The second season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is close to wrapping up production for season two, and one thing we know about it is it will include James T. Kirk, played by The Vampire Diaries star Paul Wesley. And in the brand new issue of SFX Magazine members of the cast talk about the new Kirk.
SNW crew talks Kirk
The July issue of SFX Magazine features interviews with the cast of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and the subject of Kirk in season two came up with a number of them. Paramount has previously confirmed that even with the inclusion of Kirk in season two, Anson Mount remains the star of the show and Captain of the Enterprise. Speaking to SFX, Mount talked about how Kirk impacts Pike:
Pike himself is not even aware of the significance of Kirk, right? He’s going to be discovering this character in real-time, hopefully at the same time that we’re discovering what a young Kirk was like.
Rebecca Romijn, who is also a genuine fan, talked about her excitement for being part of a show that includes Kirk:
It’s very exciting. We’re actually shooting an episode right now and the very last thing that happens in that episode… I mean certain things happen and you just read it on the page and you burst into tears. That involves Jim Kirk…
Paul Wesley as Kirk in Strange New Worlds
Of course, a key part of Kirk’s future history involves his close friendship with Spock. When asked if he was looking forward to building on that classic relationship, Ethan Peck said:
It’s hard to wrap my head around that. It’s already so amazing to be part of this as Spock, so to bring him into the picture is its own kind of Bizarro World for me. But yeah, I’m thrilled, and trepidatious. I hope that they really handle it again with due diligence and great care. I’m sure that they will.
It was previously reported that Christina Chong (La’an Noonien-Singh) talked about the fun she had working with Wesley on set. This may or may not have anything to do with Kirk on Strange New Worlds, but when asked the open-ended question about what other Star Trek captain she would like to serve under, Chong told SFX:
I would say Kirk, because he’s very charming. And because, who knows… [meaningful smile]
From the July issue of SFX Magazine
Much more in the new SFX
The July 2022 issue of SFX has a lot more from the rest of the Strange New Worlds cast along with a special Pride feature about LGBTQ+ representation on Star Trek: Discovery with an interview with showrunner Michelle Paradise. The issue is showing up on newsstands now in the UK and soon in the USA and around the world. You can also buy the issue directly online.
July issue cover for SFX
Keep up with all the Star Trek: Picard news and analysis.
I’d have preferred it if they kept Kirks involvement until the last season of the show but the producers did make it clear that they are gonna play fast and loose with canon so I think we might as well enjoy it. I am curious how Paul Wesley will interpret the role, lets hope it doesn’t become a parody of Shatner and just its own thing.
“Fast and loose” is too mild a term for this. Nearly completely ignore is more like it.
I have really enjoyed SNW but I wish they would just come out and say that it is a full on reboot. They wouldn’t have to be so strict and canon strict fans like myself can enjoy it a little more and they can prevent Pikes issue.. Thats how I was able to enjoy the Kelvin timeline movies.
I usually refer to it as a soft reboot but I don’t think soft applies anymore. Discovery being set before the original series opened the door and introducing Pike in season 2 kick the door wide open not to mention the Spock connection and the Enterprise it was inevitable they do this in comic books all the time they reimagine stories that were told 50 years ago or change them entirely in Star Trek you can blame time travel for any alterations to the prime universe as a fan I’m totally okay with this. The original series was great but it was canceled after three seasons and for generations writers use things like the novels and the newer shows to fill in gaps. I love the original series but let’s be real a lot of the things that happen on it don’t hold up well today including how they portrayed and treated women I guarantee you there will be another series with Kirk and Spock after strange new world is done and that series will create new episodes around the original series not negating the cannon necessarily but tweaking it.
Lieutenant uhura and chapel were treated as background characters and I would even go so far to say that chapel was way more developed as a character than Nyota was. As progressive as people claim Star Trek was the black actors were not exactly on full display all the time. I think the original series era is right for all kinds of possibilities how are they going to reconcile the Khan stuff. Guess we’ll just wait and see but Discovery already blew those doors wide open with the mirror universe and the list goes on and on. I’m loving strange New world and all it has to give. Just blame it on the red angel or a Klingon time Crystal and get it over with and I’m cool with that.
Me too. As much as I’d like to see TOS-characters again, the Pre-TOS-cast should have time to evolve and stand on its own. The show was created because of Pike and Spock’s popularity in Discovery. It’s clear from the beginning that SNW leads to TOS (or even a TOS-soft-reboot), but that should happen in a later season. Of course it might be interesting to see what Kirk makes on the U.S.S. Farragut (maybe the could do a prequel to “Obesession”?!?) but this shouldn’t be the focus.
“maybe the could do a prequel to “Obesession”
So, instead of a deadly cloud, they’ll have to fight living fat in “Obese-ssion” :-)
HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!! excellent!
It’s coming (Obsession prequel episode) I bet. That’s just too good not to do and was clearly an important moment for Kirk.
That would be great. There are some loose ends (or beginnings) in TOS which SNW could pick up.
I’d also love to see the original Captain Decker vs. the Doomsday Machine as an ep.
I left religion because of Star Trek demonstrated a future of possibilities. Let’s not become overwhelmingly clerical if the producers can come up with clever twists on what we thought we knew.
For example, I am loving cheesy Sam Kirk. It’s just so opposite our Kirk, and his hipster mustache…. I mean… Who would do this? Well, these producers did and it’s fun.
Remember, when Kirk said he only met Pike once, that could still be true. But that line was written post-WW2. With true social media-like interactivity likely in the military and science, there is no way that Pike and Kirk wouldn’t know a lot about each other eventually. In the current military I am sure everyone knows everyone’s record. Even if you listen to OSINT right now, you can hear discussions about Russian officers field experience. Where does that info come from?
There is no reason Pike wouldn’t know OF Kirk. He could have even recommended him for Captain. But it is clear they only met when Pike got promoted. Presumably when Kirk took over the Enterprise.
I agree with this too but I think like they been doing, they are going to ignore that idea obviously. But of course I get why they are doing, we all do.
WRONG. Kirk only says that he met Pike when Pike was promoted to fleet captain. He does not use the word only. Look at the script for the Menagerie. The only thing they weren’t aware of was the accident, because Kirk’s Enterprise was off underway with its 5-year mission and not in regular communication…
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Pike simply gets a promotion in rank to Fleet Captain and remains as captain of the Enterprise, and Kirk continues his career on the Farragut… Perhaps he was acting captain of the Farragut… Perhaps he was given a new assignment with a different ship. There are plenty of possibilities in canon when the only certain thing is the point at which Kirk met Pike… Everything else we’ve carried around for 50 years is simply speculation.
Kirk only says that he met Pike when Pike was promoted to fleet captain. He does not use the word only. Look at the script for the Menagerie.
I just verified this — you are 100% correct. This removes a major canon issue with this.
I get a kick out of all this hypersensitivity with canon on this series on one hand, yet on the other hand I see so many fans just giving free passes all the time to the juvenile stuff that to me violates (or reduces to silliness)Trek canon on Lower Decks, but maybe that’s just me? LOL
True but the way he said it and the words used would STRONGLY imply that he had not met him before. If I had only met my predecessor that one time I would say “I met him when he retired.” But if I had met him and even worked together a time or two the closest to that line that I MIGHT say is “I last met him when he retired.” But it’s more likely my response would be if I already met him before the last time, “We worked together a couple of times. I last met him when he retired.” Or something to that effect. What people say does have implications.
Nevertheless, “strongly implied” does not equate to it being true in terms of canon. It provides them plenty of wiggle room, unlike if he had actually said “only.”
I think eventually they are going to redo TOS, and that will give them a chance to adjust some of the canon issues that are coming up with all of the new series’.
It was so strongly implied that the way it was presented it could be taken as factual. The only semi reasonable argument against that is in the future standard syntax could be different. While true the show is made for a current audience and pretty much needs to use language that people of the day comprehend. I’m not a fan of the logic that says just because it wasn’t specifically said or shown then strong implications don’t matter. Using that line of thinking one could say that Scotty sold ice cream on the side and it is perfectly OK because they never specifically said he didn’t. I don’t consider that sort of thing to be “wiggle room”.
Yes it all comes down to the original intent of the episode. Clearly Kirk and Pike didn’t know each other besides meeting him once or twice; but nowhere does it remotely imply the two went on adventures together or were friends.
But yes you can find enough room to say they met before. To me, it just feels disingenuous. There is a reason why Spock and only Spock was so hard pressed to help Pike in the Menagerie because he was the only one that had an actual relationship with him. Kirk didn’t seem to know Pike on a personal or professional level beyond meeting once.
But it doesn’t stop them from implying they had a deeper relationship either. This is where it becomes more subjective than anything.
Well said.
Since we don’t know what happens in these upcoming episodes we may see a something like a conflict or even a diffidence between Pike and Kirk. Maybe not as far as disliking each other, but perhaps as far as not caring for the other’s opinion. Just a guess.
Of course we don’t know how this will work out until we see the episodes next year. I’m thinking the only way this works is if Kirk and Pike never share any scenes together. But the article suggests that is not the case and given how Secret Hideout has treated TOS canon on SNW it is reasonable they are going to throw that bit out the window as well.
Clearly those responsible for making SNW just don’t care, either.
Makes sense to me.
That’s totally what I thought they were going to do. But thinking about it I’d love to see a much younger Kirk as a Lieutenant serving aboard the Farragut. And there does need some explanation as to why Kirk was Pike’s choice for Captain and why he and Spock were so close from the (almost) very beginning of Kirk’s command.
It’s waaaaay too early to judge anything, but I did get a little concerned with Christina Chong’s comments- very slightly so. We are promised a very different version of Kirk, and I hope they let the “stack of books with legs” straight-edge Kirk come through. He can be a nerd and charming, right? Rebecca Romijn’s quote bodes well, she’s such a joyful TREK fan in real life.
I read it as possibly hinting at a romance between La’an and Kirk, though in that case people really have to come to terms with him not recognising the name Noonien-Singh immediately.
Or a romance between Chong and Wesley come to think of it.
The way the article is written it very much sounds like there is interaction between Kirk and Pike. Which given how they have opted to ignore nearly everything that has happened on TOS I’m not surprised they would screw up using Kirk, too.
I say this as a life-long “fundamentalist canon” guy: we gotta just let it go.
Everything past Enterprise is so far removed, production and writing-wise, from the Berman-era at this point — twice removed from the original series — that we’re setting ourselves up to be incredibly miserable audience members the further we go. In light of that, I’ve since accepted that as long as the broad strokes are represented, and the story is engaging, it’s fine.
Besides, declaring it “prime” or not, we’re so far up the ass of ‘multiverses’ nowadays that if we’re REALLLLY butt-hurt over a narrative decision, we can just chalk it up to that and get on the with the day. :P
Exactly the way I’m going, Fortyseven. Well said. Let it go.
I’m with you. This is a reboot. The only drawback — from my perspective — is the natural arrogance that comes with thinking they can do TOS but better because it’s new and modern (which is always better than something old). It’ll beg for comparison and take up time explaining the hows and whys it all “works,” which I think is a disservice to SNW. NOT because I think TOS is the best thing ever, but because that makes it difficult for SNW to stand on its own — which every show ought to be able to do.
Of course, there are no doubt millions of Trek fans unfamiliar with TOS or who outright hate it who wouldn’t care/welcome any changes or remixes, this comment isn’t for them and I’m glad they have SNW to stomp all over something they dislike/know nothing about. Maybe someday I’ll get something that stomps out these Star Trek writers’ most cherished personal work.
I think TOS 2.0 was forseeable, but I expected that more in 10-20 years and maybe with modern DeepFake CGI technique which could bring back Shatners and Nimoys Kirk and Spock.
As a fan of 70s sci-fi-styles I would love to see the hypothetical Phase II series how it could have aired in 1977. The designs and the screenplays exist. Maybe one day…
The Phase II scripts are pretty terrible. It’s a good thing that show never happened. It would’ve, in all likelihood, killed off the franchise for good.
In terms of redoing Kirk, Spock, and McCoy (I will be SHOCKED if/when this SH team remembers McCoy exists and understands his role in that trio’s friendship), it’s a marketing decision only, and that’s why it’s such a bummer. We can’t get knew ideas that’s not directly tied to the most recognizable bits of the IP because that’s the easiest way for execs to lose their jobs. Just a bummer that we might not ever get a new Star Trek show that has nothing to do with a prior show.
Well said. Agreed.
We saw what were viewed as the better Phase II scripts in TNG season one.
They weren’t great.
No, THE CHILD was s2 and DEVIL’S DUE was s5 or so.
There are plenty of unmade p2 scripts and outlines, but except for the one by David Ambrose (is it called DEADLOCK maybe?) and John Meredyth Lucas’ KITUMBA, none of them seemed very good to me, and most were plain bad. The Pearl Harbor one was particularly flinch-worthy, especially coming from a competent and busy writer who should have been able to do better, and shame on the folks who bought the idea.
I admit, that bums me out too at least and we probably won’t get a totally new show anymore. Right now the two shows we know are on the drawing board are the Section 31 show which obviously stars Georgiou and the Academy show which could be completely new characters (and the cadets basically have to be) but like most I suspect the lead will also be a legacy character. Maybe they will surprise us? I suspect ANY Picard spin off will have at least 1-2 legacy characters and most likely from TNG.
Of course it is fun to have legacy characters back. But it doesn’t mean they have to be on every show either. And I do feel they WAY over did it with SNW. That show already has the most legacy characters as part of their main ensemble. The next show after that is Picard with just two characters (OK, next season that’s about to change too ;)). But SNW has even more when you include minor characters from TOS in supporting roles like Sam Kirk and T’Pring as part of the show too. And now Captain Kirk will be showing up next season, but who knows how many other characters will show up before that guy does?
So SNW is really the first show that stuff their cast with a lot of old characters unlike the other shows where it’s at least just been the leads. And it may be a fluke given that show’s setting but yeah who knows?
It’s not arrogance. It’s a TV show. Let’s keep some perspective here.
Relative to what? You do not believe that ego is a factor at all in the entertainment business?
Everyone is concerned with canon violations, but yet I haven’t seen one. They are playing loose with canon but I interpret canon broadly anyways.
I have a difficult time reconciling the fact that the show is so obviously a reboot with the fact that the producers continue to insist it isn’t. I wish I could do what you and Danpaine are doing. Just pretend. For Star Trek Discovery I was able to consider it a KU set show for some time. But for some reason this one I have a tough time with that. I just with the producers would have just said it was a reboot going in. Would be a ton easier to take. But a big problem thus far has been that the misalignments they have made with TOS have been ones that could have so very easily been dealt with without compromising one bit of any episode they have done. I find that to be amazingly frustrating.
Ultimately, they should do what they want and do the best they can to make it work without going out of their way to contradict canon any more than necessary. In the end, it would be a ridiculous notion for them to miss a chance to tell a story they are excited to tell because of something that aired 55 years ago on a show where no one working on it could possibly have imagined all the shows, movies and stories that would follow. I honestly hope that at least half of their audience has never seen TOS. Those young fans are the future!
I love Star Trek, every last bit of it, and I am loving Strange New Worlds. They should be free to make the show they want to make, while doing their best to respect what came before. Which is exactly what I think they have been doing. Keep up the good work!
And I agree with that. The issue is the canon mistakes they made were easily correctable with zero affect on the story they wanted to tell. For example… Everything related to the Gorn could have been done with another alien that wasn’t an established unknown in Pike’s time. They could have used Kzinti assuming they got the rights. They could have made one up, too. Then just replace every word “Gorn” with whatever the new scary alien is. Momento Mori is the exact same episode. La’an is exactly the same just with new scary alien instead of Gorn. The other major misalignment is Christine Chapel is not only an entirely different person but is now very well aware of Spock’s relationship status. If they wanted a kick-ass tough as nails nurse/scientist they easily could have made up a new character. That would have also killed the T’Pring knowledge, too. But even ignoring the character change they could have had a different character (#1 or La’an for example) go with Spock/T’Pring on T’Pring’s job. Would have still been a bit of stretch but certainly better that completely exposing Chapel to it.
So again, that is the most frustrating part of the show. All the mistakes they made should have been pointed out and were amazingly easy to fix while still changing nothing about the stories they are trying to tell us.
Speaking as a TOS-centric Trek fan, and someone who does care a lot about canon, I don’t personally think that the examples listed above are all that big a deal, and they don’t really bother me at all or affect my enjoyment of the show. Just my own personal opinion.
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On the other hand, what DID bother me a lot was the concept of Spock having a previously unknown sister, even though technically that didn’t break any canon at all, since nobody had ever directly said that he didn’t have one. But it was an egregious attempt on the part of the producers to foist upon the existing Trek universe a conceptual change with wide ramifications. That I object to…
Yeah that’s the thing with me too. I don’t like all the canon issues SNW has created but none of it has stopped me from enjoying the show obviously. I have made all my concerns clear but with the idea A. No one else has to care and B. that most of it is not a huge issue even for myself. But what DOES bother me when they pretend it’s not breaking canon when it is. Of course, people can argue it’s really not but these arguments can get super super tedious. But everyone can see what they want of course, so fine.
But the Spock/sister idea is just on another level of ridiculousness. Now I have accepted it as you know because it is just a TV show, but I have a much bigger problem with that compared to anything they done on SNW because it just flies in the face of common sense to me. Now they have rectified as much as they could short of killing Burnham (which technically they did do lol) so it is what it is at this point. But it just felt cheap since it was clearly just to get fans more invested in the new show and not for any story reasons.
I didn’t like the Spock adoptive sister thing at all. It felt like a safety net more than anything. But I didn’t hate it because it was a canon violation. It wasn’t. It was a bad creative decision. Which in all honestly Star Trek Discovery has made a lot of and still makes them. Albeit not as bad as the first two seasons but they are still doing it.
And honestly I’m whining about this canon violation but in general I’m not a huge stickler to canon. I’m fine with a tweak here or a twist there. Especially if it makes the story work better. Even the changes they made to Chapel I can take but that’s about my limit. But some things I just don’t think are things that should be broken. Trek history should be observed. Picard is French and changing him to Australian just ‘becuse’ (like they did with the Gorn) ought not happen. That is where I stand on this.
“But I didn’t hate it because it was a canon violation. It wasn’t. It was a bad creative decision.”
Exactly right!
They never actually said anywhere in TOS that Dr. McCoy’s mother WASN’T a Saurian lizard person, so if the current producers suddenly decide to reveal that McCoy is descended from lizard people it technically wouldn’t be breaking canon… but c’mon!!! Just because you can write anything you want doesn’t mean you should write anything you want…
Yep. Exactly that.
I made a similar argument in an earlier response that just because something isn’t superficially spelled out EXACTLY does not mean there is room to screw with it. Intent can be very clear.
Again, from David:
Kirk only says that he met Pike when Pike was promoted to fleet captain. He does not use the word only. Look at the script for the Menagerie.
Look at my earlier response to you above that starts with “It was so strongly implied that the way it was presented it could be taken as factual.”
And “could” also is not definitive.
So there you have it. This provides plenty of “room of maneuvering” in terms of Pike and Kirk. Obviously your not going have them be best buds, but limited interactions are certainly fine based on a liberal interpretation of this non-definitive statement.
Well said. Canon for me is a general guidestone…it’s not a definitive “law,” nor is it meaningless as some clown here said a couple of months ago.
Nearly everything that happened on tos has not been ignored.
You are right. Only the bulk of the TOS connections we have seen on the show so far. And I’m sure more are on their way…
I have a feeling that we are going to see “TOS-Revised” in about 4-8 years…and then they will tweak/update the canon to be consistent with these shows. It needs to be done regardless, as there is lots of dumbass stuff now like the Eugenics Wars not happening in the 1990’s, etc. etc.
I think TOS Revised will include both redone versions of some of the best eps, plus some new ones as well…perhaps a 50/50 ratio.
Geezus, that has got to be one of the most misguided notions ever. You want to spend more time and money ‘fixing’ shows that were mostly okay to begin with nearly 60 years after the fact so that they dovetail with whatever nuttiness this group coughs up?
I’d like see TOS updated. Don’t get me wrong, I love TOS classic eps, and they aged very well for many decades, but today they are now just too far dated for most of the younger generation to appreciate them. That’s the primary reason I’d like to see a new TOS. Adjusting the canon issues would be a supporting secondary benefit for me. Plus, I’d like to see some “new eps” from TOS crew, as TOS movies (and the Kelvin movies) never really provided the sort of stories that I wanted to see, even though I enjoyed a few of them.
I definitely agree with you on the latter point; there are some early TOS-era Pocket novels that deserve to be adapted into actual filmed installments, plus I’d like to see more about the gap between TOS and TMP and especially between TMP and TWOK.
And the last years of the 23rd Century are the great unmined latinum deposit of TREK for me, because dramatically it is wide open … basedon parts of TSFS and TUC, you have an almost insanely retro Starfleet and Fed rife with paranoia and sadly contemporary thinking, a setting that could let you take Jack Sowards’ unused notion for ST II — that Starfleet has abandoned (temporarily for our purposes) the ‘to boldly go’ in favor of just hanging onto its existing territory — and really run with it. You’d have generations of Starfleet who literally are wondering if it is better to get out and go privateer if they want to see the universe, and you could run all sorts of relevant-to-today stuff with conspiracies and selfishness coming to the fore. It would be a way to play out all the dark stuff that TPTB like to do, but without steamrollering the eras where that clearly wasn’t the main focus.
Ever since coming out of GENERATIONS opening day, I ‘ve had an idea for doing a miniseries on the E-B and crew and their ‘rehabilitation’ post-getting-kirk-killed, and it’s the only reason I never read THE CAPTAIN’S DAUGHTER, because I want to honestly say I wasn’t influenced by anybody else’s take on the material.
End of 23rd century Trek in my mind is very much equivalent to westerns set at the start of the 20th century, where the idea that things are changing but people not so much so plays out against a visually interesting landscape. Think THE WILD BUNCH, plus Richard Brooks’ THE PROFESSIONALS and BITE THE BULLET if you like and know westerns, but add the 70s political paranoia feel that TSFS verges on with its extremely troubling ‘sir, I don’t think you want to be discussing this matter in public’ line, and you’ve got insanely good potential to do good trek in tough times that is still largely virgin territory.
I gotta try to get an agent again.
I love that idea of a series set during the period of say Star V to VI, and yes, I agree that there was a vibe that the Federation was kind of stagnating during that point.
70’s westerns with a political feel are an interesting idea. Your idea isn’t all that different from I expect Tarantino was thinking about? I think 80% of my fav movies were made between 1962 and 1977.
I’m pretty close to being with you on my fave era for movies, though I might extend it another 5 years through the start of the 80s, so I can put ALL THAT JAZZ and APOCALYPSE NOW and TAPS and TRUE CONFESSIONS and CUTTER’S WAY in there.
There’s what some call a ‘second level of sell’ in a lot of films from that stretch, where in the second half of act 2 you pay off something hinted at earlier that makes things much more complex, possibly even introducing an ethical quandary. That’s usually the sign a movie I like is going to move into the must-own category. A later film that delivers on this is the Timothy Dalton film LICENCE TO KILL, where we and Bond find out fairly late in the story that his revenge rampage has wrecked two legit operations, one of which was a years-in-the-making sting.
By way of contrast, since back when I was a teenager in the 70s, I found that the second half of act 2 is also where most movies, good or bad, fall apart. I called this the ’10-10:30pm problem’ since a movie starting at 9 and ending at 11 often experienced this dropoff. A movie with Nimoy in a small role as a baddie called CATLOW is what made me come up with this, because it was a very fun western with Richard Crenna and Yul Brynner that just utterly derails in irrelevancy an hour or so in, then comes back strong at the end.
I often tend to think of TOP GUN in this way, but I guess the dropoff is actually in act 3, post the death of Goose, because the movie (which wasn’t any great shakes to me before that event, to put it mildly) just stopped dead to mourn with Cruise for what felt like a 1/2hr before the obligatory air stuff at the end. I don’t blame the writers on this, because I think it has to do with the daddy issue stuff that Cruise had added. Plus I think the film was fatally flawed (again a minority view, but hey, I don’t get Cruise’s appeal, never did) when they split what was originally a single character into the Tom Skerrit and Michael Ironside parts (presumably to help avoid having a great character actor totally overshadow the star.)
Fine. Do that. But that is called a “reboot”. Which really is what Secret Hideout Trek is but they aren’t officially calling it that.
This group has the hubris to do just that. They obviously think their version is superior and are already taking it upon themselves to “fix” Trek. As if it was broken and they are the only ones who can.
It’s idiotic to shift Trek history just because something the show said would happen in the ’90’s didn’t. The show is fiction. Not reality. Does Inglorious Basterds need to get fixed because that is not what actually happened in WWII? It’s fiction. In THEIR history the WWIII/Eugenics wars happened in the 1990’s. Nothing to fix there.
What will Trek writers do in 40 years when Vulcans don’t appear? Will they have to go back and fix all the Trek stuff?
At the end of the day TOS is nearly 60 years old and I personally would love to see it redone…my opinion.
I disagree that they think their Star Trek is superior. However, I do think that you are right in that they have enough hubris to try to recreate TOS.
Good point, and I’m glad that they are not ignoring what happened on TOS.
I knew this was going to happen from the moment they announced SNW was a real thing. Here comes TOS 2.0. Add McCoy and Scotty and we’ll be pretty much done here.
Same. I predicted Kirk was going to be in season 2 a year ago in fact. People who thought he was going to show up in the last episode of SNW for 5 minutes were kidding themselves. Kirk sounds like he’s going to be part of this show the way T’Pring is and not just a one off appearance.
And yes it probably will be setting up a TOS show down the line. How can it not? If you have fans begging for a Pike show (and they got it), imagine how many will want a TOS show in time too? Fans were begging for a TNG revival (and they will sort of get it now in Picard next season), an Enterprise revival (which I personally want too) and now that Kate Mulgrew hinted she will be back as a live action Janeway, some are now suggesting a continuation of Voyager. I’m not suggesting all of this will ever happen of course but the producers know nostalgia sells and more than ever these days so they are going to create as much of it as possible.
And fans from every property go with what they like and what they know. So none of it is a surprise of course. Star Trek is having a big revival and it’s doing that by bringing in characters and settings fans have grown up with and love. There was a time people thought the Prime Universe was ‘over’ once Enterprise left the stage and we got the Kelvin movies. And now it oddly feels like it’s just getting started and they have a thousand year time period to play with thanks to Discovery.
If they end up doing a TOS 2.0 and are STILL trying to tell us this is prime….
You are overthinking this. It would replace TOS as prime.
No, it would be a reboot.
Yea, I’ve been saying that we are going to get a new TOS since last year here myself. It’s coming, and it will allow a modest canon rewrite, which is needed in any case given that series is almost 60 years old.
They’ll do the whole Killer Cloud thing, and show Kirk stepping up.
Here’s hoping Wesley’s Kirk is nothing like the fratboy portrayed in Trek 2009. Nothing against Pine as an actor, but as someone who idolized Kirk as a youth I just loathed the way the character was written in the 2009 movie. (And don’t even get me started on his magical leapfrog promotion.)
Agreed.
Seconded. The childhood and early life Kelvin Kirk lived is NOTHING like the live real Kirk lived. Those 2 men couldn’t be more different if they tried.
easy on the frat boy stuff…
That’s a stretch to say nothing.
Nah. He seemed a lot more like more of a bad-boy loner than a guy who needs the group approval to misbehave that one would get with a frat?
On the whole I’d have preferred to let this cast/these characters stand on their own for a while longer before bringing James Kirk into the mix, which comes off to me more like a stunt than something they really need to do. That said, there’s not too much in canon regarding Kirk’s early years, his first encounter with Spock or the Enterprise, nor the circumstances of his first meeting Pike. So I don’t think there’s really any canon for them to break here. I do hope, though, that the writers show restraint…
Agreed. They didn’t even wait to get feedback from the 1st season before diving right into the 2nd. Because of that it doesn’t look like we will get any adjustments from the errors they made in the first season. And as some have said, I’m honestly not surprised they dipped into that well so quickly. Running to Kirk this fast again tells me they have little faith in their own show to carry the load. But given how they have treated TOS I don’t see how this is going to help.
….like DSC did, running to Pike and Spock. So predictable.
Well, as Nick Meyer had it, in his judgment his task was not to “give the fans what they wanted”” — i.e. solicit their feedback — but to get them to want what he wanted. I haven’t seen SNW aside from the pilot and a few clips on YouTube, but I have gauged a pretty solid chunk of the fan, critical, and public reception to the show, and while your opinion is no less valuable than anyone else’s, you seem to be very much in the minority in your level of dissatisfaction. The simple fact of the matter is, the producers can’t please everyone.
Trying to please everyone is a fools errand. This is a big lesson in life too because no matter how much you try you never can please everyone. So sometimes its just better to do what you want to do and hope for the best and don’t really care for what others say.
No, they cannot try to please everyone. They should make the show they want to make. But if they want to keep their show in the Prime world they should be obliged to follow the rules. They haven’t been. If they want to be free of such restrictions then make the show you want and call it a reboot. It’s really quite simple. These people want both. It just doesn’t work that way.
I have not gone out to check how the show is being received except by the handful of people here. So I cannot say for sure what kind of consensus, if any, there is out there. It might be seen as better than the other stuff and if so it’s probably mainly because older TOS people like me are getting fewer in number.
Asking for these writers to show restraint is like asking for Sonic to go slow or for Vader to stop breathing, never gonna happen.
Absolutely love this show so far, but I’m kindve bummed at the Kirk news. I just don’t feel like the show needs another legacy character – the cast and characters are already great. I just don’t want these great characters to be sidelined to spend more time with a character we already know well. Uhura and Chapel weren’t developed in TOS or the movies so I’m fine with them being on the show and they have been great – but I just don’t feel the need for more Kirk at this point. I’m hoping he’s just a small part of the season.
That’s a valid point.
So far the canon stuff hasn’t bothered me that much, and I’m enjoying this show for the most part. But having said that, if there is a weakness in SNW, and really pop culture as a whole right now, it’s the unneeded wedging of too many familiar iconic elements into things when it would probably be best to concentrate on creating new stuff.
And it’s not like they’re incapable of doing it. Hemmer, if we ever see him again, seems like a great character in the making. I’m liking Ortegas. Plus, the stories that have focused on new aliens and cultures have been good, I think.
I don’t mind seeing Kirk, eventually, but do we need him? Probably not. Just like La’an didn’t need to be related directly to Khan to tell her story. And the Gorn didn’t need to be the Gorn. And Chapel didn’t need to be Chapel. Er, you get my point.
I would just prefer if they made these things canon adjacent instead of hitting it directly on the head. That makes the universe seem bigger, and strange, and new.
One more point, I think this ‘canon adjacent’ way of going about it is one reason The Mandalorian was such a big hit from the start (a cute little gremlin buddy doesn’t hurt either). They didn’t make it, at least at first, about the iconic character Boba Fett. They made it about a guy who kinda looks like Fett but is different. He comes from a weird cult, has a different code of honor, had never heard of the Force before, etc. So they could go at the familiar canon stuff at a different angle by creating a new character.
So, briefly, the Star Wars universe felt big and fresh again.
The Mandalorian really is a great example but same time an ironic example to use. First season, not a single old character. It did feel new and original even if it was obviously using a lot of old familiar elements of that universe. But then season 2 came and the flood gates opened wide! Now characters were showing up from the OT through the TCW. It even tied the show into a story line directly from TCW in fact. And it was then used as a back door for two spin off shows for two iconic characters, Boba Fett of course and Ashoka. Now it looks like future seasons it’s going to be a big tie in for all the SW shows going forward and probably movies the same way TNG became a big tie in to the other shows, movies and characters when it was running.
I always wondered was that the plan for Mandalorian from the beginning? Or once they knew they hit gold with the show they could use it as a spring board to bring other legacy characters in it? We’ll probably never know but more proof producers knows what fans want. And it’s being directed more to casual fans than hardcore fans obviously (since they know we’ll watch anything) but obviously hardcore fans have a vested interested to see legacy characters too.
Yeah, that’s why I was sure to say “briefly.” The first season being that brief period.
I can’t say I know what fans want, but I know I couldn’t care less about legacy characters anymore. That’s why I can’t be bothered with the Obi-Wan show. I’ve watched a few clips and read the reviews but still can’t find the interest.
I mean, I’m supposed to care what he did without himself in hiding? Well, maybe if it were interesting, but rescuing Leia and facing off against Vader isn’t interesting to me. Been there, done that. A long time ago…
I’m enjoying the Obi-Wan show but same time noting about the story felt necessary to be told. We learn nothing new or interesting about any of the characters. It’s there because yeah, it’s Obi-Wan and Darth Vader which oddly hasn’t been as prominent as fans hoped.
Anyway, I do like seeing legacy characters but no I don’t need to see them either. When a lot of us was begging for the next show to go forward in time, many was hoping a century past Voyager because we wanted to start fresh with new setting, situations and characters. But I can understand wanting to return to the TOS and TNG eras obviously, they can still go to new eras in future shows too and hopefully they will…but not holding my breath it will be anytime soon.
I am waiting to binge watch it. Sounds like they pulled a Picard S2 and dragged out the story, and fans are generally disappointed?
If you respond to my post here, please, no spoilers. :-)
Ah dang, sorry if I spoiled anything in my earlier post. I’ll be more careful in the future.
No worries, I deliberately looked away when I saw your post. LOL
Obi Wan has a few problems but for the most part it has been great. It’s a masterpiece compared to Picard S2.
I’m already rewatching episodes of Obi-Wan, while I can safely say I’ll never watch PIC S2 again. I didn’t even finish it, I thought it went off the rails so badly.
I thought Picard S2 was the worst of the new live action seasons and it is a lot better than Kenobi. Picard had more weight in its story (although it did drag), more meaning, and more urgency in the early episodes than Kenobi has had at all. Kenobi is only 6 episodes and is repetitive. Also not much plot. Picard at least had some interesting character work for Picard and Jurati sprinkled in, and a great ending with Q…nothing like that in Kenobi so far. I feel like people get distracted because “It’s darth vader – cool!” but there isn’t a lot of meat in the stories. Obi Wan also has a bunch of plot holes, poor writing, and things that just don’t make sense.
“Obi Wan also has a bunch of plot holes, poor writing, and things that just don’t make sense”
Respectfully, so does PIC. Overall, I think legacy characters (and their new stories) have been treated pretty shabbily by both franchises, honestly.
That is the same criticism of Solo. No one cared how he got his name or his early days. I was hoping we would get something interesting but nothing of any real significance happened. (Except an enjoyable performance from Glover as Lando).
I still REALLY want a post TUC show. And while I’m not betting for legacy characters it does seem like a good opportunity for Cho to finally lead a Capt. Sulu show.
That said I just don’t want Secret Hideout to make any new Trek anymore. They just have shown they aren’t up to the task. I’d rather all the Trek leave streaming while Paramount finds a new group to produce it.
Solo in my opinion is the best Star Wars movie since the original trilogy. A great story and underrated acting. It’s the John Carter of the Star Wars film — a hidden gem done in my bad marketing and internet fanboy group-think.
Yeah… What is the deal with Hemmer? We are 6 episodes in and it seems like he has had perhaps 10 minutes of screen time. I’m starting to wonder why he is even there?
I agree. I thought the point of having the grumpy character with a heart of gold is to get to know that person. Worked for Worf. And Odo. And the Doctor.
The bits with Hemmer and Uhura were pretty good. I assume we’ll get more eventually. Fingers crossed.
Bruce Horak, who plays Hemmer was tagged as “recurring” in the early writeups.
Absolutely agreed and it is kind of ironic that one of the best new characters of the show, Hemmer, has been sidelined for so long. It’s like pop culture is refusing to be creative just because there is money in what came before. Maybe its time for everyone to think beyond money.
So wait, young Kirk is played by a 41 year old? So what, by the time he takes over Enterprise, he’ll be 50? That doesn’t sound right.
Actors don’t always play the same age as their characters. Johnathan Archer was actually in his late 30s at the beginning of Enterprise although Bakula was in his fifties. On the flip side Picard was in his sixties on TNG although Stewart was only in his forties. In Hollywood, if an actor can pass for a certain age, then they just go with it. Actors in their 20s play teenagers on shows all the time. This is not exactly new.
Also, Paul Wesley is only 39 per Wikipedia.
He’s in his 30’s still.
Yet, he will turn 40 on the 23rd of July.
It kind of seemed to me that Discovery rushed into canon territory a bit early, meeting the Enterprise, Spock, Pike, etc. within one season. Now SNW is doing the same with Kirk. Maybe that’s something that has to be done, I don’t know.
This makes me a little nervous. The show is working *really* well at the moment. I hope this introduction of Kirk doesn’t shake things up too much and potentially break it.
I think Kirk’s line was “We met when he was promoted to Fleet Capitan” That could in turn mean that Pike is promoted but still commands the Enterprise as his Flag Ship. They then could meet again when Kirk finally takes command.