Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 1x01 - "The Vulcan Hello"

[Mudd]

It's nice that they have credentials.

Will we every find out how much Goldsman rewrote Fuiller?

I think my bigger problem was how easily Georgiou brushed her off. She was just talking five minutes earlier of Burnham being ready for her own command.

The first episode suffers from a variation of what's called "Idiot Plotting."

In this case, the plot unfolds as it does only because the main characters will not listen to one another with anything like the degree of attention that you'd expect from long-time coworkers who know and respect one another. As you say, Georgiou brushes Burnham off. Burnham goes straight to eleven, favoring anecdotal information from her childhood mentor over the on-the-spot judgment of the woman she's served under for seven years and has supposedly great respect for. Etc, etc...

 

[Matthew Raymond]

The desert scene reminded me of the Dune/Children of Dune TV miniseries, and for a couple of moments, I was expecting the characters to have to outrun a sandworm.

If they'd drawn the Star Trek delta by riding a sandworm, that would have been frakkin' awesome!

As it stands, I don't see how the ship could see a line a thin as a set of footprints and couldn't the Captain and her XO. And why would they even let their two highest ranking officers go on an away mission alone together. This would drive Riker stark raving mad.

You know. I actually think the 7 years thing was intentional. I don't think it's a coincidence that it's the same number of years TNG was on the air. It was pretty obvious they were trying to riff on the Picard/Riker relationship.

After seven years, not only should Burnham be a captain of her own ship, but Georgiou should be an admiral, just like Janeway. At least Picard has the excuse of prejudice-against-former-Borg. And, of course, Riker has his mortal fear of command chairs.

Yes -- all the people who've been posting here for months about how obviously doomed Discovery is. If you look hard enough, I'm sure there's at least one post predicting with total certainty that the Discovery pilot would be so bad, CBSAA would have a record number of cancellations on the day it airs...

Actually, it's entirely possible that Star Trek: Discovery could have decent ratings and still not make the ratings necessary to justify its budget. The show could be a ratings and critical success and still be a financial disaster. Plenty of good shows with strong fan bases and critical acclaim have died because they were too expensive.

Totally agree. Burnham has been on this ship SEVEN years. She commits treason because her Vulcan Step Father told her to. Seven years with Georgiou and she doesn't trust her judgement????

Yeah, the whole mutiny thing surprised me in a bad way. It felt unearned, and it made no sense for a person brought up as a Vulcan to make a decision that was so impulsive and poorly thought out. She had absolutely no plan whatsoever. Ironically, it would have made more sense if she was half Vulcan, because then she'd have her strong Vulcan emotions to suppress. A pure human trained in logic from childhood would probably have a cooler head in those circumstances. I would have liked to have seen a more carefully planned mutiny, with the climax being that Burnham almost gets away with it until Georgiou comes onto the bridge, still shaking off the effects of some kind of drug or something, and stuns her with a phaser just as she turns around to see her.

 

[Michael]

Just watched this again with my non-Trekkie wife, who liked it just fine. Decided to give it a rating of 7. Definitely nowhere near anything I would call perfect, but okay. There's definitely too much Klingon hogwash in the first part. And the plotting seems way off, too.

One other thing that bugged me on the second viewing: What's up with all the Dutch Angles? They are getting way overboard with them in some scenes. It was especially notable during the holo-communicator scene in Burnham's quarters. There isn't a straight camera angle in there. Odd choice.

 

[Quinton O'Connor]

One other thing that bugged me on the second viewing: What's up with all the Dutch Angles? They are getting way overboard with them in some scenes. It was especially notable during the holo-communicator scene in Burnham's quarters. There isn't a straight camera angle in there. Odd choice.

I talked about the Dutch angles a little bit last night, and I'm glad I'm not alone here. They're very bewildering. I hope they're toned down over the course of the season, because they're not working.

 

[cultcross]

Georgiou brushes Burnham off.

Well, she goes to red alert based on nothing but her word that she saw a Klingon, so i wouldn't quite describe it as brushing her off. When they disagree about the way to handle it, she takes the time to explain her point and why she thinks Burnham is wrong.

Burnham goes straight to eleven, favoring anecdotal information from her childhood mentor over the on-the-spot judgment of the woman she's served under for seven years and has supposedly great respect for.

She doesn't really go 'straight to eleven', she believes she has the only solution and when she can't make Georgiou see it, her PTSD driven reaction is that the course of action is so important it overrides the chain of command. And how the Vulcans maintain peace with the Klingons from the mouth of the Vulcan ambassador is a bit more relevant than you're making it sound with "anecdotal information from her childhood mentor".

 

[Quinton O'Connor]

There is one thing I'm confused on. Did Burnham's parents die previous to the "terror incident" Sarek recounts, with the flashback we see of him having a breakdown over her possible death and melding with her? If so, we didn't actually get any flashbacks [yet?] on when her parents died, but rather, we got a quick explanation for Sarek's long-range communications ability. Which surprises me, because I reckon it would confuse the casual viewer somewhat.

Of which I may admittedly be a member, if I'm the one confused here.

 

[Michael]

There is one thing I'm confused on. Did Burnham's parents die previous to the "terror incident" Sarek recounts, with the flashback we see of him having a breakdown over her possible death and melding with her? If so, we didn't actually get any flashbacks [yet?] on when her parents died, but rather, we got a quick explanation for Sarek's long-range communications ability. Which surprises me, because I reckon it would confuse the casual viewer somewhat.

Of which I may admittedly be a member, if I'm the one confused here.

Yes, that's how interpreted it. They are two separate events. 1. Her parents are killed on that outpost by Klingons. 2. She survives and lives on Vulcan where she attends a Vulcan school. 3. There's a fire at the school and Sarek saves her.

 

[cultcross]

There is one thing I'm confused on. Did Burnham's parents die previous to the "terror incident" Sarek recounts, with the flashback we see of him having a breakdown over her possible death and melding with her? If so, we didn't actually get any flashbacks [yet?] on when her parents died, but rather, we got a quick explanation for Sarek's long-range communications ability. Which surprises me, because I reckon it would confuse the casual viewer somewhat.

Of which I may admittedly be a member, if I'm the one confused here.

I interpreted the mind meld incident as being the attack which killed her parents, but they may be two separate events.

 

[Markinvirginia]

When I first saw the holo scene you could not quite make out who it was, at first. I thought for a few seconds they were going to have a Shatner cameo in there. I seem to recall every new series had a cameo in it. I didn't see any in this one. Did anyone else think it was going to be Shatner or were you expecting a cameo from someone else?

 

[Michael]

No, can't say I did.

 

[Ithekro]

This is exactly what's wrong with subtitles.

I've watched enough stuff that have subtitles that I can at least multitask just enough to read and watch was is going on in the story. As long as the subtitles can be read easily enough.

I did have one bad experience with subtitles on a French film. It was from I think the mid-late 1950s and in black and white. That wasn't the problem....the problem was that the subtitles were in plain white text....over the black and white images....and if the majority of the lower part of the screen was white...you couldn't actually read the subtitles, as they had no black border. They just vanished in to the white parts of the picture.

The only other bad experience is if the subtitles are not very well translated because it was a translation of a translation from two languages that don't share some attributes of English....like pronouns.

 

[dahj]

Yes, that's how interpreted it. They are two separate events. 1. Her parents are killed on that outpost by Klingons. 2. She survives and lives on Vulcan where she attends a Vulcan school. 3. There's a fire at the school and Sarek saves her.

I don't think they're two separate events, they mentioned it happened on a Vulcan-Human outpost, hence why it looks Vulcany and she (and her parents) are humans there.

 

[gblews]

Boy, that was a fast hour. Liked this first episode a lot. The show has an epic look more in line with say, The Expanse. And you can see the $6 million on the screen.

Really liked Captain Georgiou. She had that relaxed power vibe that someone who has no doubts about who is in command would have. Loved her and Biurnham on the planet together. These two, you can tell, don't just have a professional relationship, but a personal one as well.

Agree with whoever wrote about liking that the reason for the first weapons discharge was for a humanitarian purpose. I fist pumped when I heard Georgiou refer to Burnham as "No. 1". So, they still haven't started calling it the "Prime Directive".

Enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere on the bridge. So different from first season of TNG with Picard running the bridge with kind of an iron fist (which, thankfully eased up after a while).

The Klingons are my favorite Trek aliens so I'm glad to see them in DSC. But it iis going to take a minute to get used the new look. Glad to hear them mention honor and Kahless. LOVED when they alerted Sto'Va Kor that a warrior was on the way. Didn't love their mushmouthiness.

Really loved the strategy of locking the phase cannon's on the nebula in order to draw out the Klingons. Seeing Burnham use the neck pinch on the captain was shocking to me. I had to run it back to be sure of what I was seeing.

That's a real problem, too.

With respect to Georgiou and Burnham's conflict, just because Michael was in line for her own command, it did not change the fact that she was currently still the Shenzou's first officer and Georgiou, the captain.

Burnham's readiness for command didn't give her opinions any additional weight other than their inherent logic or lack thereof. Georgiou reacted as captain. Conversely, in the earlier scene, we see Georgiou consider Burnham's assertion that there were Klingons in the nebula, and order a red alert even though the only evidence she had was Burnham's word.

 

[Cyrus]

Do some research before you make silly comments.

- Bryan Fuller, the creator of the series and architect of at least the first two episodes, is a former writer and producer on Star Trek Voyager

- Nick Meyer wrote The Wrath of Kahn

- Alex Kurtzman co-wrote and co-created the story for Star Trek '09 and Into Darkness

- Kirsten Beyer took over the post-Endgame Voyager novels from Christie Golden, and wrote one of the Voyager String Theory novels

- Rod Roddenberry is a producer on the show

The "Trek cred" on this show is impeccable.

Joe Menosky, who was on the writing staff for TNG & VOY and wrote some DS9 episodes, is also a writer/producer on the show.

 

[cultcross]

Do some research before you make silly comments.

You've already been given plenty of warnings today about your attitude towards other posters in this forum. You've chosen to continue posting things like this.
Infraction for trolling, comments to PM.

 

[Ithekro]

The more important stat from last night is this:

http://www.superherohype.com/news/4...o-record-sign-ups-for-cbs-all-access#/slide/1

The question is, how many of those are the free week version and will drop it after seeing Episode two or three without CBS getting a dime out of them?

 

[Michael]

I interpreted the mind meld incident as being the attack which killed her parents, but they may be two separate events.

I don't think they're two separate events, they mentioned it happened on a Vulcan-Human outpost, hence why it looks Vulcany and she (and her parents) are humans there.

Now I'm confused. And I just watched the episode a second time.

They do show the scene where child Burnham has an anxiety attack when questioned about the incident where her parents died before they show the scene with the fire and Sarek. That's what led me to believe they were separate events. Would also be a weird way by the Vulcan test computer to phrase the question if the place it was talking about was the place they are currently at.

But then again, maybe they showed those scenes out of order. Weird …

 

[cultcross]

then again, maybe they showed those scenes out of order. Weird …

That was my reading - the mind meld scene being an earlier flashback than the school scene. Otherwise she has to lose both her parents in an attack, then be in another attack later on. Pretty unlucky.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Well, she goes to red alert based on nothing but her word that she saw a Klingon, so i wouldn't quite describe it as brushing her off. When they disagree about the way to handle it, she takes the time to explain her point and why she thinks Burnham is wrong.



She doesn't really go 'straight to eleven', she believes she has the only solution and when she can't make Georgiou see it, her PTSD driven reaction is that the course of action is so important it overrides the chain of command. And how the Vulcans maintain peace with the Klingons from the mouth of the Vulcan ambassador is a bit more relevant than you're making it sound with "anecdotal information from her childhood mentor".

Granting that Sarek is a completely reliable source, what reason does Burnham have to think that these Klingons in the here and now will behave as Klingons from centuries before did? There's been a lull in contact for a hundred years. Burnham had just gotten through telling the Admiral not to confuse race with culture. How does Burnham know what Klingon culture is now? She merely intuits that these Klingons are intending to go to war. Georgiou was clear and reasonable that Starfleet doesn't start shooting on a hunch, which is really all Burnham has.

By the way, Burnham was present when the Admiral gave Georgiou a direct order not to act without provocation. Burnham is disobeying direct orders from a flag officer as well as her captain.

With respect to Georgiou and Burnham's conflict, just because Michael was in line for her own command, it did not change the fact that she was currently still the Shenzou's first officer and Georgiou, the captain.

Burnham's readiness for command didn't give her opinions any additional weight other than their inherent logic or lack thereof. Georgiou reacted as captain. Conversely, in the earlier scene, we see Georgiou consider Burnham's assertion that there were Klingons in the nebula, and order a red alert even though the only evidence she had was Burnham's word.

Actually, I agree now (as of right now, anyway) that Georgiou gave Burnham a pretty fair hearing.

 

[cultcross]

Granting that Sarek is a completely reliable source, what reason does Burnham have to think that these Klingons in the here and now will behave as Klingons from centuries before did? There's been a lull in contact for a hundred years. Burnham had just gotten through telling the Admiral not to confuse race with culture. How does Burnham know what Klingon culture is now? She merely intuits that these Klingons are intending to go to war

And that is precisely the mistake she makes. She makes what amounts to a racist assumption about the Klingons as a result of her early experience with them. That's the whole point of the story. She thinks Georgiou and the Admiral are being naïve and stupid, and thinks she has to act to save her Captain and crew.

Basically without that, you have no story