Compare/Contrast: Strange New Worlds vs. the Rest of Trek

[jah1986]

The absolute worst DS9 and I think Star Trek episode was "Move Along Home". It had the crew as pieces in a board game. I'll take Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow any day over that monstrosity.

[Prevailing Wind]

But "Move Along Home" is worth watching to see Quark grovel.

[jah1986]

21 hours ago, Prevailing Wind said:

But "Move Along Home" is worth watching to see Quark grovel.

Is it though 😉? Nope, not even Quark groveling is enough to move from the top of my most hated ST episode ever. 

[paigow]

These valid examples of Berman / Braga era crap highlight the inability of Goldsman and crew to learn. 10 episode seasons should be almost crap free.

[marinw]

AFAIK, Spock was the only Officer to ever serve both as Science Officer and First Officer. Do they ever explain why this is? Spock kept saying how he had no desire for his own command.

On Voyager, Janeway and later Seven seemed to do most of the Science things.

Edited July 27, 2023 by marinw

[paigow]

1 hour ago, marinw said:

On Voyager, Janeway and later Seven seemed to do most of the Science things.

Tuvok graduated from The Vulcan Espionage Academy

[Chicago Redshirt]

17 hours ago, paigow said:

These valid examples of Berman / Braga era crap highlight the inability of Goldsman and crew to learn. 10 episode seasons should be almost crap free.

I think there has been a lot of conditioning by the first couple seasons of TNG and DS9 kinda sucking relative to the rest of those series that series need a bit to find their voice and actors need a while to "get" their characters, etc.

But that really shouldn't be so. There's no reason why shows can't hit the ground running, especially when there's so many role models both from inside and outside Trek of what might make a good/great show, and how to avoid common blunders.

That said, I maintain my position that the worst SNW episode is nowhere near as bad as the worst of the pre-streaming Trek series. I'm not sure what I would put as the worst SNW episode....What do people think?

[Mr. Sparkle]

1 minute ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

I'm not sure what I would put as the worst SNW episode....What do people think?

Unpopular opinion perhaps, but for me, "The Elysian Kingdom." 

[baldryanr]

2 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

That said, I maintain my position that the worst SNW episode is nowhere near as bad as the worst of the pre-streaming Trek series. I'm not sure what I would put as the worst SNW episode....What do people think?

Heh, if you listen to some people every episode of Nu-Trek in general is worse than the previous one, so we'll have to wait until the series finale for the worst.

More seriously, the ep where they plugged the kid into the computer was pretty meh. Pike acting like a love-struck teenager, mediocre action, etc.  Plus I'd argue it's one of those episodes where Pike crosses the line from laid-back to oblivious.

In fact, in some ways that's (potentially) a big problem with Pike in general.  He's cool space-dad, more or less willing to let the kids do their own thing as long as they don't go too far off the rails.  It's been de-emphasized a bit, but he even has Una to act as the strict parent while he gets to float above it all.  Is is appropriate for the captain of a Starfleet vessel - let's not forget that this is supposed to be a military organization and I can't see a present day commanding officer acting this way.

Edited July 27, 2023 by baldryanr

[Chicago Redshirt]

On the flip side, I think the Season 1 finale where Pike sees the alt-Balance of Terror outcome and the Una courtroom drama this season probably stack up nicely against the best of most Trek series. 

[tv-talk]

21 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

On the flip side, I think the Season 1 finale where Pike sees the alt-Balance of Terror outcome and the Una courtroom drama this season probably stack up nicely against the best of most Trek series. 

The more I think about it, the more to me this past episode has to be a top5-7 all-time Trek episodes. 

[Prevailing Wind]

While browsing IMDB, looking for the TOS episodes with M'Benga, I discovered that one of the Metrons was played by a woman who was also a dancer on Shindig! - the one with the glasses.

[paigow]

TOS only showed a single Metron talking to Kirk.. maybe she was edited out..

[baldryanr]

39 minutes ago, paigow said:

TOS only showed a single Metron talking to Kirk.. maybe she was edited out..

That was her, they just dubbed in a male voice for the dialogue. 

[paigow]

17 minutes ago, baldryanr said:

That was her, they just dubbed in a male voice for the dialogue. 

Edited July 31, 2023 by paigow
ETA: Roddenberry called her back for TNG S1

[starri]

If you'd like to discuss TOS, you may do so here.

Please keep this discussion on how SNW does or does not compare with the rest of Trek.

Thank you.

[Chicago Redshirt]

To dovetail from a discussion in the thread for the Subspace Rhapsody episode:

A poster put forth the thesis that SNW is showing progressive politics by elevating its female characters and lowering its male characters, almost to make up for previous incarnations of Trek. To quote them:

 I think it's specifically how they want to write the show ie giving much more emphasis to role of various women by elevating what they are capable of, basically in a sense making amends for how women and POC were generally portrayed in TOS and tbh even TNG- if they were portrayed at all. 

What we have seen in SNW so far, you could argue that Spock actually needs the assistance of the rest of the crew to even get by, if anything he is portrayed as the weakest link. Meanwhile Ortega is the greatest pilot in the universe, La'an is some kind of fighting machine that could be engineered a bit, Una is the impervious engineered Illyrian who is clearly superior to plain old humans, M;Benga is the most lethal warrior in the galaxy, Uhuru is some kind of genius who has barely scratched surface of what she may be able to do....and Pike has been reduced to a happy chef hoping everyone can get along thru food and Sam Kirk is the annoying doofus. That is no accident, it's the progressivism of the show on display. 

Full disclosure I dont say any of that as criticism but rather observation, though I do wish Spock was good bit more TOS Spock and in hindsight do find myself a bit annoyed with how he's written because of how bad ass he really is in the rest of Trek.

I just think this is a mistaken way of looking at SNW and Trek.

All characters in Trek are, generally speaking, among the best at what they do (again with the somewhat exception of Lower Decks, and even those characters are portrayed as pretty kick-ass at their jobs once they get past their various personality flaws.

There's not IMO a reason to think that Pike is portrayed as "lowered" in any meaningful sense of that term. He is loved and respected by his entire crew. He has generally been portrayed positively as a thoughtful and capable leader.

Similarly, M'Benga is portrayed as extremely skilled at his job and overwhelmingly positively, despite now having some moral baggage. One can't say that he is simultaneously "the most lethal warrior in the galaxy" and argue that he is somehow "lowered" in status, let alone that he is lowered because he is male.

I will concede that Lt. Spock is not as much of a badass as Lt. Commander Spock is in TOS. They often miss opportunities for SNW Spock to respond as TOS Spock would. One such instance was in Subspace Rhapsody: When Uhura said something along the lines of "Do you know the odds of all of us being aboard the Enterprise serving together at this moment in time?" TOS Spock would have instantly said, "Approximately 45 quadrillion to one" or whatever number.

SNW Spock is portrayed as struggling with his emotional/human side much more than TOS Spock. TOS Spock has pretty much downplayed the fact that he is half-human and almost treats the notion that he is human as an insult. But again, these are not gender-based differences. This is rooted in a difference in philosophy. TOS Spock and TOS characters often talked as though he and Vulcans in general didn't have emotions even though it's evident that TOS Spock and TOS Vulcans in general did, and just preferred to hide them and rationalize them. Sarek loved Amanda. Spock was happy to see that he didn't kill Jim in Amok Time. TNG and subsequent series clarified that indeed Vulcans have but suppress emotions.

And SNW Uhura has in 20 episodes shown more agency than 78 episodes of TOS and most of the TOS movies. But again, I do not think that is some sort of revenge for the character not even being developed in her original run or you-go-girl feminism.  

But none of this is because Star Trek has gone woke or is trying to make amends for perceived shortcomings of previous series. 

[baldryanr]

Hasn't Star Trek always been "woke"?  A senior staff that wasn't all white men in TOS was pretty progressive for the time. 

I do think it's fair to say that Pike, while beloved by his crew, has tended to be more passive and laissez-faire than Kirk to the point where in his worst moments he comes across like a doofus or willfully ignorant (that ep with the kid who got plugged into the machine, letting Boimler run amuck, etc.).  

[Prevailing Wind]

I want to know if her name really IS Una, or is she just called that because she's "Number One."  If her name really is Una, how propitious that she has the rank of "Number One."

(For those unfamiliar with Spanish, Una is the feminine version of "one.")

[marinw]

9 hours ago, baldryanr said:

Hasn't Star Trek always been "woke"?  A senior staff that wasn't all white men in TOS was pretty progressive for the time. 

TOS had a Japanese Helmsman twenty years after the end of WWII. We also saw a black scientist (Daystrom) and a Commodore (Stone). And a Russian Navigator during the cold war/space race. We all know the mark Uhura left on our popular culture. So yes, quite daring and "woke" for its' time.

[tv-talk]

12 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

I just think this is a mistaken way of looking at SNW and Trek.

I think you have missed what TOS is most famous for- how progressive it was for its time. That was Rodenberry's direct intent, it's very well known. It wasnt happenstance that Kirk kissed Uhura, just random plot point, it was the first inter-racial kiss in the history of television! That spirit of progressivism was very much the show and runs thru all Trek right up to today. If there is an issue with it, it's how heavy handed it's become recently. Burnham is the epitome of this and turned many people off, just too on the nose with that character.

At any rate I dont even think there is an argument as to whether Trek is progressive or not, it's been in its DNA from the very beginning. 

1 hour ago, marinw said:

So yes, quite daring and "woke" for its' time.

Yep and that's huge part of made it so great and iconic!

[paigow]

6 hours ago, Prevailing Wind said:

I want to know if her name really IS Una,

(For those unfamiliar with Spanish, Una is the feminine version of "one.")

Her court martial confirmed that her real name is Una.

[Chicago Redshirt]

11 hours ago, baldryanr said:

Hasn't Star Trek always been "woke"?  A senior staff that wasn't all white men in TOS was pretty progressive for the time. 

I do think it's fair to say that Pike, while beloved by his crew, has tended to be more passive and laissez-faire than Kirk to the point where in his worst moments he comes across like a doofus or willfully ignorant (that ep with the kid who got plugged into the machine, letting Boimler run amuck, etc.).  

Yes, Star Trek has traditionally been progressive and is still. It's also true that by the standards of 2023, 1960s progressive and 1980s-1990s progressive are pretty conservative, especially when it comes to gender roles. 

As groundbreaking as it was to have a Black woman in a relatively senior role in a quasi-military organization in the 1960s, TOS Uhura rarely initiated things. had a focal role, solved problems or showed skills beyond being a space telephone operator. Nurse Chapel was said to have given up a career in biomedical research to serve on a starship, but she too had no agency and entirely just did what McCoy and M'Benga told her (and pined for Spock in an obvious, pathetic and doomed way). Number One wasn't around much but she was referred to in The Cage/the Menagerie as "a walking computer" and Pike insulted her by saying he wasn't used to a woman being on his bridge when she has been there presumably for quite some time. In the interest of time, I won't go into details about how TNG didn't really allow Yar, Pulaski, Troi or Crusher to live to their full potential as characters or truly be on the same level as the male ones.

SNW has elevated Uhura, Chapel and Una up to more 3D characters and allowed them to be saviors of the day in a way that they had not been in TOS.

And it's true that Pike and Spock have not been the ones to always save the day like Kirk and Spock generally were in TOS.

But that doesn't get us to the point that current Trek is undermining Pike and Spock and M'Benga and elevating Una, Uhura and the female cast to avenge how previous Trek's treated women. At least not in my opinion.

6 hours ago, Prevailing Wind said:

I want to know if her name really IS Una, or is she just called that because she's "Number One."  If her name really is Una, how propitious that she has the rank of "Number One."

(For those unfamiliar with Spanish, Una is the feminine version of "one.")

Her childhood friend the lawyer called her Una, so I assume that is her birth name. Whether Pike adopted the habit of calling her Number One because of that or cognizant of that is unclear. In TNG, Picard calls Riker Number One so it is apparently what some captains do (although we haven't seen any other captain do that for their first officer, I don't think).

41 minutes ago, tv-talk said:

I think you have missed what TOS is most famous for- how progressive it was for its time. That was Rodenberry's direct intent, it's very well known. It wasnt happenstance that Kirk kissed Uhura, just random plot point, it was the first inter-racial kiss in the history of television! That spirit of progressivism was very much the show and runs thru all Trek right up to today. If there is an issue with it, it's how heavy handed it's become recently. Burnham is the epitome of this and turned many people off, just too on the nose with that character.

At any rate I dont even think there is an argument as to whether Trek is progressive or not, it's been in its DNA from the very beginning. 

As I said above, I'm not arguing that Trek is not progressive. I am arguing that it's doubtful that its progressive nature has led its current creators to downplay its male characters to elevate its female ones. 

That thesis ignores that a) its male characters generally haven't been downplayed. Pike is fleshed out and lionized. M'Benga has been given some depth as well. Spock admittedly isn't as sharp or central to most plots as he was in TOS, and SNW focuses a lot on his struggles with his emotions and his romantic relationships more than his devotion to logic or his saving the day. But that isn't part of a woke conspiracy to elevate the women in the show. And while he arguably isn't TOS Kirk, SNW Kirk has shown a lot of his qualities at least on paper: he's smart, humorous, adept at reading people and situations, hard-working, ambitious and charismatic.

b) that traditionally all main characters on Trek are optimized with ridiculous levels of competence, so it should not be surprising or shocking that the main women characters in SNW are also shown to have high levels of competence.

c) that even accepting the premise that the male characters have been downplayed and the women have been upgraded for discussion's sake, that doesn't mean that the women have been upgraded and the men downgraded to serve the woke philosophy of current Trek management to avenge sexism in the past. It's not like there's a limited amount of cool points to be dished out among the crew and TPTB decided to spend most of them on women. They could very easily have made the men cooler or more effective while still keeping the women as cool as they are (or even making them cooler).

As to Burnham, again, most complaints about her are IMO baseless. She is basically treated about the same as any other lead character in Trek -- being brilliant, resourceful, sexy, admired and so forth. There are lots of reasons to dislike Discovery but the notion that Burnham is a Mary Sue or most of the other knocks on her character are BS.

[tv-talk]

You are the only person talking about a "woke conspiracy" and obviously sensitive to the criticism non-Trek fans have made about recent Star Trek. I am thinking that on this forum everyone loves Trek and no one feels a "woke conspiracy" is going on, just my guess.

Burnham's awful, the entire point of season1 Disco was to establish that the somehow unknown stepsister of Spock was his superior in every possible way, and better than Kirk too, etc etc. Just an annoying thing to do to the show and clearly the intent of the writers. 

On SNW, I would say that Pike, Spock, and Sam Kirk are all at times doofus'...and they are 3 of the 4 white, male characters. Coincidence right? Everyone else is somehow the greatest in the galaxy in some form or another whereas Spock is just weak-minded and in need of help in this show, S.Kirk portrayed as a slobbish bro, and Pike now a chef.  This fits with most new Trek in tending to downplay one group and elevate others. And I have no problem with it as long as the shows are good, but it's obviously not just happenstance. It's how Trek looks to stick with its progressive roots today when in TOS simply having characters like Uhuru and Sulu present in the scene was groundbreaking.

Edited August 9, 2023 by tv-talk

[Chicago Redshirt]

1 hour ago, tv-talk said:

You are the only person talking about a "woke conspiracy" and obviously sensitive to the criticism non-Trek fans have made about recent Star Trek. I am thinking that on this forum everyone loves Trek and no one feels a "woke conspiracy" is going on, just my guess.

Burnham's awful, the entire point of season1 Disco was to establish that the somehow unknown stepsister of Spock was his superior in every possible way, and better than Kirk too, etc etc. Just an annoying thing to do to the show and clearly the intent of the writers. 

On SNW, I would say that Pike, Spock, and Sam Kirk are all at times doofus'...and they are 3 of the 4 white, male characters. Coincidence right? Everyone else is somehow the greatest in the galaxy in some form or another whereas Spock is just weak-minded and in need of help in this show, S.Kirk portrayed as a slobbish bro, and Pike now a chef.  This fits with most new Trek in tending to downplay one group and elevate others. And I have no problem with it as long as the shows are good, but it's obviously not just happenstance. It's how Trek looks to stick with its progressive roots today when in TOS simply having characters like Uhuru and Sulu present in the scene was groundbreaking.

Unknown, yes. I don't see why that should bother anyone familiar with TOS. Spock canonically told no one on the Enterprise that his father was a Vulcan ambassador who was coming aboard prior to "Journey to Babel," and never told Kirk that he had a step-brother prior to STV. 

"Superior" to Spock? There's nothing in S1 to base that Burnham is better than Spock in anyway other than her having a better relationship with Sarek. I suppose when you have him side by side in S2 at least there is a plausible argument but again, I don't think there are specific things she says or does that show her to be better than Spock. And I don't know how Kirk gets in the equation. Point out some specifics, please.

Sam Kirk is comic relief and not a main character, so I don't think it's fair to count him. Sure, Pike and Spock occasionally look like doofuses, particularly in comedy episodes. But then so do pretty much every other character, whether it's Una's being concerned about being a pin-up girl or La'an fixating on alt-timeline Kirk. And throughout Trek, there are times when Kirk, Spock, Picard, Janeway, Archer or whoever you might name were doofuses and there were times when they were written as the best the galaxy had to offer at pretty much everything. That's just part of Trek's DNA and has little to nothing to do with the characters' races or genders.

[baldryanr]

2 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

Unknown, yes. I don't see why that should bother anyone familiar with TOS. Spock canonically told no one on the Enterprise that his father was a Vulcan ambassador who was coming aboard prior to "Journey to Babel," and never told Kirk that he had a step-brother prior to STV. 

I'd like to believe that in-universe people knew, but never talked about it with Spock.  Burnham should have been infamous as the only Starfleet officer convicted of mutiny at that point in time, so the gossip mill would have spread pieces of her bio out to the fleet (you'd think someone raised by a Vulcan wouldn't mutiny, etc.).  Once Kirk found out Sarek was Spock's father then he should have made the connection.

[RachelKM]

50 minutes ago, baldryanr said:

I'd like to believe that in-universe people knew, but never talked about it with Spock.  Burnham should have been infamous as the only Starfleet officer convicted of mutiny at that point in time, so the gossip mill would have spread pieces of her bio out to the fleet (you'd think someone raised by a Vulcan wouldn't mutiny, etc.).  Once Kirk found out Sarek was Spock's father then he should have made the connection.

If I remember correctly, it was a specific plot point that Burnham and the Discovery as a whole were going to be scrubbed from the Star Fleet records once the shot into they future. And, to the extent that people present knew, the information was made classified and they were ordered not to discuss Burnham, the Discovery, the AI, or the hologram technology the AI had used (which was also scrubbed after Spock was framed using it). 

The only Enterprise crew that were on the Discovery were Pike, Chin-Riley, and Spock. After the classification order, there is no reason any of the other Enterprise crew should have been made aware of the Michael and Spock's connection even if they'd heard about the mutiny case. 

I seem to recall that even those who served with Michael didn't know a lot about her family or background beyond that she was raised on Vulcan until the events of Discovery Season 2.

Edited August 9, 2023 by RachelKM
Typos

[marinw]

It occurs to me that La'an shares a lot of Character DNA with Tasha Yar, in that she was the Security Chief with a traumatic past. In season 1 of SNW we also had a blind engineer.

As for the "Wokeness" of various Treks, I think that one thing that annoys us about Discovery is how seemingly self-congratulatory it is about its' own wokeness. 

Edited August 10, 2023 by marinw

[marinw]

23 hours ago, tv-talk said:

Everyone else is somehow the greatest in the galaxy in some form or another

Yes. I lose interest when everybody is a super-genius. I'm more likely to engage with characters who are smart and competent but a still imperfect and struggling. Betas rather than Alphas. 

[Panopticon]

Quote

As for the "Wokeness" of various Treks, I think that one thing that annoys us about Discovery is how seemingly self-congratulatory it is about its' own wokeness. 

Yes, this. I feel like the earlier Star Treks, while deeply unsubtle about their sociopolitical views, often managed a show-don't-tell.

If one of the earlier Star Trek series wanted to send a message that a [Widget Person] was as valuable and worthy of respect as anyone else, it would plunk the Widget Person down on the bridge of the Best Starship Ever: clearly great at the job and implicitly trusted by the captain. Meanwhile, the audience would be told a story about how the brilliant-if-flawed crew fought to protect each other through dangerous and humorous challenges.

If Discovery wanted to send a message that a [Widget Person] was as valuable and worthy of respect as anyone else, two characters would have a conversation.

"Widget People are as valuable and worthy of respect as anyone else."

"Can you believe that some planets are bigoted against Widget People?"

"Not any planet I want to visit."

"They just need to be educated. Called in, not called out."

"No, I don't think there should be any debate about the value of Widget People."

"Of course you're right. Did you know how much Widget People contributed to medical advances across the universe?"

"And the music of Widget People is the most popular in seven galaxies!"

And this dialogue would go on for so long that Discovery would completely forget to tell a story.

I was really hesitant to try SNW because I was so repulsed by Discovery and its lectures. But I happened to get a free trial of Paramount Plus and I thought I'd put SNW on in the background while I did something else, turning it off when the self-righteousness wore me out. It was a pleasant surprise when I actually liked SNW. I'm almost tempted to watch some of the Discovery episodes with Pike, as I didn't make it that far when I attempted to watch Discovery when it was new.

Almost tempted. Not quite.

Edited August 11, 2023 by Panopticon
comma

[Affogato]

On 8/10/2023 at 8:49 AM, marinw said:

It occurs to me that La'an shares a lot of Character DNA with Tasha Yar, in that she was the Security Chief with a traumatic past. In season 1 of SNW we also had a blind engineer.

As for the "Wokeness" of various Treks, I think that one thing that annoys us about Discovery is how seemingly self-congratulatory it is about its' own wokeness. 

I think this may be true for a lot of people, that is their reaction to the show, but I am not sure if it is fair. There is a deliberate and joyful sense of diversity on the show and an abandonment of paternalistic ways of operating and a concern for problems that are not specifically the problems of men. We are unused to seeing this much representation and the people doing it, when they speak of it, are happy to be doing it. It is unusual, it is noticeably unusual, and will strike people over an over with this fact. Thing is, I wasn't too thrilled with the first season or second of discovery, but I feel they have managed to make something together worth making.  To be self aware is not necessarily self congratulatory or smug. someone has to do it over and over, so that eventually it will start being the way things should be.

If you search the term 'woke' has an interesting background.

https://www.vox.com/culture/21437879/stay-woke-wokeness-history-origin-evolution-controversy

Edited August 11, 2023 by Affogato

[Chicago Redshirt]

On 8/10/2023 at 7:47 PM, Panopticon said:

Yes, this. I feel like the earlier Star Treks, while deeply unsubtle about their sociopolitical views, often managed a show-don't-tell.

If one of the earlier Star Trek series wanted to send a message that a [Widget Person] was as valuable and worthy of respect as anyone else, it would plunk the Widget Person down on the bridge of the Best Starship Ever: clearly great at the job and implicitly trusted by the captain. Meanwhile, the audience would be told a story about how the brilliant-if-flawed crew fought to protect each other through dangerous and humorous challenges.

If Discovery wanted to send a message that a [Widget Person] was as valuable and worthy of respect as anyone else, two characters would have a conversation.

"Widget People are as valuable and worthy of respect as anyone else."

"Can you believe that some planets are bigoted against Widget People?"

"Not any planet I want to visit."

"They just need to be educated. Called in, not called out."

"No, I don't think there should be any debate about the value of Widget People."

"Of course you're right. Did you know how much Widget People contributed to medical advances across the universe?"

"And the music of Widget People is the most popular in seven galaxies!"

And this dialogue would go on for so long that Discovery would completely forget to tell a story.

I was really hesitant to try SNW because I was so repulsed by Discovery and its lectures. But I happened to get a free trial of Paramount Plus and I thought I'd put SNW on in the background while I did something else, turning it off when the self-righteousness wore me out. It was a pleasant surprise when I actually liked SNW. I'm almost tempted to watch some of the Discovery episodes with Pike, as I didn't make it that far when I attempted to watch Discovery when it was new.

Almost tempted. Not quite.

I think that is a straw-man as to Discovery's alleged wokeness. Point to an actual exchange from Discovery that is supposedly woke, and I'm sure I can find you at least one in SNW or any other Trek series that was similar or even more blatant.

I think it and SNW is no more or less self-congratulatory or subtle about being progressive than any other Trek show. 

[tv-talk]

The fact remains Discovery S1 was mainly panned by Trek fans for the reasons stated and generally considered an awful show whereas SNW S1 was a big hit with fans in large part because so many fans felt it captured the spirit of TOS. 

[Guest]

22 hours ago, tv-talk said:

The fact remains Discovery S1 was mainly panned by Trek fans for the reasons stated and generally considered an awful show whereas SNW S1 was a big hit with fans in large part because so many fans felt it captured the spirit of TOS. 

I don’t think it is that clear cut. Often times the vocal fans are only one small part of the picture. It’s very easy for fan spaces to become echo chambers and to miss there are other fans actually enjoy something that is seen as panned. 

Discovery wouldn’t have lasted as long as it has if it wasn’t appealing to an audience. 

[Chicago Redshirt]

16 hours ago, tv-talk said:

The fact remains Discovery S1 was mainly panned by Trek fans for the reasons stated and generally considered an awful show whereas SNW S1 was a big hit with fans in large part because so many fans felt it captured the spirit of TOS. 

Those aren't "facts." They are opinions. I tend to doubt that one can point to any objective measurement of how fans felt about either SNW or Discovery, just what representatives of the fanbase have said.

And even accepting the premise that "because there have been fans who panned Discovery as too woke and fans have not panned SNW because it was felt that it captured the spirit of TOS and that is fully representative of the fanbase as a while" as true, that would not mean the fans were right to come to that conclusion.

If they were, it should be a simple matter to point to specific scenes in DIS that showed that they were woke in a way that SNW is not. 

Edited August 18, 2023 by Chicago Redshirt

[Affogato]

I like Pike and Picard, but they are both really paternalistic heads of shows, very staid and comfortable to watch, very predictable. Men are in charge. Daddy is going to take us flying. Relax and enjoy.

Discovery is not.

I think that, any other considerations aside, this has to have some thing to do with the controversy.

Also, oddly, I don't get that feeling from TOS, either. TOS is a lot more male centric than I thought at the time, when that was even more common in entertainment, but I think the social structure of Kirk's crew was different.

I have noticed this in a lot of shows, I think, and I raise it as a possibility.

[tv-talk]

21 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

If they were, it should be a simple matter to point to specific scenes in DIS that showed that they were woke in a way that SNW is not. 

That would involve going back and rewatching an awful show that I saw years ago at this point, something I have no interest in doing. Rather I just recall my opinion of the show at the time, namely that it was a bit too on the nose in that aspect (tho I am loathe to use the term 'woke') and that the point of season1 seemed to be to elevate Burnham to be the single greatest character in series history. 

As to the rest, I seem to recall S1 being panned whereas SNW S1 was lauded but I could be wrong about that.

[tv-talk]

20 hours ago, Affogato said:

I think that, any other considerations aside, this has to have some thing to do with the controversy.

I think having the main character being Spock's heretofore unknown stepsister was the sticking point. Having a show's star character come out of nowhere but be deeply rooted in Spock's life and basically everything that ever had to do with his family, Vulcan, etc, etc was kind of trying to have your cake and eat it too.

That said, clearly all of it works for the show's fans and there is certainly nothing wrong with that!

[Affogato]

I had a thought to throw out. People talk about how unpleasant Vulcans are in so many of the shows. This was addressed in Discovery, when Sarek tries to integrate humans, Michael and Amanda, into his family to show/teach Spock empathy. To take a small step to change Vulcan society.

Think about it. Vulcan is a planet of Narcissists, always needing to validate themselves by being smarter and more accomplished, less emotional and reactive than others. Love and forgiveness and so on are not a part of the equation. It isn't pathological, because it is the societal norm, but just because something is normal doesn't mean it is ideal, pleasant, or likeable.

That's my theory as to why Vulcans become less attractive as a group as we get to know them. It isn't all that evil Discovery, either. In the original show Romulans were much more relatable, as they are in Picard.

[Affogato]

I have been rewatching Discovery and finished the first season. Now, Lorca averted a trope, in that he is consistently the best captain and the best leader. He rescues Michael, who is on a track to be wasted by the federation. He is operating in time of war, for which we make allowances. Then we learn

Spoiler

That he believes the opposite of the Federation's beliefs and goals, but he still remains a good leader who inspires and motivates people to be their best.

Pike is also kind of a perfect guy who does embody the principles of the federation, to the extent later than we see him fail the federation with his measured responses (as opposed to Kirk).

As things progress in Discovery, as I remember, and also in SNW, Spock is shown to be the specialist special guy in the world, much more so than Michael, and yet people do not hate him.

Saru and d later Michael have different leadership styles, and the viewers learn why all of these people have different leadership styles.

Yet tMichael is the one who really aggravates people.

[baldryanr]

On 8/21/2023 at 8:02 AM, Affogato said:

As things progress in Discovery, as I remember, and also in SNW, Spock is shown to be the specialist special guy in the world, much more so than Michael, and yet people do not hate him.

I'm pretty sure hating Spock and liking Trek are, for the most part, mutually exclusive.  It helps that we've seen Spock's future good deeds - erase the rest of Trek and it's a harder sell that this emo half-Vulcan is going to become the most pivotal person in Federation history. 

[Chicago Redshirt]

At some point, I would like to rewatch Discovery S2 to compare/contrast Pike/Una/Spock (which I just realized forms the unfortunate acronym PUS) in that show to how they are portrayed in SNW so far.

My memory is that Spock is mostly sidelined by being on the run and mental difficulties, Una doesn't have much to say/do and Pike is still awesome (but doesn't cook much) and is more about the action.

[Affogato]

22 hours ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

At some point, I would like to rewatch Discovery S2 to compare/contrast Pike/Una/Spock (which I just realized forms the unfortunate acronym PUS) in that show to how they are portrayed in SNW so far.

My memory is that Spock is mostly sidelined by being on the run and mental difficulties, Una doesn't have much to say/do and Pike is still awesome (but doesn't cook much) and is more about the action.

Pike consistently seems to embody the principles of Star Fleet and reacts accordingly.

[chaifan]

On 8/17/2023 at 7:57 PM, tv-talk said:

The fact remains Discovery S1 was mainly panned by Trek fans for the reasons stated and generally considered an awful show

Late to the conversation here, as I just finished watching S1 of SNW... 

I tried watching Discovery, got about 1/2 way through Season 1.  I didn't like it, but for none of the reasons that have been discussed in this thread.  My problem with Discovery is that there was just too much retconning from the start.  Not only the modern ship, but Klingons looked/acted entirely different, and there were several others that I can't recall now.  Yeah, I know, it all gets explained, but by then I was out.  I thought Discovery was good sci-fi, but not good Star Trek.

SNW has some of the same issues for me - a very modern ship compared to TOS, a total reworking of the Gorn (why not just create a new alien baddie?), characters like Nurse Chapel that are so removed from their TOS counterpart, etc.  But for some reason, I'm enjoying it a lot more.  Maybe I've just learned to take it for what it is, partly due to watching some of Discovery.  Or maybe it's just a better show. 

That said, I really don't like SNW's James Kirk.  He's not working for me, not one little bit.  And I think Nurse Chapel has such a different personality from TOS, it's distracting.  Again, good character, just not a good Nurse Chapel for me. 

So maybe I need to give Discovery another chance.  Just set aside my issues and watch it for the sci-fi that it is.

[phlebas]

I think SNW/TOS suffers from some of the same problems you had with the Star Wars original series vs the prequel. In some ways, Trek has it worse because we have a lot of the same characters -- it's not like we knew much about Qui Gon in A New Hope.

But because in both franchises, the shows/films were not made in chronological order, you have moments where you're explaining things as a new concept after you've established it's common knowledge 10-20 years in the past. Pon farr, for example -- the audience largely knows what pon farr is by now, so re-explaining it would be wasteful.  I think that's not so much sloppy writing or canon-breaking as it is storytelling.

The occasional "I don't recall ever owning a droid" discontinuity is a little more annoying, but having to restructure your prequel is hardly worth adhering to one throwaway line.  Maybe Obi Wan is being coy for reasons of his own?  Maybe he's being pedantic because he never really OWNED R2? R2 had his memory wiped in any case, so what does it matter?

Resolving Spock's and Chapel's relationship is likely the biggest wrinkle (hmmm... second biggest, after having a Gorn war and then forgetting they exist 10 years later) but it looks like they're working on it. Didn't the OG Chapel get engaged to Roger Korby? And in the musical, we see Spock taking steps to re-establish his Vulcan stoicism.

Anyway, one of my favorite things about this show is speculating how this cast will morph into the TOS cast.  Does Una get promoted after Pike's injury, but leaves the Enterprise at the same time because she's messed up about her friend? Does she take La'an with her? Navigator Jenna Mitchell has an interesting name -- is she a nod to Gary Mitchell without Gary himself showing up? Does Bones become CMO on the Farragut, then comes over with Kirk?  Does M'Benga get demoted in favor of McCoy because of suspicions around that Klingon's murder? When does Sam leave the ship? It would be awkward to have your brother as captain.

TL;DR -- It looks like they're trying to stick close enough to canon so they can claim they're in the same universe as TOS, but retaining enough space to wiggle -- no one wants to tell Jess Bush she has to act like Majel Barrett.