I think it was an one point, but now? I have CBS All-Access, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime. Which is about $50 a month, and none of it works without an internet connection, which is another $60.
Eek! Who are you paying for your internet? I get fiber-optic from a local provider bundled in with my rent for just $30/mo.
(Of course, lots of other countries provide a much better value proposition for internet service than most of the US... it really should be regulated as a public utility these days... but I digress.)
That's exactly what worries me about this season. It feels more consistent than the first season, but that seems to be almost entirely because where season one was constantly smashing the accelerator and trying new things, even when it'd be better served by coasting a while and letting what it'd already done unfold naturally, season two is pumping the breaks, putting out a lot of crowd-pleasing fan-service to cram the show back to a late-Berman-era "TNG-lite" mold.
I don't really care whether the pace is fast or slow, so long as it serves the story being told. And, thankfully, in terms of
tone I don't see DSC hearkening back to late-Berman-style Trek so much as I do to TOS-style Trek... which is what I prefer (especially in a series that's a TOS prequel, after all!), so that's not a problem.
DSC doesn't necessarily need to be good to survive, just good enough to keep you from remembering to cancel your subscription, and while that kind of safety should be conducive to boldness and innovation, it doesn't seem to have been so far.
I wouldn't call DSC S1 a landmark of "boldness and innovation," unless by that term you mean the "throwing ideas at the wall" approach others have mentioned. IMHO S1 started shaky and improved through midseason, but then, in a fatal flaw for a show with only one season-long plot arc — well, two, if you count the MU as separate — it Completely. Failed. To. Nail. The. Landing. on either story arc, winding them up in ways that were not merely lackluster but were actual "idiot plots," with some random character assassination thrown in to boot.
If it had been a series finale, resolving things that badly would've tainted the whole show (like, say,
Lost or
Galactica). As it was only a season finale, there was a chance to bounce back. By comparison, S2 so far is a definite improvement.
However, one area where I think the show should take a look backwards towards the '90s (and, for the matter, towards the '60s) in its second season is in character scenes. Not even, like, whole unrelated b-plots, just a little downtime, like the TNG poker nights or something. ... They could uncram the plots a little bit just to give everyone a chance to sit with the problem, or even talk amongst themselves about stuff outside of work, without continously blasting through the episode like a bunch of ping-pong balls in a dryer.
Making the pace suit the story can be a tricky thing. The last thing I want to see are '90s/TNG style "character bits" that are completely extraneous to the actual plot. A better model to emulate would be something like, say,
Game of Thrones, which certainly has fast-paced, event-filled episodes, but also understands when and how to slow down for deeper character-focused scenes, and even entire episodes,
that are intimately connected to ongoing events. (One of my favorite episodes of
GoT ever, for instance, is the one in S4 that's mostly just about Tyrion and Jaime talking in Tyrion's cell while he awaits trial.)
I find the less they focus on the Klingons, the better STD seems to be doing.
Word. That's pretty much true for
every Trek series, actually, but even more so for DSC.
Casting aside my preconcieved notions and simply watching something for what it is has never failed me.
As I've mentioned before, though, "what it is" isn't some obvious given thing. It's very much in the eye of the beholder (especially for a show like DSC that's still trying to find its way), and deciding for yourself "what it is" in order to enjoy it may actually be something you
can't do without, dare I say, "preconceived notions."[/QUOTE]
