I tend to find myself in the "not my Trek" camp when it comes to Discovery. Rather than beat a dead horse as to why (the character of Michael Burnham in general, disregard for continuity and the Prime Directive, and the forced melodrama to name a few), I'd like to visit an alternate universe where I've been named showrunner beginning with Season 3 and here are some of ways I'd like to "course correct" for the direction of the show. Both The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine made shifts in aesthetic and story-telling that made those shows markedly different (better) in their third seasons. So, I’ve been named showrunner and the only directive I’ve been given is that I can’t get rid of Burnham. Here we go: Regardless of how S2 ends, the show gets a little bit of a reset button. The end of the season results in Section 31 being publicly disavowed by Starfleet, which allows for them to become the unsanctioned organization we know. Georgiou and Tyler leave the show to be on their spin-off. They take Owosekun with them so her character can be fleshed out on a show that has room in the cast. The final scene of S2 sees the Discovery arrive at Vulcan to pick up the captain they were supposed to pick up at the end of S1. The Enterprise is there as well so Pike, Spock, and Nhan can return to their ship. Doctor Culber, having gone through everything he has the past two seasons, ends his relationship with Stamets and takes a transfer to the Enterprise. Whatever conflict Burnham has with Spock extends to Sarek and Amanda. They don’t want to see her ever again. We meet the new captain of Discovery: an Andorian played by Jeffery Combs. S3 picks up three months later. The ship has undergone a slight refit including the removal of the spore drive and an aesthetic shift to a more TOS looking design (the nacelles look more like TOS-era ones, the ship interior is redesigned and made brighter). The crew also adopt the uniforms used by the Enterprise crew. This will be the ONLY "‘member Star Trek?” we see from now on. No more Enterprise/Pike/Spock appearances, no hitherto unheard of encounter with the Gorn, Tholians, Romulans, the Talosians, Harry Mudd, or other species that it’s explicitly stated first contact occurs with in TOS. And certainly none from Berman-era Trek like the Ferengi, the Borg, Cardassians, etc. From a story-telling standpoint, the biggest shift will be away from Burnham being the main character and to a more ensemble approach to the cast and an abandon of being a full drama and injecting some comedy into the series. The new captain says the state of the engineering department is in disarray. He names Stamets chief engineer, but because he’s actually a scientist, Jet Reno is made his assistant due to her expertise. The new chief medical officer is a Vulcan male who clashes with Burnham over her (perceived) appropriation of Vulcan culture. This, coupled with the conflict with Spock/Sarek causes her to re-evaluate how see acts, prompting her to be more human and a little less pretentious. Lieutenant Detmer becomes security chief. Tilly takes over as helmsman, continuing her quest toward the captain's chair. So our main characters are: Andorian Captain Saru Burnham Stamets Tilly Detmer Vulcan Doctor Jet Reno Other characters who will be fleshed out throughout the season are: communications officer Bryce, tactical officer Rhys, Linus (the Saurian introduced this season), and a female command training program Ensign who will play as foil for Tilly. The premiere will feature an attack on the Starbase where Discovery is undergoing refit. We learn that the attack is perpetrated by the Orion Syndicate and the goal is the theft of the spore drive itself. The Syndicate will serve as the season-long antagonists and will be played essentially as the mafia (in spaaaace!). Discovery will be tasked with tracking down the spore drive before they can figure out how it works or sell it to another power (e.g. the Klingons). The season will advance with mostly standalone episodes focusing on exploration and science such as: A follow-up episode with the Kelpien homeworld to see how that situation is playing out An episode with a Tellarite ship to do some world-building A follow-up episode with Pahvo from S1 A true first contact episode with a new species that has achieved warp drive A visit to the Saurian homeworld in an effort to flesh out Linus' character and that species Generally, the aim would be somewhere in-between an episodic approach (like TOS, TNG, VOY) and fully arc based (like Discovery has been and DS9 in Seasons 5-7) while world building new concepts introduced in Discovery like the Kelpiens, Pahvo, the spore drive and previously under-utilized species like the Saurians and Tellarites rather than treading over established things like Vulcan culture, Klingon politics, Talos IV and General Order 7, and Spock's family dynamic.
Those are all very interesting ideas, but perhaps this should have been placed in the Fan Fiction part of the forums? (I believe that's what that particular forum was created for) Otherwise the discussion of regular aspects of the individual shows would be over run with constant threads about "How I Would Have Done It".
Whatever they do, they've got to figure out a way to make me remember the show even exists. Half the time, I forget completely about it until I come here.
Thanks! I didn't even think to post in the fan-fiction section. My worry would be that particular forum doesn't get much traffic, but don't oppose moderators moving the thread.
But it seems like season 2 was already something of a course correction and the popularity of the show makes me think there is not a need for a season 3 course correction. A fresh direction, yes, but it not 'Enterprise'.
and I'm pretty sure the season 2 course correction already was a step in the wrong direction, with all that Enterprise season 4 level fanwank going on in the last episode
I go there on many an occasion just to read other folks ideas and creations. I'm not inclined to be that creative myself, so I don't post over there, but I do enjoy reading what others imagine and write about.
[SIZE=17px][FONT=UICTFontTextStyleBody][COLOR=rgb(69, 69, 69)] Reading this, there’s a lot I like. Some of it I wonder if it’s crossing the line into the same sort of fanwank that one ought to avoid (such as Coombs as Ann andorian), but the notion of focusing on original concepts Discovery has introduceI might actually come up with my own take on this - as a “what would you do” debate, this is actually a positive way of critiquing what one finds less-than-stellar about the show. [/COLOR][/FONT][/SIZE] [FONT=UICTFontTextStyleBody][COLOR=#454545][SIZE=17px]ETA: is anyone else seeing that bleh of code? Sorry about that, it’s weird posting on iPhone sometimes.[/SIZE][/COLOR][/FONT] [SIZE=17px][FONT=UICTFontTextStyleBody][COLOR=rgb(69, 69, 69)] [/COLOR][/FONT][/SIZE]
You know, you're right. I complain about the fan wank in the show, then introduce an idea that is fan wank itself. The heart of that particular idea was an Andorian captain. The "played by Jeffrey Combs" bit isn't especially necessary. I'm a big fan of "introducing an alternative" rather than complaining outright. So, I agree that this was my way of critiquing in a positive way.
I'm a big fan of following the vision of The Great Bird and so in line with his vision, I would suggest we could see the following in season 3: * Now we have an a) a confused Spock and b) time-travel introduced there no reason we cannot introduce the idea that Spock travels backs to the 1960s and assassinates JFK from the grassy knoll with a tear in his eye to save the timeline; * Similarly although it's slightly too early to introduce James T Kirk - his mum's love instructor would likely still be a young man and James (because we know he's called James) could be introduced and have adventures with the crew; * We could finally get the four breasted hyper-sexed female that Gene Roddenberry wanted. Given that all of these ideas are straight from the creator - by definition they are in line with his vision and anyone against their inclusion is against real Trek.
To be fair, Star Trek Online had Combs return as an Andorian in the Discovery era (actually, he was literally Shran’s descendent), so it’s not like the idea’s beyond the realm of possibility. (Thankfully no block of code this time, and autocorrect is behaving)
This. But this isn't going to stop people who wont like the show because it isn't exactly the show they wanted right down to cast member choices which they will be quite pleased to share with you in a non-truncated format.
Fuck no. We need new approaches to the world of Trek, not just the same tired shit we had five series of. I would've preferred Discovery be closer to John Byrne's "Crew" miniseries and followed Burnham from cadet to captain, with each season being on a different ship. Regardless, I find the focus on one character refreshing.
Discovery is in a fairly unique position, though. I have no idea of actual numbers for subscriptions (does anyone?), but all it has to do is be "Star Trek" enough to drive a significant proportion of CBSAA subscriptions. It's entirely possible that the die-hards who stayed all the way through the end of Enterprise, say, are a large enough audience, and that it's possible that franchise goodwill means its mathematically impossible for Discovery's audience to move in any way that would prompt a retooling, whether it's the best thing on streaming or a Trek-flavored mush with bland characters rushing through highlights of six well-liked episodes from earlier series every week. All the behind-the-scenes changes to DSC happened because of behind-the-scenes reasons, and not because the show itself was losing popularity and in danger of becoming unprofitable. My greatest fear is that CBSAA's Trek shows are going to be able to sleepwalk for years unchallenged by commercial or critical considerations, with high-quality writing coming about by accident since there's no evolutionary pressure on the franchise. Granted, that may not always work out, DS9 and Beyond, for instance, being acclaimed but not drawing the numbers that made the decision-makers point and say, "Yes, yes, do more of that," but its shaping up that there's going to be a lot of Star Trek coming out soon with very little churn, so whatever is produced is what will be produced, indefinitely, barring personal friction among the creative staff.
I see now that I was wrong. Discovery doesn't need to change at all to satisfy it's fanbase. Instead, it just needs more of the same. A lot more. So, alternative proposal: episode count gets increased to 26/season. Each episode will be a full 60 minutes with three-quarters being devoted to Burnham's moronic monologues where she waxes poetic about some garbage. The remaining 15 minutes will be spent introducing concepts and characters like: Our new helmsman James T. Kirk who becomes Burnham's love interest Culber leaves and the new CMO is a young Leonard H. McCoy who forms a lifelong friendship with Kirk. This is super necessary because we can't just take their friendship in TOS at face value, we have to see it formed on screen. Ash Tyler transformed back into Voq as our chief of security (and the real first Klingon in Starfleet, forget Worf!) who forms a love triangle with Kirk and Burnham Another encounter with Spock as a result of him going cra-zay! This time he goes to Romulus and shacks up with a hot Romulan. Burnham is able to convince him to return because they have such an unbreakable bond (so unbreakable that we never hear Spock mention her). After he returns to the Enterprise, the hot Romulan learns she's pregnant and she decides to name the baby Saavik The new captain (another white man) gets trapped on an alien planet, encounters a hulking green monster, and we're treated to a shot-for-shot remake of Arena. Kirk & Co. had never heard of the Gorn before because the captain doesn't document any of it in the ship's log, because fuck Starfleet regulations! The Red Angel from S2 is revealed to be a time traveling Michael Burnham using Borg tech. The existence of the Borg has classified, that's why we never heard of it before! Harry Mudd appears in every episode, but never in front of the crew. He's the real mastermind behind EVERYTHING we see on camera. We're introduced to Captain Rene Picard, Jean-Luc's grandfather and the namesake for his nephew. He's the commanding officer of the Defiant. There's a line in Generations about how the Picards are explorers and we have to expand upon every line of dialogue from the rest of Star Trek and he has to be the captain of an established ship in the universe rather than a new one. The Prime Directive gets broken in every episode by the new captain because fuck Starfleet regulations! The season finale will show us how Captain Pike ends up in the chair from The Menagerie. The explanation will be markedly different from how it's explained in that episode. Also, the Enterprise will get destroyed in the finale. The Enterprise we know is actually a replacement vessel. There's no story-driven purpose for this, it's just something that's kewl. And the whole thing is classified, that's why we never heard of it before! I think these ideas are much more to the speed of the average Discovery viewer.