Why the hate for Disco?

[F. King Daniel]

I just don't need to actually SEE Stametz kissing Culber!

When I was 14 at school and I saw 2 guys kissing it was like, "Ewww, gay!" (but of course women doing it was sexy)

But that's because my school back when I was a kid was a very homophobic environment. I un-learned my prejudices pretty quickly outside of school. It's not guys kissing, or girls kissing. It's people kissing. And these days whoever's doing it barely registers.

 

[eschaton]

Discovery is very "progressive" which translates to "liberal".

I actually think Discovery is probably the second least left-leaning Trek overall (Enterprise is the only clearly right-leaning Star Trek show). Like a lot of modern TV/movies, there's a little bit of surface diversity, but it's essentially content-free when it comes to politics.

 

[Sci]

Star Trek: Discovery is of equal or higher quality than most of the latter seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and season four of Star Trek: Enterprise. It is of clearly higher quality than most of the early seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, all of Star Trek: Voyager, and the first three seasons of Star Trek: Enterprise. The hate it gets is not about its level of quality.

The best of the people who hate it, do so because they are threatened by change and refuse to open themselves to the conventions of modern serialized television.

The rest who hate it, do so because they are (whether consciously or subconsciously) bigots who don't like seeing a black woman as the primary character and/or don't like seeing an ethnically and sexually diverse cast.

 

[MacLeod]

Star Trek: Discovery is of equal or higher quality than most of the latter seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and season four of Star Trek: Enterprise. It is of clearly higher quality than most of the early seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, all of Star Trek: Voyager, and the first three seasons of Star Trek: Enterprise. The hate it gets is not about its level of quality.

The best of the people who hate it, do so because they are threatened by change and refuse to open themselves to the conventions of modern serialized television.

The rest who hate it, do so because they are (whether consciously or subconsciously) bigots who don't like seeing a black woman as the primary character and/or don't like seeing an ethnically and sexually diverse cast.

I take it these are the same people who hate DSN because it had a black male as the lead or VOY because it had a female lead? People can dislike a character for any number of reasons unrelated to the gender/sexual orientation/ethnicity/race etc.. I'm not saying that some people hate DSC because of the reasons you state but perhaps others dislike it because the of the writing. It might just be me but I can't say I've seen too many complaints about SMG acting in the show but I have seen plenty about her character.

Just curious what do you mean by conventions of modern serialised television?

 

[Sci]

I take it these are the same people who hate DSN because it had a black male as the lead or VOY because it had a female lead?

There were a lot of people who hated those shows for that, too. (Also, nobody with good taste can hate DS9.)

People can dislike a character for any number of reasons unrelated to the gender/sexual orientation/ethnicity/race etc..

I agree. I cited them in my post you're replying to. They are the ones who are threatened by change and who are unwilling to open themselves up to the conventions of modern serialized television.

Just curious what do you mean by conventions of modern serialised television?

A lot of people don't like how each episode is a continuing part of a larger story rather than an closed story in and of itself, and so they evaluate DIS along the same terms by which you would evaluate a season of TNG. It's like reading a chapter in a novel and being upset it doesn't function like a short story, and comparing a season of DIS to a season of TNG is like comparing a novel to a short story anthology. It's judging one type of story by the standards of another because you don't like the format.

 

[Garblovian Greg]

In my opinion, Voyager was a great show. It mixed a long term plot (getting home) with short term plots that ran from 1 to 3 episodes to resolve. But let's be honest: Voyager became much better when Seven joined the crew.

I like basically all ST series. TOS was episodic, and was pretty much "anything goes". Fun and adventure aboard a starship. Anything could happen from Tribbles to Jack the Ripper to space hippies to planet eating doomsday machines to time travel to planetary amusement parks that read your mind. Animated was pretty close to an extension of the same theme, but with places, creatures, and aliens that would have been prohibitively expensive to make as props and sets. But easy enough to animate. I did like the fact that on at least one episode it borrowed Larry Niven's Known Space series for a storyline. No, Kzinti are not part of the ST universe otherwise.

There had been some plans made to bring back the original TOS cast and relaunch the series in the late 70s, but they did the first Star Trek movie instead. I think I would have preferred to see the series that was proposed. Not that ST:TMP was bad....but it wasn't great. Amazingly, they followed it up with the best ST movie of all time.

TNG got off to a slow start. The pilot episode should have been disposed of and the masters burned before it ever reached a TV studio for broadcast. But it hit its stride right after getting rid of Yar. Death by tar pit!

DS9: It's a space based soap opera with some combat and later is central to a full scale war. I've missed some episodes and it's fun to catch them at random in reruns.

Honestly I've managed to miss most episodes of Enterprise but I'm catching up on it, in an erratic fashion. It usually airs at the wrong time for me to sit down and watch it.

Discovery had the strangest start of all of them but I've always liked it despite its SJW stuff that kind of irritates me.

I just sort of figure that by the time we have warp drive and transporters, people won't be confused about biological gender anymore. Nor will they be so easily upset by a difference of opinion. Maturity must eventually come to the race, right? Hopefully?

 

[F. King Daniel]

No, Kzinti are not part of the ST universe otherwise.

Tell that to retired old Riker and has family!
(Michael Chabon loved the Kzinti and sought Niven's permission to namedrop them in Picard S01E07)

 

[TimeIsAPredator]

I actually think Discovery is probably the second least left-leaning Trek overall (Enterprise is the only clearly right-leaning Star Trek show). Like a lot of modern TV/movies, there's a little bit of surface diversity, but it's essentially content-free when it comes to politics.

Glad I am not the only one noticed this. Lots of nods to things but very very few people writing political or racial shows with any skill or depth right now. The Handmaids Tale while it was still following the books was the last I can think of but that is obviously taken from old material. Watchmen started great but the racial aspect kinda slipped away towards the end

The best of the people who hate it, do so because they are threatened by change and refuse to open themselves to the conventions of modern serialized television.

Utter BS and any time people like me point to a better "modern serialised" show like The Expanse Disco fans throw a hissy fit

 

[StarMan]

Star Trek: Discovery is of equal or higher quality than most of the latter seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and season four of Star Trek: Enterprise. It is of clearly higher quality than most of the early seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, all of Star Trek: Voyager, and the first three seasons of Star Trek: Enterprise. The hate it gets is not about its level of quality.

The best of the people who hate it, do so because they are threatened by change and refuse to open themselves to the conventions of modern serialized television.

The rest who hate it, do so because they are (whether consciously or subconsciously) bigots who don't like seeing a black woman as the primary character and/or don't like seeing an ethnically and sexually diverse cast.

Not about quality? Lesse ...

Well, I'm most certainly in the "not like" category.

The best who hate it, you say? Well, let's have a nosey at some shows I happily call myself a fan of:

Twin Peaks, Stranger Things, Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, The Expanse, Game of Thrones.

They certainly qualify as serialised television. So clearly, I'm not in the best category. Which would mean ... I'm a bigot. I must have a screw loose then thinking Naomi Nagata from The Expanse is a wonderfully drawn character with strength, resiliency and heart.

...

Or maybe - just maybe - it is about quality. My measuring stick is what I enjoy that's being produced in the here and now, not Trek series produced decades ago which were a product of their time. If anyone has a problem with a black, female lead and LGBTQ themes, then they have some work to do on themselves. But let's be clear - containing those "progressive" elements is not a shield against genuine criticism, or a measure of quality in and of themselves.

 

[Lord Garth]

Trek overall (Enterprise is the only clearly right-leaning Star Trek show).

And that vibe I got from it is one of a few main things that's colored my overall view against ENT, even to this day. Sure, there are individual episodes I liked, but as a whole? It's the one Star Trek series I just can't bring myself to embrace, even after I watched it from start-to-finish twice, 10 years apart.

Like a lot of modern TV/movies, there's a little bit of surface diversity, but it's essentially content-free when it comes to politics.

I agree and disagree at the same time. We live in an age where people complain about "Identity Politics" where those in the extreme will try to politicize everything. Having gays, a non-binary person, a transgendered woman, a mostly female bridge crew, and a black female Captain is going to make large pockets of people scream about an agenda being pushed down their throats. It's ridiculous, but that's the situation as it is, unfortunately. Some day that won't be the case, and hopefully we'll live to see it.

 

[Robert April]

There were a lot of people who hated those shows for that, too. (Also, nobody with good taste can hate DS9.)



I agree. I cited them in my post you're replying to. They are the ones who are threatened by change and who are unwilling to open themselves up to the conventions of modern serialized television.



A lot of people don't like how each episode is a continuing part of a larger story rather than an closed story in and of itself, and so they evaluate DIS along the same terms by which you would evaluate a season of TNG. It's like reading a chapter in a novel and being upset it doesn't function like a short story, and comparing a season of DIS to a season of TNG is like comparing a novel to a short story anthology. It's judging one type of story by the standards of another because you don't like the format.

I don't think it's the format so much as not caring for the story (or characters). If you don't like the story, you don't like the arc, and you don't like the season, which is a big chunk of the series (so far). With an episodic based series, you like some, maybe hate some, and some are meh. Thinking of other series, some of my favorites are stand alone. TNG, Yesterday's Enterprise comes to mind.

I think Enterprise was more arc based than previous series and it received the most hate to that point.

I also think Discovery is the most left leaning ST series to date, which may account for part of the hate.

 

[Lord Garth]

Who needs to compare Discovery to old Star Trek shows? I don't.

Twin Peaks, Stranger Things, Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, The Expanse, Game of Thrones.

I've seen most of these shows. And, as I've said before, I love Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul. Going by the averages I rate Discovery, which I give an 8, I'd give those two shows a high-9 or even a 10.

Yeah, I would say they're better but not so much better that it makes me not want to be able to even watch Discovery or say I don't like it. There's a difference, but I think the difference is exaggerated. Or at least that's my view of it. I don't need everything to be perfect 10s all the time.

Before someone says "This is 2021! It has to be all 10s all the time!" No. There's plenty of crap on TV. Real crap. Shit that I'm not going to bother with, and most people here won't or at least shouldn't.

 

[cooleddie74]

New guy here. And first post.

I LIKE Discovery, but some things do annoy me about it.
Let me start by saying I'm old enough to vaguely remember seeing some of the last episodes of the original Star Trek when they were in their first rerun cycle. Not quite old enough to have seen them premiere on TV, but by 1971 I was definitely watching. I would have been six years old. So...I'm not the youngest guy here.

Our culture has changed a lot since then. A LOT has changed since then. And my attitudes are a product of the times I grew up in.

Discovery is very "progressive" which translates to "liberal". It makes heavy use of the cards found in the deck of today's "social justice warriors". The series is NEARLY hostile toward white human males. Aside from Anson Mount's portrayal of Captain Christopher Pike (Fantastic work, and I'm glad he's getting his own new ST series because of it!), white human males in Discovery are either of low rank or are villainous to one degree or another.
But I'd have to say....I personally thought that Lorca was a really GOOD Captain, his origins in the Terran Empire universe and his agenda to get Georgiou notwithstanding.

The series heavily pushes homosexuality and the notion of gender fluidity and even takes a poke at gender naming. (Male, female, he, she, it, other...) To a person of my generation I find these things to be anywhere from somewhat unsettling to positively triggering!

I'll be the first to say that "You like what you like, you like who you like, and you are free to live and think as you please" but that doesn't mean you have to shove it down my throat by making HALF the cast neither straight nor definitively gendered!

Taken individually, I find that all of the cast members that represent these "alternative lifestyles" are engaging, charming, and endearing. I LIKE them. I just don't need to actually SEE Stametz kissing Culber! And to be totally fair about it, I'm not a fan of kissing scenes even among straight white couples. I don't watch any Star Trek series out of any interest in the crew's romantic interests or sexual proclivities.

So it's not that I object to these alternative lifestyles....but they're really trying to hammer the viewership with it, and that's the part I have a bit of a problem with. Can you turn it down, maybe?

 

[The Lensman]

No shit. Pass the bottle and order another.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Gotta love those guys not giving a single fuck that Superman is downing shots right next to them

 

[cooleddie74]

It was 1983. The economy was rough. Most everyone was suffering.

 

[M'Sharak]

I LIKE Discovery, but some things do annoy me about it.
... I'm old enough to vaguely remember seeing some of the last episodes of the original Star Trek ...
Our culture has changed a lot since then... my attitudes are a product of the times I grew up in.

Discovery is very "progressive" which translates to "liberal" ... "social justice warriors". The series is NEARLY hostile toward white human males. ...

The series heavily pushes homosexuality and the notion of gender fluidity and even takes a poke at gender naming. (Male, female, he, she, it, other...) To a person of my generation I find these things to be anywhere from somewhat unsettling to positively triggering!

I'll be the first to say that "You like what you like, you like who you like, and you are free to live and think as you please" but that doesn't mean you have to shove it down my throat by making HALF the cast neither straight nor definitively gendered!

... all of the cast members that represent these "alternative lifestyles" are engaging, charming, and endearing. I LIKE them. I just don't need to actually SEE Stametz kissing Culber! ...

So it's not that I object to these alternative lifestyles....but ...

Glad to hear there are some things you like about the show.

However:

To a person of my generation I find these things to be anywhere from somewhat unsettling to positively triggering!

Let's nip that pretense in the bud right there.

You've gone to some lengths to establish that you're older than a lot of the other people you imagine are here... and then you want to use that as an excuse for not wanting to accept certain very specific aspects of story, character, casting, or whatever.

Here's a secret: None of that has anything to do with how old you are.

If you made a choice to lock yourself in to some outmoded preconceptions, then call it that. Own it.

If you made a decision that you would adhere to beliefs which were already becoming obsolete during the time you claim to have been growing up, then call it that. Own it.

If you consciously chose to arrest your personal growth at some predetermined point and swore never to change your mind about anything ever again, then say that.

But when you come in and say stuff like:

I'll be the first to say that "You like what you like, you like who you like, and you are free to live and think as you please" but that doesn't mean you have to shove it down my throat... ​

... you know what it looks like to everyone else?

Seriously. You might want to step back and reconsider a lot of what you've said here. It's not painting a very flattering picture of an open-minded Trek fan.

Any time you catch yourself expressing an opinion in the form of "I'm not _______, BUT . . . " -- stop. Ask yourself why you're doing that. For whose benefit is it supposed to be? Why does "I'm not ________" need to be qualified?

Ask yourself why what it really sounds like is an excuse being made. And whether that's in any way necessary or desirable.

Think about it. And welcome, new guy.

 

[The Rock]

I like the show a lot, but for me its main problem is that it is a chore to rewatch any episodes. I really have no desire to go back and watch any of its episodes again individually. There are many favorite Trek episodes of mine from the other series (even Picard) that I can watch over and over again and never get bored. For Disco? I dunno, it's like so serialized that if you want to rewatch any episodes, you pretty much have to watch an entire season because each episode for that season is so dependent on the other episodes to work.

Picard and Lower Decks (I'm using these as an example because these are part of the current era of Trek) are much easier to rewatch since their individual episodes, while serialized, are more self-contained.

 

[Jadeb]

Imagine Spock were created today. People would be up in arms that Trek was promoting inter-species mingling to advance the leftist agenda and would claim that he was made to look like the Devil as an insult to Christians.

That stuff blows my mind.

 

[Garblovian Greg]

I OWN the belief that there are two genders and only two (aside from rare cases where the gender is neither chromosomally XX or XY) and your chromosomal expression of the 23rd allele determines that, and that is that. I OWN the belief that homosexuality is not a normal behavior. I OWN the belief that any notion that gender is a matter of opinion, or can be changed, is outright silliness. Oh, sure, you can by drug therapy stimulate different hormonal responses and cause feminization of males or masculinization of females, and enhance those changes by surgery or implants, but if you think that a female can become male or vice versa, I'll recommend a really good psychotherapist to you. My generation was not raised to believe that any of these things are normal or even worthy of consideration.

So there. That's my belief system which Discovery runs afoul of in several ways. Nonetheless I have absolutely no issue with any of the characters who embody these things I've mentioned, except that there are too many on the show, to such an extent that its shameless attempts to commit acts of liberal social engineering can not be ignored no matter how much I wish I could. So I notice them. And reject what they are trying to preach to me.

And after all that I still like the show! I accept things as they are even if I may not agree with certain aspects of what they represent.