Star Trek: Discovery - New series on Netflix

[ChocolateFrog]

You guys are tempting me.

Might have to see if it's appeared on my Firestick yet.

[SpudLink]

I gave up during season 3. I’m not anti-woke, but I kinda agree with the complaints that too much of the focus was on everyone’s need for personal validation and a good cry.

I’m tempted to give season 5 a go. Will I be completely lost if I don’t watch the episodes I missed? (Are they still ‘lost in the far future’? Do the rest of the bridge crew have names yet?)

[Flip Martian]

SpudLink said:

I gave up during season 3. I’m not anti-woke, but I kinda agree with the complaints that too much of the focus was on everyone’s need for personal validation and a good cry.

I’m tempted to give season 5 a go. Will I be completely lost if I don’t watch the episodes I missed? (Are they still ‘lost in the far future’? Do the rest of the bridge crew have names yet?)

Yeah they do but I honestly can't remember them. They still don't have personalities and are very under written. You won't be totally lost, no. S4 ended with Burnham saving the universe and now Starfleet is rebuilding. Still in the future. There IS an attempt to tie in with a story from an episode of TNG, which is what kicks off S5 and leads to the story arc.

Safe to say I think that if S5 ep 1 doesn't grab you then give up again and you've only lost 45 mins from your life.

[Drawweight]

I went on to Discovery and realised I’d missed a whole series.

Honestly binge watching series 4 is not a good idea. If you watch it weekly you can forget how bad it was from episode to episode. Watching a few episodes at a time just confirms the banality of it all.

By the time Book gave his speech at the end I felt like throwing something through the telly.

The trouble is even though series 5 seems slightly better you’re still aware that it’s the Michael Burnham show and the rest is just background noise.

[Flip Martian]

Drawweight said:

The trouble is even though series 5 seems slightly better you’re still aware that it’s the Michael Burnham show and the rest is just background noise.

Sadly true - reflected in the poor character development. Enterprise, TNG and DS9 most of all, had well rounded characters (not really watched much Voyager so can't comment). In Discovery, too many of them really are cardboard cutouts.

[Vipers]

Unless I am loosing the plot, is Star Trek Discovery on Netflix now?

[cslwannabe]

Paramount +

[mikeh501]

In synopsis having not read 169 pages….. it’s utter utter garbage and absolutely not Star Trek. Thank god for strange new worlds.

[ThomW]

mikeh501 said:

it’s utter utter garbage and absolutely not Star Trek.

No, it is. The clue is in the name.

It's here in case you're struggling:

[Vipers]

cslwannabe said:

Paramount +

Tks

[Flip Martian]

I think you know what he means by Discovery wasn't ST. Ultimately, Discovery for most of it's lifespan has been very unlike ST and could easily have stood or fallen as a stand alone series. Character development, writing, pacing...all very unlike Trek. Ironically, this, their last season, finally is. Funny that.

Stories and characters first - get those right and the rest follows. They didn't. If they had, they wouldn't been so eager to develop SNW as "a return to classic format ST". How quickly SNW featured characters you got to know and care about! Or even create Picard - which they messed up as well by messing with the ST formula, before delivering what fans wanted in season 3. And now finally making the 5th season of Disco rather more ST-like - picking up the pace, with less "lengthy meaningful conversations about how we are feeling".

[SpudLink]

"It's Star Trek, Jim, but not as we know it."

[Flip Martian]

Then again, I suppose 20+ years ago trekkies were saying "OMG DS9 is NOT ST!" for different reasons.

[DodgyGeezer]

Flip Martian said:

Then again, I suppose 20+ years ago trekkies were saying "OMG DS9 is NOT ST!" for different reasons.

the thing that gets me is that EVERYTHING in STD has to be discussed and explained maaaaannnnnnnyyyyy times (talk about beating you over the head!). In DS:9 - Sisko was the boss and Kira his second. There was no big speech about how important it was to be a black captain or how empowering it was for a woman to be his XO. Likewise with Uhura in TOS and Janeway in Voyager - they broke boundaries but the 'plot device', if you will, is they are there and you have to accept it if you want to watch...

[Flip Martian]

DodgyGeezer said:

the thing that gets me is that EVERYTHING in STD has to be discussed and explained maaaaannnnnnnyyyyy times (talk about beating you over the head!). In DS:9 - Sisko was the boss and Kira his second. There was no big speech about how important it was to be a black captain or how empowering it was for a woman to be his XO. Likewise with Uhura in TOS and Janeway in Voyager - they broke boundaries but the 'plot device', if you will, is they are there and you have to accept it if you want to watch...

Couldn't agree more. It's like the viewing audience now can't work it out for themselves unless it's explained IN GREAT DETAIL and AT LENGTH. Even when everyone's running around in an emergency - they would still stop and have a meaningful chat. It was like primary school level inclusivity lessons.

There was even a scene when the non binary character lectured Stametz on the "they" pronoun that was their preference. In the 23rd century. Really?!! I think the world might have got it by then...

[rider73]

Flip Martian said:

DodgyGeezer said:

There was even a scene when the non binary character lectured Stametz on the "they" pronoun that was their preference. In the 23rd century. Really?!! I think the world might have got it by then...

it was done a few times in TNG , even one where Riker fell in love with someone non binary.....
I feel STD does it the way it does it to try and cover huge crappy plot holes, writing, and pad out a series that would be a double episode in TNG/DS9/Voyager these days, the entire plot feels like an after thought just for fitting in the emotional and moral beating of the viewer of THIS IS HOW YOU SHOULD THINK.

[C5_Steve]

Flip Martian said:

DodgyGeezer said:

the thing that gets me is that EVERYTHING in STD has to be discussed and explained maaaaannnnnnnyyyyy times (talk about beating you over the head!). In DS:9 - Sisko was the boss and Kira his second. There was no big speech about how important it was to be a black captain or how empowering it was for a woman to be his XO. Likewise with Uhura in TOS and Janeway in Voyager - they broke boundaries but the 'plot device', if you will, is they are there and you have to accept it if you want to watch...

Couldn't agree more. It's like the viewing audience now can't work it out for themselves unless it's explained IN GREAT DETAIL and AT LENGTH. Even when everyone's running around in an emergency - they would still stop and have a meaningful chat. It was like primary school level inclusivity lessons.

There was even a scene when the non binary character lectured Stametz on the "they" pronoun that was their preference. In the 23rd century. Really?!! I think the world might have got it by then...

I can't believe we're still doing this.........

You lot are clinging to this, there is no beating anything over anyone's head and never has been. When in Disco does anyone mention that Burnham being black is a thing? Or a woman? She's persecuted because she mutineers and gets her Captain killed in the show, that's it. The last episode even did a call back to that!

And the "scene" you mention about pronouns was one line. They looked uncomfortable, they corrected Stamets, he said "Ok" and pulled an awkward face and that was it. Was it there for a reason? Yes. But it was 10 seconds, if that, of screen time. Did you also call out Picard for being woke when they included the plot thread of Shaw dead naming Seven throughout? Becasue that took up several episodes and was a massive part of the plot and payoff.

This revisionist history of Star Trek is hilarious, Star Trek was "woke" before the word started being used for anything that dared show emotions or feelings. You mentioned DS9 for example. A series that dealt with fascism and religious extremism it's entire run, had the first POC lead in any ST show and honoured that by having whole episodes about black culture during times of white privilege (Far Beyond the Stars, directed by Brooks). You also had a whole episode of TNG on being non-binary ffs. But that was before it was "cool" to call things "woke" right?

Disco is as much Star Trek as every other thing to have come out of the studio. If you don't like it that's absolutely fine but the issues you're picking at, are your issues not the shows and have been there in every series. Star Trek is such a great franchise exactly because it picks up on all of these issues, often way before it's popular to do so and is able to wrap them in the scifi fantasy bubble of the shows and present the issues to fans. It has always been a diverse and inclusive franchise where fans from many backgrounds can see versions of themselves and feel included in the worlds they construct.

If you dislike the show that's fine but stop calling it out for being too inclusive because Star Trek has been and always shall be, for everyone.

[C5_Steve]

Anyway

I thought Ep6 was a bit filler-ish which is a shame given it's the last episode. It was kind of a bottle episode in that it didn't actually affect the bigger plot but if gave us more Rayner which is a plus as I really like his character. I assume they're used it to deal with the friction between the two in one single episode so they can now get on with working together but it did feel a bit forced.

I did like the jump forward to when Disco is abandoned and Zora is just listening to music on her own, ties in to the short trek Calypso nicely.

[Flip Martian]

rider73 said:

it was done a few times in TNG , even one where Riker fell in love with someone non binary.....
I feel STD does it the way it does it to try and cover huge crappy plot holes, writing, and pad out a series that would be a double episode in TNG/DS9/Voyager these days, the entire plot feels like an after thought just for fitting in the emotional and moral beating of the viewer of THIS IS HOW YOU SHOULD THINK.

Yes. That was kinda the point - it was done in previous ST series many times. As part of the overall story. No moralising, no "THIS IS WHAT WE WANT TO TELL YOU" speeches, they just got on and told it as part of the story. The story stood or fell on the strength of the script and the acting, not the message. The message was there. Maybe if social media had been around then, there would have been outrage and disgust at those episodes I don't know. To me, it was just another episode, representing a fictional future. Certainly nothing to get upset about.

[Flip Martian]

C5_Steve said:

I can't believe we're still doing this.........

You lot are clinging to this, there is no beating anything over anyone's head and never has been. When in Disco does anyone mention that Burnham being black is a thing? Or a woman? She's persecuted because she mutineers and gets her Captain killed in the show, that's it. The last episode even did a call back to that!

Etc etc

If you dislike the show that's fine but stop calling it out for being too inclusive because Star Trek has been and always shall be, for everyone.

So there we have it. We can say many times about the poor writing and characterisations etc and how the "message" dominated at the expense of all those things. Every fan of Disco seems to accuse every critic of not being pro inclusivity, whatever we actually say. You can disagree with what I say, fine - but don't put words in mouths. ST has always been for anyone, of course - it's a tv show, they want ratings! I've watched it on and off since the early 70s. I've seen messages about racism, sexism, sexuality, right wing politics, gender inclusivity - pretty much everything in that time. It's all been a positive.

Only with Disco has it been so clumsily handled. The writing, fleshing out of non-lead characters, pacing and plotting has often (until season 5) played second fiddle to characters representing minorities pushed to the front, regardless of their merit or importance to the plot. Most people still struggle with the names of the bridge crew, even by season 5. 1 of the originals only got fleshed out a bit because she was being killed off by the end of the same episode. People run around in an emergency trying to get something done before something explodes/someone gets killed - but they will still find the time to stop and talk about a trauma or worry that's bugging them, get a pep talk from Michael (usually, as she's the focus of the series) and then resume. What do they do? Stop time while that happens?

The writing on this show has been NOTHING like as well done as pretty much any other ST I've ever seen. Which is understandable, given they have been writing a message, not just a series of stories. There is no way anyone will ever convince me the writers weren't told by show runners to get that message in there, front and centre, and make sure people know what ST represents.

We already did know - it didn't need the focus being pulled away from the stories. Older Trek delivered messages while telling stories. People could use their brains.

And finally, I don't recall that "they pronoun" scene being 10 seconds. But I do remember it was totally unnecessary. It's the 23rd century, totally irrelevant - everyone would be more than aware by then. In fact, "him" and "her" may well have disappeared by then altogether. It wouldn't even be thought about it. It was jarring, and took you of the story. A 21st century conversation in a future world. And a very clumsily placed message for people watching.