Would you like the regular "silent characters" to get more of a role?

[XCV330]

Shhh, you can't say anything positive about looks of women on the show on this forum. I already got busted for that once. Women are to be admired for their talents only and never for their looks... on this forum.
Anyhow, Sarah Mitich sure often likes to go under such heavy makeup, as to be unrecognizable. Here she is as seen on The Expanse (raise your hand if you knew she was on The Expanse without googling):

I never would have guessed that was her

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Shhh, you can't say anything positive about looks of women on the show on this forum. I already got busted for that once. Women are to be admired for their talents only and never for their looks... on this forum.

Seeing as how you don't have any infractions, your "bust" couldn't have been that severe.

And I don't recall anyone ever getting an admonishment for simply saying that a woman is attractive, which is a far cry from the type of objectification that usually does draw mod attention.

 

[eschaton]

I never would have guessed that was her

I mean, she seems to be wearing a fake nose as Airiam, meaning aside from her eyes and mouth, there are no elements of her real face to be seen.

 

[XCV330]

and now ive seen her name mentioned so much I can stop calling her Commander Daft Punk

 

[Vger23]

As I said before, I think the problem here was coordination between the scriptwriters, the directors, and the design guys was weak on the show.

Look at how earlier Treks treated extras. They were these boring looking people - usually human, though occasionally Vulcan or something else - who were always in the background of the shots. They were rarely referenced by names. Some of them appeared in a ridiculous number of episodes (like Ayala in VOY) yet we never really noticed them.

Contrast this with Discovery. The scriptwriters still treated these characters like extras, only giving them the tiniest bit of dialogue, mostly dealing with system status. But the visual crew decided to give several of them (like Detmer and Ariam) really distinctive looks which catch the eye. And the directors decided to add in "reaction shots" where the camera focuses directly on their face at times when others were talking - signaling they were not really props, but characters in some sense.

I don't see it that way at all. I see it as they'd simply made a concerted effort to give a little more life and appeal to the background characters, and now people are finding a reason to be disappointed and let down and (as usual) blame the production team for somehow doing something wrong.

It's frigging insanity.

 

[Tuskin38]

There is a video of her make up being done on the CBS twitter account, it isn't region locked, at least not in canada

https://twitter.com/CBSTVStudios/status/1007045798012469248

 

[gblews]

As I said before, I think the problem here was coordination between the scriptwriters, the directors, and the design guys was weak on the show.

Look at how earlier Treks treated extras. They were these boring looking people - usually human, though occasionally Vulcan or something else - who were always in the background of the shots. They were rarely referenced by names. Some of them appeared in a ridiculous number of episodes (like Ayala in VOY) yet we never really noticed them.

Contrast this with Discovery. The scriptwriters still treated these characters like extras, only giving them the tiniest bit of dialogue, mostly dealing with system status. But the visual crew decided to give several of them (like Detmer and Ariam) really distinctive looks which catch the eye. And the directors decided to add in "reaction shots" where the camera focuses directly on their face at times when others were talking - signaling they were not really props, but characters in some sense.

True. But my broader point stands. People want to know more about Detmer and Ariam in particular because they made the decision to make them interesting visually and focus the camera on them. How many of you, in contrast, even know the name of the Asian guy on the bridge?

I swear, you come up with some of the most inane complaints. So, you're complaining about the production staff making the background bridge characters too interesting and then showing them on camera too much. Huh?

I think the producers would read your post and be quite satisfied with themselves because I'm sure they strive to make every character "too interesting". As for the camera time, no doubt that the folks who have become fans of these characters are pretty happy they got the screen time they did get.

But besides all that, interesting looking characters whether they spend most of the time in the foreground or background, do nothing but help a show, especially a sci fi show like DSC.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

I swear, you come up with some of the most inane complaints. So, you're complaining about the production staff making the background bridge characters too interesting and then showing them on camera too much. Huh?

I don't think it's an inane complaint at all. If you put a visually interesting character with cool traits in a highly visible location, I'm naturally going to want to learn more about that character.

Like the pale tall bald guy with glowing eyes and a robot voice in Star Trek Into Darkness. I want to know more. A movie only has limited time, but a TV series should be able to do a little better.

 

[dahj]

If Boba Fett can get a movie, I don't see why Detmer, Ariam, Rhys and/or Owosekun can't get an episode.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

Boba Fett!? Boba Fett!? Where!?

 

[eschaton]

I swear, you come up with some of the most inane complaints. So, you're complaining about the production staff making the background bridge characters too interesting and then showing them on camera too much. Huh?

I think the producers would read your post and be quite satisfied with themselves because I'm sure they strive to make every character "too interesting". As for the camera time, no doubt that the folks who have become fans of these characters are pretty happy they got the screen time they did get.

But besides all that, interesting looking characters whether they spend most of the time in the foreground or background, do nothing but help a show, especially a sci fi show like DSC.

Opinions can vary of course if it was a "mistake" or not, but I do insist the reason people "expect more" of the characters is how they were treated visually and by the directors - e.g., not as extras.

I would partially disagree with your last statement only because budgets for these kind of shows are limited. I don't think this was a waste, but I do think that the level of production design, for example, which went into intricate things like the Klingon spacesuit which were on the screen for a very small period of time was a waste of finite resources.

 

[dahj]

Boba Fett!? Boba Fett!? Where!?

Smoking the good stuff with Green Clint Howard in a deleted scene

 

[gblews]

I don't think it's an inane complaint at all. If you put a visually interesting character with cool traits in a highly visible location, I'm naturally going to want to learn more about that character.

That's not the inane part. The complaint was about DSC making the background bridge characters "too" interesting, especially if they had no intention of expanding on any of the characters, at least not in season 1, and that this is somehow detrimental to the show.

They are background characters so the likelihood of the characters' roles being expanded is negligible, so that being the case, the implied remedy is "don't make the background characters so interesting". That suggestion is ridiculous.

 

[gblews]

Opinions can vary of course if it was a "mistake" or not, but I do insist the reason people "expect more" of the characters is how they were treated visually and by the directors - e.g., not as extras.

Your core assertion was that making the background bridge characters too interesting was somehow a production mistake. How could making characters intereseting looking ever be a mistake? That is one of the main goals of a production team especially in a genre show. So the producers are going to say, "hey, better tone down the "interestingness" of those background characters, fans are going to want to know more about them". If nothing else, it sets up new casting and story options for the production staff.

If the show were to go another couple of seasons and are stuck for a standalone story, or a main cast member is sick or on vacation etc, that could be the perfect opportunity to create a story around a character that fans have been wanting to know more about. Who knows, they might at some point want to promote one or two to main cast. The possibilities are myriad.

If there is a down side here, please point it out. BTW, they're not "extras". Extras usually don't get dialogue and individual reaction shots.

 

[eschaton]

Your core assertion was that making the background bridge characters too interesting was somehow a production mistake. How could making characters intereseting looking ever be a mistake? That is one of the main goals of a production team especially in a genre show. So the producers are going to say, "hey, better tone down the "interestingness" of those background characters, fans are going to want to know more about them". If nothing else, it sets up new casting and story options for the production staff.

Look up Chekhov's Gun. If you call attention to something in a work of fiction, people will believe it is important to the plot.

 

[The Wormhole]

Which Disco has already done with Lorca's tribble or the Black Badges. Although in the case of the Black Badges, we do appear to be getting something with them in the second season.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Look up Chekhov's Gun. If you call attention to something in a work of fiction, people will believe it is important to the plot.

People who need to overthink things are the only ones who believe that.

Which Disco has already done with Lorca's tribble or the Black Badges. Although in the case of the Black Badges, we do appear to be getting something with them in the second season.

Tribbles are Easter Eggs.

 

[The Wormhole]

In the case of Lorca's Tribble, everyone thought it would be instrumental in exposing Voq Tyler. Which it wasn't.

 

[Nerys Myk]

In the case of Lorca's Tribble, everyone thought it would be instrumental in exposing Voq Tyler. Which it wasn't.

Overthinking again.

 

[Vger23]

In the case of Lorca's Tribble, everyone thought it would be instrumental in exposing Voq Tyler. Which it wasn't.

I didn't think that for a single second. I thought it was there so people would say, "oh, look , a Tribble!"

Overthinking again.

I think people get really frustrated when they go through these massive unnecessary mental gyrations to try to figure out all the secret intricacies of the plot of a movie or show, and then have it all turned out to be for nothing. Which is ironic, because when it does turn out to be that their theory was true, they then criticise the writing as being predictable and childish. Another example of how you can't win