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Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 1x12 - "Vaulting Ambition"

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Discovery needs to remember Star Trek's original mission statement:
"Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before".
That was never Star Trek's mission statement. It doesn't even qualify as the Enterprise's mission statement. It's just a nice monologue from the opening credits.
 
There is no good word for it in the English language however. Sophontophagia perhaps?
Or sapiophagia. But, yeah, that's not a bad idea. And, you would think that, having discovered intelligent life besides one's own species, a norm would develop among some--but not necessarily all--that eating other such sapients/sophonts would be taboo, at least.

A lot of interesting implications could spin out of that one. Some species might not comply or not see what the problem is, thus spawning many arguments over "philosophical imperialism" or something similar. Humans, themselves, may be conflicted about such things. Some, on the Right, might say "Of course you don't eat other intelligent species!" Others, on the Left, might say "But we shouldn't impose our mores and cultural norms on others!"

Fun stuff. Well, grim stuff but fun thinking about the 2nd and 3rd order effects of trying to establish a norm amongst multiple intelligent species.
 
It seems counterintuitive, but there has to be one out of the infinity that works and this is that one.
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Yep. The Mirror universe is rediculous, BUT if there is anything to the Infinite Worlds hypothesis, than Douglas Adam's conjecture that in an infinite universe anything might happen, like a planet of mattresses seems workable for fiction. Though I hope they get done with it an leave for another couple of decades.
 
Yep absolutely agree. Section 31 stuff (which was hinted at) was dropped as well.
Mirror Universe arc seems like them retooling what they had to work with after the Fuller ideas were not working out after the first few episodes. (I would almost make a bet the Klingon makeup led to severe cutting back of Klingon War as well)

Hm you don't know if they dropped the link to Section31. Ha ha mabey Section31 in the MU sees the Terran empire as a threat and that could be reveald in next episodes. So Lorca could be still a Section31 agent. So agent Lorca kills the emporer an become the new emporer (to start a change for the better) an grant Discovery save exit to their own Univers. The producer of SD Aaron Harberts reveald that at the end of season 1 you will have the feeling of hope so this could be a senario.
 
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No worst than making Ensign Ro a court marshaled criminal when we first meet her or Riker a conspirator in an illegal plot to undermine a binding treaty or making Wesley complicit in the death of a fellow cadet.

The only difference is personally witness Burnham’s as falls from grace. We watch her crime firsthand. In any other Trek story we would have learned it all secondhand in flashback or via dramatic confession *after* we’d come to like the character. Here OTOH we walk with Michael step by step as she journeys down the long road to redemption.
There is no redemption, in my estimation. There is only a group of writers trying very hard to justify something they have absolutely no understanding of to tell a muddled story they really didn't think out very well.

But, that's just me and I freely admit others think differently. My career in the military and my continued work as a civil servant, of necessity, colours, informs, and shapes my judgement. In my eyes, she is completely unredeemable. At the very most, should she ever have her sentence commuted, she might be worthy of a warrant, considering she seems to be good at her specialty of xeno-anthropology. But never the captain's chair. Never have anyone under her command other than other specialists or lesser-ranked warrant officers. She is fatally flawed and I lay that entirely on the heads of a writers group who appear to have absolutely no understanding of how chains of command, esprit d'corps, or military (or, if you insist, quasi-military) structures actually work.
 
Point 2: I think the ISS Discovery does have the spore drive. It switched places with the USS Discovery afterall. Plus Stamets is on the flagship working on Spore tech; Straal is probably on the ISS Discovery working on the spore drive.

The emperor doesn't seem to have heard of a Dash drive, and Stamets is still in a lab not a starship, so I'd be surprised if the Terrans have the technology.

Section 31 stuff (which was hinted at) was dropped as well.

I'm not convinced it was ever 'hinted at'. The whole thing came from fans reading into the Discovery's registry number and the general darker tone - the idea that a super secret Starfleet organisation would label their ships and wear black badges is really pretty silly. I can't imagine that was ever the plan.

You're right, he did say that.

I'll offer one more point in support of body-swapping – because I still think that's likely the intent even though it's unclear what happened – and then shut up. If the Stametses (Stamaii?) did indeed switch bodies, that's setup for stuffing Prime!Culber's disembodied mind into MU!Culber's body, as people have been predicting would happen from the moment Tyler snapped Culber's neck.

It's the sort of heavy handed foreshadowing for a twist fans already predicted that this show loves to do.

For what it's worth I thought body swapping had gone on, in fact it didn't leave me in any doubt at all - if i hadn't read the comments here and it turned out they hadn't body swapped, I'd have been like "wtf?! Continuity, guys!"
 
He was her father figure who per the Emperor had watched her grow up...

That’s Woody Allen type shit there. It’s Predatory and oh yeah, I’ll take the Emperor over that any day

The use of 'grooming' was significant - and we are to judge by modern standards, it is damning (unless of course Georgiou misread her daughter's elopement?). But it also reminds me of court culture in the past - I was rather reminded of The Lion in Winter, and Henry II's reputed relationship with his mistress Alais, whom he's known since she was sent to England to be bethrothed to his son Richard. The opening scene sees them in fields, talking on this:

ALAIS I'm going to lose you, Henry, aren't I?
HENRY Alais, in my time I've known... contessas, milkmaids, courtesans... and novices, whores, gypsies, jades... and little boys, but nowhere in God's western world have I found anyone to love but you.
ALAIS And Rosamund?
HENRY She's dead.
ALAIS And Eleanor.
HENRY The new Medusa, my good wife?
ALAIS How is your queen?
HENRY Decaying, I suppose. No, don't be jealous of the Gorgon. She is not among the things I love. How many husbands do you know who dungeon up their wives? I haven't kept the great bitch in the keep for ten years out of passionate attachment.

Later on:

HENRY [Richard] can't help the pimples.
ALAIS. He could have a bath!
HENRY. It isn't such a dreadful thing to be queen of England. Not all eyes will weep for you.
ALAIS. Will yours?
HENRY. I don't know. Very likely.
ALAIS. All I want is not to lose you. Can't you hide me? Can't I simply disappear?
HENRY You know you can't. Your little brother Philip's. King of France now and he wants your wedding or your dowry back. I only took you for your dowry. You were seven. Two bi knees and two big eyes and that's all. How was I to know.
ALAIS Let Philip have the dowry back.

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It is very disturbing to modern eyes, although a wonderful brilliant play & the Peter O'Toole + Katharine Hepburn film is grand.
 
That means nothing. He would say that about any member of the cast.

She's terrible on Discovery. I don't know if it's her fault or if it's the writing/directing, but she's embarrassing herself.
Your opinion also means nothing and it is in the minority. Thanks for sharing your views.
 
Or sapiophagia. But, yeah, that's not a bad idea. And, you would think that, having discovered intelligent life besides one's own species, a norm would develop among some--but not necessarily all--that eating other such sapients/sophonts would be taboo, at least.

A lot of interesting implications could spin out of that one. Some species might not comply or not see what the problem is, thus spawning many arguments over "philosophical imperialism" or something similar. Humans, themselves, may be conflicted about such things. Some, on the Right, might say "Of course you don't eat other intelligent species!" Others, on the Left, might say "But we shouldn't impose our mores and cultural norms on others!"

Fun stuff. Well, grim stuff but fun thinking about the 2nd and 3rd order effects of trying to establish a norm amongst multiple intelligent species.

A similar thing which was never addressed in Star Trek is with the advent of replicators, you would think a lot more humans would look at consuming the flesh of animals as being barbaric, since it would literally no longer be required. But aside from Chakotay, I don't think any humans are canonically vegetarians in the Trekverse.
 
That was never Star Trek's mission statement. It doesn't even qualify as the Enterprise's mission statement. It's just a nice monologue from the opening credits.

Truer words have never been spoken.

Haters gotta hate. 'Cause, Lorca...

And, it's just too obvious to say that Lorca is just evil and he's not up to something more complicated that it seems on its face. To that end, I'm giving favorable odds Burnham is going to find herself in the middle of the conflict between Georgiou and Lorca, it will "get complicated," and she'll be forced to choose between them. I'm also giving favorable odds that it ends with her killing one of them, and I'm betting that will be Georgiou.
 
Truer words have never been spoken.



And, it's just too obvious to say that Lorca is just evil and he's not up to something more complicated that it seems on its face. To that end, I'm giving favorable odds Burnham is going to find herself in the middle of the conflict between Georgiou and Lorca, it will "get complicated," and she'll be forced to choose between them. I'm also giving favorable odds that it ends with her killing one of them, and I'm betting that will be Georgiou.
Yes because Lorca is a Section31 agent from the MU who sees the Terran empire as a threat for humanity and want to change it for the better to become the emporer him self (desperate times need desperate measures)
 
The motto is universal. Just change one word and it could work for Discovery too:
Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Discovery. Its continuing mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before.

Not really. I said I enjoy Discovery and I do. At the same time, I can still wish that parts of the show were different. There was a lot of good about Old Trek too. Not all of it needs to be rejected.

Yeah, but it wasn't DS9's mission either. They were at a crossroads, so while they did see new life and new civilizations, that life generally came to them. Their mission was prep Bajor for induction and hold down that corner of (future) Federation space.

I didn't take it as either being comfortable in their locations so much as disoriented and unaware of where they were.

I too heard the Stamets aboard the MU flagship mutter "I did it!" right after he awoke, but in the context of the scene this is immediately after Culber tells Prime!Stamets that all he has to do to return to his body is open his eyes. Cue close-up of MU!Stamets opening his eyes, saying "I did it!," and stumbling out of bed before the camera tracks sideways to hold on a Sickbay monitor showing the Terran Empire logo, center frame. If that's not cincimatic language for "oh shit Stamets is in the wrong body. Dun dun dun." I don't know what is.

The Stamets aboard Discovery expressing concern about the mycelial garden is harder to explain if hes really MU!Stamets, but I did notice he brushed off Tilly informing him of Culber's death by saying "I know" in a dismissive tone. It's hard to believe Prime!Stamets would so casually dismiss his feelings for his partner not thirty seconds after saying goodbye forever (as far as he knows.)

I will rewatch it, but I didn't see any disorientation.

The close up of the logo could be used to indicate that they unknowingly switched, or it could be to center the audience so that we know where MU Stamets is, since we hadn't seen him or his lab before in the MU.

I wouldn't say (without a confirming rewatch) that it was dismissive. If he was "at peace" with it due to the discussion with Culber in the mycelial network, then he might have more pressing issues to deal with (the dying spores, getting home) and would leave personal issues for later, especially having been comatose for a long time.

Actually the MU Stamets woke up on the flagship and said "He did it!". The visualization (showing it fade from PU Stamets in quarters trying to open eyes to MU Stamets on bed opening eyes) made you think they switched places but what they said and how they acted appeared as though no switch occurred.

Agreed.

Yep absolutely agree. Section 31 stuff (which was hinted at) was dropped as well.
Mirror Universe arc seems like them retooling what they had to work with after the Fuller ideas were not working out after the first few episodes. (I would almost make a bet the Klingon makeup led to severe cutting back of Klingon War as well)

I think the fans were the only ones reading in Section 31 hints where there were none. NCC-1031 is arguably because Fuller loves Halloween. Black badges openly declaring who belongs to section 31 doesn't seem like a Section 31 method to me. Etc, etc.

To be fair though, that is a problem with many of the Trek characters from past series.

In After Trek for this week, Frakes was asked how Mirror Riker would be different from PU Riker. He joked that "he would sit differently." I laughed, but it kind of emphasized for me that the TNG characters were all group-think utopians with just minor surface differences. Riker has his sit down move, plays trombone, and likes having sex with lots of other characters.

Picard likes making sanctimonious speeches and drinking tea, and so on.

I think these characterizations are the most surface-level generalizations one can imagine for these characters. They may have been idealistic utopians, but there is much greater depth to them than you are allowing for here. It's a little insulting to these beloved characters.

Even in TOS, before serialization was a glimmer in Trek's eye, the writers put in "character moment" scenes into most episodes. Basically these were seemingly throwaway interactions between two characters which had nothing to do with the plot of the week, but had everything to do with establishing the characters as plausible, well-rounded human beings (well, sapients, being inclusive of Spock). This tradition continued in TNG. DS9 perfected it (think about the "lunch dates" that Garak and Bashir had). Even VOY and ENT had this, although it was often irritating (the perpetual friction between Neelix and Tuvok for example).

That's a lot of what I'm missing in Discovery. And even though the show as a whole has been getting better, it's been getting worse in this respect. Early on Stamets and Tilly were given some legit scenes which were plot-independent and helped establish their characters, but this has completely fallen to the wayside.

I think this is one drawback of the streaming service. Without the minimum required 42 mintues per episode, TNG and DS9 (and maybe even Voyager) would have missed out on the little character moments, often called "Pillar filler" that Michael Pillar created to get short episodes up to the minimum. Often these were little character moments, because they were easiest to film and integrate into the full episode because they didn't have to be critical plot elements. I could use a few more "Pillar filler" moments in Discovery's shorter episodes (or in all its episodes why not).

Not necessarily - Like PU Georgu; PU Lorca could be dead (killed with his crew in the U.S.S. Buran incident.) There isn't allways a 1:1 correspondence of events.

You forgot one of the primary ST: D showrunners: Kristen Boyer - who, as I understand it is a HUGE ST:VOY fan; and has penned a lot of the ST:VOY novels. And if I'm not mistaken she's the one who on set told Jason Isaacs he could ad lib an expletive using 'God' because in GR's Star Trek Universe, religion is passed <--- Which is a clear indication that if she did watch TOS, she didn't pay a lot of attention to it, because not only did Doctor McCoy use a lot of religious exclaimations; they did have a Chapel on the 1701; were holding a Wedding ion said Chapel (in TOS - "Balance of Terror"); and actually had a couple of episodes with straight up religious themes.

So yeah, I still say, there's a lot of ST:VOY influence in ST: D and it's starting to show and have (IMO) a disappointing/somewhat negative effect one the resulting episodes of late.

As for PU Lorca being dead, yeah, there isn't always a 1:1 correspondence, but like Ted Sullivan said on last week's "After Trek", without a body you can't be sure, and the writers don't want to limit future writers in being able to bring someone back if they need to - hence you can't be sure he is dead.

The showrunners clarified that Boyer's objection to Lorca saying "god" was not an overall ban on religious words in Discovery, but instead because Lorca character in particular would not use the word (either because of his character in general, or because of his MU origin status we don't know).

It appears to me that actually the Terran Empire keeps the existence of the Discovery and the Mirror Universe a tightly held secret - thus Georgiou immediately killing of all those that witnessed evidence of its existence.

It actually doesn't make any sense that the Shenzhou or Rebels even had files at all on the Discovery.

The ISS Discovery, as far as we know, isn't itself classified. Some of its work may be (provided it has a spore drive), but it doesn't seem to have anything directly to do with working on or knowing of the ability to cross over into parallel universes. Also, since the "rebels" are made up of former members (at least the Vulcans or half-Vulcans seem like they can be full citizens of the Empire given Spock's status on the ISS Enterprise) or slaves of the Empire, it is reasonable some of them had access to ships/personnel files when they rebelled. Maybe even someone like MU Lorca.

Lorca is not a scientist, he's a captain. It would be way, way easier if he had some sort of "briefing" by Stamets in how this all worked than if he had to figure it all out himself while also being busy impersonating his prime self. He certainly should have known MU Stamets as well - considering he used to be close to the emperor, and Stamets may have worked on her ship for quite awhile.

Yeah, but we don't know when Stamets (either MU or Prime) started work on the Spore drive/spores/Discovery. Based on episode 3, the Discovery is brand new when PU Burnham arrives on it, so it could all have been spun up after the start of the Klingon War, and if so, then so too could MU Stamets work have really started after the war (i.e., gone from academic thought puzzles to real world). And we know that the Buran happened early on in the war (I forget the exact timing). So MU Lorca might have transitioned over to the Prime Universe before MU Stamets and the spore tech was even a thing - plus Stamets isn't on the ISS Discovery, so they are even more separate in the MU.
 
I too heard the Stamets aboard the MU flagship mutter "I did it!" right after he awoke, but in the context of the scene this is immediately after Culber tells Prime!Stamets that all he has to do to return to his body is open his eyes. Cue close-up of MU!Stamets opening his eyes, saying "I did it!,"
He said 'He did it!"

Yep absolutely agree. Section 31 stuff (which was hinted at) was dropped as well.
That was never hinted at.

(apologies if someone posted this already)
E3V05Uo.png


On Stardate 0141.7 ISS Enterprise, on the orders of Commander Jonathan Archer, crossed into Tholian space in violation of orders from Starfleet Command. Upon entering [REDACTED] Enterprise reached [REDACTED] where they discovered the warship Defiant hidden in [REDACTED] Tholian Base

The warship Defiant's technological specifications are similar to those of Starfleet vessels, including saucer and engineering sections and warp nacelle configuration. Armaments include 2 forward torpedo tubes, 1 aft torpedo tube, and multiple phased energy weapon arrays.
 
Lorca is not a scientist, he's a captain. It would be way, way easier if he had some sort of "briefing" by Stamets in how this all worked than if he had to figure it all out himself while also being busy impersonating his prime self. He certainly should have known MU Stamets as well - considering he used to be close to the emperor, and Stamets may have worked on her ship for quite awhile.

Here are my thoughts.

Stamets has been doing sport research in the MU. He works with Lorca and there is something Lorca wants to do where the sport ship would be perfect for... maybe get into a heavily defended planet where they cannot go through the front door due to defenses. Anyway, so Stamets theorizes a spore drive could be possible but knows they cannot make one in the MU without the emperor geting her hands on it. So he comes up with a plan where he thinks he can enter the network and possibly send one person to the PU where hopefully the other stamets can actually make the spore ship. So he sends Lorca back and that is what puts MU Stamets into his coma where he is lost in the network due to the power needed to send somebody to PU.

So Lorca get to the PU, gathers Stamets and Michael and is able to successfully get a working spore drive ship. The 133 jumps was never about the cloak but always about "filling in the gaps" in order to get home (MU Stamets told him what was needed)... and back to the MU they go.

So Stamets comment at the end of last night of "He did it" was about Lorca/PU Stamets being able to successfully make the spore drive technology actually work which was the plan all along.

Next week we will find out IMO what it is that LOrca has in mind where he needed a spore drive ship so badly. I don't think it is just to have a better ship. I think he has a specific mission or missions in mind....maybe being able to jump right to Earth or to where the Defiant is or something like that.
 
I am so not happy right now.

Don't get me wrong, it's clever how the long con all ties together, from Tilly to Burnham and everyone else, but I fucking hate it. I loved Lorca, he was my favourite character by far. He was damaged, he was an asshole, but he was great. And now he is how he is because he's an evil mirror duplicate.

I'm pretty fucked up. I loved that fucked up, damaged people could prosper in this version of Trek's universe. I loved that there were shades of grey. I hate that the shades of grey I loved were only there because he was an evil mirror duplicate and only pure, virtuous and well adjusted people can be in the happy joyous Starfleet.

Fucking pissed off.

:mad:
 
I'm pretty fucked up. I loved that fucked up, damaged people could prosper in this version of Trek's universe. I loved that there were shades of grey. I hate that the shades of grey I loved were only there because he was an evil mirror duplicate and only pure, virtuous and well adjusted people can be in the happy joyous Starfleet.

He still prospered as a Starfleet Captain despite who he actually was.
 
Yeah, but we don't know when Stamets (either MU or Prime) started work on the Spore drive/spores/Discovery. Based on episode 3, the Discovery is brand new when PU Burnham arrives on it, so it could all have been spun up after the start of the Klingon War, and if so, then so too could MU Stamets work have really started after the war (i.e., gone from academic thought puzzles to real world). And we know that the Buran happened early on in the war (I forget the exact timing). So MU Lorca might have transitioned over to the Prime Universe before MU Stamets and the spore tech was even a thing - plus Stamets isn't on the ISS Discovery, so they are even more separate in the MU.

They have to solve the problem/moment that Lorca came in the orignal univers. Basicly they have to go back to their own univers before Lorca arrives an possible before the ship of Lorca was destroyd which will change the time line (for the better or the worse). Atleast Lorca will remain than a reliable captain and Burnman will not be in the situation she is in (with her current knoledge). As Aaron Harberts reveald after the first season their will be a positive feeling of hope.
 
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