And don't forget also became friendly adversaries long after! Well...as friendly as an irritated Gorn can be.
Spoilers Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 3x10 - "New Life and New Civilizations"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
- Start date
I dunno... A generous 7? It heavily drew from a previous episode I didn't care much for but the story, acting and all was good, just... I dunno.
Normally, I grade on a rewatch so we'll see but this doesn't feel like one I could easily rewatch in the same weekend like I do with others.
A tepid season... I could probably blame the strike and other delays in the two-year gap between seasons, but extra time usually gives you a chance to *fix* things.
Ugh, so, what.... Next Spring or Summer we get our next handful of episodes, including one with Muppets? I'm not checked out but this season didn't feel the same as S1 or S2, most of it lacked a element. This hardly felt like "seeking outlet life and new civilizations." It's been a long week and a long year.
Now, I'm going to be hearing the knocking on Pike's door in my subconscious forever.
Normally, I grade on a rewatch so we'll see but this doesn't feel like one I could easily rewatch in the same weekend like I do with others.
A tepid season... I could probably blame the strike and other delays in the two-year gap between seasons, but extra time usually gives you a chance to *fix* things.
Ugh, so, what.... Next Spring or Summer we get our next handful of episodes, including one with Muppets? I'm not checked out but this season didn't feel the same as S1 or S2, most of it lacked a element. This hardly felt like "seeking outlet life and new civilizations." It's been a long week and a long year.
Now, I'm going to be hearing the knocking on Pike's door in my subconscious forever.
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So Pike and Betel got to live an imaginary life (worth risking everything for) together, before they both come back to the present, so Betel could become the new glowing hands prison warden to evil aliens to halt their ability to trans-dimensionally travel, and Pike, a few years later becomes prisoner to a chair that beeps, then gets whisked away to Talos IV to live out an illusionary life with Vina?
Did I miss anything?
Whatever you do, don't answer the door.
Did I miss anything?
Whatever you do, don't answer the door.
Not sure what to think about that one. Gave a 6. Maybe it will get more if I watch again over the weekend.
Also, presenting it as some kind of happy ending to be turned into a statue that will spend eternity alone in a creepy chamber on top of a bunch of monsters.
Maja Vrvilo's direction. She is just awful. I knew we were in trouble when I saw her credit.
As far as I can tell, she's the only episode director used by Streaming Trek who is properly BAD. All her episodes are marred by things like this. She's all about staging that makes no sense, filmed in an awkward way, that then has to be stapled together with excessive ADR to achieve even semi-coherence.
I can. not. imagine. the level of dirt she must have on Kurtzmann to keep getting hired.
Yes! Why not just leave out the child? I can't recall either of these characters expressing a desire to be parents before this. They absolutely didn't need that to make the narrative device work or to provide the emotional impact.
Which is, for me, the sole complete failure of the season.
Eurgh, I get what they were trying to do, but I have to say this fell kinda flat for me.
Too much deus ex machina. Too much sci-fi babble that wasn't properly grounded.
"Somehow Palpatine returned" + "I am all the Jedi" vibes in places, frankly (that's not a good thing).
And the emotional montage button has just been pushed too many times in too many series at this point. The Inner Light, the Visitor, heck, even Jurassic Bark made me smile or cry, but this just felt played out.
Sorry, SNW. There have been some decent episodes this season, but I think this was by far the weakest final episode of the three seasons.
Too much deus ex machina. Too much sci-fi babble that wasn't properly grounded.
"Somehow Palpatine returned" + "I am all the Jedi" vibes in places, frankly (that's not a good thing).
And the emotional montage button has just been pushed too many times in too many series at this point. The Inner Light, the Visitor, heck, even Jurassic Bark made me smile or cry, but this just felt played out.
Sorry, SNW. There have been some decent episodes this season, but I think this was by far the weakest final episode of the three seasons.
Well, I'm so conflicted on this one that I can't rate it yet.
Like so much of this season, there was much to love, and also so many things that just did not work at all.
I am so relieved we have these next 16 episodes, though! This was clearly written to be a possible series finale, and would it have ever sucked as one.
I do find it hilarious that Pike's story is now that he has gotten to live not one but TWO full altered-reality lifetimes, with TWO different great loves.
Like so much of this season, there was much to love, and also so many things that just did not work at all.
I am so relieved we have these next 16 episodes, though! This was clearly written to be a possible series finale, and would it have ever sucked as one.
I do find it hilarious that Pike's story is now that he has gotten to live not one but TWO full altered-reality lifetimes, with TWO different great loves.
That was... not great. Just a rushed and messy episode. The Vezda who were legitimately terrifying in 'through the lense of time' are like a wet rag in this one. They were dealt with way too easily. Overall I think season 3 of SNW if the weakest out of all of new trek for me. While I like the way the episode ended and the promise of all those m-class worlds revealed by studying the vezda manuscripts, I can;t say I'm too excited for season 4.
Have any of the Doctors been spotted in Toronto recently?!
I did cry at the end of the Pike/Batel alternate life montage, but even at that moment, I couldn't stop thinking how much more powerful it would be if that relationship had played better.
I just never thought these two had "life partners" chemistry.
Their dynamic in the pilot felt right - captains who are on their own independent life paths, who will come together for short-term flings, when it lines up that way. They fit together in a way that also built in distance - their connection was more about their similar life circumstances than it was about who they were as people.
I just don't think they ever had the chemistry to justify where the writing was trying to take it.
I just never thought these two had "life partners" chemistry.
Their dynamic in the pilot felt right - captains who are on their own independent life paths, who will come together for short-term flings, when it lines up that way. They fit together in a way that also built in distance - their connection was more about their similar life circumstances than it was about who they were as people.
I just don't think they ever had the chemistry to justify where the writing was trying to take it.
Third seasons of Trek hold a special place for me because that's when I feel the series often gel, and that happened with TNG, DS9, ENT, and PIC. I was hoping the same would happen with SNW, but I've been mostly disappointed. This season finale is the worst SNW season finale thus far, one of the weakest Trek finales period, and was the close to an overall underwhelming season that felt like a regression. Off hand, the only Trek season finale that was as bad, maybe worse, was DISCO's third season, an episode that also curiously ended in what could've been a series finale.
There wasn't much I liked about this episode, but here goes:
-Number One leading a landing party (finally, for once it seems!)
-La'An being petty about knowing the Vulcan nerve pinch
-Pelia's off hand mention of Dr. Who. (It would be nice to finally get a live action crossover).
-Batel/Pike in the alternate reality: It allowed Pike and Batel to get that future together, and for Pike to experience what his life might have been without the accident.
-Elijah April, though I don't know if he was real. Though his uniform didn't look like one from the late 23rd century.
-Gamble's dark overlord outfit.
-The Kirk brothers having a drink. The series doesn't do enough with the other Kirk.
-The pacing for the first half was good. It had an ominous foreboding.
Dislikes:
-This episode overall was rushed and disjointed. It should've been a two-parter, which makes the inclusion of "Four and a Half Vulcans" even more abominable. That hour could've been given to this story.
-The "science" was really stretching it this episode. I don't even recall them figuring out a way to bring Pike back, and there was little pushback to him going on what for all they knew was a one-way trip.
-Pelia not being as involved. I was thinking she would know, or should know, more about these entities.
-The Korby/Chapel and Spock/La'An relationships were underfed, especially Korby/Chapel. But I don't care for any of these couplings, despite how many minutes, now hours, devoted to them.
-Shoehorning Kirk in, yet again, and trying to barrel into Year One. I don't care about these Spock-Kirk moments because these two actors, particularly Wesley, don't feel like the original takes, to draw any sentimentality from me.
-The alternate reality scenes: I wasn't choked up about it because I wasn't that much into the Pike-Batel relationship, though I liked it a lot more than Spock with Chapel or La'An. I also felt it was an attempt to inject some emotion and weight into a weak story, so its attempted emotional gut punch was unearned.
-Batel as a kind of Emissary, and it felt like a hollow rip on Sisko's destiny. With SNW's penchant for unnecessary use (or abuse) of canon, I don't see why they didn't go all in here and make the evil spirits Pah-Wraiths. This story could've even been the first contact with Bajorans or Cardassians. If not the wraiths, then the entities from TNG's "Power Play".
-The alternate reality transition was jarring and awkward and killed the momentum.
-The boss fight was rushed and underwhelming after all the set up.
-Pike played no decisive role in the outcome, he was more of a bystander.
-Not having an Ortegas/La'An scene after "Terrarium". I would rather the finale been about them dealing with that.
There wasn't much I liked about this episode, but here goes:
-Number One leading a landing party (finally, for once it seems!)
-La'An being petty about knowing the Vulcan nerve pinch
-Pelia's off hand mention of Dr. Who. (It would be nice to finally get a live action crossover).
-Batel/Pike in the alternate reality: It allowed Pike and Batel to get that future together, and for Pike to experience what his life might have been without the accident.
-Elijah April, though I don't know if he was real. Though his uniform didn't look like one from the late 23rd century.
-Gamble's dark overlord outfit.
-The Kirk brothers having a drink. The series doesn't do enough with the other Kirk.
-The pacing for the first half was good. It had an ominous foreboding.
Dislikes:
-This episode overall was rushed and disjointed. It should've been a two-parter, which makes the inclusion of "Four and a Half Vulcans" even more abominable. That hour could've been given to this story.
-The "science" was really stretching it this episode. I don't even recall them figuring out a way to bring Pike back, and there was little pushback to him going on what for all they knew was a one-way trip.
-Pelia not being as involved. I was thinking she would know, or should know, more about these entities.
-The Korby/Chapel and Spock/La'An relationships were underfed, especially Korby/Chapel. But I don't care for any of these couplings, despite how many minutes, now hours, devoted to them.
-Shoehorning Kirk in, yet again, and trying to barrel into Year One. I don't care about these Spock-Kirk moments because these two actors, particularly Wesley, don't feel like the original takes, to draw any sentimentality from me.
-The alternate reality scenes: I wasn't choked up about it because I wasn't that much into the Pike-Batel relationship, though I liked it a lot more than Spock with Chapel or La'An. I also felt it was an attempt to inject some emotion and weight into a weak story, so its attempted emotional gut punch was unearned.
-Batel as a kind of Emissary, and it felt like a hollow rip on Sisko's destiny. With SNW's penchant for unnecessary use (or abuse) of canon, I don't see why they didn't go all in here and make the evil spirits Pah-Wraiths. This story could've even been the first contact with Bajorans or Cardassians. If not the wraiths, then the entities from TNG's "Power Play".
-The alternate reality transition was jarring and awkward and killed the momentum.
-The boss fight was rushed and underwhelming after all the set up.
-Pike played no decisive role in the outcome, he was more of a bystander.
-Not having an Ortegas/La'An scene after "Terrarium". I would rather the finale been about them dealing with that.
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That scene with Una and Pike sitting quietly together was the best thing in this episode and a rare moment of these writers showing and not telling. And there was so much telling in this one.
Apart from this, I think by tomorrow I would have forgotten this episode's existence as, unfortunately, most of this season.
I won't whine much, I might see SNW as a big wasted opportunity, but at I least I get some dose of few decent Star Trek episodes, and I guess this is the best I can have for now.
Shrugs...
Apart from this, I think by tomorrow I would have forgotten this episode's existence as, unfortunately, most of this season.
I won't whine much, I might see SNW as a big wasted opportunity, but at I least I get some dose of few decent Star Trek episodes, and I guess this is the best I can have for now.
Shrugs...
This, a thousand times.
Putting Jim Kirk on this show at all was the worst creative decision SNW has made, and the ONE thing that is interesting about it is the chance to explore the Jim/Sam relationship, AND THAT IS THE ONLY KIRK RELATIONSHIP THE SHOW NEVER TOUCHES.
It drives me fucking insane.
Also, Dan Jeannotte is giving a beyond fantastic performance in his role, unlike Wesley's forced, hollow imitation. DO SOMETHING WITH THE ONE WHO CAN ACT. Why is this so hard for these producers to see?
It was certainly a rushed episode but I didn't think it was as bad as some are saying. I give it an 8 for effort.
I am very sorry to see Batel go but I appreciate the way they wrote her out with the fantasy future between the her and Pike.
Overall a mixed season to be sure. Hope season 4 has a better average.
I am very sorry to see Batel go but I appreciate the way they wrote her out with the fantasy future between the her and Pike.
Overall a mixed season to be sure. Hope season 4 has a better average.
It does seem odd to me that they pivoted to some grand love story after Batel was introduced as nothing more than Pike's casual 'squeeze' who he'd been with on and off for years. He learned he had only a few years to live, went out into deep space on a few missions, and slept with two other women in Season 1 (iirc).
What led to them suddenly becoming inseparable? Don't get it.
Don't get me wrong, I think Melanie Scrofano is great actor and it was good to see more of her than they probably initially planned, but the deep romance arc just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
I guess I'll start with a positive comment, and note they made a great effort to tie most of the season together here at the end. Though largely a sequel to Through the Lens of Time, it also weaves in Batel's whole season arc, Korby, finds an excuse to drag in Kirk yet again, etc. All it needed was to drag back in Beto and it would've felt like a suitably full package.
And yet, the execution here was lacking, even though I thought all the pieces were in place for an excellent finale. The first third or so of the episode was decent setup, I felt. Then when they finish the scans of Batel and she just starts having all these sudden realizations about her destiny, the episode lost me. It was one of the worst failures of show vs tell I've ever seen in Star Trek. Nothing about the dialogue coming out of her mouth was in any way a reflection of what we knew regarding her character. The show was just making her state the plot because it was the easiest and most effective way to get from point A to point B.
Adding to this is the weirdly rushed pace of much of the episode. This was hugely overstuffed with twists, sideplots, and exposition, which meant that none of the individual crises lasted long enough to really have an impact. It really feels like they had the story here for a two-parter (whether as a season finale or cliffhanger) and the story would be given far more time to breathe (and the characters time to have genuine moments of intimacy) if they did so.
But then there were the lovely flash-forward scenes with the potential future if Batel survived and had a family with Pike. I didn't know what to make of these scenes at first, thinking they were some sort of illusion put up by the Vezda to defeat Batel. Yet they were too heartwarming for that, and indeed it turned out to be some imagined timeline that Batel created to give her and Pike more time together? I presume he remembered this timeline as well, given the ending. While I do think it's heartwarming, I cannot believe she was so incredibly cruel as to dream up a hypothetical daughter who will never exist. I understand the intent of this inclusion, but Pike will not reminisce about the full and happy life they had together, somewhere else, but of the child who never got to exist.
Regardless, I didn't hate this episode, but I found it an underwhelming season closing. They could have gone with a big high-octane ensemble finale or a close, personal look at Pike and Batel. But I think 50 minutes just wasn't enough to do both, and the entirety suffers as a result. It diminished both the Vezda and Pike and Batel's relationship.
Oh, and are they starting to queer bait Kirk/Spock?
And yet, the execution here was lacking, even though I thought all the pieces were in place for an excellent finale. The first third or so of the episode was decent setup, I felt. Then when they finish the scans of Batel and she just starts having all these sudden realizations about her destiny, the episode lost me. It was one of the worst failures of show vs tell I've ever seen in Star Trek. Nothing about the dialogue coming out of her mouth was in any way a reflection of what we knew regarding her character. The show was just making her state the plot because it was the easiest and most effective way to get from point A to point B.
Adding to this is the weirdly rushed pace of much of the episode. This was hugely overstuffed with twists, sideplots, and exposition, which meant that none of the individual crises lasted long enough to really have an impact. It really feels like they had the story here for a two-parter (whether as a season finale or cliffhanger) and the story would be given far more time to breathe (and the characters time to have genuine moments of intimacy) if they did so.
But then there were the lovely flash-forward scenes with the potential future if Batel survived and had a family with Pike. I didn't know what to make of these scenes at first, thinking they were some sort of illusion put up by the Vezda to defeat Batel. Yet they were too heartwarming for that, and indeed it turned out to be some imagined timeline that Batel created to give her and Pike more time together? I presume he remembered this timeline as well, given the ending. While I do think it's heartwarming, I cannot believe she was so incredibly cruel as to dream up a hypothetical daughter who will never exist. I understand the intent of this inclusion, but Pike will not reminisce about the full and happy life they had together, somewhere else, but of the child who never got to exist.
Regardless, I didn't hate this episode, but I found it an underwhelming season closing. They could have gone with a big high-octane ensemble finale or a close, personal look at Pike and Batel. But I think 50 minutes just wasn't enough to do both, and the entirety suffers as a result. It diminished both the Vezda and Pike and Batel's relationship.
Oh, and are they starting to queer bait Kirk/Spock?
Kirk's knowledge of Pike is becoming more than, "I saw him at a conference once."
Odd pacing in this one, yeah? I need to rewatch it to solidify my thoughts but there were times where I definitely think it would have played better as a two-parter.
The alternate-future fare was handily the strongest stuff. Man, I don't know. I'm conflicted. The one thing I know for certain is that I didn't like this as much as either of the previous seasons' finales. I don't think it was bad, but was I expecting more? Yeah, probably.
The alternate-future fare was handily the strongest stuff. Man, I don't know. I'm conflicted. The one thing I know for certain is that I didn't like this as much as either of the previous seasons' finales. I don't think it was bad, but was I expecting more? Yeah, probably.
"We met when he was promoted to Fleet Captain." That's the line. Kirk also calls him Chris in the scene. Calling someone by his first name in a naval structure seems to show more than a passing familiarity.
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