Discovery Needs To Go Ahead And DO THE THING

[captainmkb]

One of the interesting things about when I was re-watching TNG in 2019 in the lead-up to PIC was seeing how everything I associate with Berman Trek slowly and gradually crept up over time. It didn't happen all at once. But by the seventh season, everything I didn't like about the Berman Era was there in full-force: the wallpaper music that saps the energy out of everything, the over-reliance on technobabble, the character B-plots that don't really do much, the "everyone knows everyone" feeling, and the forced conflict between the main characters. "See? We can have conflict and arguing too!" which just doesn't work when all the characters are usually so chummy.

I did like the weird, out-there plots they had in seventh season TNG. <<-- Unpopular Opinion

But the issue I had with the weird out-there craziness was that they tried to explain it all away with technobabble. I wish they didn't do that. The crazier something is, the more you're supposed to be able to suspend your disbelief. If you're trying to go out of your way to explain something, or sometimes even over-explain it, then you're telling us we're not supposed to suspend disbelief, which doesn't help anything.

In contrast: I buy into the Spore Drive and the Mycelial Network because they never over-explained everything, didn't get all technobabbly about it, and gave us the space to actually suspend our disbelief. Which is a major point where Berman Trekkers and I disagree. I like being able to completely suspend my disbelief, they don't.

I also think that since technobabble isn't actual hard-science, having it in there is just really half-assing it. Either go full hard-science or trust in our ability to suspend disbelief. No half-measure technobabble that insults everyone's intelligence.

I couldn’t agree more. It’s a heretical view to most, but I genuinely find, for all the immense flaws of the first couple of seasons, they’re somehow more rewatchable to me than the last few. Around the time Ron Jones was fired, TNG lost more than just good scoring; it lost its edge, became content with pairing soap opera stories with lame technobabble B-plots, and had a fetish for reuniting the characters with long lost family: brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, long lost aunt’s second cousin’s half nephews. I think the show maybe became a victim of its own success in a way; it was so popular it didn’t have to push itself and its storytelling. It just kind of ambled amiably along, content that it had already peaked at the end of the third season. Plus, as you said, the technobabble got way out of hand. Sadly, Voyager just replicated a lot of TNG’s later weaknesses.

TNG started losing its "spark" immediately after s3, s4 started to grow bland despite having all the good momentum, s5 was 'event-oriented' meaning there were some superb highs and the rest was filler of low quality. s6 carried on like that -- and by s7 it was a dessicated husk with only a few vital pieces to be gained from it. the strength of the finale and its run-up overshadows the weakest moments but we saw them. the bland pathetic b-stories, unintelligible pseudoscience, etc.

 

[Dukhat]

You realize that Season 4 is a fanwank and its considered to be the best season of ENT ever produced?

Whether it was the 'best season of ENT ever produced' is debatable. I will admit that in my opinion, it was better than the first two years of TNG jr., and the third year of 9-11 allegory. But did we really need three entire episodes about how the Klingons got smooth foreheads, just to stroke Spiner's ego?

 

[FederationHistorian]

That's not saying a whole lot.

Whether it was the 'best season of ENT ever produced' is debatable. I will admit that in my opinion, it was better than the first two years of TNG jr., and the third year of 9-11 allegory.

There are only four season to pick from: the one with the highest ratings and most viewership (S1), the one that actually tried to worldbuild the ENT era and all of its main cast (S2) , the 9/11 & WOT allegory (S3), and the TOS fanservice (S4). YMMV per season.

But did we really need three entire episodes about how the Klingons got smooth foreheads, just to stroke Spiner's ego?

Technically, it was a 3-part Augment arc (which Spiner was a part of), and a 2-part Klingon forehead arc (which Spiner was not a part off) that was bookended by an Orion arc if we are trying to be really accurate. I supposed the Klingon forehead arc could be looked as being 3 parts considering how the last episode of the augment arc ends. But those 5 episodes are half a season of Kurtzman era Trek now. It would be good enough for a season of DIS if they wanted a new threat-of-the-season arc.

And they creaked the door open to explore Augments and bring in Spiner as a Soong ancestor when they acknowledged that Archer’s great-grandad fought in the Eugenics War in the episode were Archer want to be a caretaker for insectoid younglings. Not to mention all of the previous Klingon episodes with not a single smooth forehead Klingon anywhere in sight.

 

[Dukhat]

But the point of those three episodes was to give a reason for the TOS Klingons. All of that other stuff was just plot device for that result.

Either way, I think we’ve severely gotten off topic, so I’m going to bow out of this discussion now.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

No rush. This is Star Trek: Discovery not Star Trek: What Happened With All the Berman Shit.

Well said.....

 

[FederationHistorian]

Well said.....

TBF, they could have used Short Treks for that. And have the Short Trek referenced in Lower Decks later on.

 

[Timofnine]

I have no idea what ‘THE THING’ is in the context of this thread, it just popped up in the recent posts notifications for the Discovery Forum.

In my mind, ‘THE THING’ can only be one of two things:

1. The reset button
2. ‘The Thing’ movie homage, but Enterprise already did that in Regeneration… kinda.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I have no idea what ‘THE THING’ is in the context of this thread, it just popped up in the recent posts notifications for the Discovery Forum.

In my mind, ‘THE THING’ can only be one of two things:

1. The reset button
2. ‘The Thing’ movie homage, but Enterprise already did that in Regeneration… kinda.

Janeway stole the reset button from all the other Trek universe......

 

[Annorax849]

Id rather they stay away from explaining too much about Klingons, Cardassians, Dominion, etc. Leave that to Picard or a 25th/26th century show

 

[Deks]

Id rather they stay away from explaining too much about Klingons, Cardassians, Dominion, etc. Leave that to Picard or a 25th/26th century show

Why?
They don't have to go into intricate details, just show us the general state of affairs.
In fact, if they want to aim for greater consistency, what they could do is that Disco discovers somethign about a species from 800-900 years ago, but only in part... a foreshadowing of sorts.
Then Picard or other Trek series that deal with earlier points in history can tap into that.

What I'd like to see however is some sense of freaking progression. Everything is so too static in the 32nd century for me to care about it... as if, tech/science hasn't changed much at all since then from what I saw (an equivalent of BARELY 50-100 years worth of progress) and its making things BORING for me.
Make the 32nd century at the forefront of MASSIVE technological leaps for UFP (ones that will actually STICK with the franchise moving forward and change it for the better so it establishes NEW trends and moves away from the old ones - or radically enhance them).

 

[fireproof78]

Id rather they stay away from explaining too much about Klingons, Cardassians, Dominion, etc. Leave that to Picard or a 25th/26th century show

Indeed. Those powers are boring as sin. Let the Federation grow, give brief acknowledgement to some power, and move on with their story, grow the technology, and make new additions to the lore, not revisiting old powers.

 

[Dukhat]

What I'd like to see however is some sense of freaking progression. Everything is so too static in the 32nd century for me to care about it... as if, tech/science hasn't changed much at all since then from what I saw (an equivalent of BARELY 50-100 years worth of progress) and its making things BORING for me.

This is the inherent problem with the show. The 'world-building' is set up that no one had found a better alternative for regular warp drive for 800 years, even though there are even shows CBS is producing RIGHT NOW that show that that's not the case. We see some pretty cool new ships and a new space station, but pretty much everything is the same, other than some 'programmable matter' plot device.

Make the 32nd century at the forefront of MASSIVE technological leaps for UFP (ones that will actually STICK with the franchise moving forward and change it for the better so it establishes NEW trends and moves away from the old ones - or radically enhance them).

I would rather they just ended the show.

 

[Deks]

This is the inherent problem with the show. The 'world-building' is set up that no one had found a better alternative for regular warp drive for 800 years, even though there are even shows CBS is producing RIGHT NOW that show that that's not the case. We see some pretty cool new ships and a new space station, but pretty much everything is the same, other than some 'programmable matter' plot device.

Pretty much.
Same old format, with some minor difference.
The 24th/25th century is the center point for innovation it seems where we see technology moving forward (and possibly in radical ways - it would actually be cool to see that managing to upend Disco's version of the 32nd century completely from the timeline).

800 freaking years between 24th century and the 32nd and according to Disco, NOTHING ever happened from what we saw and UFP learned from Berman Trek?
Guess it was easier to just 'wave it all away' under a nonsensical argument.

I would rather they just ended the show.

That's also an option... as is de-canonizing it or placing it in an alternate timeline (meaning the 32nd century as seen on Disco wouldn't be happening in the prime timeline).


Alas, that's not likely to occur.

 

[Dukhat]

Pretty much.
Same old format, with some minor difference.
The 24th/25th century is the center point for innovation it seems where we see technology moving forward (and possibly in radical ways - it would actually be cool to see that managing to upend Disco's version of the 32nd century completely from the timeline).

800 freaking years between 24th century and the 32nd and according to Disco, NOTHING ever happened from what we saw and UFP learned from Berman Trek?
Guess it was easier to just 'wave it all away' under a nonsensical argument.

The thing is, the 'V'Draysh' and the storyline from 'Calypso' presented a completely different futuristic scenario in which the Federation had devolved significantly, were fighting a war against human colonists, and valued relics from the past. This was entirely different than what was shown in season 3. And we know it's supposed to be the same time period, because some guy used the V'draysh term to describe the Federation, although it ended up just being a retcon.

 

[Agony_Boothb]

My take on how calypso can be explained is that its set around 4189 of a timeline where the Discovery crew all died in transit with discovery exiting at a different location from the colony. Burnham was unable to contact the Federation and lived out her days as a courier. The Federation in turn allied with the emerald chain and together they evolved into the v'draysh and after a thousand years had conquered most of the alpha quadrant, hence why craft's people were at war with them

 

[Dukhat]

Except that doesn't take into account that the term 'V'Draysh' was already being used to describe the Federation in the 32nd century, even though the Federation itself did not use this term.

 

[fireproof78]

Not sure why "V'Draysh" needs to refer to all of the Federation.

 

[Dukhat]

Not sure why "V'Draysh" needs to refer to all of the Federation.

The problem is that the person who used the term used it fully knowing what the Federation was, used it in conversation with people who were already using the term ‘Federation’ to refer to the same organization, and he never used it again after that. It’s one thing to use a nickname like ‘the Feds’ to refer to Starfleet, but using such a vastly different syncope to refer to something that already has a familiar name doesn’t make sense. It was clearly meant to just be thrown in as a link to Calypso, but the latter episode strongly implied that ‘V’draysh’ was the prominent term and a bastardization of another term that was no longer in use. DSC season 3 shows something quite otherwise. The term was basically used as a slur, which retcons how the term was used before.

 

[fireproof78]

The problem is that the person who used the term used it fully knowing what the Federation was, used it in conversation with people who were already using the term ‘Federation’ to refer to the same organization, and he never used it again after that. It’s one thing to use a nickname like ‘the Feds’ to refer to Starfleet, but using such a vastly different syncope to refer to something that already has a familiar name doesn’t make sense. It was clearly meant to just be thrown in as a link to Calypso, but the latter episode strongly implied that ‘V’draysh’ was the prominent term and a bastardization of another term that was no longer in use. DSC season 3 shows something quite otherwise.

Oh, OK. Well, the term could have twisted over time.

 

[Dukhat]

The more fundamental issue is that the description of the V’draysh in Calypso is completely different from the Federation we see in the 32nd century. The use of the term was just a symptom of a much larger retcon.