Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 1x13 - "What's Past Is Prologue"

[Kane_Steel]

Again, it's not a big division if it's just a small subset of vocal white males. But fine, I get it. You prefer your sci-fi to have a strong male lead. Sorry this isn't for you.

I'm not White, lol. Sorry to burst your bubble. I've seen female reviewers tear the Mary-Sue Burnham 'character' apart as well, like Ashley Robinson on the Jaawin channel. Their YT reviews for STD always show up as the first in searches. The character is divisive.

And to further destroy your silly reasoning, Janeway was a fantastic lead character and Mulgrew was charismatic as hell, still is. Great ST lead. Solid presence. Sonequa is definitely nowhere close.

 

[Captain Killy]

The Gorn were a third rate power. The Cardassians were always presented as a near-pier to the Federation -- maybe not as large in size, but capable of going head-to-head with Starfleet in battle.

Hmmm

Major powers in the quadrant
Federation, Klingons Empire, Romulan Empire

2nd tier powers
Cardassian Union, Tholian Assembly

3 tier powers
Gorn Hegemony, Breen Confederacy, Ferengi Alliance

4 tier powers
Everyone else...

But I kinda like the idea of the Cardassians being a third rate player, explains the massive damn chip on their (especially wide) shoulders

 

[Longinus]

Nope.

I see that you're as articulate as you're scientifically literate.

What I said is true. Your multiverse articles have absolutely nothing to do with your mushroom articles.

 

[Tomalak]

I'm not White, lol. Sorry to burst your bubble. I've seen female reviewers tear the Mary-Sue Burnham 'character' apart as well, like Ashley Robinson on the Jaawin channel. Their YT reviews for STD always show up as the first in searches. The character is divisive.

And to further destroy your silly reasoning, Janeway was a fantastic lead character and Mulgrew was charismatic as hell, still is. Great ST lead. Solid presence. Sonequa is definitely nowhere close.

That's cool, my bubble remains unburst. I can also point to plenty of positive YouTube reviews of the show, for what it's worth. Sorry you don't like the show!

The problem is that all the criticism seems to focus on Burnham, and Sonequa herself, such as your ridiculous avatar. It's hard to shake the impression that there's something about her in particular that really grates on these reviewers.

 

[Agony_Boothb]

Totally agree here... except for that last sentence. I have two reasons:
1) Objectively, Star Wars movies have never been particularly good at clear, well-paced, plausible, logically coherent storytelling. That's just not what they do. They really don't even try.
2) Subjectively, I have no personal sentimental attachment to Star Wars like I do to Star Trek, so I just don't have it in me to care that much. (Kind of like JJ Abrams' attitude toward Trek, I suspect.) Hence, I found The Last Jedi to be at least as good as any SW picture I've seen before, and better than some.


.

To be honest I'm not a huge SW fan, I know enough of the lore to get by but and tend to view them fairly objectively. Take the SW prequels for example, i can see why hardcore SW fans hate them but i don't mind them. They're fun for the most part and I can switch my brain off and enjoy them.

The Last Jedi just brought out this fan rage that i didn't know i had. I just think it is an awful film in general. The Last Jedi is like the movie version of that guy that everyone knows who has a really irritating face or personality and just looking at him make you want to smack him in the mouth. I don't know where this is coming from, I don't even get fanboyish over Star Trek. It's like this Fanboy demon has decided to make me it's vessel on earth AND IS MAKING ME DO THINGS.

 

[Lord Garth]

Mary Sue is inserting yourself into a story. And then you yourself solve everything. I don't believe in moving goal posts. This is the definition.

So, unless Bryan Fuller was blamed for starting a war with a foreign power and spent six months in prison for it, and he was raised by an adoptive family after his parents were killed, Burnham's not a Mary Sue.

Georgiou dying in the pilot is failure on Burnham's part. The war with the Klingons starting at all is failure on Burnham's part. She wanted to avoid a war with the Klingons by responding in a way that they would understand. If everything had gone according to plan and everyone was praising it, then you might possibly have a case that Burnham is Too Perfect -- which is still not the same as Mary Sue -- but that's not what happened.

And Burnham did have to prove herself in the early episodes of DSC after the opening two episodes because not only was she dismissed as a criminal and a mutineer but, because of that no one would want to listen to her besides Lorca, so she had to work just that much harder to get someone like Stamets or Landry to take her seriously.

 

[Tomalak]

Mary Sue is inserting yourself into a story. And then you yourself solve everything. I don't believe in moving goal posts. This is the definition.

So, unless Bryan Fuller was blamed for starting a war with a foreign power and spent six months in prison for it, and he was raised by an adoptive family after his parents were killed, it's not a Mary Sue.

Georgiou dying in the pilot is failure on Burnham's part. The war with the Klingons starting at all is failure on Burnham's part. She wanted to avoid a war with the Klingons by responding in a way that they would understand. If everything had gone according to plan and everyone was praising it, then you might possibly have a case that Burnham is Too Perfect -- which is still not the same as Mary Sue -- but that's not what happened.

Yep, I loved how that was set up in the pilot. It was following the usual Star Trek motions - knife-edge situation, a brave plan, the captain and the first officer beaming over to save the day - the things we've seen Kirk and Spock do a hundred times.

But here, it went wrong. Catastrophically wrong. The central character fucked up to universal proportions and caused a war which tore apart a fleet of Starships on day one.

Not exactly the stuff of an infallible superheroine.

 

[Campe]

Based on a snarky comment by McCoy

If we are going to count one random line about only being able to fly at warp in a straight line when there are several occasions where it’s contradicted onscreen, we’re going to count this one.

CANON!!!

Er, TEH CANNON!!!!!!1!!!

(I’m kidding. I really couldn’t care less. But it seems that’s what they’re setting up to do!)

 

[Tomalak]

Hmmm

Major powers in the quadrant
Federation, Klingons Empire, Romulan Empire

2nd tier powers
Cardassian Union, Tholian Assembly

3 tier powers
Gorn Hegemony, Breen Confederacy, Ferengi Alliance

4 tier powers
Everyone else...

But I kinda like the idea of the Cardassians being a third rate player, explains the massive damn chip on their (especially wide) shoulders

They weren't exactly top rank. The Phoenix was blasting away Cardassian warships before she was even in their weapons range, and the Galaxy class ships in the Dominion war blow them away with similar ease.

Dukat himself calls them a "third rate power", which is why he joins the Dominion. Sure, this is when they're at their weakest following the Klingon invasion, but the ease with which the Klingons took over vast swathes of territory (whilst also fighting border conflicts with Starfleet) suggests they weren't much to write home about before the war.

 

[SJGardner]

I'm a bit torn, to be honest. On the one hand, the episode left me wanting for more, I enjoyed it from start to finish despite its flaws that others have presented so well before me. Saru is growing on me as The Captain with a definite article, the bridge crew finally got something to do (hope more is coming from them in Season 2), Georgiou surprised me by having an Asianesque sense of honor to her and I definitely wouldn't have guessed the twist of Burnham saving her life (but I have to admit, completely in character for her).

On the other hand, I just witnessed Lorca not simply getting killed off but practically being butchered. It didn't diminish my enjoyment of the episode as when he finally got to be himself, he was the classic laughably bad character through and through ('I hate poetry'), but I'm bummed that the show confused antagonist with villain. Before this week, I sincerely hoped that the time he spent in our universe rubbed off on him a bit or that he was more compassionate than his compatriots from the start, but it turns out that in the end, he was just that good at pretending. Kudos to him for being so good at it, though, that even Cornwell could only guess it was the work of PTSD. I'm not making predictions on whether Isaacs will come back or not, so I only say he will be sorely missed. He was a highlight of the series for me.

 

[Captain Killy]

Yep, I loved how that was set up in the pilot. It was following the usual Star Trek motions - knife-edge situation, a brave plan, the captain and the first officer beaming over to save the day - the things we've seen Kirk and Spock do a hundred times.

But here, it went wrong. Catastrophically wrong. The central character fucked up to universal proportions and caused a war which tore apart a fleet of Starships on day one.

Not exactly the stuff of an infallible superheroine.

And that was the beauty of those first two episodes, genius really. We start with a Star Trek series - Star Trek: Shenzhou - already in progress. We meet a crew functioning like every other Trek crew we’ve ever seen, complete with banter. We get an opening Log entry and and the start of a mission we’ve seen a thousand time, repairing a damaged piece of space equipment, Then it all goes so horribly, horribly wrong and one person’s bad decision leads directly to everything that follows...

 

[Longinus]

And that was the beauty of those first two episodes, genius really. We start with a Star Trek series - Star Trek: Shenzhou - already in progress. We meet a crew functioning like every other Trek crew we’ve ever seen, complete with banter. We get an opening Log entry and and the start of a mission we’ve seen a thousand time, repairing a damaged piece of space equipment, Then it all goes so horribly, horribly wrong and one person’s bad decision leads directly to everything that follows...

Yep. My problem is that I would have much rather watched that Star Trek: Shenzhou show...

 

[waxon]

This was a disappointing episode, it was so predictable. I was hoping for something more. Yet again, sloppy writing.

 

[SJGardner]

And that was the beauty of those first two episodes, genius really. We start with a Star Trek series - Star Trek: Shenzhou - already in progress. We meet a crew functioning like every other Trek crew we’ve ever seen, complete with banter. We get an opening Log entry and and the start of a mission we’ve seen a thousand time, repairing a damaged piece of space equipment, Then it all goes so horribly, horribly wrong and one person’s bad decision leads directly to everything that follows...

It actually seems to be a recurring theme in DSC that most convoluted plans eventually blow up in your face. L'Rell's whole Manchurian Candidate operation comes to mind, not to mention Lorca's entire character arc.

 

[Tomalak]

And that was the beauty of those first two episodes, genius really. We start with a Star Trek series - Star Trek: Shenzhou - already in progress. We meet a crew functioning like every other Trek crew we’ve ever seen, complete with banter. We get an opening Log entry and and the start of a mission we’ve seen a thousand time, repairing a damaged piece of space equipment, Then it all goes so horribly, horribly wrong and one person’s bad decision leads directly to everything that follows...

I suspect this is why a lot of fans didn't like it, and still don't. They wanted Star Trek: Shenzhou, they wanted The Orville. Discovery is different, and there's always been resistance to change because people like what they like.

I guess it's the problem with trying to innovate in an established series. Deep Space Nine faced a lot of the same criticism!

 

[Gepard]

Oh my God, this is such glorious schlock. They pissed away every bit of potential Lorca had, and it's just fights and backstabbing and over the top melodrama.

It's the narriative equivalent of the way the CG ship shots look: crappy, overdesigned, and hoping we like it anyway because of how flashy it a is.

 

[Grendelsbayne]

To be honest I'm not a huge SW fan, I know enough of the lore to get by but and tend to view them fairly objectively. Take the SW prequels for example, i can see why hardcore SW fans hate them but i don't mind them. They're fun for the most part and I can switch my brain off and enjoy them.

The Last Jedi just brought out this fan rage that i didn't know i had. I just think it is an awful film in general. The Last Jedi is like the movie version of that guy that everyone knows who has a really irritating face or personality and just looking at him make you want to smack him in the mouth. I don't know where this is coming from, I don't even get fanboyish over Star Trek. It's like this Fanboy demon has decided to make me it's vessel on earth AND IS MAKING ME DO THINGS.

I've never been a huge fan either, but I have to say I loved The Last Jedi and would pretty much argue it as the best SW movie ever. If Ep IX is a satisfactory conclusion, I may actually wind up one day involved in all those ridiculous 'Which trilogy is the greatest' wars defending Rey and Kylo Ren to the bitter end.

But seriously, the prequels were crap. You don't have to be a fan to see that. (Though some of the actors did pretty well despite it.)

 

[SJGardner]

And, to simply nitpick a plothole that actually had me laughing out loud when I hit me:

Was Tilly's MU hair a wig all along? Because if it wasn't, then the first thing she did when she realized she didn't have to keep up the charade anymore was to not only dress back in her normal uniform like everyone else but to go and wash the straightener out of her hair like she had nothing better to do. She must have hated what those chemicals were doing to it. Knowing her, she probably continued to discuss the plan with Stamets over the comm while she was in the shower.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

I went in hoping that Lorca wouldn't just be a moustache twirling villain, but Isaacs pulls off villains so good that I enjoyed every scene he was in. He pulls it off so well you almost believe he believes what he's saying when he's complimenting the Discovery crew

I definitely wasn't expecting Burnham to pull Mirror Georgiou back to the Prime Universe, either. I guess we can also assume that there wasn't a mirror Discovery pulled into our universe, laying waste to Klingon ships.

My big complaint is that for Lorca's plan to come to fruition, then a BIG coincidence had to occur. I guess it's pretty lucky he got assigned to one of the only two ships in the quadrant equipped with a spore drive (and the only one that didn't get it's entire crew killed). His plan would have been shot to shit if he'd been assigned to the Enterprise

The only question I'm stuck with is, if Lorca was pulled into the prime universe after beaming off the Buran, then what happened to Prime Lorca? Was he blown up real good on his ship, or did he go to the Mirror Universe? Maybe he's spent the past one year and 200-some odd days floating around in an escape pod.

 

[Agony_Boothb]

Disagree about Voyager, despite other intentions they might have had on hiring Jeri Ryan, they ended up hiring a great actress. Additionally, the writers were apparently actually interested in writing for the new character, so they turned out better scripts. Now, not everything they did improved the show, but I don’t think it went downhill after that.

As for Enterprise, I agree. It was not going well, and despite their well-intentioned effort to improve things by going with a more serialized arc for season 3 (which can improve character continuity and create a more important storyline than episodes-of-the-week), I don’t think it was all that great of an improvement. I still remember shaking my head when Enterprise had a character (Xindi reptilian) basically say the cliché “guards, have this prisoner taken away”. It was pretty bad. Now, I don’t see you mention Enterprise season 4 which I felt was truly streets ahead, and what Enterprise should have been all along (that plus more of the “early Starfleet” stuff that we only see in “First Flight” that Braga, surprisingly, intended on being the original season 1 setting before the network told him to get his ass into space in episode 1).


.

I have a weird relationship with Voyager. It has a special place in my heart due to it being the series that got me into star trek as a chubby 14 year old. I absolutely love the first three seasons and voyager as a series contains some of my favourite trek episodes. However, I do think that the writing got lazy after season 4 and feel that it became less intelligent and more action packed because ratings. In terms of Seven of Nine, i actually like the character a lot and love Jeri Ryan as an actress, but i didn't like that the powers that be felt they had to resort to T&A (albeit PG T&A) to get people into the show because they didn't have faith in the other characters. They went for the sex sells approach to fix the shows problems instead of taking other avenues like making the other characters more interesting or adding story arcs or giving us interesting adversaries like DS9 did with The Dominion.

In terms of Enterprise season 4 I agree, i think it was really good and it was like watching an entirely different show. The mini arcs were great, the performances from the cast were generally pretty strong. The show was definitely headed in the right direction, it's what it should have been from the start. It's a shame that such a strong season went out on the whimper that was 'These are the voyages'.