Star Trek

[VileTerror]

I only just saw the episode a couple of hours ago, actually.  

Yeah.  That was actually kind of very gratuitous.  Sorry about that.

 

The whole series has felt more and more like a Love Letter to all kinds of other Sci-Fi and geek culture lately.  Episode 4 felt like "We loved Firefly too!"  Episode 5 felt like "We've played Shadowrun v4 too!"

I'm not saying that's a bad thing . . . but it feels a bit sad to me that something with legs as strong as Trek is still standing on the shoulders of other fanbait.

[Mister Mass]

On 2/22/2020 at 10:26 AM, VileTerror said:

I'm happy with Trek pushing boundaries.  While the motivation might be a little suspect, in the form of some board of executives saying "we need more ratings!"  I think the outcome of pushing up against the walls of society can sometimes give way to progress.  I mean, it's not like they're bowling over boundaries and trampling people under foot; just sort of nudging up against uncomfortable spaces to see if there's something nicer on the other side.

 

ie:  Haijinx's comment about the interracial kiss.  Kudos to Trek for that!  No idea if the motivations were pure (social progress, versus "let's do something to get talked about in the news!"), but motivations only provide context anyway.

The interracial kiss was in an episode ("Plato's Stepchildren") from the 3rd (& final) season of TOS in 1968, where the characters were being mind-controlled to do things.  So the kiss was hardly portrayed as consensual.  But the network executives were nervous about a negative response, particularly from the South, so they requested a non-kiss version of the scene be filmed as well, which would allow for a decicion to be made about which one to use.  But since the actors knew that Roddenberry wanted the kiss in, Shatner as Kirk & Nichols as Uhura flubbed all of the non-kiss takes.  With only the kiss takes usable, the network suits just went with it, rather than approve the expense to reshoot. 😛  Anyway, ToS was cancelled at the end of that season due to poor ratings, so likely few people ever saw or heard about the kiss at the time.  Nichols states that the network received almost no negative comments.  But when reruns of TOS turned into a star in syndication in the 70's, fans began to point to the scene as an example of the show's impact.

 

 

[Haijinx]

Oddly Kirk kissing Aliens was cool.  As long as they were white aliens.  

[ShardWarrior]

On 2/22/2020 at 2:27 PM, Apparition said:

It's clear that, even though I loved Star Trek for nearly 40 years, the property is no longer for me. 

This sums up my feeling as well.  I am at a point where I am not going to follow Picard anymore.  There are too many inconsistencies with canon for my liking.  It seems to me they had some general bullet point ideas for the series and have had quite a lot of difficulty filling in the story between them. 

 

I will give Discovery season 3 a try even though I personally felt season 2 fizzled out toward the end.  I tend to agree with my co-worker on this in that the newer Trek does not hold our attention as it did before. 

[Haijinx]

I am loving the new Picard though.  

 

I guess I never bought into the shiny beacon Federation in the first place.  

 

 

[VileTerror]

My spouse and I were discussing Star Trek:  Picard this morning, talking about how if it didn't have Patrick Stewart while still calling itself Star Trek, we probably would have already stopped watching it.  BUT if it didn't have Patrick Stewart AND didn't bother calling itself Star Trek, we'd be hooked.  And then she came up with an interesting description:  The Picard series is like the intestines of Star Trek, with new filling stuffed inside.

 

I felt I should share.

[Haijinx]

Ultimately I was disappointed in the New Star Wars Movies and the New Trek Reboot Movies because they mainly traded on their nostalgia values while not really giving us anything new. 

 

I think Picard is different in that aspect.  Its trying to tell a different story. 

 

Its not going to be about a Shining Beacon Federation Starship exploring the Galaxy, because that was Picard's past. 

 

He is old now, More jaded like we all get.  He has PTSD (shown vividly in Episode 6).  But he still stands for something.   

Star Fleet is not what it was anymore.  Its become more insular, more paranoid.  Tarnished.  Which can happen to all institutions.     

 

Nostalgia exists but its meant to tell a story.  Its not just there for a theme park experience. 

 

A lot of people probably want a show that Follows closer the Star Trek Formula.    I think a lot of people wanted that with Discovery also.   Its probably what the fanbase wants as well.  From what I can tell Picard is disliked by most Youtube reviewers.  

 

That's too bad.  Its probably my favorite Trek show yet.  

 

 

Edited March 1, 2020 by Haijinx

[MetaVileTerror]

Digging in to it, I think there's also something about the music.  It doesn't feel 'Trek' enough for me, but I can't quite put my finger on it.  The musical and ambient sound cues are priming my mind for something else . . . 

I'll probably need to do some rewatching to really figure it out, but yeah.  Something in the sound for Picard just isn't signalling the parts of my brain that say "Yup!  This is Trek."

[WanderingAries]

Imma just drop this here:

 

 

[ShardWarrior]

This totally needs to be made into a powerset!

 

[Apparition]

I may or may not have made a Martial Arts/Energy Aura Scrapper named "Kirk Fu Apparition" last week.

[Marine X]

I have actually been pretty pleased with Star Trek: Picard. It was always in the discussions that Patrick Stewart would not be interested unless it was something new, and they always try for " something new " and seldom succeed. I believe they have succeeded. Every institution goes through growing pains and evolution, even the Federation. This show is more topical of what is going on in the world than anything since DS9. I think have done more to establish a tone and focus, in 9 episodes, than any other Trek show ever has. coming out of the gate. I do understand it is not perfect, but compared with the Kelvin Timeline, it is at least not just packaging up a bunch of action movie sequences and slapping a " Trek " on it. I like that it is in the original timeline, takes on the new events from the Kelvin Divergence, and opens the door for a whole new future of stories. I think they have a good cast, although sorry to see so many characters killed off, but it is just the first season, I'll see where they go from here.

 

Haven't started catching up on Discovery, just got the CBS All Access account recently. I bought season one on DVD, and thought it took a while to get going, but was improving as it progressed. I'll probably start Season 2 this weekend.

[ShardWarrior]

Finished the first season of Picard and I can comfortably say I am out.  Will not be following the series any longer.

[ArchVileTerror]

I may regret asking this, but any details as to why?

[Coin]

Conversely, I loved it and can't wait for the next season 🙂

[Apparition]

9 hours ago, ShardWarrior said:

Finished the first season of Picard and I can comfortably say I am out.  Will not be following the series any longer.

 

Yeah.  My head Star Trek canon has now entirely erased Enterprise, Nemesis, Discovery, and now Picard from existence.  Probably all new Star Trek for the next five to ten years as well.

[ZeeHero]

Picard was decent. most of the gritty dark stuff happens in space outside federation juristiction so makes more sense, and the things which happen IN it are explained by Romulan infiltration.

 

Never diss ENT again. it firmly has its place in the old good Trek. how about watching more than first season? it all makes sense for the time period its in.

Edited April 14, 2020 by ZeeHero

[Haijinx]

4 hours ago, ZeeHero said:

Picard was decent. most of the gritty dark stuff happens in space outside federation juristiction so makes more sense, and the things which happen IN it are explained by Romulan infiltration.

 

Never diss ENT again. it firmly has its place in the old good Trek. how about watching more than first season? it all makes sense for the time period its in.

I didn't like the theme song.

 

But I love Enterprise.

 

Originally the fact the writers played loose with the canon bothered me and I stopped watching when it was a new show.

 

But years later I realized writers in general don't follow canon on anything anywhere.  And so I decided to watch it on Netflix.  

 

Even the first season is cool in many ways. They don't trust transporters.  Their tech barely works.  They are unfamiliar with Aliens.  The ship is making revolutionary changes like encountering Warp 2 Cargo ships that take years to travel their routes.  

 

There is a lot more there than at first glance. 

 

 

Edited April 14, 2020 by Haijinx

[ZeeHero]

I dont remember ENT ever breaking canon. and the ENT theme song is my favorite. it embodies the very essence of Star Trek.

 

The acting was great- at least from Archer, Tpol.. eh.

[Haijinx]

3 hours ago, ZeeHero said:

I dont remember ENT ever breaking canon. and the ENT theme song is my favorite. it embodies the very essence of Star Trek.

 

The acting was great- at least from Archer, Tpol.. eh.

First Episode: 

Klingons on Earth, return of body before ever contacted (TOS Cannon).  Klingons don't care about bodies (TNG Cannon).  Klingons should have been closer to the time of Star Trek Discovery, Contact definitely did not predate the Romulan War.      

 

Later - Romulan War - This war was supposed to be fought Pre-Warp (which was dumb) and at no point were Romulans ever seen, The entire treaty was done by radio.  Vulcans did not know that Romulans were Vulcanoid, but Spock said it did make sense when they found out (TOS+Released materials in the 70's Cannon)

 

The one regularly Brought up is the contact with the Borg.  Which were not supposed to be ever contacted until Q intervened (TNG Cannon)  Though that was also messed up in First Contact movie.  

 

The contact with the Ferengi was also against Cannon.   (TNG / DS9 Cannon) 

 

One of the Issues with unavoidable Fladerization and doing a Prequel.  While it initially bothered me, I later realized that no other 'verse ever has remained internally consistent either.    

 

=============

Some things were just new - Not strictly Non-Cannon, but not previously ever discussed despite lots of material.  

 

Such as -

The Vulcans being Patronizing limiters to Human development. 

The Andorian conflict with the Vulcans, including the new wrinkle of competing for territory. 

The Green Orions actually running their Society, previously they were an enslaved minority.  

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

[Haijinx]

Blatantly violating the cannon of the Klingon first Contact, etc, was just as Jarring to a Sci Fi nerd that grew up in the 70's as the major appearance and cultural changes that were introduced in the 1st Episode of Discovery.  

 

 

[ZeeHero]

Star Trek history says there was NO ALIEN CONTACT humans knew about pre warp. plus, the Romulans had a HUGE head start on tech.. if Humans didnt have warp at the time there would not have BEEN a war. it would have been an easy conquest by the Roms.

 

Do you even star trek nerd cuz... why would you think this? its confusing that you'd say that.

 

NOT TO MENTION no one really witnessed the ferengi contact, so its perfectly fine since it would not be recorded history.

Edited April 15, 2020 by ZeeHero

[Haijinx]

58 minutes ago, ZeeHero said:

Star Trek history says there was NO ALIEN CONTACT humans knew about pre warp. plus, the Romulans had a HUGE head start on tech.. if Humans didnt have warp at the time there would not have BEEN a war. it would have been an easy conquest by the Roms.

 

Do you even star trek nerd cuz... why would you think this? its confusing that you'd say that.

 

NOT TO MENTION no one really witnessed the ferengi contact, so its perfectly fine since it would not be recorded history.

You have to qualify WHEN (RL) in Star Trek History it said that.  Since Star Trek Cannon History spans over 50 years of RL time. 

 

During the 1960's and 1970's Cannon The Pre-warp exploration of parts of the Federation was a thing.  As was the pre-warp Romulan war.  It was supposedly fought with Lasers (The Enterprise has lasers in the First TOS Pilot) Not Phasers.   It occurred only in space with Romulans and Humans not even knowing what the other looked like.  This concept was first introduced in TOS Episode "The Balance of Terror"  and was expanded upon in official source material they tried to get us kids in the 1970's to buy.     

 

This was "sort of" retconned later.  By "sort of" I mean they changed it to No Alien Contact until the warp drive was invented.  But they never addressed the earlier cannon specifically.  But once they start retconning its already started ... The inconsistent internal dynamics have already begun.      

 

Enterprise was obviously following the Cannon as Established in "First Contact" TNG movie.  

 

======

Its not the only thing like that.  Klingon First Contact and the resulting war was supposed to have been fought by Captain Garth of Izar.  The guy who takes over the Looney Bin in TOS Episode "Whom Gods Destroy".  He was supposed to be Kirk's idol for how he handled that situation (the Battle of Axanar).   There was supposed to be a sort of Hot/Cold semi-cease fire that existed after Garth's decisive victory.  This was later semi-retconned as well to have possibly been someone other than the Klingons.  As the Klingons were not specifically mentioned in the episode, but were identified in other materials, and then expanded upon in additional materials, and so on.       

 

But the Klingons get adventurous again in a conflict over the planet Organia in TOS  "The Errand of Mercy",  The Organians end up being Q-Lite types and enforce a Peace Treaty that makes it so Klingons and Federation can no longer fight.  This is to set up a cold war situation so the Klingons could be Soviet Expy's to conflict with the Federation's NATO Expy status.   This stuff was also conveniently forgotten later, and non specifically retconned.  Because not being able to have big fights with Klingons was considered boring.  

 

Star Trek Cannon is a mess.  Originally the sources were pretty limited.  TV Show, Cartoon, and a handful of print publications.   This was officially released stuff way way before the internet.  Later of course came novels, games, etc.  As the conflicts increased over time eventually the cannon status of additional materials outside of the shows/movies was removed.  Some writers made token nods to stuff that had been held as fan cannon by long tradition.  Others didn't.  I think all long lived Franchises with lots of materials eventually run into these types of continuity problems.   Trek has been a very successful franchise so it has had a ton of things released for it.  Its no longer possible to have Read/Watched/Learned all of them.   But way back when it was.  

 

Its like what eventually happened with Star Wars.  They eventually declared print sources (mainly novels) non-canon.  Which bothered a lot of people since Star Wars at least for some time claimed all its novels were policed and cannon.   

 

=====

So the real question is which RL era of Star Trek Nerd I would be.  Not whether I am one. 

 

Although Trek is not really my favorite franchise.   For TV Shows that would probably be The Expanse.  Which due to its much smaller number of Novels and Episodes is less prone to this stuff.   Ironically of course even so, there are major differences between the novels and the show.           

 

 

 

 

Edited April 15, 2020 by Haijinx

[ZeeHero]

ENT was made after ST canon was revised, it matched the canon at the time it was made in that regard- and a pre warp war with anyone, especially the Romulans would have ended in humans slaves to the romulans lol.

 

Expanse is good for sure, but ENT didnt break canon even half as much as you claimed.

[Haijinx]

2 minutes ago, ZeeHero said:

ENT was made after ST canon was revised, it matched the canon at the time it was made in that regard- and a pre warp war with anyone, especially the Romulans would have ended in humans slaves to the romulans lol.

 

Expanse is good for sure, but ENT didnt break canon even half as much as you claimed.

Depends on what you mean by Cannon.    

 

I was the viewer.  I was bothered by that stuff.   The very first episode broke the old Klingon Story, etc.  

 

Saying something that retcons a bunch of stuff is Canon so it doesn't violate Cannon really misses the point.  Or relies on a bunch of other kludgy Retcons, etc.  The question is how it approached previous canon.  Its a continuity problem. 

 

As I said years later (Quite a few) I came to a more zen approach to that stuff.  And decided to just watch it for what it was.