And that's all entirely subjective, and I disagree, and I will just leave it at that.
Star Trek's Sexist Legacy
- Thread starter Danja
- Start date
In season one, there was no Pike. Every character was totally defined by their relationship to Michael, with very few exceptions (basically Stamets was the only character who didn’t revolve around her in some way, even Lorca was a smitten kitten.) and many of the characters/positions we are used to seeing having a little more to the were lucky if they got a name. Even TOS wasn’t like that, and it was from an era of much simpler ‘leading man’ formulas. Burnham is closest to Star Trek V Kirk...where he is in pretty much every scene, even if he doesn’t really need to be a part of the action. (There’s plenty of exceptions in that film though...Shatner is more generous than he is given credit for.)
It is a lot of weight for the character to carry, and though Sonequa gives it her all, it does make Burnham very hard to like. It’s exhausting in season 1. Throw in her close relationship with Sarek, and you don’t have to squint too hard to see why not all the criticism is motivated by viewers prejudices. Which isn’t to say it’s as bad as all that.
I wandered off in season two, because while I was kind of enjoying it more, there were still hangovers I didn’t enjoy which seem part and parcel of the show. Throw in that I was spoilered and knew one of the most terrible ideas in Trek Lit history was being ported over well...I was bored and I bailed out. Slightly unintentionally.
I really really wanted to like the show, to like Burnham more, but...I just Couldn’t do it. It was badly written, and with little charm. There’s an argument TNG was as bad if not worse in series 1/2, but I think we were more desperate for TV Trek then, and the cast of characters were a lot more...interesting and developed in some ways. DSC has a few very well developed characters, but at that point, season one, not enough variety and spread. The writing just really wasn’t working, and they had hung so many damn albatrosses around Burnhams neck, I wasn’t surprised when the criticism got heavy.
Then throw in how much of that was really motivated by prejudices, and you just get a smokescreen.
Which kind of circles back to the topic... Trek? Sexist? It’s too easy to pick a moment...let’s go with poor upskirted blue shirt girl way back on the tantalus colony..and go ‘yup, sexist, why’s she gotta crawl in that vent’ but then you also get to point at other things...Uhura is on the bridge and ain’t serving coffee...and say ‘nope’. How do you paint a picture overall? How do you look at the different shows Nd different eras? Voyager has probably the most diverse cast of characters in Trek, and multiple female leads who really are female leads...but we will get hung up on a catsuit in the era of Spice Girls and the great sixties Renaissance.
I dunno. For me, Trek is progressive in so many ways, I don’t think I could hang any ‘ism’ round it’s neck without being disingenuous and ignoring the time it was made.
Except for Enterprise frankly. Token sexy girl. Token Black Dude Who we then pretty much forget about (that’s the feeling I got before I gave up on it early on. Which is annoying because he is the focus of one of only two scenes I even liked in the pilot.) and a whole bunch of white guy stereotypes flying through space in their tin can. I don’t even know where to begin with that and it’s post 9/11 hoorah hangover.
DSC and Picard are meh on the scale if I am honest. But Voyager and DS9 had eaten pretty much all the progressive cookies. They are pretty darned heavy on equality of the sexes and ethnicities, *especially* for the day.
"I just don't like Burnham, Tilly, and Saru as much as Kirk, Spock, and McCoy." I like both sets of characters for different reasons. Kirk, Spock, and McCoy have been deified. When you deify characters, no one else is going to measure up, so we have to move passed that. I did.
They haven't been about anything you're interested in. And I'm surprised you didn't say "intellectual weight of TNG". I thought you were a TNGer.
Believe me, once the Trump Presidency is OVER, the less that reminds me of it, the better. So DSC not aggressively addressing Trumpism is going to be a plus in my column. Anything that's all "Trump this! Trump that!" is going to be instantly dated once this joke that's gone on way too long is finally over.
As I've said before, I'm not too broken up about it. I think religion should be left up to interpretation instead being told to us "this is what it is!" If they're not going to do it right, I'd rather they not do it at all.
It's offered enough so that we've had certain posters on this board (not you) complain about it non-stop and, if they're not outright about it, they'll dress it up as "SJWs!" or "Mary Sue!"
I wish someone would tell me what a "Mary Sue" is
I'm almost frightened to ask
I'm almost frightened to ask
Yeah it's a very fuzzy, ill-defined concept, not helped by the tendency of some people to throw it at every character they don't like.
Yes.
STD doesn't have a character like Spock as a counterpart and source of important advice to Kirk, where in STD do we see anyone at that level with Burnham? Burnham accepts important advice from no one, why would she?
Important advice come from her, not to her.
Some TOS episodes separates Kirk and Spock, and then switches back and forth between them, major players in their particular story lines. This was done with McCoy once too. STD does this when? Oh right, Burnham is always the center.
Kirk was hardly even in The Tholian Web, the focus was on Spock, when was the same done with Burnham?
I always found Tilly and Saru as good counterpoints to Burnham.
Its not the same as Kirk, Spock and McCoy but that's OK. Star Trek needs to stop that.
Its not the same as Kirk, Spock and McCoy but that's OK. Star Trek needs to stop that.
Why?
(Also, It did. Years ago. It only ever fell back on the triumvirate approach later on for various reasons...actor ego, writer interest/disinterest, burnout. But everything between say Farpoint and Scorpion part 2 was very much an ensemble set up. Even then there were different characters carrying weight. At the height of J/7/Doctor Voyager, there was also room for Neelix/Tuvok or Paris/Bells.)
Because its living in the past, something Trek does enough off.
ENT definitely felt like it was trying to at first. I'm not saying its always done but I don't think its the gold standard either.
Hell, Enterprise was being a bit too obvious about replicating the TOS triad, given like TOS their own triad consisted of the Captain, the Vulcan, and the Southerner. For that matter, they were trying to replicate the general TOS formula with the cast, what with an officer from the UK and, here they try to be clever and do a little role reversal, black helmsman and Asian communications officer to contrast TOS's Asian helmsman and black communications officer. Phlox is the only one without an obvious parallel in the TOS cast.
I like Tilly and Saru a great deal but it's more because of who they are instead of how they interact with Burnham. In fact them plus Stamets is why I wish the show was less focused on Burnham and more of an ensemble based show. Actually I wish Tilly was the star of the show. She could dominate the show in the same way McKay did on Stargate Atlantis many years ago. More Tilly makes for better tv. You then make Saru Captain and the sort of father figure to her and Stamets and Reno as a bickering Quark and Odo and Culber and Stamets as a kind of normal everday romantic couple like O'Brien and Keiko I think the show would be amazing. Keep Georgiou around for internal conflict and as the resident asshole and potential threat. Sort of Spike on "Buffy."
As for TNG I do like it. It has the most nostalgic value but I think DS9/TOS are the best shows and TNG is a close third. Picard is 4th even though I didn't like the last two episodes. Voyager and Enterprise are a couple of notches bellow then Discovery is my least favorite. Well the old TOS cartoon is my least favorite so it's my second least favorite.
I also don't want them exploring Trump but I was looking forward to a season exploring faith. Pike being a true believer and Burnham and others being skeptics. I would have liked that better than killer robots. But you also have other things to explore. Climate Change, Cancel Culture, Police Brutality, Systemic problems in the justice system and even online hacking which would have been inspired by the Russia stuff but it goes beyond Russia. The whole system is fragile and can be brought down by a bunch of nerds with time and resources..
Jason
They got to you. Didn't they?
If any of these fit the stories they want to tell on any of these series, then I wouldn't mind seeing those issues tackled.
I just found Burnham to be a very unlikable character and as the star of the show that was one of the things that put me off.
She lacks the warmth and "sass" of Janeway in Caretaker, the bearing of Picard in EaF, and the passion of Sisko from Emissary--they all had something to them that brought them to life and endeared me to them by the end of their respective pilots.
She lacks the warmth and "sass" of Janeway in Caretaker, the bearing of Picard in EaF, and the passion of Sisko from Emissary--they all had something to them that brought them to life and endeared me to them by the end of their respective pilots.
Which to me is one of the reason the show would be so much better with Tilly as the lead. She has compassion and is quirky and everyman qualities which would be a true first in terms of Trek show leads. Might not be great at action scenes but this is why I compared her to Rodney McKay on Stargate as the type of series lead she could be. Solving problems with a fancy tricorder more than a phaser.
Jason
Jason
Or could take more of a Daniel Jackson arc, with being unprepared/overwhelmed/unskilled for combat in the beginning but over time gets to grips with it more and more--though a Starfleeter should always be looking for a way to think or talk their way out of bad situations and not resort to pew pew.
Ah well, I haven't seen anything beyond those two and a half episodes so maybe she isn't. But still, she did remind me a bit of that short story anyway. And a bit of Sybok 2.0.
That would work but she would have to train and get into action mode. I noticed Shanks in the later seasons had some impressive muscles. He looked like he could kick butt even more than O'Neil who was suppose to be in special forces.
Jason
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