“Red Directive”
Star Trek: Discovery Season 5, Episode 1 – Debuted Thursday, April 4, 2024
Written by Michelle Paradise
Directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi
A strong season opener resets the series with a new tone and a new sense of adventure.
We’re back!
WARNING: Spoilers below!
RECAP
“Surprisingly, I’m not dead yet.”
Things kick off in media space res action with Michael Burnham astride an unknown ship at warp telegraphing the pivot goal of this new season: “Never a dull moment.” Flashback to how her night started at a nice reception aboard the Disco celebrating Federation Day. The formal event is not unlike how the last season ended, but it’s been a few months, giving time for Tilly to settle in at the Academy, Stamets to get unsettled over the spore drive program being shut down, Michael to pretend to be over Book’s betrayal, and Saru and T’Rina (Sarina?) to master their cute couple dancing routine. The Kelpien has big news: he has been offered a job as a Federation ambassador, but he is conflicted about leaving Discovery versus spending more lovey-dovey time with the Vulcan prez. Vance kills the light jazz vibe by whisking Burnham away to Kovich’s super double secret “Infinity Room” for a briefing about a 24th-century Romulan science vessel found at the edge of the Beta Quadrant. She is being tasked with securing what Kovich ominously describes as “something vital to the security of the Federation,” brushing away any need to explain more by declaring the mission a “Red Directive”… Episode Title Alert!
Cut to the Rommie derelict with a couple of looters willing to risk a confrontation with the two Starfleet ships coming in hot knowing this must mean there is something “extra shiny” (really?) on board. Kovich orders Burham to use “any means necessary,” and she, Rhys, and Owo board, only to find nothing but an extremely dead Romulan and a very empty vault. Space Bonnie and Clyde come out of hiding and neutralize Owo and Rhys with a cool gun that shoots containment bubbles, leaving Michael and the duo with a phaser face-off: She will let them go if they hand over the old box they found. They choose door number 2 by blowing a hole in the floor, which sends Burnham flying (saved by programmable matter insta-space suit). She flies onto their cloaked ship and we’re back at the starting action. The USS Antares catches up; gruff Captain Rayner has a grudge with the thieves and won’t let go of his tractor lock, even though it risks getting everyone killed. Her attempts to stop the ship fail and she convinces Rayner to let go, allowing the baddies to escape within a flurry of 20 decoy warp signature drones. Kovich demands a “brilliant idea” and it’s time for Michael to get ominous: “I know someone who can find them.” Who could that be?
Saru is wondering if the bridge is big enough for a Vulcan/Kelpien wedding.
“How can we make an excellent deal today?”
It’s Book, of course it’s Book. Michael awkwardly greets her former BF (and now Federation convict) so they switch to “very professional” mode. Rayner briefs them on Moll and L’ak, the former couriers and current MacGuffin possessors. Cleveland sorts out where they would go to unload the vintage knickknacks, so Vance orders the Antares and the Discovery to head to Q’Mau. Before she leaves, Michael enlists Sylvia Tilly to do some database snooping at Fed HQ to get around Kovich’s obtuseness.
The thieves head into a space bazaar to on the desert planet to find Fred the fence, who turns out to be an eccentric OG android. He is particularly interested in the puzzle box, which he opens with ease, speed-reading the old journal of Romulan scribbles and diagrams within. He offers 3 bars of latinum in a take-it-or-get-shot deal. Moll and L’ak choose to get shot, but it’s Fred’s goons who end up dead, and the synth is left with a big hole in his chest. The Federation trio arrives too late, but beam what’s left of Fred up to the ship as they split up to find the baddies. Back at the Academy, Tilly gets caught hacking but Vance saves her; he’s tired of Kovich’s mysteriousness, too. She finds an old garbled recording of a Romulan scientist talking about the secrets he has written into that same journal, dropping clues about “twin moons” and an “ancient technology” that “cannot fall into the wrong hands.” Jolan tru!
Michael, Book, and Rayner head out into the desert for a speeder bike chase, still finding time to bicker while under fire. Moll and L’ak get to their ship and plan to use some tunnels to escape. The trio has a fierce debate over how to counter this move, with Burnham warning Rayner that ordering the Antares to close the tunnel could trigger a town-destroying avalanche. Rayner decides to do it anyway, resulting in no avalanche, so no problem… except the thieves decide to trigger one anyway. Cue rapid-fire science chatter on the Disco to sort out how to save the town: The only solution is to use both ships as giant sand wedges to build a shield wall… that’s a new one. Mission-focused Rayner votes no, but reluctantly backs down, reminded Starfleet is all about saving the innocent and all that goody-goody stuff. With Detmer’s “I’m taking us in, brace!” the ships save the town, complete with exploding consoles, cool effects, triumphant music, and cheering locals. Rayner doesn’t join the jubilation as Moll and L’ak escape again, letting Burnham know he is definitely not her biggest fan. She and Book take a moment to decompress… and officially break up, just in time for Tilly to call: “Is this a bad time?” You think?
So Commander Data was your third cousin?
“I’ve got some answers for you and they are wild.”
Disco returns to space dock and Saru’s love life is headed in the other direction. The day’s events have reminded him of what is most important and he now realizes that his future lies with T’Rina. The stoic Kelpien is taking the ambassador job because she is also his family, “I want to be with you, always.” Aww. President girlfriend is moved (not to tears, she still is a Vulcan), so she does the logical thing, suggesting “we codify our mutual commitment in a more official capacity.” ICYMI, that is a Vulcan proposal. Still, aww. (He accepts, btw.)
In sickbay, Hugh and Paul have been sorting through Fred’s positronic brain, and thankfully Fred has a recording of the Romulan diary. Burnham spots a clue identifying the “twin moons” location, giving her leverage for a confrontation with Kovich who is looking at the wrong planet. She pushes past his obstruction for a mission that has been classified for centuries. Her little bit of blackmail works and he briefs her on what’s really going on. The long-dead Romulan scientist was named Dr. Vellek. He was one of those present when a certain Captain Jean-Luc Picard found a message left by ancient beings who created “every humanoid species in the galaxy.” Vellek found their technology and now “the greatest treasure in the known galaxy” is up for grabs and Moll and L’ak are already a step ahead in finding it… but not if Michael and the Disco can beat them to it. With a wry smile she readies for 9 more episodes of galaxy-trotting questing adventure with… wait for it… “Let’s fly.”
Michael tries to emulate how Picard used to sit in his chair.
ANALYSIS
Indiana Tones
Now that’s how you do a season premiere. “Red Directive” delivered on the promised pivot in tone for the series, introducing us to this new quest. Like with most Disco season premieres, there was plenty of action, but Olatunde Osunsanmi kept up a balanced pace, ramping things up for the set pieces while slowing things down for some poignant character moments. Surfing this wave ably was Sonequa Martin-Green delivering a standout performance. She helped set the new tone for the season as she added a layer of fun to Burnham, perhaps exemplified best by how she wrapped up the episode, trading in the usual existential dread with a sense of elation as she set out on the first stage of what is literally a treasure hunt. But she was far from alone, assisted by her co-stars, a strong musical score, and striking visual effects. It’s clear they want fans to come away feeling Indiana Jones vibes from the style of action to the music. The desert setting and Michael’s reveal that Kovich was looking at the wrong planet were clear homages but still not too heavy-handed. Speaking of planets, it’s a good start to actually visit a new one (Q’ Mau), which looked great, and there was even a little classic Trek vibe about how all the locals wore variations of the same outfit.
The episode still had a strong sense of Trek’s consistent theme of teamwork and being stronger together, from romantic unions like T’Rina and Saru to reluctant collaborators like Burnham and Rayner, with their ships and crews syncing up to save the day. Callum Keith Rennie is a fantastic addition to the cast, bringing back some of that gruff Lorca energy from season 1—as he came into conflict with pretty much everyone with a welcome layer of snark. The return of Mary Wiseman’s Tilly is also welcome, as she was sorely missed in the second half of season 4, and she can still deliver those fun lines, but the character has also grown through her time away at the Academy. Other character arcs were also reset, notably Cleveland Booker, who is facing the consequences for his actions last season. Some beats do feel like retreads: Paul Stamets still feels lost in a role that has become mostly a technobabble and exposition generator, but maybe there will be some payoff for the bit about collecting old wire? …probably not. Still, that Paul/Hugh moment was a nice bit of fun, as everyone seemed to be playing with the new tone. Even T’Rina is getting in on it, playfully threatening Saru with a mind meld. These 32nd century Vulcans are picking up some naughty traits from their Romulan cousins.
Indy would have loved to have one of these.
Chasing Canon
The premiere nicely set up our season bad guys, Moll and L’ak, who are atypical villains. The stakes may be historic and galactic, but this pair is just in it for the LOLs and dolla, dolla bills latinum. They are sort of a dark reflection of Michael and Book, former couriers who have taken a different path now that the galaxy is flush with dilithium again, a fresh take for a series that often falls short when it comes to its villains. And this idea of how the galaxy has been changing since the Discovery crew ended “The Burn” at the end of season 3 was a nice bit of 32nd century worldbuilding, another area the series has been lax on. Rayner himself is a great example of a relic of the Burn era, no longer fitting in with this new world. There were even some lines about threats from the Breen and Tholians… dare we hope these things will actually be followed up later in the season? It’s always hard to tell what is being telegraphed, but it’s likely there are many bits of foreshadowing in this opening episode. While they were doing all this worldbuilding, would it have killed them to explain what exactly a “Red Directive” is? This may seem nitpicky, but understanding these parameters (like with General Order 7 or The Omega Directive) helps set the dramatic stakes, which were hinted at with the conflict early on between Michael and Kovich over the use of lethal force.
And finally, Discovery is fully embracing the whole Star Trek of it all with more of links to franchise lore. The scene with Fred the android and all his quirkiness was delightful and hopefully, we will get more of actor J. Adam Brown’s “effervescent” takes on the 32nd century if Stamets can rewire him. Making Rayner a Kellerun is quite the deep cut, and Michelle Paradise tells TrekMovie they plan to build some backstory for the one-off alien race from DS9. Of course, the big thing everyone is going to be talking about is the “appearance” of Jean-Luc Picard, or at least a screencap from the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode “The Chase.” Turning a random background Romulan from that episode into this Dr. Vellek (now played by Michael Copeman) is just the right kind of retconning. Discovery is picking up a fascinating thread that TNG left dangling and unspooling it into a whole season, and I love it. And they really hung a lantern on their mystery box tendencies by literally introducing a puzzle box and then opening it up right away, showing us the canon goodies buried inside. This is a message: We get it, we are trying to do better.
You guys got any more self-sealing stembolts?
Final thoughts
The new tone and style set up what looks to be a more episodic adventure with the next clue and destination already queued up at the end of episode 1. The reduction to 10 episodes (to conform with all the other Paramount+ Trek series) is probably a plus for this show, since it tends to drag in the middle of its serialized seasons. After a two-year absence, Discovery’s return is a bit bittersweet as we know it’s the final season, especially as the show appears to be hitting its stride and picking up some of the best qualities of other modern Trek shows. But for now, we can just enjoy the ride and in this case, fans don’t have to wait for episode 2.
Think he is deactivated enough?
Bits
- “Red Directive” was released simultaneously with the second episode of the season (reviewed separately).
- The episode was dedicated “For JP, with love,” honoring J.P. Locherer, a camera operator for the series who passed away in 2022.
- The “Tonic 2161” cocktail celebrating the Federation’s first millennium is still popular in 3190… perhaps because it tastes “like jumja sticks.”
- There is a new member of the bridge crew named Lt. Naya (Victoria Sawal), apparently replacing Lt. Nilsson.
- The guy Tilly was crushing on is named Lt. Jax (Gregory Calderone).
- Programmable matter bracelets can convert phaser pistols into phaser rifles.
- Andorians make champagne, and Tilly likes it.
- The spore drive program lost out to the Pathway Drive, a prototype propulsion system installed on the USS Voyager-J, first seen in season 3. Burnham was part of the short list of potential captains for the Voyager-J in season 4.
- The Romulan science vessel was the same design used in the TNG episode “The Next Phase.”
- There is at least one tribble running (rolling?) wild through the corridors of the USS Discovery.
- This is the third USS Antares in Trek canon; the last one seen was a Miranda-class in Deep Space Nine.
- Romulan Tan zhekran puzzle boxes were introduced in season 1 of Picard.
- Tilly asks “I can’t crash all these kids onto an ice moon to teach them that, right, could I?” referencing how she got the cadets to work together in the season 4 episode “All is Possible.”
- In addition to trying to sell the puzzle box, Moll and L’ak also had 24th-century isolinear chips, PADDS, and a self-sealing stembolt.
- Fred says he hasn’t seen relics like those for 622.7 years, indicating he has been in operation since at least the 26th century. It’s likely he’s even older than that, since his design was akin to Data and the Coppelius androids seen in the early 25th century.
- Fred’s serial number was AS0572Y, with Stamets guessing the “AS” as an homage to 24th century scientist Altan Soong.
- Linguist Trent Pehrson, who constructed the Romulan language for Picard, consulted for this episode.
- Portions of the Q’Mau desert sequence were filmed by a second unit in Brazil’s Lençóis Maranhenses National Park.
- Kovich gave Burnham the key to the Infinity Room, which will probably be important later.
I know I like to say “Let’s fly,” but this is ridiculous.
More to come
Every Friday, the TrekMovie.com All Access Star Trek Podcast covers the latest news in the Star Trek Universe and discusses the latest episode. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Stitcher and is part of the TrekMovie Podcast Network.
The fifth and final season of Discovery debuted with two episodes on Thursday, April 4 exclusively on Paramount+ in the U.S., the UK, Switzerland, South Korea, Latin America, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, and Austria. Discovery will also premiere on April 4 on Paramount+ in Canada and will be broadcast on Bell Media’s CTV Sci-Fi Channel in Canada. The rest of the 10-episode final season will be available to stream weekly on Thursdays. Season 5 debuts on SkyShowtime in select European countries on April 5.
Keep up with news about the Star Trek Universe at TrekMovie.com.
The episode was fantastic i really enjoyed it and i find it to be the best season opener of Discovery and so far the best season opener of any of the modern Treks.
I loved the callbacks to the TNG episode The Chase and the little Easter eggs planted through the episode and this is how you do nostalgia correctly. You let it come naturally and not shove it into the cracks of a very weak/paper thin story that i felt Picard S3 did.
I loved seeing Tilly again and Admiral Vance again continues to shows that he is not a bad guy like some admirals have been.
I found Raynar to be a bit of a jerk but hopefully his character evolves through the season.
The CGI was as always fantastic and i loved the sequence of both Discovery/Antares being a shield wall against the avalanche.
Liked this one and really enjoyed the promo for the rest of the season.
Did my eyes deceive me or was the derelict in the Nebula in the promo the Enterprise?
Looked like the Enterprise or another Connie emerging from some kind of nebula and a beam was coming from it.
It helps if you view it using a ******.
When Michael and Book approach the green nebula the word Enterprise is visible as is 1701 in the ruin.
It almost looks like it says ISS, but couldn’t make that part out well.
That’s weird cause we know what happened with both the 1701 and 1701-A
I wonder if it’s some sort of portal in time and the Enterprise emerges through and now “hey here’s a chance for the Discovery crew to go home” on the Enterprise before the portal or wormhole closes.
But going back would defeat the fact that Discovery & her crew were wiped out of all records pre-TOS. In the 2nd Short Trek “Calypso”, the Discovery had been abandoned (going on memory I think it was parked in a nebula) 10,000 years with orders to remain until the crew returned. I guess they could have gone back to their time, but they would have to live with new identities and could never contact family or old friends.
welp – seems just like Enterprise they may have finally found the right formula just in time to get canceled.
Enterprise feels slightly less lonely. :/
The first season of Enterprise had some of the greatest episodes of Star Trek, and they werent as self referential. As a stand alone, f.e. Fight or Flight is really great.
Agreed. A lot of great episodes those two first seasons. It’s amazing how much I took that show for granted back then.
A Constitution in the trailer :)
I enjoyed it but it struck me how often the characters were quipping in deadly situations and with seconds to spare. There’s ‘being calm under pressure’ and treating the situation like it’s no biggie. I felt episodes 1 and 2 did more of the latter than the former.
I also noticed how often people entered rooms uninvited (normally due to Insta-transport) and how people have stopped announcing tbemselves when speaking though communicators: they just start taking through them whether the person on the other end is ready or not
These are obviously very nerdy nitpicks but I hadn’t noticed it to such a degree before!
Its a bit of a coincidence, but its not the first time the Romulans were interested in the technology of the Progenitors, because they did the same thing in the PC video game Star Trek: Hidden Evil and Salome Jens reprised her role as the Ancient humanoid aka Xa-Tal from The Chase, however she does get killed by the Romulans who are interested in the destructive powers of a coveted genetic seed
Now THAT was good.
It was truly amazing fun.
In the trailer it was the 1701… must have been A obscured.
I zoomed in. It may be the ISS Enterprise…
Ooh! Yes! That would also explain the sickback set seen in the trailer.
Interesting and possible link in the future (pun intended) to the S31 movie?
Fred reminded me of Data.
I am crossing my fingers that Stamets and Culber revive Fred at some point. He was way too much fun to off so quickly!
If his positronic brain was untouched, then what’s the deal? Fred should be fine. Just fix the hole in his chest. For a synth who has been around for centuries, his apparent demise should not have been quick or easy. Just seems like Fred would have been more durable, more prepared, and simply better than what we saw.
It’s funny cause his looks reminded me of Data but his demeanor reminded me of a Vorta. Like the Izzy Top one.
Is that an Iggy Pop / ZZ Top cover band?
Awesome! Finally one of my favourite NextGen episodes gets a season-long sequel. This is so essential.
Loved poor Fred. There was a German pop song back in the 80s and 90s during Trek’s heydays titled “Fred vom Jupiter” (“Fred from Jupiter”). I had to think of that one, too.
It was so good. I was on the edge of my seat the entire time! I’m curious what’s up with L’ak. His head glimmered when he took off his helmet. Made me think. He kinda has some Romulan features, like the arched up brow bones and the shape of his ear area. He could be a Romulan/Reman hybride. Or maybe he’s from the parallel universe.
Overall a FANTASTIC episode!
I really loved so much about it especially the main twist it’s all built around The Chase, one of my favorite Star Trek episodes. I have known this twist for a few weeks now so was looking forward to the reveal and it did not disappoint. Like so much in Star Trek there are so many stories I wish they follow up and this is a pretty big one lol. The creation of life itself.
But this episode was just a lot of fun. Loved all the action sequences, especially the desert chase (but LDS did it first chasing down the Romulans in Crisis Point 2 ;)) and the opening with Burnham.
The two new villains are also cool and I’m seeing theories that Lak could be a shape shifter or even a Breen. Please bring the Breen back please!! Also loved Fred which I also knew about a head of time and loved how much he looked like Data. And Rayner was great. That dude comes off like a total hardass and I love it lol. Glad he’s going to be the first officer.
And they really used the 32nd century pretty well here. I liked seeing all the proto matter stuff with the weapons. And also cool we’re starting to learn so much more about it.
It still wasn’t perfect though. It’s still Star Trek: Discovering your feelings with all the touchy feely stuff and Book and Michael working through their stuff. I get it, that part was necessary but some of it still lingered too long for me. And the scene with drunk Tilly and her 16 year old crush on some guy was eye rolling. It’s crazy she’s supposed to be a teacher. But whatever.
Overall though it was a great episode and probably my favorite premiere episode for Discovery although Brother is still pretty great and pretty close to a tie. But this one edges it out with the cool Progenitors twist.
Hopefully we’re going to get a great season and it’s pretty strong out the gate. But I remember saying something like this the last three are too. 😂🙄
But I would love this season to be the Enterprise season 4 or Picard season 3 of Discovery and go out with a huge bang. Great start so far though.
I wasn’t Crazy about drunk Tilly either. Hacker Tilly was much better. Also liked that Staments found something to do in this episode now that the spore drive is going to go away. Vance and Kovich were great additions as always. Rayner has promise and I am glad that Rhys and Owo got something to do off the bridge. Saru as diplomat wasn’t my first choice but he would be great in the role.
Overall this was one of the better season starts for Discovery. I was surprised by that because I never felt like The Chase needed a follow up. Let’s hope they can sustain the mystery as the season goes on!
Heya! I never liked the Burnham Book stuff myself but we were warned fairly well on that no matter what becomes of this season Discovery will still be Discovery.
You could give me Saru and T’Rina romance scenes for the whole season because that is something they have really done well.
When I think how badly SNW does romances it elevates how good this is.and how romances can be interesting rather than just really annoying.
Also Saru is just a wonderful character and by far the best character on Discovery and SNW. Whish we had more like that, Hemmer was probably my second favourite in Nu Trek.
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I wonder has anyone figured out what self-sealing stembolts are actually for after 800 years. Aside from O’Brien I don’t think anyone else actually knew.
Well, they were treated in this episode as a relic, and not even a prized one at that (Fred was apparently the only dealer who wants stuff that old). So they aren’t used for anything anymore, except as neat historical artifacts (and maybe to repair super old tech here and there, would laugh if they ended up taking it and using it later this season).
Back during DS9, they were obviously used for bolting objects together, without requiring manual sealing. lol, jk, someone find O’Brien
I know we’ve only seen the first two, but I have a renewed hope for this season.
Wow such an improvement! Really enjoyed Raynar really good character just what this season needed.
So is this the light hearted “action comedy” genre of Star Trek now?
Well that’s what you get when people complain Star Trek is getting too dark
Give me dark over light hearted action or SNW sit com any day.
Like the awful reboot movies this is hard to take seriously at times.
Pretty depressing road Star Trek is on, not too enthusiastic really and honestly I can see the Academy show being rubbish also.
Jeez I know it’s a completely different show but I watched Shogun episode 7 back to back with Discovery season 5 01. I really wish we could have Star Trek that was on that level of just being a great series like Shogun is.
Blame the fact a large section of the fandom championed The Orville and the success of Lower Decks (among some fans, not me, alas) for the MCU quippy comedy tone of Trek now. I felt DS9 got the balance right. It was 85% serious, 15% goofy as hell. Trek is in danger of reversing that ratio.
That said, I did enjoy this. It’s not at SNW levels of quippery yet.
Yep that’s why I get so frustrated and you’re right MCU quippy tone really sums it up. I enjoyed this episode on the whole but the light hearted action was not for me.
The truth is DS9 just had much better writers than we have now with contemporary Trek.
For all Discovery’s failings it is still much better than the TOS reboot movies for me which felt more Marvel than Trek.
It was an exciting episode. I’m looking forward to seeing the rest of the season.
It will be interesting to see if that nebula in the season promo ends up being the final resting place of the ISS Enterprise.
That was awful. Granted, I’ve rarely enjoyed the show (though I loved the fourth season). Still, just one ill-conceived idea after another after another. All seemingly built upon one of the absolute worst ideas TNG ever had! And the second episode was even worse.
Looking forward to being done with this series.
Not a huge fan of Disco – still too emotional and quippy for my tastes. So far these two eps are fine; usually how I feel about the premier of Disco (barring S1).
That said, I take exception to you calling “The Chase” one of TNG’s worst ideas. Reverse evolution and Scottish ghost lovers would like a word. In fact, I think The Chase is one of TNG’s better ideas. Thematically, the idea that no matter our physical differences, we are all actually commonly human is exceptionally Trek. And the final scene between Picard and the Romulan commander is just the perfect cap to that episode – the idea that greater men and women can begrudgingly see the future they can’t accept yet, but maybe they can move toward it.
I’m sorry you didn’t enjoy it, but I think its actually one of those tonally on the spot TNG episodes that delivered what it wanted to – a huge chase, to discover that the great powerful secret was really just a fundamental truth of the human condition that no one wants to accept, except those humanists seeking an optimistic future.
Get ready for what I’m about to say – I enjoyed this episode a lot. There are soem issues, sure.. but overall.. I found it really intriguing, and the call back to The Chase.. I quite liked it. We’ll see if they can deliver on it’ spromise. I have a fear of some reductive reveal, but we’ll see. The only part I found outright cringey was the starships stopping the avalanche. Just felt dumb and certainly not organic. But overall, I’m in for this ride.
Agree about the starships stopping the avalanche. That bit jumped the shark a little for me.
Yeah, felt like an opportunity to show off effects, not anything that made sense.
Just finished watching the premiere… so far so good. Will PVR and watch E2 tomorrow. Cautiously optimistic! We shall see if they can keep it up.
Hey where is everybody?? This place is dead. I expected to be a lot more posts by now since this is the first Trek show we gotten since last year, it’s been off the air for two years, it’s final season and strong critic reviews.
But very few posts so far. Odd.
We were all busy enjoying the episodes!!
That’s the crazy thing. When episodes are great you usually get a ton of posts praising it.
Not this time. Just weird.
Maybe that should be your clue to how most people actually feel
I turned it off after about 5 minutes or so.
It only comes out in the UK today so won’t be watching till later after work.
Actually you’re right. I was a little surprised when I clicked on this thread this afternoon to only see around 20 posts. I come back tonight and it only jumped up by another dozen or so.
To see a comparison I went and saw how many posts did the first episode of Picard season 3 got and that had over 600+ posts. Obviously not all in one day but it probably got over 300 the first day alone though.
Then I looked at SMW season 2 opening episode and while not as big as PIC it still got over 400 posts.
But then I looked at Discovery season 4 opening episode posts and it only had 140 posts from over 2 years ago.
So I think that tells you a lot in terms of interest this show has these days. To be fair it still gets more than the animation shows easily but it has fallen off quite significantly over the years. In fact the first episode of the series, The Vulcan Hello, still has the most posts out of any episode or show here with over 700. That’s when the hype was enormous at the time obviously.
Five seasons later and the premiere looks like it may not even reach 100 posts which IS surprising.
But that may change later with future episodes if word of mouth is really strong. And of course it may not reflect actual viewing patterns but that’s mostly in the dark anyway.
Ok got more curious and looked at Discovery other season premieres.
Brother (season 2): 440 comments.
That Hope is you (season 3): 345 comments.
Kobiyashi Maru (season 4): 140 posts.
There’s been a drop every season, but looks like from season 4 on there was a big drop off. Again it’s hard to say how it reflects overall interest with this being such a smaller board but maybe it should tell us why the show got cancelled IF it does reflect overall interest or trend in fandom, even as a microcosm.
Again will probably never know.
This is exactly what I mean.
I didn’t start posting here until after season 4 of Discovery ended but I been lurking and reading here since the first season and it was certainly a lot more discussion around the show in the earlier seasons. I guess it does partly prove people are less interested in this show compared to the beginning at least. Same on boards similar to this one. Just not a lot of back and forth like the old days. More so on Reddit but even that’s lighter than usual in terms of traffic.
But maybe more people will show up if the season stays popular.
The Picard season 3 threads were fun! That’s what really got me to sign up here because I wanted to talk about that show as much as possible and this place didn’t disappoint during that season. A lot of wide spread discussions every week. I’m sure half those posts for the opening episode were mine though. 😂
To be fair, a lot of those 100+ post articles have been filled with bickering, and that’s simmered down a little. Also, I would guess the episodes people tend to like ironically don’t get talked about much.
Sure there is some of that but this is actually quite low in general. And there are actually threads where it’s gotten into the hundreds of mostly praise like every first season episode of Picard for example.
There seems to be a lack of interest here; especially for a show that’s been off the for so long. But that could be the other issue as well that it’s been off so long some have just moved on.
Lower Decks also didn’t get much engagement here last season. It’s a shame.
Yeah very true. But the animated shows never gets the same kind of attention as the live action shows anywhere except YouTube oddly, especially LDS. But pretty low to moderate in other places.
I don’t really keep track of that sort of thing. Wouldn’t know where to start gauging YouTube comments, that’s usually such a clusterf**k once you get past the first couple popular comments.
I can deal with Reddit and Disqus boards. The main Star Trek Reddit mods aren’t exactly chill, but it keeps things calm. I do think the tone of discord here in recent weeks could have been a tipping point for a good few people. Too many discussions got completely subsumed by what could politely be described as “personal distractions,” (I am not blameless there), and trolling can hit pretty hard here.
—
“Wouldn’t know where to start gauging YouTube comments, that’s usually such a clusterf**k once you get past the first couple popular comments.’
Yeah YouTube can feel like a swamp at times. But if you stick to the more balanced and more positive sites like Trekyards, Trekculture, etc the comments are more balanced. I stay from the ‘NUTREK IS TOO WOKE’ channels. 🙄
And thankfully those ‘personal distractions’ has now mostly disappeared since a certain someone has been banned.
The irony is all the whiny posts over people being overly negative about this show the last few weeks and yet the negative comments have been pretty subdued so far.. No one is attacking or berating each other and everyone is just giving their opinions and moving on. The views have been fairly balanced on both sides.
Only ONE person took everything so personally and tried to fight with everyone because they didn’t like other opinions.
They should’ve been banned long ago and was just too disruptive. Sorry just being real about it.
What??
You’re not missing the “JUST WAITING FOR THE 35 L-O-U-D VOCAL HATERS HERE WHO REPEATS THEMSELVES 35 TIMES A DAY (ALTHOUGH I REPEAT MYSELF WORSE THAN ANY HERE) TO SAY SOMETHING MEAN ABOUT DISCOVERY SO I CAN GET TRIGGERED ABOUT IT BECAUSE IT’S ALWAYS ABOUT ME!
AND BTW, I SAW THAT POSTER LEGACY SAY SOMETHING MEAN ABOUT DISCOVERY WITH JUST TWO LINES AND I DON’T LIKE IT.
.SHE DOESN’T KNOW OR CARE WHO I AM BUT I’M GOING TO MAKE IT MY BUSINESS TO STALK HER HARDER TO GET HER ATTENTION. I’M NOT A BITTER AND CRAZY OLD MAN WITH DEEP PERSONALITY ISSUES I’M JUST REALLY OBSESSED OVER A TV SHOW!!”
PS: “I STILL DON’T LIKE LDS! AND HATE IT’S CANON!!!!!!!!”
I mean look how dull the boards have become? People just discussing things calmly without the resident lunatic turning everything up to an 11. Who doesn’t miss the crazy? 😂
Lol fortunately no, I do not miss that lunacy. I think I speak for everyone here as well. 😉
And what’s more funny Legacy hasn’t even bothered commenting on any of the new episode yet. Looks like she just has no interest in it.
But judging by the lack of posts here she’s clearly not alone it seems.
That is what’s hilarious. The guy was losing his marbles over a new poster here who just gave a couple of opinions about the show but didn’t seem to care that much one way or the other. She seem way more interested in discussing in what she likes about Star Trek instead of what she hates.
But for some bizarre reason he took it as some personal front against him and all things holy and began giving her grief over it. Now the former resident lunatic lost his chance to be beligerant here for the entire season over someone who never had an inkling to talk to him, respectfully asked him to ignore her and makes about 10 posts here a week lol. It’s the final season and now he can only lurk here and locked out of the conversation. Poor baby.
Ok last time I bring it up I just find the whole thing utterly hilarious but also deliciously deserved. 😉
Ok back on topic! Yeah I thought the episode was good. Hopefully more people will post in the next episode.
Ha ha, I got caught up in the “watch it now” article and didn’t know this one was here. There are only 17 comments there so I got confused too.
Yeah it’s weird man. This place is a graveyard but it’s not much better on TrekCre either. Not even a hundred posts. This is definitely not the Picard season 3 crowd lol.
Marked improvement! The production values are hard to beat, and the space chase and ships stopping the landslide were pretty epic. The quest is set up well enough, and I don’t really mind it being a sequel to The Chase.
I do like Rayner, I’m a sucker for any no-nonsense character in this ensemble. Villains have some promise, liked the android, and I’m moderately invested in Saru’s romance still. The more laid back tone is welcome and fits with a version of Burnham we didn’t see nearly enough but know is there from early season 3.
Some expository dialogue was a bit clunky, I still don’t vibe with Tilly at all, and the new intrusive transporters will always be hilarious to me, but honestly nothing crazy to whine about. Hope this bodes well for the future.
Also, question for the people who know this show better: Burnham knew that planet from the diary right away because she’d been there in another episode?
I knew it was going to be a good episode when we finally got to see how CBS Studios did the animated STAR TREK pre-roll for Discovery for the first time. I crossed my fingers for it, I was really hoping they would do it, and they did: Disco materializes in front of the camera before warping off to trace the Starfleet shield. PERFECT!
Do I wish that this vibe had been there in seasons three and four? I do. Am I sad that we only have eight episodes left? I am! Will I savor and enjoy each one of them? I sure will, if they keep up this high level of quality that I saw tonight.
Let’s fly, Discovery!
I forgot Disco has never gotten its own pre-roll.
Lower Decks’ is still my favorite with the koala, but it goes to show how engrained this has gotten for me in such a short span of time – when they did the special one for “The Last Generation” I did an audible, “Aww!”
Why didn’t their mouths fill up with sand during the hover bike race through the desert? Now, I’m asking for a friend but personally that was one of the stupidest things I’ve ever seen.
They had shields. Only explanation I can think of.
Yeah. You see their shield bubble at one point.
This definitely was a great start to the season! A very solid episode overall that was actually fun and action packed with a great tie in to TNG.
I didn’t love this episode as much as others seem to but definitely good. I knew what the twist was ahead of time but didn’t feel spoiled at all. And it’s nice we didn’t have to wait 5+ episodes to know what it was like the last 3 seasons. And the Chase is an amazing story to follow.
That is the thing about Star Trek and TNG in general where they have stumbled upon these amazing discoveries just to totally move on to something else the next week.
That episode just felt like another Tuesday for the crew of the Enterprise and I think when I originally saw it literally was on a Tuesday lol when the show aired in my area.
Anyway it’s great we can get a full on story and being so far into the future makes it more interesting for me.
And I really enjoyed all the 32nd century stuff. We’re finally getting a deeper dive into it and it’s obvious they are setting up for Starfleet Academy.
Also all the new characters were fun to watch and really excited to learn L’ak backstory since the actor confirms he has another TNG connection. Rayner looks like he’s going to be interesting to watch too.
Oh and loved Fred. Some amazing Data vibes. Totally there for it.
I did have some downs, some of the Tilly stuff wasn’t great and the usual Discovery bringing up personal stuff in a crisis showed up but it was kept to a minimum.
But no real complaints. This was great overall and set up the season well with strong action, mystery, humor and FX. I just hope this keeps up which is ALWAYS this shows problem IMO, but we’ll see.
Score: 8/10
A couple of things:
Loved meeting Fred. Aren’t Coppelius class a druids conceived as twins?
Did anybody else spot the two shots of the Constitution-class ship in the trailer for the rest of the season?
I tried to like Disco for four seasons. I canceled my Paramount Plus after the end of the last season of SNW. I watched this ep free on YouTube, curious if there was any improvement. My thought are that the writer strike must have caused the show to pay less for worse writers. That was just awful. Bad writing. And bad acting. And bad directing. I can’t even understand how Burnam is a captain. She’s wrong about everything all the time and so full of herself. If she had listened to Leoben then they would have caught that ship. Tilly is written so poorly. You can be autistic and not be a cartoon. Same with Stamets. How is that guy such a supposedly accomplished actor? It’s like he and the guy who’s his husband are acting in a Cartoon. Over the top, silly, 2 dimensional. The cut of the scenes and action are hap hazard and plot remind me of the last two Star Wars movie. Made up as they went along and McGuffins to drive the plot instead of story and acting and relationships. RIP Disco. I won’t be renewing my membership till something else Star Trek comes back.
I though Season 4 was the worst.
Now they proved me wrong.
This first episode was barely watchable, all flashes and feelings, but zero Star Trek.
What a shame this series had become after the first 2 seasons.
Strange,
I didnt enjoy the episode as much, have only seen the first one, yet. My mistake was, I dabbled in the first season last few weeks and must say Lorca is dearly missed. Shroomdrive aside, still stuff in S1 that irks me, but I came around and rewatching is fun. Maybe DSC S5 has to sit a few years until I come around to it as well. As with ENT, at the time somehow terrible, but in hindsight and fresh rewatches comes across very smooth as dutifully executed Berman Era Trek.
Well and The Chase, positive message (TV was different back then) but a throwaway episode. Dont have to explain why almost all actors dressed up as aliens have a head and two arms and two legs in-universe, no need to explain the klingon ridges as with that Augment virus. But whatever, take it as your starting point.
Threshold is another Episode, Id like not to be reminded of. Hopefully the Pathway drive remains under that speed limit that will… well you know. Or this might have been Discovery Season 6.
Liked parts of S3, liked most of S4. Lets see what happens. .
Kind of a minor thing, I suppose, but after the ship they were chasing does its flippy thing that throws off all those false warp signatures…couldn’t they simply follow the one that they visually saw the ship take? Like..that-a-way…
I vote for a moratorium on desert planets for the next 20 years at least. It’s officially cliche. :D
Scientifically and statistically speaking, there are probably way more frozen, rocky and desert planets than Earthlike ones. I’m surprised that they don’t go to more places with lower / higher gravity and thinner / denser atmospheres, but that’s hard to do in live-action.
I’m impressed they got in that second unit photography in Brazil to help. After years of easy-access to deserts in California, those are now ironically pretty exotic to shoot with a Toronto-based series. It’s only the conversation at the end between Burnham and Book where the AR wall didn’t look so convincing.
I haven’t seen the show since season 1 and I watched the first episode for free on YouTube. I have a few thoughts and questions:
– why is Michael Burnham doing everything as the captain? She’s never on the bridge sending away teams on missions and all of the bridge officers never leave their bridge chairs.
– why is the federation sending a 900-year-old ship on away missions? That would be like us asking Ghengis Kahn’s army to fight against drone warfare.
– if the objective was to prevent the Sith looking girl from Asohka and her boyfriend from leaving the Romulan ship, why didn’t they just blow it up?
– the technology used to spread humanoid DNA throughout the galaxy is probably fairly self evident from a scientific perspective. It’s probably some kind of gene sequencing methodology that was done by the progenitors, which unfolded over millions of years. I don’t see why it’s a mystery or a such a big deal to get a hold of. That’s like trying to find the technology that created the Grand Canyon. It was the Colorado River. I’m not going to chase down two people just because they bottled some of it and ran away.
– The speeder bike scene was when I started tuning out. They were yelling some exposition about an avalanche and I was so bored. None of this was intellectually stimulating or thought provoking in the slightest.
All in all, my rating is D+ for the episode.
To your first points:
The in-universe answer to why Burnham does everything could be explained as that just being the way they did things in the 23rd century. Archer often led away teams, and Kirk led most of his. Maybe Admiral Vance should give her a talking to about how that snot how it’s done anymore, but if Captain Rayner is any indication, things may have reverted a little since The Burn.
Discovery has been given a full refit while being familiar enough for this crew to acclimate. They’ve been pretty generous with how quickly everyone form the 23rd century has adjusted to 900 years of advances, there’s no denying that though.
Not really sure how blowing up the Romulan ship solves the main objective of securing the ship and what’s on it…
Thanks for answering my question. I still wouldn’t ask Ghengis Kahn to break a Pentagon encryption, so I’m not sure why Starfleet is relying on Tilly to do so. Did they all have to go back to school to catch up?
I’m also still not clear about why finding the tech that the progenitors used to spread life is such a big deal. It’s not like our society is in a race to capture the stardust that derived carbon based life. Makes no sense.
I’ve always had an issue with how easily everyone picked up on how to handle 32nd century… everything. Tech, history, politics, social cues… they’re smart, but in the span of what, 3 years? They’re all caught up? it’s one of those things that’s been a frustration as it’s tied into how little all of that has actually been explored on the show – the Federation and its borders have felt very claustrophobic. I don’t even remember anyone but Burnham researching their long-deceased families. For a show that’s all about self-care and exploring feelings, that was kinda glossed over.
As for Genghis Khan being called upon to decrypt something… I’ll go one better – it’s silly to bring back Khan Noonien Singh to basically do the same. Into Darkness had bizarre logic too.
As for the tech… yeah I dunno. Logically you’d think that every society has progressed beyond the tech of the Progenitors in the last few million years. But that was also baked into the motivation of everyone in “The Chase” too. The galaxy is rebuilding, so perhaps its just the allure of a possible shortcut to regaining a technological edge?
The motivation for everyone in “The Chase” was to solve a puzzle, which they did. The prize was finding out the common origin of humanoid species. The progenitor hologram basically stated how they did it, and that was that.
But remember that the Cardassians and Klingons both went into it thinking the prize would be an all powerful technological secret – one thought it was a weapon, the other an unlimited power source. So the same logic applies – modern species thinking long lost technology from millions of years ago would give them a massive advantage over their rivals.
I was glued to my seat. Otherwise I’d have got up and switched it off.
😂👍
Bravo!
Myself, I was bored. Bored by the stupid action and plot devices that made no sense. Like a paralysis ray that paralyzes your body but not your mouth? Or starships of considerable mass that can fly into the atmosphere and saucerplant into the ground but cause no residual damage anywhwere to the terrain or the city? Or the effects of an apparently unshielded body being on top of a ship travelling at warp? Or getting hit by a chunk of space debris?
I’ve been looking past Disco’s flaws because I like and actors and mnay of the characters. But at this point the flaws are vastly outweighing the good parts.
“Maybe you didn’t notice it, but your brain did.” Mr. Plinkett
I suppose Altan Soong may be the best possibility, but it could have been Adam or Arik. At least they didn’t have Brent Spiner playing him. :-) Although that might have been interesting.
Just got to see this today (Sunday), because I’ve been sick, so I’m late to the party. I hope everyone hasn’t gone home already. :-)
I thought the chase sequences went on way too long and weren’t actually very interesting. I’d rather watch Michael talk about ideas than watch her ride a motorcycle across the sand for a really. long. time.
So, Michael went against orders AGAIN by setting her phaser to stun and trying to talk things out. I mean, normally, I’m all in favor of talking instead of violence, but the one person who knows what’s going on says getting the thingy back is so crucial that phasers should be set to kill. If the one person who knows what’s going on says that, maybe Michael could consider believing him?
But how cool that they’re following up on “The Chase!” I’d be excited about that if I thought the season would mostly be about the ideas, but it’s probably just going to be more explosions and car chases. *sigh*
Something about the closeups in this episode felt clumsy to me. I don’t know enough about filmmaking to use the right language, but they didn’t feel organic; it felt like HERE’S A CLOSEUP NOW. Eric Cheung, you know way more about all this stuff than I do — what’s the right terminology for what I’m trying to say here?
Although there were things I didn’t like about the episode, to me, the entire episode was worth it for the scene of two starships stopping an avalanche by driving their noses into the ground and extending their shields. I’ve never seen a starship DO that before, and that’s so cool! To me, that’s worth WAY more than characters riding on stupid motorcycles. Cool idea, Michelle Paradise!
It made me smile to see the character named “Moll”. In the early 20th century a female companion of a gangster, was called a Moll or Gun Moll.
Two Federation starships crashing into a sandy planet, head first, to cause a barrier to stop a landslide. So idiotic and over the top, just like everything on Discovery.