Spoilers Let’s talk about the destruction of Trek utopia…

I forgot Amok Time.

 

So did his parents, I guess. I suppose that might have made some amusing banter in the recovery room, though.

 

As an aside here, this also tells me Kirk never once bothered to read his XO’s personnel file. Kirk was a bad administrator.

 

half of it was probably classified above his paygrade

 

I’d anyone is interested in some good Star Trek YouTube’s I find Steve Shives’ Trek, Actually series and Jesse Gender’s Trek episode reviews quite insightful

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0-LSnSBNInfrr7MDRuXmfk1LJ_KjvaXt

https://www.youtube.com/user/lostrekkie

 

Hey, I love Sarek as much as the next person. I’ve often said the House of Sarek is to Trek as the Skywalker Clan is to Star Wars, but let’s be honest here, Sarek was not particularly good at the whole parenting...thing.

I would pay all the Latium in the quadrant for a Christmas Episode where the entire Sarek family: Sarek, Amanda, Spock, Sybok, Burnham all come home for the holiday and we get treated to an entire hour of awkward, passive-aggressive, dysfunctional family discussion done Vulcan style around the dinner table. That would pure comedy gold man...

 

Utopia Planitia sure got destroyed though.

Apropos the shipyard: One thing that did bother me was that in the late 24th century regular line workers still get shitty lunches.

 

they don't work to eat good food, they work to better themselves

 

Since you put it that way, it does make Picard sound communist in the worst stalinistic way.

 

What does that mean? /NogVoice

 

#GenesVision

 

that means I need your bars of latinum to buy my dad some bagels

 

Yup.

 

Seriously, what Picard described is Socialism. Socialism is NOT Communism.
(And no I don't believe the level of 24th Socialism as described by Picard would be sustainable even with replicators.)

 

To Improve Themselves - the new line of Lunchables from Oscar Meyer.
You should try it....

 

I am glad to have a show that does spend alot more time on the darker side than what we have seen before. It was always this case that this existed. DS9, in large part due to Quark, we got to see more of that than in previous shows, but this can be an even better, more sustained look. We will still have Jean Luc there to give moralizing speeches for those who want to hear them. But I find this a more interesting side that would be fertile ground for storytelling.

 

The setting was not supposed to be utopian, but the members of Starfleet out on the frontier were supposed to be from that utopian society. That is where the prime directive comes in. Kirk makes numerous comments about how the people of the Federation have evolved past a lot of the conflicts that they encounter.

And the series was based on a famous series of the day - Wagon Train. A great many of the story could have been written for that show instead. But really it was the concept of going different places and guest star of the week roles.

 

Kirk and Spock both note that humanity is savage as well. Kirk's comment "We are killers. But, we're not going to kill today."

Spock: "Savage, treacherous. The very flower of humanity." (referring to the Mirror Universe counterparts).

 

I think the reason why I can live with "Conspiracy" (TNG) so much better than "Stardust City Rag" (PIC) is

1. No obvious screaming of a rightened victim in agony
2. No torture allusions ("hey buddy")
3. No extreme close-ups of the gore
   
4. No human blood being splattered over the body
5. no pice-by-piece dismembering
   
6. Also - this is me personally - no eye gouging stuff

Yes, I think even "conspiracy" is on the extreme end for a family show (like, say, "First Contact" as well). But it stays within boundaries, because there is an additional layer of abstraction. The human evaporates pretty fast, the icky stuff is with an alien. PIC straight up felt like "Hostel". A movie which I saw, but have no desire to watch with family and friends.

I will live with that level of gore and continue to watch. But I sure as hell won't recommend it to people close to me.

 

Recommended always vary.