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Star Trek: Discovery |OT| To Boldly Stream Where No One Has Streamed Before

No one wanted a world where you add up the payments on all the streaming services and you ended up paying more than goddamned cable used to cost. But I guess you can't ever underestimate capitalism.

But that's ala carte. In what world would you expect to split everything up where you can pick and choose and then when you add it all back up together it would cost less or the same? That's not how splitting things up has ever worked. Anyone wanting what you were suggesting was living in an unrealistic fantasy world.
 

MartyStu

Member
But that's ala carte. In what world would you expect to split everything up where you can pick and choose and then when you add it all back up together it would cost less or the same? That's not how splitting things up has ever worked. Anyone wanting what you were suggesting was living in an unrealistic fantasy world.

People wanted / would have benefited from ala carte when TV was a wasteland of reality shows.

Now? Ehhh....
 
I know they had suffered casualties, but it bothered me to no end that the captain and first officer beamed aboard a crippled portion of an enemy ship full of suicidal warrior beings with no other assistance. Would have been much better if they brought a squad of redshirts.

Gotta admit I thought the same when it was happening and that they easily could have a avoided the minor flak they'll get for it. They easily could have written in one or two no-name redshirt security guys to join them in the transporter room and die quickly to make it feel better.

But she's not a Vulcan. Georgiou went on about this. She couldn't separate logic from emotion and made a mistake.

Yep. And on top of that, I think Georgiou herself said she'd spent much of the last 7 years trying to break her out of her "Vulcan shell" or something to that effect.
 
Overall these two episodes had some really bad writing and the show didn't seem logical at all. Did a lot of telling and not showing. A lot of inconsistency's in Michael's character from her Vulcan years till now. I'm assuming that will be explained but I think it is unnecessary to even have it be a plot point. Typically shows start off rough and then they hit a stride. I will continue to give it a chance as I have watch everything star trek and love the lore.
 

TDLink

Member
So far very lukewarm on this show.

Saru was the only one I inherently liked, which is good, I guess, since other than Michael he seems to be the only one making it to episode 3.

I already suspected from trailers that Michelle Yeoh wasn't making it out of the premiere alive, but labeling her a special guest star in the credits instantly confirmed it... at that point it was just a matter of waiting.

There were some "cool" sequences, but everything felt weird. The Klingon scenes were both numerous and dull. The writing was really sloppy and kind of only made serviceable by the actors being pretty good. That said, there were a lot of lines they obviously couldn't save. And I thought the entire desert sequence at the beginning was alarmingly bad (thankfully it got better after that). Everything about Michael's past and her mind conversations with Sarek seem like a major warning flag in order to connect this to TOS in some way too.

Michael's heel turn is an interesting premise, but the way it was presented here was almost random and there isn't a strong argument made for her being right at all. So it comes off entirely as her acting extremely unprofessional despite being praised enough to start talking about a captain's position at the beginning of the premiere. Really bizarre choice for the character. The solution of course would be to have just started it at the next episode, where she's already been convicted of treason.

Overall these episodes felt entirely like a prologue... and the REAL pilot won't be for another week. Yeah the effects were great and there were some neat battle scenes, but nothing here couldn't have been backstory. Really weird way to choose to premiere a show.

I guess the effects are giving people an overall positive impression so far though.

I'm still hopeful episode 3 will be better when...
we actually learn what the show will be like. Actually see the Discovery. Actually meet the Captain (Jason Isaacs) and the rest of our regular crew.
 
Michael's heel turn is an interesting premise, but the way it was presented here was almost random and there isn't a strong argument made for her being right at all. So it comes off entirely as her acting extremely unprofessional despite being praised enough to start talking about a captain's position at the beginning of the premiere
.

I think it's pretty clear she was right.
 

Kevin

Member
I do agree with some of the complaints but I think the writing will get better as the show continues. I had a lot of fun with the two episodes we got tonight. I only wish we got more episodes or longer episodes.

42 and 40 were not very long for a streaming show and a Star Trek show. The episodes could use more room to breath.
 
I do agree with some of the complaints but I think the writing will get better as the show continues. I had a lot of fun with the two episodes we got tonight. I only wish we got more episodes or longer episodes.

42 and 40 were not very long for a streaming show and a Star Trek show. The episodes could use more room to breath.

40-42 is the industry norm and probably has to be that way for Canada.
 
People wanted / would have benefited from ala carte when TV was a wasteland of reality shows.

Now? Ehhh....

Well the saving grace of all these streaming services is that a lot of money is now being poured into producing content like this new Star Trek that would never have been spent before as attempts are being made to draw people to the new services. Both Netflix and Amazon have produced a lot of original programming and we're seeing a response from the big guys now who realize that they actually need to compete in a world where the latest reality trash isn't good enough anymore because of the new competition.

This show wouldn't have been made if it weren't for the new competition. It's interesting to note that a bidding war actually took place when this show was being shopped around. Netflix, Amazon, and Showtime all wanted it. But CBS regained the rights to produce Star Trek after their lockout period from the Viacom deal expired at the end of 2016, so they went ahead and claimed it for themselves. They still got an amazing deal for the show's entire budget from Netflix to stream it internationally out of it.
 

Grizzlyjin

Supersonic, idiotic, disconnecting, not respecting, who would really ever wanna go and top that
Saru is great. I am glad to hear that we will continue to get more of him.

I was expecting him to be majorly corny based off the trailers. But I loved him in these first two episodes. I like that he's basically a lanky space cow who wants to avoid conflict. The makeup on him is excellent as well.

We got way more of the Klingons than I was expecting. Like extended scenes to flesh the group out.

Edit: And #OnFleet is all over my timeline. This show is Black Twitter approved.
 

TDLink

Member
I think it's pretty clear she was right.

Other than "she's the main character, so of course she's right", I don't see it. Obviously the character has the bias to want to attack the ship first (which makes sense), but it still doesn't seem like it would change anything. T'kuvma was trying to prove the Feds wanted war. They say they want peace? Just a lie. They attack? Look, I was right. He had a bunch of cloaked ships, including the huge one that took out the Admiral's -- just waiting there. The Shenzhou firing a shot wouldn't have changed anything.
 
Other than "she's the main character, so of course she's right", I don't see it. Obviously the character has the bias to want to attack the ship first (which makes sense), but it still doesn't seem like it would change anything. T'kuvma was trying to prove the Feds wanted war. They say they want peace? Just a lie. They attack? Look, I was right. He had a bunch of cloaked ships, including the huge one that took out the Admiral's -- just waiting there. The Shenzhou firing a shot wouldn't have changed anything.

T'Kuvma never would've been able to unite the houses if they had shot first and gotten rid of them. Maybe the Shenzhou would've gone down, but T'Kuvma wouldn't have been able to unite the Klingons against the Federation.
 
I feel pretty ambivalent about this, but I'm willing to continue watching because several reviewers say episode 3 (where we actually meet the new characters and ship and the show gets into its regular groove) is pretty good.

I'm hoping we get more standalone episodes about exploration like typical Star Trek and don't focus on the serialized Klingon storyline in every episode. I have little investment in this conflict, especially since it's still ongoing in TOS (and therefore won't end in this show).

Also, I bust out laughing when
Burnham nerve-pinched Georgiou
. I guess she learned respect for authority from reboot-Kirk.
 
Well, I watched episode 2.

So it turns out the first 2 episodes
were just the prologue and the real show actually starts next week.

This is the New Trek, where everyone was actually a stealth redshirt until after the prologue ends!

I'm interested in seeing where this goes now. New hairdo for Michael, that means shit gets real starting here.
 

TDLink

Member
T'Kuvma never would've been able to unite the houses if they had shot first and gotten rid of them. Maybe the Shenzhou would've gone down, but T'Kuvma wouldn't have been able to unite the Klingons against the Federation.
Michael's justification for it was she wanted to save the lives of Georgiou and the other people on the ship. If they fired first, they would have just been destroyed. The other Fed ships had already been called, T'kuvma could still accomplish his goal of uniting the houses purely based on the stunt he pulled by killing the Admiral, which would play out the same way even if the Shenzhou was already gone.
 
Yeah, can't wait to meet Isaac's captain and the rest our main crew.

Loved these first two eps.

Overall these episodes felt entirely like a prologue... and the REAL pilot won't be for another week. Yeah the effects were great and there were some neat battle scenes, but nothing here couldn't have been backstory.

In After Trek they pretty much confirm this was a prologue. They also said they didn't want to do it as just random flashbacks that we only get bits and pieces of sprinkled around as backstory, they wanted to actually do it and show it.
 
Maybe I didn't quite understand, but when Burnham is a child, and fails to answer the question about the latest Klingon terror raid, is that raid supposed to be some from sort of history outside her lifetime? Her parents were killed by Klingons though. But the captain later says no one has seen a Klingon in nearly a hundred years?

But "latest terror raid" implies an ongoing occurence? Am I missing something, or was this just to scratch the surface of world building for later elaboration.
 
Michael's justification for it was she wanted to save the lives of Georgiou and the other people on the ship. If they fired first, they would have just been destroyed. The other Fed ships had already been called, T'kuvma could still accomplish his goal of uniting the houses purely based on the stunt he pulled by killing the Admiral, which would play out the same way even if the Shenzhou was already gone.

I doubt it. They were super suspicious of T'Kuvma when they show up. They show up, both the Shenzhou and the scarcophagus ship are destroyed (probably the latter if the Shenzhou got the first shot). They leave. T'Kuvma doesn't get to convince them to join him and he's just some religious wacko who lit a light. And the Klingons would've developed a begrudging respect for the Federation that they no longer have because they see them as Liars who Lie about wanting to come in peace instead of warriors (aka speaking to them in a language they understand).

Michael didn't know about the cloak ship, but that doesn't factor into her decision. Still would've been more likely the better outcome would've been to do what she said to do

Maybe I didn't quite understand, but when Burnham is a child, and fails to answer the question about the latest Klingon terror raid, is that raid supposed to be some from sort of history outside her lifetime? Her parents were killed by Klingons though. But the captain later says no one has seen a Klingon in nearly a hundred years?

But "latest terror raid" implies an ongoing occurence? Am I missing something, or was this just to scratch the surface of world building for later elaboration.

They kind of bought it back when Anderson said that they've only had a few run ins, which would've presumably been one with Michael's parents.
 

Shauni

Member
But that's ala carte. In what world would you expect to split everything up where you can pick and choose and then when you add it all back up together it would cost less or the same? That's not how splitting things up has ever worked. Anyone wanting what you were suggesting was living in an unrealistic fantasy world.

Yeah, pretty much. I think people had an idea in there heads of a future where literally everything was on Netflix streaming, but this happening was the obvious result
 
What's most interesting about these first 2 episodes is that T'kuvma claims credit for
inventing the cloaking devices used on Klingon warships
. If this is true it's a rather big development in this universe. It also actually sets a point of time where this technology was invented within the Prime timeline.

Also, as a tangent, but is there any explanation for why in all of the Star Trek content for why the Federation never tried to develop cloaking technology like what the Klingons have had for literally forever and ever by the time of the late-timeline entries like DS9 and Voyager?
 
It felt like the short nature of the second episode (only 37 minutes of content, by my count) really held it back and forced some questionable forcing of the plot, which was a shame. I hope now that the episodes are streaming only that they'll be bit longer and more fleshed out.

Overall, I enjoyed it well enough, and certainly a better season premiere than TNG or DS9. What worked the most was easily the production values and Saru. I will also credit the shows for making alien species already more, well, alien than pretty much every other Trek series combined. I'm not sold on Michael yet, and most of that had to do with the writing which will (hopefully) improved.

I absolutely loved the preview of the rest of the season at the end. Jason Isaacs looks like he'll be great.
 
Maybe I didn't quite understand, but when Burnham is a child, and fails to answer the question about the latest Klingon terror raid, is that raid supposed to be some from sort of history outside her lifetime? Her parents were killed by Klingons though. But the captain later says no one has seen a Klingon in nearly a hundred years?

But "latest terror raid" implies an ongoing occurence? Am I missing something, or was this just to scratch the surface of world building for later elaboration.

Vulcan has more contact with them than the Federation does. The assumption was Burnham's original home was in Vulcan space.
 
Unlike many here, I really enjoyed it. I can’t wait to see what happens next week.

Maybe I didn't quite understand, but when Burnham is a child, and fails to answer the question about the latest Klingon terror raid, is that raid supposed to be some from sort of history outside her lifetime? Her parents were killed by Klingons though. But the captain later says no one has seen a Klingon in nearly a hundred years?

But "latest terror raid" implies an ongoing occurence? Am I missing something, or was this just to scratch the surface of world building for later elaboration.

It’s implied that the Klingons had sporadic contact like destroying colonies on the edge of Federation space, such as the one on which Burnham grew up. It appears the Klingons bombed the Vulcan world on which the learning center was located also.

That’s why relations with the Klingons were described as a state of cold war. The Klingons are fractured and without a single, centralized government. More aggressive elements were able to pursue these attacks without serious consequences and the Klingons had no formal contact or diplomatic relations with the Federations.

For their part, the Klingons viewed the territory into which the Federation had expanded as part of their historical empire and T’Kuvma wanted to unite the twenty-four houses and reforge the empire into what it was in its golden age.
 
For all it's vaulted production values, the writing, acting, and direction were so mediocre. Too many modern directing tropes with spinning camera angles, lense flares (who the fuck is gonna do any work and not go blind with celestial bodies constantly pulsating in your face) and shaky fighting scenes ugh. Not sold on Michael as a likeable main character either. The klingon interpretation was interesting to say the least... The kilngon dialogue delivery was so stilted. The language coach needs to give these characters cadence to make it believable.
 

Luqi

Member
Is this a good Star Trek to start watching Star Trek? (I watched the first 2 new movies too, and albeit I didn't fall in love, I liked enough)
 
Good first two episodes. One thing about the ending that felt off to me though was when after
Captain Georgiou is killed and Michael subsequently kills T'Kuvma, Michael contacts Saru to beam both her and the Captain back to the Shenjou. Saru says that he can't beam the Captain back without her life-sign, which obviously she no longer has because she's dead. so instead, Michael is frantically beamed back alone.
I thought it was odd because I don't remember that ever being a requirement for transporting something. It makes me wonder if they were cutting a corner in order to heighten the drama. Or maybe that's just how the tech worked during that era and I'm not aware of some detail.

IIRC, during the Enterprise era, they needed beacons or transporter fields set up in order to identify and transport inanimate objects. Even in TNG, they found plenty of technobabble excuses to justify not being able to use the transporter.

I feel like most of the people on GAF liked it tbh.

I see that now, I was skimming the last page.
 

antonz

Member
For all it's vaulted production values, the writing, acting, and direction were so mediocre. Too many modern directing tropes with spinning camera angles, lense flares (who the fuck is gonna do any work and not go blind with celestial bodies constantly pulsating in your face) and shaky fighting scenes ugh. Not sold on Michael as a likeable main character either. The klingon interpretation was interesting to say the least... The kilngon dialogue delivery was so stilted. The language coach needs to give these characters cadence to make it believable.

I think I would have liked the new Klingon look more if they had taken it a step further and had some variations between the Houses. Something along the line that the 24 major houses represent worlds of the empire or something and each is somewhat unique but all are Klingon.

What was odd is how stiff the Klingon delivery was when he was speaking to the Admiral. Moments later when he is saying I let you live to spread the word he is speaking perfectly clear and without any hint of trouble.
 
So I just checked in "Balance of Terror" and Spock specifically says "Invisibility is theoretically possible, captain. Selective bending of light, but the power cost is enormous. They may have solved that problem."

So did Starfleet not keep any record of
that time a massive cloaked Klingon ship blew up a bunch of their ships? I guess Spock's adopted sister forgot to mention this at the family reunion?
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
Really milquetoast on this one myself. I'm just not really into yet another grimdark science fiction show. I have no idea how much influence Kurtzmann has on the series since taking over, but this almost feels like what a sequel to Star Trek Into Darkness would have been like, given that film essentially set up a war with the Klingons as a possibility.
 
For all it's vaulted production values, the writing, acting, and direction were so mediocre. Too many modern directing tropes with spinning camera angles, lense flares (who the fuck is gonna do any work and not go blind with celestial bodies constantly pulsating in your face) and shaky fighting scenes ugh. Not sold on Michael as a likeable main character either. The klingon interpretation was interesting to say the least... The kilngon dialogue delivery was so stilted. The language coach needs to give these characters cadence to make it believable.

The Klingons were weird in general. I mean, I get that it was a re-imagining of the racist warrior race trope used in the past, and admire the show not wanting so them (and other species it appears) to be as humanlike in the past, but they just seem kind of comical.
The most menacing Klingon thing from the episode was the one in the spacesuit. That was an incredible costume.
 

Drain You

Member
Is this a good Star Trek to start watching Star Trek? (I watched the first 2 new movies too, and albeit I didn't fall in love, I liked enough)

Whatch Star Trek the next generation first, if you enjoy that watch whichever other series you feel like.
 
Really milquetoast on this one myself. I'm just not really into yet another grimdark science fiction show. I have no idea how much influence Kurtzmann has on the series since taking over, but this almost feels like what a sequel to Star Trek Into Darkness would have been like, given that film essentially set up a war with the Klingons as a possibility.

The Federation-Klingon Cold War is occurring during TOS and started before TOS began. This series occurs 10 years before TOS. What we're seeing here is apparently the first time a beginning date for the Cold War is set. So everything that will be seen in this show is already part of Prime timeline canon as historical events.
 
Another thing that made me laugh (in a bad way) was when
Burnham decided to call Sarek to ask for advice about the Klingons
.

It immediately reminded me of that horrible scene in STID where Spock contacts Old Spock just to ask if he's ever heard of Khan before, and Old Spock provides no useful advice and basically just gives a 15 second summary of Wrath of Khan.
 

firehawk12

Subete no aware
The Federation-Klingon Cold War is occurring during TOS and started before TOS began. This series occurs 10 years before TOS. What we're seeing here is apparently the first time a beginning date for the Cold War is set. So everything that will be seen in this show is already part of Prime timeline canon as historical events.

I'm speaking to the show's tone rather than the specific events. I mean we've seen DS9 try "grimdark" too, but it still felt tonally similar to TNG. I guess we'll see if they bother doing any standalone "we explore the universe" episodes later on, but when you have people in the preview that I saw say things like
you people up there keep forgetting about the people down here, implying some kind of class war in the Federation
, then it certainly feels more at home with a franchise where an Admiral would decide to start a war for no good reason instead of the franchise where the majority of the episodes are resolved without any weapons being fired.
 
Good first two episodes. One thing about the ending that felt off to me though was when after
Captain Georgiou is killed and Michael subsequently kills T'Kuvma, Michael contacts Saru to beam both her and the Captain back to the Shenjou. Saru says that he can't beam the Captain back without her life-sign, which obviously she no longer has because she's dead. so instead, Michael is frantically beamed back alone.
I thought it was odd because I don't remember that ever being a requirement for transporting something. It makes me wonder if they were cutting a corner in order to heighten the drama. Or maybe that's just how the tech worked during that era and I'm not aware of some detail.

They can transport inanimate objects, so no that's not how transporters worked back then.
 

Amneziak

aka The Hound
I'm not liking the new Klingon look, but I will roll with it. They've changed the Klingons so many times, but they can't update that stupid Vulcan haircut?
 
Good first two episodes. One thing about the ending that felt off to me though was when after
Captain Georgiou is killed and Michael subsequently kills T'Kuvma, Michael contacts Saru to beam both her and the Captain back to the Shenjou. Saru says that he can't beam the Captain back without her life-sign, which obviously she no longer has because she's dead. so instead, Michael is frantically beamed back alone.
I thought it was odd because I don't remember that ever being a requirement for transporting something. It makes me wonder if they were cutting a corner in order to heighten the drama. Or maybe that's just how the tech worked during that era and I'm not aware of some detail.

Later in the episode, they transported a
proton torpedo warhead
so that's not how it works, at least when going out. Coming back is unclear, there seem to be a lot of restrictions imposed "because the plot demands it" for that.
 

golem

Member
Later in the episode, they transported a
proton torpedo warhead
so that's not how it works, at least when going out. Coming back is unclear, there seem to be a lot of restrictions imposed "because the plot demands it" for that.

I felt it was more of an issue of not knowing which object in that room
was her body since they lost the signal transmission for her vitals, which is also a little dumb since the signal should keep transmitting in case of emergency unless the klingon dude destroyed it when he stabbed her.

It's up in 4k HDR on UK Netflix.

OMG FU CBS, guess I should find a VPN
 

Famassu

Member
No one wanted a world where you add up the payments on all the streaming services and you ended up paying more than goddamned cable used to cost. But I guess you can't ever underestimate capitalism.
The thing is, no one is forcing you to pay for EVERY service all the time. The good thing about these streaming services is that you can so easily start and end your subscription and everything is watchable at any point. So if paying for 6 services at a time doesn't sound good, just pay for less interesting services when you can binge stuff you are interested in.

I originally wasn't a fan of this future either but realizing the above and that in the end online and streaming is the future and there is a limit as to how much Netflix & HBO alone can produce has changed my mind. Other companies will want their own piece of the pie and ultimately that isn't wrong just because HBO, Netflix and Hulu got to the market first.
 
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