CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar 2 - Electric Boogaloo-Fanboys gone WILD-too many hyphens

Precisely so. And then it, of course, got repeated and assumed and the whole thing took on a life of its own.

 

I apologize, perhaps I should've been more precise. There are plenty of perfectly rational reasons why someone might decide they don't like the show. Personally, I have plenty of issues with some of the writing choices, disregard for very basic science, and the turbolift system that looks like a giant indoor roller coaster. But a rational person, when confronted by a TV show they don't like, simply selects another TV show to watch instead. It's not like we're hurting for entertainment options in the 21st century. Sure, maybe there's some disappointment because they really wanted to like the show, but they get over it.

I was talking about the people who are obviously enraged by Disco's very existence and cannot stop screaming on the Internet about how much they hate it. I'm talking about the people who have to inject themselves into any Star Trek-related conversation to say that they hate Disco because of its "fake wokeness" and "forced diversity", or because it's "too political". All of those phrases are code words that means that the person is angry that the show does not have a white male lead character with the women and brown people (and ESPECIALLY the brown women) in subordinate positions. And it's relevant to the Axanar discussion because the Venn diagram of that kind of Disco super-hater and Axanar superfans is a perfect frakking circle.

 

Similarly, a different equally rational person when confronted by an opinion they don't like has the option to simply not reply and/or select a different discussion to participate in. It's not like we're hurting for discussion options on the internet in the 21st century. Sure, maybe there's some disappointment because they really want to participate in that exact discussion on the internet but they get over it. See how that same reasoning can apply both ways?

They're no more injecting themselves into an online discussion any more than you are as long as it is the topic determined by the OP and/or the flow of the conversation depending on the thread. As for your quoted talking points that you take issue with, maybe it is "too political" given how publicly monolithic Hollywood is in that regard including the writers, stars, producers and directors with zero nuance given to anything that deviates from the flavor of the month 12-18 months ago talking point? Previous trek shows took a stance in the end but at least they typically attempted to explore the reasoning behind the arguements for the other side; that doesn't happen in current trek. I don't have to agree with every political point (though I do side with most of them in classic trek... Enterprise had some exceptions for me) to like either an episode or a show as long as they're not overtly disrepectful/oblivious to the nuance of the discussion. Ask yourself if the new shows took the complete opposite side of what it traditionally did, would you criticize that? I'm guessing probably and I'd be defending you doing it (as long as it was focused on the topic and not those arguing it).

Or maybe it is "fake wokeness" because they took that first POC woman lead character and gave her such ridiculous story arcs season after season and that the best episodes for many watchers are the ones that specifically don't focus on her ruining and/or subsequently saving the galaxy? You're not Q; stop omnipotently inferring the worst possible motivation in things you read as if every opinion that differs from you is some sort of Kobiyashi Maru that you must try to win at all costs. If you want to debate someone then debate the points they ACTUALLY MAKE instead of ascribing motivations and extrapolating from there and maybe you'll change some minds instead of closing them. My favorite trek show is DS9 in large part because of Avery Brooks/Sisko who displays the gravitas of Picard but can instantly switch to the earnestness of Kirk and I've seen that show described here on trek bbs as racist because he was the only lead who wasn't a captain. ZOMG!?! Can you believe they demoted the first black lead!?! Never mind that the character showed more internal growth and development than any lead before or after or that he actually had a realistic in-universe career advancement in Starfleet that allowed the dynamic between him and the other characters to further deepen (especially with Dax). That's the pitfall of looking at something superficially and inventing the motivations behind it.

 

Is it too late for a grammar nitpick? It's copyrighted, not copywritten, because it's copyright, not copywrite, because it's about the right to copy, not copying writing. Trust me, I'm a librarian.

And not just because of noobz. Some of us old coots who go back to the days when there was just TOS found a lot to like in the JJ movies and also enjoy the new Star Trek series. Personally, I'll take Discovery over Enterprise any day -- but I still bought Enterprise on blu-ray and have all the novels. Because it all adds to the big picture that is Star Trek.

 

Really? I have never heard one word about people not liking new Trek because of its diversity. That really goes against everything Star Trek stands for. From the beginning Trek has embraced diversity even though it may not have been executed well. What I hear and frankly agree with is that the problem is the shitty scripts and bad character development. If a character is not interesting or likable; it really does not matter what race, gender, etc. they are, people will not embrace them. I doubt there is any majority that dislikes new Trek because of diversity; that's just a BS talking point to take focus off bad ratings and how bad the scripts and story lines are; generally they are just not appealing.

 

In a lot of cases I've seen elsewhere online, it is clear as day that complaints about the writing are a talking point to cover the racism and misogyny.

 

So, how about that Axanar thingy?

 

Apparently "it's coming" according to a recently released trailer or some nonsense. I talked to my bookie about it and even he wouldn't take that bet on it actually happening

 

Thank the prophets that we have you to discern the hidden real meanings of posts on the internet like our very own Kai Winn!

 

You don't understand... there are people (not) posting dastardly things somewhere right now on the internet and we need to (pretend to) know what they really aren't telling us!

 

Really?! Because I've seen it on this very board. It's a minority of posters, but... hell yeah, I've seen people complain here about turning Star Trek into a SJW show... as if it wasn't from the very beginning.

Yep. But some people are into Star Trek for the pew pew pews and the swaggering of Kirk.

 

Yep to all of this. (It's worth noting that DISCO is not alone in having been the recipient of criticism founded upon both open and cloaked bigotry. The other two pre-CBSAA series without a white male lead also got some, from self-described Star Trek fans no less.)

I think that American imperialism (especially that of the 1960s) embodies a lot of what some Trek fans consider Tru Trek to be (I hope only a minority of Trek fans, but again: what's the data?), as that represents the moral and intellectual heart of a not insignificant portion of TOS. The same can be said of cultural norms of 1960s America, as the cultural heart of much of TOS. This is all a major part of what is meant by the idea that TOS was a product of its time.

For some, nostalgia for the way things used to be cuts across both Star Trek and contemporary American culture in similar, parallel ways.

So, it is a small leap at most to take Garth, as a hero of Kirk's, as the representation of a nostalgic ideal.

 

Well! If you've seen it online; it MUST be true!!!!

 

I laughed at the cast "interviews," too, since they went on an on praising how great the still-unmade movie is. But, hey, they're actors. They're acting!

 

That doesn't make any sense. It would be a straw man argument to say that people are claiming that those posting such rubbish sincerely believe what they are posting. Unless I'm mistaken, no one has gone that far; no one can see into the heart of another. That doesn't change the fact that these things are getting posted.

Again, no one's saying that every criticism is based on bigotry.

 

Look, we're not really on a tangent here. I got us started on the discussion of what appeals to people about Axanar, and a couple of subsequent posters have proposed the idea that the appeal is that it's less diverse than modern trek and therefore attracts those anti-Discos that are inherently racist, so it's worth discussing the motivation of Disco's detractors. If it's not racism, then the idea that Axanar attracts anti-Disco racists is flawed. If it is racism, then the next discussion should be about how non-diverse Axanar is.

It's not a fun discussion, but it is relevant.

 

Plus it's an 8 minute promo for what's at best a 30 minute fan film (assuming anything further ever gets made).

I couldn't watch the whole promo of course. And I laughed out loud when an actress said, "and it has such depth..."; and I just couldn't go on watching at that point.

It also really cracks me up how Axanar's supporters claim it's " true Star Trek"; yet most of it shows all the "pew pew" they fault JJ Trek and the current CBS Trek for - And hell the former director Robert Meyer Burnett did two 20-minute videos on how he and Alec were salivating over all the battle footage Tobias Richter was creating; And how to tailer their live shots to match it.
^^^
Yep real "depth" there.

Not to mention that the majority of the "Prelude To Axanar" effects footage reused here for the promo; Plus the other footage Alec either finally found or got from Robert Meyer Burnett looks like a cutscene from a Star Trek video game...

Well at least they didn't reuse the John G. Hertzler VO of the "...waves against the firmament..." line over the reused ships docking at the starbase VFX footage.

 

I don't know how anyone on this board could miss the "too much forced diversity!" comments re Discovery. I don't even read topics related to the show and I've been made aware of it. Kane Steel or Kpnuts anyone?

That's the fan critique equivalent of "I have black friends."

So there are certainly fans out there who beat the "too much diversity drum", and some of those are of the "Discovery is shit and Axanar is 'true Trek'" stripe. Not all. Maybe not many. But they're there.

 

I'll see if I can think of something on-topic about Axanar before I finish this post. In the meantime...

I was online back around the time when DS9 premiered. I saw white people argue that the number of nonwhite cast members on DS9 would offend people who weren't white, because those people would be offended by the tokenistic, pandering casting of people who aren't white as just a sop to political correctness because it wasn't driven by any actual story needs. I saw white people argue that it was a bad idea to have a nonwhite captain because white people would no longer be able to relate to the lead character of a Star Trek series, but everyone of every sex, gender, skin colour, nationaity, and ethnicity was used to relating to a white male, so why would you ever have a captain who wasn't a white male? In other words, the straight white male American character was a blank, default figure, and any change to any of those characteristics absolutely had to be justified by the demands of the plot. Otherwise it was just so much PC SJW virtue signalling. Some of those terms didn't exist yet, but the ideas did. Demanding that a show justify why a character is anything but a white male, and never demanding it justify why a character is a white male, is preferential treatment of white males. There's a word for this kind of thinking, and the word is racist. (And yes, the sexist equivalent certainly happened with Janeway. And Burnham. And the Thirteenth Doctor, for that matter.)

I suppose we could congratulate Axanar for its progressive fight against ageism and ableism by letting Peters play Garth despite being significantly older than Steve Ihnat was, and for being acting-challenged. There, see? On topic!