Season 3 Course Correction
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IDK - Fans (myself included) like to read a lot into stuff, but that said: Season 1 had PLENTY of canon connections as well, so I don't see season 2 as any different in that regard. Yes, they did give the Klingons their hair back, showed an actual Klingon D7 'holograph plan'; but again, Season one had plenty of 'canon' connections to the 'Enterprise' series and still to a LOT of TOS.
Thus, I say there's been about the same level of 'pandering' in BOTH seasons; BUT, the pandering in Season 2 is a bit more to many fan's liking WRT what it shows and connects to.
It would be stupid for any production not to read audience reviews and reactions; and if they find some comments valid, makes adjustments to better please that audience. But overall, they really haven't adjusted that much per se. They are just telling a different story; and they still do it in the sa,me manner they did with Season one.
Of course it had. But that was done a lot smarter and way more subtle than in season 2. Sure, Mudd, Stella, the Sareks all were there, but in a way that didn't feel as on the nose as travelling to Talos IV with the The Cage crew
I actually feel like Season 2 has less fan pandering overall. I mean, in Season 1 we had little things like Lorca's tribble and the Gorn skeleton which were just there to make nerds go "I recognize this!" This season it seems like most of the little nuggets of fanwank are either somehow plot relevant or else put much more unobtrusively in the background.
All the previous Trek show had the benefit of still being the best ptoduced SF-series around. Yes, TNG season 1 was clunky as hell - but it was the only SF show with space-ships on the air! And thus the best one by default. By the time of ENT, there was some competition, like Firefly, Stargate and Farscape. But even then, ENT was the one with the biggest and most experienced production.
DIS simply has the problem that in the last few years so much good shit has happened on screen - we are endlessly spoiled and can compare it to a plethora of other, equally good and amitious SF. Seriously, you can't imagine how much the simply imagery of a re-used starship on screen was able to pull people to the screen, simply because it was so rare!
Discovery still manages to be the most cinematic of any scifi show I can recall on a week in week out basis. The Expanse for instance is high quality tv, but it is still TV quality as are most of the others at varying level of discount fun, but comparatively discount looking nonetheless.
Now you have Pike, Spock, Number One, the Enterprise, Talosians...
I like seasons 1 and 2.
Point of order:
- We first actually saw the Enterprise in Season 1 (Pike also was Hailing at the end of the Season).
- Pike was one of the Captain's name's displayed on a list of 'Most Decorated Starfleet Captains" called up by Saru in Season 1.
- Spock was referred to numerous times in Season 1.
So in the "new for Season Two" we only have (so far): Number One, Talos IV and Talosians.
I'll also reply to your post piece-by-piece, but I'll try not to be critical of the ideas, and just offer suggestions or slight rebuttals:
No problems here. Owo has an interesting background, so it might be fun to see her there. I prefer 31 to be a little more unsanctioned than they appear, and have even offered up ideas (including how to deal with Kirk as a main character) in other threads.
I'm not sure about getting rid of Culber. He's been through a lot, so I'd rather have Stamets stay with him. Although I will admit that they may have laid some groundwork for this.
An Andorian: Cool.
Jeffrey Combs: Cool.
An Andorian played by Jeffrey Combs: We kinda saw that, already.
Why not? It might be good for future crossover potential. A break though would make sense.
Tholians were a known entity in TOS, and encountered by Archer and the NX-01. Harry Mudd is a criminal who has had past run-ins with Discovery. Having him try to disable and steal the spore drive will be fun after they remove it and there's no trace. They could be the ones who finally put him (and his wife?) in prison.
Talosians should never appear again, agreed, and Gorn might be best saved for Section 31. But the Romulans are such a classic, that I wouldn't mind them being the enemies behind-the-scenes known to us, but not known to the crew. I've suggested as much before. Maybe they employ the Orions that you bring up later?
Cardassians should be fine, especially if portrayed as a more peaceful, less militaristic race. An odd Ferengi here and there wouldn't be out of place.
Well, you did just estrange her from her family and her boyfriend is gone again, but yeah, toss her in the background.
I don't think Stamets should be on the show without a spore drive, and I don't know about making him Chief Engineer. Reno (currently) outranks him, so really this should be reversed if anything. He might work as a science officer, although that's Burnham's job.
I don't think she's that pretentious, and that can go away easier with less of a focus on her. Conflict with the CMO is good, but I feel it is a bad idea to make him Vulcan. That runs the risk of going to the Enterprise well of making Vulcans into racist jerks.
As others have said, Detmer is a lifelong trained with no known security background. Maybe put Detmer on Ops (Owo's station) and put Tilly at the helm. Or, with the refit, make the front stations helm and navigation again, allowing Detmer and Tilly to share the role and make a mentor out of Detmer.
If Airiam is still around, have her take over ops, and move it to her station.
One small issue with this: The Animated Series promoted the idea that Orion piracy was a big secret, with the pirates killing themselves rather than being discovered. So, having known Orions attacking starbases is kinda breaking continuity, unless well-handled.
I'm not a fan of the Tellarite design, but they do have an appeal as a classic species that can be expanded on. A break from the Klingons might be good, or they can be encountered mostly in the Pike series.
If we're fanwanking here, I wouldn't mind a cliffhanger scene of L'Rell being finally deposed by General Rynar, a smoothhead dressed to the tee as a TOS Klingon, who marches his smoothhead troops into the room and vows revenge on the Federation. Played, of course, by Kenneth Mitchell.
No problems here. Owo has an interesting background, so it might be fun to see her there. I prefer 31 to be a little more unsanctioned than they appear, and have even offered up ideas (including how to deal with Kirk as a main character) in other threads.
I'm not sure about getting rid of Culber. He's been through a lot, so I'd rather have Stamets stay with him. Although I will admit that they may have laid some groundwork for this.
An Andorian: Cool.
Jeffrey Combs: Cool.
An Andorian played by Jeffrey Combs: We kinda saw that, already.
Why not? It might be good for future crossover potential. A break though would make sense.
Tholians were a known entity in TOS, and encountered by Archer and the NX-01. Harry Mudd is a criminal who has had past run-ins with Discovery. Having him try to disable and steal the spore drive will be fun after they remove it and there's no trace. They could be the ones who finally put him (and his wife?) in prison.
Talosians should never appear again, agreed, and Gorn might be best saved for Section 31. But the Romulans are such a classic, that I wouldn't mind them being the enemies behind-the-scenes known to us, but not known to the crew. I've suggested as much before. Maybe they employ the Orions that you bring up later?
Cardassians should be fine, especially if portrayed as a more peaceful, less militaristic race. An odd Ferengi here and there wouldn't be out of place.
Well, you did just estrange her from her family and her boyfriend is gone again, but yeah, toss her in the background.
I don't think Stamets should be on the show without a spore drive, and I don't know about making him Chief Engineer. Reno (currently) outranks him, so really this should be reversed if anything. He might work as a science officer, although that's Burnham's job.
I don't think she's that pretentious, and that can go away easier with less of a focus on her. Conflict with the CMO is good, but I feel it is a bad idea to make him Vulcan. That runs the risk of going to the Enterprise well of making Vulcans into racist jerks.
As others have said, Detmer is a lifelong trained with no known security background. Maybe put Detmer on Ops (Owo's station) and put Tilly at the helm. Or, with the refit, make the front stations helm and navigation again, allowing Detmer and Tilly to share the role and make a mentor out of Detmer.
If Airiam is still around, have her take over ops, and move it to her station.
One small issue with this: The Animated Series promoted the idea that Orion piracy was a big secret, with the pirates killing themselves rather than being discovered. So, having known Orions attacking starbases is kinda breaking continuity, unless well-handled.
I'm not a fan of the Tellarite design, but they do have an appeal as a classic species that can be expanded on. A break from the Klingons might be good, or they can be encountered mostly in the Pike series.
If we're fanwanking here, I wouldn't mind a cliffhanger scene of L'Rell being finally deposed by General Rynar, a smoothhead dressed to the tee as a TOS Klingon, who marches his smoothhead troops into the room and vows revenge on the Federation. Played, of course, by Kenneth Mitchell.
I would agree with you, generally, but Tilly is supposed to be training for command right now. So I would assume slotting her into a position she is not that familiar with would be a part of her training.
Even Deanna Troi learned how to fly a ship. Supposedly.
And what happened both times she flew a ship???
I honestly don't give a chit about how little or too much "pandering" the Producers FEEL They have to do.
I've been loving just about everything DISCOVERY has shown us since episode Four of Season 1, when I began to understand where They were going with the characters.
But ya know what beyond that, I'm a Star Trek Fan..., They SHOULD be Pandering to me!
CRASH AND BURN!!!
I've been loving just about everything DISCOVERY has shown us since episode Four of Season 1, when I began to understand where They were going with the characters.
But ya know what beyond that, I'm a Star Trek Fan..., They SHOULD be Pandering to me!
CRASH AND BURN!!!
So...Tilly is the ancestor of Deanna Troi (on Troi's Father's side) then...got it.
CRASH AND BURN!!!
I sense danger
Season 1 was already finished writing, and filming wrapped in early October 2017 less than a month after the first episode aired. That includes receiving a hail from Captain Pike and "it's the USS Enterprise" with Sarek and Michael looking at each other. S1 was already full of canon reference, and it was obvious especially since episode 6 that they intended to explore Spock's family dynamic.
Then there were these interviews at the premiere in September:
In this one, Klingon artists Hetrick and Page were asked if all the Klingons are bald and they respond "in this iteration, yes... for now."
In this one Kurtzman talks about "pushing the edges of canon" and how they couldn't fit it all into one season:
"There is a certain point when you are working through the story arc of a season that you start to have ideas you fall in love with that you realize cannot go into that season. So, you start putting them on index cards and thumbtacking them to the board and then suddenly that becomes the next season.
We are about to start shooting the final episode, so late in the season a really strong emotional idea became clear to all of us and we decided that is what season two is going to be all about."
For people who spend too much time in jaded corners of the internet like this one, I suppose it's easier to assume that the outside world revolves around them much more than it does. In reality it seems like they always wanted to introduce hairy Klingons, who were bald mainly because of Bryan Fuller alone, and evidently much of season 2 was from ideas that they'd been sitting on for over a year already including Spock and the Enterprise. The idea that it was all a reaction to some disappointed fans seems like wishful thinking by those fans overestimating their importance.
There are a lot of people who truly believe their comments are being read by the producers and writers. Fans of the show often ask themselves (and the detractors directly) why they would watch and constantly post complaints if they could simply ignore the show.
This is why.
For some of these folks, the post isn't even really meant for anyone on the message board. It's meant for Alex Kurtzman, JJ Abrams, or whoever else they like to fantasize is treating a backwater message board like a Star Trek suggestion box.
It's also why they get so frustrated with "fanboys" and "cheerleaders," because those voices are drowning out their suggestion box entries (in their minds) and that is frustrating.
It also doesn't feel like it promotes discussion.
