Spoilers Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 2x01 - "The Broken Circle"

[Pauln6]

I don't find it lazy. I find the reaction a bit overly negative.

But, it's funny, I don't even like the episode. But, it's not because of the fight scene.

Like I said, I've worked with psychiatrists trained in self-defense. I've worked with Army nurses and combat medics who wouldn't hesitate to put someone down if needed, all women. I've heard stories of combat medics in Vietnam carrying shotguns.

Maybe anecdotal but seriously bugs me how being X profession means you can't fight. I'm trained to fight too; of you met me in person you would not know it. Just a quiet, goofy, mental health professional.

McCoy could fight. He was a Starfleet Officer. He didn't have the skill to take on a Klingon and win. I can buy the serum can enhance them physically, I'm just more sceptical that it could also given them professional level combat skills. Randomly bashing Klingons with heavy objects, I would probably have found less jarring character-wise, albeit possibly a bit too violent for a family show. Still, it does look as though they are going to lean into the notion that, as wartime medics, they were trained to fight Klingons. It's logical, just a bit bit overcooked IMO.

Come on, you're the one always wanting to transform Rand, a clerical worker, into a badass part time bodyguard. You bummed that Chapel got there first?
I'm not expert (far from it), but to me Chapel was just brawling not showing a lot of technique.

Lol - actually yes! Rand's skill set was even more vague than Chapel's but she at least was a formally trained Starfleet astronaut as opposed to a researcher who had grabbed a last minute posting. Personally, I would have loved to see Rand developed as a make do and mend technician with moderate combat skills, so having the medical staff completely outshine that does feel a bit weird and wrong. Plus Jet Reno may have taken that McGyver trope so far that I feel nobody can ever touch it again - oof.

I never thought Chapel could ever have this kind of potential and, after the way Abrams treated her character, I genuinely thought that the writers just hated her, so, I do love Bush's portrayal. I always wanted her to be the sciency one - like Marella in Airwolf - handing McCoy all the information he needs to save the day and leaving him to steal the glory. They disappointed me a bit by making her a nurse this early on instead of a scientist (a nurse has a broad set of interesting and worthy skills but is too often in the shadow of the doctor character). It looks like from the little teases in episode one, they ARE going to explore her researcher past. It also looks like they might be slotting her in as subordinate to M'Benga even in that role, which is a disappointment. We will see!

 

[fireproof78]

I would probably have found less jarring character-wise, albeit possibly a bit too violent for a family show.

I doubt it, given current content produced, especially Marvel.

Also, some episodes of TOS were downright disturbing. You know, for families!

It's logical, just a bit bit overcooked IMO.

Again, I would not recommend working with the people that I have worked with. Hell, even one of my undergrad psych professor's was proficient in firearms and would go with the School Resource Officer on outings.

Different strokes, different folks, etc.

 

[Sci]

hmmmm...not surprised by the mixed to negative reviews this episode is getting across the spectrum.

Look at the poll. 71% of responses are 8 out of 10 or above, and the overwhelming majority of professional reviews are positive.

Chapel and Mbemga as action heroes is really getting bahsed by fans on treklore and trekmovie,

So, in other words, a bunch of people with tunnel vision over-reacting to a fairly minor part of the episode while ignoring the plot devices that are provided in the episode to explain it and contextualize it.

Par for course for online fandom, I suppose.

Although I did say this was an issue in the first season that it made no sense to give medical people action scenes especially when it is legacy characters like chapel or mnbega that we know.

Ridiculous hogwash.

surprised also by the backlash with spock and chapel, many calling the romance set up cringe,

Ah, so they have bad taste too.

spock been ooc.

Well, yes he's behaving out of character. He says so himself in the episode. That's part of the plot.

however i think spock/chapel worked a lot better in season 1 when she was pining and he was curious,

We are one episode into Season Two.

And that's a really sexist interpretation of S1. They were both curious and both developing feelings and both lying to themselves about it. Neither one was "pining" while the other was merely "curious." The power disparity you're implying did not exist.

i read a review on trek movie that spock has now gone to loving his finace to loving chapel. well this is what happens in streaming trek and the cw style writing they mostly have.

Yes, isn't it just terrible when they give people emotions and personalities and relationships? Only those awful CW shows have characters who fall in love! Real people don't have feelings or complicated relationships!

same goes for this episode that is more suited for a DC Crises story

That doesn't even make sense. "DC Crisis" stories tend to be about multiverses fracturing and whatnot. "All Good Things..." would have made for a "DC Crisis"-type story, not "The Broken Circle."

Yes, it was in a good way. Like Shepard Book in Firefly. "Wasn't always a Shepard. "

Or, to quote the great poet Ludacris in Fast Five: "I had a life before you knew me, O'Connor."

yes, it is also the strong female character trope that will end up be not logical anymore to the world, its like Rey all over again from star wars.

Not this shit again.

I think it's fine for them to know how to fight a bit, although Chapel has previously exhibited no formal combat training. She was a researcher not given over to physical pursuits.

Says who?? I mean, hell, Christine's first appearance in Strange New Worlds had her running down an alien who got loose on the ship -- there's no indication whatsoever that she's "not given over to physical pursuits" and every indication that she's someone with physical training.

It's more a case that they were fighting Klingons, or more accurately, many Klingons at once. That's more exhibiting Batman level of prowess, which seems a bit much. Of course it may turn out that the serum activates physiological programming in addition to increased speed and strength which would make much more sense.

Dude, they got a temporary ability to hit harder and not feel as much pain, they both clearly have hand-to-hand combat training, M'Benga clearly has jujitsu training like his actor does, it was over in about 180 seconds, and they were fighting a bunch of untrained amateurs. You're reading too much into it.

Would I prefer to see terrified Chapel using her wits to avoid getting eaten by a Gorn or bad ass Chapel tooling up with two bat'leth to take on a hoard of Gorn? Both would be fun but one is Chapel and the other is River Tam.

You mean, one matches what you imagined Christine to be like on the basis of no evidence.

About that illusion the Talosians gave Pike...

Keep in mind that not all of the illusions were of things he wanted. They were studying him. Pike said he could be a trader, but it was Boyce who mentioned trading in Orion women. Pike may not have meant that at all, but instead of just going into more detail on his thoughts, Pike simply said it was only one of many options he could do if he left Starfleet.

And even if it was an accurate account of a fantasy, it doesn't matter. People are allowed to have fantasies.

Sure. The fantasy per se is not what makes the version of Pike we see in "The Cage" a douchebag. What makes him a douchebag is that has that fantasy and he clearly thinks of women as sexual objects rather than as his equals, even to the point of openly talking about how he can't get used to having women on the bridge of the Enterprise.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Lol - actually yes! Rand's skill set was even more vague than Chapel's but she at least was a formally trained Starfleet astronaut as opposed to a researcher who had grabbed a last minute posting

Eh, its possible for a civilian to have more martial arts training than someone in the military. Especially if someone's military job is filing reports.
I don't think TOS or SNW implied that Chapel just waltzed in and grabbed a post.

 

[Mudd]

This whole building of a controversy about a couple of Star Trek characters juicing and then kicking ass in an adventure story has be one of the most foolish Trek arguments I've seen in three decades online.*

*I go back to the CompuServe days, pre-web.

 

[DaveyNY]

That's right, medical professionals, stay in your lane. Combat is not for you.

IF ONLY that were true ...
I got attacked so many times working in the hospital as an Aide, by young and old patients alike.
Bitten; Scratched; Punched; Headbutt; Stabbed at with pointy objects; as the years went on it became more and more prevalent.

The last four years I was working, there were yearly mandatory classes in self defense for all hospital employees working on the patient wards.

 

[fireproof78]

This whole building of a controversy about a couple of Star Trek characters juicing and then kicking ass in an adventure story has be one of the most foolish Trek arguments I've seen in three decades online.*

*I go back to the CompuServe days, pre-web.

Well, as we all know Star Trek never involved combat.

*goes and watches Where No Man Has Gone Before* That's right Kirk. Kick his ass.

 

[Farscape One]

Look at the poll. 71% of responses are 8 out of 10 or above, and the overwhelming majority of professional reviews are positive.



So, in other words, a bunch of people with tunnel vision over-reacting to a fairly minor part of the episode while ignoring the plot devices that are provided in the episode to explain it and contextualize it.

Par for course for online fandom, I suppose.



Ridiculous hogwash.



Ah, so they have bad taste too.



Well, yes he's behaving out of character. He says so himself in the episode. That's part of the plot.



We are one episode into Season Two.

And that's a really sexist interpretation of S1. They were both curious and both developing feelings and both lying to themselves about it. Neither one was "pining" while the other was merely "curious." The power disparity you're implying did not exist.



Yes, isn't it just terrible when they give people emotions and personalities and relationships? Only those awful CW shows have characters who fall in love! Real people don't have feelings or complicated relationships!



That doesn't even make sense. "DC Crisis" stories tend to be about multiverses fracturing and whatnot. "All Good Things..." would have made for a "DC Crisis"-type story, not "The Broken Circle."



Or, to quote the great poet Ludacris in Fast Five: "I had a life before you knew me, O'Connor."



Not this shit again.



Says who?? I mean, hell, Christine's first appearance in Strange New Worlds had her running down an alien who got loose on the ship -- there's no indication whatsoever that she's "not given over to physical pursuits" and every indication that she's someone with physical training.



Dude, they got a temporary ability to hit harder and not feel as much pain, they both clearly have hand-to-hand combat training, M'Benga clearly has jujitsu training like his actor does, it was over in about 180 seconds, and they were fighting a bunch of untrained amateurs. You're reading too much into it.



You mean, one matches what you imagined Christine to be like on the basis of no evidence.



Sure. The fantasy per se is not what makes the version of Pike we see in "The Cage" a douchebag. What makes him a douchebag is that has that fantasy and he clearly thinks of women as sexual objects rather than as his equals, even to the point of openly talking about how he can't get used to having women on the bridge of the Enterprise.

And that Pike is not totally the same Pike as Anson Mount's. There's an almost 60 year gap between the two shows.

You can't compare that kind of dialogue with the current era. Applying standards of behavior of current times is unfair to shows made that long ago... you can easily take away enjoyment of shows from long ago.

 

[Trekker4747]

Honestly, this is better than nine or ten of the Star Trek movies.

Not saying much with that.

 

[Mudd]

It's absolutely absurd and unbelievable that Kirk could fight back against a talking t-rex that could lift and through a boulder the size of the one it did, just by boxing its earholes.

Trek was ruined right there. I could never get into it again after that. Kirk did too much shit that no real starship captain would do.

 

[Sci]

And that Pike is not totally the same Pike as Anson Mount's. There's an almost 60 year gap between the two shows.

Sure! In-universe, I only accept the broad strokes of "The Cage" as in continuity with Strange New Worlds. I completely retcon out his reference to not being used to women on the bridge, for instance.

You can't compare that kind of dialogue with the current era. Applying standards of behavior of current times is unfair to shows made that long ago... you can easily take away enjoyment of shows from long ago.

I don't think it's unfair. It just speaks to the fact that misogyny was extremely common in that era. There's nothing wrong with rejecting a piece of entertainment that supports once-common values which you recognize as toxic.

 

[Tuskin38]

To view this content we will need your consent to set third party cookies.
For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Accept third party cookies

 

[Mudd]

During the opening fly-around of the Enterprise in space dock, the score is the opening phrases of Alexander Courage's Star Trek theme - not the fanfare, nor the parallel theme that Russo composed for SNW. The actual TOS theme.

 

[Captain Jollydark]

I don't find it lazy. I find the reaction a bit overly negative.

But, it's funny, I don't even like the episode. But, it's not because of the fight scene.

Like I said, I've worked with psychiatrists trained in self-defense. I've worked with Army nurses and combat medics who wouldn't hesitate to put someone down if needed, all women. I've heard stories of combat medics in Vietnam carrying shotguns.

Maybe anecdotal but seriously bugs me how being X profession means you can't fight. I'm trained to fight too; of you met me in person you would not know it. Just a quiet, goofy, mental health professional.

It's also weird, unless all the people asserting that if you are Y you can't do X are incapable of having more than one skill or interest at a time.

Aahhhh!!! It makes no sense what's being said. A nurse can have a black belt in martial arts, or compete in ballroom dancing, or be trained in hand-to-hand combat (because they were a soldier in the freaking army) or practice Wicca in the woods or, in fact, do all of these things.

I know it may seem like a cliche now - the "little woman" who kicks ass, but the protests also start to sound like misogyny after a while.

 

[fireproof78]

you can easily take away enjoyment of shows from long ago.

Isn't that what we do here? Whittle away at past entertainment so it is no longer entertaining?

Asking for a friend.

I know it may seem like a cliche now - the "little woman" who kicks ass, but the protests also start to sound like misogyny after a while.

Sadly, whether intentionally or not, it's starting to really sound like it.

 

[Sci]

I know it may seem like a cliche now - the "little woman" who kicks ass, but the protests also start to sound like misogyny after a while.

Y e p.

Coming hot on the heels of comparing giving a woman agency, confidence, and a personality to "revealing Mister Mot was once a supersolider," I might add.

 

[Pauln6]

Eh, its possible for a civilian to have more martial arts training than someone in the military. Especially if someone's military job is filing reports.
I don't think TOS or SNW implied that Chapel just waltzed in and grabbed a post.

TOS stated she was a scientist who took a posting on the ship in order to get to Exo-II and even gave her the option to leave after she had achieved that goal. Nurses in the sixties had less formal training than now so it would not have been a stretch for the writers to assume she had settled for any available post she could land at relatively short notice. That was an implication from dialogue. Of course, the script may not have been changed much from the time the role was written for a guest character who wasn't a nurse. The writers then forgot any of her scientific training beyond functioning as an off-screen lab researcher and an assistant to alien cyberneticists until she was fully qualified in TMP.

NuTrek pivoted by making her a nurse as her chosen career largely so they could do a fan-service name check. SNW pivoted by making her a nurse by profession prior to training as an officer for unknown reasons but possibly largely so she could be called Nurse Chapel like in TOS rather than Miss Chapel, a biologist who later took a posting as a nurse. It now looks as though their plan was actually to give her more of a wartime backstory. A scientist recruited as a nurse during a war would be a more logical story pivot with a lot of potential.

And I was never suggesting that it would be impossible for a civilian to have advanced combat training or for a nurse to have advanced scientific training but rather more that it feels to me as though Spock and Pike are being piloted masterfully towards the characters we see later on while Chapel is being steered away from that somewhat in come curious ways. She was so poorly written that this is a necessity as a main character and is very welcome but I would still prefer to end up broadly in the same ballpark as a character i.e. sciency rather than fighty. Trained in self-defence - makes sense. Trained in advanced combat - less so. IMO.

The fact that I think Spock is acting in character by being out of character while some people think that is a terrible portrayal shows that not everyone will agree with every choice they make. But we should be able to express our differing opinions without taking chunks out of each or vehemently insisting that such an opinion is objectively wrong. The fact that the conversation seems to have got weirdly polarised very quickly is a bit disturbing!

 

[Nerys Myk]

TOS stated she was a scientist who took a posting on the ship in order to get to Exo-II and even gave her the option to leave after she had achieved that goal. Nurses in the sixties had less formal training than now so it would not have been a stretch for the writers to assume she had settled for any available post she could land at relatively short notice. That was an implication from dialogue. Of course, the script may not have been changed much from the time the role was written for a guest character who wasn't a nurse. The writers then forgot any of her scientific training beyond functioning as an off-screen lab researcher and an assistant to alien cyberneticists until she was fully qualified in TMP.

Pretty sure it was the latter. Nothing really about waltzing in, though.

 

[valden]

It's also weird, unless all the people asserting that if you are Y you can't do X are incapable of having more than one skill or interest at a time.

Aahhhh!!! It makes no sense what's being said. A nurse can have a black belt in martial arts, or compete in ballroom dancing, or be trained in hand-to-hand combat (because they were a soldier in the freaking army) or practice Wicca in the woods or, in fact, do all of these things.

I know it may seem like a cliche now - the "little woman" who kicks ass, but the protests also start to sound like misogyny after a while.

I don't think it is fair to say misogyny, since it is fair to say that society sees it differently when a woman hits a man and when a man hits her. a woman hits a man, people laugh and do SNL skits, a man hits a woman, he goes to jail and his career is over. people just want a little logic and some familiarity. chapel should not even be doing any action scenes. if you say it is misogyny, you can also raise a counter argument that it is also toxic -femininity.

I think the scene with chapel here is more of like a poorly badly version of saldana's uhura in star trek into darkness and i dont like that film or how the characters were portrayed. in into darkness uhura goes toe to toe with a klingon, speaks to him and stabs him but before they could react she has back up from kirk and spock. uhura is a combat girl but she is still limited as she is written more realistically. she is not empowered magically in anyway and is not written to make a girl power statement that will defile logic. SNW here is just cliche faux girl power writing that deserves the backlash as it makes no sense in the context of chapel or any medical person. so I don't agree that the misogyny is fair.

Chapel is also a civilian, she should not be going on such dangerous task in the first place. she is there to be protected not the other way around.

 

[Farscape One]

Isn't that what we do here? Whittle away at past entertainment so it is no longer entertaining?

Asking for a friend.

You can tell your friend that sometimes, it feels like people argue just to argue, and do try to chip away at entertainment.

I never have a problem with past shows, because I know certain things in the past were prevalent that I didn't like. But I don't let it take away from my enjoyment of the characters, story, or the message that is being presented, whatever the series.

I just find it sad that there are shows and characters from the past that have lots of merit and good, but just dismiss them because they have a trait or two that doesn't fit in the current era of acceptable behavior.