Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 1x10 - "Despite Yourself"

[The Memetic Susurrus]

Thanks for the kind words.

And I agree with your overall sentiments that I also personally would rather that Lorca is our prime version an so on. But at least if he is indeed the Mirror Lorca so far what has been said indicates that this Lorca might be genuinely heroic, which would probably drive the Lorca-haters over the edge.

Because if he is Mirror Lorca we know that he has tried to overthrow the evil dictator of the Terran Empire and that apparently his mission and dedication to this is so intense that he willingly has allowed himself to be taken to an ISS ship to be tortured in the most painful way imaginable.

If the above turns out to be the case, while he would definitely be a maverick, it would be rather difficult to make him out to be a villain.

I was telling my wife and youngest son the very same thing! I'll have to make that point to my Old Man. He just was just flabbergasted some people think that Lorca is some kind of moustache twirling fascist because he yells at insubordinate, snooty lieutenants (as Stamets was, originally) and he, gasp!, actually seems to have some kind of strategic acumen. Which is more than I can say about most of Starfleet, apparently!

Then again, my father was a Marine, so...of course he'd think Lorca was awesome! I just happen to agree!

 

[The Memetic Susurrus]

On the other hand, I feel like overuse of the concept could have killed it.



I completely agree with you. I'm fine if these theories turn out to be true, but I'd like it if they threw us a curveball we didn't see coming. That said, I don't think they necessarily want to throw complete curveballs: I've said this before, I think the producers are laying obvious clues such that it leads to fan speculation and endless blogging, thereby creating a circle of "buzz" for the show.

Half of what made shows like Game of Thrones, Westworld, and Walking Dead so popular was fans endlessly and fervently speculating online in between episodes and seasons.

And we Trekkers and Trekkies are the archetypes for that kind of behaviour, so, at least to me, we're just maintaining a fine lineage of good, fan-obsessiveness ;-)

 

[137th Gebirg]

Kinda feel like it's a shame we never got a TNG or VOY Mirror episode now.

"Living Witness" comes close for VOY without being a full-on MU ep. Pretty decent one for VOY, actually. Yeah, TNG would have been fun, but after Naked Now and a few others, I think they wanted to avoid rehashing TOS ideas for that series. Makes sense. I highly recommend the book "Dark Mirror" that told that story quite effectively.

 

[eschaton]

No one has raised one of the most surprising things about the episode 11 trailer. Burnham, Tyler, Tilly and Saru are all back in Federation uniforms. It seems their "cover" is going to be blown mid episode.

 

[The Memetic Susurrus]

No one has raised one of the most surprising things about the episode 11 trailer. Burnham, Tyler, Tilly and Saru are all back in Federation uniforms. It seems their "cover" is going to be blown mid episode.

Oh, I don't know. I thought the Tyler vs. Voq fight sequence at the 20 second mark got my eyebrow up...

 

[eschaton]

"Living Witness" comes close for VOY without being a full-on MU ep. Pretty decent one for VOY, actually. Yeah, TNG would have been fun, but after Naked Now and a few others, I think they wanted to avoid rehashing TOS ideas for that series. Makes sense. I highly recommend the book "Dark Mirror" that told that story quite effectively.

Living Witness is probably my favorite Voyager episode. "Action Trek" leaves me cold, and Voyager fell into this far too often. That episode was the only time they did a "message" episode where the lesson of the week (basically, an extended rumination on the history) was more than skin deep.

 

[Lord Garth]

Doesn’t apply here thankfully, because for MUpeople, there’s no way to learn the behaviours and hide. Their universe is different.

I was talking about Life In General, of course, nothing really to do with the Mirror Universe or Star Trek at all. But for the Mirror Universe and the actual episode itself, you might be right...

It's true that everything in the Mirror Universe seems upfront. Not being upfront would have to be learned.

So, in that sense, it is possible that it would be harder for someone savage who's lived such an uninhibited life to be able to reign anything in and be civilized.

 

[Albinator]

I was telling my wife and youngest son the very same thing! I'll have to make that point to my Old Man. He just was just flabbergasted some people think that Lorca is some kind of moustache twirling fascist because he yells at insubordinate, snooty lieutenants (as Stamets was, originally) and he, gasp!, actually seems to have some kind of strategic acumen. Which is more than I can say about most of Starfleet, apparently!

Then again, my father was a Marine, so...of course he'd think Lorca was awesome! I just happen to agree!

I think Lorca goes a bit far sometimes, his scruples are most certainly askew, but I wouldn't label him a villain outright. A morally dubious anti-hero, perhaps.

Is he the traditional Starfleet captain? Absolutely not. But in a time of war, he is perhaps the captain they need. Reminds me a bit of some of Sisko's darker sides, without any of his better ones.

 

[gblews]

Considering how "well" she does her primary job--psychiatry--that isn't saying much. I can chalk it up to bad writing (though, for god's sake, writers do have access to search engines and they can look up the symptoms of PTSD vs Acute Stress Disorder and figure out the difference...) but, since she's shown to be ethically conflicted in the first place--sleeping with your patient?

Wait, Lorca wasn't Cornwall's patient. She did a psych eval, but wasn't his treating physician.

 

[Jayson1]

Did anyone else think the writers were using the Mirror Universe as another example of the xenophobic alt-right and/or insular foreign culture? Is it going to become another allegory and message to examine today's politics?

That was what I was also thinking. It kind of works in fact it works better with the mirror universe than it does with the Klingons because they basically forced enhanced religious beliefs on them that never had been that big of a deal with them. Klingons don't so much as worship but instead celebrate their nature, which is why they killed their Gods according to Worf in one DS9 scene. Kahless seems to be valued over all others for no other reason than he was the ultimate warrior. Not because he had tons of valuable insight on how Klingons should live their lives.


Jason

 

[Jayson1]

You're right, for me, not everything has to be super creative, nor super original. There's plenty of great Trek this is standard sci-fi fare.

Besides, how is introducing a race of racist aliens any more creative than using the MU as an allegory? What makes that NOT creative in your mind? I think it's a fairly original and creative premise to start from, considering the Mirror Universe prior to this was mainly a one-note gag.

My issue with racism in regards to mirror universe is that if humans aren't bigoted towards each other it sort of undermines the whole idea that "Discovery" is more edgy or gritty than past Trek shows. Being bigoted towards fictional aliens doesn't carry the same weight as human on human bigotry and it is also something Trek has never ran from in the past even with TNG which might have been the least edgy Trek show of all-time. It just reminds be that while the show is edgy by Trek standards it's not so much compared to lots of other stuff on tv and frankly it's about on the level of "DS9" right now. Yet people sometimes act like we are getting the "Sopranos" version of Star Trek.

Jason

 

[Jayson1]

Neither is calling all your opponents socialists.

Can we please leave political trolling and baiting out of this thread?

What's wrong with socialists? Frankly we Americans needs some more socialism.

Jason

 

[Borgminister]

Took a second viewing just to be sure but in a crowded episode, Frakes did a great job overall and although I initially thought "overdirected", it had to be thus given the ambitious scope. Could've been a 2 part episode quite frankly. My only fear is that they make Culber return to normal as a "miracle" of the mycelium network.

 

[Jayson1]

Took a second viewing just to be sure but in a crowded episode, Frakes did a great job overall and although I initially thought "overdirected", it had to be thus given the ambitious scope. Could've been a 2 part episode quite frankly. My only fear is that they make Culber return to normal as a "miracle" of the mycelium network.

If they bring him back that seems like the best option IMO. I kind of like the idea that he comes back acting kind of strange much like Stamets did once he started using the spore drive. In fact I can already see Culver going into the machine in order to get the ship home so Stamets doesn't half to. Of course what kind of change you might get in Culver is unknown since he unlike Stamets is dead. Frankly I kind of like the "Pet Sematary" aproach which means a new storyline might form with Stamets wanting to reverse the effects and basically help him regain his soul.

Jason

 

[Borgminister]

Mirror Culber?

 

[Refuge]

In fact, I thought, for a while there, we were going to get a nuanced treatment of Acute Stress Disorder (Lorca) and PTSD (Tyler) as well as a realistic portrayal of a man who's been sexually abused by a woman and the psychology of why he would react the way he does about it.

Instead...we're heading towards Mirror Friend, Mirror Foe and Manchurian Candidate territory, respectfully, and all I can see are missed opportunities.

Exactly. So far Discovery likes to set up challenging subject matter even diversity in relationships. Just get a little invested into the integrity of that and it's like it's a ploy for a 'gotcha' moment.

 

[Immolatus]

Possibilities:-
1. Burnham misinterpreted the data
2. Ten years is a long time politically for an empire, anything can happen including a few social reforms
3. This is not the Prime Mirror universe
4. You assume every human agrees with how the empire operates

I think this is an alternate mirror universe from TOS

 

[cooleddie74]

Mirror Culber?

If he's anything like Mirror McCoy was reputed to be then we could be in for a treat. Mirror Phlox was a cold, calculating sadist with a typical Denobulan enthusiasm for and embrace of his job.

 

[Llama]

So... technically Worf wasn’t the first Klingon to serve in Star Fleet... Tyler/Voq was! Canon violation!!! Lol

 

[guyute03]

I wonder if the Mirror U Enterprise D was at that huge assembly of ships in TNG's 'Parallels'.