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USS Enterprise (eventually) on Discovery?

I disliked the Jammies, but loved the many uniforms.

The Kelvin Timeline does have better uniforms post-2233 than the Prime Timeline seems to. While I strongly prefer the sequence of historical events in the Prime chronology the JJ films do give us more TOS-style Starfleet uniforms and those movies do look more like the original timeline of the mid-23rd century at least from a wardrobe perspective.
 
The Kelvin Timeline does have better uniforms post-2233 than the Prime Timeline seems to. While I strongly prefer the sequence of historical events in the Prime chronology the JJ films do give us more TOS-style Starfleet uniforms and those movies do look more like the original timeline of the mid-23rd century at least from a wardrobe perspective.

Differnt strokes, i find them silly and totally unbelievable. The many alt uniforms rock though
 
........ and even people who obsessively watch the show are frequently unable to see the real Kirk instead of the distorted cultural memory of him they've received from Zapp Brannigan.

Of course, the reason the Brannigan character worked in the first place was that people already saw Kirk this way. The drift had already happened or the jokes wouldn't have landed. (I realize that you didn't mean the particular phrasing above to be taken literally.)

That piece reminded me of one of the NY Times' classical music critics reviewing a PDQ Bach concert. He loved the show, but it brought him to the brink of despair. I think his conclusion was that it demonstrated just "how late in the day it is" for classical -- even fans of the form see it as a collection of ridiculous tropes and mannerisms. I suppose that's a side-effect of classical losing its function as a class signifier; without that, what's left?
 
That piece reminded me of one of the NY Times' classical music critics reviewing a PDQ Bach concert. He loved the show, but it brought him to the brink of despair. I think his conclusion was that it demonstrated just "how late in the day it is" for classical -- even fans of the form see it as a collection of ridiculous tropes and mannerisms. I suppose that's a side-effect of classical losing its function as a class signifier; without that, what's left?
Couldn't disagree more. What's left in classical music? Fantastic music. Nothing else is required of it.
 
Well, that was kind of the point... he wasn't sure if people actually thought the music was fantastic anymore. Maybe they never did.
There's bad, imitative, uninspired, trope-ridden, regurgitated crap in basically every kind of art. There's no reason that classical music should be any different, and it isn't. But neither does the existence of bad classical music immunize any other type of music against having bad entries.

There are even bad Star Trek episodes. ;)
 
"Toxic masculinity"?
Sure, what about it? I assume you're familiar with the term?

Anti-intellectual? :lol: I’m currently working on my third graduate degree (a PhD in history) and I have been teaching for 27 years (the last 15 at the college level). And I understand postmodernism just fine, thanks (I’ve been swimming in it for the past 24 months).
Props to you for your achievements, then (we apparently have something in common)... but it just makes your cheap shots at Horakova seem all the more inappropriate.

(And I can't help being curious what kind of history you're studying that requires deep dives into Foucault, much less postmodernism in general!...)

The fact that Pine-Kirk is different from Shatner-Kirk does not negate the very Trek-like exploration of the human condition—it’s an example of such exploration. Moreover, the films have an element not really seen since TOS (at least not to nearly the same extent), something that makes them much closer to the “spirit” of TOS than anything else in the Trek “universe”—a sense of fun and adventure.
No, the mere fact of an alternate Kirk doesn't negate such qualities in the Abrams films. The films as a whole certainly negate it, though. There is zilch, nada, zip in there that constitutes a meaningful "exploration of the human condition." As for "fun and adventure," they offer only the kind that requires you to turn off your logical faculties. The storytelling in those films makes the Star Wars prequels look sophisticated, for heaven's sake. They're basically two-hour-long strings of "refrigerator moments," except the absurdity of them doesn't even wait 'til the movie's over to hijack your attention.

I think it's a really excellent piece, and I routinely recommend it to people who aren't even Trekkies. I'm a right-winger who normally closes an article the instant I see the word "kyriarchy" (heck, guys, I backed Santorum in 2008, just to give you an idea of how far I am from Horakova ideologically)... but Horakova points out something that is really, really strange: the fact that our cultural memory of James T. Kirk isn't simply unrelated to the actual James T. Kirk depicted on screen, but is actually opposed to the actual Kirk in almost every way, and even people who obsessively watch the show are frequently unable to see the real Kirk instead of the distorted cultural memory of him...

Also, although it is only a footnote, her comment on the gamification of continuity -- not just in Star Trek but in a huge range of "franchises" today -- absolutely hits the nail on the head of a problem that's been bothering me for years, but which I could never quite articulate. (I love continuity! But the most important part of continuity is verisimilitude, and the great majority of "references" in, say, modern superhero movies not only fail to advance verisimilitude, but actually undermine it.)

Thanks for pulling me (and this wonderful article) into the conversation, Lawman!
Hear, hear. Thanks for sharing the link! Sorry to see that some posters seem determined to miss the point of it. (But however much we agree about Trek characters and continuity, you and I had better avoid discussing politics! Suffice it to say that I wouldn't vote for Rick Santorum for dogcatcher, and the only presidential candidate I really found tolerable in 2016 was Bernie Sanders... :whistle:)
 
Its not "elegant" its NX style

First of all, no it's not, and second of all, the two aren't mutually exclusive, and third of all, yes federation ships tend to go for grace and elegance.

Heck most the DSC have NX styling, but they look newer than the Connie, mostly due to the connie having a jarring mish mash of styling.

It's made to look old because of mixing styles? That doesn't make any sense.

On any show, sci-fi or not, things designed to fit within a set time frame look newer or older.

Yeah, and that doesn't actually make sense. We expect it from fiction but there's no reason why it would be so, were this universe real.

We have infact seen 9 of them.

Still not a degree in 23rd century starship design.

Not sure what you mean here. They could have built something like the Galaxy, it would not have had the power, but they could have built what amounts to a failed experiment

We're talking about design, here. They could've made a 641m ship that looked exactly like the Galaxy, with 23rd century tech. It's just not the design they were into at that time. But if the Galaxy had shown up as the 1701-A in The Voyage Home, would you have thought it was out of place? Of course not, because no other Trek period would've been in your mind at the time.

I’m not saying that.

Would you mind telling me what you're saying, then?

Why do they go from domes, to no domes and then back to domes again?

Again, why do you think once you go for domes, you can't go back? You're seeing starship design as a smooth, linear progression through time, but that doesn't make any sense. Two ships have two different design requirements, and sometimes they'll try new things with a particular class.
 
Horakova points out something that is really, really strange: the fact that our cultural memory of James T. Kirk isn't simply unrelated to the actual James T. Kirk depicted on screen, but is actually opposed to the actual Kirk in almost every way, and even people who obsessively watch the show are frequently unable to see the real Kirk instead of the distorted cultural memory of him they've received from Zapp Brannigan.

When I saw the 2009 movie, which I loved, I thought "hey, Kirk wasn't really like that before, right? Well, it's a new version so it's ok" and then when I watched TOS again I realised that Kirk is a level-headed, responsible, mission-first superhuman, and is not at all a womanising or head-first-into-danger kind of guy. For some reason we've got this image of him like that, but he's almost as diplomatic and seasoned as Picard.

Sure, what about it? I assume you're familiar with the term?

I'm familiar with it but it's nonsense, especially here.
 
I was not criticising Eaves. He is obviously very skilled designer. I was criticising the lack of coherent art direction, and that is due some executives who probably are not trained artists or designers.
What do you actually KNOW about the art direction in Star Trek: Discovery?
 
So, by that logic, anyone who's ever had a producer credit on a broadcast TV show "obviously know what they're doing." Are they all then immune from criticism?
They're immune to accusations of incompetence. The fact that they are able to do their jobs and make a finished product is proof to the contrary.

As before, you could make the case that you don't LIKE what they produced, but that's a different thing from saying that what they produced is of poor quality or workmanship.

Can we not draw meaningful distinctions between the competence of the creative professionals doing one show versus another?
Only when it comes to production MISTAKES, like a boom mic being in the shot and not edited out, or a cameraman's reflection in a mirror, or an effects shot with half of its effects incomplete (lights appearing in the wrong place because one of the negatives slipped) and so on.

A deliberate choice you disagree with isn't the same thing as a "mistake." Everybody thinks Rick Berman's "sonic wallpaper" in the TNG era was generally a bad idea, but it was an IDEA, not an accident.

Funny, that sure sounds to me like it supports my point, not yours. He gave lip service to the original while very clearly stating that his goal was to make something new and different.
Actually he said the original series would be at the core of his film, which is pretty much the OPPOSITE of "lipservice". You, as an "experienced audience member" should be able to tell the difference.

I don't get what you're trying to be sarcastic about here. "My" Star Trek television series is Star Trek.
Based on Star Trek created by "lawman?"

I'm seriously baffled by what you seem to be trying to say here. Following your examples to their logical conclusion, you're apparently out to discredit and undermine the very concept of criticism as a profession (much less as a pastime).
That's just it, being a professional critic requires a certain amount of expertise and experience enough to be able to judge what quality even looks like. This is the whole reason why professional critics have credibility and why we consider their opinions to be more valuable than some guy you meet on the bus. It's assumed that a critic actually knows quality when he sees it and has enough experience with similar products -- as well as knowledge of the products themselves -- to tell what was done right and what was done poorly. Paramount to this is some knowledge of how the product was made in the first place to be able to tell how that process plays into the finished product.

In other words, I am out to discredit the idea of people who don't know what the hell they're talking about demanding their opinions be taken seriously.
 
What do you actually KNOW about the art direction in Star Trek: Discovery?
I see the results. I also know that Eaves was told to not use the round engines and the costume designer was told to put those horrid huge bling areas on the sides of the uniforms.
 
I see the results. I also know that Eaves was told to not use the round engines and the costume designer was told to put those horrid huge bling areas on the sides of the uniforms.
So you don't know who gave them those directions, or when, or why, how how those directions factored into production choices, or how those choices were made in the first place, or why those choices were made in the first place, nor even how those directions fit in the context with OTHER directions you know nothing about...

But feel confident saying there is a "lack of art direction" because you're a genius and you just know these things.:techman:
 
So you don't know who gave them those directions, or when, or why, how how those directions factored into production choices, or how those choices were made in the first place, or why those choices were made in the first place, nor even how those directions fit in the context with OTHER directions you know nothing about...

But feel confident saying there is a "lack of art direction" because you're a genius and you just know these things.:techman:
Yep, because I can see the end results. The show suffers from the lack of coherent overall vision in other ways too. This is probably due the mess caused by Fuller departure. I hope the things improve in the future.

I've worked as professional illustrator, and I have to say that a difference between working with a competent art director and some higher up person who thinks they can do the art director's job too despite having zero training or experience on that field is drastic.
 
On a par with the article. Rationalization of a personal taste is rather a bore, although the Internet has made it a competition.

When I read a post like this, I can only conclude that you did not read the article, because this is a hot take that makes no sense. It's not even cogent enough to be wrong.
 
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