Indeed. I understand that people have their preferences but treating as the dark thing really seems to miss the point of the whole season.
I like The Burn..... But I was also wondering this.
- Thread starter Gingerbread Demon
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Well too bad i guess.
It's bad for me, great for you.
Out of all the things in ST.Discovery, the thing that bugs me the most is the Grim Dark 32nd Century setting for the UFP / StarFleet.
I really don't mind Michael Burnham, the Spore Drive, the Mirror Universe, heck I liked Lorca for what he was, but I felt he deserved more screen time and his reveal as being a "Traitor" should've been done later.
Pretty much all of Discovery would do better with more time. Lorca would have been more fun to have around longer, MU longer, longer Klingon War. Though, personally I would skip the stupid time jump.
I only disagree with the term "grimdark." It's tragic what happened to the Federation but it is trying to rebuild itself. It's the opposite of bleak.
I only disagree with the term "grimdark." It's tragic what happened to the Federation but it is trying to rebuild itself. It's the opposite of bleak.
To add to this, it's worth remembering that what the Dominion was evolved heavily over the course of Season 2, and during the break between Season 2 and 3.
The original Dominion concept was of being the "anti-Federation". Federation in scope (or larger), comprised of many species, but run like the mafia. You joined, you did what the Founders said, and if you didn't they sent their enforces after you. This is why in Season 2 you saw new species that were part of the Dominion, but you really didn't see that in Season 3 when the Dominion became almost exclusively the Vorta, the Founders, the Jem'Hadar, and alter the Cardassians and the Breen. But at the core of the of the original concept was that the Dominion was a dark mirror of the Federation - comprised of hundreds of species acting in concert, which was (at the time) very new for Star Trek as every adversary up to that point had been a monolithic alien culture.... you know, the Klingons, the Romulans, the Cardassians, the Borg. A "race" was the enemy. Not so with the Dominion. A key part of the creators vision was that it would emphatically not be that. Even the name is a give away to this vision. "Federation" implies mutual cooperation. "Dominion" implies a ruled domain of subcomponents, but still small parts leading to a greater whole.
The Founders being Odo's race was envisioned between Seasons 2 and 3. In Season 2, there was no inkling who the Founders were. That was along with the Vorta losing their telekinetic abilities and Jem Hadar attack ships being depowered compared to their first appearance. The Dominion becoming a mostly 3 race enterprise instead of a vast anti-Federation dark mirror came then as well. The Dominon being long aware of the Federation, which came at the start of Season 3, likely was a hold over of those early ideas.
Why? Lots of reasons. Part of it was to bring Odo's story closer to the core story of the show, which abandoned the early hints about his origins in Season 1 and 2. Part of it was budgetary. DS9's aliens were extremely expensive compared to TNG or Voyager owing to the number and diversity. To offer an example, a single Cardassian extra required two make-up artists 3-4 hours to prepare, and cost the show $3000 a day. Now extrapolate that to the Dominion having tens of species in a given episode, on top of the aliens normally milling around DS9.
But I still think the original idea of a "Dark Federation" or "Alternative Federation" out there in the galaxy is worth doing. There are vast swathes of the galaxy unexplored that should be home to Federation-like organizations (perhaps even in scale) and anti-Federations . The Dominion wasn't the Gamma quadrant in the 24th century. It wa, perhaps, a fifth the beta quadrant. And the Borg controlled about third to half the Delta Quadrant. much of the Beta Quadrant beyond the Klingon empire and Alpha Quadrant beyond Breen Space is entirely unexplored.
So when looking at those 32nd century ships the first time, sure some of them with their saucer shapes show traditional Federation design going back to the NX-01. Both others, like the USS Nog, I can't help but speculate "did the Federation absorb some other major spacefaring design tradition?". It would be cool, I think, if "tall ships" like the USS Nog's clas came as a result of the Federation merging with a near-peer in some part of Galaxy unknown in the 24th century. That way it shows that as the Federation spread over 1000 years, it changed far beyond what we saw by the late 24th, which by the 32nd century, would be the dawn years.
I sympathetic to wanting to see the Federation at the height of it's powers and reach, but be aware where it lead: the Temporal Cold War, which lead directly to the Temporal War. And the war, which they won, still basically destroyed the Federation.
My thought on the Temporal War based on Enterprise and Discovery was that by the 30th century, the Federation has become so powerful that the only way to defeat it (because it's vast scale invited challenge and was an existential threat to other powers) was to try and erase it from existence via manipulating time, which various groups attempted to do.
As we learned in Season 3, the Federation spent most of the 30th century fighting the war, and as we saw in Enterprise, the war was devastating. Still, the Federation won and time travel was outlawed on a galactic scale. But resources, already stretched thin, were drying up, and within a decade of winning the war (more or less), the Burn happened. And the Federation never recovered. It spent 80 years trying to recover, and then the decades after retreating to 35 worlds barely in touch with it.
Seeing the Federation at its peak would be really watching a tragedy. It's be like watching Season 1 of Game of Thrones when you know it leads to pretty much everyone dying and much of what exists being destroyed within a relatively short period of time. I think the more interesting period would be the "Age of Expansion", as I like to call it. In my head, between the 26th century and 29th century, the Federation expanded relentlessly and pushed the boundries of exploration. A large part of that was because of a 300 year "long peace" between their last major war in the 25th century and the start of the Temporal Cold War. In canon, Star Trek already has this: the 74 year "long peace" that began at Khitomer in 2293 and ended with the Battle of Wolf 359 in 2367 allowed for the Federation to advance it's technologies, explore and expand widely, and shift from a joint exploration-security mission to an almost entirely exploratory one, to the point that families started to be put on even Miranda class starships by the 2360s, and the Galaxy class was designed around it. That peace was punctuated by the Tomed Incident, the Enterprise-C incident, the minor conflict with the Tzenkethi, and the Cardassian border wars (which sound much more like infrequent skirmishes).
Now imagine of that peace was 300 years long, how far the Federation can go. With no Borg, and the Dominion being at the very fringe of the galaxy, they could do almost anything.
As I wrote in my last post on this, I think in-universe, the Dominion War is the essential catalyst to this. Within the Gamma Quadrant, the Dominion is now influenced by Odo and just, very far away. Within the Alpha Quadrant, by 2390, the Klingons would just be recovering per Sloan's prediction, but they're allies of the Federation (and destined to join per-Enterprise); the Romulans Star Empire is no more thanks to Hobus (dumb luck on the Federation's part); the Cardassian Empire is no more and will take generations to recover thanks to the genocide by the Dominion, and the Breen surrendered. Even insular and burned by the Attack on Mars, the Federation stands apart as the clear victor of the Dominion War, with all of it's potential rivals either severely weakened or friendly with them. Can there be a clearer path to a good century ahead?
Of course we know in the 25th and 26th century the Federation comes into conflict with the Sphere builders, in what I think is probably the last major war the Federation faces until the 30th. But they used to the 25th and 26th centuries to get into a position to be able to build ships like the Enterprise-J, that by the 30th century would be antiques.
Doug Drexler (i think) used to say that Star Trek is best viewed as a period piece. I wholly agree with that POV. And from that POV, almost everything we've seen in Star Trek pre-Discovery S3, excluding Voyager's Temporal Cold War stuff and Voyager's USS Relativity stuff, is just a lead up to the Dominion War and defeat of the Borg which, by virtue of winning both, "made" the Federation from a regional power into a galactic-scale power. Even the conflict with the Klingon's in the 22nd century, through that lense, would just be a prologue to the alliance that won the war, eventually leading to a merging and eventually hundreds of years of peace and prosperity.
Part of Time Travel is using it to fix the past or future, and once you include Time Travel tech, you can start changing the future since not everything is set in stone.
And one of the things that doesn't sit well with me is the abandonment of Time Travel tech including the Galactic Wide Ban. How would you enforce such a ban if a rogue party has Time Travel tech and you don't?
They could easily screw you over if you don't have the ability to Time Travel yourself.
So enforcing Time Travel and policing it would be a critical eternity wide responsibility well into the end of time where Time Travel is HEAVILY regulated for Educational and Good purposes.
Not for misuse or gross increases of power, affluence, wealth, etc.
The whole point of Star Trek is to explore, putting a ban on Time Travel seems to be the antithesis of exploring all boundaries of Space-Time.
Yes, using Time Travel to protect your own time-line and to prevent mis-use is critical.
We don't want to get lacksidasical like "Legends of Tomorrow" and turn into a comedy.
But there are plenty of ways of using Time Travel for the greater good without screwing things up for the better.
Imagine using Time Travel to save lives, prevent point-less deaths.
Imagine Homicide/Murder becoming a thing of the past.
Mass Terrorist attacks become preventable and avoiding the lost of life.
Incidents that trigger wars can be prevented, avoiding to massive loss of life.
Banning Time Travel tech would prevent alot of good that could be done with said tech, even with the adversaries that the UFP were dealing with.
Time travel is never good.
It is also a veritable Pandora's box in terms of implications and lack of use whenever it's convenient to the plot. Honestly, I think maybe two or three time travel stories really worked for me. The rest just is a means to an end to good Star Trek.
To each, their own.
I also enjoy watching "DC's Legends of Tomorrow", despite having more Plot Holes than Swiss Cheese.
What appeals?
I think seeing a 'Dark Federation' in the show is a real possibility. The mention of Deep Space 253 and how it was cooperating with Chain seemed to imply that there were other factions of Starfleet out there following their own agendas. Knowing how Starfleet Admirals can be, it's probable that there is at least one out there who went all heart of darkness and turned all the Starfleet assets and Federation territory they were in charge of into a little fiefdom.
As for Federation ships, I think it's more that they diversified the designs due to experimenting with different propulsion methods and hull configurations to support those methods.
I won't speak for @KamenRiderBlade but I love that I can *never* guess what's going to happen next and I really like the characters.
The character interactions, the familial like bonds, the rotating cast of characters every season where some leave and some stay which drastically change the dynamic, the fact that it isn't ever predictable despite being a Time Travel show, the expanded DC EU where normally B-Rated Super Heroes & some villains gets to be part of the main cast.
So normally a character like "Black Canary" wouldn't get her own show, but in DC's Legends of Tomorrow, she is the lead of the show.
Was more curious about the appeal of time travel stories but fair enough.
Time Travel allows you to explore the Past, Present, & Future in Legends of Tomorrow.
Hell they even get to go to space and go onto Alien Planets every now and then.
Strange...if only other shows went to alien planets without time travel.
The Alien Planet travel isn't the primary focus, it's just a side bonus.
The Time travel is the primary focus.
I disagree (sort of) - the primary focus is the characters. This may be splitting hairs, but my hubby often says there are plot-driven shows and character-driven shows. There is certainly crossover, but this is kind of a "primary thrust" thing. I tend to like character-driven stuff and will forgive plot holes, as long as they aren't bad enough to take me out of my suspension of disbelief while watching. My hubby isn't quite as forgiving.
The first season of Legends was very focused on the time travel. IMO, it was also a bit of a mess. I think focusing on the "band of misfits who become family" has worked much better.
OTOH, I also love Doctor Who, so time travel is okay by me.
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