What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

Discussion in 'General Trek Discussion' started by Amasov, Jun 20, 2020.

  1. Ovation

    Ovation Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Sep 19, 2003
    Location:
    La Belle Province
    Wow. About 95% of the time, I literally have no idea what I’m going to watch until 5-10 minutes before I do (work-related viewing excepted).
     
  2. Lord Garth

    Lord Garth Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    May 7, 2011
    Location:
    Aug 10, 2399
    This is me we're talking about. ;)
     
    kkt, Markonian and Richard S. Claus like this.
  3. FormerLurker

    FormerLurker Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    May 17, 2009
    David Lynch's Dune makes the SyFy remake look like the porn version without the sex.
     
    Lord Garth likes this.
  4. drt

    drt Commodore Commodore

    Joined:
    Jun 5, 2013
    I recall the SyFy one being pretty good, painfully low budget aside.
     
  5. FormerLurker

    FormerLurker Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    May 17, 2009
    There was some bad acting going on. The Bene Gesserits were prime examples, especially Gaius Helen Mohiam. And the name pronunciation was atrocious.
     
    Richard S. Claus likes this.
  6. Richard S. Claus

    Richard S. Claus Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 10, 2021
    Location:
    Richard S. Ta
    Interesting to see a young James McAvoy if nothing else.
     
  7. FormerLurker

    FormerLurker Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    May 17, 2009
    He was in the sequels, but not SyFy's original with William Hurt as Duke Leto.
     
  8. Michael Two Wolves

    Michael Two Wolves Commander Red Shirt

    Joined:
    Sep 18, 2023
    Location:
    Borg Space
    Wait, Leto as in Dune?
     
  9. fireproof78

    fireproof78 Fleet Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Apr 11, 2014
    Location:
    Classic Space
    Yes. Scifi channel miniseries version.

    Enjoyable, if overly long.
     
    Michael Two Wolves likes this.
  10. Michael Two Wolves

    Michael Two Wolves Commander Red Shirt

    Joined:
    Sep 18, 2023
    Location:
    Borg Space
    I haven't seen the mini-series. I remember the Dino Di Laurentiis film, though. lmao A young(ish) Patrick Stewart starred in it, I recall. You almost had to read the books just to know what the hell was going on. Love how they tried to jam the first three books into the prologue.

    *plants a thumper, runs away*
    [​IMG]
     
    HIjol likes this.
  11. HIjol

    HIjol Vice Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    Feb 13, 2014
    Location:
    Midwest, USA
    Star Trek Controversial Opinions?
    I think Boothby may have been a Traveler.
    Or a Martian…
     
    kkt and publiusr like this.
  12. UnknownSample

    UnknownSample Commodore Commodore

    Joined:
    Aug 10, 2004
    Location:
    Earth's surface
    This is controversial these days I suppose..
    Vulcans *suppress* emotion/passions, deep
    down... they're neither devoid of emotion like
    robots, nor just keeping a straight face, which
    believe it or not, are the two debate positions I
    hear among young fans.
    ------------------
    In the 60s, psychological concepts were in the
    air, real psychology, not lightweight pop
    psychology. They could expect some viewers
    to pick up on what they were doing. Newer
    viewers might not even know about supression
    of ideas, feelings, or memories, and how much
    a person can push things under.
    ------------------
    This includes love/lust/sex. Their supression of
    all feeling, to prevent the initially very violent
    nature of Vulcans from recurring, wouldn't
    leave out the most tumultuoius of passions, that
    probably leads to more murders than any
    other. This created the question of how they
    could reproduce, leading to the pon farr idea.
    There's no possible other reason for introducing
    such a thing.
    ----------------------------
    The new shows are made by people, and for
    people, who grew up with later versions of
    Trek, where writers never re-explained what
    Vulcans were in depth, assuming we all knew
    already... and Vulcans rarely figured into plots.
    Eventually there was Tuvok, but the
    supression of emotion wasn't referred to much.
    A viewer could easily get the idea that Vulcans
    were just sort of "stiff" and liked logic... making
    them like so many other lightweight, generic TV
    aliens, like Teal'c from Stargate... whom we
    know is alien, why? Because he speaks in a
    very dignified way...
    ------------------
    I hear the Abrams movies had Spock and
    Uhura dating. He said, cluelessly, that the no
    sex for Vulcans thing in TOS was the prudism of
    the times... humans were very sexual in TOS. I
    mean, Kirk... SNW had Spock in a romantic/sex
    scene in episode one.
    -----------------
    Whether Vulcans' extreme supression can
    possibly be healthy, and not traumatic and
    damaging, is questionable. But it's still a great
    concept that they explored well, in TOS. Many
    episodes lose most of their depth and resonance,
    if you're unaware of the concept... like This Side
    of Paradise.
     
    Richard S. Claus likes this.
  13. Lord Garth

    Lord Garth Admiral Admiral

    Joined:
    May 7, 2011
    Location:
    Aug 10, 2399
    I've seen most SNW episodes, but not all of them. And of the ones I've seen, I've only watched them once. But I don't think it's been established on that series that Vulcans are devoid of emotion. I don't think it's ever actually said in the Abrams Films either.

    Though I will agree there's an assumption that people were more familiar with TOS than they actually were. Things were either forgotten, misremembered, exaggerated, or distorted. In both fandom and pop culture.

    JJ Abrams was really a Star Wars fan. Akiva Goldsman, the Showrunner for SNW, was born in 1962. Definitely not a Millennial. I don't think it's a stretch to say he actually really is a TOS Fan. When he found out the original setting for Discovery (during its first two seasons) was 10 years before TOS, his first thought was, "Where's Pike?" Though I do think the target audience is people who didn't grow up with TOS and who want a 21st Century version of it. I won't argue with that point.
     
    Last edited: Sep 23, 2023
  14. Richard S. Claus

    Richard S. Claus Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 10, 2021
    Location:
    Richard S. Ta
    Vulcans are at their best when it's clear they are straining to maintain their composure. Nimoy plays Spock so well when he is at the limit of his tolerances.
     
    Last edited: Sep 23, 2023
    kkt, HoHoHoRod, Yule Cat and 4 others like this.
  15. Santa Kang

    Santa Kang An honorable elf Premium Member

    Joined:
    Nov 4, 2001
    Location:
    North Pole, Q'oNos
    Yeah, he's mentioned being a fan and it was a "refuge" from a turbulent childhood while growing up.
    The other show runner, Henry Alonzo Meyers was born in 1972, so also not a Millennial.
     
    Lord Garth likes this.
  16. The Knappos

    The Knappos Fleet Captain Fleet Captain

    Joined:
    Dec 7, 2021
    Location:
    South coast, UK
    Mark Lenard is the quintessential Vulcan for me. Cold. Logical. But so full of emotion it hurts as a viewer that he’s suppressing it so much.
     
  17. UnknownSample

    UnknownSample Commodore Commodore

    Joined:
    Aug 10, 2004
    Location:
    Earth's surface
    I don't know what you're trying to say. SNW established in episode 1 that Vulcans are apparently very emotional, in the romantic scene. Whether you keep a straight face or not, romance/love/sex are emotional... One thing I'm afraid of is that people have come to view sex as just "getting off" (like the scifi fans who think robot sex would be preferable to sex between people) to the point where emotionlessness and sex seem to go together for them. So routinely sexually active Vulcans make sense to them...
    --------------
    What do you mean by "devoid of emotion"? Suppression of emotion, and having no emotion to begin with, are two very different things.
    ------------
    I should add that I've just seen the first 3 episodes of SNW, during their free month. That ep 1 scene told me a lot... and I'[COLOR=rgb(20, 20, 20)]ve just seen 3 or so Discoveries.
    --------------
    Of course Abrams is no millennia l, but I was thinking of TV. In Abrams, h e had no interest in Trek and no particular respect for it when offered the job. He had to ask his Trek fan pals, who told him Trek is good because of Kirk's struggles with the issue of command... Anyway, I figure any show is largely made by people in their 30s, aside from those at the very top. I don't know if I'm right. That would mean millennials.
    -------------[/COLOR]
     
  18. UnknownSample

    UnknownSample Commodore Commodore

    Joined:
    Aug 10, 2004
    Location:
    Earth's surface
    He was only "full of emotion" when a disease made him unable to suppress, in "Sarek", TNG.
    When we watch TOS, we often suspect that there might be more emotion, closer to the surface, than Vulcans care to admit. But it's going way too far to believe that the Vulcan claim of being without emotion is just a claim. Psychological repression is a powerful thing. He's locked much of the emotion into a tiny room in the basement, but it won't be completely contained. Human characters keep reading human emotion into Vulcans' words and actions, and the latter keep having to explain patiently that it's not appropriate to.
     
  19. Richard S. Claus

    Richard S. Claus Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

    Joined:
    Mar 10, 2021
    Location:
    Richard S. Ta
    Hard disagree. In Journey to Babel, the love he has for Amanda is palpable. Just very, very subtly played.
     
    kkt, HoHoHoRod, Yule Cat and 7 others like this.
  20. AresB

    AresB Commander Red Shirt

    Joined:
    Feb 9, 2020
    Location:
    Turku, Finland
    The same in the Search for Spock. By Mark Lenard's intense performance in his scene at Kirk's apartment, it was obvious "his logic was uncertain where his son was concerned."
     
    kkt, Yule Cat, Turtletrekker and 3 others like this.