Spoilers Lower Decks General Discussion Thread

Nice. But will it be canon.

 

Genus Roddenchrist is gone. CBS is in charge. It will definitely be canon.

 

There was a "planned hiatus" right after the second showrunner shuffle. I think it's doable for them to do 13 episodes in a year, but maybe not.

Their goal is to have new Trek shows year round, so I imagine that CBS would like to have some scheduling consistency with their shows.

But year round Trek isn't going to be a reality for another year or two at least.

 

Ah, you beat me to it. Just what I was going to ask. If it is a full on comedy like Red Dwarf, then I would guess not. But as someone who enjoys world/universe building I hope we do get something canonical. But it ain't going to stop me from enjoying it either way.

Also, can someone please tell me, is the original animated series canon? I don't recall it ever being discussed or debated here before!

 

I think Roddenchrist didn't want it to be canon. I guess current CBS don't consider it canon either.

 

TAS is canon.

 

Someone predicted all this back in 2016 . Here is a Star Trek animated comedy featuring Rick and Morty

Please note that the video contains adult language

 

TAS was officially decanonized for a long time. Not because of anything about the show, but because there were copyright issues involved that could potentially have cost CBS money if they referenced the wrong thing without permission. The copyright issues were legally settled years ago, though, and CBS has treated TAS as canon ever since.

 

TO be honest, it's not exactly what I expected, nor necessarily what I hoped for. I was hoping for a genuine adventure series, akin to TAS, or the DC animated universe. Something like this:

https://www.thetrekcollective.com/2013/03/amazing-concept-art-for-new-star-trek.html

In fact, I think animation would be the one thing where I would have been totally okay with them bringing back well known heroes like Kirk and Spock, or even better, have an animated Pike-series.

 

I'm not so sure the "lower decks"-concept really lends itself to a good Trek series, even an animated one. It has the risk of becoming too mundane very fast, or, more likely, waaay to fantastic: "Even the lower deck schlubs have such wild fantastic ride every week!"

No matter what, I don't expect this series to stay "true" to the "lower decks" format for a long while. I guess they will pretty fast go the Orville/Futurama-route, of telling the fantastic adventures of a low-profile ship.

So yeah, I'm not exactly hyped for this show. But I'm genuinely looking forward to it, and what they will be doing with it. This is a case where I really should try hard to not go with any expectations into it, but honestly let me surprise at what they will do, and see wether I like it or not. Which is honestly much easier if there are multiple Trek series around (if there's only "one", I much easier fall into the trap of having expectations of what "a" Trek series should be like).

 

Without seeing any character concepts, it's impossible to judge how effective the style of that proposal would (or could) be.

I always thought "Lower Decks" was one of the best TNG episodes. One of its highlights was the sparring session between Worf and Sito Jaxa, the Bajoran ensign. That was "mundane" yet highly intriguing.

 

"Mundane" is exactly what skiffy entertainment shouldn't be - it's a waste of resources.

 

Mundane is what it shouldn't be. "Mundane" — in scare quotes — is actually something that isn't mundane.

 

Couldn't care less about this one. I don't like cartoons and I certainly don't like Star Trek and comedy. The Orville is bad. This is even worse.

 

Though I do love the character, you sound exactly like Ron Swanson from Parks and Rec.

I did some calculations once. Starfleet probably needs on the order of 500,000 new recruits per year. With a Federation population of approx. 10 trillion, you probably have at least 90 billion new college age kids each year. All indications are that Starfleet is elite, so I don't see it as difficult for it to recruit entirely awesome people when it only needs 0.0006% of the available recruiting pool.

I too was hoping for a hour-long drama, but this will likely be great, and I am sure to watch.

My hope is that we see comedy more on the side of "look at these awesome lower decks people kick ass and be awesome and funny while encountering crazy stuff", rather than anything that dumps on the reality or quality of Trek (I'm looking at you, "Redshirts"). Maybe something like "Terminal Alliance: Janitors of the Post-Apocalypse".

 

As with any organization, Starfleet will have the support staff and less-than-amazing people in their ranks. It simply will not be all awesome people. The Air Force, Navy, Army, Marines, Coast Guard are all not made up of top rank people. That's why you have Green Berets, Strategic Air Command and so on.

You're going to have the people mopping floors, cooking the food, etc. for every person beaming down to quell a civil war or make a first contact.

 

This sounds atrocious to be honest.

I love Rick & Morty but I certainly have no desire to watch a Star Trek comedy show. The entire direction of the franchise is disappointing to me.

 

Well, it is getting publicity for Star Trek and getting the name out there. Frankly, I'd rather they try different things within the Trek universe than just one show going.

Star Trek has always attracted some great writers, producers, effects people, etc. because it's been an inspiration to them. The universe has millions of stories and billions of beings to showcase and talk about, and Trek has always done that well, for the most part.

What one person may not like, may be someone else's can't miss classic and get them into watching more Star Trek. And that's never a bad thing.