So, the big one.
Sep. 26th, 2017 07:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
avevale_intelligencerWhat I bit the bullet and signed up to Netflix for. Star Trek: Discovery.
We still haven't got to the episode that sets up the format of the series, unless it's going to be a prison drama, which doesn't seem to jibe well with the title.
I'm not, I will admit, keen on the new Klingons. They look like armadillos with caricatured Black features. Like the Ice Warriors, far too ungainly to be actual fighters. And the writers seem to have ditched the one good idea that Berman et al explored about the Klingons in DS9, i.e. their romantic nature. I've never felt a "warrior culture" was a convincing idea for a spacegoing civilisation. (A point in this lot's favour in that they indicate that without some form of unifying figure cropping up every few generations they would spend all their time fighting each other.) If there were a warrior culture, though, it would be a culture of larger then life heroes and grand gestures and lots of drama, and I can't see these Klingons bringing that off at all successfully.
The intended point of these episodes was fairly clear; principles are shown to be too inflexible as against pragmatism. The correct way (according to the writers) to deal with the lone Klingon ship would have been to do what the first officer said, strike a telling blow and establish mutual respect, but the captain clung to "Starfleet doesn't shoot first" and ended up enabling a massacre instead. (And yet; was the big Klingon ship that rammed the Europa there the whole time? In which case there was no good way to resolve the situation, the Klingons also learned from their contact with the Vulcans, and the whole thing is a Kobayashi Maru scenario (which we may find was actually the case next episode, in which case I shall be Miffed).
Diversity in casting good and not overemphasised. Offset slightly by the previously mentioned caricature Klingons.
Minor continuity points, if continuity were still a thing we were allowed to care about: the Romulans developed the cloaking device, not the Klingons. Starfleet is now definitely established as a military force, which it did not use to be as far as I am aware. And I really can't see how they'll get from the design look they're using now to the TOS look, which of course was a function of less sophisticated set design and the non-existence of CGI.
Summary: I'm not as invested in original Trek as I was in realWho, so the reboots haven't bothered me at all, and this is no different. There are points of detail that bothered me about these episodes, but I'm willing to give it time. On the whole, it was worth signing up to Netflix to see it. Whether I can justify the expense of continuing after the free month will depend on various things.
We still haven't got to the episode that sets up the format of the series, unless it's going to be a prison drama, which doesn't seem to jibe well with the title.
I'm not, I will admit, keen on the new Klingons. They look like armadillos with caricatured Black features. Like the Ice Warriors, far too ungainly to be actual fighters. And the writers seem to have ditched the one good idea that Berman et al explored about the Klingons in DS9, i.e. their romantic nature. I've never felt a "warrior culture" was a convincing idea for a spacegoing civilisation. (A point in this lot's favour in that they indicate that without some form of unifying figure cropping up every few generations they would spend all their time fighting each other.) If there were a warrior culture, though, it would be a culture of larger then life heroes and grand gestures and lots of drama, and I can't see these Klingons bringing that off at all successfully.
The intended point of these episodes was fairly clear; principles are shown to be too inflexible as against pragmatism. The correct way (according to the writers) to deal with the lone Klingon ship would have been to do what the first officer said, strike a telling blow and establish mutual respect, but the captain clung to "Starfleet doesn't shoot first" and ended up enabling a massacre instead. (And yet; was the big Klingon ship that rammed the Europa there the whole time? In which case there was no good way to resolve the situation, the Klingons also learned from their contact with the Vulcans, and the whole thing is a Kobayashi Maru scenario (which we may find was actually the case next episode, in which case I shall be Miffed).
Diversity in casting good and not overemphasised. Offset slightly by the previously mentioned caricature Klingons.
Minor continuity points, if continuity were still a thing we were allowed to care about: the Romulans developed the cloaking device, not the Klingons. Starfleet is now definitely established as a military force, which it did not use to be as far as I am aware. And I really can't see how they'll get from the design look they're using now to the TOS look, which of course was a function of less sophisticated set design and the non-existence of CGI.
Summary: I'm not as invested in original Trek as I was in realWho, so the reboots haven't bothered me at all, and this is no different. There are points of detail that bothered me about these episodes, but I'm willing to give it time. On the whole, it was worth signing up to Netflix to see it. Whether I can justify the expense of continuing after the free month will depend on various things.