Jessie Gender's rewatch of DISCO and what we think

[Charles Phipps]

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Jessie Gender is one of my favorite geek media/political Youtube commentators. I don't always agree with her conclusions and thinks she reaches quite a bit to reach some of her conclusions but generally enjoy her reviews of just about all of Nu Trek as well as other works. She's also honest in a way I trust more than other commentaries because when she hates a show, like Rings of Power, she'll say she HATES a show.

But she's mostly VERY kind.

Interestingly, she's been doing a review of DISCO episode by episode in preparation for the final season of Discovery. I think we're all in agreement that Disco is now kind of the odd man out of the Nu Trek era as while you may have your issues with Picard, everyone likes Strange New Worlds and Lower Decks (first two episodes aside) that the Nu Trek era is "accepted" as Star Trek now. Disco is still controversial, though, and now sits there with ENT for a lot of people or even lower.

Her review is giving me an interesting perspective on things, though. There's the speculation the BATTLE OF THE BINARY STARS pilot movie was actually made after the first half of the series and that originally we would have gotten it in flashbacks or just started with Burnham as "Mysterious Mutineer and Prisoner" which would have been SO MUCH BETTER. However, I do think it remains the best thing DISCO ever did as well and is a shame because T'Kuvma is a character who deserved better.

A lot of her reviews so far focus on the normalization of fascism in the series and how Lorca represents old style militaristic and controlling versus Burnham learning to resist that. It's not 100% accurate I think but I do think it holds up pretty well in many places with what we later find out about everyone.

I do totally disagree with her, though, about her thinking Tilly choosing NOT to be a Captain was a good then when I think that was a much better arc for BURNHAM. Tilly should totally be a Captain.

 

[Jayson1]

Trying to make Tilly never made sense. Why give her the same story arc and to top it off you had some of that, desire to be Captain stuff with Saru as well. Personally they should have never made Burnham a captain IMO and went the Stargate route were Saru basically being General Hammond. The guy in charge, but Burnham is O'Neil, the series lead and the focus of most of the stories.

 

[Charles Phipps]

Trying to make Tilly never made sense. Why give her the same story arc and to top it off you had some of that, desire to be Captain stuff with Saru as well. Personally they should have never made Burnham a captain IMO and went the Stargate route were Saru basically being General Hammond. The guy in charge, but Burnham is O'Neil, the series lead and the focus of most of the stories.

Yeah, I think it's a HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER situation where the show showed character development going against their plans for the character. They wanted Burnham to be captain except Saru makes a much better captain, Burnham makes a much better Science Officer, and Tilly on the track to becoming a Captain in the future and learning from both worked.

However, somewhere the writers wanted Burnham as Captain, Saru as second, and seem to have written Tilly off.

Jessie would comment on the parallels with Sisko as him being the first black Captain and not being allowed to be one (and in fact does) but the thing with Deep Space Nine was that it wasn't supposed to be anything other than a backwater assignment beneath his abilities. That obviously CHANGED with the Defiant and it becoming the focus of the Wormhole but it made sense to start him as a Commander then move him to Captain later.

Burnham not being a captain isn't demeaning. She just has the very Star Trek-esque lesson that it's not a good fit for her character.

 

[Jayson1]

The idea you lead has to always be a Stafleet Captain seems almost like a very limiting idea. Something I noticed they avoided in both of the cartoons and even in the modern movies. They start the movie of with that Kirk as a cadet and we don't see him as Captain until the end of the first movie.

If their was disrespect in the idea of Sisko starting off as commander it would be from fans having a narrow vision of what Trek can be. Many of them being the ones I imagine who were complaining at the time of DS9 being to dark and how it's space station so it goes nowhere.

 

[Quantum21]

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Jessie Gender is one of my favorite geek media/political Youtube commentators. I don't always agree with her conclusions and thinks she reaches quite a bit to reach some of her conclusions but generally enjoy her reviews of just about all of Nu Trek as well as other works. She's also honest in a way I trust more than other commentaries because when she hates a show, like Rings of Power, she'll say she HATES a show.

But she's mostly VERY kind.

Interestingly, she's been doing a review of DISCO episode by episode in preparation for the final season of Discovery. I think we're all in agreement that Disco is now kind of the odd man out of the Nu Trek era as while you may have your issues with Picard, everyone likes Strange New Worlds and Lower Decks (first two episodes aside) that the Nu Trek era is "accepted" as Star Trek now. Disco is still controversial, though, and now sits there with ENT for a lot of people or even lower.

Her review is giving me an interesting perspective on things, though. There's the speculation the BATTLE OF THE BINARY STARS pilot movie was actually made after the first half of the series and that originally we would have gotten it in flashbacks or just started with Burnham as "Mysterious Mutineer and Prisoner" which would have been SO MUCH BETTER. However, I do think it remains the best thing DISCO ever did as well and is a shame because T'Kuvma is a character who deserved better.

A lot of her reviews so far focus on the normalization of fascism in the series and how Lorca represents old style militaristic and controlling versus Burnham learning to resist that. It's not 100% accurate I think but I do think it holds up pretty well in many places with what we later find out about everyone.

I do totally disagree with her, though, about her thinking Tilly choosing NOT to be a Captain was a good then when I think that was a much better arc for BURNHAM. Tilly should totally be a Captain.

There's no YT influencer I always agree with 100%, some are better than others. I prefer coolheaded reviewers with some understanding of context.

I have a vague recollection there was a problem with the T'Kumva actor, so his part was cut.

Six years is a long time.

 

[Tuskin38]

I've been enjoying her re-watch

 

[Lord Garth]

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Interestingly, she's been doing a review of DISCO episode by episode in preparation for the final season of Discovery. I think we're all in agreement that Disco is now kind of the odd man out of the Nu Trek era as while you may have your issues with Picard, everyone likes Strange New Worlds and Lower Decks (first two episodes aside) that the Nu Trek era is "accepted" as Star Trek now. Disco is still controversial, though, and now sits there with ENT for a lot of people or even lower.

"I think we're all in agreement"? No. None of what you typed in that paragraph is anything I agree with in regards to what I think of Trek, regardless of other people's opinions.

Though it's nice that New Trek is more accepted now, where it matters the most to me that hasn't changed. And I'm glad that Jesse Gender is a fan of DSC.

 

[fireproof78]

I think we're all in agreement that Disco is now kind of the odd man out of the Nu Trek era as while you may have your issues with Picard, everyone likes Strange New Worlds and Lower Decks (first two episodes aside) that the Nu Trek era is "accepted" as Star Trek now.

I didn't agree to that.

 

[Charles Phipps]

"I think we're all in agreement"? No. None of what you typed in that paragraph is anything I agree with in regards to what I think of Trek, regardless of other people's opinions.

Though it's nice that New Trek is more accepted now, where it matters the most to me that hasn't changed. And I'm glad that Jesse Gender is a fan of DSC.

I didn't agree to that.

Hence controversial.

 

[Quantum21]

There's really no choice to accept Discovery since it's Canon and it is the show that most of the others are directly related to, literally.

 

[Jayson1]

There's really no choice to accept Discovery since it's Canon and it is the show that most of the others are directly related to, literally.

Or maybe the holodeck has gone wonky like the time it made it look like Trip died on "Enterprise" even though we know that isn't how things REALLY happened in the Prime Universe. It's screwing up again, what with giving Spock a sister and modern day 24th century tech in the 23rd century. I only hope Geordi gets the holodecks working again before we watch the final season so we see what the REAL Discovery and crew was like.

 

[Charles Phipps]

There's really no choice to accept Discovery since it's Canon and it is the show that most of the others are directly related to, literally.

It's not a matter of canon or not, it's whether people like it or not.

 

[Cr0sis21]

It's not a matter of canon or not, it's whether people like it or not.

True. Part of the fun of Star Trek is taking stuff that wasn't so great and making something great with it.
You don't have to wipe something out of continuity. But you CAN put it to good use. That's why I'm so excited to see what SNW does with Sybok eventually.

 

[Cr0sis21]

Yeah, I think it's a HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER situation where the show showed character development going against their plans for the character. They wanted Burnham to be captain except Saru makes a much better captain, Burnham makes a much better Science Officer, and Tilly on the track to becoming a Captain in the future and learning from both worked.

However, somewhere the writers wanted Burnham as Captain, Saru as second, and seem to have written Tilly off.

Jessie would comment on the parallels with Sisko as him being the first black Captain and not being allowed to be one (and in fact does) but the thing with Deep Space Nine was that it wasn't supposed to be anything other than a backwater assignment beneath his abilities. That obviously CHANGED with the Defiant and it becoming the focus of the Wormhole but it made sense to start him as a Commander then move him to Captain later.

Burnham not being a captain isn't demeaning. She just has the very Star Trek-esque lesson that it's not a good fit for her character.

Interestingly, the Sisko thing was apparently built around the idea that station commanders are simply that, commanders. But by the end of the third season, Ira Behr was like "Can we please just make Sisko a captain?" and the producers just shrugged and said "Sure, why not?"

 

[Charles Phipps]

Interestingly, the Sisko thing was apparently built around the idea that station commanders are simply that, commanders. But by the end of the third season, Ira Behr was like "Can we please just make Sisko a captain?" and the producers just shrugged and said "Sure, why not?"

I mean, if he's tooling around in the Defiant there's no reason he shouldn't be.

 

[Jayson1]

Interestingly, the Sisko thing was apparently built around the idea that station commanders are simply that, commanders. But by the end of the third season, Ira Behr was like "Can we please just make Sisko a captain?" and the producers just shrugged and said "Sure, why not?"

I think it was as well. I remember in season 1 in the episode "11001001" we saw the guy in charge of the starbase was just a commander. It seems like the idea is all starbases have either a commander or admiral in charge. To be a captain you had to have command of a ship.

 

[Tuskin38]

Though in reality Lt. Cmdrs can also be COs of ships, they’re just really small

 

[Jayson1]

Like that one guy in "Second Sight" on DS9. I think they might have did that though just so the guy wouldn't outrank Sisko.

 

[Cr0sis21]

Like that one guy in "Second Sight" on DS9. I think they might have did that though just so the guy wouldn't outrank Sisko.

I think you're right. And really, that highlights the problem with setting the ranks up that way. As soon as another ship comes in, Sisko's no longer the top guy.

 

[fireproof78]

Of course he is, on the station. It's his command. Higher ranking officers don't just get to come in and bark orders unless they are within that chain of command.