[Closed] Star: Trek: Discovery

I’d love to change the world - Jetta

I’m looking forward to it - but it could easily be awful... JJ Abrams and the last Enterprise series made serious mistakes IMHO.

Might be time for a Netflix subscription with this and Stranger Things 2 due.

Looks good:

Discovery is JJ-Trek (regardless of what universe it's supposedly in) with wrong Klingons. And Netflix. Nope.

The Orville though has no UK release as yet. Also, not great reviews, though to me it sounds like it's more like Trek of old with a bit of comedy and people are expecting whizz bang gloss & lens flares with no plot (JJ style). Sadly it won't do well then. That or a laugh a minute comedy with a laugh track, but I get the impression Seth (as a big Trek fan) is trying to do a traditional Trek under the guise of comedy to make up for low budget. Besides we have Red Dwarf for straight sci-fi comedy (new series in October BTW).

http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/ustv/news/a837489/seth-macfarlane-the-orville-reviews/

Balls, sorry, meant to post the trailer also!!

Besides we have Red Dwarf for straight sci-fi comedy

No, no it hasn’t. It’s not been funny for a long time.

Yep, looks pretty decent and very JJ Abrahams.

Besides we have Red Dwarf for straight sci-fi comedy
No, no it hasn’t. It’s not been funny for a long time.

Seriously, moderate yourself.

Besides we have Red Dwarf for straight sci-fi comedy

What a bizarre thing to say. We're only allowed one show in each genre or something?

footflaps - Member 
Yep, looks pretty decent and very JJ Abrahams.

Yeah, looks like a load of Star Wars style action to me, blowing ships up, dramatic dark moods, yelling at each other.

Nothing like Star Trek.

But what I loved and what Roddenberry had envisioned doesn't sell and doesn't attract mass audiences of casual viewers, so I'll have to stick with my old DVDs it seems.

JJ Abrams is a ****ing hack

Hoping that Discovery is better than that!

Seriously, moderate yourself.

🙄

I thought the JJ Abrahams reboot was by far the best Star Trek movie, 3rd one was a bit poor but first two were excellent.

footflaps - Member
I thought the JJ Abrahams reboot was by far the best Star Trek movie,

[img] [/img]

Abrams ripped the soul out of trek & turned it into a disposable Hollywood blockbuster

The Orville is coming to Fox UK, so said Mr MacFarlane...

[url= https://twitter.com/SethMacFarlane/status/907711130583175169 ]Tweet[/url]

I think it's pretty good. Looking forward to Discovery too, but not desperate.

Seriously, moderate yourself.

Hate to say it Drac, but I'm with TW. It had a dip for sure, but s11 was pretty good.

The Orville kind of sucks. I've seen the first couple of episodes and it's far from MacFarlane's best work. Basically a direct spoof of TNG that comes across as unimaginative and lazy.

Humour in sci-fi good, comedy sci-fi bad*

*(With the exception of the early seasons of Red Dwarf)

Excited for the new series of Star Trek though. Roll on Monday!

footflaps - Member
I thought the JJ Abrahams reboot was by far the best Star Trek movie, 3rd one was a bit poor but first two were excellent.

absolutely agree with this, first yin in particular was excellent.

Speaking of Red Dwarf, I've just seen a trailer.

HOLY SHIT, HOLLY'S BACK!!

On Netflix now, 2 episodes

The Orville is coming to Fox UK, so said Mr MacFarlane...

I caught the first episode of that last night. It wasn't half bad, I was expecting it to be another Hyperdrive so it exceeded my expectations at least.

On Netflix now, 2 episodes

Ooh. That's tonight's viewing sorted then.

the Orville is odd, I don't quite know what to make of it! It's part comedy spoof and part "serious" spoof. It's like star trek with non pc endings 😕

The Orville would probably have been better if MacFarlane hadn't put himself in it.

Just watched both eps, phasers set to Like!

Orville phasers now set to , load of Pap!

Only on Netflix?

I only have the trailers on Netflix what's going on?

Holding off signing up to Netflix until next month so my free month covers Stranger Things 2 as well, this isn’t helping.

Hate to say it Drac, but I'm with TW. It had a dip for sure, but s11 was pretty good.

I’m still right though it’s not anywhere near as good as it was.

Just watched the first one .....liked it . Cup of tea and now for the 2nd

No Netflix for me.

Pretty good I thought . Enough to get me back next week

How come it's not on Netflix for me? You guys have US accounts or something? 😐

Australia here, it's a Netflix own series. And yes Iiked it, yes darker but it was darker times

I'm not a massive Star Trek nerd. Will I like this?

Give it a watch, still has phasers and transporters but best just give it a go. First 2 episodes were decent

Well, I just caught up and I thought it was bloody brilliant.

How come it's not on Netflix for me?

It is, it's just buried. I had to search for "star trek dis" before it turned up.

Cheers Cougar. I'll try again, but I just keep getting three trailers appear.

It was alright, but there has been far too much time spent on detailed backstory exposition, then a bit more explanation in case you don’t quite get it. Then a little bit more

I fear it may be star trek for dummies

Or just not for fanbois....
1st couple of episodes of everything are a bit of a set up

It seems promising enough, "bloody brilliant" is a bit of a stretch though. And the Klingons speaking one syllable at a time is pretty tedious.

watched last night, was OK enough to watch it again. Like all S.T. it was predictable, a bit to shiny, Basil Exposition showed up a bit too much, and the baddies were, well, a bit dare we say there to fill the role of "baddy who will make a tactical/philosophical/cultural cock up at the convenient 35 min mark" to allow the show round off with moral conversation between the 1st mate and captain...

Well I thought it was a bit rubbish. Very generic action series template dusted off and some Starfleet logos inserted.

So the usual complaints apply - rejecting realistic character behaviour to increase the melodrama/jeopardy being the main one. Yawn.

Give it a watch, still has phasers and transporters but best just give it a go. First 2 episodes were decent

I watched all of Iron Fist, so my bar is set pretty low.

It is, it's just buried. I had to search for "star trek dis" before it turned up.

It's plastered across the top 2/3 of my TV screen when I start Netflix up.

Trek nerd here.

I liked it overall, not bad, following a different storytelling route to previous treks, but that's OK, modern TV drama series' generally work differently to how they did in the 60s/90s and you need to engage with the audience you have today...

For the most part it's in line with trek 'prime cannon', except we've got hologram communications, rather than boring old screens now?

It doesn't quite feel like an Abrams trek, which is a good thing, it feels like a step on from the last few series and a definite improvement on enterprise IMO...

Overall 7/10... So far.

following a different storytelling route to previous treks

really?

It pretty much had a soundboard made of the normal Star Trek tropes, and set about walloping them with a big hammer repeatedly

I didn't really like The Orville either. Not great at being sci fi or comedy.

It's definitely no Red Dwarf or Futurama.

miketually - Member
I'm not a massive Star Trek nerd. Will I like this?

If anything, it probably means you'll enjoy it more, as you won't have nerdy canon hangups.

I'm a big Trek fan though, and I enjoyed it. Yes, it's different, but then, so was TNG, so was DS9.

For the most part it's in line with trek 'prime cannon', except we've got hologram communications, rather than boring old screens now?

They've pretty much said the legacy of original shows is out the window. Might be the same timeline but it's a reboot.

miketually - Member 
I'm not a massive Star Trek nerd. Will I like this?

If it follows JJ's Trek films in style and plot, then it should be appealing to a mass audience who like to switch off brain, enjoy visuals, and don't care for all those annoying principles, politics, morality and decent science fiction storytelling of classic Trek 😉 (and to be fair, the reboot films, or the first at least, were way more successful than the old films as a result, as anyone could watch it. Just wasn't Star Trek other than in name, that's all).

A prime cannon, yesterday:

[img] [/img]

The word you're looking for is "canon." (-:

so who is the hot alien humanoid in this one?

Depends on your persuasion, there was one with a cute toaster/ipad on their head...

I watched both pilot episodes last night on Netflix.

The new central character is compelling and pretty well realised, there were some examples of original scriptwriting too - Burnham has to reason verbally with the ethical subroutine of the computer managing the ship's brig, a welcome change from the usual trope that the subject happens to have l33t skillz and can simply hack a 23rd century computer to free themselves.

The chemistry between Martin-Green and Yeoh was quite well played out too.

The Klingons were a miss for me. Like all good Sci-Fi, Star Trek has always been a metaphor for our time, but the Klingons in ST: Discovery were a meditation on race relations and the current clash of culture we're seeing between the west and ISIS, "Remain Klingon!" being a particularly grating chant. While a rethink of the established feudal Japanese inspired Klingons of the 1980s/1990s has been long overdue, the end result is quite fussy, fetishistic and owes a huge amount to Battlestar Galactica's Cylons in so many ways, from the aesthetics of their ships, to their backstory - an alien menace is suddenly back after a prolonged absence. Their backstory felt derivative and clumsy, BSG is approaching it's fifteenth birthday in rebooted form and the sci-fi antagonists' game hasn't moved on since.

The influence of JJ Abrams is obvious too, for better or for worse. Fans of lens-flares will be indulged frequently, but Abrams-Trek's rejection of non-violent problem solving in favour of explosions and space battles is in abundant evidence.

To summarise, there's some fresh thinking in evidence and the lead character is a real find, but I can't help feeling that Discovery is a missed opportunity.

So Trek geek here.

I have nothing against the Abrams films, they work well as films and the action focus suits a feature rather than the more episodic approach you get from TV.

So it was okay but I've got a couple of issues with it:

The Klingons?? Why? They were easily the best realised alien race / culture in the Trek universe with some outstanding characters, there was no need to arse about with them, they look like they've mated with the Narn from Babylon 5 and why do they speak liiikkkke tthhhaaaaat.

Too much exposition, its a TV series we don't need to know everything about the characters on day one. Why do we need a load of back story for the Klingon character?

Good to see Michelle Yeoh in something again - she even has a fight scene

Central character is pretty interesting I really don't know why she is called "Micheal" though

I've finished The Expanse (which was great BTW) so I'll probably carry on watching it.

Nice uniforms

I watched all of Iron Fist, so my bar is set pretty low.

Iron Fist was far better than this dross 🙂

Iron Fist was far better than this dross

Or just not for fanbois....
1st couple of episodes of everything are a bit of a set up

I'm not a fanboi, and you don't need to be one to realise that setting up the backstory for both Michael and the Klingons didn't need to be repeated 3-4 times to hammer the point home, unless it was aimed at the hard of thinking.

Netflix have a minor problem with padding out their series' to hit a certain number of episodes. The opening two of ST could have reached the same point in one episode without losing anything.

I've finished The Expanse (which was great BTW) so I'll probably carry on watching it.

Should I watch The Expanse first?

I watched it. Sort of enjoyed it. Could have made 1 or 1.5 episodes do the same thing though.

there a two series of the expanse, it's a good show. The lack of budget for top of the range effects is the only thing that slightly detracts

It pretty much had a soundboard made of the normal Star Trek tropes, and set about walloping them with a big hammer repeatedly

It is, they've gone straight for good old fashioned modern allagory focussed on extremeism, popularism and failure to understand different cultures... But they've also kicked off with more of a single character back story, where "traditionally" trek introduce a whole crew and build the detail of their backgrouds over the series, although it's called 'Discovery' the show feels more like it's going to be focussed more of the exploits of a main character...
But yeah it's still Star Trek, they likes their tropes...

Perhaps controversially I have no problem with the tredesigned Klingons, let's be honest their aesthetic (like many of the trek races) has been a bit flexible over the decades in TOS they're basically just blacked up actors in a bit of chainmail, by the 80s they pop up in the films with a few forehead ridges, extra shoulderpads and sexier ships and by the time we get to Worf the forehed-pasty is just about fully formed, Enterprise tried to explain the non-ridgey ones away as a genetic experiment to create klingon/human hybrids for espionage... So I'm willing to accept that actually 'prop[er' klingons looked a bit more gnarly all along and the representations seen in previous series were simply what they could do/did at the time, a bit of re-imagination is OK even for one of the most iconic races.

As for the overall look of it? again I'm generally OK with it, each series they use the make up and SFX available at the time, a Faithful reproduction of 'Cage era' TOS style sets, costumes and ships would look pretty odd today so they had to update the appearance. I'm not sure I bought the idea of the Shenzou (sp) being an "Old ship" it was a bit shiny and while I liked the under-slung bridge it was quite a departure from "Traditional" federation vessel configuration.

The discovery is a bit of an odd one again (when it's eventually shown) I read a rumour online that it's backstory is as a re-purposed old science vessel, quite how that explains the concentric Sphere, Ring, Ring rather than a standard saucer, or the massive warp Nacelles, I don't know but I'm sure all will be revealed.

JJ-trek did makes a point of making it all look a bit like a kitsch shiny version of TOS, it was like Austin powers, shot by Michael Bay in space to me. It utterly missed to point IMO. Discovery still seems to be on track after an hour and a half so it's already doing better than JJ did.

I'll just leave this here...

I watched all of Iron Fist

Really ?

I watched all of Iron Fist
Really ?

So you too discovered that Danny was the Immortal Iron Fist, protector of Kun Lun and sworn enemy of the hand?

I'm going to watch Trek tonight if I can find the bloody thing. I'm okay with them altering the look of things, mainly because if they made it look even vaguely like the original series it would be utter shit and an unintentional comedy. 🙂

Edit - I'm digging the Ryker manoeuvre.

Who is that Danny Rand character again?

Seemed pretty good and I'll continue watching to see where it goes. I liked the updated Klingon look. They now look alien as opposed to a tragic accident that occurred when Ginsters production line and a glue factory exploded.

I liked it but didnt like the bridge of the ship. Too big and dark.(enough to annoy me) Hopefully Discovery will be different.

Just watched Killjoys. Reminded me that TV series don't need to be the exact same stuff endlessly re-hashed. Even similar is better than just more Trek 🙂

Enterprise tried to explain the non-ridgey ones away as a genetic experiment to create klingon/human hybrids for espionage...

I think the Klingons were the weak link in the pilot. I'd like to hope that the 24 tribes / castes subplot means that the 'real' Klingons are going to rock up at some point and kick the tar out of this lot in some sort of Klingon civil war, but I expect that's wishful thinking on my part.

It's worth considering though, this was the pilot. a) Star Trek pilots have always been weak and it's taken a season to get going, and b) we've not even seen the Discovery yet, presumably the Sho Zin or whatever it's called is going to get creamed in the near future (along with its captain?) and the Commander is going to take Captaincy* of the new ship.

(* - shit, that's an actual word, who knew!)

In other news, I've just watched the second ep of The Orville. It's better than it's got any right to be. It's 85% Star Trek, 10% Red Dwarf and 5% nob gags. They could lose the last 15% and have a real ST contender on their hands.

I note also that Brannon Braga is in the credits, this is Star Trek By Stealth.

Is the new Star Trek coming out on DVD over here?

I liked it.
I'm glad Michelle Yeoh is dead though, she can't act outside of HK kick-flicks.
Don't like Michael (WTF?) Burnham who I expect will become the Captain, maybe she'll become a bit more likeable.
I like Saru the science office, he's my favourite so far.

I do find myself siding with the Klingons though. Shame T'Kuvma is dead though, he was cool.

kennyp - Member
Is the new Star Trek coming out on DVD over here?

Don't like Michael (WTF?) Burnham who I expect will become the Captain, maybe she'll become a bit more likeable.

I watched it yesterday, loved it, but I was never a huge fan of the original series..

REMAIN KLINGON!

[img] [/img]

It wasn't half bad, I was expecting it to be another Hyperdrive so it exceeded my expectations at least.

Can't get Netflix? Then probably wait a year

Cheers. Will check Netflix out. Did have it a few years ago but gave it up as the choice of films was so poor. May have improved now.

presumably the Sho Zin or whatever it's called is going to get creamed in the near future (along with its captain?) and the Commander is going to take Captaincy* of the new ship.

I'm guessing you failed to find the second episode which also went up Monday? Best catch up, it's all getting a bit spoilery up there^^