Ten Best/Worst things about season 2

[Vger23]

I wouldn’t mind so much if it was handled better. So I file it along with the overall writing into the missed potential bin. They seem to have some good ideas but are miserable at translating them to the screen.

Yeah, I'm admittedly a nostalgia whore when it comes to TOS call-backs, so I'm more forgiving than many, I think. I don't think it was handled nearly as haphazardly as some of the other stuff in S2, though. And I do think that the integration of the pre-Kirk Enterprise team was handled very well, as was the return to Talos IV and exploration of Pike's fate.

If you compare the TOS linkage plots in S2 to the Red Angel / Burnham's Mom / "Build a timesuit to defeat the AI" stuff....the TOS callbacks are basically Godfather, Part 2 worthy, at least by my read.

 

[BillJ]

Yeah, I'm admittedly a nostalgia whore when it comes to TOS call-backs, so I'm more forgiving than many, I think.

I don't mind callbacks, I just prefer a lighter touch than Discovery has given us so far. Sometimes, it feels like the show is more about the callbacks than the actual crew, ship and situations of Discovery.

Which is why I really enjoyed "Dead Endless" by @DaveGalanter. For the first time, I felt like I got a story that actually focused on the Discovery and her crew without all the outside material.

 

[Tuvix5675]

You’re just trying to find things to hate on.
You have an agenda here and I won’t be part of it.

Insert Diabolical laugh

 

[Tarek71]

1. Pike was good. However, given emerging medical advances in the real world, like 3D printed organs, neural interface, exoskeletons, etc it seems unlikely Pike couldnt be put back together. The chair with just a flashing light seems unlikely now.

2. Not enough of Number One and the Enterprise. To have Romijn and do so little with her was a missed opportunity. I think that should have been the show all along.

3. We didnt know Airiam well enough to care that much about her death. Also, should have been written as a cybernetic species, not a bionic human. Also makes the Pike scenario even more unlikely. Why couldnt they do that with Pike?

4. Burnham is still just not that fascinating a character. Saru on the other hand, really came into his own.

 

[Tarek71]

Some of the main issues arent just specific to the 2nd season.

1. Spore drive is still hard to make fit in the timeline. How has no further mention, use or advance in this technology occured? You mean the Borg, Romulans, Vorta scientists, etc, ...no one else has come up with this? But the Federation could do it in the 2250s?

2. So Section 31 knew how to make time machines in the 2250s? And then...what? Just forgotten about?

3. Looking forward to the return of the real Klingons.

4. Time crystals? Wow, those would come in handy! Apparently they go down the same memory hole that interstellar beaming, time suits and spore drive go down. At least with the Picard show, they wont have to worry as much about bringing in all these amazing tech breakthroughs that for some strange reason have been retro fitted into the 23rd century Disco and JJverse timeframes. But tech they keep? Pike in a rolling iron lung that flashes once for yes and twice for no when even now in 2019, paralyzed people who cannot speak can communicate in complete sentences with assistive speech technology.

 

[Vger23]

Brilliant how the thread went from "List things you liked and didn't like in S2" to "Just list things you didn't like about S2 and don't bother with positives" to "Ah, fuck it, just gripe about whatever tired, unoriginal things piss you off about DSC in general" in about 2 posts.

 

[Lord Garth]

10 things I didn't like about Season 2. Are you ready for this?

1. I had to wait almost a year for it.
2. It was only 14 episodes.
3. Those stardates.
4. What do I need #4 for?
5. Tyler is a dumb-ass.
6. Double dumb-ass on Tyler.
7. Burnham should've done more to piss off the subset who complain about "SJWs!"
8. Spock's sideburns at the end of the season.
9. Not enough Number One.
10. Leland had no balls.

Now with that out of the way: 10 things I liked about Season 2.

1. Amanda shows there's other types of strength than just physical.
2. Spock and Burnham's sibling relationship.
3. Starting to see more of the bridge crew.
4. Borath. 'nuff said.
5. Georgiou helping L'Rell to keep her hold on power. Strength is the only thing a Klingon male would understand.
6. The Mycellial Network is the trippiest thing ever.
7. The Red Angel suit.
8. Culber wanting to kick Tyler's ass because he's a dumb-ass.
9. Saru coming into his own.
10. I like Pike.

Don't agree with me on any of these? Tough shit.

 

[Tarek71]

Honestly, the Disco showrunners have themselves to blame for that. Most of the negatives listed here are fair. The great majority of them.

 

[Lord Garth]

Insert Diabolical laugh

'sup?

Yeah, we never hear about Timekeeper Klingons from TOS-NEMESIS, or even earlier in ENTERPRISE.

Clearly if you never heard of something before, it must've never existed. Because you must've heard of everything before and already know all there is to know. So you go to a museum and they show you something you didn't know existed. You say, "I never heard of it before! How can it exist? How could I have lived __ years and never have heard of it before?" Same thing here.

It sounds like Charles S. Duell in 1889 claiming that everything that can be invented has already been invented. Nothing else could be invented and they couldn't learn or develop anything new. Then, surprise! Guess what happened? More stuff was invented. New things were learned. New discoveries were made.

You can learn new things right up until the day you die. Maybe even beyond if there's an afterlife. Star Trek can show us new things about the Klingons as long as it's being made, right up until it stops being made. Whenever that is. It will probably outlast every single one of us.

 

[Tarek71]

Lord Garth,

Yes, but it's more like saying "hey, here is the Confederate Army jet bomber!" Oh, you never heard of that? Surely something can exist that you never heard of! Yes, but how the fuck did they have a fucking Jet in the 1860s when no one else does for nearly another 80 years? There werent even piston engine propeller planes for over 40 years after that.

At what point does Earth to Klingon interstellar beaming, 2250s Federation Time Travel Suits, Instantaneous Spore Jump Drive, and "time crystals" become so out of step with mid 23rd Cent tech that it becomes ridiculous?

 

[Lord Garth]

Lord Garth,

Yes, but it's more like saying "hey, here is the Confederate Army jet bomber!" Oh, you never heard of that? Surely something can exist that you never heard of! Yes, but how the fuck did they have a fucking Jet in the 1860s when no one else does for nearly another 80 years? There werent even piston engine propeller planes for over 40 years after that.

At what point does Earth to Klingon interstellar beaming, 2250s Federation Time Travel Suits, Instantaneous Spore Jump Drive, and "time crystals" become so out of step with mid 23rd Cent tech that it becomes ridiculous?

You should know that I was responding specifically to the point about Timekeeper Klingons. That's the reason why I only quoted that portion when I typed my response to Tuvix.

For everything else, I'll tailor my answer to those particular items. Later. I have a time-crunch with something else right now. In the meantime, please don't take an answer I had for one item and assume that I intended for it to be applied to everything else. Thanks.

 

[Tuvix5675]

Thank you Tarek 71, time crystals given their power are a clear game changer, why didn't the Klingons use them during the Dominion War?, why weren't they sought after by the Suliban in the 22nd century? Why didn't Daniels and his timeline peace keepers do anything about the Red Angel?

 

[Lord Garth]

Thank you Tarek 71, time crystals given their power are a clear game changer, why didn't the Klingons use them during the Dominion War?, why weren't they sought after by the Suliban in the 22nd century? Why didn't Daniels and his timeline peace keepers do anything about the Red Angel?

I direct you to what I just said above. I'll see you all in a few hours.

 

[BillJ]

Thank you Tarek 71, time crystals given their power are a clear game changer, why didn't the Klingons use them during the Dominion War?, why weren't they sought after by the Suliban in the 22nd century? Why didn't Daniels and his timeline peace keepers do anything about the Red Angel?

This is where niggling minutiae can ruin the overall experience. The writers of Discovery pretty much treated the show as a reboot, but called it a continuation.

There is a couple of options: simply roll with it or treat Discovery as a reboot/altered timeline. I find the show dramatically more appealing as an alternate timeline. But, everyone's mileage may vary.

 

[Tuvix5675]

This is where niggling minutiae can ruin the overall experience. The writers of Discovery pretty much treated the show as a reboot, but called it a continuation.

There is a couple of options: simply roll with it or treat Discovery as a reboot/altered timeline. I find the show dramatically more appealing as an alternate timeline. But, everyone's mileage may vary.

That's the only way I can even watch it, is to think of it as a reimagining, not sequel to ENTERPRISE or prequel to TOS.

 

[fireproof78]

At what point does Earth to Klingon interstellar beaming, 2250s Federation Time Travel Suits, Instantaneous Spore Jump Drive, and "time crystals" become so out of step with mid 23rd Cent tech that it becomes ridiculous?

That ridiculous tipping point will vary from person to person.

 

[Amasov]

5. Lack of Conviction, Part Deux- The final solution of time-jumping the ship 900 years into the future was so mindnumbingly perplexing to me, I still don't know what to think. I've said for years that the creators of these shows should not / would not listen to idiots like us on the interwebs to get direction on where to take the story and characters....and I've taken a lot of heat from the "TEH FRANSHIZE IS NUTHING WITHOUT US TEH FANZ!!!1!1one!" crew who disagree with my stance...thinking that they own the franchise because reasons. But, you know what, congratulations, because you all were right. They apparently DO listen to online griping and whining, rather extensively I might add...because they became so overwhelmed with fan feedback and criticism of the series that they literally threw up their hands and decided "Fuck it, let's just throw the whole thing out and start over almost completely from scratch." I don't know...It just feels really broken to me.

I truly could not agree with this more.

On the Enterprise S2 BLURAY, they discuss this in the Uncharted Territory doc. Even back then, the people behind the show would go online and read fan feedback. While they don't specify where they are looking, I'm fairly convinced it was here.

Say what you want about the Berman era of Star Trek, but, to my knowledge, they never changed any aspects of their shows because of negative reactions from viewers. If Berman was anything, he was far too conservative in what he (and what felt Gene) thought Star Trek should be. I would've been shocked if any of them had basically thrown out the entire premise of their show because of fan feedback.

I feel like we're in dangerous territory now where the audience of anything basically starts to dictate what should happen and is willing to spew a shit-ton of venom for it. While not to this extreme, the online hate that Kelly Marie Tran got for her character in The Last Jedi -- to the point where she shut down her Instagram account -- disturbed me. And its impact was evident based on how she was utilized in Rise of Skywalker.

People used to love to tease me about my passion for Star Trek, but, I've never seen anything quite like that before.

 

[Amasov]

Clearly if you never heard of something before, it must've never existed. Because you must've heard of everything before and already know all there is to know. So you go to a museum and they show you something you didn't know existed. You say, "I never heard of it before! How can it exist? How could I have lived __ years and never have heard of it before?" Same thing here.

It sounds like Charles S. Duell in 1889 claiming that everything that can be invented has already been invented. Nothing else could be invented and they couldn't learn or develop anything new. Then, surprise! Guess what happened? More stuff was invented. New things were learned. New discoveries were made.

You can learn new things right up until the day you die. Maybe even beyond if there's an afterlife. Star Trek can show us new things about the Klingons as long as it's being made, right up until it stops being made. Whenever that is. It will probably outlast every single one of us.

I'm so glad you said this because it crystallizes EXACTLY the perceived problem with the finale. The finale was meant to answer why we never heard of Discovery before.

I swear I've said it on this forum AT LEAST 100 times, but it's absurd and ridiculous to think Kirk, Picard, Sisko, or Janeway would reference the events of Discovery. They aren't going through a manifest of Starfleet vessels from the last century wondering the hell the deal is.

Archer and the NX-01 were never mentioned before either. And while it was established for a long time that, for example, the Enterprise-A was the second starship to bear the name, the NX-01 would technically make it the third. But that statement had to be modified to say the A was the second Federation starship with that name.

If anything, Voyager is the one that had the most potential to reference the spore drive due to their travel time back to the Alpha Quadrant. But, even then, it was basically answered already as to why Starfleet would never use that technology before the finale. First using an alien lifeform goes against everything Starfleet stands for (and we see a similar scenario played out on Voyager's "Equinox") or having to use a human interface. Stamets established the drive was decommissioned until they find a non-human interface. One could easily extrapolate that this never worked out.

What no one ever mentions is how Starfleet was experimenting with transwarp with the Excelsior in ST3. Despite the fact that it "failed," Starfleet never again tried, which, didn't make any sense to me. One would think that by TNG's time, Starfleet would have at least figured it out.

 

[Vger23]

I truly could not agree with this more.

On the Enterprise S2 BLURAY, they discuss this in the Uncharted Territory doc. Even back then, the people behind the show would go online and read fan feedback. While they don't specify where they are looking, I'm fairly convinced it was here.

Say what you want about the Berman era of Star Trek, but, to my knowledge, they never changed any aspects of their shows because of negative reactions from viewers. If Berman was anything, he was far too conservative in what he (and what felt Gene) thought Star Trek should be. I would've been shocked if any of them had basically thrown out the entire premise of their show because of fan feedback.

I feel like we're in dangerous territory now where the audience of anything basically starts to dictate what should happen and is willing to spew a shit-ton of venom for it. While not to this extreme, the online hate that Kelly Marie Tran got for her character in The Last Jedi -- to the point where she shut down her Instagram account -- disturbed me. And its impact was evident based on how she was utilized in Rise of Skywalker.

People used to love to tease me about my passion for Star Trek, but, I've never seen anything quite like that before.

I think the Star Wars sequel trilogy and Star Trek Discovery are very sad examples of exactly that phenomenon....and the creators are over-correcting instead of just being free and artistic with a singular vision.

 

[fireproof78]

I think the Star Wars sequel trilogy and Star Trek Discovery are very sad examples of exactly that phenomenon....and the creators are over-correcting instead of just being free and artistic with a singular vision.

Fear rules Hollywood right now.