so the producers and writers said that discovery will lead into TOS (60's aesthetics and all)...

[Jayson1]

In theory they don't need to fully embrace the 60's look so much as add a few more TOS looking design elements from time to time and sort of make it look like that a transition is going to happen only most of it will happen offscreen, once this show is over. Starters would be uniforms that use the same color scheme's, maybe have a bee hive haircut on some 60's looking haircuts on a few extra's in the background in a couple of season's, maybe a throwaway line about how the Augment disease is happening again on some Klingon colonies, which we can sort of imagine is something that will impact the entire race once again, even if none our characters of course will know about that.

Jason

 

[Mad Jack Wolfe]

For all those still trying to force DSC into the TOS mould, or TOS aesthetics into DSC...

You're welcome.

 

[Long Syntax]

In theory they don't need to fully embrace the 60's look so much as add a few more TOS looking design elements from time to time and sort of make it look like that a transition is going to happen only most of it will happen offscreen, once this show is over.

No, the current producers along with CBS do not have to come up with some convoluted aesthetic to shoehorn a 2017 production into a late 60's era budget with limited special effects ability (compared to today of course). There would be no other reason to do so other than to placate the neurosis of a relative few Star Trek fans.

Sorry guys / gals - but just like I'm never going to see the 5th season of Enterprise, the devolution into a 60's aesthetic will not happen.

 

[Jedman67]

I don't think anyone will like this post, and I hope I'm wrong about my conclusions.

I expect no resolution of how the Klingons look, the change of ships, why the Spore Drive isn't in use, why Spock never mentions Burnham.

Producers, show writers and showrunners telling us that everything will make sense and to just hold in has been a trope of TV production from the X-Files, modern BattleStar Galactica, Lost, FlashForward and many more.

In other words, none of what has been suggested will be resolved, will likely be resolved. No answers will be given this season. In reality, I suspect that whilst their knowledge of the franchise is far better than anyone gives them credit for, I think they have made this up as they go along with no end in sight.

One very clear indication of this is how the incredibly talented makeup, prosthetic guys repeatedly insist on throwing Fuller under a bus each time the Klingons are brought up. I think the two guys featured on After Trek are incredibly talented, but in almost every interview, the Klingon design gets laid at Fuller's door,

Fuller has become the fall guy for the Klingon design, and the only reason I can see you would do that is that you've been told to say that. Otherwise, it's incredibly bad form for what are very nice designs, if a little hard to get used to initially.

I suspect the Klingon issue is like the TOS aesthetic issue. It could all be resolved by calling this a reboot. They chose not to do this, but I don't think they've planned this out either. I'd be happier just saying that they revisualised things but now that overarching story points such as cloaking are not fitting, I'm no longer sure.

Mark my words - they will tell you that everything will be revealed and resolved next season.

Why do you need an explanation? it's a reboot. It's gonna be different. The only reason why they called it the "Prime Timeline" is to differentiate it from the Kelvin-Timeline. In actuality, it's a prequel/reboot that will do its own thing and try to fit in with previously established trek continuity only in the most basic sense.
Visuals? All new; we have NV or STC if we want to see the 60's trek again.
Storyline? All new; with only a few callbacks to TOS (thankfully).
Timeline? Well, there's a chance we can meet Captain Kirk and Commander Spock. I'd rather not, though. The best thing about Discovery is that its a new show.
CBS is treating it as a reboot. DSC is treating itself as a reboot. The best way to explain and resolve and reveal everything is to call it a fucking reboot!

 

[Cyrus]

There would no need to explain the klingon cloaking stuff. As implied from the latest episode starfleet will figure out how to bypass it, so it will become obsolete.

 

[Jayson1]

No, the current producers along with CBS do not have to come up with some convoluted aesthetic to shoehorn a 2017 production into a late 60's era budget with limited special effects ability (compared to today of course). There would be no other reason to do so other than to placate the neurosis of a relative few Star Trek fans.

Sorry guys / gals - but just like I'm never going to see the 5th season of Enterprise, the devolution into a 60's aesthetic will not happen.

Of course they don't have to but it also means that we can't pretend that both shows are set in the same shared universe. They might follow the same canon in the same way Bruce Wayne's parents always get killed, basically the same way in each version of "Batman" you see but it doesn't mean that Micheal Keaton's Batman is the same guy as Val Kilmer's or Christian Bale or Adam West. The only way to do that is to either imply through easter eggs and maybe a few design or wardrobe changes that the 60's look is somehow going to happen or you go with a alternate universe within the prime universe.

Also it isn't even about old school fans having a neurosis because I think most people do like the show. It's only about HOW you like the show. A show that takes it's reboot setting as a means of having some nostigia isn't a bad thing. "Stranger Days" and the modern "Star Wars" feeds off of those feelings. Of course this doesn't matter much to younger fans who are to young to have those kinds of feelings but that is why you don't go into full 60's mode. You find a balance and you find ways to make old stuff look cool which is what things that go for a retro look are always trying to do. If you want to wear a some bell bottom pants then how do you do it and still make it look cool to people in 2017. I mean if you don't want to have fun with nostigia I am not sure why anyone would want to a prequel in the first place.

I mean the only other reason would be to focus on a already established character and show them at a earlier moment in their life but the show is all about a character and mostly new characters so that motive doesn't seem to apply. So you don't want to really have any fun with the old "TOS" show in regards to design and technolgy and the universe was kind of blank slate back then so you didn't have any real political thing that people have been dying to see. You also want to focus on new characters instead of old. Exactly what is the point of this specific setting anyways? It could have been done after the "TOS" movies or post "Voyager" or even post "Enterprise" since you would have a huge gap in time for all the tech to change but instead they went with basically the worst setting and it's the worst setting because your sharing a time period with a show that looks really dated and like nothing else in Trek. "TOS" should always sort of be off in it's own time period all by itself and not shared with other shows because they don't mix that well, naturally. MIght be a key reason why "TNG" was set 80 years in the future from the old show.

Jason

 

[Ronald Held]

The cloak will become obsolete by the 2260's, IMO.
Maybe Discovery was a testbed of tech that only likely gets incorporated into Starfleet? Uniforms are either old phasing out designs,or the Constitution class crew has special uniforms?

 

[Cinema Geekly]

They're not going to make a 21st century TV show look like it was made in the 1960s.

That is ridiculous.

They've already done it. Enterprise - In A Mirror, Darkly

Enterprise as a show isn't a spring chicken anymore but it was young enough to be shot and aired in HD and it's just a far removed from the 60's design as Discovery as far as what design aesthetics were when Enterprise aired (they haven't changed that much). They showed a TOS era bridge and the characters treated it like future technology (even if they took a shot at the style choices).

Trek is a mostly visual product so I'd argue that visual continuity is still important. I'm not saying it even has to be exact but they should get much closer to the actual look and feel over time. Everything that's old is new again and styles and designs fluctuate all the time.

 

[Tuskin38]

Good for them. It still won’t work in DSC.

 

[Jedman67]

The whole concept of an optical cloaking device makes little sense. Right now, astronomers can glean a lot of information of objects based on heat emission, radio wave emission, various types of electromagnetic signatures far more than actual optical recognition. Now of course, a starship is going to be considerably smaller than Mars or Europa, so even the best sensor sweep is going to have to be sensitive towards a starship-or smaller sized object.

In order to function, the cloak has to mask the optical signature, the electromagnetic signatures, warp/subspace displacement and all other emissions that another starships sensors are used to picking up.

They've already done it. Enterprise - In A Mirror, Darkly

Enterprise as a show isn't a spring chicken anymore but it was young enough to be shot and aired in HD and it's just a far removed from the 60's design as Discovery as far as what design aesthetics were when Enterprise aired (they haven't changed that much). They showed a TOS era bridge and the characters treated it like future technology (even if they took a shot at the style choices).

Trek is a mostly visual product so I'd argue that visual continuity is still important. I'm not saying it even has to be exact but they should get much closer to the actual look and feel over time. Everything that's old is new again and styles and designs fluctuate all the time.

That was a one-off two-part episode with a "guest" bridge. Sure it looked great for HD but its not something that can be revisited outside of a special; and frankly DSC doesn't want to connect to the "old" TOS.

 

[Arvis Taljik]

I am perfectly fine with Discovery "reinventing" the TOS aesthetic later into the series. I would definitely not consider TOS to look nor feel futuristic by today's standards in any way, shape or form.

I agree that there should be design CUES from TOS, but that's all. I'm also fine with them not touching TOS at all and just sticking with what they have as well.

 

[STR]

They've already done it. Enterprise - In A Mirror, Darkly

Enterprise as a show isn't a spring chicken anymore but it was young enough to be shot and aired in HD and it's just a far removed from the 60's design as Discovery as far as what design aesthetics were when Enterprise aired (they haven't changed that much). They showed a TOS era bridge and the characters treated it like future technology (even if they took a shot at the style choices).

That was one episode. One, single episode whose point was nostalgia and alt-reality fun. Audiences can suspend belief for that because the whole thing doesn't matter. It's pretty much a big campy joke that everyone is going along with for giggles. Archer dressing up in Kirk's shirt is meant to be absurd yet nostalgic. "Empress Hoshi" is a gag.

That is NOT the same thing as setting a whole dramatic series in some weird, cheap retro-future stuck in the 60's. It's cornball AF. Camp works for some things. It does not, however, work for the kinds of stories Trek has traditionally told and what the current writers are trying to tell.

 

[pst]

That was one episode. One, single episode whose point was nostalgia and alt-reality fun. Audiences can suspend belief for that because the whole thing doesn't matter. It's pretty much a big campy joke that everyone is going along with for giggles. Archer dressing up in Kirk's shirt is meant to be absurd yet nostalgic. "Empress Hoshi" is a gag.

That is NOT the same thing as setting a whole dramatic series in some weird, cheap retro-future stuck in the 60's. It's cornball AF. Camp works for some things. It does not, however, work for the kinds of stories Trek has traditionally told and what the current writers are trying to tell.

i watched that episode when it aired with someone who knew nothing about star trek. he thought it was terrible, did not understand that it was an homage. i have the feeling the same would be true of the wider audience today.

there's a reason the producers of discovery adopted (or coopted) the look of the kelvin timeline films: that's what most people associate with the franchise these days. they can inch closer to TOS, add some color to the displays, evolve the uniforms toward the more classic look, but there's no way discovery will slot into visual continuity with the original series the way the star wars prequels fitted with the classic trilogy, or rogue one lined up so beautifully with a new hope.

 

[Worf2DS9]

CBS is treating it as a reboot. DSC is treating itself as a reboot. The best way to explain and resolve and reveal everything is to call it a fucking reboot!

Um, if you say so. I haven't seen or heard anything that suggests anyone in an official capacity considers DSC an outright reboot, apart from its obvious visual upgrade. I suppose there are some out there who want to justify their dislike of the series by calling it a "reboot," and that's fine, but that doesn't make it one.

 

[F. King Daniel]

There would no need to explain the klingon cloaking stuff. As implied from the latest episode starfleet will figure out how to bypass it, so it will become obsolete.

The cloak will become obsolete by the 2260's, IMO.
Maybe Discovery was a testbed of tech that only likely gets incorporated into Starfleet? Uniforms are either old phasing out designs,or the Constitution class crew has special uniforms?

Except Spock explained that cloaking was only a "theoretical possibility" in TOS, and the Romulans having overcome the energy drain issue and making it a reality was a big deal. It was not something that had actually been developed and was in common use only 10 years before (or 100 years before, in the case of ENT)

 

[F. King Daniel]

Um, if you say so. I haven't seen or heard anything that suggests anyone in an official capacity considers DSC an outright reboot, apart from its obvious visual upgrade. I suppose there are some out there who want to justify their dislike of the series by calling it a "reboot," and that's fine, but that doesn't make it one.

It's not justifying a dislike, it's making sense of what's in front of you. It doesn't look like classic Trek. The characters don't act like it's classic Trek. The technology is directly at odds with classic Trek and Berman Trek. The story contradicts classic Trek.

It's a modern reimagined prequel. Aka, a Smallville or Gotham to the Superman movies or old Batman series.

 

[Jedman67]

Um, if you say so. I haven't seen or heard anything that suggests anyone in an official capacity considers DSC an outright reboot, apart from its obvious visual upgrade. I suppose there are some out there who want to justify their dislike of the series by calling it a "reboot," and that's fine, but that doesn't make it one.

They've called it a "reimagining" and "updated" and "new". So its a whole new modern trek show that more or less takes place in the same one from the 60's. There's a word for that, and it ends in "boot."
If the show even mentions the Augment virus I will be really upset.

 

[BillJ]

I suppose there are some out there who want to justify their dislike of the series by calling it a "reboot," and that's fine, but that doesn't make it one.

I'd probably like it more if the writers and CBS were treating it as a reboot. That way it would be possible to do something interesting with Sarek and Mudd and the Spore Drive and the Klingon War.

 

[Fandango831]

I could see what we now see as the Discovery look turning into something more colorful, lighter, and still maintaining a solid futuristic look as perceived from 2017 technology.
This:

Becomes this:

Edit: Ala something more TOS like.

 

[F. King Daniel]

I'd probably like it more if the writers and CBS were treating it as a reboot. That way it would be possible to do something interesting with Sarek and Mudd and the Spore Drive and the Klingon War.

The Mudd thing really reminds me of Smallville's finale, where...

Spoiler: Just in case anyone hasn't seen to the end

Lex Luthor has his memory wiped, erasing the entire rich backstory between himself and Clark so they can end synced up to the classic comics and movies. Because continuity.

Ugh.