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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on Apr 29, 2021 16:30:06 GMT -5
Anyone have thoughts over Q being in the new season of ST: Picard? Colour me unthrilled at Q's inclusion. The straightforward inability to do anything that's actually new is the biggest curse of post-Enterprise Star Trek and I'm frankly fed up of these series just not being able to come up with anything original. In a way I do admire S1 Picard for addressing the whole B4/Data thing and bothering to take the ending of Nemesis seriously rather than an embarrassment, but at the same time... y'know. Stop leaning on the scrapings of the past to prop up the present. Star Trek is meant to be about progress - personal, society, technology et al - and going back to the same old wells is the exact opposite of that which is why the constant harking back to the TOS era in the Abramsverse and Discovery is so very wearying. I suppose Discovery deserves credit for its time jump and finally doing something new... except what it did sucked. Anyway, I'm sure there will be lots of S2 Picard material for people who think Tapestry is great rather than trite and patronising but eh. I'll give a chance, but it's a profoundly uninteresting creative choice. The first duty of a Star Trek series is to demonstrating progress, whether it's societal progress or technological progress or personal personal progress! It is the guiding principle on which Star Trek is based. And if you can't find it within yourself to stand up and find something new to say instead of rehashing the past, you don't deserve to wear that franchise name! Sorry, couldn't help myself. |
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on Apr 29, 2021 16:31:40 GMT -5
I had totally forgotten about both episodes, so I was tickled and impressed that Voyager actually bothered to follow-up on the conclusion to it's "sure, why not let the weird mimicking alien goo on this hell planet create duplicates of our entire crew?" episode.
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Post by Prole Hole on Apr 29, 2021 16:41:52 GMT -5
I had totally forgotten about both episodes, so I was tickled and impressed that Voyager actually bothered to follow-up on the conclusion to it's "sure, why not let the weird mimicking alien goo on this hell planet create duplicates of our entire crew?" episode. It's not a popular opinion (quel surprise) but I fucking love Course: Oblivion. It's daring and interesting and challenging in all the right ways, and it profoundly annoys Star Trek fanboys because "our" crew are only in it for about one minute fifteens seconds. Which of course makes me love it even more. Such a fantastic episode. |
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on Apr 29, 2021 16:43:20 GMT -5
I had totally forgotten about both episodes, so I was tickled and impressed that Voyager actually bothered to follow-up on the conclusion to it's "sure, why not let the weird mimicking alien goo on this hell planet create duplicates of our entire crew?" episode. It's not a popular opinion (quel surprise) but I fucking love Course: Oblivion. It's daring and interesting and challenging in all the right ways, and it profoundly annoys Star Trek fanboys because "our" crew are only in it for about one minute fifteens seconds. Which of course makes me love it even more. Such a fantastic episode. What?! It’s a GREAT episode!! |
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Post by Prole Hole on Apr 30, 2021 2:43:33 GMT -5
It's not a popular opinion (quel surprise) but I fucking love Course: Oblivion. It's daring and interesting and challenging in all the right ways, and it profoundly annoys Star Trek fanboys because "our" crew are only in it for about one minute fifteens seconds. Which of course makes me love it even more. Such a fantastic episode. What?! It’s a GREAT episode!! It warms my little processor to see someone else agreeing! |
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Post by Desert Dweller on Apr 30, 2021 2:55:26 GMT -5
What?! It’s a GREAT episode!! It warms my little processor to see someone else agreeing!
Is this an unpopular opinion? I really like "Course: Oblivion". I thought it was a great follow up to the goo people episode.
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Post by Prole Hole on Apr 30, 2021 3:37:36 GMT -5
It warms my little processor to see someone else agreeing!
Is this an unpopular opinion? I really like "Course: Oblivion". I thought it was a great follow up to the goo people episode.
The consensus *spits* opinion is that it's a waste of time and barely even filler because it's not about "our" crew, nothing in it matters because there's no "actual" character progression, that Tom's reaction to B'Elanna's death isn't convincing, that it's too handy for the Demon crew to find our crew, Harry wouldn't be the last person standing. etc Fans, man... For the record... Season 5, Episode 18: Course: Oblivion |
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Post by Desert Dweller on Apr 30, 2021 4:27:05 GMT -5
Is this an unpopular opinion? I really like "Course: Oblivion". I thought it was a great follow up to the goo people episode.
The consensus *spits* opinion is that it's a waste of time and barely even filler because it's not about "our" crew, nothing in it matters because there's no "actual" character progression, that Tom's reaction to B'Elanna's death isn't convincing, that it's too handy for the Demon crew to find our crew, Harry wouldn't be the last person standing. etc Fans, man... For the record... Season 5, Episode 18: Course: Oblivion
Ah, I see. This doesn't really bother me because I consider most VOY episodes to be kinda pointless. And I feel there's not really any substantial character progression for anyone who isn't Seven or the Doctor.
I think the episode is fun. (Edited: Well, "fun" in that the idea is fun.)
Edited to add: I love how desperately the goo people try to survive. I love seeing the differences in their, er, interpretations (?) of the crew. And I really like the ending where there is no record that this ever happened.
Edited again: I also love seeing the goo people react to finding out they are the goo people.
I don't know. I just think this is a cool idea. |
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Post by liebkartoffel on Apr 30, 2021 7:52:56 GMT -5
Agreed that Course: Oblivion is a classic. It's rare that a Trek episode goes so relentlessly, verging on humorously, bleak, and it has a real throwback Twlight Zone/60s sci-fi short story vibe.
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on May 27, 2021 9:30:39 GMT -5
My new favorite response to “Modern Trek is too political” is going to be making people watch Robert Picardo flip a “subtle” double bird to the U.S. healthcare system for 40 minutes in Critical Care.
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on May 27, 2021 9:35:30 GMT -5
Agreed that Course: Oblivion is a classic. It's rare that a Trek episode goes so relentlessly, verging on humorously, bleak, and it has a real throwback Twlight Zone/60s sci-fi short story vibe. I’ve really come around on Voyager after actually watching it again after coming out of my “too cool for Trek” wilderness years. That really effective throwback mode they’d occasionally engage in is a big reason why and one of the reasons I find all the whining over what they show “should have been” annoying now. |
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Post by Desert Dweller on May 31, 2021 0:25:06 GMT -5
My new favorite response to “Modern Trek is too political” is going to be making people watch Robert Picardo flip a “subtle” double bird to the U.S. healthcare system for 40 minutes in Critical Care.
I find Modern Trek to be *less* political than Classic Trek. In Modern Trek it all feels surface level. The shows feel ideologically empty. Classic Trek felt like it really took a stand.
Of course, I also can't imagine people who watch Classic Trek and think it isn't political.
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Post by Roy Batty's Pet Dove on May 31, 2021 11:05:48 GMT -5
My new favorite response to “Modern Trek is too political” is going to be making people watch Robert Picardo flip a “subtle” double bird to the U.S. healthcare system for 40 minutes in Critical Care.
I find Modern Trek to be *less* political than Classic Trek. In Modern Trek it all feels surface level. The shows feel ideologically empty. Classic Trek felt like it really took a stand.
Of course, I also can't imagine people who watch Classic Trek and think it isn't political.
I've seen like 1.5 episodes of Modern Star Trek shows, and have absorbed a decent amount of Discovery discourse through osmosis. But just to be clear, when people say it's "too political" what they mean is they hate that there are women and people of color as major characters, right? Despite the fact that the old-timey Treks were generally more diverse than most shows of their eras (which usually wasn't a super high bar and didn't keep old-timey Trek from having some very problematic episodes, obviously). Anyway, the 1.5 episodes of Modern Star Trek I've seen leads me to agree with you that the current era is ideologically empty. Also that Lower Decks wore me out with all the references to TOS/TNG before the end of the pilot episode. |
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on May 31, 2021 11:42:59 GMT -5
My new favorite response to “Modern Trek is too political” is going to be making people watch Robert Picardo flip a “subtle” double bird to the U.S. healthcare system for 40 minutes in Critical Care.
I find Modern Trek to be *less* political than Classic Trek. In Modern Trek it all feels surface level. The shows feel ideologically empty. Classic Trek felt like it really took a stand.
Of course, I also can't imagine people who watch Classic Trek and think it isn't political.
I’m always curious what age those people are. Because yea, obviously TOS is super blunt, TNG/DS9VOY less so but still usually not subtle. However If you only saw those in reruns decades after they aired, I think they are blunted in the same way everyone gets to pretend we all thought MLK was a swell chap despite it being pretty clear that couldn’t possibly have been the case. |
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Post by liebkartoffel on May 31, 2021 11:47:19 GMT -5
My new favorite response to “Modern Trek is too political” is going to be making people watch Robert Picardo flip a “subtle” double bird to the U.S. healthcare system for 40 minutes in Critical Care.
I find Modern Trek to be *less* political than Classic Trek. In Modern Trek it all feels surface level. The shows feel ideologically empty. Classic Trek felt like it really took a stand.
Of course, I also can't imagine people who watch Classic Trek and think it isn't political.
Yeah, Roddenberry was very much embedded in the 60s/70s "the point of science fiction is to lay bare the contradictions of contemporary society" ethos, and he was not subtle about it. *cough* "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" *cough* The TNG-era shows were slightly less preachy about it--*cough* "Symbiosis" *cough*--but political moralizing was still very much part of their DNA. DISCO on the other hand...umm, zapping giant water bears is bad? |
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Post by Roy Batty's Pet Dove on May 31, 2021 11:52:18 GMT -5
I find Modern Trek to be *less* political than Classic Trek. In Modern Trek it all feels surface level. The shows feel ideologically empty. Classic Trek felt like it really took a stand.
Of course, I also can't imagine people who watch Classic Trek and think it isn't political.
I’m always curious what age those people are. Because yea, obviously TOS is super blunt, TNG/DS9VOY less so but still usually not subtle. However If you only saw those in reruns decades after they aired, I think they are blunted in the same way everyone gets to pretend we all thought MLK was a swell chap despite it being pretty clear that couldn’t possibly have been the case. Owl, remember the episode of TOS where there's a planet of Slightly Too Patriotic Americans where they also have the same exact flag and a US Constitution with "We the people" written in the exact same handwriting despite being a different planet that wasn't populated by earth humans? Also remember the episode where they've clearly decided that civil rights is bad now because of 1968, so they made a species of alien where there's two "races" one of which has the left side of their body completely white, the right side completely black, and for the other "race" it's the opposite, and the alien species is an allegory for the writers' shitty "both sides" racial politics? |
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on May 31, 2021 12:19:37 GMT -5
I’m always curious what age those people are. Because yea, obviously TOS is super blunt, TNG/DS9VOY less so but still usually not subtle. However If you only saw those in reruns decades after they aired, I think they are blunted in the same way everyone gets to pretend we all thought MLK was a swell chap despite it being pretty clear that couldn’t possibly have been the case. Owl, remember the episode of TOS where there's a planet of Slightly Too Patriotic Americans where they also have the same exact flag and a US Constitution with "We the people" written in the exact same handwriting despite being a different planet that wasn't populated by earth humans? Also remember the episode where they've clearly decided that civil rights is bad now because of 1968, so they made a species of alien where there's two "races" one of which has the left side of their body completely white, the right side completely black, and for the other "race" it's the opposite, and the alien species is an allegory for the writers' shitty "both sides" racial politics? I remember both of those episodes, although I’d argue the real issue with “...Last Battlefield” in retrospect is it’s proto-post-racialism |
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Post by Desert Dweller on May 31, 2021 23:26:31 GMT -5
I find Modern Trek to be *less* political than Classic Trek. In Modern Trek it all feels surface level. The shows feel ideologically empty. Classic Trek felt like it really took a stand.
Of course, I also can't imagine people who watch Classic Trek and think it isn't political.
Yeah, Roddenberry was very much embedded in the 60s/70s "the point of science fiction is to lay bare the contradictions of contemporary society" ethos, and he was not subtle about it. *cough* "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" *cough* The TNG-era shows were slightly less preachy about it--*cough* "Symbiosis" *cough*--but political moralizing was still very much part of their DNA. DISCO on the other hand...umm, zapping giant water bears is bad?
I am still struggling with the idea that these people convinced Patrick Stuart to return to play Picard, and the only story they could think to come up with was "Robots are people too". They used a mass refugee crisis as *background material*. Essentially uninterrogated background material. Dear God, the setting of PIC is so great to explore political and ideological issues. Alas, no.
I have no idea what the real theme of DSC S3 was. I feel like they tried for a "connection" theme, but I am not sure they really got there. In any case, they also had a setting that was ripe for some strong political commentary. But no.
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Post by Desert Dweller on May 31, 2021 23:41:15 GMT -5
I find Modern Trek to be *less* political than Classic Trek. In Modern Trek it all feels surface level. The shows feel ideologically empty. Classic Trek felt like it really took a stand.
Of course, I also can't imagine people who watch Classic Trek and think it isn't political.
I've seen like 1.5 episodes of Modern Star Trek shows, and have absorbed a decent amount of Discovery discourse through osmosis. But just to be clear, when people say it's "too political" what they mean is they hate that there are women and people of color as major characters, right?
Yes, it seems so.
But, DS9 had a Black man as the Captain, a woman as First Officer, a vaguely Arab-looking Doctor and a woman science officer who used to be a man. VOY had a woman Captain, a (nominally) Native American as First Officer, a Black man as security chief and a woman as chief Engineer.
So, I have no idea what these people are really arguing about. I doubt they have really watched Classic Trek. Or maybe they only watched TOS/TNG.
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Post by Roy Batty's Pet Dove on Jun 1, 2021 7:26:26 GMT -5
I've seen like 1.5 episodes of Modern Star Trek shows, and have absorbed a decent amount of Discovery discourse through osmosis. But just to be clear, when people say it's "too political" what they mean is they hate that there are women and people of color as major characters, right?
Yes, it seems so.
But, DS9 had a Black man as the Captain, a woman as First Officer, a vaguely Arab-looking Doctor and a woman science officer who used to be a man. VOY had a woman Captain, a (nominally) Native American as First Officer, a Black man as security chief and a woman as chief Engineer.
So, I have no idea what these people are really arguing about. I doubt they have really watched Classic Trek. Or maybe they only watched TOS/TNG.
I think a lot of them probably have seen Classic Trek, but those shows aired before the current era of reactionary grievance culture were there to tell them that they shouldn’t like it, so in their minds, Classic Trek just embodies the most sanitized victories of the civil rights era, the ones that even most conservatives agree were good, values consistent in their minds with Roddenberry’s vision. But then according to the reactionaries, New-Timey Trek is just SJWs shoving their cultural Marxism down everyone’s throats. Now, the logical response to this is “What fucking evidence even vaguely supports this reading of Star Trek?” and the answer is “If you’re into grievance culture shit, then you’re almost by default lacking in intellectual integrity or at least basic critical thinking skills, and thus can be won over by disingenuously cherry-picked evidence as to how Classic Trek is exhibits real tolerance but New-Timey Trek is pernicious woke cultural Marxism”. |
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on Jun 1, 2021 8:35:22 GMT -5
I've seen like 1.5 episodes of Modern Star Trek shows, and have absorbed a decent amount of Discovery discourse through osmosis. But just to be clear, when people say it's "too political" what they mean is they hate that there are women and people of color as major characters, right?
Yes, it seems so.
But, DS9 had a Black man as the Captain, a woman as First Officer, a vaguely Arab-looking Doctor and a woman science officer who used to be a man. VOY had a woman Captain, a (nominally) Native American as First Officer, a Black man as security chief and a woman as chief Engineer.
So, I have no idea what these people are really arguing about. I doubt they have really watched Classic Trek. Or maybe they only watched TOS/TNG.
Not just a lady first officer, but basically Space Antifa |
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Post by Prole Hole on Jun 1, 2021 11:19:49 GMT -5
Yes, it seems so.
But, DS9 had a Black man as the Captain, a woman as First Officer, a vaguely Arab-looking Doctor and a woman science officer who used to be a man. VOY had a woman Captain, a (nominally) Native American as First Officer, a Black man as security chief and a woman as chief Engineer.
So, I have no idea what these people are really arguing about. I doubt they have really watched Classic Trek. Or maybe they only watched TOS/TNG.
Not just a lady first officer, but basically Space Antifa Voyager also had an Asian-American Ops officer, which means Tom is the only white male bridge officer (and Voyager's original helmsperson, seen briefly in Caretaker, was female and played by Alicia "Not That" Coppola). |
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Post by Desert Dweller on Jun 1, 2021 23:49:16 GMT -5
Not just a lady first officer, but basically Space Antifa Voyager also had an Asian-American Ops officer, which means Tom is the only white male bridge officer (and Voyager's original helmsperson, seen briefly in Caretaker, was female and played by Alicia "Not That" Coppola).
Oh dear, I forgot about Harry Kim. I'm not surprised I forgot about Harry Kim. |
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Post by Desert Dweller on Jun 1, 2021 23:58:21 GMT -5
Yes, it seems so.
But, DS9 had a Black man as the Captain, a woman as First Officer, a vaguely Arab-looking Doctor and a woman science officer who used to be a man. VOY had a woman Captain, a (nominally) Native American as First Officer, a Black man as security chief and a woman as chief Engineer.
So, I have no idea what these people are really arguing about. I doubt they have really watched Classic Trek. Or maybe they only watched TOS/TNG.
I think a lot of them probably have seen Classic Trek, but those shows aired before the current era of reactionary grievance culture were there to tell them that they shouldn’t like it, so in their minds, Classic Trek just embodies the most sanitized victories of the civil rights era, the ones that even most conservatives agree were good, values consistent in their minds with Roddenberry’s vision. But then according to the reactionaries, New-Timey Trek is just SJWs shoving their cultural Marxism down everyone’s throats. Now, the logical response to this is “What fucking evidence even vaguely supports this reading of Star Trek?” and the answer is “If you’re into grievance culture shit, then you’re almost by default lacking in intellectual integrity or at least basic critical thinking skills, and thus can be won over by disingenuously cherry-picked evidence as to how Classic Trek is exhibits real tolerance but New-Timey Trek is pernicious woke cultural Marxism”.
Ugh, you are probably correct, though it feels awful that real people can be like this. It is deeply annoying. There are substantive reasons to hate on ST:DSC that have nothing to do with the casting! I start to wonder if DSC's writing problems are actually contributing to the complaints about casting on some level? The way the writers treat Burnham, and the way they treat all the other characters... maybe it is easier to complain about casting when none of the characters seem to really matter to the story except Burnham, and Burnham is always depicted as being right.
Hmmm, or maybe I just want to redirect all the DSC hate towards the writing so badly that I am seeing a connection where none exists.
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on Jun 2, 2021 8:12:38 GMT -5
Voyager also had an Asian-American Ops officer, which means Tom is the only white male bridge officer (and Voyager's original helmsperson, seen briefly in Caretaker, was female and played by Alicia "Not That" Coppola).
Oh dear, I forgot about Harry Kim. I'm not surprised I forgot about Harry Kim. The sad part is, unlike Chakotay who always gets bogged down with faux-Native bullshit that makes it hard to appreciate his feature eps, I generally LIKE Harry episodes, they just don’t happen often outside the context of being Tom’s sidekick. Garret Wang is a good “Geordi, but he doesn’t feel a little uncomfortably incel-y in 2021” type. He should have gotten more love. |
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Post by Prole Hole on Jun 2, 2021 12:14:32 GMT -5
Oh dear, I forgot about Harry Kim. I'm not surprised I forgot about Harry Kim. The sad part is, unlike Chakotay who always gets bogged down with faux-Native bullshit that makes it hard to appreciate his feature eps, I generally LIKE Harry episodes, they just don’t happen often outside the context of being Tom’s sidekick. Garret Wang is a good “Geordi, but he doesn’t feel a little uncomfortably incel-y in 2021” type. He should have gotten more love. "Always gets bogged down..." translates to about three and a half episodes over seven seasons. There's more terrible "Harry falls for the wrong girl" episodes than there are Chakotay Native American episodes. I know the episodes stick in the mind because they're generally sub-par at best and one was very early in the show's run, but I do feel Chakotay is unfairly beaten with this stick because he's a great second-tier character and his good feature-episodes (Nemesis, Timeless (a great two-hander with Mr Wang), Shattered and others) really show off how good Beltran can be. Though FWIW I don't disagree about Harry but the show never learned the lesson of what constitutes a good Harry episode - basically it's when he's off balance and on the back foot, and never ever when it's about romance. Anyway I agree that the problem with criticising Discovery in the mainstream is that the bad show = unWokeFascist! take somehow seems to preclude bad show = it's-really-badly-written take. There's lots of grounds to criticise Discovery but I feel that people who go for the "oh you hate this show because its diverse so you must be a KKK member" are intentionally muddying the waters and deflecting away from the vast writing, tonal, character and basic storytelling issues. Michael? Fine. Use of Michael? Fucking terrible. That's not racism, that's pointing out that the show does a potentially great character and a strong performance a massive disservice by now writing her well. |
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on Jun 17, 2021 12:23:53 GMT -5
Q2 suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks
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Post by Prole Hole on Jun 17, 2021 13:17:15 GMT -5
Q2 suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks We are as one. We are as one! |
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Post by Superb Owl 🦉 on Jun 17, 2021 13:31:59 GMT -5
Q2 suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks We are as one. We are as one! It's a shame too because I actually really like "Death Wish" and (gross propositioning of Janeway aside) "The Q and the Grey" was an ok follow-up to the consequences of that episode. Add in that Voyager Q had clearly had ol' Jean-luc rub off on him more than he cared to admit...look, Q wasn't ever my favorite, but it was a solid story. But that kid is such a little shit. And I know that's kind of the point, but that doesn't make it any more fun to watch. |
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Post by liebkartoffel on Jun 17, 2021 13:35:30 GMT -5
Q2 suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks Q stories only work in relation to Picard. Like, he was literally created as a foil to Picard. In the pilot. They're a set from the beginning. DS9 has that great "I'm not Picard" moment but otherwise their Q episode is unremarkable. The Voyager Q episodes A) suffer from the fact that Janeway's character has always been all over the place, so they never really settle on what her dynamic with Q is supposed to be; and B) commit the cardinal sin of over-exposure (see also: Borg, the). The Q are a race of capricious godlike beings. They're supposed to be mysterious and inscrutable. The more we know about them the less interesting they become. |
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