Pretty close, yeah. 1 was the best and smartest story arc but dragged down by awful pacing and a terrible finale. 3 was the most fun, but dumber than a broken dildo. 2 was just terrible in most every way, shape and form.
Spoilers Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 4x02 - "The Griffin Incident"
No. Competence was nowhere in sight in PIC3. (Much like the visuals)
The thing is, I don't know that most "prestige" TV was really aiming for prestige either. I mean, I don't think David & Dan set out to make Game of Thrones into a prestige TV show. They just cribbed the character-based writing from the books, adapting it for TV. And when they ran out of books, they shifted to typical plot-based schlock, and the show no longer felt "prestige."
Prestige TV really just means dramatic shows which focus on complicated main characters, who are allowed to go on long-form character arcs across multiple seasons. I'd actually argue that although it predated the Sopranos by several years, DS9 displayed some elements of prestige TV in its overall structure, which is why I don't think it's impossible for Trek to take on the qualities of prestige television.
Indeed, my biggest frustration of Kurtzman Trek by far is none of the shows really have the foggiest idea where they want to go with their characters for more than a single season. Often season finales set up the characters to go in a certain direction, and then they sort of shrug and come up with something entirely different the following season. It makes the characters seem less like real people, and more like plot marionettes to me.
I dunno, maybe SFA will surprise me in Season 2, but what I wouldn't have given for like a single character in modern Trek to have an arc like say Nog - going from juvenile delinquent to upstanding, by-the-book young Starfleet officer.
David's probably less than a year old at this point.
Definitely a year or under, if this episode is indeed in 2262.
Perfect age for My First Phaser™
Perfect age for My First Phaser™
Space America! FUCK YEAH!!!
"Whoa, whoa, kiddo, My First Health Insurance™ ain't happening. This is a utopia, not socialism, snowflake."
Doctor for kids in the future just involves running a flashlight over someone and saying "all better."
After coming into the season completely and sadly devoid of any personal excitement, these first two episodes have been great. I’m really hoping that the trend continues and we are able to have more of these compelling episodes featuring competent people doing sci-fi stuff.
As for S4E2 I loved it. 9/10 easily. Great performances by everyone, and I love the atmospheric horror elements. Episodes like Tholian Web, Time Squared, Where Silence Has Lease, Night Terrors, Schisms, etc always do a great job reminding us that there are still dangerous and mysterious things happening in deep space that are beyond our comprehension and sometimes defy scientific explanation.
I like that this episode did not go entirely to the “it was all a dream” excuse, as there are still very real consequences of what the landing party experienced and there are some indications that something more complex and sinister is going on (for example, the entity “knowing” David’s future).
Great stuff
Please, for the future, I hope they continue to minimize
1. Flippant MCU inspired dialogue between the crew
2. Spock as comedy relief
3. Spock as romantic comedy material
4. Pela
5. Experimental “very special” episodes
And keep up the great work with:
1. Interesting sci-fi mystery adventures
2. Character development for the main cast
3. Competent disciplined professionals behaving like competent disciplined professionals
4. Focus on great characters like Pike, La’an, Una, etc
As for S4E2 I loved it. 9/10 easily. Great performances by everyone, and I love the atmospheric horror elements. Episodes like Tholian Web, Time Squared, Where Silence Has Lease, Night Terrors, Schisms, etc always do a great job reminding us that there are still dangerous and mysterious things happening in deep space that are beyond our comprehension and sometimes defy scientific explanation.
I like that this episode did not go entirely to the “it was all a dream” excuse, as there are still very real consequences of what the landing party experienced and there are some indications that something more complex and sinister is going on (for example, the entity “knowing” David’s future).
Great stuff
Please, for the future, I hope they continue to minimize
1. Flippant MCU inspired dialogue between the crew
2. Spock as comedy relief
3. Spock as romantic comedy material
4. Pela
5. Experimental “very special” episodes
And keep up the great work with:
1. Interesting sci-fi mystery adventures
2. Character development for the main cast
3. Competent disciplined professionals behaving like competent disciplined professionals
4. Focus on great characters like Pike, La’an, Una, etc
Personally I would say nothing the MCU has ever done comes close to the quality of SNW.
Spock has always had comic relief scenes. Always. Hell TVH is Comedy Relief Spock: The Movie and TUC ends with his go to hell scene.
Spock has always been a romantic figure, Chapel was deeply enamoured with him before we knew why, Dax was all like Kirk who when she saw Spock in person.
I love Pelia so I have no argument that can't be clouded entirely in my own bias.
Genre hopping is SNW's identity to distinguish itself from being a carbon copy of what came before and with that comes experimenting with new genres to try out. It is just its nature.
This is probably going to continue to hold true for Star Trek for the foreseeable future, but there are still plenty of TV shows that make 20+ episodes a year, at least in the U.S.
Georgie & Mandy's First Marriage, Law & Order, Elsbeth, The Simpsons, Family Guy, Chicago P.D., Chicago Fire, Chicago Med, and other broadcast network TV shows continue to pump out 20+ episode seasons most years. I guess not too surprising considering they still need to air shows in specific time slots year round.
It's definitely not as universal as it used to be, even if you exclude the years affected by COVID and the strikes. (For example, Matlock hasn't hit 20, though it's still usually made more episodes than most streaming shows) I'd just be surprised to see a higher-budget show like a Star Trek spin-off manage it these days, Scouts excluded; the lower viewing figures of modern broadcast TV likely couldn't support it economically.
Though it's kind of ironic that the shows that require a monthly fee to see produce less content on average than the "free" shows. Even shows that switched from network to streaming like Futurama and King of the Hill did so with reduced episode counts.
So your point still holds true in effect, but generally speaking I cringe at claims that 20-30 episode seasons aren't a thing anymore. I suppose this is really more targeted at that general mindset than your comment specifically.
Speaking as a huge fan of the mcu, I have to disagree with the first part. Whether you care for that type of storytelling or not, the tapestry is something that's never been attempted at the Cinematic level before and it has been successful beyond anyone, even the concepts biggest cheerleaders, could have ever predicted.
I do agree with the rest, but would add that Mariner was hot for Spock as well.
Fair enough, I would express equal diehard devotion to my beloved Arrowverse.
Oh yes. "see, hot spock agrees with me"
Spock has Always been a target if attraction.
As for the MCU, the emotional beats in those films are great, well done, and equal SNW easily.
That's exactly what Turtletrekker said in the first place.
I mean, I guess you could argue it tried to be prestige TV, but I don't think the showrunners even understood what made prestige TV work.
Like, the scenes from Season 1 on the Ship of the Dead where L'Rell, Kol, and Voq were talking were meant to ape Game of Thrones, but it didn't seem to understand the reason those scenes worked in Game of Thrones is because there had been episodes and episodes of setup where we got to understand both the motivations and the personality flaws of the characters. Like, the political scheming was interesting because the characterization worked, not for an inherent reason.
I may have a solution for the uniform problem. Maybe Kirk, Spock and La'An saw what uniforms the entity wanted them to see the entity was mimicking what the landing party was wearing. The landing party didnt realize it because the hallucinations had a hold on their minds. Yeah. That could be it.
So...what people have been saying for the last several pages?
Um, no. The MCU didn't start this kind of crew arguing/bantering dialogue.
It dates back to the TOS. SNW is doing nothing 'new' to/for the Trek franchise here.
The sterile dialogue style was part of the Berman Trek era, and I hope it NEVER returns to ANY future Trek project.
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