Spoilers R rated content - what does it add?

[Greg Cox]

I have no issue with characters swearing, but they should be professional enough not to do it on the job unless there are no superiors around and you're really comfortable with everyone in your company.

And let it be noted that the one instance we've seen had Tilly looking slightly embarrassed at her lapse, and her supervisor letting it slide because the three of them were having a moment. It's not as though people on the bridge are swearing all over the place every time they go to Red Alert.

It's one thing to have "professional" standards. It's another thing to expect our characters to be perfectly cool and professional at all times. STAR TREK is not about perfect people who always behave impeccably. It's about flesh-and-blood human beings who react emotionally sometimes.

(Pretty sure that if they filmed "The Corbomite Maneuver" or "Balance of Terror" today, there'd be some harsh language amidst the more emotional outbursts.)

 

[JirinPanthosa]

It's one thing to have "professional" standards. It's another thing to expect our characters to be perfectly cool and professional at all times. STAR TREK is not about perfect people who always behave impeccably.

Not this Trek, at least.

I don't think you have to be perfect to restrain yourself at work. I do my share of swearing but I can control myself in front of my boss even when I'm emotional.

I suppose Lorca has created a culture of strict utilitarianism where everyone knows nobody gives a damn about your language.

 

[MacLeod]

Then there was the excruciatingly poorly delivered F-Bomb that felt so unnecessary and was there simply for the shock value. Finally we now have naked Klingon breasts and Klingon sex/rape scenes.

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An F-Bomb is hardly enough to warrent a high rating but then again I seem to recall that the film "The King's Speech" which has a minute or so long F-Bomb scene paassed with a 12A certificate in the UK whilst the same cut got an R rating in the US (there was a PG-13 cut in the US with some of the profonity removed I believe)

But I haven't scene anything that would warrent anything higher than a 15 certificate in the UK.

 

[Refuge]

Not this Trek, at least.

I don't think you have to be perfect to restrain yourself at work. I do my share of swearing but I can control myself in front of my boss even when I'm emotional.

I suppose Lorca has created a culture of strict utilitarianism where everyone knows nobody gives a damn about your language.

See I think the use of a random swear moment actually has made it more unrealistic. With all that crew, across the range of emotional stresses, the highs and lows, and we have one jarring example of excited swearing. Yet not a peep from anyone else before or after Tilly and Stamets. The writers opened that door. Does that mean we necessarily want them to swear all the time? That's up to the viewer but in a Star Trek world without swearing you just go with it. However this so-called realistic model is not one where the language incorporates swearing organically either. It's the same Star Trek world we've always had but with two naughty words thrown in. That's it. They were a box to tick.

 

[RuthlessNate]

It adds realism. You don't like it, you don't think it's needed, i get that, but for the rest of us, that is what it adds and we appreciate it.

See, it doesn't really bother me, per se. I'm still enjoying the show. It just kind makes me wonder why they felt it was necessary in these few instances. Like I said, 99% of the time, it's not worse than PG-13. They could show slightly less gore, made Tilly say "This is really damn cool" or something instead of "fucking cool," and just edited the sexual assault flashback to not show frontal nudity (plenty of sex scenes show no frontal nudity), and nothing would have really changed, other than the rating. It doesn't really punctuate the realism of it to me because they're so rare and they don't really serve a major purpose. If these were more regular occurrences, I wouldn't bat an eye. But because these instances are so rare in the overall show, they really stand out and make me wonder why the producers felt they were necessary. It just makes me wonder what the point is of peppering these things in.

 

[Greg Cox]

"Who the hell are you?"-- Odo's very first line on DS9. Which served to establish his gruff, no-nonsense personality.

"That's fucking cool."--Yeah, that sounds like something Tilly might blurt out. Fits her character.

There is not (and shouldn't be) some one-size-fits-all rule for how Star Trek characters ought to talk. Lord knows Spock and McCoy and Scotty had very different speech patterns. So it stands to reason that some characters would be more likely to swear than others.

As for behaving "professionally" at all times: again, remember that young crewman who briefly snapped under pressure in "The Corbomite Maneuver"? Or Kirk and McCoy clashing in the same ep? Or the time that Uhura snapped at Kirk in "The Naked Time," then apologized afterwards? Starfleet officers are human beings, not robots; they aren't "professional" twenty-four-seven.

Nowadays that stressed-out ensign in "Corbomite" might well say something like "What's the fucking use? We're screwed!"

And that would be fine.

 

[EnderAKH]

See, it doesn't really bother me, per se. I'm still enjoying the show. It just kind makes me wonder why they felt it was necessary in these few instances. Like I said, 99% of the time, it's not worse than PG-13. They could show slightly less gore, made Tilly say "This is really damn cool" or something instead of "fucking cool," and just edited the sexual assault flashback to not show frontal nudity (plenty of sex scenes show no frontal nudity), and nothing would have really changed, other than the rating. It doesn't really punctuate the realism of it to me because they're so rare and they don't really serve a major purpose. If these were more regular occurrences, I wouldn't bat an eye. But because these instances are so rare in the overall show, they really stand out and make me wonder why the producers felt they were necessary. It just makes me wonder what the point is of peppering these things in.

You want the honest answer? Because CBS All-Access asked them to. When they green lit The Good Fight, a spinoff from The Good Wife, All Access specifically asked them to include adult elements to justify why it is on the streaming platform versus the network. And so, at the 20 minute mark, just before the opening credits, Diane's line is "Fuck." I would almost guarantee a similar situation here. If you want a Star Trek show, it is going to be on All Access, and if it is going to be on All Access, it has to have a reason. I think the writers and producers are doing an excellent job in weaving the requested content in, so it doesn't bother me at all. But that is most likely why it HAS to be there.

 

[Vger23]

There is not (and shouldn't be) some one-size-fits-all rule for how Star Trek characters ought to talk. Lord knows Spock and McCoy and Scotty had very different speech patterns. So it stands to reason that some characters would be more likely to swear than others.

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It's funny, but it's one of the things that really shatters my "suspension of disbelief" when I watch the Berman-era Treks nowadays. Nearly all the Starfleet characters have the same kind of speech patterns (or at least it seems to me, which is I guess all that matters). They all talk very much the same, regardless of the series. It's especially evident in the action / battle scenes...they all have that same exact generic cadence between them.

As the bulkheads collapse and sparks fly
"Shields at 60%"
And a console explodes
"Re-routing primary intercoolers through secondary compensators"
And a person catches fire and dies in the background
"Return fire! Come to course 316 mark 4!"
Then a Horta beams aboard and melts someone
"Transferring controls to manual!"

It's really very bad. One of the worst examples is Picard and Worf in the shuttle trying to recover Data in INS. Just that unflappable, geeky, overly professional, "Trek tone..." It not only saps the excitement and kenetic energy from a scene, but it's completely generic. Almost literally every characters talks in the exact same manner in every series from that era. The dialogue could be spoken by any of the actors and it would sound exactly the same.

 

[Greg Cox]

^ Which is not something you can really say of TOS . . . or DISCOVERY at its best.

To be fair, most of the time Deanna did not talk like Worf, and Odo did not sound like Quark. Ditto for the EMH, Seven of Nine, etc. Maybe not when spewing technobabble, but most of the latter-day Trek characters had their own distinctive voices and personalities. Kes was certainly not as glib and flippant as Paris, or as cranky as B'Elanna, or as acerbic as the EMH, etc.

And, just to stay OT, I can certainly see B'Elanna swearing at a stubborn relay--in English and Klingon.

And Neelix might have been more tolerable if he'd been more foul-mouthed and "unprofessional."

 

[Ovation]

Although you can argue in Star Trek, you don't want people to act like real people, you want people to be principled and morally driven.

You can, but I wouldn’t—cause I don’t. I prefer characters who behave like real people and one of the reasons I enjoy both the Kelvinverse and DSC almost as much as TOS is because they offer “real people” for the first time since TOS.

 

[Greg Cox]

You can, but I wouldn’t—cause I don’t. I prefer characters who behave like real people and one of the reasons I enjoy both the Kelvinverse and DSC almost as much as TOS is because they offer “real people” for the first time since TOS.

And, for the record, you can be principled and morally driven and still say "fuck" a lot.

 

[Refuge]

And, for the record, you can be principled and morally driven and still say "fuck" a lot.

Or you can be non-morally driven and still say 'fucken' twice like Discovery

 

[ralfy]

And make it sound as if you're part of a group giving a presentation in high school.

 

[Greg Cox]

Meanwhile, CRAZY EX-GIRLFRIEND did an entire musical production number about penises last night--on regular network TV no less--and people are freaking out about strong language on STAR TREK?

 

[Vger23]

Meanwhile, CRAZY EX-GIRLFRIEND did an entire musical production number about penises last night--on regular network TV no less--and people are freaking out about strong language on STAR TREK?

But Star Trek must be held to a HIGHER STANDARD!!!!11!1!

 

[fireproof78]

But Star Trek must be held to a HIGHER STANDARD!!!!11!1!

#notrealStarTrek
#notmyStarTrek

 

[Crazy Eddie]

True anecdote, we gave Who another chance at family viewing earlier in the year...within five minutes, a little boy was dying in the Thames, and the Doctor didn’t save him. Was more worried about his Sonic. Off went the TV and I ended up relating the story later with a few necessary edits.

This is what baffles me about you selective outrage: for some reason you didn't turn off the TV when the Toclafane disembowled the reporter who caught on to the Master's false identity? She was screaming in agony for, like, five minutes. Hell, you didn't turn off the TV when the Doctor DELIBERATELY set off the volcano that destroyed Pompei? Capaldi was in that one too!

Your standards are arbitrary and weird, but somehow given what you've described about yourself this isn't really surprising.

Who forgot the bit where the Dragons are fought, the Battle won, and everything is OK in the end...and where children aren’t a shortcut for a narrative showing how terrible things are by having a few get offed.

"The skies are made of diamonds..."

 

[Smoked Salmon]

I'm curious: Why did you frame your OP as a question when it's obvious you've already made up your mind on the subject? Were you just looking for the "right" answer?

Shocking as this may be for you, I was looking to see how many thought similar to myself. I felt a question was a more diplomatic way of having the discussion, rather than making declarations, which tends to make people more combative. But you’ve just proven that there will always be someone waiting to give you shit no matter how diplomatic and non confrontational you try to be, so maybe I shouldn’t have bothered!

 

[Vger23]

Or you can be non-morally driven and still say 'fucken' twice like Discovery

I'd love to hear how, especially in the context of what is happening in that scene, you'd define Tilly or Stamets as "non-morally driven."

 

[Refuge]

Discovery is a war driven show.