Star Trek: Discovery (2017)

How are you watching Star Trek: Discovery?

  • Signed up for CBS All Access before watching the premiere

    Votes: 13 9.1%
  • Signed up for CBS All Access after watching the premiere

    Votes: 13 9.1%
  • Not signing up, but will watch if it's available for free

    Votes: 82 57.3%
  • On Netflix (Non-US viewer)

    Votes: 35 24.5%

  • Total voters
    143
TOS was amazing, every reboot since then has been poor IMO, this reboot is too soon to call, but the PC is strong in this one.

think the term you're looking for is "inclusive".;)

I believe the point of Star Trek's future is that people of different races and genders aren't captains or engineers or doctors because it's PC, but because we've moved past the stupid crap that leads to our current problem of inequality.

So maybe stop worrying about it being "PC" and enjoy a future where two women of different ethnicities are in charge of a ship without question.
 
Just watched the 3rd episode of Discovery. I'm liking it ALOT! Of course I'm having to resign myself to the fact that this is only 5 years before JJ-Trek Kirk/Spock/Enterprise and not 5 years before Roddenberry's Trek Kirk/Spock/Enterprise. I just have to change that perspective in my mind, make that quantum leap in my head, and it all sits much better with me. If I don't do that, I'll just drive myself nuts with frustration.

But given that hard pill to swallow, the show is really becoming interesting and complex and compelling. The characters are being revealed slowly, with backstories and personalities. Lorca seems to be a lot more Lucius Malfoy than Captain Kirk...he seems devious and secretive and not what you'd usually expect in a starship captain. But it is war afterall, and I guess all's fair in love and war even in the 2340(?)s. (Hope you're not rolling over in your grave Gene!)

The special effects were top-notch in this. I did like hearing the Tribble in Lorca's office. I'm glad we are at least getting an original story here. Thats a big plus for me.
 
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Okay, a few things I liked about this episode:

1) The shuttle. Dear GOD that thing was beautiful. Disregarding the warp capability (something that shuttles on the Enterprise did not have), the design was nice. Recognizable as a Federation shuttle, yet sleek. I wouldn't mind having one in Star Trek Online.

2) Saru. It's Doug Jones.

3) Cadet Tilly. Overly eager and enthusiastic, with a touch (okay fine, a heavy fist) of social awkwardness. She's gonna be the one to fulfill the "Break The Cutie" trope.


What I didn't like:

1) Fungus-Powered Starfleet Hyperdrive. Seriously? Come on now.

2) The engineer dude. Seems like an arrogant jerkass. An understandable situation, given his dislike of what is going on with his research, but still. Tone it down a notch, son.

Everything else was "meh."
 
I hate to be negative, but episode 3 just made me angry from start to finish. I was literally yelling out at the screen a few times a minute, it was that bad.

Every character is a jerk (and not just because of Michael's history, which obviously influenced it), Michael is very unlikable and doesn't act like she was raised Vulcan, and as hard as I may try, I can't shut off my brain and pretend this is connected to the prime timeline or TOS in any way. It's impossibly jarring to try and reconcile this with anything we've seen from the first 40 years of the franchise which it claims to connect to, and it's not just the obvious visual differences. Aesthetically, technologically, inter-personally, it's not Trek to me, it's just any other generic Hollywood scifi series. Even as a prequel to the JJ films, it's rather weak and pointless so far imo. Even as a standalone scifi series, it has very few redeeming qualities that compel me to watch it, and I haven't enjoyed a single thing about it so far.

What was the deal with that random tribble anyway? It just felt like empty and careless fan service without any care. Why has it not multiplied and taken over the ship? Maybe they're going to use its magical blood to heal everyone from death. And what's the deal with this silly propulsion experiments? It makes very little sense, and we know it doesn't succeed in the long run anyway, unless they want to retcon that somehow.

I really tried to give this a fair chance, but it just doesn't resemble Star Trek in any way to me. It doesn't feel like the optimistic utopian universe that Gene Roddenberry envisioned. I'm literally only watching it at this point because they slapped the name "Star Trek" on it, and luckily I'm not paying CBS for it. The best case scenario to me now is that it gets canceled as soon as possible to minimize the damage it is doing to canon being considered prime timeline.
 
In all fairness that was a better episode ( if not a little like Orange is the New Black Alert at times).
Good to see the midichlorians have managed to teleport from the SW universe into ST one, that single concept embodied everything that makes the stupidity quotient in this new series so incredibly high , but hey this is NEW TREK!
However what saves it are the new characters, which are a more interesting mix than in the pilot, and I really liked Jason Isaccs rather moralistically slippery Captain, though this is NOT the Federation as I knew of old. Would a mirror universe episode make any difference to the main characters at this time? Would some of them actually be nicer?
I did like the black ops side of the pure science equation (which again ties in with the JJ universe), but not the very obviously idiotic things they did, like bringing on board the very dangerous alien ,which I swear I just saw on Rick and Morty. I was a little confused by the corpses though, were they thinged or being thinged?
LIked the VFXs and the new shuttle ,lets see where they take this from now.
 
Yeah, it was another bad episode. The whole fungus drive was really a dumb idea. You have to remember that this is supposed to be 10 years before TOS and, as before, they have better technology than TOS ever did. I constantly find the characters to be irritating, in fact, this is Starfleet, a quasi-military organization where nobody has any idea how the military works or how to respect the chain of command. Everyone is arguing with their commanding officer. This would never, ever, ever happen. And the idea that you can just openly recruit a war criminal onto a top secret Federation research vessel is absurd. That would never, ever happen. Now I might be able to see it if, say, she was supposedly killed in the shuttle and they came across her body and put her into a deep, dark project or something, if they're going to go dark, killing the other prisoners and setting the shuttle adrift is something I could see from Dark Trek, but nope, they're going to go back and tell people that the great mutineer is alive and well and back with Starfleet. It's dumb.

I hated everyone in the episode, especially the captain and Tilly, who was 100 shades of obnoxious. Somebody needs to smother her in her sleep. And seriously, what advanced technology makes it necessary for the pilot to go outside the shuttle to clean off bugs? What prison transport is only going to have a pilot and no guards? I mean, the prisoners weren't even held down, what's stopping them from killing the pilot and escaping? And Michael was saying "well, we're going to die". Can't she pilot the shuttle? Are there no other space suits on board to go clear off the bugs? And if it was going to take Discovery days to clean up the bugs, how did the pilot think they were going to do it in a couple of minutes? And if the shuttle was so infested, why bring it on board Discovery, why not beam the prisoners off and clean it up outside the shuttle bay?

Just a lot of really stupid stuff.
 
I still don't love the ship design, but the pan shot that came up on the bridge did make me feel like it has more of a TOS feel to it. They've at least gotten rid of the absurd scaling of the JJprise.

So I guess this is a Section 31 ship?

I do like how they are at least dealing with how much war is going on, with having the characters discuss the dichotomy between Starfleet's mission and their current situation. But honestly, in my imagination, I had CessnaDriver like a little cartoon Angel sitting on my shoulder pointing out that there's way too much war and not enough optimism. And this is coming from someone who loves DS9's Dominion war arc. ST has always had a bit of military conflict thrown in, but always gave the audience something else besides that. Still waiting on the something else.
 
I still don't love the ship design, but the pan shot that came up on the bridge did make me feel like it has more of a TOS feel to it. They've at least gotten rid of the absurd scaling of the JJprise.

So I guess this is a Section 31 ship?

I do like how they are at least dealing with how much war is going on, with having the characters discuss the dichotomy between Starfleet's mission and their current situation. But honestly, in my imagination, I had CessnaDriver like a little cartoon Angel sitting on my shoulder pointing out that there's way too much war and not enough optimism. And this is coming from someone who loves DS9's Dominion war arc. ST has always had a bit of military conflict thrown in, but always gave the audience something else besides that. Still waiting on the something else.

If they get a second season, maybe they will change course.
Caught a Voyager the other day, I forgot so many it's been enjoyable to catch them again.
This ep was on, and it's an example of "throw me a bone now and then" and I can be content with a lot of other stuff.
http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/One_Small_Step_(episode)

SEVEN: I'm receiving telemetry from the probe. It appears to have entered a stable core within the anomaly. The gravimetric forces are negligible.
TUVOK: The eye of the storm.
SEVEN: An apt metaphor.
TUVOK: Computer, run a multispectral analysis of the anomaly's core.
COMPUTER: Analysis in progress.
SEVEN: The Borg developed shields to get through the gravimetric currents. They intended to dissipate the anomaly from within. Perhaps we should continue their efforts.
TUVOK: It would be short-sighted to destroy it. We should study the phenomenon.
SEVEN: I didn't realise you shared this crew's penchant for exploration.
TUVOK: I am a Starfleet officer.
SEVEN: When the risks outweigh the potential gain, exploration is illogical.
TUVOK: We can't predict what we might find here, Seven. One must allow for the unexpected discovery.
COMPUTER: Core analysis complete.
SEVEN: There are more that two point eight billion compounds in the core.
TUVOK: Fascinating.
 
So commander Surak can sense the danger that Michael represents when she stays on the ship, but can't detect the captains menagerie of dangerous animals that literally ripped the sister ship apart?

Anyone getting rathtar vibes as the thing was chasing them down the corridor?

I did like the shuttle, and the autistic girl.
 
I enjoyed this episode, my only gripe is the Engineer is like early Rodney Mckay from Stargate, Where's a Lemon when you need one? As for Michael Killing T'Kuvma, remember, she was raised on Vulcan, she was not ready for the sudden emotional impact of losing her Captain and friend viciously like that. Who here probably wouldn't have drilled the SOB themselves? As for the Tribble, they are Grade-A Klingon detectors.
 
This is not for tv? This is just cbs internet?

First episode was broadcast. Everything past that is subscribed streaming service only, in the US. If you are elsewhere in the world, it is broadcast.

This discussion isn't really about or at this point add to the discussion of STD, so I'll be bowing out of further comment.

Good point. I'll shove my further commentary in a little box to keep things tidy...
In A Matter of Time, discussion about what the 22nd century was like and Riker said that warp coils hadn't been invented yet. In the TNG episode Rasmussen, "I suppose the warp coil. Before there was warp drive, humans were confined to a single sector of the galaxy." - which indicates that warp coils are necessary for warp drive.

Yeah, there's been a lot of discussion over the years in even nerdier circles dissecting that one line, clause by clause. The general gist goes:

• Various non-Human species had FTL propulsion well before us, so we regard Riker's comment as being from a Human-centric perspective, oddly chauvinistic compared to the rest of his portrayal across the series.

• While it's true that before warp drive, Humans were confined to a single sector of the galaxy, everything else points to high-sublight drives in the last decade of the 20th century and the development of warp-1-capable ships by mid-to-late-21st century, so that sentence is regarded as expanding indirectly on the prior sentence, as...

• ...Much, much discussion, which I'll condense here, to the effect of there was reactionless drive before warp drive, as the Botany Bay model had no exhaust openings on the back faces of any part of its structure; Cochrane likely didn't have antimatter, dilithium crystals, or exotic metals like the "verterium cortenide" the TNG Technical Manual references; and that it was liklier that Cochrane extrapolated from existing technologies rather than conjuring his FTL drive from utterly whole-cloth. It was charted out that if it was a straight logarithmic progression from warp 1 in 2063 to warp 8 in 2245, that'd be about one integral warp factor per 23 years, with an error margin for setbacks and breakthroughs increasing or decreasing those intervals. But by that, they'd be hitting warp 3 in the early 22nd century. If fission gave way to fusion gave way to antimatter, if refinements and tweaks revealed the energy-consumption thresholds between warp factors... We figured it's the most probable course that the Phoenix had some sort of pulse-fusion reactor that could push an early version of his engine just past the warp threshold, and that as they studied and developed things over the next few decades, they were able to turn it from an incremental advance over the previous high-c-fractional drives into an actual warp drive, as we tend to think of it.

So we generally parse Riker's comment as indicating a view of history that holds that Cochrane invented the technology in the 2060s, but that it didn't become a viable quantum leap over what had existed before until the turn of the following century. Further things like the Phoenix being called a "warp test ship", Cochrane being described as "the [Human] discoverer of the space warp", and the Bonaventure being described as "the first [Human] ship equipped with 'warp drive'" we interpret as implying a gap between the technological breakthrough and it being refined into a viable, reliable drive system. Roughly equivalent to our often-problematic development of the initial V2 rocket technology into something that could take us to the moon without blowing up on launch.

You mentioned TOS' Where No Man Has Gone Before which strongly implies that the Valiant is a pre-warp ship,,, hence this:
Spock: Decoding memory banks. I'll try to interpolate. The Valiant had encountered a magnetic space storm and was being swept in this direction.
Kirk: The old impulse engines weren't strong enough.

The implication is there. Is it concrete proof? No. But, the intent seems pretty solid.

Mm. I'll throw these quotes from downthread in, as they're germane:

1) The shuttle. Dear GOD that thing was beautiful. Disregarding the warp capability (something that shuttles on the Enterprise did not have), the design was nice.
They had warp nacelles.

And the Romulan ship in "Balance of Terror" was described as being powered by "simple impulse", and the TOS shuttle blueprints show the nacelles as being "impulse pods" or something similar. Over the years, the attitude in the Treknical community has shifted from "impulse = sublight" to "impulse = one type of power generation, of lesser capacity than antimatter". That Romulan ship likely did not take decades to traverse the distance from its base to the Federation's Neutral Zone outposts, nor did it take years to get between outposts. The TOS shuttle was shown to be crossing interstellar distances more than once. We've come to figure "impulse" is a form of pulse-fusion-powered continuum-distortion drive (hence the "spacetime driver coils" in the Enterprise-D's impulse drive) that lower the ships' inertial mass and create distortion "ripples" that the ship rides. The exhaust ports are pointed aft to vent waste products along the ships' usual direction of flight, rather than being reaction-drive propulsion like a rocket.

Impulse or similar is fine for sublight propulsion, and probably enough to push a ship into the low warp factors (maybe as much as warp 2 or 3). That would let a stealthy Romulan ship or a Starfleet shuttle cross nearby interstellar distances in reasonable times without needing something as powerful and volatile as antimatter to do it. And on antimatter-fuelled ships, impulse drives can add a power boost to the FTL drive (in TNG's "Conspiracy", an impatient Riker orders an acceleration to warp 6 and Geordi responds with "Aye, sir. Full impulse." The already-Engineering-inclined LaForge used the ship's impulse drive as an acceleration assist, rather than putting the strain on the antimatter reactor -- a bit like newer hybrid performance cars that, in one operating mode, use the electric motors to assist the gasoline engine on acceleration and to smooth gear changes).

]In TOS Metamorphosis, Cochrane is a human from Alpha Centauri - later he's from Montana and had moved to Alpha Centauri. The original intention was that Cochrane was the originator of warp drive - not Earth warp drive, but for the galaxy - which makes Star Trek and the Enterprise's mission all that more sensible (at least to some).

In TOS it was implied that Vulcans had warp drive before Humans did, by at least a couple hundred years. This, pieced together across several episodes' dropped references. There were other things, such as Spock being the first Vulcan in Starfleet, then, later, the distinctly-not-Vulcan-named Intrepid being crewed entirely by 400 Vulcans. It was a Starfleet ship, though, as it was on Commodore Stone's status board at Starbase 11. The overall pattern is that Starfleet has been traditionally a Human-only or Human-majority organization that is only contemporaneously becoming more diverse at the time of TOS. This seems to be more participatory on the parts of the non-Humans than exclusionary on the part of the Humans. So I and others take a lot of the dropped data in TOS as being from a Human point of view. Including, as I mentioned above, Cochrane's status as discoverer of the space warp.

Also, because we were sending out sublight sleeper ships roughly 70 years before Cochrane broke the light barrier, I'm fine ignoring the retconned backstory Enterprise gives him and am fine having him be born on an Alpha Centuari colony, make a first near-warp test flight to Earth, and get stuck there due to WWIII. There's about a twenty-year error margin in the character's age, between all factors, but even at his oldest, he'd've been born after the turn of the century. Reference my earlier gripes about the showrunners not knowing/caring about their own lore. A good writer can (and often enjoys) work within the confines of established data. A sloppy one ignores it and just tells the story they want to tell, regardless of how much it might contradict in the process. More and more failure-to-research has crept in over the years, but it's still possible to compensate for most of it.

--Jonah
 
Thank you for answering. Boo it being subscriber streamed though.
I'm am still trying to figure out how I'll watch this in Canada.

At this point, I wish I could just buy it on the PlayStation Network or Google play. I would GLADLY pay for it episode at a time

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