Season 4 title sequence - has anyone else noticed...

[Sakonna]

What on earth do Craft and Book have in common?

They're both cast with charismatic Black leading men of the exact same age, both characters are lone wolves making their own way through a dystopian universe, both are utilized by the show as romantic leads and sexy eye candy, and both served as our introductory character to situate us after a 1,000 year time jump.

They're completely different characters with different backgrounds, character arcs, and motivations.

Yes, that would be where the revision I mentioned comes in.

 

[Sci]

You do know the meaning of "first draft"?

Yes, and it's not this.

1000 years in a dystopian future.

Is the future in "Calypso" dystopian? All we know about it is that the Discovery has been alone for a thousand years and Craft is from a world with a history of conflict with the polity the Federation eventually became. That's not dystopian in any meaningful sense.

People have forgotten their past.
V'draysh.

Who's to say Craft's world forgot their past? It's entirely possible the people of Alcor IV know full well that the culture they call "V'draysh" was or is still more accurately called the Federation. The fact that he's not familiar with millennia-old MGM musicals does not necessarily mean they've "forgotten their past."

They're both cast with charismatic Black leading men of the exact same age,

... so the fact they're both mid-30s black men makes them just variations on the same character?

both characters are lone wolves making their own way through a dystopian universe,

Craft is a married soldier who left his wife and child back home to fight a war against the V'draysh. Book is a single empath who left his home out of disgust at their Faustian bargain with the Emerald Chain and spent his time trying to help endangered animals, and he is now aligned with the Federation. Their goals and emotional journeys are completely different.

both are utilized by the show as romantic leads and sexy eye candy,

Incredibly tenuous parallels.

and both served as our introductory character to situate us after a 1,000 year time jump.

Again, that is an incredibly tenuous parallel. Any character the respective narratives introduce would be an "introductory character to situate us." Book's story extends far past "situating us" into the future, and Craft's is over within 30 minutes.

Yes, that would be where the revision I mentioned comes in.

It's not just a revision. They're fundamentally different characters. The only thing they have in common is being black.

 

[Sakonna]

... so the fact they're both mid-30s black men makes them just variations on the same character?

No, of course not.

Craft is a married soldier who left his wife and child back home to fight a war against the V'draysh. Book is a single empath who left his home out of disgust at their Faustian bargain with the Emerald Chain and spent his time trying to help endangered animals, and he is now aligned with the Federation. Their goals and emotional journeys are completely different.

Yes, of course. Obviously they're very different, and maybe I missed a post but I don't think anyone ever claimed otherwise.

Though your paragraph reminds me of another similarity between them I'd previously forgotten -- they are both characters who ended up as lone wolves by leaving their homes to fight for idealistic values against oppressive forces.

Any character the respective narratives introduce would be an "introductory character to situate us." Book's story extends far past "situating us" into the future, and Craft's is over within 30 minutes.

Yes, of course.

It's not just a revision.

Maybe you have a different interpretation of "revision" than I do. I think revisions can include both small changes and massive ones. Sometimes you may revise something so extensively that the final product bears no resemblance to your original idea, but that doesn't mean the final product is no longer a revision of the original idea. And sometimes just enough is left from the original idea that you can still see the line between them, as with Craft & Book.

They're fundamentally different characters.

Yes, of course. Fundamentally different characters that represent two attempts to introduce the new romantic leading man that they (wisely) decided to bring onto the show with Disco's jump to the future.

The only thing they have in common is being black.

And the other similarities already outlined.

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

No, it is the anomaly itself that is supposed to be an analogy for the pandemic.

I can't see a single thing about the anomaly arc to back up their claims.

 

[Sci]

Though your paragraph reminds me of another similarity between them I'd previously forgotten -- they are both characters who ended up as lone wolves by leaving their homes to fight for idealistic values against oppressive forces.

... no, they're not. Craft does not end up as "a lone wolf leaving his home to fight for idealistic values against oppressive forces." Craft leaves home to fight in a war for ten years, then tries to escape the war. That's very different. He's a refugee, not a "lone wolf fighting for what's right."

Maybe you have a different interpretation of "revision" than I do. I think revisions can include both small changes and massive ones.

I would expect there to be a common starting point, and I just don't see it.

 

[Tim Thomason]

Craft is just Odysseus with the serial numbers shaved off.

I will note that both Craft and Book specifically concealed their real names.

 

[Sci]

Craft is just Odysseus with the serial numbers shaved off.

I think that's a fair argument. Craft is certainly part of a long tradition of characters in Western fiction who are inspired at least in part by Odysseus and his journey home from war.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I do have faith that the showrunners could find a decent way to make "Calypso" fit, but I don't expect them to do so.

I mean, "Calypso" IS just a Short Trek, and it would seem that Short Treks aren't really that important anymore. So we shouldn't be surprised if this is just another plot point that got tossed aside because of all the changes in whoever's in charge.

That said, here's how I personally think this could all go down:

Spoiler

It's all in Zora's head. She imagined the whole thing.

 

[JoaquinSlowly]

Calypso’s relationship to the current status quo came up in the thread about whether or not this might be Disco’s last season. ‪‪I mentioned there that both Kurtzman and Paradise have mentioned it a while back, as they continue to add elements to the Sphere Data from Calypso this season.

Re: Calypso’s place in the timeline relative to now, and whether or not it’s been abandoned/ignored/retconned, from an interview with Michelle Paradise at Inverse while they were filming the first part of Season 4, back last January when Season 3 had just finished airing.

Calypso has now become part of our canon, and it takes place far beyond our time now even, in Season Three. And yeah, eventually we’ll have to find our way there. So that short, in the grand scheme of things, fits together as a piece. In certainly in Season Three, we were beginning that process with Zora — who isn’t quite the Zora we saw in Calypso — but we were getting that process started a little bit of her sparking to life in episode Four, and then coming in and having a bit more of a presence in Twelve and Thirteen. So, we’re starting our way there.

Around the same time Alex Kurtzman and series director Olatunde Osunsanmi were interviewed for the Blerd Gurl Podcast where Kurtzman spoke about connecting the show to Calypso as well.

We definitely knew that we wanted to connect Calypso to Discovery. And, obviously, we did because we did it in Calypso. Calypso ends with a big open mystery, which is: how did how did this voice end up on the ship and why is the ship empty? So we have a lot to answer there. We love connecting Discovery to the trek to the Short Treks.

Given that since the start of the new season, with the Sphere Data/Discovery Computer calling itself Zora, they’ve further connected themselves to Calypso, ‪‪I don’t think there’s any indication it’s been retconned.

And as to the discrepency between the pre upgrade look of the Discovery in Calypso and its current status, currently my best guess/explanation is it reverted back, at least in appearance, by utilizing programmable matter.