WAS planned but changed when they actually started production. So I’m not saying you’re wrong per se, it just could’ve been different factors at the time it was said. But looking at the timeline, the show itself was clearly always set closer to 100 years prior.
I would be curious what others thought but its pretty clear now this was always the timeline.
I am not so arrogant to not admit I could have heard it wrong or am not remembering it right. So, yes. That is a possibility.
Cool!
The plot of Broken Bow took place in April 2151. Archer mentions that date in a log entry right in the episode. So that date was established long before Discovery. It’s nothing the Discovery producers changed.
If anybody said that Enterprise took place 150 years before Kirk they didn’t either didn’t know when Enterprise and TOS took place or they couldn’t do the math.
Exactly!!!
Enterprise’s missions took place a about 100 years before Pike’s Enterprise missions.
And T’Pol was born in 2088.
So she is in her 160’s during the Pike-era.
Easy-peasy
That is simply not correct.
T’Pol was born to T’Les and her husband in 2088.
In 2250, Pike was promoted to captain and was given command of the Enterprise where he served as the ship’s commanding officer until 2265,
Now do the math.
T’pol YES!!!
A bit bitter-sweet, to me. I just hope Star Trek doesn’t fall into the same trap Star Wars did, where they’re so focused on worshiping this one particular era that they don’t try anything new.
TNG worked because it took the tone and format of TOS, but still grew to do it’s own thing with character-focused stories and a few multi-part story-arcs. It was initially failing when it tried to follow the same format as TOS.
Let’s see if this show can bring anything new to the table without messing up the tone.
“A bit bitter-sweet, to me. I just hope Star Trek doesn’t fall into the same trap Star Wars did, where they’re so focused on worshiping this one particular era that they don’t try anything new.”
Yep, and that’s why I loved The Last Jedi, but poor Rian Johnson got crucified for doing something different and unpredictable. To me, that’s the best SW movie since ROTJ, by a long shot.
We agree on something else. I think TLJ was unduly ridiculed by the fans. Sure, there were some issues but most genre films have those. When I saw it the first time I was put off by the events. But upon a 2nd viewing on disc at home, I liked it a LOT better. I praise Johnson for doing something the audience did not expect. A disillusioned Luke works. I mean, it’s been 35 years. You don’t think life events might change a person by then? And there were other things he included that I liked. Although that side trip to the casino planet went on WAY too long…
Agree with everything you said. The casino scene feeling shoehorned in was the only issue I had with the film…reminded me of how Marvel unnecessarily shoehorned in Spiderman for Civil War and made that movie unnecessarily too long.
OMG OMG OMG!!!
STAR TREK PIKE NOW!!!
I CAN’T BELIEVE IT!!
STAR TREK PIKE NOW!!
Finally.
After Picard and Discovery my goodwill has now been exhausted. With mostly the same people in charge chances are it’ll be as horribly written and structured as those two shows are.
I give it some hope since they mentioned a different approach- TNG, VOY and DS9 were much better mainly because they were episodic. (Most of DS9, anyway).
Look at the Q & A Short Trek, for example, I think that was written in the spirit of the previous shows.
Strange New Worlds will suffer if they insist on making SPOCK look like “Sheldon Cooper”