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First Impressions?

It's a prologue so hard to judge. I think it is fair to give the show until the end of the first season.

First impressions? Average. With the exception perhaps of part of Enterprise's fourth season, I don't feel we have had truly good, cerebral Trek since DS9 ended. I feel this is more JJ Trek then Roddenberry/Justman/Berman Trek. It feels that sadly Trek must dumb down and become hyper action to survive. I find that sad, not just for the franchise, but particularly for the state of attention limited, on thinking audiences of today. I pray that once the crew and ship show up next week we get more of what Trek is about.
 
Great sci-fi show, not a Star Trek show. Very disappointed, I know that there was a lot of scuttlebutt about putting the show in the JJ Verse but I also heard that it was going to be in the prime universe as well. really was hoping for the latter.
 
I was blown away by these first two episodes. I HATE prequels but this was way better than I expected. Loved the characters, loved the story, loved the aesthetics, and I'm really intrigued by the preview of the coming season. Favorite part was the exploration scenes of the "mystery object." I'm definitely going to be watching this every week.
 
I really enjoyed these first two episodes. Love the look of the show for the most part. The Shenzou looked great. The uniforms manage to look even worse in motion than in static pics. They're the only real aesthetic failing to my eye.

Things I loved:
Loved the Klingons. The broken empire, the fanatical cult, the attempted unification. This is the most interesting Klingons have been since TUC.
Loved that Starfleet failed at every turn. That the characters screwed up and made mistakes. That their choices look to have real consequences moving forward.
Loved Michelle Yeoh. She was the best part of the episode, and hopefully has more to do in this series down the road.

Oh, and Saru (Sar'u? Haven't caught the correct spelling yet). Doug Jones really sells the full makeup characters.

About the only thing I didn't like was Burnham. The actress seems fine so far, but the character is really, really unlikeable. Which thus far seems like it's probably the point. So we'll see what they do with her for the rest of the season before I worry too much.

All told, I'll check out next week. Which is really the best a pilot can hope for, right?
 
The first hour had nothing to it. Watching the second NIW. Hope it gets better. Pretty, tho.
 
This is not only the worst Star Trek I've ever seen, it's one of the worst shows I've ever seen. The acting reminded me of the acting in the 70's Star Trek Animated series. The camera work reminded me of the 60's Batman series with the goofy angles they used. The computer generated lens flaring was completely unnecessary and distracting. (Ok, the first lens flare was kinda cool)

The Klingon's are completely unlikable and have no sole. Michelle Yeoh's performance as Captain just just as bad as Voyagers original Janeway, Genevieve Bujold.

I DO NOT like ANYONE on this show and I predict it this will be the only season.
 
Kane_Steel said:
Youtube Reactions and Reviews Seem To Be VERY Mixed and Divisive about STD.


Damn.
Click to expand...
JJ Trek all over again.

Instead of trying to appeal to the modern non fan audiences with dumbed down, divisive stuff, why can't they just look back on Trek history, look at what is regarded as the best kind of Trek, and say "let's try and keep up with the intelligence, heart and depth of that with all the big budget touches we can bring to it". It's this need to reinvent the wheel from people who don't seem to fully understand Treks long standing appeal that is causing division and letting the franchise down in my opinion.
 
  • The acting was a mixed bag. Most of the background people where fine. Frain was the weakest. Jones was the strongest. SM-G got better as the shows went on. Yeoh was Yeoh.
  • The Klingons need work. Having the cumbersome makeup is bad enough. But those poor actors had to say a lot of awkward technobabble in an already awkward foreign language with the cumbersome makeup to boot. This was just a poor decision by the production team both stylistically and practically. And it really takes the audience out of the story.
  • The plot was way too contrived. The goal was to make Burnham a pariah moving forward. But the writing staff really had to bend a lot of storytelling "rules" and conventions to get her there in the end. And really stretched the suspension of belief noodle to its max.(But this is discussed to greater end in other threads.) But the story just wasn't that interesting. It was poorly paced and, given that it was a two-part episode not a whole lot actually happened.
  • Everything look nice and pretty, but it all felt way too glossy and artificial. The Kelvin films do the "high definition" set building much better. Everything feels organic and lived in. Everything here feels like over-engineered sets.
  • All that said, there were a lot of good individual moments. However, I feel the result was much less than the would be sum of all those parts.
  • Oh and the music was just so uninspired--even for TV fluff.
 
I really enjoyed both episodes. I thought the design work was really well done, and I loved seeing this smooth, polished version of Star Trek. I watched both episodes twice, and came away with the same conclusions each time.

However, the second time I watched, I did so with two friends, both of whom are into pop culture and sci-fi, but not Star Trek. They watch the big shows that are on....Game of Thrones, Rick and Morty, Handmaidens Tale, Stranger Things....stuff that is prevalent in pop culture today. They have seen the Abrams Trek films, and enjoyed them for what they were for the most part. Both of them very much enjoyed Discovery. I realized then that THIS is who this show needs to appeal to, not to me who will watch it anyway, not to those who fret about NCC numbers and canon and whether they should be using phase cannons or phasers. They thought the show looked beautiful, enjoyed the story, and more importantly they want to see what happens next. If this show can get people like that onboard, then it'll be okay.
 
So far? Meh. Visually, it's stunning. The scale on which they worked to produce the pilot is large, and I appreciate that. Tonally speaking, the fact that it's so dark, and grim this early on doesn't work for me. The characters are fine, though only Burnham and Saru stood out for me. The Klingons sound like they're chewing taffy, and their speeches are overly long whilst sounding this way, which is a bummer.

In short, it seems to have potential, and I'm hoping it will improve significantly while I have my free All Access pass. Once that's done, I'll be moving on unless it improves dramatically in the "hope," "optimism," and "we turned on the lights this time" department.
 
The first ep was okay, a 7 for me, the 2nd, an 8. The second ep is really good. So far I'm happy with the show but the Burnham twist, I don't know how that plays out. It's kinda weird to be honest, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt and see where they go with it.
 
trekfan_1 said:
Also 6 pages of user reviews on IMDB.com and most of them are negative
Click to expand...

It's IMDB. It's hard to take reviews there seriously, especially when it comes to franchises. Same sort of stuff happens with Marvel and DC movies. I feel like this show will get the same amount of hate levelled at it enterprise did when it first started and abrams trek when it began to carry the torch on the silver screen.
 
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