While I do generally enjoy discovery, I do think It’s still pretty flawed. Not because of the spore stuff, but because of the way that they have to deal with so many “danger to the entire galaxy/universe/multiverse” type events back to back. Like, doing a few is fine, I generally enjoyed the xindi arc in Enterprise for example, but having so many starts to feel very forced after awhile.
I especially find that bit with the spore energy extractor in the mirror universe that could kill all life in the multiverse if not stopped jarring, because, if you have a potentially limitlessness number of alternative timelines, and the massive expanse of space, to develop that tech in, the odds that nobody else ever built one of these drops to essentially zero, except that the existence of the plot at all implies nobody else ever has.
Not because of the spore stuff, but because of the way that they have to deal with so many “danger to the entire galaxy/universe/multiverse” type events back to back. Like, doing a few is fine, I generally enjoyed the xindi arc in Enterprise for example, but having so many starts to feel very forced after awhile.
I totally agree. When the stakes are over the top it makes the universe feel small. When everything depends on one crew at all times it feels hard to believe there is a larger world they exist in in which to immerse my imagination. Discovery has fantastic characters, acting, directing, costumes, sets - I would love to see all these great features thrive without leaning on artificial plot tension. The main goal of any show is to make you care about what happens. Ideally you care because you feel a personal connection to the characters. But making the stakes huge, and including frequent ticking-clock scenarios is easier. The thing is I do care about these characters! The artifice is unnecessary!
But it got better the longer the show went on! I appreciate how every season the stakes got smaller, and more believable, and the pacing got less frantic especially in the last two seasons.
spoilers: de-escalating stakes each season
season 1: The entire Klingon war, and btw the existence of every possible universe is threatened.
season 2: All life is about to be wiped out, but only in one universe.
season 3: Is the Federation over? It’s not clear if the dilithium crisis extends to other galaxies, but the stakes seem to be scoped to geopolitics in one quadrant.
season 4: Several planets are in danger. Still bigger stakes than I’d prefer, but there is much improvement over season 1.
It would be very funny if they had kept the trend and de-escalation, and Season 7 is just that lunch is threatened because one of the duotronic circuits in the food synthesiser computer banks broke, and people haven’t used duotronics in centuries.
I especially find that bit with the spore energy extractor in the mirror universe that could kill all life in the multiverse if not stopped jarring, because, if you have a potentially limitlessness number of alternative timelines, and the massive expanse of space, to develop that tech in, the odds that nobody else ever built one of these drops to essentially zero, except that the existence of the plot at all implies nobody else ever has.
Agreed. It’d have been perfectly fine to scale it down to have the extractor messing up the nearby mycelial network/subspace enough that the spore hub drive would become inoperable, and they’d lose the only method they had to get home.
If anything, that might be more compelling, since you could easily squeeze in a character conflict with some people wanting to leave, damn the consequences, or make preparations for a long term stay in the mirror universe if they got stuck.
In some way, its probably similar to Lazarus’ machine. He managed to build something capable of obliterating two universes. It didn’t seem that difficult, or that much more advanced than the Enterprise, you’d think someone else would have built something similar, and accidentally destroyed the universe in so doing.
That’s how I felt reading the Batman new 52 run. It was just constant city-wide crises with escalating stakes. Just foil a bank robbery or something now and then ffs.
I wonder… What world you say if they gave Discovery the Battletech TAS treatment?
To explain, the tabletop wargame Battletech got an animated series in the early 90s. The series, while well-versed in the game’s setting and lore, played fast and loose with both and had, well, early 90s cartoon writing.
As a result, it wasn’t received well. However, it is canonical – as an in-universe propaganda show aimed at children, complete with inaccuracies and bad writing. The show’s antagonist even ended up suing over his portrayal.
Now I imagine that Discovery is referenced in a future Trek show but the dialogue mentions that there’s a horrifically inaccurate in-universe holoseries about the ship and most people have entirely wrong ideas about it. We deliberately never learn whether Discovery-the-show is the accurate version or not.
I think that might work as a nod towards both the fans and the haters of the show but if like to hear what you’d think.
Eh, good point about the secrecy. You’d have to really twist the lore into a pretzel in order to accommodate that and that ain’t worth it for what’s essentially a throwaway gag.
As for bowing to haters, I definitely wouldn’t do that. I’d acknowledge that there is some controversy with a tongue-in-cheek reference but I wouldn’t take a side. That’s the fans’ job – and let’s be honest here, everyone who debates the canonicity of DSC is a Star Trek fan, just maybe not one of that particular show. People who hate Trek in general will not engage in debates about relative worth; to them, all of the shows suck.
It’s been a while since I saw season 1, but wasn’t his early behavior characterized by a desire to avoid stress? Discovery definitely benefited from his skills and senses though.
I’ve not seen much of lower decks tbh. I’ve tried watching it a couple times, trying different episodes in case its just a case of it taking a few to get in stride, but I’ve just not liked it the same as other trek shows, the characters just seem annoying and everything happens too fast.
I mean, we’ve seen a number of ships in Starfleet that don’t look identical. The set design also seemed pretty spaceshippy to me. Especially when you consider that it’s an experimental ship designed for this one purpose. Very clean and pristine and showing that one purpose design.
Discovery’s set design resonated reasonably well with the look of the TOS films, which made sense for a cutting-edge ship. And that was also well underscored by the way the Shenzou looked more Enterprise inspired, right down to using the NX-01 style lateral transporters versus Discovery’s vertically aligned ones.
That’s to say, Discovery used Trek design elements from different eras intelligently, to communicate the different roles and histories of these ships. Very much the opposite of throwing it all away.
TOS was, well TOS, TNG had a rough start but was always viable, DS9 started with consolidated lore and respected it, albeit being of course darker than the others, VOY… had bad writing. Wackyness in itself is not a huge issue though.
DIS gets hate because it feels like they wanted to write a specific series and just used the Star Trek setting for it, instead of wanting to make a Star Trek series.
People who whine about the silliness of some of the concepts in Discovery (spore drive, space-tardigrades) have never seen TOS.
While I do generally enjoy discovery, I do think It’s still pretty flawed. Not because of the spore stuff, but because of the way that they have to deal with so many “danger to the entire galaxy/universe/multiverse” type events back to back. Like, doing a few is fine, I generally enjoyed the xindi arc in Enterprise for example, but having so many starts to feel very forced after awhile.
I especially find that bit with the spore energy extractor in the mirror universe that could kill all life in the multiverse if not stopped jarring, because, if you have a potentially limitlessness number of alternative timelines, and the massive expanse of space, to develop that tech in, the odds that nobody else ever built one of these drops to essentially zero, except that the existence of the plot at all implies nobody else ever has.
I totally agree. When the stakes are over the top it makes the universe feel small. When everything depends on one crew at all times it feels hard to believe there is a larger world they exist in in which to immerse my imagination. Discovery has fantastic characters, acting, directing, costumes, sets - I would love to see all these great features thrive without leaning on artificial plot tension. The main goal of any show is to make you care about what happens. Ideally you care because you feel a personal connection to the characters. But making the stakes huge, and including frequent ticking-clock scenarios is easier. The thing is I do care about these characters! The artifice is unnecessary!
But it got better the longer the show went on! I appreciate how every season the stakes got smaller, and more believable, and the pacing got less frantic especially in the last two seasons.
spoilers: de-escalating stakes each season
It would be very funny if they had kept the trend and de-escalation, and Season 7 is just that lunch is threatened because one of the duotronic circuits in the food synthesiser computer banks broke, and people haven’t used duotronics in centuries.
Agreed. It’d have been perfectly fine to scale it down to have the extractor messing up the nearby mycelial network/subspace enough that the spore hub drive would become inoperable, and they’d lose the only method they had to get home.
If anything, that might be more compelling, since you could easily squeeze in a character conflict with some people wanting to leave, damn the consequences, or make preparations for a long term stay in the mirror universe if they got stuck.
In some way, its probably similar to Lazarus’ machine. He managed to build something capable of obliterating two universes. It didn’t seem that difficult, or that much more advanced than the Enterprise, you’d think someone else would have built something similar, and accidentally destroyed the universe in so doing.
That’s how I felt reading the Batman new 52 run. It was just constant city-wide crises with escalating stakes. Just foil a bank robbery or something now and then ffs.
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I wonder… What world you say if they gave Discovery the Battletech TAS treatment?
To explain, the tabletop wargame Battletech got an animated series in the early 90s. The series, while well-versed in the game’s setting and lore, played fast and loose with both and had, well, early 90s cartoon writing.
As a result, it wasn’t received well. However, it is canonical – as an in-universe propaganda show aimed at children, complete with inaccuracies and bad writing. The show’s antagonist even ended up suing over his portrayal.
Now I imagine that Discovery is referenced in a future Trek show but the dialogue mentions that there’s a horrifically inaccurate in-universe holoseries about the ship and most people have entirely wrong ideas about it. We deliberately never learn whether Discovery-the-show is the accurate version or not.
I think that might work as a nod towards both the fans and the haters of the show but if like to hear what you’d think.
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Eh, good point about the secrecy. You’d have to really twist the lore into a pretzel in order to accommodate that and that ain’t worth it for what’s essentially a throwaway gag.
As for bowing to haters, I definitely wouldn’t do that. I’d acknowledge that there is some controversy with a tongue-in-cheek reference but I wouldn’t take a side. That’s the fans’ job – and let’s be honest here, everyone who debates the canonicity of DSC is a Star Trek fan, just maybe not one of that particular show. People who hate Trek in general will not engage in debates about relative worth; to them, all of the shows suck.
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You made me realize that Discovery was probably the worst ship Saru could have possibly been assigned to.
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It’s been a while since I saw season 1, but wasn’t his early behavior characterized by a desire to avoid stress? Discovery definitely benefited from his skills and senses though.
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I’ve not seen much of lower decks tbh. I’ve tried watching it a couple times, trying different episodes in case its just a case of it taking a few to get in stride, but I’ve just not liked it the same as other trek shows, the characters just seem annoying and everything happens too fast.
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The Klingons in TNG didn’t match either. And it still felt like a starship. The set design isn’t too different from SNW as well.
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Discovery’s set design resonated reasonably well with the look of the TOS films, which made sense for a cutting-edge ship. And that was also well underscored by the way the Shenzou looked more Enterprise inspired, right down to using the NX-01 style lateral transporters versus Discovery’s vertically aligned ones.
That’s to say, Discovery used Trek design elements from different eras intelligently, to communicate the different roles and histories of these ships. Very much the opposite of throwing it all away.
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or TAS
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TAS? Never happened.
Don’t mind me. I’m just thinking about the time Voyager had to battle a plague of giant viruses.
TBH Voyager is the orginal “bad trek”
TOS was, well TOS, TNG had a rough start but was always viable, DS9 started with consolidated lore and respected it, albeit being of course darker than the others, VOY… had bad writing. Wackyness in itself is not a huge issue though.
DIS gets hate because it feels like they wanted to write a specific series and just used the Star Trek setting for it, instead of wanting to make a Star Trek series.
I thought we all agreed that canon doesn’t start until the Wrath of Khan.