Michael Burnham and the Klingon War

[Mudd]

A lot of that happens, yes. Screenwriters ultimately write to the dictates of a lot of folks higher up on the food chain. One reason other than money that writers like to become producers is to have more control over what's done to their work.

In this case, the writer of the original version was probably no longer at STD.

 

[Orphalesion]

So yeah...just started watching Discovery a bit ago and I'm currently at the episode where the prisoners in that transport blame Michael for the war and she agreed and that really, really confused me..and then the people at the Discovery blame her as well?

I mean I understand that the characters don't know that the Klingons (who look pretty cool, but really seem a bit very nasty in this continuity with their "terror raids" et al) were luring them into a trap in order to provoke a war, but even without that...

1.Starship discovers strange object.
2.First officer is sent out to examine it, in a typical Starfleet fashion that would not really be out of place in any other trek show.
3.Alien acts hostile towards the First Officer who then proceeds to defend herself.
4.The situation escalates from there.

How does that equal to "starting a war"? By that category a lot of Trek characters from Kirk to Janeway have started wars. Until that came up I was under the impression that she had been tried and convicted of mutiny...
Up until now I actually liked the show.
Now it seems like it tries to hard to be "dark" and "harsh".

 

[Mudd]

And dumb.

 

[cultcross]

How does that equal to "starting a war"?

In short, it doesn't.

There is some saving grace though for the arc in that I could imagine why people in universe would think it does. Remember we have what Riker's holodeck would call Objective Mode. We can see both sides of the conflict, and also see the truth of what happened when Burnham and Georgiou beamed over to the Ship of the Dead.

From the in universe perspective of somebody on the Shenzhou, they encountered a Klingon device, Burnham was in some kind of vaguely defined conflict with a Klingon in a spacesuit, then the ship is confronted by a Klingon vessel, and while the captain is preaching peace and calm, Burnham apparently goes nuts, argues with the Captain, then decides to mutiny in front of the bridge crew, then gets given a second chance and beams over to the Klingon ship with the Captain she just metaphorically stabbed in the back, then comes back unscathed with a story of how said Captain literally got stabbed, and the mission failed by Burnham's hand. Then their ship and all the others got blown up.

I could see how the characters might interpret the resulting war as Burnham's fault.

 

[eschaton]

In short, it doesn't.

There is some saving grace though for the arc in that I could imagine why people in universe would think it does. Remember we have what Riker's holodeck would call Objective Mode. We can see both sides of the conflict, and also see the truth of what happened when Burnham and Georgiou beamed over to the Ship of the Dead.

From the in universe perspective of somebody on the Shenzhou, they encountered a Klingon device, Burnham was in some kind of vaguely defined conflict with a Klingon in a spacesuit, then the ship is confronted by a Klingon vessel, and while the captain is preaching peace and calm, Burnham apparently goes nuts, argues with the Captain, then decides to mutiny in front of the bridge crew, then gets given a second chance and beams over to the Klingon ship with the Captain she just metaphorically stabbed in the back, then comes back unscathed with a story of how said Captain literally got stabbed, and the mission failed by Burnham's hand. Then their ship and all the others got blown up.

I could see how the characters might interpret the resulting war as Burnham's fault.

I agree with this 100%. The muddle is that as the viewer, the opening arc seems to suggest we should believe that Burnham is at least partly in the right, even if she's not given credit for it. This is made worse by the end of the series, because lesson that she learns which ties it back to the beginning seemingly invalidates this, with Burnham apparently concluding that her fear and warmongering attitude is what got her in trouble (not her more general habit of making rash emotionally-based decisions, which was her Achilles heel all season).

 

[NeoStar9]

My take away from this was always that we as the viewers know full well she didn't "start" the war. It was always going to happen regardless because of what T'Kumva did and how he planned this face off.

To everyone else though because of her actions they assume she started the war. Starfleet higher ups don't actually believe this themselves though. The key to knowing that is actually in episode 5 when Cornwell is talking to Lorca. She questions him having Michael on the ship and talks about how people justifiably or not blame her for the war. I always took that as she knows Michael's actions very likely or simply just didn't cause this fight. If she came to that conclusions I'm sure others that were able to see the entire battle reports know this as well. Something lower rank officers not Captains would not see.

Everyone else simply does not have all the information. They have the court marshal and then make assumptions from there. Yet there is no actual effort to correct this. This is a failing on Starfleet's part and an example of them basically using Michael to focus the others. Allowing them to have someone to blame since people would naturally want to blame someone or anyone for this in addition to the Klingons. The idea that the Starfleet way, even if followed would have still lead to this fight regardless might be something they don't want running through the minds of people. People like Saru and Detmer should know the truth but dislike Michael for others reasons, namely getting the captain killed or believing she did.

I do think they could have made it clearer though by the end if people still believed she started the fight or if they at the end believe she "made good" by putting an end to it thus saving even more lives that were about to be lost. I guess that's something that can be explored in season 2 or 3, etc. There is no reason for the writers to suddenly ignore what happen in season 1. That's how you show continuity within the show by swinging back to those events and maybe reexamining them and looking at the fallout.

 

[Jadeb]

I think the opening eps leave it really ambiguous -- and not in a good way. If they'd wanted to, they could have done something really interesting with deliberate ambiguity. Instead, we cruise to the usual "rah rah Star Trek" speech at the end.

 

[eschaton]

I think the opening eps leave it really ambiguous -- and not in a good way. If they'd wanted to, they could have done something really interesting with deliberate ambiguity. Instead, we cruise to the usual "rah rah Star Trek" speech at the end.

Yeah. As much as I found the first two episodes a confusing muddle, the final episode was in many ways far, far worse. Because as I intimated, they basically chose to ignore essentially everything they had done to build some genuine character growth into Burnham, seemingly plucking one random-ass conclusion about the Klingons within the last 20 minutes of the final episode.

I came up with a thematically much, much better idea for a final episode off the top of my head in a few hours one night. It would have worked roughly like this:

• Burnham has a confrontation with MU Georgiou which results in Burnham having to kill her. This would show important emotional growth on the part of Micheal, because it would show she was finally not making rash decisions based upon emotional responses, but actually using logic. Or rather, admitting to herself she was not an ultra-logical Vulcan, and her emotions existed, yet understanding why she shouldn't always follow where they take her.
• The confrontation comes too late. Qonos gets destroyed. The Klingon fleet does not pull back, but devastates Earth in retaliation, and is now en route to Vulcan, Andor, and Tellar. Everything is shit.
• Stamets remembers that given the spore drive can go forwards in time, it can also go backwards as well.
• The Discovery jumps back in time to just prior to the Battle of the Binary Stars.
• Burnham hails the Shenzhou, and discusses strategy with PU Georgiou, and we get something of a touching emotional moment.
• Burnham hails the Ship of the Dead, and has L'Rell speak to T'Kumva.
• A landing party including L'Rell, Ash and Burnham goes to the Ship of the Dead. While it looks like hostilities could be totally averted, Kol and his allies decide to press an attack anyway, with Kol's faction firing upon both T'Kuvma's and Federation and beaming warriors onto the Ship of the Dead in an attempt to capture it.
• Frenzied hand-to-hand combat aboard the Ship of the Dead results in some casualties. Most notably Ash gets to see Voq die in front of his eyes, and the earlier instance of L'Rell passes away. T'Kuvma survives however, and the Klingon forces withdraw.
• The Shenzhou is destroyed in the action, meaning there are no doubles of Burnham or Saru kicking around. And Burnham has to deal with winning the big battle, but losing her mentor all over again
• At the epilogue back on Earth, Stamets is thrilled to run into Culber alive and well. But after a quick hug, he runs into the other Stamets, and akwardness ensues.
• Post whatever sort of debriefing Burnham has, she is approached by PU Lorca, who asks that she not judge him by the actions of a man who happened to have the same face as he did.

Not perfect by any means - I'm not a professional writer. But I think despite the "reset button" it would have worked far better than what we got.

 

[Tenacity]

. If they dumped Burnham for S2, I would be 100x more excited for it.

Season two, episode one, scene one.

At Pike's orders, Micheal Burnham is transferred to the USS Enterprise.
The Enterprise warps away.
The Enterprise is never on DIS again.

 

[ALF]

1.Starship discovers strange object.
2.First officer is sent out to examine it, in a typical Starfleet fashion that would not really be out of place in any other trek show.
3.Alien acts hostile towards the First Officer who then proceeds to defend herself.
4.The situation escalates from there.
.

Oh yes, in The Vulcan Hello, Mike Burns is straight up obnoxious in her efforts to sweet talk her captain into going out there to examine the mystery firsthand. She is super argumentative with Phillipa and Saru, both of whom value forbearance. Though she's not a Jedi (yet), she's clearly craving excitement and adventure. The setup for the whole first action scene in Disco is a little hamfisted, but then again, we aren't being exposed to any character traits that she shouldn't have.

 

[Mudd]

Instead, we cruise to the usual "rah rah Star Trek" speech at the end.

I'd have sacrificed a baby gazelle to Roddenberry to make that stop.

 

[eschaton]

Oh yes, in The Vulcan Hello, Mike Burns is straight up obnoxious in her efforts to sweet talk her captain into going out there to examine the mystery firsthand. She is super argumentative with Phillipa and Saru, both of whom value forbearance. Though she's not a Jedi (yet), she's clearly craving excitement and adventure. The setup for the whole first action scene in Disco is a little hamfisted, but then again, we aren't being exposed to any character traits that she shouldn't have.

I have zero problem with the portrayal of Burnham's personality and actions in the pilot (which I consider to be episodes 1 and 2). I have a big issue with how we discover her personality however. We ended up with these awkward scenes where Georgiou is telling Burnham about herself, repeated flashbacks, Sarek's holo-communication and then later appearance as some sort of "force ghost." The writers clearly felt like there were some very important things to convey about who Burnham was right away (rather than in dribs and drabs across the whole season) but I wish they didn't resort to so much telling, rather than showing.

 

[Jadeb]

I'd have sacrificed a baby gazelle to Roddenberry to make that stop.

No better time to celebrate Star Trek's ideals than after installing a dictator to rule an entire planet by force.

 

[BillJ]

The entirety of the Michael Burnham character just doesn't come across as well thought out. Whether that is Fuller's fault or the current showrunners is anyone's guess?

 

[gblews]

She really is though, she's possibly one of my most hated characters I've ever seen on TV. If they dumped Burnham for S2, I would be 100x more excited for it.

Yeah, I kept hoping Voy would drop Janeway, Chakotay, and Neelix, throughout it's run -- never happened. So, keep hope alive.

 

[Awesome Possum]

The whole point is that she didn’t start the war. The Klingons were itching for it. People just blamed her for it because people do stupid and irrational things sometimes. Just like how Burnham was wrong in what she did and had to learn from her mistakes over the course of the first season. It’s not a flaw, it’s the point of her entire arc.

I honestly think Trek fans long for the days of zero character growth or depth, where characters don’t make judgments about each other or situations or act human in any way. Just bland cardboard cutouts reciting technobabble, solving any issue in 45 minutes with a speech or by teching the tech. It’s why Star Trek died in the late 90s/early 00s and we should be grateful it’s never coming back. It’s boring and has no place on any show that isn’t another bland sitcom.

 

[Refuge]

She drew first blood. That was actually the start of the war.

 

[Jadeb]

The whole point is that she didn’t start the war. The Klingons were itching for it. People just blamed her for it because people do stupid and irrational things sometimes. Just like how Burnham was wrong in what she did and had to learn from her mistakes over the course of the first season. It’s not a flaw, it’s the point of her entire arc.

I honestly think Trek fans long for the days of zero character growth or depth, where characters don’t make judgments about each other or situations or act human in any way. Just bland cardboard cutouts reciting technobabble, solving any issue in 45 minutes with a speech or by teching the tech. It’s why Star Trek died in the late 90s/early 00s and we should be grateful it’s never coming back. It’s boring and has no place on any show that isn’t another bland sitcom.

So it's a redemption arc with no redemption necessary? That's a curious approach to character development.

What do you think she learned, and why?

 

[gblews]

The muddle is that as the viewer, the opening arc seems to suggest we should believe that Burnham is at least partly in the right, even if she's not given credit for it. This is made worse by the end of the series, because lesson that she learns which ties it back to the beginning seemingly invalidates this,

Nothing in the Vulcan Hello or Binary Stars suggests that Burnham was "partially right". That is a conclusion one could draw, but Capt Georgiou made a strong case for a diplomatic solution as well. As viewers, we were given a choice as to which one of them was right.

However, after we find out that T'Kuvma was spoiling for a fight regardless of Shenzhou's actions, that made many viewers think that they were being told that firing on the Vulcans first was the "right" thing to have done.

Burnham's actions, using mutiny as a means to fire on a ship without provocation, were wrong because those actions went against Starfleet principles and ideals, even though tactically, it might have been the right thing to do.

So naturally, what she learns by the end of the season, which is the value of Starfleet principles and ideals, flies in the face of her mutiny and her attempt at a "Vulcan Hello". Many viewers, were taught the same lesson.

 

[Jadeb]

Nothing in the Vulcan Hello or Binary Stars suggests that Burnham was "partially right". That is a conclusion one could draw, but Capt Georgiou made a strong case for a diplomatic solution as well. As viewers, we were given a choice as to which one of them was right.

However, after we find out that T'Kuvma was spoiling for a fight regardless of Shenzhou's actions, that made many viewers think that they were being told that firing on the Vulcans first was the "right" thing to have done.

Burnham's actions, using mutiny as a means to fire on a ship without provocation, were wrong because those actions went against Starfleet principles and ideals, even though tactically, it might have been the right thing to do.

So naturally, what she learns by the end of the season, which is the value of Starfleet principles and ideals, flies in the face of her mutiny and her attempt at a "Vulcan Hello". Many viewers, were taught the same lesson.

Yet Starfleet is ready to commit genocide at the end of the series, so maybe we should question those principles. Burnham certainly does. So what do we learn again?