‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Season 1, Episode 2: Battles Begin

This mess of idiotic characters fighting an equally idiotic and strangely unsympathetic villains has been the worst TV show I've ever seen, and I've only seen 2 episodes. The bland and ludicrous plot about 'diverse' women leading a crew composed of lemmings into a war that's less exciting than watching "The Hamster Dance" for 12 hours straight was a mockery of Star Trek. However, there's good news. At the rate each episode is shrinking in length, episodes will be less than 5 minutes long by Thanksgiving, and the Orville is very Star Trek-like and good in its own right.

"We also see Sarek save Burnham’s life as a child with a mindmeld, although not much context is given as to where or when this was. Or why." Jeez. The writer obviously was not paying attention. At least he should know Lt. Worf's backstory of being orphaned by the attack on Khitomer. (That's another Easter Egg that you missed - Michael's upbringing mirrors Worf's upbringing, of being an alien among their own kind.) Burnham's parents were killed by a Klingon attack on Doctari Alpha, whcih was a joint Vulcan - Human science outpost. Much like the humans Helena and Sergey Rozhenko found and raised Worf, Sarak found and raised Michael Burnham. Is there anything else that you wish explained to you? Saurian Brandy? Transporter technology? What Scotty can never give Captain Kirk enough of?

The way the hologram technology appears to work is that the users on each side see those on the other side as holograms and have surround sound. So they would know where to turn to address someone else in the room. They also appear to have call-forwarding. The way I would address the discontinuities between the different series is that these are dramatizations and not actual footage from the future. Therefore, certain details are subject to the limitations of the production, and, in the case of The Original Series, backward-thinking network executives.

been watching ST since first episode aired in the mid 1960s and been an avid fan ever since. Does 'Discovery' fit? Truthfully I don't know yet. Not at all happy with the costuming and heavy makeup for the Klingons - way too many teeth so that the poor actors sound like they are talking through mashed potatoes. That is just not believable. Halograms? Real problem with this. The captain and first officer go to kidnap the Klingon by themselves? Well, Star Trek has always done this but never this ineptly. Yes the women were warriors, but women alone against Klingons...needed a backup of Marines. Just saying. Clumsy killing off of the captain and ending up making the Klingon a martyr anyway...clumsy writing. And, where's the ship? Where is Discovery? Putting Burnham in prison and then bringing her back out to serve on a ship...shades of Tom Paris in Voyager. Well, I'm hoping the next episode is better. More characterization, character development, make me care about them - that's the hallmark of Star Trek. Just my opinion.

The story is so slow - and for all the diversity in the cast - the plot is so clearly targeted at 9-year-old boys, it was hard to stay awake during the first 2 eps of ST Discovery. But that's not true, because frequently canon-breaking inconsistencies made me perk up and get angry. We saw reps of 8 (of the 24) Klingon houses and they all looked like lobsters, which contradicts the Klingon evolution so carefully set out in the episodes of "Enterprise" entitled, "Affliction" and "Divergence". The insignia plastered everywhere was only for USS Enterprise crew until after Kirk's 5-year mission. This is canon. And yes, they slipped up in a total of 3 episodes out of many hundreds, but a .1% error rate does not justify adopting such an error as the logo for your entire show. And yes, Bob Justman wrote a memo saying he wanted it to be Federation-wide, but a memo isn't what we saw on screen. For all we know there's another memo from someone else advising the opposite. All we know is, they didn't go with Bob Justman's wishes. A memo isn't canon. Add that Vulcans can now instantly communicate with someone across any distance, and ask yourself why Spock didn't set up such a link with someone at Starfleet Command. Instead in the original series they waited hours and even weeks for subspace messages to get through in life and death situations. Then there's the holograms, Klingons with cloaking tech, and a ready room. It's absurd.

They were free to pick a time period beyond Voyager to give themselves more leeway, but they didn't. We saw reps of 8 (of 24) Klingon houses, all in violation of canon established by the "Afflication" and "Divergence" episodes of Enterprise. We saw the insignia for the USS Enterprise being worn where it doesn't belong at this point in time (3 previous mistakes across hundreds of episodes and 1 memo that never saw the light of day do not justify this). We saw routine hologram use that will inexplicably vanish in 10 years. We saw that a Vulcan can communicate instantly across any distance, so why did Spock allow the Enterprise to wait sometimes days for subspace communications to go through to Starfleet Command? We even have a pre-TNG ship with a 'ready room'. What's next, a holodeck and counselor on the bridge? For someone relatively unfamiliar with Star Trek none of this may matter, but for someone like myself, who was watching in 1966 sitting cross legged on my parents' floor and who has followed Star Trek ever since, these violations are massive distractions that ruin the show.

3 Comment (at Posting) not exactly spewing the next TV blockbuster or even decent ratings.

Star Trek at its best is not just about diversity of skin colors or a woman in charge or gay characters (all of which have been on Star Trek before decades ago); it is also about diverse, thought provoking stories. War is boring and obvious. The spirit of Star Trek is reflected much more authentically, and with far more personal affection, by Seth MacFarlane in the third episode of The Orville, "About A Girl", than in anything Discovery has dumped on us so far.

And of course the whole look of the show is based on the Kelvin timeline, the one look that doesn't fit in with anything else in Star trek (other than 3 movies) across Star Trek's entire history. Even if it were not a look from another timeline, it's overwrought, overdone, like the cast is acting on a giant goth inspired wedding cake. It doesn't work as anything but a distraction. But canon violations and sluggish pace aside, the key act of the protagonist that gets her in trouble - the pivotal action that is the whole setup for the story - was just not credible. That someone who had been serving for 7 years under the same captain, a person who is culturally Vulcan to boot, would do something like that ... it was transparently forced to drive the plot. So unfortunately, after 12 years, we've been handed a dud.

David Smagula is my hero! what knowledge!