Star Trek: Discovery - Season 2 page 27

Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you:

No adverts like this in the forums anymore.
Times and dates in your local timezone.
Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance.
Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely.
Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net.

If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

**Breotan**

Well, for those who thought (or more correctly, hoped) that Discovery would die in ignomy, I got some bad news.

‘Star Trek: Discovery’ is returning for a second season

Clearly, all those threads about who Ash Tyler really is justifies the studio's faith.

The experiment has been a success, because news has just dropped that CBS is renewing Star Trek: Discovery. The show, which was used as a tentpole to launch CBS' All Access streaming service, has been enough of a success to justify a second season of episodes. The move comes as a vote of confidence for both the show and its platform, since it has recently aired the sixth of its fifteen-episode first season. Now, a second run of Discovery will air, presumably at some point toward the back-half of 2018.

Discovery has certainly benefited from plenty of hype, since it's the first Trek show to air as a TV show since 2005. The pull of the Star Trek name was always going to be a draw, but it wasn't clear how much of a draw given the saga's lackluster popularity at the box office. CBS refused to offer numbers, but did boast that Discovery's debut lead to the highest number of sign-ups in the history of its All Access service.

The show itself was also plagued by pre-production woes, including the acrimonious departure of star producer Bryan Fuller. According to Entertainment Weekly, Fuller's replacements, Gretchen J. Berg and Aaron Harberts, are expected to remain in charge of the show for another year. Outside of Canada, the show will apparently remain on Netflix, since the official partnership account confirmed the renewal.

**pgmason**

I'm delighted by this. I think I'm the only person in the world who's really enjoying Discovery.

**Paradigm**

pgmason wrote:
I'm delighted by this. I think I'm the only person in the world who's really enjoying Discovery.

Nope, count me in as well. I was very ready to absolutely pan Discovery, pretty much none of the marketing made me think there was a show worth watching in there and it all seemed very 'style over substance' like the Abrams films (which I do hate). However, I said I'd give it a fair shot and so far I've really enjoyed every episode, it's probably my favourite thing on at the moment (at least until Stranger Things comes back in a few days...). I'm very pleased it's got a second season, I look forward to seeing what the cast and crew can do now they've found their identity as a show and (hopefully) won't be beset by the production troubles this first series had.

**Ratius**

I'm delighted by this. I think I'm the only person in the world who's really enjoying Discovery.

Count me in too. It aint perfect by any means but I really look forward to it each week!

**Chillreaper**

Monday night has turned into Star Trek night for me. To the point where I was getting ready for work this morning and thought "Hey, new Star Trek episode tonight!"

I never would have expected this in a million years!

**KamikazeCanuck**

I like it too but I think the last episode actually did fall into all the fears people have over the show. Style over substance and overly grimdark.

Spoiler:

**JohnHwangDD**

Breotan wrote:
Well, for those who thought (or more correctly, hoped) that Discovery would die in ignomy, I got some bad news.

Star Trek: Discovery’ is returning for a second season

There's no accounting for taste, I guess.

That said, I wouldn't expect CBS to admit failure of All Access, and Discovery, by extension.

Discovery is a "success" only because it absolutely needs to be, regardless of how poor the actual show and numbers might be. Otherwise, CBS has to shutter All Access and broker a deal for distribution outside their control. Discovery can continue to be a gak show, losing money hand over fist, and it'd still be deemed a "success" because it's in-house.

**LordofHats**

To be fair there was that one Vulcan back in DS9 who was procuring weapons for a terrorist organization, and the other one who was a murderer in the final season. While Roddenberry wasn't really involved in the show, the idea that a strictly logical mindset, absent "emotional" considerations, might lead someone to "extreme" action isn't entirely new to the franchise.

**Compel**

Aside from Discovery, what else actually is on CBS All Access?

"Discovery's debut lead to the highest number of sign-ups in the history of its All Access service. "

After all
Going from 0 subscribers to 1, is an infinity percent increase...

**LordofHats**

Well it is disappointing cause while I don't want Discovery to fail per se, I definitely want All Access to fail, and hard. The idea of networks putting exclusive content on their own streaming services irks me and isn't the way I want the market to develop.

**Manchu**

Malevolent Vulcan factions are nothing new. See ENT.

**JohnHwangDD**

LordofHats wrote:
Well it is disappointing cause while I don't want Discovery to fail per se, I definitely want All Access to fail, and hard. The idea of networks putting exclusive content on their own streaming services irks me and isn't the way I want the market to develop.

And that is precisely why Discovery, and by extension, All Access, is a "success".

We'll see that CBS will "invest" a ridiculous amount of money to force people to pay them directly, rather than Hulu or Netflix.

**LordofHats**

JohnHwangDD wrote:

And that is precisely why Discovery, and by extension, All Access, is a "success".

I think that really only works in a short term concept though. They can stick with it, like EA did with Origin, and hope that eventually people just cave and pay them which might work. Alternatively it could end up like Windows Live, which was a burning failure for years straight and eventually Microsoft just let the ghost die. I want the later, but the sad truth is that I expect the former

**KamikazeCanuck**

LordofHats wrote:
To be fair there was that one Vulcan back in DS9 who was procuring weapons for a terrorist organization, and the other one who was a murderer in the final season. While Roddenberry wasn't really involved in the show, the idea that a strictly logical mindset, absent "emotional" considerations, might lead someone to "extreme" action isn't entirely new to the franchise.

The latter was just a guy with some kind of psychosis. The latter "terrorist" subscribed to the whole one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter fighter school of logic. Wasn't she maquis? There's a certain logic to the maquis that's a compelling moral quandry rather than throw away bad guys we've gotten here. Suddenly we have Vulcan ISIS.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Manchu wrote:
Malevolent Vulcan factions are nothing new. See ENT.

The Vulcans in Enterprise were mainly just jerks.

**Manchu**

Again, during ENT, the Vulcan High Command itself was secretly controlled by a radical faction.

**Voss**

KamikazeCanuck wrote:
LordofHats wrote:
To be fair there was that one Vulcan back in DS9 who was procuring weapons for a terrorist organization, and the other one who was a murderer in the final season. While Roddenberry wasn't really involved in the show, the idea that a strictly logical mindset, absent "emotional" considerations, might lead someone to "extreme" action isn't entirely new to the franchise.

The latter was just a guy with some kind of psychosis. The latter "terrorist" subscribed to the whole one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter fighter school of logic. Wasn't she maquis? There's a certain logic to the maquis that's a compelling moral quandry rather than throw away bad guys we've gotten here. Suddenly we have Vulcan ISIS.

'We don't like Cardassians so... boom go federation outposts?' I'm not sure what the moral quandary was supposed to be. Federation citizens have literally everything they could ever want. That they are inconvenienced by a treaty that solidifies borders so they can't 'Wild West' colonize those planets (as opposed to dozens of others) doesn't justify murder, terrorism and trying to spark wars.

**KamikazeCanuck**

Manchu wrote:
Again, during ENT, the Vulcan High Command itself was secretly controlled by a radical faction.

I don't recall that. What happened?

**LordofHats**

KamikazeCanuck wrote:

The latter was just a guy with some kind of psychosis. The latter "terrorist" subscribed to the whole one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter fighter school of logic.

The Maquis did have a compelling and sympathetic reason for their actions, but that doesn't change that they engaged in terrorist tactics to achieve their goal. A Vulcan was full on board with them, up until she got out logic'd by Quark of all people

And yeah, the other guy had a psychosis, but it was driven by his inability to solve a logical quandary. In both cases, Vulcans engaged in violent and extreme acts in spite of "logic." It's not inconceivable that there exist or existed radical Vulcans who engaged in violent actions and could logically justify them.

The Vulcans in Enterprise were mainly just jerks.

Hey. Lets call them what they were.

Aholes working for those damn douchebag Romulans

**KamikazeCanuck**

Voss wrote:
KamikazeCanuck wrote:
LordofHats wrote:
To be fair there was that one Vulcan back in DS9 who was procuring weapons for a terrorist organization, and the other one who was a murderer in the final season. While Roddenberry wasn't really involved in the show, the idea that a strictly logical mindset, absent "emotional" considerations, might lead someone to "extreme" action isn't entirely new to the franchise.

The latter was just a guy with some kind of psychosis. The latter "terrorist" subscribed to the whole one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter fighter school of logic. Wasn't she maquis? There's a certain logic to the maquis that's a compelling moral quandry rather than throw away bad guys we've gotten here. Suddenly we have Vulcan ISIS.

'We don't like Cardassians so... boom go federation outposts?' I'm not sure what the moral quandary was supposed to be. Federation citizens have literally everything they could ever want. That they are inconvenienced by a treaty that solidifies borders so they can't 'Wild West' colonize those planets (as opposed to dozens of others) doesn't justify murder, terrorism and trying to spark wars.

It's not like I'm a maquis supporter or something but I think you're oversimplifying it there.. The Maquis were former Federation citizens that gave up their citizenship rather than be relocated from their homes after the treaty moved the border. They would supposedly live in peace in a neutral zone but the Cardassian Union took illegal steps to intimidate them into leaving. They basically used Cardassians living in the area as a proxy army and armed them and encouraged them to use violence against former feds. The maquis were a response to that.
Once again I think it's pretty obvious that that's how it would go for them once they gave up the protection of The Federation so I don't sympathize with them that much.

**LordofHats**

KamikazeCanuck wrote:
Manchu wrote:
Again, during ENT, the Vulcan High Command itself was secretly controlled by a radical faction.

I don't recall that. What happened?

At the time of Enterprise, the Vulcan High Command operated on a very radical interpretation of Surak's philosophy, which had become very common and rigidly enforced among the population up until original copies of Surak's work became public knowledge.

In the 4th season of ENT it was revealed that the High Command the were secretly being manipulated by Vulcans operating as agents of the Romulans (this was when ENT was setting the groundwork for the Earth-Romulan War), and I think it's unclear to what extent the High Command radical interpretations and enforcement of their philosophy was heartfelt or simply a guise to effect control of Vulcan by Romulus. The series was cancelled right as this plot started to develop.

**Manchu**

KamikazeCanuck wrote:
What happened?

There was a faction who believed Vulcan culture was corrupt, called the Syrannites. Among other things, they were somewhat xenophobic against humans. So they got blamed when the human embassy on Vulcan got bombed. Actually, that was the work of the Vulcan government itself - which at the time was led by a guy working for/with the Romulans. The plan was to invade Andoria and reunite the Romulans and Vulcans. Since that plan fell through, the Syrannite faction came to power.

**KamikazeCanuck**

LordofHats wrote:
KamikazeCanuck wrote:

The latter was just a guy with some kind of psychosis. The latter "terrorist" subscribed to the whole one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter fighter school of logic.

The Maquis did have a compelling and sympathetic reason for their actions, but that doesn't change that they engaged in terrorist tactics to achieve their goal. A Vulcan was full on board with them, up until she got out logic'd by Quark of all people And yeah, the other guy had a psychosis, but it was driven by his inability to solve a logical quandary. In both cases, Vulcans engaged in violent and extreme acts in spite of "logic." It's not inconceivable that there exist or existed radical Vulcans who engaged in violent actions and could logically justify them.

Not saying that its not possible but you have to admit there's something a little different here. This is an Vulcan suicide bomber trying to murder a completely innocent fellow vulcan for the cause of Xenophobia! That's a pretty big leap of Villainy for any Vulcan we've seen previously. I think if other series would have had something like that it would have been the focus of the entire episode. Here its just a minor plot point to get to the Kung Fu dream fighting.
Anyway, struck me as more than a little weird but maybe that's just me.

**Manchu**

See above ...

Also Vulcan philosophy =/= strict non-violence. Surak rescued the Vulcans from an age of self-destructive warfare that resulted in dissenters leaving en mass. Surak's teachings apparently encourage Vulcans to think critically about using violence but certainly not to disavow, especially not externally (e.g., the "Vulcan hello").

**KamikazeCanuck**

LordofHats wrote:
KamikazeCanuck wrote:
Manchu wrote:
Again, during ENT, the Vulcan High Command itself was secretly controlled by a radical faction.

I don't recall that. What happened?

At the time of Enterprise, the Vulcan High Command operated on a very radical interpretation of Surak's philosophy, which had become very common and rigidly enforced among the population up until original copies of Surak's work became public knowledge.

In the 4th season of ENT it was revealed that the High Command the were secretly being manipulated by Vulcans operating as agents of the Romulans (this was when ENT was setting the groundwork for the Earth-Romulan War), and I think it's unclear to what extent the High Command radical interpretations and enforcement of their philosophy was heartfelt or simply a guise to effect control of Vulcan by Romulus. The series was cancelled right as this plot started to develop.

Yeesh, probably not coincidentally as well. We'll see if villainous Vulcans are more fruitful for STD.

**Manchu**

The plot in question from ENT was very good IMO.

From the beginning of ENT, the most interesting thing was how the show fleshed out the relationships between the eventual founding members of the Federation: humans, Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellerites. The Vulcans and Andorians were deep into a cold war at the start of the series. Archer, too, was suspicious of the Vulcans treatment of humans. Both he and the Andorians were very much justified in their perspectives.

Vulcan xenophobia was a long-running theme in ENT. I pretty much guessed as soon as the dude in Discovery injected whatever into his skin aboard Sarek's shuttle that he would be a Vulcan supremacist. If you've been following Trek, there is nothing novel or surprising about it.

**KamikazeCanuck**

Manchu wrote:
The plot in question from ENT was very good IMO.

From the beginning of ENT, the most interesting thing was how the show fleshed out the relationships between the eventual founding members of the Federation: humans, Vulcans, Andorians, and Tellerites. The Vulcans and Andorians were deep into a cold war at the start of the series. Archer, too, was suspicious of the Vulcans treatment of humans. Both he and the Andorians were very much justified in their perspectives.

Vulcan xenophobia was a long-running theme in ENT. I pretty much guessed as soon as the dude in Discovery injected whatever into his skin aboard Sarek's shuttle that he would be a Vulcan supremacist. If you've been following Trek, there is nothing novel or surprising about it.

Holodeck Simulations don't count

**Vaktathi**

Watched the first 6 episodes, was mostly pleasantly surprised.

Don't mind most of the retconning even if a lot of it feels awkward, really what irked me most was them hamfisted forcing of tired cliche lines for their own sake and some of the more painfully unsubtle explanations of *everything*.

Overall though, it's at least interesting to watch, not the best SciFi show ever, but better than I would have expected out of a network like CBS. Was expecting a 2/10 and got a decent 6.5/10, enough that I don't mind spending the time to torrent and watch it on lazy afternoons

**chromedog**

I figure since I was willing to extend the courtesy of 3 seasons (for the prior 4 shows) before they "got good*", I should do the same for this one. They ALL had a very dodgy first three seasons (and they were full 22-26 episode seasons for the most part).

* Voyager NEVER "got good", it just stopped sucking like a dyson.

**Frazzled**

Not STOS. It was good from the start, else we would not be having this conversation.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Episode 7 was a good one.

Fairly classic Trek Timeloop fare, without feeling like it's all been done before.

Really getting into Discovery now.