Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 4x01 - "Kobayashi Maru"

I enjoyed it. It felt much more like a typical "Star Trek" epsiode than many past ones on Discovery. S3 was a step in the right direction and this episode continues it. I'm looking forward to more.

The good:

• The color grading of the new uniforms (which is done in post-production) is better than on the production photos and promotional stills. The refinements to the set looked great.
• When "Archer Spacedock" was unveiled and they pulled out the Archer theme, I grinned and choked up a little. It was cheap fan service but really appreciated.
• Also really like them discussing them developing next generation propulsion to put on their new generation of star ships (Spore Drive better not be it, it's still a stupid idea). "Reducing dependence on dilithium" is clearly an allegory for fossil fuels, and it works. It's smart. That's the kind of internal continuity Discovery needs to keep doing.
• How they use programmable matter now for tools, phasers and spacesuits. This makes the 32nd century feel quantifiably different than the 24th. Replicators changed the game in the 24th century, and programmable matter - essentially republicans everywhere on demand - changes it again. Big fan. They need to keep that up. It feels like real progression.
• The plot of the episode was overall very solid.
• The new Mandalorian-esque 3D sets their using really help the show's visual diversity.
• Loving the inter-species stuff going on, including the Federation President. By 3189, there should be vast interspecies hybridization. Almost nobody should be pureblood anything by that point, or necessarily bound to one-world-one-race. We saw some of this in S3, with the United Earth Defense Force having non-humans as part of it.

The bad

• The show's gotten much better about it, but the worst impulses of the creative staff just come out of their cell from time to time, and the ridiculous Butterfly people were no exception. They were perfectly fine until they went Super Saiyan. It looked ridiculous on screen. These should have been different (maybe non-humanoid) aliens.
• Burnham was fine across most of the episode but was awful in the opening scene. Janeway, Picard and Sisko could have handled that touchy contact without it getting anywhere close to violence. It got to violence because they wrote her as being sloppy. If there is one cardinal rule of Star Trek as a TV show, it's don't make the audience seriously doubt your protagonist''s (usually the Captain's) competence. Here, she looked extremely incompetent.
• I appreciate that the anomaly uses modern-ish real science that Berman era trek avoided ("gravitational lensing"), but I'm really not sure if this show benefits from a galaxy spanning disaster again. We just got over that with the Burn. Yes, this crisis is going to be the crucible in which the entire galaxy bands together to stop it, thus accelerating the Federation's rebuild. And if they want to do something shocking, they'll have to smash into Andor or Tellar or something. But I'd put it again as a symptom of creative staff's worse impulses. I think I'll enjoy the season if this episode is representative of it, but that'll be despite the anomaly plot hook, which shouldn't be the case.
• This is gonna come off as it's gonna come off, but Tilly does not look good at all right now. I was all about Tilly in S1 and S2. Having a different body type... no problem at all. In S3 there was some weight gain, but it was still fine for the most part. But in S4, it looks like there was Pandemic Pounds on Wiseman, like all of us (I'm working myself to lose it right now). Maybe it's the fit of the uniform, which seems very tight fitting around the torso, and the hairstyle that's gotten completely wild, but it was truly the first time in this show I ever said "wow, this doesn't look healthy one bit".

 

They mentioned they we were working on many until the spore drive could be completely replicated.
One of them is being tested on the Voyager-J, the Pathway drive.

 

I just watched this and gave it a 6/10

I would have given this a 5 out of 10 but the Enterprise music and the Starfleet Academy scene pushed this a little over the meh for myself. I won't avoid it. Hearing the Enterprise music for the first time since 2005 in something original got me right out of my seat and had me blown away for a second there.

I liked the Federation President. I LOVED that she was calling out Burnham for her constant arrogant BS which proves she's not ready for command. I think this will be an interesting relationship and dynamic going forward. Liked the scene with Vance and Michael. I like Booke as a character and I think for some reason they write his character better than the rest of them. At the end I found his looking at his destroyed planet very emotional. Nicely done.

What I didn't like: The intro scene went on too long. So my suspension of disbelief that these aliens who were FLYING OVER THEIR TARGETS just couldn't hit the side of a barn from 3 feet away. It felt very storm trooperish and I was laughing.

I HATE that Adira has somebody talking that's NOT there. I found it foolish and I was laughing at that one. I know you can say its a previous host and yeah Dax had previous hosts talking to her but this felt just ridiculous to me. I think it was poorly written and directed this scene.

The movement throughout this episode was just too much Bad Robot for my tastes. I wish they would tone down the shaky camera work. The effects team really dropped the ball with the fire explosions on the bridge. They looked more like a fireworks display than a ship taking damage. It was really poorly done cringe.

I would say its the 2nd best opener. I thought Season 2 was the best, then this, then season 3 and then the pilot which I despise.

Hoping it improves next week!

 

Yeah this irked me in Season 3 and now Season 4. Discovery plays it very loose with continuity because they don't want to be bound by what happened in someone else's show fro 20-25 years ago, but the Federation knows and has access to many different types of propulsion that are objectively better than Dilithium-based warp drive. Quantum Slipstream is first among them, but also Transwarp Conduits, non-conduit-based Transwarp drive. This doesn't seem like it should be a massive technological challenge. Surely by 3189 they knew everything they need to about the Borg's Transwarp conduits and drives. And if Quantum Slipstream is the way, then focus on artificially producing Benamite.

And whatever happened to dilithium recrystallization?

Discovery won't provide any answers of course. So it is what it is.

 

All of those are mentioned. Dilithium was the most reliable. Then big damage and they didn't know why, so cautioun was employed rather than hoping it never happened again.

 

Because he thinks his standard generic comments are superior to your standard generic comments?

 

Almost everything you mentioned here was mentioned in the first episode of Season 3.

Beneite crystals were rare, Transwarp was dangerous for some reason, Books ship had a recrystalizer but it was damaged when his ship crashed.

 

Except they did provide answers, as two other people have already pointed out.

 

They were quite distracting. They felt like just little flame puffs going off at set intervals (like a theme park ride) rather than any kind of actual damage going on.

 

I did notice that. I guess that's what high definition does. There just comes a point where you can't hide some effects.

 

JFC, can we stop it with Wiseman's weight? I get it, one of the actors doesn't look good in some people's not-so-humble opinion. Happens to me all the time, yet I don't feel the need to comment on their looks. And I'm sure Mary has people in her life to talk about her health if she so wishes.

 

interesting use of politics

 

I thought it was pretty bad.

I’m someone who started out liking Disco quite a bit. Something happened toward the end of season 2 that just really made me sour on the show. I don’t know exactly what but it is what it is.

I’m giving it a chance, trying to be open minded…but I’m starting to feel like I’m only watching it because it’s a Star Trek show rather than because I’m interested or invested in the characters and their story.

They could kill off almost any of the characters and I wouldn’t feel anything. The writers haven’t done a good job making me care about the crew.

 

Except you don't need Benamite Crystals for Slipstream.

Regular Slipstream drive works perfectly fine without it. It just caused microfracture's in Voyager's hull because the ship itself wasn't designed for it. Which... Doesn't stop them from designing ships from the ground up to use the technology...

 

You mean the version that still requires the Dilithium crystals to prper channel and focus the power generated?

 

I was kind of disappointed that after 1200 years of starship design, the consoles still explode. At least the ceiling wasn't filled with rocks.

 

Gotta hate the rock ceiling starships. They should have never put a pool on the deck above them.

 

This sounds like a terrible way to watch a show.

 

Nope, because that version runs on any power system as shown and mentioned in the two episodes it was introduced in.

 

Significant debris shrinkage.