Spoilers Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 3x04 - "A Space Adventure Hour"

[TRON JA307020]

I guess with SNW they shoot themselves in the foot a bit by tying themselves so strongly and deliberately to TOS and a specific time period, and also obsessing over "lore", but I feel like the best thing to do with almost any Star Trek show is embrace the full potential of the episodic format.

Obviously it can go too far if all internal coherence is abandoned, but the setting actively invites negative continuity between episodes. This week the nacelle snapped off and the captain turned into a snake due to a "quantum nebula", next week the ship's fine and the story is about a planet where everyone ages in reverse. The more a writer thinks "ah, but this story'll have to take place on stardate ____ and in this part of the galaxy and will have to reference these episodes", the worse the quality gets. The imagination and fun are sucked out and replaced with having characters standing around reading out the titles of Memory Alpha articles. TOS rarely referred back to itself and was all the better for it.

My big issue with the holodeck in this one wasn't that it broke canon (which it did), it's that it was an excuse to do yet another self-indulgent genre-twisting story. If it'd been used in a story I'd liked, the presence of the technology wouldn't have bothered me at all.

But if fans can keep previous canon straight in their heads without even watching episodes these guys should br able to if they're fans. A simple thing like not having a holodeck on the 1701 is a simple thing. It was obvious they didnt exist in the 23rd century because they were new in tng. Data had to explain how they worked to riker. This holodeck is no different than what tng had. Its just sad that they couldn't keep canon straight. Visual, character or tech canon.

Also I agree. The story just plain stank. I can't believe the writers are out of ideas that they couldn't think of any deep space threats or horrors to meet. I shouldn't give them ideas. They'll probably bring balok and the first Federation in next. The early reviews were right. This season stinks.

 

[IMC Headquarters]

Riker grew up in a log cabin in the middle of Alaska, right? What would he know of holodecks? He did his Academy training through mail order.

 

[Starflight]

But if fans can keep previous canon straight in their heads without even watching episodes these guys should br able to if they're fans. A simple thing like not having a holodeck on the 1701 is a simple thing. It was obvious they didnt exist in the 23rd century because they were new in tng. Data had to explain how they worked to riker. This holodeck is no different than what tng had. Its just sad that they couldn't keep canon straight. Visual, character or tech canon.

Yeah, I don't disagree, I do think if they're insistent on being a prequel (and keep constantly taking ideas from TOS), they should be able to keep at least a basic timeline straight.

It's not a huge priority for me personally though; if they were putting out otherwise-great episodes, they could break whatever canon they wanted and I'd take their side - "we've decided to ignore a previous episode because we've got a great story to tell here" is a fine enough philosophy, I think. It's when the writing quality goes down that it gets harder to accept.

 

[marillion]

I confess I did wince when "Spock" said, "Computer? Arch."

Yeah.. As I think back to that, it did me, too. Especially because it wasn't an arch, it was just a normal ship "swish-swish" door. Doesn't change my vote though.

On another note, I think the whole canon thing about the holodeck is a little overblown. Who is to say that the prototype wasn't developed way back during Pike's time? This trial deemed to too unsafe and it was shelved in favor of the TAS environmental simulator until such a time that R&D worked out the bugs so it could be safely used.

 

[HotRod]

What we see here in snw is exactly what we got in tng only 100 years earlier.

Or it's exactly like what we saw on the Xyrillian ship, only over a hundred years later.

They chose to make it part of prime than became too incompetent to keep simple canon straight.

They're doing just as well keeping everything in line as the other shows did.

Now its all a mess.

Not really. A certain segment of the fandom simply look for reasons to hate the modern stuff and look at the older series with rose coloured glasses. If these fans looked at the older shows with the same discerning view, they'd see just as many errors, if not more. But because it's what they grew up with, they're willing to look the other way. It's actually rather comical. I used to enjoy coming up with creative ways in my head to make everything fit together. Perhaps this segment of the fandom has simply forgotten how to use their imagination.

They can solve all this and call it a reboot separate from ENT, TOS, TNG, DS9,VOY and the movies. Simple solution but these producers can't seem to figure that out. Smh.

Maybe they simply don't want to? That's their prerogative. Maybe they like having it connected to the rest of the franchise. I certainly like having it as a prequel to TOS, my favourite series.

 

[Tuskin38]

The opening sequence parody was worse than every late night comedy effort to parody Trek. Why does this show want to actually be a low-rent parody of itself? Especially one that isn't even funny.

Nah, it wasn't a parody, it was an homage.

 

[Rahul]

Why even have canon at all at this point? They could easily have made this show and std reboots but they didn't. They chose to make it part of prime than became too incompetent to keep simple canon straight. Any star trek fan could have consulted them to keep it straight. Now its all a mess. This is leading into a remake of tos or the first two years. They can solve all this and call it a reboot separate from ENT, TOS, TNG, DS9,VOY and the movies. Simple solution but these producers can't seem to figure that out. Smh.

I mean this is definitely not the super tight interconnectivity that Star Trek had in the 90s between TNG, VOY & DS9 - which were really 3 shows taking place in the absolute same universe, like J.A.G. & NCIS, or maybe the Marvel cinematic universe.

SNW relates to TOS more similar to how the TOS movies related to TOS the series - in way more "broad strokes". The previous events happened. But the details and certainly the effects & aesthetics, but also some of the characterisations and characteristics, might differ quite some bit - mostly due to real life reasons.

 

[Noname Given]

I mean this is definitely not the super tight interconnectivity that Star Trek had in the 90s between TNG, VOY & DS9 - which were really 3 shows taking place in the absolute same universe, like J.A.G. & NCIS, or maybe the Marvel cinematic universe...

- TNG era "Super Tight Continuity" -

 

[Tuskin38]

I wonder if Pike wanting to throw the holodeck into deep dark place was a call back to him not liking the holocommunicators in DSC Season 2.

 

[Greg Cox]

Personally I don't care about canon-breaking and had no problem with the holodeck's presence in this episode, but it definitely doesn't line up with the portrayal in TNG (where it is presented as novel, and they're shocked by the safeties not working in "The Big Goodbye", which is obviously something they'd be aware of if someone had reported it happening a century earlier).

I'd rationalize that what they meant was they were shocked at the safety protocols not working in a modern-day holodeck in the 24-century, as opposed to some primitive experimental version from a century ago.

Kinda like the way we'd be shocked if a modern airplane wasn't substantially safer than an old biplane from the 1930s.

(That may not have been the original intent, but it requires only a tiny bit of fudging.)

 

[Agony_Boothb]

Things I liked:

1) Anson Mount playing a washed up hollywood writer was great
2) Paul Wesley was a dead ringer for shatner looks-wise
3) I really like seeing La'an let her hair down and have fun. Christine Chong sells every episode she headlines and I hope we get more ' Fun La'an' down the road.

Things I didn't mind:

1) That the Holodeck was featured. Holodecks being a 24th century invention was something that never really made sense to me. I'm fine with it being introduced in the 23rd century and also with it being sidelined because it failed it's beta testing.

2) Spock going through a slutty ho phase. He's clearly rebounding with La'an and she's going to get hurt. I'm interested to see how it ties into Spock becoming the more stoic character of TOS

Things I dislike:

1) That holodeck was featured. I hated holodeck episodes in 90's trek and it still doesn't work for me here. J. Michael Straczynski once commented how if you're writing a series exploring the bleeding edge of the unknown and you need to resort to holodecks to tell stories, you're creatively bankrupt. That's always been my feeling around holodeck episodes. It's frustrating that SNW resorted to a holodeck bottle show, when the season is 10 episodes long.


Overall i think i'll be skipping this one during rewatches.

 

[Tuskin38]

Some of Wesley's performances in this also reminded me of Chris Pine's Kirk.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Yes!
True - I remember I liked that episode a lot. But it's soo long ago - I didn't remember there was also "fake characters" in that one!

Another one, where lots were mistaken for real people: Inquisition.

 

[Turtletrekker]

While I may not have thought the canonical connecting of dots particularly necessary, I have absolutely zero issues with the continuity presented. Star Trek has never, ever, ever had anything that even remotely resembled "super tight continuity". The technology was not presented as being new in Encounter at Farpoint. Riker said that he had never seen simulations 'this real' before, which infers that he had seen holographic simulations in the past. As for Data explaining things, well he did really babble on a lot unnecessarily in those early days. Canonically, we have the rec room from the animated series. Janeway enjoyed Flotter holos as a child. If anything, this ties up those seeming contradictory threads into a nice little bow. No problems whatsoever with the continuity here.

 

[IMC Headquarters]

Hats off to the lighting team who expertly simulate starlight shifts through the viewscreen.

 

[El Maestro]

I rolled my eyes when I read what it was about but I just watched it and the cast is really good so I ended up enjoying it. Very fun. Kirk playing Shatner playing Kirk was especially funny.

 

[Bad Thoughts]

Anything that breaks Canon can be blamed on the Heisenberg Compensators (but they seem to work fine).

 

[MrShinzoff]

I really liked it. Chong and Peck have fantastic chemistry too. It was funny, interesting and I enjoyed it. Folk saying they got upset and insulted by it need to chill out.

 

[GulBahana]

So, we have a holodeck episode right after the Q episode (Wait, that's wrong, but it's in the same season). I'd prefer SNW to have its own stories and not constantly throwback.

 

[KennyB]

Not a fan......but it didn't ruin my childhood and I still make it to work today. With only 10 episodes I hate having 2-3 be gimmick episodes.