Star Trek: general discussion-Picard, Discovery, Lower Decks (and Orville)

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**bbb**

Since we're talking about The Orville and STD, let's take a look at the current numbers...

**Formosa**

STD got that 82% for many reasons, I know a lot of people who think its the "diversity score" but that is BS in my book, its trek, that is a trek thing and has always been, I reckon the 82% Rotten tommatoes score is purely down to access media and good old classic corruption of the review "journalist" industry.... god I hope STD series 3 is cancelled....

**Togusa**

Formosa wrote:
GOOD NEWS EVERYONE (professor voice)

Alex Kurtman has been fired from Star trek allegedly due to bad pre screenings of Picard.

And the chief architect of Bad trek JJ abrahms is gone too, bad reboot are leaving with him and thus so are secret hideout in all likely hood, the best Star Trek news in a long time.

Considering he literally posted updates to all the shows they have planed 1 hour ago, I find this claim to be highly suspect.

**LordofHats**

Formosa wrote:
STD got that 82% for many reasons, I know a lot of people who think its the "diversity score" but that is BS in my book, its trek, that is a trek thing and has always been, I reckon the 82% Rotten tommatoes score is purely down to access media and good old classic corruption of the review "journalist" industry.... god I hope STD series 3 is cancelled....

If you were to drop the "Star Trek" from the name, STD would probably be beloved. Almost everything I hate about I hate solely in the light of it being a Star Trek series. The critics having a higher opinion of the show doesn't surprise me. Most professional critics don't get the luxury of being fans of anything, and don't really go into most things with super specific genre expectations. I wouldn't be shocked if more than a few had never even seen prior TV series. You can see the reverse in Legendary's Godzilla films. Critics liked the 2014 one better, but fans got divided over how the movie didn't feature more monsters. Que the sequel this year, and fans are receiving the film much better because it has more monsters while critics are less happy with it because the plot is thin between the spectacle.

What fans want and what critics want are different. It's probably a good case for how aggregate scores are generally not useful for deciding whether or not a specific person will like a movie compared to finding a specific critic whose tastes match your own.

**Formosa**

Togusa wrote:
Formosa wrote:
GOOD NEWS EVERYONE (professor voice)

Alex Kurtman has been fired from Star trek allegedly due to bad pre screenings of Picard.

And the chief architect of Bad trek JJ abrahms is gone too, bad reboot are leaving with him and thus so are secret hideout in all likely hood, the best Star Trek news in a long time.

Considering he literally posted updates to all the shows they have planed 1 hour ago, I find this claim to be highly suspect.

which one dude?

**Compel**

Is this anything to do with Abrams and Bad Robot now being more heavily involved with Warner Brothers and DC?

Maybe some sort of exclusivity deal?

**LordofHats**

Compel wrote:
Is this anything to do with Abrams and Bad Robot now being more heavily involved with Warner Brothers and DC?

Now? I know there's big news about Abrams nearing a deal with Warner for half a billion, but that relationship isn't new. They've been doing TV shows with Warner Bros. for more than a decade now. The company's history, and Abrams' career, started with making TV shows for Warner vis Touchstone studios way back before Disney really stepped up its TV game. I don't think either have ever worked with DC.

EDIT: And wtf? Looking something up, I stumble across two things. Bad Robot elected not to renew their development contract with Paramount last year (expires in 2020), and Alex Kurtzman doesn't work for Bad Robot anymore. He started his own company, which is the company that is developing STD, and Picard. Bad Robot is completely uninvolved *checks Memory Alpha, Wikipedia, and the STD credits* yeah. Bad Robot isn't credited for STD anywhere. How the hell have we missed this in the 4-5 now mentions of Bad Robot in relation to STD and Picard?

Maybe some sort of exclusivity deal?

Exclusivity isn't the right word. Scarcity of talent would be more accurate. Making big budget production requires big budgets. Development deals get signed to share the financial burden and secure talent because both are limited in the industry.

If Bad Robot and JJ feel like they're everywhere, it's because no amount of internet bitching erases the mountains of money they keep making for their partners and investors. Even their worst works are usually profitable ventures.

**Elbows**

People still give actual credence to the RT industry review scores? They're a fething joke.

**reds8n**

https://trekmovie.com/2019/06/18/alex-kurtzman-gives-updates-on-cbs-star-trek-tv-franchise/

Alex Kurtzman Gives Updates On CBS Star Trek TV Franchise

In a new “Crew Call” podcast for Deadline Hollywood, the overseer of all things Star Trek on TV, Alex Kurtzman, gave updates on every currently announced project for TV.

Star Trek projects in the pipeline
Last year, CBS TV Studios president David Stapf made a mention of having “something on all the time on All Access.” Kurtzman spoke to that idea, saying:

It takes really a year from writing to finished product, it’s sort of like animation, because you have to factor in about 7 months of CG work and then 4 months of prep, especially if you’re building sets for a new show.

It’s not like they’re all going to be on the air at one time. If David [Stapf] wants a show always [on], I have to plan two or three years out from now. The goal is not to have them on top of each other. Nor is it to rush anything out when it’s not ready.

Kurtzman on growing the fanbase:

When I went to CBS and I said, “I think you have a universe here that is very under-utilized, and a fan base that I think is hungry for a lot more.” And I walked them through the plan of what I saw for the next five to ten years of Trek.

Part of it was, kind of, premised on the idea that it was going to take time. What I said was, “Don’t expect us to put the first thing out, and suddenly, you know, you’ll have 100 million new fans. That’s not gonna happen.” Trek has been around for too long for that to happen — but what we do have is new generations, and what I can tell you is that ‘Trek,’ in general, finds people when they’re about between nine and twelve.

It’s never reached younger than that — it’s never tried to, and to me that’s a hugely missed opportunity, especially because what you’re really trying to do is influence hearts and minds with really positive messages — messages about who we can be as a species and as people and what our future is. So why not start young, you know? And not for a cynical reason. Not because you know, “hey, lets sell more toys,” but because if you really want Star Trek to reach people, then you’ve got to start young.

And this is where I guess the Star Wars influence on me really mattered, because as a kid at four years old, I could imagine myself starting up with a twin suns of Tatooine and wondering what my life was. Trek didn’t give me that same thing — it gave me Wesley Crusher, it gave me different characters, but again, those are older characters.

But we are definitely seeing just metric proof that the fan base is growing, and it’s growing younger — and yet, we’re keeping our current fans, and that’s great.
Star Trek: Picard
While the show is named Picard, Kurtzman stressed that the idea of a family, of a ship’s crew, is still very much at the heart of the new show:

It’s something that has been baked into the DNA of Picard — yes, obviously Patrick, it’s Patrick’s show — we have an unbelievable cast. And you know, the thing that I loved about the Next Gen cast is that you really could have focused any episode on any of them.

I would say the same about our cast now, that it’s such an incredibly brilliant group of actors, [that] are given such amazing things to do. Without spoiling anything, I think that you will feel that.

“A really wonderful give-and-take” with Stewart
We spent a lot of time with Patrick, and you know he’s incredibly brilliant just as a human, and very warm, and obviously he knows Jean-Luc Picard better than anybody — and you know, he was really the one who from the outset said, “I don’t want to do this unless we’re breaking new ground. I don’t want to just play the character I played, why come back to that? We did that already.”

And so it’s been a really wonderful give-and-take in our collaboration with Patrick where he very quickly came to trust that we were both going to do exactly what he said in taking Picard to a new place, but also — and he doesn’t look at himself this way — we’re reverent of him, you know? He’s Patrick Stewart. When we’re in a room with him, his opinion really matters to us, and his happiness really matters to us, and ultimately, we couldn’t do this show the way we’re doing it if he wasn’t excited about it and excited to play it.

A story that honors the character
I think we’ve found a story that honors everything that people love about the character, but in ways that are not what you expect — and yet, become more and more familiar as the show goes [on].

A lot has happened to Jean-Luc Picard in the intervening years. There’s been a lot going on and he’s had to deal with some new things, he’s had to deal with some old things, and both of those things kind of come colliding together. He’s made choices that he’s not necessarily feeling great about — and yet I think the audience will understand exactly why he made them.

Discovery and its spin-offs
Discovery season 3
Writing on season three of Discovery is moving along at a fast pace:

We are on episode five of Season 3 of Discovery. We’re far along.

More Short Treks
As previously announced, there would be more Short Treks, two of which are cartoons, along with four live action shorts.

We’re doing six more of them. Two of them are animated, and the two that we’re doing that are animated are unlike our two animated shows. What I love about the Short Treks is that to me they are an experimental training ground, and a place to experiment with different things. Directors who we’ve never worked with before, tones we’ve never tried before.

Michael Giacchino is doing one of the animated shorts and Olatunde Osunsanmi is doing another one in the animated shorts and he’s our main director on Discovery. And again, different animation styles, totally different tones. Aimed at kids, I would say, more than adults, those two.

Section 31 show
As previously stated, the intention is for the Section 31 show to go into production right after season 3 of Discovery. Kurtzman briefly touched on the idea, reiterating what had been said before:

Erika [Lippoldt] and Boey [Kim], who are two of our writers on Discovery, are breaking story on it right now, and the plan is to shoot that the second we’re done with [Discovery] Season 3.

Hears fans about Pike and crew
Anson Mount’s Captain Pike has been a huge success of season 2, with lots of fans asking for more of the Enterprise crew. Kurtzman acknowledged the outpouring of interest from the fans saying:

I would be remiss in saying you’re going to see Spock again on Discovery because we’ve obviously jumped so far into the future that it wouldn’t make sense…. but the the idea of bringing Ethan [Peck] back, and Anson [Mount] and Rebecca [Romijn] and the Enterprise, I mean, we loved it so much, that to find a way to do that is definitely something we’re thinking about a lot.

Animated Trek
While discussing the animated shows, Kurtzman hinted that some members of live action Trek cast may lend their voice to one or more of the animated shows. When asked about if any characters we know my appear in the shows, Kurtzman answered:

It’s mostly new [characters]. There may be some that you know, but it’s mostly new.

Lower Decks
Lower Decks from Mike McMahan was announced in October 2018, and recently hit the milestone of having the first table read for a completed script. Kurtzman described the audience for the show and the general premise:

Both of these [upcoming animated] shows are a love letter to Star Trek. They’re targeted at very different groups. Mike’s show is really for kids, I would say, from 11 to 70. [Laughs]

What I love so much about the way Mike is doing is planning things. What would typically be the “A” story on any Star Trek episode is happening in the background — like huge, crazy, crazy gak is going on in the background and that’s super peripheral to the story that you’re actually focusing on. No show has ever really done that before.

Nickelodeon Show
Officially announced in April, the show is developed by Emmy Award-winning brother duo Kevin and Dan Hageman. Kurtzman gave an update on the progress of the child-focused ‘toon:

I won’t announce the name of the Nickelodeon show, but that’s a really different show [from Lower Decks].

That’s a show that’s for kids, younger. Full CG animation. It’s going to be incredibly cinematic. We just started seeing [story]boards this week. It looks like, wow. It’s on par with Love, Death, and Robots in terms of beauty and lighting and cinema, so it’s a a really different feel, and Nickelodeon has been wildly supportive and I think very excited to bring a new energy to TV, you know, in animation.

the podcast :
https://deadline.com/2019/06/star-trek-discovery-picard-alex-kurtzman-interview-podcast-1202634037/

and Frakes has finished his Picard work

https://www.bleedingcool.com/2019/06/18/star-trek-picard-jonathan-frakes-signals-his-directing-duties-have-wrapped/

**Mr Morden**

LordofHats wrote:
Formosa wrote:
STD got that 82% for many reasons, I know a lot of people who think its the "diversity score" but that is BS in my book, its trek, that is a trek thing and has always been, I reckon the 82% Rotten tommatoes score is purely down to access media and good old classic corruption of the review "journalist" industry.... god I hope STD series 3 is cancelled....

If you were to drop the "Star Trek" from the name, STD would probably be beloved. Almost everything I hate about I hate solely in the light of it being a Star Trek series. The critics having a higher opinion of the show doesn't surprise me. Most professional critics don't get the luxury of being fans of anything, and don't really go into most things with super specific genre expectations. I wouldn't be shocked if more than a few had never even seen prior TV series. You can see the reverse in Legendary's Godzilla films. Critics liked the 2014 one better, but fans got divided over how the movie didn't feature more monsters. Que the sequel this year, and fans are receiving the film much better because it has more monsters while critics are less happy with it because the plot is thin between the spectacle.

What fans want and what critics want are different. It's probably a good case for how aggregate scores are generally not useful for deciding whether or not a specific person will like a movie compared to finding a specific critic whose tastes match your own.

I don't know - season 2's complete and cloying obession with a single character was my issue with STD rather than non trekness given the huge variety of shows/films within that sub genre.

I donlt understand the lvoe for Godzilla 2014 given how truely awful the so called characters were in it, the poor plot and lack of actual monster - Skull island was (IMO) a far far superior film in all respects. From what i have seen of the new film - its does not look like I will enjoy so not bothered.

Most critics are obvious fans of styles or show types and are usually as biased as a fan.

**LordofHats**

Critics are definitely biased, evidence by how well they often receive art house films compared to the general movie public, but that's to be expected. They're professional movie watchers. They're going to find a run of the mill spy thriller dull, or only enjoyable for it's popcorn value. Like how critics bomb Michael Bay's work, but the general movie viewing audience eats that gak up.

As for Kurtzman, he's not going anywhere. He's the sole owner of the company producing Star Trek for Paramount with a five year development deal that gets renewed this year. The only way they get rid of him is if they hire someone else to do the job and I don't see any sign of that happening, especially not with Bad Robot electing not to continue their business relationship with Paramount. This is Midnight's Edge making stuff up again.

**AndrewGPaul**

The thing to remeber about professional criticism of franchise movies is that they're not reviewing them based on the franchise - how good the continuity from the last one is, or how well they stand up as adaptations of the comic or whatever. For instance, Mark Kermode's review of Infinity War was basically "It'll probably be great if you're a fan of the Marvel films, but I'm not, so it was OK". On the other hand, he was much more positive about Endgame. I wouldn't be surprised if the discrepancy in scores between critics and viewers for ST Discovery is because of that; if one person likes it for what it is, but another marks it down because it's not "proper Star Trek", then you'll get different scores.

I like Discovery, as it happens - season one moreso than 2 - but even though I'm generally positive towards Star Trek, I don't care about the continuity or the tone. As long as each show is reasonably consistent with itself, I don't care if it contradicts another one. I don't need some elaborate headcanon to fit it all together.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

IT also requires a fairly comprehensive review of the audience scores.

What sort of feedback is there for the low ones? Is it all kind of the same? Such as Captain Marvel, when a lot (not all by any stretch) just said 'watch Alita Battle Angel instead'. Or 'haven't seen it, but me no like woooman have opnion' etc.

Start to strip those out? As in, people who only came to bash it, and haven't seen it, and see where you end up.

**AndrewGPaul**

Which is why I agree with Lord of Hats. Ignore numerical scores - they mean nothing and are only there for the lazy. Read reviews and judge from those. Read reviews of films you like and dislike so you can "calibrate" the reviewers against your own preferences.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Indeed.

I mean, some reviewers are just weird. Both the pros and the audience. Giving 1 Star, but actually saying 'I can see why others liked it'. Or ripping into it, yet still giving 3/5.

When the metric itself isn't set, the score becomes inherently meaningless.

Disco has various negative reviews with the term 'woke'. Saying that's not Star Trek, whilst also acknowledging that Star Trek has traditionally somewhat lead the way in terms of cast diversity. That is fundamentally illogical.

**LordofHats**

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I mean, some reviewers are just weird. Both the pros and the audience.

I still remember the one guy from the Guardian who reviewed Overlord, and I'm convinced that he didn't actually watch the movie at all. Then again, hardly anyone did, which is a damn shame. Wolfenstein the movie was pretty good.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

I got the same broad feeling about reviews of Terminator Genisys.

Whilst it is a flawed effort, the reviews I read seemed to be coming from a standpoint of 'I don't like this movie, so watched it to find out why'.

Criticising plot hooks for future movies as 'plot holes'. Ragging on this and that to the point where I wondered if we even watched the same movie.

Now don't get me wrong, it's not a great film. And it's not quite a good film. But I'm hesitant to label it a bad film. It's right on the cusp of being functional, and a wasted opportunity.

It just didn't deserve the level of critical drubbing it received in the press.

**Mr Morden**

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I got the same broad feeling about reviews of Terminator Genisys.

Whilst it is a flawed effort, the reviews I read seemed to be coming from a standpoint of 'I don't like this movie, so watched it to find out why'.

Criticising plot hooks for future movies as 'plot holes'. Ragging on this and that to the point where I wondered if we even watched the same movie.

Now don't get me wrong, it's not a great film. And it's not quite a good film. But I'm hesitant to label it a bad film. It's right on the cusp of being functional, and a wasted opportunity.

It just didn't deserve the level of critical drubbing it received in the press.

They also tend to very forgiving when a film is not mainstream - oh the characters plot and pace are awful but it has such "vision" and other similar crap.

**LordofHats**

I get that though. When you've read enough books, seen enough movies, and played enough games, mainstream very quickly becomes dull.

I took a stab at guessing the plot of TLJ before seeing the movie. I used nothing but my knowledge of storytelling, and the toy line to do it. A poster here said I was about eerily close. A friend of mine said I was about 80% right. I went and saw the movie and decided I got all the major plot points correct through sheer guess work.

I often don't give a damn about spoilers, because chances are I'll guess the twists long before they happen even when they're well done. That basically leaves me looking for other things to appreciate in movies and that usually comes down to how well the movie does things that are different from the norm. So I get why critics behave that way. If we did nothing but watch and write about every movie on the planet for a living I suspect we'd all be like that. And Some critics definitely get snobby about it, and they're not worth much unless you're snobby about it to. Others have a much better handle on their biases, and others suck at keeping those in check. It's really all about finding the reviewers who seem to enjoy the things you enjoy and keeping an eye on what they think, cause they're the ones who are gonna be helpful to you, moreso than an aggregate score that achieves 82% because 4/5 of the critics gave the product at least a 3/5 or a 2/3 or a "It's okay" (which is how RT sorts reviews are fresh).

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

It's why I quite liked Jonathon Ross' reviews.

He looked at a given film as a whole, but also as an example of it's genre.

That's a decent way to do it, and the sign of an open mind in my opinion.

For instance, RomComs are most definitely not my bag. So I'm naturally gonna be prejudiced against them. Therefore, I would not be a good reviewers. JR however, would say 'it's got a lot of appeal to fans of the genre, but if that's not you, maybe avoid'.

And on ridiculous reviews? They're pretty damaging overall. See, much as I like Discovery, I get that it's not for everyone. But sadly, there are increasingly organised 'push backs' originating on quagmires such as 4Chan. And the complaint points, as mentioned earlier, just seem daft 'why is a Star Trek cast diverse all of a sudden'.

And that feeds back into those who support the show/film/whatevs, and makes critical opinions seem easy to dismiss.

**Mr Morden**

LordofHats wrote:
I get that though. When you've read enough books, seen enough movies, and played enough games, mainstream very quickly becomes dull.

I took a stab at guessing the plot of TLJ before seeing the movie. I used nothing but my knowledge of storytelling, and the toy line to do it. A poster here said I was about eerily close. A friend of mine said I was about 80% right. I went and saw the movie and decided I got all the major plot points correct through sheer guess work.

I often don't give a damn about spoilers, because chances are I'll guess the twists long before they happen even when they're well done. That basically leaves me looking for other things to appreciate in movies and that usually comes down to how well the movie does things that are different from the norm. So I get why critics behave that way. If we did nothing but watch and write about every movie on the planet for a living I suspect we'd all be like that. And Some critics definitely get snobby about it, and they're not worth much unless you're snobby about it to. Others have a much better handle on their biases, and others suck at keeping those in check. It's really all about finding the reviewers who seem to enjoy the things you enjoy and keeping an eye on what they think, cause they're the ones who are gonna be helpful to you, moreso than an aggregate score that achieves 82% because 4/5 of the critics gave the product at least a 3/5 or a 2/3 or a "It's okay" (which is how RT sorts reviews are fresh).

It can however be very annoying when the same things that they take to task one film for they gloss over or ignore in another because "they" consider it "special".

Its bizare that people say about STD being so diverse when so many other sci-fi/fantasy shows are much more so and also don't make a big deal about it (which is as it should be) - also its pretty false in their case - oh look one woman on the show is not slim and athletic - wow - but everyone else is....

**Yodhrin**

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
And the complaint points, as mentioned earlier, just seem daft 'why is a Star Trek cast diverse all of a sudden'.

And that feeds back into those who support the show/film/whatevs, and makes critical opinions seem easy to dismiss.

Is that actually a common complaint though? Because the vast majority of the complaints I've seen in reference to STD that discussed "woke" or diversity tended to focus on the presentation of the show as being somehow unique for its diversity in the context of Trek when that's total nonsense, or how diversity is used to claim a Trek lineage that many folk don't feel is deserved given the tone & content of the actual stories being told and to dismiss criticism along those lines, or bring up the "in your face" aspect of such "woke" television; for all it was a morality play, it was rare to feel you were being moralised at by Trek, a couple of overly worthy TNG and overly written TOS episodes aside, whereas often modern shows are so heavy-handed about The Message they're barely one step beyond having the actors just break character and monologue direct to the camera.

It's also been the case, in my experience at least, that the opposite has been true to at least the same degree - plenty of people were happily pre-dismissing any criticisms of STD before the show had even aired or the criticisms even been made, on the basis that it had a black and female lead character and so naturally any dislike of the show could only possibly be mere crypto-bigotry.

**Formosa**

Its bizare that people say about STD being so diverse when so many other sci-fi/fantasy shows are much more so and also don't make a big deal about it (which is as it should be) - also its pretty false in their case - oh look one woman on the show is not slim and athletic - wow - but everyone else is....

Ehhhh no not really, the problem was presentation not "wokeness" or "diversity", you see STD did not do this directly but the "journalists" did it, goes like this

STD is the first trek with such a diverse cast

Fans: Nope, TOS, STTNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise all had very diverse casts

STD is the first black lead

Fans: Errrr no, DS9 sisko

STD is the first female lead

Fans: Errrr noooooo, Voyager

STD has the first openly gay relationship

Fans: Errrrr no, STTNG and DS9 and Dax is trans... soooooooooooo

STD is the first

Fans: No, Stop, you are part of a massively diverse franchise that did "woke" before "woke" was a bloody thing, stop trying to gain virtue points and make a bloody good show or shut the hell up about all this nonsense no one cares about.

STD thinks you are a transphobe, sexist, racist ismphobist.....

Fans: Sigh..... is Orville on?

All pure Hyperbole but I think you get the point, great thing is due to the power of the interwebs we can go back and see this happening over time

**warboss**

It's sadly not hyperbole as I've seen all of that from fans of the show between facebook and various forums. Sigh...

**Yodhrin**

warboss wrote:
It's sadly not hyperbole as I've seen all of that from fans of the show between facebook and various forums. Sigh...

EDIT: Oops, misread this as meaning the opposite of what you meant. The comment below will stand in a more general sense.

You can find any opinion from any fanbase if you look hard enough. Remember how "Star Wars fans" were outraged about the casting of a black Stormtrooper prior to the release of TFA? That whole nontroversy came from tweets from like, four accounts, one of which was a known troll, just being reported and re-reported and re-re-re-reported in a chain of outrage absent any context whatsoever.

The question is whether these extreme points of view are representative of the segment of the fanbase that is more generally displeased with a given franchise or a tiny fractional minority of gimps that are being cynically used by marketers to rile up the other end of the fan spectrum and paint any criticism as being ultimately derived from hatred and/or mindless traditionalism. Well, actually no, it's not a question - in the vast majority of cases I've seen, the latter is exactly what's happening.

**Formosa**

You can find any opinion from any fanbase if you look hard enough. Remember how "Star Wars fans" were outraged about the casting of a black Stormtrooper prior to the release of TFA?

That whole nontroversy came from tweets from like, four accounts, one of which was a known troll, just being reported and re-reported and re-re-re-reported in a chain of outrage absent any context whatsoever.

Yep, I remember the Activist media like Kotaku, mary sue, Vox, Vice etc. all claiming that was the case, 1 dude on twitter says something along those lines and bam! 4000 articles on how all star wars fans are white suppremicists....

The question is whether these extreme points of view are representative of the segment of the fanbase that is more generally displeased with a given franchise or a tiny fractional minority of gimps that are being cynically used by marketers to rile up the other end of the fan spectrum and paint any criticism as being ultimately derived from hatred and/or mindless traditionalism. Well, actually no, it's not a question - in the vast majority of cases I've seen, the latter is exactly what's happening.

Yep, the click bate "journalism" industry is the major problem with fandom these days, maybe if they did not lie so much and actually just delivered the news without taking a political stance
(hahah I know right, Big ask) the fanbase for Star Wars would not be as split, star trek is not split though, most trek fans see STD as a bad show.

**AduroT**

I wouldn’t call it a Bad show. It’s not a great show at all, and I’ll definitely complain about some bad aspects of it, but it’s still suitably entertaining and I keep tuning in to it.

**AndrewGPaul**

Formosa wrote:
most trek fans see STD as a bad show.

But does that mean it's a bad show, or just a bad Trek show?

**Mr Morden**

AduroT wrote:
I wouldn’t call it a Bad show. It’s not a great show at all, and I’ll definitely complain about some bad aspects of it, but it’s still suitably entertaining and I keep tuning in to it.

I owuld have agreed with that until the last half of Season 2 - I honestly can't be bothered with it any more - there is too much else on tv thats better.

If they do an Enterprise show with Anson and co - I would def try that but the writters worship of one character in STD has ruined it for me.

**LordofHats**

AndrewGPaul wrote:
Formosa wrote:
most trek fans see STD as a bad show.

But does that mean it's a bad show, or just a bad Trek show?

Saying Star Trek fans see it as a bad show is probably projecting.

Bounce on over to the Star Trek reddit, which has something like 100k members compared to this forms 2 dozen or so interested posters, and there's a remarkable amount of "I like star trek so I was STD." No one's singing its praises sure, but there's no tidal wave of "how gak is this" posts constantly bemoaning the series' flaws (though those posts are certainly there). TrekBBS is a bit of a more hardcore community, and even there I wouldn't say reception is overwhelmingly negative. Its small subset of fans who think STD is "bad." I think the majority are unimpressed, but watch it anyway because... what else is there?

EDIT: The show is blatantly polarizing, that's for sure, but honestly that's nothing new. A lot of the stuff people complain about in Disco is familiar to me. People complained about TNG changing the look of Klingons (because apparently they didn't see STIII...) and people complained about character X getting too much attention, or "this doesn't look/feel like Star Trek." Really every entry in the series since TOS has had these complains except maybe Voyager (they got different complaints). Not all of it, some of it is new. Kurtzman is probably the first show runner to be this hated. Ira Behr certainly got his share during DS9's run, but not to this degree and he didn't have Kurtzman's habit of inserting foot in mouth. Michael definitely gets way too much attention on the show, which has lost the traditional ensemble cast feel. But who knows. 20 years ago DS9 was "worst trek ever" and 15 years ago Enterprise had "ruined the franchise." Both shows are much more warmly received now (with DS9 becoming to many the pinnacle of the franchise). I'm skeptical Disco will get the same treatment, but people were probably skeptical back then to... So who knows? We'll find out in 20 years.

I would definitely say that STD would probably be a popular show among SF fanatics if you dropped the Star Trek from it's name. Star Trek burdens it with expectations and a long history to live up to. If one were to recast the entire story as an original work it would probably be there with Orville and The Expanse as one of the great scifi shows of the age, but unfortunately it does have Star Trek in its name and that comes with expectations and a long history to live up to. I wouldn't say people are wrong for judging it in that light.