Spoilers Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 2x10 - "Hegemony"

[Amaris]

I just watched it.

Being SNW - it is fantastically produced, it looks and feels movie -like, and the character work is absolutely fantastic. I literally live every character on screen, even the ones I don't really like, like Pelia.

However there are many small things that irked me a bit this episode:
I don't like the Alien-rip off (again), Chapel being the only survivor on the whole ship was too convenient, the retro colony is stupid (Stargate regularly was able to depict futuristic societies on a budget with just a few clever gadgets) and while I do like the Scotty actor, I absolutely don't like this show turning into just another TOS reboot/reunion. I hope Batel repeating Hemmer's fate is just a misdirection.

I absolutely love the Gorn in a space suit! That was dope.

So... ugh. I'm a bit unhappy where this show is going. But I wouldn't notice, because I absolutely enjoy the heck out of every second. Makes it really difficult to give a grade

If I can have one wish for season 3 however - it would be too stay away from anything legacy characters or plotlines, and stand on their own feet. That's when the show is (imo) the strongest.

It seems Batel had most of her crew down on the planet. Plus, sickbay is likely to be in one of the more heavily reinforced places on the ship. You want to protect the hospital as much as possible. So it's not much of a stretch, IMO.

As for Scotty, we're about a handful of years away from Kirk taking command of the Enterprise, so we should be seeing some familiar faces start to appear. If anything, while SNW is certainly doing its own thing, it's going to start looking more and more familiar as we get closer to Kirk's eventual captaincy.

Anyone else think of the 2013 Star Trek videogame when they see the SNW Gorn? They're visually quite similar.

Although McCoy's line about performing a C-section on a pregnant Gorn makes exactly zero sense now.

Oh don't be silly, it's easy to manufacture some minor bullshittium to account for that. For example, there may be multiple castes of Gorn, and while some reproduce by laying their eggs in others, some may have the eggs incubate inside of them until the time they "give birth" in a sense. Plus, this is McCoy, a man who uses old adages and aphorisms. It may not have been a literal c-section.

Even if that doesn't quite fit, it doesn't really matter at the end of the day, though it is fun to fill in the blanks with whatever the hell sticks.

 

[cooleddie74]

Besides, if there are different species of Gorn a'la the Xindi (only all reptillian in this case) then maybe the Kelvin Timeline Gorn gave birth to live young or that McCoy had to remove her eggs with a C-section. And the ones here all lay eggs and no human physician has ever had to cut one open to remove their eggs.

Hey, the Xindi stuff in ENT opened the door to a lot.

 

[Jedi Marso]

Well that was decently tense episode, but left me with too many questions.

So a disruption field generator on one part of the planet and screw up the whole planet's comms and transporters?

A piece of technology we will probably never see again, used by anyone, in classic Trek fashion.

Anyone else expecting 'Pike's box' to be projectile weapons?

No, but I expected that La'an would have known about it beforehand!

So they are just going to drop the saucer without checking for any other survivors?

Chapel is the only survivor? Really?

That EV suit bay was dreadfully conveniently placed heh? Could not have found Chapel a weapons locker as well heh?

Apparently Spock found the only survivor that mattered. Lucky she survived, eh? And any weapons aboard the Cuyoga would have been unmodified unless she could have gotten to their crate 32.

And I suspect you could have talked Hemmer out of it Pike, you had plenty of time to talk to him or stun him or something instead of letting him goto his death.

To be fair, they were a long way from any sort of advanced help or facilities.

Dropping the saucer does stop the Gorn from getting any UFP data from the computers I guess.

Fringe benefit!

If Batel has eggs - do any other any survivors?

If they do, the Gorn have them, not the Enterprise.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Also Scotty should have been blond to uphold Gold Key Star Trek canon.

 

[Kraig]

It's entirely possible that the Gorn Captain fighting Kirk in TOS was nearing the end of its lifecycle.
Its slow and plodding demeanor may just be how an elderly Gorn behaves.

The Metrons didn't give either side the chance to select their best fighter, they just chose the Captain of each starship.
Perhaps Gorn Commanders are picked for their lifetime of knowledge, not their fighting skills.

Most lizards here on Earth only live to be 30 or 40 years old, maybe the Gorn don't live much beyond that either.

The Metrons could have picked a spot for the contest that was colder than what would allow for a Gorn to operate at peak speed.

 

[Amaris]

Besides, if there are different species of Gorn a'la the Xindi (only all reptillian in this case) then maybe the Kelvin Timeline Gorn gave birth to live young or that McCoy had to remove her eggs with a C-section. And the ones here all lay eggs and no human physician has ever had to cut one open to remove their eggs.

Hey, the Xindi stuff in ENT opened the door to a lot.

Indeed it did. Thank goodness for ENT, which made that possible.

 

[DaveyNY]

The Metrons could have picked a spot for the contest that was colder than what would allow for a Gorn to operate at peak speed.

That planet didn't really seem to be a cold one.
Considering all the sagebrush and desert rocks around.

I also don't think the Metrons would have given either side that big of an advantage.

 

[Amaris]

That planet didn't really seem to be a cold one.
Considering all the sagebrush and desert rocks around.

[ waves bullshittium wand ]

Deserts get cold at night / The climate was arid but not hot / The Metrons changed the environment.

 

[cooleddie74]

And maybe the Gorn are more like the Tholians. Warm/hot to us may not be hot enough for them.

 

[DaveyNY]

[ waves bullshittium wand ]

Deserts get cold at night / The climate was arid but not hot / The Metrons changed the environment.

I'm pretty sure that episode took place all in one day.

 

[Jedi Marso]

Although McCoy's line about performing a C-section on a pregnant Gorn makes exactly zero sense now.

This is what happens when some "clever" scriptwriter drops a line of throwaway dialog as fan service, not knowing the fan maelstrom it will spark YEARS later.

 

[J. Frank Doobie]

You would wonder why if Earth is such a paradise,so many people want to go live on colony worlds.

I think this episode said the colony had 5,000 -- a small town. My interpretation has always been that there are NOT very many people, relative to total populations, who are colonizing the stars. Like historical Earth colonization, you'd need some compelling reason: to escape, evade, explore, enrich themselves etc.

I always assumed most Federation colonies were small and boasted very little approaching the same kind of tech as Starfleet. Much in the same way small towns don't have aircraft carriers and nuclear reactors (though the Sheriff's department might...). And I agree --- Maybe a good portion of people living in, say, a domed city on Luna or Mars might want to live a simpler (YMMV) life on an "unspoiled" M-class world, one where they could maybe be somebody. In a society that treats reputation as a currency, as I believe the Federation does to at least some degree, most high-profile places and jobs would be incredibly competitive (Starfleet certainly is), so maybe some people just want to be a big fish in a small pond. Though, as this episode and many others show... There's always a bigger fish.

Looking forward to seeing to seeing the establishment of Pike City (home of the Pioneers!) on Cestus III in a future episode. His "aw, shucks, it's really my crew who make it happen" speech will be great.

 

[FreezeC77]

Besides, if there are different species of Gorn a'la the Xindi (only all reptillian in this case) then maybe the Kelvin Timeline Gorn gave birth to live young or that McCoy had to remove her eggs with a C-section. And the ones here all lay eggs and no human physician has ever had to cut one open to remove their eggs.

Hey, the Xindi stuff in ENT opened the door to a lot.

The thing I was wondering when she was beamed up and you had Chapel back on the Enterprise. Couldn't she just be put into transporter med-loop stasis?

Oh man I just realized something. What if this is where Scotty gets the idea for how he survives on the Dyson Sphere?

 

[Amaris]

I'm pretty sure that episode took place all in one day.

I listed three usable reasons, thank you very much.

 

[cooleddie74]

Fans are still nitpicking Cadet Uhura ordering a Cardassian beverage at the bar in Iowa in 2255 of the Kelvin Timeline.

 

[Jedi Marso]

Fans are still nitpicking Cadet Uhura ordering a Cardassian beverage at the bar in Iowa in 2255 of the Kelvin Timeline.

See the post about a half dozen above this one.

 

[cooleddie74]

There's fan service, and then there's fan pander. And man, can 21st century Trek pander like no other franchise.

 

[J. Frank Doobie]

Oh man I just realized something. What if this is where Scotty gets the idea for how he survives on the Dyson Sphere?

A thousand times yes.

 

[TheFlutteringHorde]

Although McCoy's line about performing a C-section on a pregnant Gorn makes exactly zero sense now.

For me It's hard to take McCoy's comment at face value when he's trying to schmooze Carol so hard in that scene even Kirk seemed exasperated.

 

[Jedi Marso]

I think this episode said the colony had 5,000 -- a small town. My interpretation has always been that there are NOT very many people, relative to total populations, who are colonizing the stars. Like historical Earth colonization, you'd need some compelling reason: to escape, evade, explore, enrich themselves etc.

I always assumed most Federation colonies were small and boasted very little approaching the same kind of tech as Starfleet. Much in the same way small towns don't have aircraft carriers and nuclear reactors (though the Sheriff's department might...). And I agree --- Maybe a good portion of people living in, say, a domed city on Luna or Mars might want to live a simpler (YMMV) life on an "unspoiled" M-class world, one where they could maybe be somebody. In a society that treats reputation as a currency, as I believe the Federation does to at least some degree, most high-profile places and jobs would be incredibly competitive (Starfleet certainly is), so maybe some people just want to be a big fish in a small pond. Though, as this episode and many others show... There's always a bigger fish.

Looking forward to seeing to seeing the establishment of Pike City (home of the Pioneers!) on Cestus III in a future episode. His "aw, shucks, it's really my crew who make it happen" speech will be great.

I think looks might be a little deceiving here, because without highly advanced technology, a colony of 5000 souls isn't self-sustaining. It's not even really a big enough gene pool to provide for a healthy future population.

I suspect colonies like this are cosmetically 'quaint' in appearance, but boast rather imposing technology underneath the surface. You wouldn't see it on a TV show set, of course, but if Trek was the real world it would be there. The doctor's office might look like something out of Little House on the Prairie, but his couch would be a full biobed complete with a pullout touchscreen, and a rack of modern instruments and drugs. Their gaslight lamps would be powered by a fusion or even a dilithium-channeled matter-antimatter reactor, perhaps located underground. Make no mistake, a colony like this would simply be a 23rd Century version of Westworld, but without the barfights and robots. Because 5000 people can't live in a genuinely recreated Mayberry without the farms, factories, and other industrialized stuff that goes into building and sustaining it. So it has to be replicated, or based on modern 23rd Century tech. Their soda fountain probably looks like it's right out of 1955, but what comes out of it is resequenced food like you get out of the ship's synthesizers. All cosmetic.

Just my thoughts on it.