To Mildly Go Hither And Yawn. ;)
- Thread starter Doc Mugatu
- Start date
What if DSC slavishly looked like TOS, followed continuity to a T as much as was possible, and only recast out of practicality because the original actors could no longer play the part but they had exact look-alikes playing those roles?
Everything's been recreated. Would you consider it the same timeline even without the original actors?
Being purely hypothetical now.
Last edited:
does not compute
If the settings of TOS were slavishly recreated to put a new crew on a different ship that actually fit in a time period ten years beforehand, I would be fine with that. What I'm not fine with is being told some refugee from a JJTrek fever dream "happened ten years before 'The Man Trap!' Honest and for true!" The notion that STD has anything to do with the Trek I grew up loving is horseshit, and yeah, that is going to continue to bother me.
Curious to know what Discovery is then to you?
You should stay indoors and only watch fan films then........that's the ONLY area that look will ever work again.
Oh please. Star Trek was created to make a guy lots of money, it was then revived and used by a little studio called Paramount to make them lots of money.
It is interesting to see how - over time - Trek has drifted in its conception to fit modern conceptions of drama.
I often see people claim - including latter-day Trek writers - that TOS was about "the characters" - particularly the Kirk-Spock-McCoy triumvirate. Nothing could be further from the truth however. TOS was fundamentally an anthology show which was making stuff up as it went along. Something like 90% of episodes revolved around a plot which did not in any fashion involve the backstory of the characters. Even where it did, except in rare cases (like Amok Time) was the backstory something so particular it needed to be associated with that character. Really they were generic sci-fi plots (and I don't mean that in a bad way) where the Enterprise crew were always written as the "heroes of the week." But fundamentally the exact same stories could have been told with a different ship and different crew. Much of the characterization came from the actors and directors rather than the script. Even when the script put those "personal touches" in, it was generally speaking banter which wasn't really central to the mission of the week. Certainly the character dynamics are what made TOS watchable and fun. But they weren't what the show was about - they were window dressing.
Over time though this focus on the premise gave way to a focus on the characters - along with a continually more self-referential setting. Trek stopped being a setting which could be used to tell any sci-fi story, and started being a setting where you told "trek stories." Stories also shifted over time to be written for characters, instead of written based upon a concept/plot idea, with the characters shoved into the central conflict as needed.
Basically, Trek started out as the Twilight Zone on a starship. It ended up Lord of the Rings on a starship. It's very clear that the latter is what most fans want considering the arcane arguments that people have regarding mundane aspects of canon, rather than a broader discussion of storycraft. The "moar fanwank" thrust that CBS seems to be embarking on thus makes sense, as it's giving us exactly what we want.
I often see people claim - including latter-day Trek writers - that TOS was about "the characters" - particularly the Kirk-Spock-McCoy triumvirate. Nothing could be further from the truth however. TOS was fundamentally an anthology show which was making stuff up as it went along. Something like 90% of episodes revolved around a plot which did not in any fashion involve the backstory of the characters. Even where it did, except in rare cases (like Amok Time) was the backstory something so particular it needed to be associated with that character. Really they were generic sci-fi plots (and I don't mean that in a bad way) where the Enterprise crew were always written as the "heroes of the week." But fundamentally the exact same stories could have been told with a different ship and different crew. Much of the characterization came from the actors and directors rather than the script. Even when the script put those "personal touches" in, it was generally speaking banter which wasn't really central to the mission of the week. Certainly the character dynamics are what made TOS watchable and fun. But they weren't what the show was about - they were window dressing.
Over time though this focus on the premise gave way to a focus on the characters - along with a continually more self-referential setting. Trek stopped being a setting which could be used to tell any sci-fi story, and started being a setting where you told "trek stories." Stories also shifted over time to be written for characters, instead of written based upon a concept/plot idea, with the characters shoved into the central conflict as needed.
Basically, Trek started out as the Twilight Zone on a starship. It ended up Lord of the Rings on a starship. It's very clear that the latter is what most fans want considering the arcane arguments that people have regarding mundane aspects of canon, rather than a broader discussion of storycraft. The "moar fanwank" thrust that CBS seems to be embarking on thus makes sense, as it's giving us exactly what we want.
This point is very accurate. As much I hear fans clamor for something new what I often see being the money maker, or in fan works, is what we are getting. Darker, more war focused, and many returning characters, from minor ones to huge ones, like Spock. Everything revolves around little twists and connections.
I hear the complaints but you are right-this is what fans are asking for.
I mean, it's been a constant over the course of Trek.
TAS gave us "sequels" to a lot of threads from TOS. We saw the Guardian of Forever again, got insight into Spock's childhood, got more tribbles, went back to the Shore Leave planet, etc.
TMP tried to tell a "new story" (even though it was sort of an old one, since it was an expy of a TOS plot) and kinda bombed. TWOK was fanwanky (insight into Kirk's character, direct sequel to TOS episode, etc) and it was a huge success.
TNG tried to steer away from fanwank its first few years, but ultimately fell back to the Klingons and Romulans. When it came time for the TNG movies, Generations tried to do something different, and was a failure. First Contact brought back the Borg, and was a hit.
DS9 - while very well done - was mostly an elaboration on what was already established in TOS/TNG.
VOY tried to shake things up by going to the Delta Quadrant. But we still had episodes focusing on Vulcans, Romulans, Klingons, Cardassians - even characters directly from TNG.
ENT tried to shake up the formula by being a prequel, but it failed. Fans only started liking it when they decided to ape DS9 in its third season, and then go all in on fankwank in its final season.
Good post. You've touched on something here. Something beyond the scope of this thread but something nonetheless. I'll offer my own thoughts on this elsewhere and elsewhen.
To be fair, when it comes to Art vs. Commerce, it's seldom just one or the other. It's not "all about the vision" or "all about the money," but usually some mixture thereof. One can be excited about a project, and take pride in your work, and want to turn a profit.
But, yes, STAR TREK has never been a non-profit enterprise provided strictly as a public service.
Last edited:
Trek version 3.0, a floor to ceiling reboot with nothing but names to connect it to the classic franchise and windows and lens flare to connect it to JJTrek, and really, if CBS would just have come out and said that at the outset...well, I probably still wouldn't watch it, but at least I wouldn't feel so offended. But CBS did with Discovery what Paramount did with JJTrek, for the same reason: There was no confidence that the rebooted idea would be sustainable without the dollars of fans of classic Trek, so in each case they tried their best to tie the product to the classic franchise...and at least JJTrek had Leonard Nimoy to work with in the opening film. CBSAA adding Patrick Stewart is a too-little-too-late measure.
Why is it offensive?
You're a lot more patient than I am.
I saw where this was going and basically said, "I'm done with this."
