Jason Isaacs speaks about Star Trek

[Phoenix219]

So Bakula was a beloved sci fi cult actor aready, which gave him a pass.... while martin-greene is less established and has played less iconic roles. Anything more than that is reaching - the visual aesthetics have been more jarring for a TOS inspired show than anything else. Behind the scenes drama and mid-course story veers and corrections haven't helped.... Enterprise at least, knew what it was trying to be from the beginning....

 

[The Wormhole]

Enterprise at least, knew what it was trying to be from the beginning....

Did it though? UPN rejected Berman and Braga's original pitch of being Earth centric about the development and building of Earth's first warp starship, and when the series was pitched as a more "traditional" Star Trek about a starship's adventures, UPN still wasn't sold on the prequel concept and forced the Temporal Cold War onto the show to give it "forward momentum." Then by the third season Enterprise abandoned its premise for the first two seasons to go with a season-long arc about defending Earth, and finally in the fourth season it just turned into a fanwank fest.

We're already seeing something similar with Disco, with the original proposal of a seasonal anthology show rejected, and by the third season the show's premise is radically restructured.

 

[Phoenix219]

ENT never swerved mid-season, and was planned out well before going into filming stages. Network interference is different then the constantly changing showrunners and writers involved in the chaos of both years of Discovery. YMMV.

 

[cooleddie74]

ENT was imperfect but DSC has been a far bigger creative mess both in front of the camera and behind the scenes. UPN and Berman and Braga gave fans their share of headaches and the suits became too meddlesome for both their good and ours but the drama behind closed doors at DSC is pretty unprecedented in the history of a Trek series so far as we know.

 

[Alan Roi]

ENT was imperfect but DSC has been a far bigger creative mess both in front of the camera and behind the scenes. UPN and Berman and Braga gave fans their share of headaches and the suits became too meddlesome for both their good and ours but the drama behind closed doors at DSC is pretty unprecedented in the history of a Trek series so far as we know.

I don't think the drama behind closed doors at DSC over the first 29eps is any worse than the Roddenberry years of TNG or the various things that went down behind the scenes of VOY, among them Ron Moore's and Michael Pillar's resignations.

 

[cooleddie74]

Eh. At least the other series didn't have to deal with internecine copyright and IP issues, the "25% different" bullshit and changing directions midstream in a season because the fans were vocally upset about what they were seeing.

 

[Alan Roi]

Eh. At least the other series didn't have to deal with internecine copyright and IP issues, the "25% different" bullshit and changing directions midstream in a season because the fans were vocally upset about what they were seeing.

Exactly when do you imagine Disco changed midstream in a season? There's no more evidence of that than the 25% BS

 

[Phoenix219]

A few episodes into Season 2 there is a very obvious change in tone, plot, characterization, etc, that culminates in making the whole season basically nonsense, and derails the "mystery box" nature of the plot. None of the mysteries or reveals add up to anything coherent, and the questions posed early on are never dealt with again as the plot switches gears to Evil AI (TM)

 

[DarthTimon]

A few episodes into Season 2 there is a very obvious change in tone, plot, characterization, etc, that culminates in making the whole season basically nonsense, and derails the "mystery box" nature of the plot. None of the mysteries or reveals add up to anything coherent, and the questions posed early on are never dealt with again as the plot switches gears to Evil AI (TM)

Gonna have to disagree. You have your interpretation, which is fine, but not one that I share.

 

[BillJ]

...but the drama behind closed doors at DSC is pretty unprecedented in the history of a Trek series so far as we know.

TNG season one was pretty rough behind the scenes. I recommend the documentary Chaos on the Bridge.

 

[cooleddie74]

That is true. No argument there.

 

[F. King Daniel]

ENT was imperfect but DSC has been a far bigger creative mess both in front of the camera and behind the scenes. UPN and Berman and Braga gave fans their share of headaches and the suits became too meddlesome for both their good and ours but the drama behind closed doors at DSC is pretty unprecedented in the history of a Trek series so far as we know.

Watch Chaos on the Bridge to see what a mess Next Gen was behind the scenes. It's close and Disco may overtake it, but if so only just.

EDIT: Ninja'd by @King Bob!

 

[Alan Roi]

A few episodes into Season 2 there is a very obvious change in tone, plot, characterization, etc, that culminates in making the whole season basically nonsense, and derails the "mystery box" nature of the plot. None of the mysteries or reveals add up to anything coherent, and the questions posed early on are never dealt with again as the plot switches gears to Evil AI (TM)

Exactly what questions early on are 'never dealt with again' according to you?

 

[Jayson1]

Let's not forget it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows, behind the scenes of TOS either. Still I think "Discovery" might be the worst in that with TOS and TNG even though Roddenberry could be crazy he did at least have a vision he was aiming for. "Voyager's" problem seemed to be from mostly the Mulgrew,Beltran and Harry Kim. Plus UPN. "Discovery" though turned into a shit show before even the first episode was made with Fuller, basically the guy with the vision for the show, being fired. Then you had the toxic showrunners and you got to wonder how much that has changed when you have the black writer being forced out for using the N word. I think that is why the show feels so corporate in how it is made. Like I am someone who does feel the show is made from a feminism gaze but that isn't a issue. Plenty of great shows have been made from that approach. Crazy-Ex-Girlfriend,Buffy,The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and so forth. But it has sort of being Feminism by the way of CBS suits, meaning a bunch a guys and ladies in fancy suits at CBS headquarters checking out twitter and crunching stats to see how to make that work IMO. It doesn't help the backer of the show who was in charge of CBS got kicked out for his #MeTo moment.

I think the show is okay because the cast is mostly talented and the special effects are great and even the writers are mostly okay. I do think you can see though the show has never really had a strong creative vision every since Fuller was fired and it's basically being flying by the seat of it's pants trying to sort of figure out what it wants to be and frankly not liking what it was so now is going to try and new angle by going to the distant future.


Jason

 

[gblews]

A few episodes into Season 2 there is a very obvious change in tone, plot, characterization, etc, that culminates in making the whole season basically nonsense, and derails the "mystery box" nature of the plot. None of the mysteries or reveals add up to anything coherent, and the questions posed early on are never dealt with again as the plot switches gears to Evil AI (TM)

Exactly what was it that happened "a few episodes" in (on screen) that changed the tone, plot, and characterization, in season 2, and how did it render the "mystery box' (whatever this is), and the whole season "nonsense?'

 

[Shaka Zulu]

Isaacs is incorrect, by the way. The first interracial kiss took place on television took place on UK screens in 1962. If you want America instead of the rest of the world, that's great. But he's still not quite right: Hyping up the 1968 Trek episode, which was a kiss induced by coercion - physical assault. I'm not sure how that's worthy of a trophy and glorifying?

Actually, he might be wrong about the kiss. Even before "I Spy"'s 1966 interracial kiss (Robert Culp, France Nuyen) there was arguably one or a few others...

A year before that kiss on Star Trek, there was one on an episode of The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour; Harry Belafonte kissed one of the Smothers on the cheek in a skit, IIRC.

 

[Blooded]

Eh. At least the other series didn't have to deal with internecine copyright and IP issues, the "25% different" bullshit and changing directions midstream in a season because the fans were vocally upset about what they were seeing.

Just to clarify, they NEVER changed course mid-season due to fan feedback on what was already airing.

They were filming the season one finale when the first episode aired, and Season 2 was in a very similar position, if I recall.

 

[Shaka Zulu]

Watch Chaos on the Bridge to see what a mess Next Gen was behind the scenes. It's close and Disco may overtake it, but if so only just.

EDIT: Ninja'd by @King Bob!

Nothing on Discovery behind the scenes is like season one behind the scenes of TNG.

 

[cooleddie74]

Somewhat appropriate since TNG Season 1 may arguably be the single worst season of Trek in the history of the franchise. Any backstage drama and fighting clearly didn't help the quality of the series after it premiered.

 

[Alan Roi]

Somewhat appropriate since TNG Season 1 may arguably be the single worst season of Trek in the history of the franchise. Any backstage drama and fighting clearly didn't help the quality of the series after it premiered.

And yet the next 3 series also had bad first seasons.