Opinion: the show has improved since Berg and Harberts left

[Longinus]

What??? Of course not! It's the normal way most Trek time travel has worked from the beginning, the same way most time travel in science fiction in general has usually worked for generations. Kirk and Spock remembered their own timeline after changing it in "Yesteryear." Sisko and Bashir remembered theirs after changing it in "Past Tense." I could also mention Marty McFly remembering his original timeline after he altered it in Back to the Future, or Russell Johnson remembering the original history after he changed it in The Twilight Zone: "Back There," or the dinosaur hunters remembering the original history when they got back in Bradbury's 1952 short story "A Sound of Thunder." And those are far from the only examples. It's the normal rule that time travelers retain the memory of the timeline they came from, not the new timeline their actions create. Yes, there are some works of fiction that show their memories changing (like Looper), and some that inconsistently do it both ways depending on the story (like Legends of Tomorrow), but those are less common.

Ah, now I understand what you mean. I was confused and assumed you were talking about branching timeline model. In any case, even if the Angel wouldn't remember the plan, se still seems to be able to observe the past in great detail. If she couldn't, she couldn't save Burnham in the first place. So why would she know about Burnham being in danger, but not about it being a ruse?

(Also, somewhat inconsistently Marty was still affected by the changes he made to the timeline, and was in danger of being wiped out of existence due them...)

 

[Christopher]

Except we have been told it's prime timeline so it is fixed.

What? No. A fixed-timeline model is a story where history cannot be changed and any time travel is a self-causing loop, e.g. The Final Countdown, the film version of 12 Monkeys, The Time Traveler's Wife, Disney's Gargoyles, Prisoner of Azkaban, etc. We know that it is possible in the Trek universe to change history, therefore it's a mutable-timeline model rather than a fixed-timeline model.

I suspect that we could see some kind of reset by the end of the season, if so then yeah we are currently in an alternate timeline.

You're making the same mistake many Enterprise viewers made with Daniels -- assuming that the future the character came from was the Prime timeline to begin with. The intent in Enterprise was that the changes from Daniels's timeline were changing it into the Prime history we know from TOS through VGR, not away from it. I presume the same is true here. After all, I've only read recaps of the episodes, but hasn't it been suggested that the Red Angel comes from a future where the galaxy faces a cataclysm? Obviously that's not the future we know from previous Trek shows.

Besides, not every change to the timeline has to affect galactic history as a whole. Sometimes it can be small and on a personal level. "Yesteryear" ended with the fate of I-Chaya changing but the timeline presumed to be otherwise restored. "Trials and Tribble-ations" has Sisko & co. making slight alterations to the history shown in "The Trouble With Tribbles," like having O'Brien and Bashir present in the lineup after the bar fight when they weren't there in the original, but it's still assumed that the overall flow of history is the same. What I'm talking about here is just the personal memories of Michael Burnham and why a time-traveling future version of herself (which they believed she was) would logically not be expected to remember any changes to the present Burnham's experiences as a result of said time travel. I'm only addressing the issue of personal memory, irrespective of the larger flow of history.

Ah, now I understand what you mean. I was confused and assumed you were talking about branching timeline model.

Of course I was, because that's the easiest way to understand the principle I'm talking about. If you visualize a time traveler's actions changing the past as moving from one timeline to another, it's easy to understand why the history they remember is the one they came from rather than the one their actions create.

In any case, even if the Angel wouldn't remember the plan, se still seems to be able to observe the past in great detail. If she couldn't, she couldn't save Burnham in the first place. So why would she know about Burnham being in danger, but not about it being a ruse?

That I can't answer. The only thing I'm able to address is the generic question of whether a time traveler would be expected to remember alterations they make to their own history.

(Also, somewhat inconsistently Marty was still affected by the changes he made to the timeline, and was in danger of being wiped out of existence due them...)

Yes -- the problem with most time travel fiction is that it's pure fantasy and doesn't follow consistent logic, so many time-travel stories contain such self-contradictions, some more blatant than others. Legends of Tomorrow is particularly sloppy about this, and the series finale of Timeless was deeply frustrating because it had spent two seasons showing history being changed continuously and radically, but then tried to have it both ways and end with a time-loop gimmick that would only make sense with an immutable timeline.

 

[Longinus]

Of course I was, because that's the easiest way to understand the principle I'm talking about. If you visualize a time traveler's actions changing the past as moving from one timeline to another, it's easy to understand why the history they remember is the one they came from rather than the one their actions create.

But time travel before the reboot films was never branching. All the talk about 'fixing and 'altering' time wouldn't make sense otherwise. Also, Data's head in 'Time's Arrow'.

 

[Gonzo]

What? No. A fixed-timeline model is a story where history cannot be changed and any time travel is a self-causing loop, e.g. The Final Countdown, the film version of 12 Monkeys, The Time Traveler's Wife, Disney's Gargoyles, Prisoner of Azkaban, etc. We know that it is possible in the Trek universe to change history, therefore it's a mutable-timeline model rather than a fixed-timeline model.




You're making the same mistake many Enterprise viewers made with Daniels -- assuming that the future the character came from was the Prime timeline to begin with. The intent in Enterprise was that the changes from Daniels's timeline were changing it into the Prime history we know from TOS through VGR, not away from it. I presume the same is true here. After all, I've only read recaps of the episodes, but hasn't it been suggested that the Red Angel comes from a future where the galaxy faces a cataclysm? Obviously that's not the future we know from previous Trek shows.

Besides, not every change to the timeline has to affect galactic history as a whole. Sometimes it can be small and on a personal level. "Yesteryear" ended with the fate of I-Chaya changing but the timeline presumed to be otherwise restored. "Trials and Tribble-ations" has Sisko & co. making slight alterations to the history shown in "The Trouble With Tribbles," like having O'Brien and Bashir present in the lineup after the bar fight when they weren't there in the original, but it's still assumed that the overall flow of history is the same. What I'm talking about here is just the personal memories of Michael Burnham and why a time-traveling future version of herself (which they believed she was) would logically not be expected to remember any changes to the present Burnham's experiences as a result of said time travel. I'm only addressing the issue of personal memory, irrespective of the larger flow of history.




Of course I was, because that's the easiest way to understand the principle I'm talking about. If you visualize a time traveler's actions changing the past as moving from one timeline to another, it's easy to understand why the history they remember is the one they came from rather than the one their actions create.




That I can't answer. The only thing I'm able to address is the generic question of whether a time traveler would be expected to remember alterations they make to their own history.




Yes -- the problem with most time travel fiction is that it's pure fantasy and doesn't follow consistent logic, so many time-travel stories contain such self-contradictions, some more blatant than others. Legends of Tomorrow is particularly sloppy about this, and the series finale of Timeless was deeply frustrating because it had spent two seasons showing history being changed continuously and radically, but then tried to have it both ways and end with a time-loop gimmick that would only make sense with an immutable timeline.

This is why some suspect that Discovery is not Prime Timeline but that what we see in the show will restore that timeline by the end of the season, it would certainly explain the show runners difficulty with the question when they were asked, that was before the scriptwriters were shown the door.

Personally I dont actually mind if it's PU or not, some have also speculated that events in Discovery may feed into the events leading up to the creation of the Kelvin timeline.

As it stands right now the Red Angels existence indicates that their future is not what we know as being PU and it is set unless someone intervenes, which means that Discovery is not PU as we would know it until they take the actions necessary to bring the future back into line as mentioned by the show runners.

BTW when I said it was a fixed timeline I meant that we know what happens after this series and for the next 100 years and more, this is the problem when you have time travel in a prequel series.

Time is a loop until you break that loop like they did in 12 Monkeys, which is what the Red Angel is trying to do by offering the warning prompting Spock and Michael to do something about it, it's fixed until someone breaks the rules and goes back to change it as Michaels mother has done, as usual it degenerates into a chicken or egg question which is as it should be.

Interesting to note that they succeeded in the 12 Monkeys TV series in spite of the Film ending with the statement that it could not be changed.

 

[Christopher]

But time travel before the reboot films was never branching. All the talk about 'fixing and 'altering' time wouldn't make sense otherwise. Also, Data's head in 'Time's Arrow'.

Of course it does. It's just a useful analogy for talking about the flow of cause and effect. Remember Doc Brown's blackboard demonstration in Back to the Future Part 2? That was a series where the timeline was directly overwritten, but it was still useful for the sake of discussion to use branching timelines as a visual metaphor to convey the concept.

some have also speculated that events in Discovery may feed into the events leading up to the creation of the Kelvin timeline.

The "some" who speculate that are ignorant of basic facts. The Kelvin Timeline was explicitly created by Nero's arrival in 2233, 23 years before the start of Discovery. DSC has a Klingon war take place in 2256-7, while Into Darkness is set in 2259 and says that there have only been a few minor skirmishes between Starfleet and the Klingons. Also, DSC has the Enterprise in active service in 2256-7 and acknowledges that the events of "The Cage" happened in 2254, while the Kelvin Enterprise isn't even launched until 2258.

BTW when I said it was a fixed timeline I meant that we know what happens after this series and for the next 100 years and more, this is the problem when you have time travel in a prequel series.

But I was the one who introduced the phrase "fixed timeline" into this discussion to mean something totally different from that. Since I was the one using the term to make a point, I need you to understand what I meant by it in the context of that explanation.

Again, I'm not talking about Trek in general. I was addressing the single, very specific question of whether a time traveler could be expected to remember alterations she made to her own past. Please try to understand my comments within that context.

Interesting to note that they succeeded in the 12 Monkeys TV series in spite of the Film ending with the statement that it could not be changed.

Well, naturally, since the needs of a TV series are different from the needs of a film. If history can't be changed, that can drive a single story, but it's harder to build a continuing series around the premise. Many time-travel series share a common premise that it's possible but difficult to change history; that way, there's some hope that the characters could achieve their goal, but it's not something they can do easily and thus it can sustain years' worth of stories.

Although there have been occasional series that used a fixed-timeline model. Gargoyles got some clever stories out of self-consistent causal loops and its unbreakable rule that time was immutable. Babylon 5 had a self-consistent time loop as an integral part of its saga. Andromeda followed plausible physics, including an immutable timeline, for its first 2 seasons, but the later showrunner threw that out. Still, those are all series where time travel is only a secondary or occasional element rather than the central focus. Series that center on time travel generally make it mutable, unless their focus is more on visiting or traveling in the past than on causal paradoxes. Doctor Who posited an immutable timeline in its first season, only to throw that out a year later and do a story ("The Time Meddler") about protecting the timeline from change. The Time Tunnel mostly presumed an unchanging history; the only things Tony and Doug had the ability to affect were events that history didn't document, so that they didn't already know the outcome and could still make a difference (presumably they were part of those events all along but just didn't know in advance whether they'd succeeded). Although in later episodes, the writers partly forgot that rule and did stories built around the risk that history could be changed, even though it never actually was.

 

[BillJ]

This is why some suspect that Discovery is not Prime Timeline but that what we see in the show will restore that timeline by the end of the season, it would certainly explain the show runners difficulty with the question when they were asked, that was before the scriptwriters were shown the door.

I do wonder if we see most of the last two seasons wiped away? With only Spock remembering any of it, and season three picking up with Michael Burnham as captain of Discovery without having ever committed mutiny. Never having been the ward of Sarek.

 

[Gonzo]

The "some" who speculate that are ignorant of basic facts. The Kelvin Timeline was explicitly created by Nero's arrival in 2233, 23 years before the start of Discovery. DSC has a Klingon war take place in 2256-7, while Into Darkness is set in 2259 and says that there have only been a few minor skirmishes between Starfleet and the Klingons. Also, DSC has the Enterprise in active service in 2256-7 and acknowledges that the events of "The Cage" happened in 2254, while the Kelvin Enterprise isn't even launched until 2258.

I said the events that lead up to the creation of the Kelvin timeline not the actual Kelvin timeline itself, in other words the destruction of Romulus by the star that was not supposed to explode at all which is confirmed to be in the PU and will be a major plot point in the Picard series.

We still don't know what action or event started the whole sequence that resulted in what we now see in the Discovery show, did S31 start it or a future AI sending it's corruption back in time.

At this point we don't actually have a point of reference for the original sequence of events in this time period as Discovery is set before ToS and hasn't been covered much at all, presumably that's the reason the show runners chose it.

Until we know that it's impossible to say who would or would not remember previous sequences, ultimately the only individual that could potentially remember would be someone who is shielded from the consequences of said changes and was the original trigger of said changes.

That person would also need migraine tablets.

 

[Longinus]

I do wonder if we see most of the last two seasons wiped away? With only Spock remembering any of it, and season three picking up with Michael Burnham as captain of Discovery without having ever committed mutiny. Never having been the ward of Sarek.

Seems highly unlikely to me. It would be massively unwise to wipe all character development that way. If there were some weird timeline reset, it would absolutely have to happen in a way that at least the main characters remember the previous events.

 

[BillJ]

Seems highly unlikely to me. It would be massively unwise to wipe all character development that way. If there were some weird timeline reset, it would absolutely have to happen in a way that at least the main character remember the previous events.

Spock is the main character of Trek.

 

[Longinus]

Spock is the main character of Trek.

Not this Trek.

 

[BillJ]

Not this Trek.

That remains to be seen.

 

[Gonzo]

I do wonder if we see most of the last two seasons wiped away? With only Spock remembering any of it, and season three picking up with Michael Burnham as captain of Discovery without having ever committed mutiny. Never having been the ward of Sarek.

The writers can do pretty much whatever they want.

A full reset is possible but would make the last two seasons rather pointless, it would also require someone to go back in time to the Binary Star system and stop the war from ever happening by finishing what Burnham tried to do, however that would not necessarily stop the Mirror Lorca from crossing over and setting all of that into motion again.

If we go back even further to stop her family from disappearing it would require a change to S31 itself including how it is run and organised which would be a much bigger change as it is much further back in time, the further back you go the greater the potential positive changes but also the greater potential for negative changes.

Time and the consequences of messing with it can't really be mapped as there are too many variables.

I won't be surprised at all if Michael ends up putting on that Time Suit at some point though, if she does we may see her try to undo some events, the battle of the binary stars would be the most obvious one as it does directly contradict what we know of the ToS timeline of minor skirmishes with the Klingons.

She could end up wiping herself out of the timeline altogether though if she goes back to far, she could return to the point just before the signal is sent and stop it, thus preventing the other houses from being summoned, then it's just a matter of dealing with T'Kuvma and Voq, Tyler will be very helpful in that regard.

 

[BillJ]

If we go back even further to stop her family from disappearing it would require a change to S31 itself...

Not necessarily. She could save her family as the Red Angel. Then Burnham follows her mother into Section 31, where she meets an untimely demise, then Prime Georgiou who joined Section 31 instead of Starfleet takes Burnham under her wing.

Timeline rolls along in a similar fashion, just without the connections to Spock and his family.

 

[Gonzo]

Not necessarily. She could save her family as the Red Angel. Then Burnham follows her mother into Section 31, where she meets an untimely demise, then Prime Georgiou who joined Section 31 instead of Starfleet takes Burnham under her wing.

Ultimately anything is possible now that time travel has been introduced, this is why some were not happy when it became clear it was going to be a part of this season, same goes for last season and the Mirror Universe.

Saving her family would mean going much further back in time with the resulting potential for much worse things to happen, they could have Burnham go back and make sure that Lelands plan is never found out and the Klingons never set the bomb off while at the same time warning Starfleet about the Control AI, in these sort of circumstances its much better to do things from the shadows to limit any unforeseen knock on consequences.

From what Leland said it seems he was not sold on the idea of the time suits at first so Burnham could potentially talk to her own mother and tell her not to pursue it, so Leland never steals from the Klingons which triggers most of what we have seen in the last two seasons of Discovery.

The problem then would still be T'Kuvma and the cloaking technology so Burnham would also have to tell someone about them and exactly what to do to stop them from going to war 20 years later, destroying the Sarcophagus ship and putting an early bullet in T'Kuvma would be a good start and again Tyler will have the information needed for this, the Klingons would then have to gain cloaking technology from the Romulans like they do in the PU with the Romulans gaining the D7 in return.

After all of the above the only loose end left would be Burnham herself in the suit with a gigantic P for Paradox on her forehead, she would cease to exist unless her actions create a new reality (the PU we all know) in which case she would be able to continue existing just as we saw in the 2009 Film, confirming that the Discovery we have been watching is in fact an alternate reality just not the Kelvin one.

Whatever happens I get the feeling that the powers that be at CBS want all of this sorted out sooner rather than later so they can draw a line under it and move on.

But if that is the case where does that leave the Georgiou/S31 show unless they intend to pull a fast one on us and the Georgiou in that show is actually the PU version not the Emperor.

At this point all we can do is watch and wait to find out.

 

[Ovation]

I do wonder if we see most of the last two seasons wiped away? With only Spock remembering any of it, and season three picking up with Michael Burnham as captain of Discovery without having ever committed mutiny. Never having been the ward of Sarek.

Dear God, I hope not.

Not necessarily. She could save her family as the Red Angel. Then Burnham follows her mother into Section 31, where she meets an untimely demise, then Prime Georgiou who joined Section 31 instead of Starfleet takes Burnham under her wing.

Timeline rolls along in a similar fashion, just without the connections to Spock and his family.

And there's the rub, right? So, so many people are hung up about this aspect of the show. I must reiterate my "Dear God, I hope not." The show is MORE interesting for its connection to Spock, at least to me (as we're indulging in how we want things to go as we'd like).

 

[BillJ]

And there's the rub, right? So, so many people are hung up about this aspect of the show. I must reiterate my "Dear God, I hope not." The show is MORE interesting for its connection to Spock, at least to me (as we're indulging in how we want things to go as we'd like).

Honestly? It doesn’t matter to me either way. The creators are the ones saying it will line up with TOS by the end of the season. Which leaves us to wonder what they see as not lining up.

 

[Lord Garth]

I have a hard time believing "See? Now it lines up with TOS!" will convert people who don't like the series. They'll either disagree with how they did it, they'll find something else, or they'll double-down on Burnham hatred. If they're not complaining about her being Spock's sister, they'll complain about something else or they'll just stick to the old standby, when all else fails, "I just don't like her."

 

[Longinus]

I have a hard time believing "See? Now it lines up with TOS!" will convert people who don't like the series. They'll either disagree with how they did it, they'll find something else, or they'll double-down on Burnham hatred. If they're not complaining how her being Spock's sister, they'll complain about something else or they'll just stick to the old standby, when all else fails, "I just don't like her."

Frankly, I just want them to bury the sporedrive quickly and permanently, and banish the S31; that's all 'lining up with TOS' that I need. Sure, I have a few more quibbles (fine, it is actually a long list) but none of those are big deals.

 

[NewHeavensNewEarth]

I do wonder if we see most of the last two seasons wiped away? With only Spock remembering any of it, and season three picking up with Michael Burnham as captain of Discovery without having ever committed mutiny. Never having been the ward of Sarek.

I suggested that a few weeks ago, and needless to say, it was not well-received.
https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/the-bait-the-lure-the-self-destruct.298692/

A lot more about the RA has been revealed since then, but I still consider the idea of a reset to be one of several possibilities they could go with it.

 

[Alan Roi]

Ultimately anything is possible now that time travel has been introduced, this is why some were not happy when it became clear it was going to be a part of this season, same goes for last season and the Mirror Universe.

Saving her family would mean going much further back in time with the resulting potential for much worse things to happen, they could have Burnham go back and make sure that Lelands plan is never found out and the Klingons never set the bomb off while at the same time warning Starfleet about the Control AI, in these sort of circumstances its much better to do things from the shadows to limit any unforeseen knock on consequences.

From what Leland said it seems he was not sold on the idea of the time suits at first so Burnham could potentially talk to her own mother and tell her not to pursue it, so Leland never steals from the Klingons which triggers most of what we have seen in the last two seasons of Discovery.

The problem then would still be T'Kuvma and the cloaking technology so Burnham would also have to tell someone about them and exactly what to do to stop them from going to war 20 years later, destroying the Sarcophagus ship and putting an early bullet in T'Kuvma would be a good start and again Tyler will have the information needed for this, the Klingons would then have to gain cloaking technology from the Romulans like they do in the PU with the Romulans gaining the D7 in return.

After all of the above the only loose end left would be Burnham herself in the suit with a gigantic P for Paradox on her forehead, she would cease to exist unless her actions create a new reality (the PU we all know) in which case she would be able to continue existing just as we saw in the 2009 Film, confirming that the Discovery we have been watching is in fact an alternate reality just not the Kelvin one.

Whatever happens I get the feeling that the powers that be at CBS want all of this sorted out sooner rather than later so they can draw a line under it and move on.

But if that is the case where does that leave the Georgiou/S31 show unless they intend to pull a fast one on us and the Georgiou in that show is actually the PU version not the Emperor.

At this point all we can do is watch and wait to find out.

Sigh, again with the erasing of the entire series fantasy. Seems like every year we get renewal of the "if we wish really, really hard this show will go away".