The following review is based on the first six episodes of the second season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, provided early to the media. TrekMovie will have full recap/reviews for each episode starting with the season debut on Thursday, June 15. NOTE: This review contains minor spoilers.
Swinging into Season 2
The new season of Strange New Worlds welcomes viewers back to the USS Enterprise under the command of Christopher Pike. All that worked in the first season is on display, including the likable characters played by a strong cast, a variety of episodic adventures, the good mix of action, heart, and humor, and excellent production quality. Strange New Worlds continues to provide a fun, modern take on classic Trek storytelling—with a few new tricks.
If you’ve heard the showrunners and cast of Strange New Worlds talk about the show’s second season, the phrase you’ll have come across most frequently is “big swings.” We’ve been repeatedly told that they’d be shaking up the formula and pushing the boundaries of what Star Trek can be. It’s a fun idea—the seemingly most traditional of the current crop of shows (episodic, planet-of-the-week, starship out exploring the galaxy) pushing the franchise in new directions. And yet, while the initial batch of 6 episodes made available to review are entertaining, there’s little in terms of envelope-pushing to date. Admittedly, these episodes didn’t include the much-anticipated, part-animated Lower Decks crossover, or whatever-the-hell episode 9 is (rumored to be a musical). Instead, we have a varied, fun, but hardly wild batch of episodes.
I fail to see the logic in having a catchphrase.
The initial episodes cover a number of well-worn Trek scenarios. There’s a courtroom drama as Una (Rebecca Romjin) goes on trial, time travel, Klingons, and a return to Rigel VII, last visited just prior to the events of “The Cage.” Starting things off is the season opener “The Broken Circle.” With Anson Mount’s Pike largely absent (he’s off trying to help Una), command of the Enterprise falls to Spock (Ethan Peck), who takes us to an alien world to reunite the crew with La’an (Christina Chong), last seen taking a leave of absence in “All Those Who Wander.” What follows is an entertaining and action-packed, if a little insubstantial, season opener, with some of the show’s ensemble—in particular M’Benga (Babs Olusanmokun) and Chapel (Jess Bush)—getting a chance to shine.
The second episode sees Una on trial for concealing her Illyrian heritage and genetic modification. Starfleet’s blanket ban on allowing genetically modified personnel to serve was previously examined in DS9’s “Doctor Bashir, I Presume?” and more recently on Prodigy, and is something that, although understandable, has always felt at odds with the Federation’s utopian, inclusive ideals. It’s a classic Trek courtroom drama fitting with franchise themes; no “Measure of a Man,” but it’s entertaining, thought-provoking, and one of Strange New Worlds’ strongest episodes to date, with both Romjin and guest star Yetide Badaki giving great performances.
Did you think I wasn’t coming back?
The following four episodes include the La’an/Kirk time travel story, the return trip to Rigel VII, a Spock/T’Pring/Chapel episode, and a horror-tinged outing for Uhura. Of these, only the Spock-centric fifth episode really feels like it’s taking chances and is likely to prove divisive as a result. For the record, I thought this was the weakest of the 6 episodes, but tonally it’s similar to the first season’s body-swapping “Spock Amok” (which I also wasn’t a fan of). Those who liked that episode should find a lot to enjoy in it.
The time travel episode made headlines when Christina Chong was spotted filming on location in downtown Toronto with Vampire Diaries star Paul Wesley and Paramount had to confirm that yes, he was playing James T. Kirk. Following his surprise alternate timeline appearance in the season 1 finale, Wesley gets to play a different version of Kirk here, and he and Chong have good chemistry. It’s her largest role in the series to date, and we get to see a different side of the usually buttoned-down security officer. There’s an element of the episode that’s likely to provoke debate, but it’s an enjoyable time travel story. The remaining two episodes, featuring Pike’s return to Rigel VII and a spooky Uhura story, are both solid and make this an entertaining, diverse, group of episodes that shows the scope the show’s format allows.
I make this look good.
New for two
That’s not to say there aren’t some notable differences from the first season. Pike, having come to terms with his impending death, is lighter, less introspective than before, and seems determined to make the most of life. (Importantly though, the hair is still spectacular.) It also feels like more of an ensemble show, with the supporting cast getting more to do, particularly Christina Chong and Jess Bush. There are a couple of episodes where Pike is hardly featured, with the focus switched almost entirely to other crew members.
Most obviously though, there’s the addition of two new cast members: Carol Kane as the new chief engineer, Pelia, and Paul Wesley as James T. Kirk. Both have big shoes to fill. Carol Kane brings her wealth of experience to Pelia and crafts a very different character from her predecessor, Hemmer (Bruce Horak). Kane’s offbeat performance (and accent) won’t be to everyone’s taste, but they are tied into an interesting mystery about her character’s background. Like Neelix and Phlox, she looks set to be one of Trek’s offbeat characters that divides fans. And as with those characters, we suspect that once they get used to the off-kilter performance, she’ll win most people over.
Paul Wesley has the more thankless job of reimagining Kirk. Although Chris Pine had previously played the role, the alternate Kelvin timeline allowed him to put his own spin on the character. Welsey, on the other hand, is following on directly from Shatner (or should that be preceding him?), which is no easy task. Taking the wise route of not choosing to outright imitate him, his mannered performance just about walks the line between giving us shades of the Kirk we know, while crafting his own take on the character. If you can put Shatner’s performance aside, he’s a lot of fun, even if he never quite escapes his predecessor’s shadow.
Stop. It’s not Hemmer Time.
Mind the gaps
If you’re one of the people who balked at some of the liberties season 1 took with canon and the use of certain characters, you’re not going to find anything here to reassure you. The show isn’t so much “finding gaps in canon” (as showrunners Akiva Goldsman and Henry Alonso Myers claim) as driving a starship through it. The Gorn are still a thing, and considerable liberties are taken with Spock’s relationships with both T’Pring and Chapel. As for the Klingons, they’ve now morphed into something close to the version we know—their unfortunate Discovery redesign entirely discarded without explanation. We do however finally get some things officially canonized and other bits of lore expanded upon in interesting ways that will likely be the subject of much discussion. So again, like with season 1, definite liberties are taken with canon but that’s the price you pay for having a 23rd century-set show.
In conclusion, season 2 of Strange New Worlds is off to a fun start. While the promised biggest swings are (presumably) largely still to come, the initial run of episodes contains enough variety and shifts focus among the crew; there should be something here for all but the most die-hard holdouts. While the final season of Picard season 3 may have shown us how to shake Trek up and reinvent it for the modern era, there’s something delightfully old-school about Strange New Worlds: traditional Trek with a modern twist. But Star Trek has always been a versatile format and there’s more than enough room for multiple versions. On the evidence here, Strange New Worlds looks set to continue honoring the past while looking to the future. Hit it.
Hailing fr… what was that about not needing catchphrases?
Thursday!
Season 2 will premiere Thursday, June 15 on Paramount+ in the U.S, the U.K., Australia, Latin America, Brazil, France, Italy, Germany, Switzerland and Austria. The second season will also be available to stream on Paramount+ in South Korea, with premiere dates to be announced at a later date. Following the premiere, new episodes of the 10-episode season will drop weekly on Thursdays.
Find more stories on the Star Trek Universe.
Thank you for this tease of what’s to come.
Does Ortegas at least get more to do this time?
More importantly does she come across as more professional and less the quip machine.
No one ever says fighter pilots are not professional, but a significant portion of the ones I’ve met are ‘quip machines’ in the work environment.
Let’s not let our biases about what ‘should be’ professional military style conduct get in the way of reflecting the temperaments of those who are truly capable.
Some pilots are quiet and serious true, but Ortegas is very moderated compared to some I have known.
(And yes, when I first met one like that my attitude was ‘Is this guy for real?’ But he was, and was already higher in rank than Ortegas at that point and kept on rising.)
I don’t mind the quips, but I’d like to see more nuance in the character. There’s a time and place. What I agree with Neill on, is it seems like the quips are a bit of a crutch to prop up characterization. Hopefully that changes.
I don’t think the quips are appropriate on the Bridge & with superior officers. The Pike we saw in “The Cage” seemed like a no-nonsense captain. This is not the same one we see in SNW.
He, uh, have any major life events in the interval?
Yes, they are not only not being true to canon, they are also not being true to the characters (perhaps a bigger sin?).
LOL, when we have to live with Lower Decks as canon, this is so freaking minor, dude.
Don’t sweat the small stuff…we got bigger, much more serious problems in Trek canon these days.
Except that “small stuff” can lead to systemic problems. Squeegee artists, Bear Stearns, and all that.
True, but that was established all the way back to his first appearance of Discovery. I think if we got the original Pike then, people wouldn’t have been so enamored with wanting a Pike show. In reality, people just loved Anson Mount’s portrayal. He obviously could’ve just been a new character altogether.
This. There was so much room to interpret Pike. I’d argue his portrayal in Disco was a more intriguing version of that character. I think he acts less like a Starfleet Captain on SNW than he did on Disco.
I don’t agree. The intrigue when people saw Anson Mount was that he looks a little like Jeffrey Hunter! But they decided to not honor the way Gene Roddenberry envisioned him.
I agree he LOOKS like Pike, but he doesn’t act like him at all. I’m only saying it’s not because he kind of looked like him is why people liked him, they simply liked his style and personality. And I also think a big part of that was due to such a contrast with Lorca who of course was not exactly social or friendly.
Pike came off the perfect Captain, someone you can have a beer with like Kirk and Archer, a bit of a parent like Janeway and carried the ideals of the Federation the same way Picard did. They exuded every great element you can have in a leader.
I mean, all the shows tweaked their characters a bit in the early episodes. Picard was more stuck-up; Sisko was on the verge of quitting for “civilian employment.” Janeway had a dog. :)
The Pike we saw in “The Cage” had just lost, IIRC, more than ten crewmembers (in an age of smaller ships, to boot); he may not have entirely been himself, even before we consider the time crystal relevations.
Sure from a story POV, you can argue all of that.And I’m fine with that, because I truly love Mount’s version of Pike. Hunter’s version, not so much, but I’m sure I would’ve liked him more if he stayed.
But let’s not kid ourselves either. The character was established to be someone more standoffish and kind of ornery. I don’t think the next episode he was going to suddenly morph into Mount’s version of a guy cooking for his staff and telling dad jokes. I don’t see Mount’s Pike having a issue with having women on his bridge either.
But I do agree in time, he could’ve changed a bit. But then Kirk basically stayed Kirk through the entire show. But that was a different time I guess.
Well Gene Rodenberry himself completely changed the way the entire TOS universe looked when he radically changed it for TMP, and he also had the characters behave more seriously in TMP than in TOS.
I think he would be the first person who would want to update his characters some to reflect more modern times. And I spent a little bit of time with the man many years back.
Jeez, maybe that’s because it’s a work of fiction and they’ve updated the character to be both more relatable, and to come across as more realistic, to today’s audiences?
Could that be it? LOL
Although I’ve never had the chance to meet a fighter pilot, and this would have been a very interesting conversation to be sure, intuitively I agree with you TG47. I mean, it’s perfectly natural that the personality would go with the profession and even if the dudes and dudettes may not lay it on as thick as in the Top Gun movies (although some probably do), I’m sure some level of cockiness is a given.
This being said, the Enterprise is a 300+ meter capital ship, not a fighter jet. The person at the helm is not alone in the cockpit with only his/her life depending on their actions and behavior. And they have the captain right at their back too. It’s not like you can fly the Enterprise like Han Solo did the Millennium Falcon in the asteroid field in The Empire Strikes Back (yes I know they did that in Picard S3 and from a trailer it looks like they’re going to do it again in SNW, but I maintain that this goes against reason and logic).
So then, although I do like Ortegas, I wish the writers would dial down the flyboy attitude a little, if only to be more representative of the task of piloting a massive starship.
Except that on submarines today, which I would argue is more analogous to a starship than a surface ship, the crew is much less formal than on surface ships in the navy.
It’s not that she’s “less formal”; it’s that literally *everything* is a wisecrack.
That’s an exaggeration, but I do hear you.
I can’t speak to that, but I would assume the contrary would be true. A mistake in a sub is likely to have much more dire consequences than on a surface ship, so one would think a more “professional” demeanour would be required… but like I said I don’t know so I’ll take your word for it. It does make me see Ortegas’ behavior in a new light though.
Well I did not mean to imply that the chain of command is not seriously followed or that during drills or action the crew is not 100% professional.
Setting aside my experience with pilots at senior officer levels, and including those working in HQ at one point, let’s keep in mind that the Klingon war was LESS than TWO years ago in-universe.
In season one, Ortegas is a hot pilot who was only recently flying combat missions.
Pike is trying to dial back the adrenaline of the war-footing while integrating officers who were in combat with his crew that largely sat out the war on an exploratory mission.
The groundwork for the tone of the dialogue and chain of command has been set by TOS, and TNG. Rarely did Picard call Riker Will, and it was usually during a quieter side conversation. I was in the Navy. Between us Boatswains Mates, yeah, we were more casual. But as a helmsman on watch, its all business on that bridge. You don’t speak unless spoken to, and you certainly would NEVER say “you know I got this” after being given an order. It doesn’t fit with the established Star Trek universe.
Not on a submarine. I have a family member that currently serves on one, and it is much less formal than a surface vessel. If fact, enlisted crew frequently makes small talk with officers, even the XO.
And submarines are more analogous to starships than surface vessels.
I have a relative who was a USN submarine officer during the late Cold War. He’s told me he likes the portrayal of the USS Dallas crew in HfRO. There is indeed some banter in that film, but it’s not remotely at the level of what we see on SNW. (Regrettably, he’s not a Trek fan, so I don’t know how he’d react to SNW.)
Agreed for that era and HfRO. My family member is currently on a boomer, and it’s not as formal as that era, but I agree that the amount of cracks and the Captain are not as informal as some of the stuff on SNW.
Imagine any other entertainment property comparing dialogue among episodes 57 years apart. Love Star Trek, shame about the Star Trek fans.
Yeah, that is actually more true of today’s military. I think a lot of posters here just don’t get that the times have changed, even in the military.
Thank God someone is saying this. I’ve been talking about this “Gen Z” modern 2023 dialogue for a while now. I actually like the show, but the snarky banter, and the casual “day at the office”-type atmosphere doesn’t fit. Its awkward and cringy. So I agree with you. Most classic fans do.Its a Starfleet vessel. You shouldn’t speak unless spoken to, and there should be a clear chain of command. Pike needs to stop calling his helmsman “Erica”. He’s not her big brother, or even her boss. Pike is the COMMANDING OFFICER. When he walks onto the bridge, it should be all business. And cooking breakfast for everyone in your quarters? If you want to give the show a modern look, fine. But at least be true to the characters. If they wanted to have a different Captain, then you can develop him how you want. But Roddenberry invented Pike as an austere, serious, and very private man, similar to Picard, who kept his crew at arms length. I’d like them write him that way. I think he’d be much more interesting, AND he’d actually have room to grow INTO a more comfortable character with his officers. Sorry to ramble. LLAP!
Again, I don’t understand why people are so bothered with her calling Ortegas by his first name??
This is a long tradition that goes back to TOS. Didn’t Kirk call McCoy Bones and he called Kirk Jim? What’s the difference? Or Picard calling Crusher Beverly? Or Archer calling Tucker Trip?
I agree with others maybe things are TOO relaxed on that ship at times. But the Erica thing is not a huge deal when every show has done it with their Captain. In fact, what’s interesting about TNG is it’s probably the most top-down show and Picard is very strict but he actually calls a lot of his staff by their first names a lot of times: Geordi, Deanna, Wesley and as said Beverly. Every once awhile he called Riker Will (but usually stuck to Number One). So why is it OK for him to call them by their first names but its some huge issue with Pike calling one by theirs?
And Sisko cooked for his staff in his quarters. What’s the difference?
The difference is that they did it sparingly, and usually in private, and even then it was mostly between the seniormost officers. (“We’re off duty, Spock. Call me Jim.”)
I don’t mind some of this, and (although it’s been a while since I watched “The Cage”) I don’t recall Pike as being portrayed as austerely as, say, Picard was in the first few TNG episodes. But I think they’ve laid it on too heavily and need to fine-tune the balance. “You know I’ve got this” when she’s nearly crashing the shuttle is just a bridge too far.
Cooking off-duty I’ve no problem with.
No, the difference is you and what you like. It doesn’t matter to me.
Kirk called McCoy Bones in nearly every episode. He called him that in front of others all the time as well. The Spock thing is misleading because Kirk was telling him he didn’t have to be so formal all the time. And how does that explain McCoy calling him Jim on and off duty? Kirk never said McCoy could only call him that off hours.
They all do it. Picard called Crusher Beverly all the time as well. With Geordi, he would usually call him LaForge but Geordi was pretty common too. Same with Archer and Trip. In fact I can’t recall a time Archer ever just called him Tucker? I’m sure someone will correct me, but it was highly rare if he did. He did the same thing with Hoshi. Nearly always by her first name. Rarely, if ever, by Sato. In fact, I rewatched an Enterprise episode yesterday and I realized Archer called his senior staff by their first names pretty often. He would casually call Mayweaher Travis or Reed Malcolm. He would just go back and forth a lot.
I was thinking about Voyager and while Janeway was pretty formal most of the time, she dropped in a ‘Tom’. ‘Harry’ or ‘B’Elanna’ quite a bit as well. Maybe not as much as Kirk, Pircard or Archer, but she did it too.
So what am I missing?
So sorry, I just don’t see the uproar of Pike calling her Erica. And he only does it with her which the point and I and others been driving home is probably because they were close friends before she came aboard. Maybe not, but it’s not unusual in Star Trek as proven.
Agreed! 100%! The writers don’t understand this because A) they didn’t serve in the armed forces and don’t understand chain of command or professionalism B) its the generation z thing where its ok to pop your mouth off to a superior because they’re equals C) the writers want the crew to be hip and cool.
Why must Star Trek be like the modern military forces? That’s just asinine.
Jesus, my 80-something dad who was in the Army would does even agree with this. lol
You people are ridiculous. If I wanted a military show, I’d watch a military show. TNG, dS9, and esp VOY all had the crew joking around while on duty.
And please, this is sci fi, set 300 years in the future. People who saying it’s “wrong” because it isn’t like modern military behavior are supremely dense.
If you don’t like it, that’s fine. But there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it.
And please, this is sci fi, set 300 years in the future. People who saying it’s “wrong” because it isn’t like modern military behavior are supremely dense.
Yeah, great point!
Because Starfleet is ultimately asked to fight kinetically — and has been shown doing so since “The Cage.” It’s not a scientific research university. This means that unit cohesion and some melding of individual identity into the group will be important to the organization, which in turn requires a degree of military discipline.
Yes, military practices can change over time, and can differ from country to country. Much has been made about how the Russian military has a very poor NCO tradition, and how this allegedly explains its underperformance in the Ukraine conflict. Nonetheless, the idea of military life as distinct from civilian life is fairly constant throughout history and across cultures. It would have been familiar to Alexander the Great.
No one is saying military personnel cannot crack a joke. They are saying that there are time, place, and manner constraints as to when it’s appropriate. This is equally true outside of the military, too. I wouldn’t prance onto the Senate floor and start inserting Ortegas-worthy wisecracks into the Congressional Record, either. (That’s best left for staffers getting together at Cups and Coffee, back in the Hart Building!)
I wouldn’t prance onto the Senate floor and start inserting Ortegas-worthy wisecracks into the Congressional Record, either.
That is not the best example given some of the stuff that had been said on the floor and at hearings in recent years, not to mention the last POTUS. This sort of unintentionally proves the opposite of what you you are trying to say.
Not from the point of view of senior staff.
And Starfleet is shown as a well-run organization, not the equivalent of Marjorie Taylor-Greene’s office.
It’s not about wanting a military show, that’s not it. But the allegory that Roddenberry likened Trek to was Hornblower. So the idea of Starfleet was developed to be like the Navy in space. Nicholas Meyer brought a lot more if that in.
It was a vernacular that gave verisimilitude to the organisation, however, verisimilitude is something lost today but it can still be entertaining.
Just like the navy it should not be too informal on the bridge. And if you recall first names were not used all the times.
Names were often proceeded by Mister also. Which is formal. Kirk said Mr Sulu, not Hikaru, also at times called Helm.
Kirk called McCoy Bones more often in private or off duty, he has referred to him as Doctor on the bridge.
Also Picard was speaking to Riker as a friend when he called him Will, when in duty he called Riker ‘Number One’
Sisko called Jadzia “old man” all the time.
Janeway called her crew by their first names all the time.
Kirk called McCoy, “Bones” all the time and the rest of the crew by their last name – no rank.
I see no problem with it. It is the relationship that a Captain wants to have with his crew.
My buddy is in the Canadian Forces – he deals with pilots every day. The pilots are cocky, confidant and quippy.
I actually like Ortegas’ personalty and cockiness. It suits her.
Pike has a casual and professional relationship with his main crew – you can see this on how he holds his briefing in his quarter with meals. I think this is his way to get the most out of the crew.
Sisko called Jadzia “old man” all the time….Janeway called her crew by their first names all the time…Kirk called McCoy, “Bones” all the time and the rest of the crew by their last name – no rank.
EXACTLY ! Either some of these fans have forgotten more Star Trek then they have remembered, or they are being total hypocrites here?
I think people are complaining just to complain… about anything! It’s all I see in here these days.
Yeah, there is that — certainly
But first names were usually used when off duty or in times of crunch or to be sensitive in personal matters, there was a respect for the command.
At times Kirk called his officers by their role. Sometimes Sulu is called helmsman, Spock was referred to as Science officer on a few occasions.
Janeway always used “Harry”… “Tom”… “B’lanna” on the bridge during ANY situation.
The first season of TOS, Kirk used helmsman, science officer… But then it was all last names. And ALWAYS used “Scotty”
I see no disrespect of command from Ortegas at all. I see lots of respect for her Captain. She calls him Captain on the bridge. Pike has a lot of confidence in her as well.
Exactly. You and the other dude who responded here correctly shut down Neill Stringer’s continued misinformed opinion on this.
Neill, I am assigning “remedial Star Trek viewing” to you, my friend. :-)
This it not true. Nearly every Captain called certain characters by their first names all the time. Archer called Tucker Trip and Sato Hoshi 24/7. He interchanged with other members of his crew both last and first names all the time as well.
So did Picard, Kirk and Janeway. Sisko did it the least but he still called Dax Old Man.
I’ll take Ortega over a crew always needing a councillor, talking to the Borg and not feeling they are compromised, falling in love over creepy holograms of others to fall in love with, having a teenager at the helm, etc.
LOL, great point, Cmd!
How is the dialogue, it was the one thing that irked me?
Judging from the previews I’ve seen, it’s just as bad as in Season One.
Got Troll?
Yes – timid criticism of one aspect of the show’s writing is definite trolling.
Imagine being so fragile.
You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one
So you’re a hippie too?
Yes my friend Upper is quite fragile. But he’s like a lump of Play d’oh. You can bend him out of shape and squish him but you’re not going to break him… He smells funny too.
True, but my eyes don’t creep out the ladies, and they love my smell from my use of Acqua di Gio Profumo.
Such a charmer. Who could compete?
To me while season 1 of SNW was a return to form and actually something from the Kurtzman era that actually feels like classic Trek, it did feel derivative of previous shows.
However, this is not a bad thing because stand alone stories offer more variety and there were some great ideas in these stories.
I have chosen to accept this as a parallel universe as too many liberties have been taken. Enterprise fitted in better.
However, does the dialogue have to be so cringey at times. I mean do we really need to have Pike comment on Sam Kirk’s moustache in the middle of a briefing in such a casual way.
Should Ortega not have called sick bay straight away when the crew member was acting odd rather than saying that awful line “whatever tweaks your freak”?
When the aliens call themselves shepherds does Pike have to comment “shepherds really, we’re going with this?”
Also this whole self referencing of the engage command is bordering too much on self parody. I mean it’s pure cringe when Spock’s command is “I want the ship to go… Now”
It is clear they love Trek but to me it does seem like they find it more fun to parody it rather than take it seriously.
As if they want to compete with Marvel.
The self referencing the Engage command is getting incredibly tedious. It started with Discovery and that awful “…………………………..Let’s fly.” scene. I don’t think I’ve ever rolled my eyes as hard. I suppose I should be thankful it wasn’t “……… I love you all.”, I’m sure Michelle Paradise and the writers were tempted.
Yeah I have to agree with this too. One of the biggest ironies about Picard last season is no one made it a thing which I was very happy about…..UNTIL the very last scene with Seven. And it’s odd they called it out so much because didn’t we see her just say ‘engage’ in literally the first episode??? What was wrong with just saying that? And I thought that was nice, a more subtle but symbolic idea that she would just carry that word on as the next next generation since we all knew she was going to end up being captain. In fact, I would go one better and we could’ve waited for her to say that in the last scene and really bring it full circle.
But…nope. Now they turned it into a guessing game. Sigh
I don’t mind this joke, I enjoy situational humour like that.
Yea, it’s cute and funny. I certainly enjoy it.
Fair enough, it just feels overplayed when you have Freeman, Saru, Seven and now apparently Spock doing it. It’s become a running gag and I stopped laughing years ago.
I hate it so much. It’s a thing now, and it never was. It was a repeated command by Picard, not a catch phrase.
I hate it so much.
LMFAO…give me a break!
OMG, the middling comments like this just ruin all the fun in Trek.
Let’s have some perspective, people. We have silly cartoon characters showing up on a live action Star Trek series, and yet that gets a free pass, but having catch phrases and modernizing the characters a bit is what were upset about? Seriously?
We got a moronic cartoon sitcom, folks — now that really is a problem that we should be upset about…lol
It certainly doesn’t get a free pass from me, but all of these problems share a similar root cause: treating the franchise as a parody.
Just because Moonraker’s James-Bond-in-space was the most cringeworthy moment in that franchise doesn’t mean we should overlook cringeworthiness-writ-small, like Nick Nack.
Actually I can overlook the silly Sumo Wrestler shoe-horning in for You Only Live Twice, because that movie is so much better than the silly Moonraker, which I have a much larger problem with.
So yeah, I can largely overlook stuff like that is fairly minor like that. It’s a question of what your priorities are in something like Star Trek or James Bond.
We survived Discovery, you can survive LDS. But I agree with the basis of your point.
Yep
It’s absolutely a case of “first time funny, second time silly, third time a spanking.” Enough is enough (to channel my inner Theresa May).
As far as an approach to a Trek show goes, it could be much worse. The episodic format helps as they can just drop stuff, so we’re not necessarily spending an entire season focused on a questionable story choice from Episode 2, or something, that has to be dealt with. Sadly, the execution tends to drag it down, and this review confirms that we’re going to be dealing with more of the same. If they would just tell new stories, and quit trying to deal with the bigger tie ins that are not needed nor asked for, I think this show could be a home run.
SNW is a FAR better show than DISCO, which I quit watching a long time ago. However, I still think the show runners don’t really get Star Trek that well. SNW feels like a remake of TNG without the charm & wit of that show.
Agreed. It takes a very superficial view of what Trek is and goes with it. It’s maddening.
What’s maddening is you guys always finding petty things to complain about. Do us all a favor and stop watching then. Go suck the life out of some other room, ok?
Well, I kind of enjoy “watching their train wreck”, let’s sweat the small stuff, lame remarks.
You’re not wrong, but you could also stop reading the negative comments. I mean, that’s why they’ll always be called Trekkies and not Trekkers.
This!
Very much agreed with Brent and Heyberto. I’d add that it’s like TNG without the profound/thought-provoking episodes like “The Offspring” or “The Perfect Mate” or “Tin Man.” That was ultimately what made TNG such a cultural touchstone, not Data’s relationship with Spot.
I was hoping they’d fine-tune SNW in season two and build on what they did well in season one but tone down some of the superficiality. It sounds like they’re going in the opposite direction and amping it up, particularly in the second half of season two.
I would like SNW to be a little more weighty as well. Not every episode or anything but yeah I would love to see something in the direction of ‘Past Tense’, ‘The Offspring’, etc.
I think the episode with the kid stuck in the machine (name is not coming to me lol) was suppose to be that kind of episode and I recently rewatched it. I think it did it well but it’s not at the level how the classic shows or certainly TNG did it.
But maybe this season will surprise us and we will get an episode like that.
The biggest difference between TOS and TNG and what we’re getting now is that in the earlier series the characters served the story. Now the story serves the characters (and the stories suffer much from the downgrade).
Nah. All three have both served the stories and the characters. There is very little difference in the approach.
Yah.
Just my opinion but I feel SNW is charming, at least compared to what we got in early DIS which felt like it was practically going for anti-charm in season one.
Season One of Discovery was ‘real’. I like real!
I think it was too real for my blood lol.
It was by no means perfect, but now that we’re finally a few years out from it, I think we’re beginning to get a sense of perspective on DISCO, and that the first two seasons were better than what followed. Had they not given us that Gawd-awful foray into the mirror universe and frittered away Lorca’s character, we might have gotten something approaching DS9 quality.
SNW has likable characters so even when the story is meh, it’s not intolerable to watch. SNW is more a remake of TOS, but without the really stellar episodes that were instant classics. The best they can do is an Alien knockoff and that time travel finale that lifted dialogue straight from Balance of Terror and just made me sad that Ortegas will never have to cope with Spock being related to Romulans in the “real world.”
just made me sad that Ortegas will never have to cope with Spock being related to Romulans in the “real world.”
I don’t even know what this means?
You were the hero in class that always asked the teacher the stupid questions, when in fact the entire class were just too embarrassed to ask. I celebrate your sacrifice.
Guilty as charged.
It’s a remake of TOS, not TNG. And when did TNG ever have charm? Wit, yes, charm, not so much.
You seem to be getting your Trek series’ mixed up?
Almost all those issues you’ve had with the show so far, I share as well! And I’d wager that it’s a sign that they’re trying a little too hard to be cool, or whatever it is they think this signals to their audience; its just such a clumsy attempt, and beyond me why they would want that extra cringe factor peppered into an otherwise well written show? Maybe it’s tonal DSC residue?! Either way, I agree on all accounts!
(Except, I prefer the US-English version of “fit in” as the past tense for “fit in”, rather than the awkward “fitted in”…😉)
You would lose that wager.
Don’t think so, but if cringe floats your boat, all the more power to you! And those few instances aside, I really love the show so far.
Fair enough!
SNW is just fair Trek, IMO. I agree with your points.
Regarding tweaking of freaks…they should be more careful about idioms that sound too contemporary. Very jarring. I know it’s difficult to come up with 23rd C idioms but a little more effort would be nice.
LOL, OK, whatever dude.
“Instead, we have a varied, fun, but hardly wild batch of episodes”.
And this is *my* problem with Strange New Worlds: 9 times out of 10 it plays it far too safe.
It’s clear that the backlash to Discovery and Picard’s early swings away from what came before have troubled CBS, Paramount and Secret Hideout and in response they have become completely risk averse. They are essentially playing to angry fanboys who want 90s-style Trek.
Now we have this passable, but soulless and written-by-committee show that refuses to do anything new. It relies on legacy bit-characters and fan-service way too much, and crowbars Spock into every plotline because… Spock?
All this talk of “big swings” is little more than PR guff designed to disguise the fact that Season 2 is simply dialling down on the desire not to rock the boat whatsoever.
Anyway, that’s my two cents. I’m sure somebody will throw Rotten Tomato scores in my face to try and prove that I’m wrong (like RT actually means anything…), but this is simply my opinion. I will still watch because it’s not an awful show and the cast are magnetic for the most part, but for me- this will always be one of my lower ranked shows.
They play it safe where it would matter most to be bold, and not safe when they want to toy with canon to fit what they want. What I want is more bold sci-fi stories. As much as I liked the ideas behind the Ilyrian episode and the planet that was sacrificing a kid, they’re not really innovative stories. They’re my favorite episodes from S1, but they’re not THAT original in terms of ideas. The big swings they’re referring to seem to be talking about playing with Genre, but I doubt they’re anything more than superficial. They need some sci-fi people on staff.
One of the greatest things about TOS was that some of the best episodes were written by well-known science fiction authors.
100%!
They play it safe where it would matter most to be bold, and not safe when they want to toy with canon to fit what they want
While at first glance this sounds like a complex assessment, the more I think about this, the more it comes across as a throwaway line of BS given that I can think of many aspects of the show where this statement either contradicts itself or makes zero sense.
I fear that calls to make Terry Matalas God-Emperor will only reinforce this tendency within the franchise. While I really enjoyed SNW and am looking forward to S2, I want to see more risk-taking and new approaches, not fewer. More 32nd century Starfleet Academy, less 25th century Borg. “Risk is our business,” as the man said that one time.
I sympathize. But I think the “risks” DISCO & PICARD (seasons 1 & 2) took were horrible story choices.
“Now we have this passable, but soulless and written-by-committee show that refuses to do anything new.“-Agreed. But, I wonder, how much new is there to do with
I think I would rather watch Disco or Picard’s messing up than having to watch whatever SNW is doing with the Gorn or creating a “disabled” character only to sideline him in order to further the plot of a handicapable character.
But I do get what you mean, Brent. Still it’s better to take a risk and fail than not take a risk and become stagnant. And SNW already feels stagnant.
There is indeed an impalpable feeling of “vanilla” that I get from SNW. Maybe like you say it’s from them not taking that extra step out of the box.
And taking a risk with the possibility of failure instead of playing it safe and not evolving is certainly a major character building experience that we should all embrace.
Have to agree with this as well. I wouldn’t say ‘bland’ but not very strong either. I think the show probably played it a little too safe last season. But now we keep hearing these ‘big swings’ so maybe that perception will change by the end of it.
I don’t know, they were willing to off two kids in one season. They baldly ripped off LeGuin, ALIEN, ALIENS, “Balance of Terror”; they allowed some emotionally/mentally unstable person write the M’Benga storyline — they thought it was a good idea. Pike never had an original idea and was a huge wimp about his fate, betraying the power of his sacrifice in Disco. Having an ineffective captain herd cats/adults with the maturity of immature TV writers is a really brave swing. They took a lot of risks, I thought. Also, pretty colors (they ripped off the blackhole effect in Interstellar and it looked phenomenal), loud noises, and a good score.
Omg I had completely forgotten about the finale being Balance Of Terror Redux. The way that episode was completely dependant on a classic TOS episode for the majority of its airtime- to the point where entire scenes were lifted from it- was a real damning inditement of the lack of originality and creativity.
Looking back, something felt… off across the first season but it wasn’t until the finale that it really crystallised it for me: the over-reliance on what had come before and the complete unwillingness to do *anything* remotely risky (sans the Gornomorphs). This is a show held hostage by a paralysing fear of angering a vocal minority of angry fanboys. That’s no basis to produce a show either.
As it stands, the only thing about Season 2 that I am looking forward to is the Lower Decks crossover- and that’s only because I’m excited to see live action Mariner and Boimler!
As it stands, the only thing about Season 2 that I am looking forward to is the Lower Decks crossover- and that’s only because I’m excited to see live action Mariner and Boimler!
I am speechless given you are so serious about what you don’t like about SNW, but yet you like this juvenile BS? LOL, OK, whatever, IDIC, I guess.
Was there any need for this? I get that you intensely dislike Lower Decks and that it absolutely fine. You’re entitled to your opinion. But I don’t think there is any need whatsoever to go out of your way to attack somebody for having a different opinion to you. And make no mistake, what you did was exactly that.
I’m sure you’re looking to be drawn into yet another argument, so I’m just going to leave it here and I won’t engaging with your immature behaviour unless you can respond in a measured and mature manner.
It’s simply a matter of perspective for me. I read all of your serious critiques of all of these issues you have with SNW, and I am disagreeing with it, but still reading all of your issues and taking them seriously, but then at the end I hear basically that, the one good part is that Mariner and Boimler will show up? Dude, that’s when I lost it and almost choked here on my soda…like, seriously, “you got to be kidding me” was my dumfounded response.
And I am sorry that I find this so ironic and so funny. I can’t help it. I nearly lost it, man, this just came across as so wack to me. But I apologize for upsetting you with my response, which I admit was immature, but it was honest!
Let’s be objective here. In no way was his post an attack on you. But you explicitly attacked him by calling his behavior immature. This makes no sense and invalidates your objection.
Thanks
Lower Decks is gonna do to pre-Disco Star Trek what The Simpsons did to Citizen Kane. People under 40 are only going to understand the IP through the cartoon jokey jokes.
Awesome! :-))
Given that there are many who have watched SNW and Picard S3 on the basis of Lower Decks as an entry point to the franchise, I suspect you can chill on this point.
Both Strange New Worlds and Picard Season 3 are post-Discovery, that’s why I went out of my way to say “pre-Disco”
I actually agree with this. While SNW is an entertaining show by itself, I feel like it doesn’t have its own soul or heart as a show. All the previous Trek shows had that certain heart to them that made them different from each other while SNW seems to me like a superficial redo of TOS with better effects. I think what this show needed was to get some contemporary science-fiction writers to write some solid stories and maybe have that harder science-fiction edge to it instead of doing variations on themes.
For me, what this show needed to be was anything other than a knee-jerk reaction to placate the basement-dwelling fanboys who are enraged that a black woman leads a Trek series or that the franchise can be something other than an endless loop of 90s Trek-lite episodic series.
Can you cite examples of “fanboys who are enraged that a black woman leads a Trek series”? Because most of them really like Sisko and Janeway.
(FWIW, I mostly like Sonequa Martin Greene’s take on a human who is culturally Vulcan.)
You literally just have to go on Twitter and put in “Star Trek: Discovery” to find such comments. The comments section of almost any Discovery-related video are filled with such horrid comments. Accusations of the show being woke, that Sonequa is a terrible actress, policing how she should speak. The internet is filled with this hideous takes that go unchallenged but magnified by the echo chamber mentality of the internet.
But we are getting away from the topic at hand, which was that my take on SNW is that it is a soulless, written-by-committee show that is unwilling to *actually* take “big swings”. It is desperate to play it safe and not offend anybody’s sensitivites.
Unfortunately, you are 100% correct on this.
“Sonequa is a terrible actress” and disliking her speaking style is not remotely the same thing as saying that “I’m enraged a black woman leads a Trek series.” Not all Black actresses act in the same way, and the Black community is not a monolith. Nichelle Nichols’ interpretation of Uhura is not the same as Celia Rose Gooding’s.
Again, my personal view is that Sonequa Martin Greene portrays a human who is culturally Vulcan. A somewhat wooden delivery, punctuated by moments of effervescent emotion, is appropriate for a character with that backstory. However, I appreciate that others can disagree with this view for legitimate dramatic reasons. Someone else might have interpreted the role differently.
As for “the show is woke,” I’ll punt on the opportunity to produce a treatise on what “wokeness” means, or how like any political philosophy it has various strains; there are plenty of public policy-intense journals where that discussion is more topical. However, long story very short, there are indeed moments when I have found this charge to have some merit. For instance, I would have recommended against having real-life political figures make cameos as Federation elected officials. While Star Trek has certainly produced social commentary in the past, it has never previously taken positions on partisan politics. Having a candidate for public office make an appearance ultimately takes the audience out of the moment, and — barring it being a very well respected elder statesperson type — will wind up alienating some views.
I remember once reading a piece of TNG fanfic, authored during the 1992 election, that featured a rendezvous between the Ent-D and a “USS Bill Clinton.” The TNG producers would have gracefully avoided developments like that onscreen.
Moreover, I do find Blu del Barrio and Ian Alexander (unlike Sonequa Martin Greene) to be poor actors, and both of their characters exceedingly dull and tendentious — and I think there is merit to the charge that the characters were created, and these actors were cast, for reasons of identity politics. I mean, we have a sci-fi show literally telling a ghost story. People are right to object to that.
“OMG, someone said it on Twitter!!!” is hardly evidence of a broadbased trend. It’s a big universe, and Twitter has millions of users. The entire Biden 2020 campaign was predicated on the notion that Twitter Is Not the World — and he proved that hypothesis to be absolutely correct.
“Green,” not “Greene.” Sorry for the misspelling.
I agree with your view on SNW, at least to some extent. I do however also agree with those posts on Discovery. The point here is that we disagree on DSC, not that I’m right or that you’re wrong. You have your own reasons for disagreeing with the “horrid” comments and such is your right, but give also others their right to their opinions without judgement. IDIC.
This speech nearly brought me to tears. You are one of the good guys!
Hey thanks. Hope that wasn’t sarcasm :)
It would be a more peaceful world if people didn’t take their own opinions or values as the ultimate truth and learn that everyone has the right to have their own take. We can’t disagree that the sky is blue, but we can disagree that this or that show is good or bad. Why can’t some people learn to relativize their perception without getting hysterically offended because someone disagrees with them?
And it’s not a matter of the Left or the Right. Both sides of the aisle have their own brand of crazy. Reason, wisdom and logic lives everywhere except at the extremes, where there be dragons and that big ice wall.
Yep. I was complementing you with some exaggeration thrown in for effect. But I agree with you 100%, with one exception — I think if Facebook starting sharing disinformation that the sky was green, some people would insist that is true today.
It’s given me a great update to TOS, which is what I have always wanted. I am perfectly fine with it as is, and am loving the series. I think it has massive soul, and is my highest ranked show since DS9. For this particular series, I am not looking to or wanting the boat to be rocked. For DSC, I was looing for that, and it largely delivered that for me. And for fans that wanted a Star Wars approach to Star Trek, they got the Kelvin movies and Picard S3. And for the fans that wanted silly cartoon characters behaving badly, they got that.
IDIC.
Well, exhibit A in my rebuttal to this point would be “Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach,” which gave us a society that tortured a child and rendered Pike unable to do much about it. (This is also before we get to Dr. M’Benga and his daughter.)
Yes, it was derivative from “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” but if you’re going to crib from precedent, make it a good precedent, rather than soap operas. :) It also suggests that the series would benefit from opening the writers’ room to more sci-fi authors, perhaps bringing back Chabon, or even re-starting the practice of accepting spec scripts. I’ve no doubt that many of those TNG spec scripts were fan-fiction quality, but they did give us “TIn Man” and a couple of similar episodes.
Maybe that could that 1 time out of 10 that SNW didn’t play it safe then?
I still felt that I had seen “Suffering” before and while it was a visual feast for the eyes, there was no depth to it. The more I think about it, the more I realise that is *another* problem with the show for me. It’s all very superficial. Nothing if note is ever said, it’s simply desperate not to offend the vocal parts of the fanbase. And as a result, it’s a shallow and hollow series.
Overall, it sounds like it’s going to be fun, even if a bit pedestrian, season. At least the first six episodes. As long as it’s enjoyable, I imagine it’s going to be a big hit for most fans like last season. The crazier stuff sounds like it will happen later. And we know the crossover is #7! That’s the big one. :)
“As for the Klingons, they’ve now morphed into something close to the version we know–their unfortunate Discovery redesign entirely discarded without explanation.”
Thaaaaaaaaank Kahless!!!! Not a big surprise at this point since we’ve only seen the traditional Klingons in LDS, PIC and PRO but yeah.
“So again, like with season one, definite liberties are taken with canon, but that’s the price you pay for having a 23rd Century-set show.”
Yep, and another reason why it’s always better to go forward in the timeline. I haven’t heard any major canon issues with PIC, LDS, PRO or even DIS since they been in the 32nd century. But if the show stays entertaining, most will get over it. But I suspect it’s going to be worse this season than last in that regard.
But nice review and getting excited now!! :)
In a franchise as addicted to time travel as this, going forward only is no measure of safety.
True, but it’s still easier to tell stories past the things we know as ENT, DIS and now SNW is proving. Someone is always going to have an issue somewhere.
A long time ago I decided to buy into the fandom headcanon that ST:FC created a new timeline. ENT, DIS, SNW, LD, and probably PIC are all in a different continuity from TOS, TNG (up to FC), DS9, and VOY. It’s more relaxing that way.
I did so rather recently, and yes, far more relaxing. It’s just easier.
I don’t buy that theory but I just treat it treat it as a parallel universe
Right, same basic idea. The key is they don’t have to mesh. And the benefit is that some events happened in both, so there’s no need to explain away any shared properties.
I would have put LD in the TOS timeline, but the upcoming crossover with SNW pulls it into what I call the Phoenix timeline. I guess PIC could go in either, but I feel like Insurrection and Nemesis both fit better as Phoenix timeline stories, and PIC pulls a few things from Nemesis. Maybe season 3 of PIC could be TOS timeline but that’s splitting hairs a bit too much for my tastes.
Yeah I have seen others mention this FC idea in the past. I’m completely fine with that idea. And frankly it’s really no different than what the Kelvin timeline was already doing which I really liked as well even with some issues with it.
RE canon, I think it was you who said prior that fans will pick and choose whether inconsistencies are important or not, and that will probably be based on the overall quality of the show.
I could not agree more. From Captain James R. Kirk TO Spock’s best friends not knowing his parents or betrothed TO women not being starship command material – for me those TOS issues are completely irrelevant and worthy of breaking away from.
And because shows like SNW (or Enterprise and TNG) which chose to break from canon have been good, it is easy for me as a fan to ignore those violations as being for the most part, irrelevant.
Regardless, it was good short break from the finale of Picard. With the Stanley Cup playoffs nearing conclusion, I am really looking forward to Thursday and the S2 premiere! Enjoy!
Oh btw, with both SNW and SG1 both paying homage to this movie, I watched The Day the Earth Stood Still over the weekend. What a classic!
Yeah I have said this in the past. And it’s obviously true since some people seem to tolerate some canon differences than others and vice versa. There are things in SNW that certainly bothers me but I can overlook most of them, unlike Discovery because I just had issues with the show in general and those things just piled on to the problems. And I also think with SNW, it just ‘fits’ much better overall and for a lot of people out there, that will just be enough too if they enjoy the show.
But I think most of these prequels will keep people divided as well with these issues, some just more than others. I mean I still think it’s unfortunate the Gorn issue seems to be a big one for SNW and I’m personally on both sides of the fence with that one. On one hand I agree with others who say it violates canon and in a deep way. On the other hand, I can live with it too because I accepted on day one there would be those issues from the start. And I can see the appeal of wanting to use them.
To this day I have not seen SG 1. And I know, it’s suppose to be really good. I do WANT to get into Stargate, I just haven’t found the time yet to get into it.
Yeah, I too can see the Gorn canon issue both ways. On one hand I think the appearance needed a major upgrade from the semi-ridiculous 1960s “man in a rubber suit” TOS Gorn. Enterprise did a pretty good job with CGI making the Gorn so much more agile, etc., and from the Klingons to the Trill, alien appearances have often changed from series to series.
RE first contact with the species, that is less easily ignored. Obviously TOS history says it happened with Arena. Of course Enterprise also broke canon RE first contact with the Romulans in Minefield, even though TOS was explicit that there was no contact at all (besides subspace radio) until Balance of Terror. SNW is pushing it even further with the Gorn, so I can see why some fans dont like it.
Ultimately, it goes back to what each individual fan wants to care about. For me, there have been so many forgivable canon holes in the nearly six decades of Trek history, and this is just another one – but I can see why some choose to not appreciate the updated Gorn storyline.
Actually it’s not necessarily true that TOS canon is unequivocal that Gorn first contact happened in Arena.
There’s a significant difference between the widespread fan headcanon of that episode vs what was onscreen. A few of us pulled up the quotes when season one came up.
Kirk’s personal knowledge vs Starfleet classified databases are one thing. The Gorn were clearly already known and feared. On what basis?
Second, his understanding of the situation in Arena is questionable because a more advanced species was manipulating the situation.
In any event, I’m among those who feel the Gorn are long overdue for a refresh, but I wish folks would check the onscreen canon and rewatch Arena with their many decades of headcanon set aside before jumping on the bandwagon on this one.
I was one of them, and I thought “Memento Mori” was (just) consistent with “Arena.” The Federation knew of the Gorn in “Arena.” It was not first contact.
I didn’t rewatch “Arena” yet again after “All Those Who Wander,” but my impression is that “All Those Who Wander” was indeed inconsistent with its predecessor. (It certainly is inconsistent in the sense that Kirk could never defeat a Nu-Gorn in hand-to-hand combat.)
The broader point, though, is that “Arena” was a comment on misperception in international relations. McCoy realized that “we could be in the wrong” and that the Federation had encroached on Gorn territory. That is what SNW has entirely missed, barring some major plot development this season.
Exactly!
And I did watch Arena after “Memento Mori” and to me it was clear as day Spock and Uhura had no idea who the Gorn were anymore than everyone else on that bridge. And what’s funny is someone challenged me on this saying that Uhura wasn’t on the bridge when they attacked in SNW so it stays in line with canon only for “All Those Who Wander” to completely cancel that out when she came face to face with them too.
It just doesn’t add up to me at all. La’An talks about them like they are some mysterious boogyman that everyone throughout the region heard of but then by the time Arena comes around, everyone seems completely unaware with anything about them.
And again, I don’t know why people don’t take this into account, but the MORE stories you tell with them, it’s only going to muddy the waters more. If Memento Mori was the only story, OK, you can probably get away with it the same way they did with the Borg on Regneration on Enterprise. But if the Borg kept showing up every season on that show, then it will naturally put things into bigger questions canon wise as the second Gorn story did and they will be back next season. And my guess the next season after that.
Lastly, the main problem is even if you can buy that somehow the same ship that encountered them multiple times for years now seems unaware of who they are and how they operate, isn’t this why you make a Captain’s log? Isn’t that the whole point? You hear the word ‘Gorn’ and then you look it up in the database of who came across them before and how they were dealt with. That’s exactly what Riker did when they came across the same virus the original Enterprise crew did in The Naked Now. And Janeway also did it when they first encountered the Borg in the Delta Quadrant and they already knew who they were. But in Arena’s case, you have two direct people on the bridge who dealt with them firsthand before and yet it never comes up lol.
Exactly, they clearly missed the point of Arena.
Yeah, I understand why the Gorn bothers people too but you bring up amazing points and that OTHER shows have broke canon with first contact. I have brought this up as well before like with Voyager and the Borg. They established Seven and her family were the first humans was assimilated by the Borg and that was obviously a huge retcon with Q Who. The writers at the time even acknowledged it.
That’s exactly WHY I’m not so bothered by the Gorn because I acknowledge it broke canon IMO but it’s far from the first to do it as well. I would be a hypocrite if I chastised SNW for doing it while ignoring Enterprise and Voyager also did it. Enterprise completely retcon first contact with the Klingons. In fact, that was a reason a lot of fans hated the show beginning with Broken Bow at the time. Now it’s never even brought up lol.
Which goes to my last statement. Fans get into massive uproars about these shows changing canon when the show is airing. In 5 to 10 years, no one is going to remotely care about SNW’s issue with the Gorn after the show has established it and been around awhile. It will all fade into a big shrug when the show has left the airwaves just like Enterprise with the Klingons and Romulan issues or Voyager and the Borg. And those are much bigger issues than the Gore issue by light years because those are well established species.
But if it still bothers people now, completely understandable.
Wait there is a musical episode?
Picard facepalm happening here
Here’s what’s funny.. I’m not conceptually opposed to it. I’m not looking forward to it, mind you.. but I’m open to it. I just have no faith this creative team can pull it off, but maybe they’ll surprise me. The episode from last season where they were playing Medieval Times was ok. Still.. when you only have 10 episodes, is this really the best use of the time? I want to see and understand the story reason to do a musical, other than “this’ll be fun”. Of course the actors are looking forward to it.
How about an episode where a virus gets loose on the ship and forces everyone to communicate in song? Even though some are terrible singers.
Look, *maybe* they find some non-contrived way to explain the singing. I have serious doubts, but let’s make that assumption. (Indeed, that VOY episode where the Doctor encounters a world on which music was unknown, and in which he launches a brief singing career, actually felt organic to me, surprisingly enough.)
The next problem is that, Celia Rose Gooding excepted, none of these cast were picked for their singing voice. And a musical is only as good as its worst song. I saw “Back To The Future: The Musical” a couple of weeks ago; it just didn’t have any earworms. “Cats” or “Miss Saigon” or “Wicked” it was not. I have virtually no confidence this writers’ room is going to do any better than BTTF, and I can easily see them doing a lot worse.
It’s crazy isn’t it!? 😂🙄
Have to 🤞it will be good. Think positively, it will still probably be better than Threshold and any season of Discovery.
I don’t know, some if the Kurtzman era stuff is making me feel that Threshold isn’t that bad now. Lol.
The sequel trilogy of Star Wars has made me reassess the prequels.
They are still disappointing but at least they were trying something different, rather than redo the originals.
The other day I ran into a YouTube video that was rumored that Disney was going to sell Star Wars back to George Lucas. Yeah, total BS but the amount of sheer enthusiasm from people over the idea alone was insane. It’s like a party just broke out.
I remember watching it thinking, “Didn’t Lucas partly sell Star Wars because how much shit fans gave him over the prequels?” Now they are begging for him to take it back lol.
It’s really incredible how quickly these things turn in fanbases. Fifteen years ago people wanted Berman gone from Star Trek and was jumping for joy when Abrams showed up and took things over. Some were even happy to make shows like DS9, VOY and ENT completely non-cannon like many wanted with the prequels. Now today, many fans (not everyone) want the Kelvin movies and Kurtzman Trek gone and a return to more Berman Trek; even pushing for more those characters and even shows to return. It’s a huge reason why Picard season 3 got the huge fanfare it did before and after it aired. I guess it’s the grass is always greener perception.
But I promise you, in about ten to twenty years, all the people putting down the Disney Star Wars stuff and ‘Kurtzman Trek’ will be considered sacred by the fanbase by then. People will be jumping for joy when Star Trek: Burnham gets announced in the year 2041 and.a happy return to more Kurtzman Trek….and even better because Frakes will be directing. ;D
Just how these things goes I guess.
Bro when you found something you think is worse than Threshold then you should turn off the TV and do it fast! 🤣
All seriousness it’s not as bad as it used to be to me either but it’s not something I voluntarily watch on my own.
The prequels actually feel like LOTR after the dumpster fire of the sequels. Everything JJ touches dies and dies painfully…except white Khan. Instead he’s squeezing all our heads painfully as possible. 🙄👎
Okay, curiosity got the best of me, but I did make a note to self: don’t read any of these early reviews anymore. They color they way I’m going into season 2 now, and I’ve come to the conclusion I don’t really like that. I’ve got to stay strong LOL!
I hear you. For me, they just confirmed where my head already was. It’s amazing how predictable this creative braintrust is.
The word you want is “preceding”.
.
‘Following’ Shatner and ‘proceeding’ [from] Shatner mean the same thing…. And ‘pro-seeding’ Shatner would refer to hair transplants.
That last bit is pretty funny, though I’d think ‘pro-seeding’ was somebody advocating for a prequel to SPACE SEED.
Basically, more of the same approach. Such a mid show with such great promise. It wouldn’t be hard to make it great.
I would at least say SNW is light years ahead of other shows in its early seasons IMO. For me personally, the only live action shows I fell in love with in their first seasons was TOS, VOY and now this show. So not a great track record overall lol. I love most of the shows today but it took a longer time to get there (although oddly I loved the animated shows LDS and PRO in first season too). SNW at least has the right ingredients out of the gate.
Well, when you have shows that are 24+ episodes in a single season, it gives more opportunity to find it. I’d argue these 10-12 episode season type shows that are probably not going to run past 5 seasons need to be able to get established faster, as their runway is much more limited.
Yeah also true. And I think why DIS is having the problems it still has and ironically that show has had the longest seasons in NuTrek sans Prodigy (assuming it goes beyond season 2 and still gets 20 episodes a season). But it’s sad when Picard has finally hit a high mark in season 3 with fans and critics, it’s now over (but yeah season 3 was basically just a different show). It’s a HUGE reason why people want to continue it now, because only now does it feel like it hit the right elements it was missing in the first two seasons.
So I agree, these shows have to get it right much faster than the old days. Most took until season 3 to become better shows that fans love today but in the streaming world, most shows are already starting to wind down by then and with less episodes to boot. But I can see SNW going 7 seasons if its REALLY popular, but I wouldn’t be shocked it ended at 5 either since that is the average of most streaming shows.
I also had this screener and I was BLOWN AWAY by how amazing this episodes are. Going to be a long weekly wait to discuss them with my cohosts and friends!
Lucky you!
I’m hoping you bring more positive buzz here when you can.
Another kind of pet peeve I have with the modern dialogue is how they try to make it hip by injecting irrelevant comments in the middle of important meetings. An example is when Pike says ‘I like the moustache’ to Sam Kirk, and his reply is ‘you should try one’ which feels out of place and more like lunch time talk rather than in a briefing.
Seriously dude. Stop making so much sense. lol. If there is one aspect to the SNW Pike I despise, it’s his overly buddy buddy nature with the crew..and by crew, I mean everyone. I want to see him dress someone down the way he did Saru in Discovery. Fair but uncompromising. Disciplined but understanding. I’m ok with him being friendly with his crew. I just want to see him lead through something other than the charm the actor brings.
Iron hand in a velvet glove.
That’s almost how I’d describe early Kirk, before histrionics became the default order of the day.
This feels like TNG fan hankering for the particular professionalism of Picard’s ship rather than any experience in working with real life military officers.
I knew officers that were super subdued and buttoned up, but I also knew many, especially pilots and engineers, who were anything but. In fact, many seem to test one another with their jibes and casual remarks constantly.
Nothing I have heard in SNW goes beyond the norm for what I heard as a civilian working with military colleagues. In fact, sticking out the jibes and giving back as necessary seemed an essential part of my survival as a civilian working with them.
God forbid.
I don’t remember the exchange, but in reading that post, the ‘you should try one’ sounds like he is challenging Pike to sit on his face.
I do really hate the glaringly contemporary vernacular in current Trek.
I’ve noticed worse examples than that. The other Star Trek series managed to steer clear of contemporary idiom that would sound jarring. Maybe because they replaced it with abundant technobabble (something that SNW is light on).
Is there a way we can unread a post, like for ever and ever and ever?
If it is any consolation, I went back&forth about whether I should even post that — now I really wish I hadn’t.
TOS techspeak never sounded like TNG techspeak. “Can you bridge to your setup?” just sounds like it means something without becoming ‘techtothetech-tech’ sounding (actually, what I was imagining when writing that wasn’t from 24th century technobabble, but actually the sound of the Imperial probe droid from EMPIRE.)
Well, Aaron Sorkin got away with this practice in THE WEST WING; but (to channel my inner Lloyd Bentsen this time), you, Mr. Kurtzman, are no Aaron Sorkin. :)
I was at the screening of the first two episodes in NYC last night. It’s really cool that Paramount set this up for free, and NYC Away Team coordinated how fans got tickets.
Except for an inexplicable (to me) fight scene in episode 1, the writing is absent of any science fiction – but almost note-perfect on character, shot in gorgeous cinematically constructed scenes. The comic timing in both episodes popped.
My takeaway is that the goal of SNW is to “fill in the gaps” about the characters we love in the universe we do pretty much know about. As a result, I don’t think this is really a “planet of the week” show where the narrative focus are problems the crew encounters. Rather, the focus is how the crew reacts to the problems they will solve. SNW has a high-level emotional investment for Trek. DSC and Picard tried, but SNW achieves a higher level of precision than we had any right to expect in a TOS-prequel. I think that’s what they really mean by “big swings.”
Is it candy or provocative? Is it relatable? That may depend on who you are going into this. On a large screen, in a theater filled with fans, most with shared values, there was joy. Anyone who was there would bet that there are a ton of markets where fans would head to a theater and pay for tickets, whether it was to see episodes of SNW every two weeks, or a few times a season. I feel really lucky I was in that room!
Nice review!
TUC is largely absent of science fiction too, (outside of trappings and old chestnuts like shapeshifters that are more the stuff of fantasy — the invisible ship is a variant on RED OCTOBER’s stealth mode, not real SF), and a lot of people seem to ‘get’ that more than the ones that do have genuine SF content. It often bugs me that Trek can’t do SF more often and better, but clearly the number of times they are going to get into TMP or INTERSTELLAR territory is vanishingly small.
Meyer doesn’t really do sci fi beyond time after time. His two Star Trek films are submarine movies. and the second is supposed to be Holmes but often comes off as Scooby Doo. Yeah one of those scenes was cut from the theatrical cut but the other stayed in. The infamous gravity boots scene. The Colonel West scene was trimmed.
Good points, and the one bit of ‘sense of wonder’ in TWOK is the Sallin-shot coffin, which Meyer didn’t want and fought against. I always got a kick out of David Gerrold saying TWOK is about as scientifically accurate as the 1803 Farmer’s Almanac — then I feel bad (briefly) for enjoying the film so much and so many times in spite of those kinds of shortcomings.
Lucky you!
I do wish they would get these events to more cities, and outside the US.
Toronto, London and a major city in Germany would make sense given the fanbase. In the US, at least Chicago and Seattle in addition to New York and LA.
At this point that big swings phrase is becoming meme material.
They should make a t-shirt out of it.
They should just establish that DISCO & SNW take place in an alternate timeline. They don’t fit very well the way it is.
I just look at it like a comic book with different artists. Jim Lee’s Batman looks better than Bill Finger’s but it is still Batman.
I wish the 25th century where Matalas left us in the finale of Picard S3 was an alternate timeline actually.
Not much left of Starfleet and Federation meritocracy.
Bro I had to look up the word meritocracy lol.
I don’t disagree either but NuTrek is a mess with all of that unfortunately. Maybe just put all it in an alternate universe? The haters would love it. 🤣
Yeah probably and then canon can fit better. But I’m cool about it.
I’m shocked at all the negative comments on this post. Season 1 of Strange New Worlds was wildly popular with the fandom, but you couldn’t tell it from the first couple of dozen posts.
If any of the SNW people are reading this, take heart! Most of the fandom ADORED S1 and is very much looking forward to S2!
I’m attending a concert Thursday night with one of favorite bands, but I’m FAR more excited about the season premiere of SNW (which I’ll watch in the afternoon, before the concert, of course)! Can’t wait!
It’s the best first season of a Star Trek show since probably the Original Series and will be the Star Trek people talk about 50 years from now. This is the main Trek for people under 40 now (and before people jump down my throat with LOWERDECKSLOWERDECKSLOWERDECKSMYENTIREIDENTITYISBASEDONLOWERDECKS, Lower Decks is going to feed even more people to this show with the crossover).
Yes, I agree!
Hard to say this with a straight face when DS9 offered us its excellent pilot, “Battle Lines,” “In the Hands of the Prophets,” and — especially — “Duet.” ENT had some excellent episodes as well.
Now, that said, I didn’t *hate* SNW season one; but it sounds like they’re deliberately amplifying its flaws in season two.
that’s probably correct. I’m happy to change my tune. DS9’s pilot is still one of the best pilots of the last 30 years, too. I didn’t love Strange New Worlds’ first season, but after watching the other shows (and before seeing Prodigy and ST:P-S3) it was refreshing to watch something that didn’t feel like it had been written by someone who ran into a brick wall at full speed before sitting down in front of their computer.
It’s the best first season of a Star Trek show since probably the Original Series and will be the Star Trek people talk about 50 years from now.
I agree!
“It’s the best first season of a Star Trek show since probably the Original Series and will be the Star Trek people talk about 50 years from now.”
I mostly agree with the former (although I still like VOY first season more personally, but I’m pretty sure I’m in the minority lol) but I don’t know how much I agree with the latter. That seems pretty bold to me, at least right now. I like SNW, but it just feels like a copy of pretty much every show we already got in the 90s…just shinier and more modern. It’s partly why I like it so much. Yeah it’s fun, but it hasn’t stood out from anything else either. Yes TOS fans naturally will be pulled to it, but outside of it being on another Enterprise and remaking old characters, you can replace this show with a number of others and I don’t think anyone would blink.
Just my opinion only. But I think people will be talking about the shows that really stood out and a stark difference from the rest and NOT shows just imitating a half dozen other shows or the original. Now that said, I certainly think people will still like it in 50 years but unless it really stands out, I don’t think it will be seen anymore differently than every other show we gotten lately. And especially if we just get more like it.
This may sound controversial for some, but I think DIS actually has a better chance of that because it IS different, it’s just not very good lol. But even that perception seems to change with these shows in time and as newer generations discover them (no pun intended ;)).
‘This may sound controversial for some, but I think DIS actually has a better chance of that because it IS different.”
Bruh….did you have a stroke while you typed this sentence out? 😜
Nah I’m just teasing! 😁
You may be right. People today thinks the SW prequels are actually good. I never thought I would live long enough to see this become reality. And fortunately I’ll be dead in 50 years.
If I had to choose not sure it would be SNW either if people just see it as another imitation. Definitely not Picard. It sucks so bad and season 3 was great buf it’s like SNW just feel too much like more TNG.
I love the animated shows too, but I don’t know if enough Trekkies care about them like the live action stuff.
Holy hell, maybe it will be Discovery! 🤣
Actually I think it will be DS9. I’m biased because it’s my second favorite show but it’s really the only one who started as the black sheep but has gained such respect and the ONLY show that did it without being on a starship. And it has really strong and thoughtful stories, many ahead of it’s time. I don’t feel that with any of the Kurtzman shows and I like most of them including SNW. But no real gravitas overall with any of them.
The prequels had the original trilogy as a solid foundation, and the world building was good. The dialog and acting were bad. The Disney trilogy has better acting and effects but are a remake of the OT requels. Both the prequel trilogy and sequel trilogy were loose with canon, the sequel far worse than the prequel. Neither recaptured the fun and pure magic of the first 3 movies.
Basically like any other IP the more they make of it the worse it gets and it gets more watered down. Star Wars has now suffered the fate of all other movie franchises. It just hasn’t faded into obscurity but it should. Everything after 1983 is of diminishing quality. To the point so much of it isn’t even Lucas Star Wars. How much of his SW is the actual whole now 10%? There is far more Disney and Filoni fanfiction than the stories from Lucas himself. And that is not counting all the original EU and Disney EU. Its way too much. Disney has done oversaturation to a ridiculous level. There are probably way more comics than there ever were in the old canon and novels. Too much for anyone to keep track of. To expect even a middling level of quality when at best you can expect a mediocre product.
Its no accident Mark Hamill compared the sequel to Bayformers. Its just a corporate product mass produced with no love. But hey if it makes money that is all they care about. And George himself admitted they made more on the toys and softdrink deals when he was making the prequel. Its not exactly premiere Science Fiction storytelling. The best of SW came out of literary sci fi anyway, it was strip mined. That and the pulps. What good would it be without Asimov, or any of the others Lucas liberally borrowed from.
Star Wars was fresh in the 70s in an age of cynicism when you could root for the hero again as he triumphed over evil. But its not in style anymore. The prequel tried to do the Anti hero thing with Anakin but failed, where Luke Skywalker’s story was just a simple morality tale and easier to follow. The Jedi in the prequel were more morally grey and questionable and not really better than the Sith as portrayed. That was a mistake by Lucas. Anakin was never likable he wasn’t a good friend or an amazing star pilot. Anakin’s story was obviously Paul of Arrakis from Frank Herbert. Done worse.
Last Jedi deconstructed the hero myth and tore down Luke Skywalker to build him back up at the end of the movie. Most people checked out after he threw his lightsaber from the original movie and were not paying attention. So furious they boycotted everything that came after. You can’t point out that refusal of the call to adventure is part of the heroes journey those people won’t listen. Rian was doing something subversive with the material and weaving myth, but people didn’t want their childhood memories messed with or challenged. To me its the only valid film out of that mess of a trilogy that tried to tell a story. That wasn’t just reheated nostalgia. Abrams films are abominable. I’ve tried to watch them again and i just can’t. There are some good flourishes there i like, Rey, Poe and Finn. But he almost destroyed Star Wars by making Luke a worthless maguffin. And the awful way they killed Han only saved in the Rise of Skywalker.
Your pointing out the refusal of the call to adventure being part of hero’s journey is astute and dead-on target.
Like you, I find TLJ a superior film to the messes preceding it and following it (though TFA remains the only thing Abrams ever directed that I found even mildly watchable or rewatchable, probably because SW doesn’t mean anywhere near as much to me as ST does), and believe that the last film in the series — I’ve actually blanked on the name — was perhaps the biggest waste of time I’ve ever spent on a franchise film, far more than the MATRIX sequels and even AOTC, which, like TREK 09, I’ve had to fast-forward through parts of both times I’ve tried watching it.
I also think Lower Decks has a chance of that as well, but yeah I’m more on the fence with that one, even more so than Discovery. I have to see where it will be in a few more seasons. But it stands out too, just in a different way. And I’m not trying to jump down your throat about it lol, it’s just what I believe. And as said, DIS probably has a better shot anyway.
Lower Decks has the potential to be The Simpsons of the franchise and build up it’s own cache and instead of being a mirror to popular culture but within Trek’s own popular culture and as it keep growing.
That’s why I love it so much. It takes everything I love about Stat Trek and amplifies it in a fun way.
I hope they will still be making episodes 50 years later. 😄🤞
You’d be shocked to hear the TV, films, and music from creatives I’m a fan of that I have been honestly critical of. Trek is no exception.
You must be fun at parties.
Damn straight. It takes a sycophantic personality to like everything from some artist or franchise, not a discerning one. I like the old William Goldman line about why the auteur theory is BS – “anybody who subscribes to that, I wish you on a desert island with only Chaplin’s THE COUNTESS FROM HONG KONG for ‘entertainment.” Could say the same for Fincher and PANIC ROOM, which actually made me glad I didn’t have to write about it.
By the same token, there are some relatively terrible movies that I still manage to enjoy and rewatch often (IRON EAGLE and especially ACTION JACKSON) and many mediocre ones as well (VOLCANO has got somebody jumping INTO lava and still managing to throw a wounded man to safety before dying — and somehow it makes me tear up and not from laughing.) I can’t really defend why I like them, but I can sure go on at length about why I don’t like stuff from people I think are usually near-genius.
Now you, kmart, I would love to have a beer with you at a party and pick your cinephile brain.
Be careful what you wish for … I really like STAR TREK 5 a lot, and probably have other weird habits (I’m probably the only person you’ll ever meet who, when remembering how awesome 1982 was for filmgoers, cites WRONG IS RIGHT as one of those movies.)
I don’t think people are being that negative, just critical. No one is saying they think the show sucks, people running it should be fired or should be cancelled (all the things I heard people say about DIS), just that things they feel can be a little stronger going forward. And that’s been the case with every show. Compare that to where people were after the first seasons of PIC and DIS here. BIG difference. Lower Decks (surprisingly) gets lots of love here too, but others are critical of it at times as well, which should be expected.
SNW seems to be a well liked show overall, but people still have issues with it. That’s OK because it isn’t perfect, even if I feel it’s getting more right than wrong. And the canon issues will never go away in some circles.
And I guess people being positive or negative about a show has never bothered me. I don’t know why but I guess because I always enjoy hearing both sides. And it makes me 90% less triggered lol.
SNW was worse than I expected because there was too much unwarranted praise. It’s B material, I want to see A+.
And that’s a reasonable take to have. In fact I rate the first season around a B+. Still very solid (especially when compared to most first seasons of Trek lol) but it’s not perfect either. I am hoping second season naturally be a little better but I’m not going to over think it either. I’m happy if it’s about as good as first season but of course I will be thrilled if it is much better.
As far as the show feeling overhyped, the same complaints happened with Picard season 3 as well by some fans. Like SNW, I really liked that season too but would only give it a B+ as well. In fact I’m literally rewatching both of them now (currently on episode 5 of SNW episode 4 of Picard) and enjoying them both. SNW a little more since I haven’t watched it at all since it ended last year.
But yeah there was a lot of hype for both, especially Picard and I can see why others may feel disappointed in them.
It’s only over hyped because we are paying so much attention to how it is being promoted as if the hype speaks for us. But how can the producers stir up new viewers without some overhype – especially when most people – even people who know about Star Trek won’t head to Paramount as a service? They have to really want it.
I agree with this and of course when you’re a studio putting something out, you’re always going to show it in the best light as possible. They are paying a lot for it, so I can’t blame them obviously. But as consumers, we have to measure how accurately it is and pay accordingly.
And I also think in terms of Paramount+ itself, it is desperately trying to get more subscriptions, so it’s doing whatever it can. That’s why season one of SNW is currently free on YouTube. They know there are still probably millions of potential Star Trek fans out there who isn’t signed on to the service and doing everything possible to entice them. I mean I’m only paying $50 a year for the premium version and this is the third year straight I’m paying for such a reduced price. Of course I would happily pay the full price if I’m getting good shows out of it but they know there is a large segment that isn’t willing to. So you have to do what you have to do.
I’m just curious but how were you able to only pay $50 for three straight years? I been paying the premium price since the second season of Lower Decks (the first time I felt it was worth it), but only monthly. When a season is over I cancel. I haven’t had it since a week after Picard went off the air. I’m signing back up tomorrow for SNW.
But if I was only paying $50 a year for the premium, I would definitely keep it all year! 😁
The first time is kind of a long (and odd) story but I’ll keep it as short as possible. Originally I WAS planning to pay the full amount which is $100. This was back in 2020 and I had never had the premium version. I always had the commercial option but had it every month since 2017. But I was enjoying it more and wanted the non-commercial option. So I decided if I was going just start paying more, then I would bite the bullet and pay for it annually because I would save $20. So that’s what I did.
Cut to the next day and my girlfriend found out I upgraded it and paid did the annual subscription. She was NOT happy lol. She didn’t think the service was worth it and hated paying money for something we may not watch much of 6 months from now. She was cool with the upgrade, but didn’t want to pay the full year for it. I made it clear we never once cancelled it in over 3 years but she came back it was easier to justify when it was only $5 a month. So we went back and forth, IDK, 9 or 10 hours before I finally gave in lol.
So I called them up to see if I could get a refund. But I was prepared for them to tell me no (which I was kind of hoping lol). I explained to the CSR exactly what happened and that if I wanted my girlfriend not to leave me, I needed the refund….because she also bought the 4K Smart TV too I watched the service on. And if that left, then I was really screwed. Priorities! ;)
And I kept emphasizing we didn’t want to cancel the service, we just wanted to keep paying it monthly. You get a lot less hassle that way but it was actually true lol. She was great and said no problem, just needed to talk to her manager to clear it and put me on hold.
A few minutes later, she came back on but then gave me an option and said her manager said I can just pay the monthly fee again OR if I stay with the annual subscription, they would give me a 50% discount and basically knock off $50 for the year. I was like WTF???? But I was like suuuure lol. I wasn’t just paying less than the original premium fee, I was now paying less than the commercial fee as well. This was an amazing offer and it ended up making both me and my girlfriend super happy lol.
At first I couldn’t figure out why they would offer me that deal when I would end up paying more if I paid the premium price every month? Now they are losing money. But my guess was the churn on this service was SO high and they are trying to retain customers all year, they were willing to give me a sweet deal instead of the risk I would cancel in 6 months. They want those numbers to look as best as they can. That’s why there is such a push to get people to pay annually. Not just to get more money, but for the metrics to look better.
So sorry this is so long lol but I wanted to make it clear it was a really out of the blue offer. And the irony is my girlfriend loved the service even more because that year they added like a thousand movies and tons of new channels on it. She was watching more stuff on it than I was lol. She even said that I was right and we could’ve paid for it annually…and now we were. ;)
Wow yeah they must’ve have been desperate! 😂
But that’s cool they were willing to work with you. And they could’ve just said the transaction was final and that would’ve been it. Instead they gave you the same deal at a discount and you never asked for one either. That’s how good customer service is suppose to work.
Yeah it was definitely a nice deal, especially when you’re not even looking for it. And this was all before they were pushing the service overseas so their subscriptions was even tinier back then.
LOL I went on so long, I didn’t explain how I got it the other two years for that price. The second time was actually through a Black Friday promotion. Just by crazy luck again, the year subscription was almost up and I wanted to renew it. This time I got NO push back from my girlfriend lol. I was going to pay the full price but they were offering a $50 annual deal less than two weeks before our original subscription was up anyway. So we just signed up for it that day.
They then offered the same deal again in 2022 and we got it. I think we had to use a different bank card or something but had no problems getting it.
But it’s a sign that these services are probably really struggling, especially the smaller ones like P+. And there are deals for it all the time. There are always 1 month free deal or just pay $2 a month for 3 months etc.
So keep your eye out on the Black Friday deal this year. My bet is they will keep offering it and I bet that will be included with Showtime this year too. But to make clear, I’m talking America only.
But based on the report I read on how much this service was still in a hole financially, it may not make a profit until 2027 and that was considered a rosy outlook, it could be longer. So the belt tightening is real lol…but so are the discounts and savings. ;D
That’s actually a good answer. I never thought about that. But I don’t nind paying if it’s worth it. For the first few years I just wanted to pay the bare minimum. Today I would pay double what I am now and not complain if I got more stuff like Picard season 3, LDS or SNW.
I know not everyone loves all of these shows but they have honestly been a remainder why I fell in love with it in the first place.
Still though I’m going to be doing a lot of searching at the next black Friday. 😁
Exactly. That’s the thing, for hardcore fans they know we’re not leaving. We’re going to always subscribe when a new show or season starts. It’s really everyone else, the casual fans and trying to attract the newbies, etc. I bet you every single person here would pay double what their paying now IF they really like the show they are watching (and can afford it).
But there is probably a large segment out there that is skeptical of these shows or just paying for them. That’s why I keep saying we probably only get stuff like Picard season 3, SNW, etc because they are trying to rope in the more casual skeptical fans and will only think about watching a show if Janeway, Spock or Seven is on a show. Those are the people they are trying to attract.
In fact, I think I told either you or someone here I got a coworker to finally check out the service since he was a long time Trek fan. He’s been watching it from 1966, but had zero interest in the new stuff because it’s not on regular TV anymore. I finally got him to give Picard season 3 a try and he liked it. And he also liked SNW, but not a fan of the others. Anyway, I bring him up because I asked him just yesterday now that he’s watched some of the newer stuff did he plan to subscribe to P+ for season 2 of SNW. His answer was nope, he had no interest to pay to watch it monthly and said he may just wait for it end and just binge it. And he said it will also depend if people really like it or not even though he liked first season enough. And this guy makes $90,000 a year. He can definitely afford it lol. But to him it’s ‘principle’.
It’s people like my coworker that shows why it’s so hard to keep them committed to one service any longer than they have to; even if they are fans of certain brands or IPs on it. As consumers we still have tons of power even if people feel they are getting higher.
Very well put.
I just watched it. My expectations were too high due to all the praises. It’s okay but not sensational. It has likable characters thank God, Disco and Picard were just unbearable. But it also has a hollow feel, just trying to ape TOS without the occasional brilliant episodes and no personality of its own. Hoping for improvements in S2. Having likable characters is a great foundation to build on.
If any of the SNW people are reading this, don’t get complacent. S1 was all right but you can do better. Be careful about the jarring contemporary idiom. Don’t try to write more comedy till you have writers you’re sure can handle it. Imitating the original series is going to get old. Use S2 to develop a personality for this series of its own.
You know it has been my life experience that people tend to get critical of or angry at the most at the things or people they love. I know its weird but we as humans tend to be much more emotional at the stuff or people we love so I think this makes perfect sense and I personally see it as a form of love. I think it would have been much more problematic if there was no reaction to the show or nothing but just positive reaction.
It’s interesting, I have found it surprising too, but the balance of people commenting here has been changing.
I have come to realize that, despite its rep as a board with a large proportion of TOS fans, at this point many of the loudest voices here are TNG fans, by preference and age group. That’s at least how I can understand their uncritical eye on Picard S3 while nitpicking on SNW.
No matter. The reviews released yesterday, based on the first six screeners are, taken as a whole, extraordinarily strong.
TrekMovie’s review is actually is at the least gushing end. Others, including mainstream reviewers like TVGuide, are unequivocally gushing. Some say there’s one or another episode they didn’t find as strong. But that’s the strength of the episodic format – it can try different things and please different audience niches all in one season.
I have come to realize that, despite its rep as a board with a large proportion of TOS fans, at this point many of the loudest voices here are TNG fans, by preference and age group. That’s at least how I can understand their uncritical eye on Picard S3 while nitpicking on SNW.
Yeah, it’s crazy how when you get past the fan service/sentimentality aspects, Picard S3 was just so freaking lazy and bad in so many ways, but I am seeing here some of the same fans who were just so oblivious to that because they love TNG so much — taking much more critical potshots at the vastly superior SNW.
Dude no offense but I don’t see this at all. And I loved BOTH Picard season 3 and SNW season 1. I have rated them the same in fact. I have also been critical with both as well, right?
But what I mean is people are critical of Picard season 3 here just like people are of SNW. What I think is funny since you enjoyed SNW, so you think it’s getting some kind of a beating but since you didn’t completely enjoy Picard S3, you think it’s getting nothing but praise.
That’s just not true on either side. SNW is mostly LOVED here. Picard is ALSO mostly loved. But both shows also have their critics here. I’ll say it again, I liked BOTH shows and defended them when I thought they needed defending. But I don’t have a single issue of any criticisms with either one of them because they are both valid. I know its a message board so its not shocking, the people who like a show feels its being unfairly attacked but thinks the one they don’t like isn’t getting attacked enough lol.
This is just human nature. There are Trump fans out there that thinks the guy is being treated unfairly every time he sneezes, but not a shock, the people who hates him thinks the guy is getting off with everything and of course this is not completely true on either side. So yeah.
Picard season 3 definitely played too hard on nostalgia at times, took a LOT of short cuts in its story and didn’t develop the story enough in places like with the Dominion and Vadic or even the Borg. I agree with all of that and it’s been pointed out constantly here, right? But yeah if you liked it enough, you probably won’t care all that much.
SNW season 1 did play fast and loose with canon, is also leaning very hard on nostalgia (but Picard now has it beat lol) while making the characters feel a little too immature at times and the show could have a bit more weight overall. Again, I agree with all of this as well as it’s being pointed out. But yeah if you liked it enough, guess what, you won’t care all that much either. ;)
Pretty certain Trump haters are a lot happier these days! 😁🤣
Hope he goes to prison for 100 years.
Amd I liked both seasons too but Picard season 3 beats SNW easily for me. But season 2 looks like it’s going to be good too so I don’t have any complaints about it.
And for me, the season is mostly a countdown to the crossover episode! 😁
LOL! Yeah they do. And I won’t derail the topic but Trump proves over and over again why he never should’ve been President in the first place. This guy has so many mental/psychological issues and now he’ll probably spend the rest of his life locked up over it because he couldn’t just return some documents he wasn’t suppose to have. It may not be prison, but he’s not getting away with this one. And he will probably be indicted for more in the next few months.
But to keep it on topic, I think most fans have been pretty satisfied with the last year. Yes some will never be happy no matter what, but I just don’t see the need to divide people over every little disagreement. Some fans like one show over another, welcome to fandom. But the thing people should be more focused on is that fans are mostly happy these days, some just think it can improve a little more because it can. But it doesn’t mean they are just being unhinged haters and no one here is begging Kurtzman or whoever to be replaced by Matalas. Calm down.
I know the three of us don’t talk these days, but I am 100% in agreement with you guys on the orange-haired, sociopathic liar, wannabe dictator.
Yes, we fully agree on this. I’m just so sick of this narcissist sociopath and ready for him to just go away, but now we have at least 18 more months of this circus until he’s officially convicted on something.
It’s shocking that there are people out there still defending him even now. They seem to think he should take no accountability for anything he does ever. It’s just sad, but I think he finally blocked himself into a corner he can’t get out of and he knows it.
Well said!
We’ve also been told that the zaniness starts in the second half of the season. It may be that they released the first six episodes to bait the critics into release positive early reviews, whereas the back end of the season fails to live up to the hype. Indeed, something very similar happened with PIC season three.
Great point on Pic S3 — the back half was a mess and the near-nonsensical ending a total rip-off of ROTJ.
I don’t see that happening here, but your never know.
I saw it as a fans desire to retcon the first two seasons and the TNG movies. Elaborate fanfiction. to make it more like TNG but in the style of the Kirk movies of 1-6. I think its the TNG cinematic experience Terry always wanted. Its a kind of vanity but it would be fun to be able to do if you were Terry. Imagine Paramount allows you to play Roddenberry for a season. Its bound to get to ones head. The only other comparison i have is JJ remaking Star Wars and Star Trek the way he wanted them. Or maybe if Dave Filoni suddenly grew a big head and suddenly thought he was George Lucas
I think season 2 sounds fine and I really loved season 1! 😀👍
Always great to see you. 🙂
I liked the DISCO design of the Klingons. I liked that they were more alien and less 80s metal hair band with a rubber prosthetic pasted to their forehead.They were more formidable and scary.
Agreed!
One of the few things I liked about Disco was that the Klingons actually seemed like real aliens, not just humans with funny foreheads.
Sure, they made for good aliens. They just weren’t Klingons.
Agreed.
Star Trek has never been good with continuity. Just look at the original series. The concept of the Federation wasn’t introduced until later in the series and has been retconed back a century. The use of dilithium crystals was inconsistent. Not to mention they were originally lithium crystals until the producers changed it to something exotic for the fantasy aspect. I think as fans, we sometimes get too fixated on canon instead of just enjoying the show. I agree that consistency is good for building a franchise like Star Trek. But sometimes it gets so big, and you have so many different show runners and writers with different ideas, that inconsistencies are going to happen. They’ve been pretty open that between a good story and canon, they’ll fudge canon. If you need a head canon explanation, I use this one: In episode 3×02 of the Flash TV show, Jay Garrick explains time travel to Barry Allen. He compares space-time to a coffee mug. Whenever you travel back in time it breaks. You can try to reset the timeline, to fix it, but it’s never gonna be exactly the same. In essence, traveling though time can alter reality. Sometimes you get big changes like the Kelvin timeline and sometimes you get subtle changes like the use of dilithium or lasers vs. phasers. Star Trek has altered time a lot and for me, that’s a good enough explanation for certain canon violations for things like the Gorn, dilithium and Klingons.
I’m not trying to sound like an apologist for TOS, but it’s a big difference comparing a low budget show that was just starting out and was still trying to get the basics concepts of the show right vs comparing the large and deeply developed franchise it is today. People making TOS didn’t even know if people would ever watch the show once it was off the air. It’s really not the same thing with the show it is now.
But you’re not wrong either, it has become too big to the point you’re going to just run into certain issues, especially with prequels in a universe with 800+ hours now. And yes we are too focused on canon at times, which is WHY I think it would just be smart to reboot it at some point but no one seems all that interested to ever do that.
It’s literally easier to think “this is the way the people making the show want it to be.”
Here we go again. The problem isn’t that someone got Canon wrong.. that’s happened over and over, and will always be an issue. It’s easy for most reasonable fans to overlook honest mistakes. But that’s not what we’re talking about here. These guys have bent over backwards to remind us all that this is the prime timeline, and that they ‘respect’ canon. So when they blatantly disregard that.. fans are going to call them out, as they should. The whole thing they’ve done with the Gorn? They could have just as easily made that a new species. Not everything has to tie in. That’s a willful disregard of the things they keep telling us that they “respect”. We’re already seeing a descendent of Khan, and everyone talking about him and his place in history on board the ship in SNW, yet when he is found by the Enterprise under Kirk’s command, Spock has no idea who he is. These are major problems for a creative group that says this honors canon. All they have to do is call it a reboot, or make it a divergent timeline or whatever.. and yet they won’t do it. So what you describe in the first half of your argument above, I don’t have a problem with. What a do have a problem with, are those in charge, lazily setting it aside when they could just as easily do something a little different. That’s not the fault of fans, or fans being unreasonable. This is fans calling out the creatives for laziness and lack of imagination, while lying to us. It’s really simple.
Fun fact Matt D., while it’s long established that Roddenberry lifted (was inspired by) a lot in the 1950s MGM feature film Forbidden Planet, I was rewatching the outtakes of the opening scenes recently and found out that even the name ‘The Federation’ originated with Forbidden Planet.
All to say that Roddenberry was blenderizing a lot of sci-fi ideas and tropes at the time, clearly tossing in more and more on a just-in-time basis for great storytelling.
But some of it, especially the rubber-suited Gorn, were pure and intentional pulpy, campy stuff that has gone on to be a mainstream culture Trek influence as ridiculous memes – no matter the aspirational message of Arena.
TOS was able to laugh at itself and defy continuity in its own time.
And in several cases, the ‘facts of canon’ don’t hold up at all against actual verification of what was said onscreen. Even some of the ‘official’ statements such as ‘Spock was the first Vulcan in Starfleet’ have absolutely no basis in onscreen canon.
In the case of other ‘violations’ we see in SNW, we’ll just have to see where the relationships are down the line to know if they’re reconcilable with bits of TOS dialogue here or there.
Let’s not get so precious about continuity that we lose sight of that.
Worse, let’s not put visual or canon continuity ahead of continuity of the aspirational values of Trek as I argue Picard S3 did.
Or, if we are willing to accept that there’s room for a show that jettisons those values while heaving close to visual continuity, let’s also accept that there’s room for a show that instead prioritizes the continuity of aspirational Trek values over perfect continuity in plot with TOS’s made-on-the-fly canon, and more often long held head canon.
I notice that a lot of the folks here, who are now Enterprise enthusiasts, seem to have forgotten the raging fan arguments about its many ‘canon violations’ back when it was in first run. I have yet to see anything more profound as a discontinuity than we have come to accept from Enterprise.
When I hear “big swings”, I get nervous. Because all modern Trek has been taking some big swings since 2009, and it hasn’t panned out to put it lightly. I am cautiously excited to see what they do this season. I just hope they drop the modern “Gen Z” dialogue, in favor of the more Star Trek-like neutral dialogue.
I wish that they would just go ahead and blame the Red Angel, The Suliban, and the Borg incursion from first contact for altering the Prime timeline as a way to explain all of the canon changes they are making.
As much as I love the original series, it had its day and there is nothing wrong with building something new around it. As a fan, I just want them to admit it. It is rather obvious. Michael Burnham’s mother made a comment about how Time Travel alters technology. The Temporal Cold War (Didn’t the Suliban alter First Contact with the Klingons?), the Borg (Didn’t Chekov leave a communicator behind in ST IV?), The Time Orbs from Bajorans, The Klingon Time Crystals, Neros divergent incursion into the past…… The list goes on and on.
Maybe the Lower Decks episode answers a lot of these questions. It is Time Travel so…. Tell Alex and Akiva to just admit it already…..
Only recently got thru S1 of SNW. Good news: actual likable characters!
I can sorta buy Peck as Spock despite the change of looks. I can’t buy Wesley as Kirk, maybe because Anson Mount already seems so Kirk-like (the voice is very similar). Uhura and Chapel are fundamentally different but good characters, so I can accept the change. Ortega is a blast. She and Spock are probably my favorites in the cast.
But so far it just seems like a knockoff of the original series, with no personality of its own. Hopefully they can grow into it in S2. Also, they need to stop doing comedy until they have writers who can write comedy.
“While the final season of Picard season 3 may have shown us how to shake Trek up and reinvent it for the modern era…”
Yeah, no. PIC III was a nostalgia-drenched, ponderous exercise in the kind of path-of-least-effort sort of long-form plotting that has epitomized streaming Trek: a ticking-clock suspenser without suspense, chock full of telegraphed reveals and pointless ambling around in the dark to fill out the three hours or so of significant story.
It’s a road map to yesterday.
While nothing will quite capture the magic and anticipation of Picard S3 for me, SNW is a fresh and breezy bit of stylish fun, even if it tends to be overly disposable for such short seasons.
Why does it always say Pike knows of his impending death? All he knows is that he gets disfigured and is in a yes or know wheel chair. He actually never dies in TOS and lives happily ever after with Vina in illusion form at the end of The Menagerie.
That Pike thinks he is going to die a horrid disfigurement but does the job any day makes him a hero.
True though, I suppose its that Pike knows of an impending fate potentially worse than death as opposed to death. Little does he know he’ll get to live happily ever after all, SNW makes The Menagerie all that more powerful.
What was said in S1E1 is that it would be the end of his life as he knows it.
Excellent! Will definitely be avoiding this train wreck then. And we thought they were back on track after Picard Season 3! Typical Team Kurtzman. I’ll watch the Lower Deck crossover episodes (LDS being a far superior show) then pass on the rest. The headache isn’t worth it. Akiva clearly doesn’t care about this universe/time period, why should we care about his show?
To be fair, is that any worse then Picard and company going back in time in First Contact to mingle with Zephram Cochrane who was nothing like Glenn Corbetts Cochrane in metamorphosis?
That was more of a retcon, but didn’t really change much canon wise with Cochrane. People change/evolve. Cochrane in Broken Bow acted nothing like Cochrane in FC. Physically? Cochrane was rejuvenated by the cloud entity. I imagine this is what he looked like when he was younger (more younger than FC).
Very nice “teaser” write up. Since his first appearance on Discovery, Anson Mount has given the Trek franchise the lead it needed. Despite that, I’m relieved that the ensemble gets moments to shine in season 2 of SNW. I’m not crazy about the inclusion of Kirk (always seemed unnecessary to me), but unlike Disco which was all Burnham with dashes of Saru, Tilley and Stamets, SNW has a solidly written and acted crew deserving of additional screen time. I’m ok with with playing a bit loose with canon but I’m good if we never see any more TOS characters on the show. Give me a kooky Carol Kane over Scotty. Picard gave me the fan service I wanted to close the TNG era. All I want from SNW is to be the best version of itself.
According to some reviews Pelia is not only from a long lived species, she’s a teacher of engineers.
If she formed Hemmer, perhaps we’ll get to see her mentor Scott down the line. Or, given Scott was significantly older than Kirk and Spock, perhaps this has already happened.
But as you say, not too soon with Scotty please. We need time with the characters we have, and already seem to have too much, too soon of the prequel lives of legacy characters.
Good post, this. I heartily agree with you. Looking forward to Thursday.
One or both?
You say “but that’s the price you pay for having a 23rd-century-set show.” But that doesn’t have to be. I don’t understand why they need to play with canon, as they could have the exact same show without doing that.
The Gorn didn’t need to be the “Gorn.” They could have been a completely new species. The Chapel triangle with T’Pring could have been Leila Kalomi and even included T’Pring without Chapel or Uhura ever being aware.
There was absolutely no need to bring Khan into it, and it has added NOTHING to the show. La’an could have been the exact same character without this lineage.
Adding Kirk is unnecessary as this should be the “Pike” show, and don’t get me started on Spock’s first command. It was clear in The Galileo 7 that his first command was that mission, but nope – playing with major canon and rewriting history again.
And don’t get me started on Dr. M’Benga versus Dr. Boyce (Jeffrey Combs should have done this) and the lack of all the characters from The Cage.
Don’t get me wrong, if breaking canon helps for some reason, I’m okay with it, but when there is just no reason to do it and you could have had the exact same show, just as compelling and strong – it is silly, distracting, just plain weak and more of Kurtzman Trek.
Actually agree with nearly all of this even if I don’t have a personal big issue with everything. But canon wise, it makes a huge mess of things.
But this list proves they are trying to throw in as much TOS nostalgia bait as possible. And if it wasn’t a prequel, then it would be fine. But as a prequel, you have to be a little more disciplined and they are clearly not doing that.
Having the original crew from the Cage was never going to happen today, however it’s a shame they didn’t include Boyce as his relationship with Pike in The Cage was well done. The scene in Pike’s small quarters between them is the kind of stuff they could have developed upon.
Sounds good! After how great Picard season 3 was, looks like we’re getting another great season of Star Trek! And LDS after that one! And of course THE CROSSOVER BABY!!! THE CROSSOVER!!!!!
Trekkies are eating good these days. 😎
Silly question: how much more productively could you use your time, instead of arguing about the crew calling each other by their first names, or engaging catchphrases? Just curious. Maybe you could, I don’t know, volunteer some time at a shelter or soup kitchen? Plant some flowers that make people smile? Learn a musical instrument? You know, something useful