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from the so-many-spinoffs-I'm-getting-dizzy dept.
CBS is launching a new Star Trek series, Strange New Worlds, which will be a TOS prequel set prior to Kirk assuming command of the Enterprise. As in season 2 of Discovery, the new series will feature Anson Mount as Captain Pike, Rebecca Romjin as Number One, and Ethan Peck as Spock. Discovery has been polarizing for Star Trek fans with many fans criticizing the writing of both Discovery and Picard, saying it deviated from the defining characteristics of Star Trek. Despite the criticisms, Mount's portrayal of Pike in Discovery was generally received well. The story for the pilot will be developed by Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman, and Jenny Lumet, the first two of which are executive producers of Discovery. Because filming of TV shows has generally been halted by COVID-19, it is not known when the series will film or premiere on CBS' streaming service.
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @09:05AM (20 children)
The same clowns that flushed the Star Trek spirit and charm down the tubes. Enjoy.
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @09:14AM (16 children)
The real Trek:
(1) Original Series, mostly because Kirk, plots and effects are thin back then - memories of watching it on 16mm as a kid
(2) Next Generation - simply the very best
(3) Voyager - also good
(4) DS9 - on parr with Voyager
and there it ends. All else is imitation and a poor photocopy.
Like the real Star Wars ended with VI, or at best once Lucas was forced to bow to fan threats over JJB (who was to be THE Sith)... and now under Dismal(tm) it has fallen apart entirely.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @10:25AM (8 children)
Last year I watched Enterprise again on netflix. When it originally came out I though it was "Meh" (Cap wants to surf the universe sticking his nose in all kinds of places where it doesn't belong), but now, being also a bit older, there were also some good parts in the show... it just started in like the third season. Is it "Star Trek"? I don't know (what really defines it?), but I did enjoy it.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Saturday May 16 2020, @11:28AM (6 children)
I kind liked the show, there was mainly two things I hated -- the intro with the singing that got cut after the first season or so and that the ending was so horrible. Beyond that it was fairly ok -- perhaps not as good as some of the others but still ok.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday May 16 2020, @11:56AM (5 children)
You just ain't got faith of the heart is your problem. Seriously though, the annoying as all fuck song stayed in the intro through the entire four seasons.
But, yeah, the show itself was fine. Not Kirk and Spock good and the multi-episode story arcs all over the place were somewhat annoying but it was still quite enjoyable.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by looorg on Saturday May 16 2020, @08:16PM (4 children)
Clearly. I might be remembering wrong about when they dropped the lyrics, as I recall they did have some kind of instrumental piece for the last seasons or so at least. Which was a lot better then the singing one, could also be that there had never (?) been a singing soundtrack to any Star Trek show before -- not counting Kirk singing etc.
That said the epic arc of the temporal war was interesting, or could have been but it sort of went nowhere and fell flat or wasn't developed really well. At least the Doctor and the Pilot (Trip?) were fun characters. T'pol was kinda shit since it was so clear that "we need a seven of nine"-character preferably somewhat hot to appeal to that demographic that still needs some kind of wank-fantasy in space.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @08:25PM
yah-y for mind-reading decease ... even getting rid of TV doesn't solve this ^_^
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday May 16 2020, @09:03PM
T'pol was fucking annoying, and yeah the wank-fantasy was also kind of annoying. Of course with Vulcans you have pon farr so there had to be a scene with that as well.
If Trek is to have wankfests, then they should go all-out and feature a young Lwaxana Troi getting gangbanged by Klingons and Ferengi all at once, with male starfleet officers cheering in the background and throwing gold coins and other space-bucks at the orgy pile.
Patrick Stewart can guest-star as the creepy old man watching the orgy, who says, "Now do ass-to-ass!" [fjcdn.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 17 2020, @06:44AM
The instrumental version was used in all seasons for the closing credits.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday May 17 2020, @12:09PM
Fired up an episode in the middle of the last season to check before I posted that. Vocals remain through the whole thing.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 17 2020, @05:57AM
Basically it got a lot better when Manny Coto took over as showrunner. As much hate as Rick Berman got, I would happily take Berman Trek over anything with Alex Kurtzman and Akiva Goldsman. But just like TNG failed at trying to recreate TOS, Berman failed at trying to recreate TNG -- first in the Delta Quadrant, than 80 years before TOS. Even TNG wasn't quite as good in its final season. DS9 worked because it was still Star Trek but Ronald D. Moore and Ira Steven Behr weren't trying to do TNG on a space station. Berman did a lot of good things for Star Trek, so I don't want to criticize him too much. Unlike the current group of producers, Berman tried very hard to stick to Roddenberry's concept of Star Trek. Enterprise got a lot better starting with the third season because Coto brought some fresh ideas while still having the show feel like Star Trek.
If Enterprise hadn't been cancelled, the remaining seasons probably would have been quite good. They were going to show more about how the Federation was created and Archer's role in that. They were laying the groundwork to show a war with the Romulans. And Jeffrey Combs was going to be upgraded to a main cast member in the fifth season. He was great, whether he was portrating Weyoun, Brunt, or Shran. Enterprise still felt like Star Trek, with an optimistic view of the future and a lack of internal drama between the crew. Much like TNG and DS9, Enterprise started with two rather unremarkable seasons. It was judged against the very high quality of the series before it and Star Trek had been running continuously for 18 years at that point. If Enterprise had premiered when Discovery did and aired on free TV, as it did on UPN, it probably would have run for seven or eight seasons.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @10:33AM (5 children)
And depending on your view, some of the content in the later seasons of TNG. While you could pick and choose good episodes after that, there were a bunch of jumping the shark moments in both DS9 and Voyager, not counting the entire Q arc, or the 'Precursors' who showed up in that find the treasure arc which then got forgotten about in all later Trek episodes, despite TNG basically laying out that all humanoid looking species in the Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Delta quadrants were in fact interrelated by way of a precursor species who had died out.
Between Star Trek, Star Wars, what has happened to modern computer hardware and software, and the current trends in both the US and abroad, I am not sure what is left to believe in or support anymore. Because it seems like it's all turned into shoveling our plates full of a heaping pile of shit and being told to like it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @10:35AM
Those were actually quite good with the temporal war not having a major (any?) presence in them.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday May 16 2020, @09:08PM (3 children)
Voyager jumped the shark in its first episode. The only redeeming quality was the series finale, but you had to wait the entire series for a somewhat watchable episode. Voyager was Trek's first lesson about how not to do the "woman in charge" thing.
Voyager would have kicked major ass if they had Commander Shelby from TNG promoted to captain and in charge of Voyager. She better-represented the spirit of the coffee-drinker and could be sassy and kickass without being annoying, unlike Janeway who gave off that "naggy mom" vibe.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @09:25PM (1 child)
How about Captain Garrett of the Enterprise-C?
She is destined to die a warrior's death in glorious battle.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday May 16 2020, @10:03PM
Garrett was also pretty cool but due to the circumstances she couldn't be shown at her best. Through no fault of her own she had to give off vibes of being a despondent miserable aunt always drunk on wine and held together by benzodiazepines while fighting an uphill battle she knew she wouldn't win(so, basically Nancy Pelosi). She died an honorable death with purpose, though, you can't really say that about a lot of other Captains in the Trek franchise...or Nancy Pelosi.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 17 2020, @06:06AM
Janeway would have been much worse if the role hadn't been recast and given to Kate Mulgrew. See for yourself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8SIZcDWKyw0 [youtube.com]. Mulgrew did a pretty good job with a poorly-written character.
I definitely would have enjoyed seeing Commander Shelby have a few more battles with the Borg. But Janeway could have been much, much worse.
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @10:43AM
After the disaster that was the Disney Trilogy, Prequel Trilogy nostalgia is through the roof. The cheesy dialogue and midichlorians can be forgiven because they are fun movies that still make more sense than the Disney trash.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday May 16 2020, @01:51PM
The animated Star Trek is even preferable to STD or Picard.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bzipitidoo on Saturday May 16 2020, @03:16PM (1 child)
The spirit of Star Trek is the spirit of science, of conquering irrational fears with cold, calm, logic. And, the thrill of exploration and discovery And the eschewing of violence and conquest, and the problems such activities tend to lead to. Klingons are that, and it just doesn't work that great, not for them. Romulans too, are flawed and get into trouble thereby. Star Trek hams it up mightily, but mostly in a fun way. They explore the physical plane. Real science has plenty of field trips, but on the whole is much more mental.
However, aspects of Star Trek are becoming dated. The bridge in TOS has not aged well. Toggle switches for a user interface? LOL. The viewscreen, yes, spot on, great idea. Then, the whole idea of personally scouting a dangerous situation or place with people, and having the fabled redshirt death or two, is just silly. How do we explore Mars, today? With robots, not people. As the years go by, sending people to the Moon looks ever more obviously a mere publicity stunt. Now that too is primarily explored with robots. Doubtless 24th century robot and drone tech will be able to do a superb job. No need for a magical transporter device, robots could certainly be dropped down to a planetary surface easily enough with the methods used today, the parachutes and heat shields, the retro rockets, and even the giant inflatable bouncy ball method.
Finally, the whole Faster Than Light travel and communication. While that's necessary for Star Trek, the show, to work, it's fantasy. Great that they employ a somewhat plausible propulsion method, warp drive. But it falls apart when you start considering how incredibly much energy it would take, and the "dilithium crystal" is, sigh, crystals. Crystal mumbo jumbo. But even if it was dilithium something-else, it's still "hand-wavium."
But those are mere technical details, really. It's things like the Prime Directive, the spirit of camaraderie and willingness to help, rather than exploit, and the respect and veneration for science and discovery, the hopeful tone, that defines Star Trek. Someone said Kirk was the spirit of TOS? I disagree. Spock is the spirit of TOS, though not without constant questioning, particularly in the constant but friendly sparring Kirk and Spock engage in over the value of emotions.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday May 17 2020, @12:14PM
You forgot the bit where the Federation are authoritarian douchebags. You can live in peace and harmony in their technotopia but only if you do so how they say you must. And even if you've no allegiance to their flag at all, they're more than happy to interfere with your shit.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.