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Star Trek Discovery's First Trailer Brings a New Ship, New Characters, and Old Conflicts (cbs.com)

nyquil superstar writes: Hey all, the Star Trek: Discovery trailer is out. Looks entertaining! From a report via Vox: "The trailer features Sonequa Martin-Green, fresh from The Walking Dead, as Michael Burnham, a first officer promoted unexpectedly to the position of captain by her mentor, Captain Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh). Set 10 years before the original Star Trek series (and 90 years after the franchise's only other prequel, Star Trek: Enterprise), the new series follows the starship Discovery as Burnham learns to become a captain. But she soon finds her abilities tested by a host of challenges that will be familiar to all lovers of the classic sci-fi universe: new worlds to explore and alliances to forge, hostile Klingons, and the difficulty of adhering to the Federation's peacekeeping mission."

311 of 507 comments (clear)

  1. This video is not available by TheRaven64 · · Score: 4, Informative
    Sorry about that.

    I guess that means that we're going to have to just talk about something else...

    --
    I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    1. Re:This video is not available by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 5, Funny

      I guess that means that we're going to have to just talk about something else...

      Lack of knowledge of a subject has never stopped Slashdotters from ranting on endlessly about it. We don't read TFA, we don't read the summary, and sometimes we don't even read the post that we are replying to.

      When in doubt, just string up something with Trump, Climate Change, Russians, Universal Basic Income, Bitcoin, 3D-Printing, Apple, Drones, Bones and Elon Musk's new plan to eat a cathedral.

      --
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    2. Re:This video is not available by stealth_finger · · Score: 1

      Elon Musk plans to eat a cathedral? Well...that's a new one, I'm sure it will be good for, oh I dunno, batteries.

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    3. Re:This video is not available by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Informative

      Well, I can describe it if you are interested. It looks like a cross between the 90s/00s era stuff and a bit of the retina scorching bling from the new movies. It's set in the prime universe though.

      The Klingons look kinda bad at first, but I suppose we have to remember that a decade later in Kirk's time some of them had mixed Klingon/Human augment DNA so lost the forehead ridges and gained a goatee. As we know, bad guys have facial hair in Star Trek.

      A lot of it does seem familiar, especially the language used which could have been lifted from an episode of Voyager or Enterprise. No plot details at all.

      It's too early to tell if it will be any good, and remember that all Trek series took at least one season to find their feet. To me it really seems like it is going to depend on if they get a good plot hook.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    4. Re: This video is not available by antdah · · Score: 1
  2. Good by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    More sequels. Or is this a prequel? If not Star Trek, then what? Crappy Alien CGI? Gone are the MOVIE STARS of yester-year! Movies suck. Music sucks. It's like that South Park episode, only everything REALLY IS CRAP!

  3. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 5, Informative

    Star Trek has always been quite diverse, by TV standards.

    Pilot - Number One was a woman
    Original Series - Black woman, east Asian man, Russian and Scot in the main cast
    Next Generation - Many female and black characters, Picard was French
    Deep Space 9 - Black captain
    Voyager - Female captain and chief engineer, Native American second in command

    I didn't even mention the black/east Asian members of the crew in the later ones, they were so normal (for Trek) by that point. And Janeway was originally going to be French too, but they replaced the actor after some test footage didn't turn out as they had hoped.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  4. Alternative link by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    This one seems to work for me:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8mesUEFjas

  5. The original serie by DrYak · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Where the show was designed by the actor's race and sex instead of a plot and a casting call.

    On the other hand, even the original serie, from the beginning has tried hard to be inclusive (the communication officier was a african american woman, the navigator comes from the other side of the iron curtain, etc.)

    So trying to feature under-represented minory is absolutely nothing new in Star Trek.

    The only key question is : are these characters otherwise well written, and are the actors portraying them good ? (or are their "under represented minority" the only noticeable thing about them). but that's hard to judge without watching 1-2 episodes of the serie.
    (Which isn't available here around, at least not to me. So I can't judge)

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
    1. Re:The original serie by Baron_Yam · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Two things:

      First, there's a big difference between a black woman with authority accepted by white men in the 60s, and having a non-white woman in command in 2017. Orders of magnitude of difference. They're late to the game if the goal is to show what's possible in an egalitarian society. We're not perfect, but it is certainly no longer unusual to the point that people gasp upon seeing a female CEO, and if she wants to move into a new neighbourhood she's not going to have trouble buying a house or making friends.

      All that ground got thoroughly trampled in the 80s and 90s, along with homosexuality... which is why being known as gay or lesbian is now a marketing gimmick rather than a career ender. We're even (mostly) over the childish novelty of getting girls to kiss each other for men's pleasure.

      Second, Rodenberry was a cynical guy. One of the stories regarding Chekov is that his late addition was to cash in on the Monkees' popularity (thus the stupid bowl cut). I tend to credit that over most other stories, because Roddenberry was a cynical bastard who would push any story that sold his product. He was not particularly interested in the philosophy espoused in Star Trek when it came to his own life, and especially his own wallet.

      >The only key question is : are these characters otherwise well written, and are the actors portraying them good ?

      It's an order of operations issue. When they have a good character and then say, "Hey, you know what? What if we lean towards someone who is [trait x] for this role?" that's one thing.

      When they say, "Hey, we need a show about a minority woman" that's a totally different, and offensive thing. Just imagine, "Hey, we need a show about a wealthy white male" and tell me how you feel about THAT as a starting point...

    2. Re:The original serie by Antique+Geekmeister · · Score: 5, Informative

      > Second, Rodenberry was a cynical guy.

      Roddenberry was a working director in a tough broadcast market. From his own cast's testimony, he was a wonderful, sweet man to work with who had visions of what people could be and should be, and showed them living up to those goals in the face of tremendous pressures to please or avoid displeasing the sponsors who advertised on Star Trek episodes and on other shows by the same network.

      > First, there's a big difference between a black woman with authority accepted by white men in the 60s,

      This was the *early* 1960's, at the height of the civil rights movement. A black woman with authority for whom her racial identity was cultural, rather than a source of plot tension on a mixed staff, was a very large issue. The kiss between Captian Kirk and Leutenant Urura was a _very_ significatnt event, the first inter-racial kiss in television history. Nichelle Nichols part in Star Trek was a huge inspiration to black women and girls of all races. And Gene Roddenberry deserves all the credit he earned for his very positive stories that helped make Nichelle, and Uhura, heroes.

    3. Re:The original serie by Topwiz · · Score: 1

      George Takei took some time off to be in the John Wayne movie The Green Berets so they brought in the Checkov character. When George returned, NBC was too cheap to pay for dialog to be written for both characters so they had to split their lines.

    4. Re:The original serie by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      When they say, "Hey, we need a show about a minority woman"

      Do you have any evidence that this actually happened?

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    5. Re:The original serie by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

      >Do you have any evidence that this actually happened?

      The original press release, where they explicitly said that and nothing else?

    6. Re:The original serie by denzacar · · Score: 1

      Cynicism. Pure, unadulterated cynicism.

      WHAT WE MUST HAVE:

      - Action/Adventure/Drama Entertainment
      - Involving our starship crew and vessel
      - PLUS, once the above has captured the audience's attention, we want to include our usual comments about the challenges humanity now faces.

      --
      Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
    7. Re:The original serie by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      They didn't say that in the original press release.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    8. Re:The original serie by Baron_Yam · · Score: 3, Insightful

      OK. This is where you've called me a liar, and I call you a liar in return.

      We can stop now.

      "Major plot and character details about Star Trek: Discovery have not been revealed. It is known, however, that it will take place about 10 years before the events of the original series, and that the lead character will be a young woman, likely non-white, serving as a lieutenant commander aboard the Federation starship Discovery"

      Literally all the studio felt like revealing. "Non-white woman lead."

    9. Re:The original serie by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      "likely non-white" is not the same as "let's do a show about a minority woman". You can't infer much from that statement. Maybe they were mid-way through casting and the front runners were non-white...

      I'm not calling you a liar, don't over-react. I'm saying you made an unwarranted inference.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    10. Re:The original serie by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

      Thoughts:

      1) OMG. Typewritten, not printed, not an email. The 80s are so long ago technologically. I lived through them, and I routinely forget we didn't all have smart phones.

      2) I like it so far (I'm only up to page 13), but man, did they ignore some of the best instructions and fall back on the 'easy out' a few times in TNG. Right in the pilot, with Q, they threw out the whole 'Science fiction based on extrapolation of current scientific knowledge'.

      3) It's funny (and sad) that in 1987, "telepathy is supported by reputable scientists" was seriously included in a document.

    11. Re:The original serie by Wulf2k · · Score: 1

      Since it was announced (has it been over a year now?) I have learned exactly two things about Discovery.

      1. The cast will be diverse. Before there was a director, scriptwriter, idea, anything, this was established. The cast will be diverse.

      2. It will live or die or CBS All-Access.

      Diversity should be one of those quiet aspects of the show. Ideally, it's never brought up at all. It just "is" diverse, and everybody accepts it because it flows seamlessly and isn't forced. That is not the case with Discovery.

      As for the CBS thing, well, a moment of silence in advance for this doomed Trek-like show.

    12. Re:The original serie by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      That statement obviously isn't a press release or it would not say "have not been revealed" but some news outlet making conjecture based on what information they had at the time.

      THIS is the original press release, you will note that the sentence you supposedly quote:

      and that the lead character will be a young woman, likely non-white,

      do not appear...at all.

      https://www.cbspressexpress.co...

      NEW âoeSTAR TREKâ TELEVISION SERIES COMING IN 2017!

      The Next Chapter of the Legendary âoeStar Trekâ TV Franchise Will Premiere on the
      CBS Television Network, Then Move to CBS All Access Digital Subscription Service

      Alex Kurtzman, Co-Writer and Producer of the Blockbuster Films
      âoeStar Trekâ and âoeStar Trek Into Darkness,â to Executive Produce

      CBS Studios International to Distribute the Series Globally
      For Television and Multiple Platforms

      STUDIO CITY, CALIF. AND NEW YORK, N.Y. â" Nov. 2, 2015 â" CBS Television Studios announced today it will launch a totally new âoeStar Trekâ television series in January 2017. The new series will blast off with a special preview broadcast on the CBS Television Network. The premiere episode and all subsequent first-run episodes will then be available exclusively in the United States on CBS All Access, the Networkâ(TM)s digital subscription video on demand and live streaming service.

      The next chapter of the âoeStar Trekâ franchise will also be distributed concurrently for television and multiple platforms around the world by CBS Studios International.

      The new program will be the first original series developed specifically for U.S. audiences for CBS All Access, a cross-platform streaming service that brings viewers thousands of episodes from CBSâ(TM)s current and past seasons on demand, plus the ability to stream their local CBS Television station live for $5.99 per month. CBS All Access already offers every episode of all previous âoeStar Trekâ television series.

      The brand-new âoeStar Trekâ will introduce new characters seeking imaginative new worlds and new civilizations, while exploring the dramatic contemporary themes that have been a signature of the franchise since its inception in 1966.

      Alex Kurtzman will serve as executive producer for the new âoeStar Trekâ TV series. Kurtzman co-wrote and produced the blockbuster films âoeStar Trekâ (2009) with Roberto Orci, and âoeStar Trek Into Darknessâ (2013) with Orci and Damon Lindelof. Both films were produced and directed by J.J. Abrams.

      The new series will be produced by CBS Television Studios in association with Kurtzmanâ(TM)s Secret Hideout. Kurtzman and Heather Kadin will serve as executive producers. Kurtzman is also an executive producer for the hit CBS television series SCORPION and LIMITLESS, along with Kadin and Orci, and for HAWAII FIVE-0 with Orci.

      âoeStar Trek,â which will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2016, is one of the most successful entertainment franchises of all time. The original âoeStar Trekâ spawned a dozen feature films and five successful television series. Almost half a century later, the âoeStar Trekâ television series are licensed on a variety of different platforms in more than 190 countries, and the franchise still generates more than a billion social media impressions every month.

      Born from the mind of Gene Roddenberry, the original âoeStar Trekâ series debuted on Sept. 8, 1966 and aired for three seasons â" a short run that belied the influence it would have for generations. The series also broke new ground in storytelling and cultural mores, providing a progressive look at topics including race relations, global politics and the environment.

      âoeThere is no better t

    13. Re:The original serie by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      Go ahead and call him a liar, because THIS is the original press release:

      https://www.cbspressexpress.co...

    14. Re:The original serie by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      "Sorry this site is not available from your location."

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    15. Re:The original serie by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      Pasting it, again:

      NEW âoeSTAR TREKâ TELEVISION SERIES COMING IN 2017!

      The Next Chapter of the Legendary âoeStar Trekâ TV Franchise Will Premiere on the
      CBS Television Network, Then Move to CBS All Access Digital Subscription Service

      Alex Kurtzman, Co-Writer and Producer of the Blockbuster Films
      âoeStar Trekâ and âoeStar Trek Into Darkness,â to Executive Produce

      CBS Studios International to Distribute the Series Globally
      For Television and Multiple Platforms

      STUDIO CITY, CALIF. AND NEW YORK, N.Y. â" Nov. 2, 2015 â" CBS Television Studios announced today it will launch a totally new âoeStar Trekâ television series in January 2017. The new series will blast off with a special preview broadcast on the CBS Television Network. The premiere episode and all subsequent first-run episodes will then be available exclusively in the United States on CBS All Access, the Networkâ(TM)s digital subscription video on demand and live streaming service.

      The next chapter of the âoeStar Trekâ franchise will also be distributed concurrently for television and multiple platforms around the world by CBS Studios International.

      The new program will be the first original series developed specifically for U.S. audiences for CBS All Access, a cross-platform streaming service that brings viewers thousands of episodes from CBSâ(TM)s current and past seasons on demand, plus the ability to stream their local CBS Television station live for $5.99 per month. CBS All Access already offers every episode of all previous âoeStar Trekâ television series.

      The brand-new âoeStar Trekâ will introduce new characters seeking imaginative new worlds and new civilizations, while exploring the dramatic contemporary themes that have been a signature of the franchise since its inception in 1966.

      Alex Kurtzman will serve as executive producer for the new âoeStar Trekâ TV series. Kurtzman co-wrote and produced the blockbuster films âoeStar Trekâ (2009) with Roberto Orci, and âoeStar Trek Into Darknessâ (2013) with Orci and Damon Lindelof. Both films were produced and directed by J.J. Abrams.

      The new series will be produced by CBS Television Studios in association with Kurtzmanâ(TM)s Secret Hideout. Kurtzman and Heather Kadin will serve as executive producers. Kurtzman is also an executive producer for the hit CBS television series SCORPION and LIMITLESS, along with Kadin and Orci, and for HAWAII FIVE-0 with Orci.

      âoeStar Trek,â which will celebrate its 50th anniversary in 2016, is one of the most successful entertainment franchises of all time. The original âoeStar Trekâ spawned a dozen feature films and five successful television series. Almost half a century later, the âoeStar Trekâ television series are licensed on a variety of different platforms in more than 190 countries, and the franchise still generates more than a billion social media impressions every month.

      Born from the mind of Gene Roddenberry, the original âoeStar Trekâ series debuted on Sept. 8, 1966 and aired for three seasons â" a short run that belied the influence it would have for generations. The series also broke new ground in storytelling and cultural mores, providing a progressive look at topics including race relations, global politics and the environment.

      âoeThere is no better time to give âStar Trekâ(TM) fans a new series than on the heels of the original showâ(TM)s 50th anniversary celebration,â said David Stapf, President, CBS Television Studios. âoeEveryone here has great respect for this storied franchise, and weâ(TM)re excited to launch its next television chapter in the creative mind and skilled hands of Alex Kurtzman, someone who knows this world and its audience intimately.â

      âoeThis new series will premiere to the national CBS audience, then boldly go where

    16. Re:The original serie by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      The words "white", "minority", "black" and "diverse" don't even appear in that statement. What the hell are you talking about? Did you even post the right thing?

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    17. Re:The original serie by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      That's my point, you were right.

    18. Re:The original serie by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Thanks. Sorry, I got the wrong end of the stick there.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  6. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 5, Informative

    Roddenberry certainly tried to give women equal roles in the original series. In the pilot Majel Barret played the second in command of the ship. Unfortunately the studio objected and decided that they would have the child-like Yeoman Rand, and then got rid of her to make way for a love-interest-of-the-week (which is how Kirk got his reputation).

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  7. Hey Slashdot... by jolyonr · · Score: 1

    Perhaps before approving a story with a youtube link someone could actually check to make sure the video is available in a reasonable % of the world outside the USA?

    --


    Please read my Canon EOS tech blog at http://www.everyothershot.com
    1. Re:Hey Slashdot... by tehcyder · · Score: 1

      Perhaps before approving a story with a youtube link someone could actually check to make sure the video is available in a reasonable % of the world outside the USA?

      Why do you hate the US's freedoms?

      --
      To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
  8. UNAVAILBLE by sproketboy · · Score: 1

    Fuck you Star Trek!

  9. Re:The Quota Show by sproketboy · · Score: 1

    Exactly.

  10. Wait by 110010001000 · · Score: 4, Funny

    Wait the new Captain is a female with the name Michael? I am confused already.

    1. Re:Wait by uncle+slacky · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I thought female captains weren't allowed in the TOS (or earlier) time period? That was the whole reason Janis Lester had to swap bodies with Kirk in order to become captain. http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Janice_Lester

      --
      Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it.
    2. Re:Wait by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

      Wait the new Captain is a female with the name Michael? I am confused already.

      I've known a few girls named Michael over the years, it's usually a boys name but it can be a girls name too.

      Oh, and she's the first officer not captain.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    3. Re:Wait by Baron_Yam · · Score: 5, Interesting

      You are correct, of course. The problem is that is even worse than what they're shovelling now... because while that was relevant social commentary back then, it ain't now.

      Sticking with that - showing the great Federation as still recovering from post-WWIII social regression despite thinking of itself as an egalitarian utopia - would have been a great sci-fi premise, but a difficult sales pitch.

      In fact, showing the Federation as a bunch of aggressive but cautious jerks who are reeling from getting kicked in the groin by the Romulan War right while still recovering from the Eugenics Wars, and heading straight into the Klingon War would have been a really brave move with a lot of potential for stories with emotional weight - something Trek's been pretty weak at.

      Showing women (and scapegoated minorities) fighting to regain rights they know their ancestors had, in a Cold War-esque paranoid society with the general population trying to return to peace while the leaders and military know war looms and want to crack down on social progress to maintain control in the name of survival... there's so much material there. Plenty of which that would be a great analogue for the problems of today.

    4. Re:Wait by 110010001000 · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but why choose a normally "male" name for the name of a main character? Why not "Sally" or "Mikala". There are millions of choices, but they chose a traditionally "male" name.

    5. Re:Wait by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

      Probably a character building name. I'm sure being a girl named Michael she got bullied in school. Probably will have some flashback to being a bullied child when facing a Romulan and start screaming "Please don't give me a wedgie... PLEEEAAAASSSEEE!"

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
    6. Re:Wait by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      Could be interesting to see if they decide to go with that and explain how the rule came about.

      The fan series Star Trek Continues addressed it, explaining that it was due to the Telerites demanding it and the young Federation needing their support and so having to accept it. It wasn't an actual rule, just an informal agreement not to promote women to that level and cause a rift.

      It's hard to see how they can get from where they start to where TOS started in a mere decade, with women going from apparent equals to those rather silly uniforms and being banned from senior ranks. Then again, apparently Harry Mudd will be making an appearance so they will have to deal with that whole can of worms.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    7. Re:Wait by meta-monkey · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Showing women (and scapegoated minorities) fighting to regain rights they know their ancestors had, in a Cold War-esque paranoid society with the general population trying to return to peace while the leaders and military know war looms and want to crack down on social progress to maintain control in the name of survival... there's so much material there. Plenty of which that would be a great analogue for the problems of today.

      Except no one would watch it. The audience of Star Trek is white male nerds. They want shows about exploring the galaxy and science and aliens, and yeah a few episodes a season do some kind of social commentary thing. But when absolutely everything else in school, the HR department at work, the nightly news is RACE RACE RACE GENDER GENDER GENDER GAY SHIT GAY SHIT STRONG INDEPENDENT BLACK WYMYNZ WHAT DON'T NEED NO MANS they kind of don't want to see that shit in Star Trek. Star Trek is the escape from all that. So, you can make SJW Trek, but nobody's going to watch it. And then it'll fail, and HuffPo will right nasty articles about how racist and sexist white men are because they didn't want to watch a show about how racist and sexist white men are...IN SPACE.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    8. Re:Wait by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

      And the security chief is a boy named Sue.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    9. Re:Wait by meta-monkey · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Which is what they did with Cisco and Janeway. The shows were never about how he was black or she was a woman. Geordi never had to give a speech about how he was discriminated against because "no negroes can engineer spaceships!" He was just the ship's engineer and nobody cared about his race.

      The idea that nerds are especially racist or sexist is retarded. Nerds were watching all these shows and had no problem with strong independent women like Ripley or blacks in authority like Cisco for decades before wearing your tolerance on your sleeve became fashionable. Then the normies suddenly got their paws all over the franchises, make them shit because of the writing and the plots, shoehorn in "diversity" and then when the nerds complain "this is a bad show" they accuse us of racism and sexism.

      It's just more nerd bullying. When we were watching shows about space and aliens with a diverse cast 20 years ago, they were pushing us into lockers for liking all that nerd shit. Now they've taken over all the nerd shit, made it crappy, and are bullying us for not liking it. The one constant is you can heap any amount of abuse you want on low social value males.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    10. Re:Wait by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1, Insightful

      >The one constant is you can heap any amount of abuse you want on low social value males.

      Before you finish nailing yourself to that cross, consider that the drama nerds often have it pretty bad compared to other varieties of nerd until they're adults, and even then life can suck unless they're really talented or make it big. It's still the pretty people and the athletes that by default score well in popularity until you get out of high school. Luckily the majority of people grow the fuck up in their 20s and most of that shit fades away.

      But it's the drama nerds who are writing the scripts and the drama nerds who are acting them out, and most of them know what it's like to be on the shit end of the stick. Unfortunately... they're just not as smart as us alpha nerds and can have trouble with logic and moral philosophy so they don't see the flaws in the SJW manifesto. ;p

    11. Re:Wait by jlockard · · Score: 1

      The description says "a first officer promoted unexpectedly to the position of captain by her mentor".

      --
      --JLockard - "Some mornings, it's just not worth chewing through the leather straps." - Emo Phillips
    12. Re:Wait by i_ate_god · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but why do you even care?

      Man there are a lot of strange comments over these 2 minutes of trailers because there is a black woman that seems to be the lead like it's somehow a threat.

      I miss the days when you kids would argue over whether or a fleet of X-Wing fighters could take on a galaxy class starship. Now it's all "waaah, it's a black woman and I'm offended, waaahh". Everyone gets so butthurt over the dumbest things.

      --
      I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
    13. Re:Wait by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

      No. It's be great to have sci-fi shows about science, exploring strange new worlds, meeting weird new aliens, and not having to think, at all about current race/sex politics. I need neither SJW shit nor anti-SJW shit in my Star Treks.

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    14. Re:Wait by Moridineas · · Score: 1

      Alpha Nerds....love it!

    15. Re:Wait by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      Then the normies suddenly got their paws all over the franchises, make them shit because of the writing and the plots, shoehorn in "diversity" and then when the nerds complain "this is a bad show" they accuse us of racism and sexism.

      It's just more nerd bullying. When we were watching shows about space and aliens with a diverse cast 20 years ago, they were pushing us into lockers for liking all that nerd shit. Now they've taken over all the nerd shit, made it crappy, and are bullying us for not liking it. The one constant is you can heap any amount of abuse you want on low social value males.

      20 years ago was 1997, the internet was being hyped, there wasn't much nerd bullying. Even back in 85 there wasn't all that much.

      I'm going to quote an AC at you:

      And this is where a lot of the animosity by borderline autistic nerdy white males complaining about 'social justice' or whatever is sourced from. For years, the socially inept physically unimpressive dorks had refuges in their various obsessions. But now social media has allowed 'normies' to express their enjoyment of pop cultural phenomenons, and a societal focus on embracing technology even allows them to participate without have to adhere to idiotic concepts of nerd social hierarchy. It's as if the losers are angry that their stereotyping has been taken from them, and they now have to rely on personality alone...

    16. Re:Wait by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      explaining that it was due to the Telerites

      nerd moment... it is Tellarites...but I am not a Trekkie.

      IIRC either the Blish novelization of Turnabout Intruder or some of the early novels said there WERE female captains in Kirk's time, it's just that Janice Lester got diagnosed with a mental disorder (maybe adult manifesting paranoid-schizophrenia that they couldn't cure) and was kicked out of Starfleet.

    17. Re:Wait by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      It is not that uncommon, didn't you ever watch "The Waltons or "Nurse"

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

      or "ER" or "Homicide Life on the Street"?

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    18. Re:Wait by mjwx · · Score: 1

      I thought female captains weren't allowed in the TOS (or earlier) time period? That was the whole reason Janis Lester had to swap bodies with Kirk in order to become captain. http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Janice_Lester

      That was well and truly thrown out of canon by ENT as the USS Columbia (Enterprises sister ship) had a female captain.

      --
      Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
  11. Looks nice but it smells like it will be shit. by sproketboy · · Score: 1

    nt

  12. Criticism: Awful Lighting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Characters they showed seemed likable, but I didn't care for the lighting. I really hope most of the sets are brighter than the bridge, or this is going to be a very short-lived show.

    (IMO Stargate Universe failed because the screen was so dark most of the time. People don't like dark screens in prime time.)

    1. Re:Criticism: Awful Lighting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      So much lens flare in the trailer. I thought they would have learned about that by now.

    2. Re:Criticism: Awful Lighting by freeze128 · · Score: 1

      How do any of the techs in CSI ever see what they're doing when the labs are so DARK?

  13. Re:Operation is impossible :-/ by 91degrees · · Score: 1

    Does that lmgtfy link make the link in the story work?

  14. Social Justice Checks Out by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Senior Transgendered Asian Female Captain: Check
    Gender muted African-American Female Protege: Check
    Black males portrayed as vicious savages: Check
    While males in unimportant, peripheral roles only: Check

    I for one love this show and just know it will be a great success!

    1. Re:Social Justice Checks Out by elrous0 · · Score: 2

      Real diversity isn't simply shifting the stereotypes.

      --
      SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    2. Re:Social Justice Checks Out by i_ate_god · · Score: 1

      you got all that from a 2 minute trailer? Impressive

      --
      I'm god, but it's a bit of a drag really...
  15. Re: The Quota Show by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Not the same... this truly is blatant sexism. They are trying to create a role model that is not realistic. Most women have rejected feminism and this is why.

  16. Re: The Quota Show by DThorne · · Score: 1

    I'm in the same boat. Had many years of ST enjoyment, so thank you Mr Rodenberry and all you other people that pushed it further, but I feel like I've grown out of the model where humanity has simply "solved" all the problems we currently have so we can focus on aliens. It was designed for a "story of the week", and it's hard to take the characters seriously. The dialog in the trailer feels like lines from Lucas (ok, perhaps too harsh). Enjoy it if it still turns your crank, fans, but I've moved on.

  17. Re:Nope. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    was that
    some
    weird attempt at
    poetry?

  18. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    They're on a five-year mission to discover even one straight human white male who isn't either a villain or an incompetent idiot.

    Here's a hint, crew: Don't look on any planet affiliated with Disney.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  19. Pure Incompetence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    The episode order has been increased to 15. That's 15 too many, in my opinion. The development of Discovery has been marked by pure incompetence, despite having some really good people involved. I had high hopes with Bryan Fuller and Nicholas Meyer, who did really good work previously with Star Trek. I thought Rod Roddenberry might have a good feel how to run the show because he had praised Star Trek Continues, which is really well done. Fuller is gone and the show keeps sounding less interesting as more news comes out. It wasn't that long ago that Michael Dorn passed on being cast for Discovery as one of Worf's ancestors because they gave him an insulting lowball offer, about 65% of what he was paid on TNG and DS9. Between seven seasons on TNG and four on DS9, I don't think anyone else has come close to appearing in as many episodes as Dorn has. It's embarrassing.

    I have no confidence in the people developing Discovery that it's going to be worthwhile. There's nothing in the trailer that impresses me. There's a lot of action but I'm not convinced there's an interesting story to go along with it. CBS hasn't given much information on the actual premise for Discovery, and I don't see a whole lot in this trailer to provide any more information about it. It doesn't matter how diverse your cast is or how much you include special effects and combat if you don't have good writing and an interesting story to tell. With all of the delays and personnel changes, there has been more than enough time to devise a compelling premise. If there was truly an interesting premise to this show, I would expect CBS to provide more information on what that is to attract viewers. The trailer doesn't do that at all. This just seems like more incompetence to me.

    I wish this show interested me. But I have yet to see anything that makes me think it's worth watching. If I'm going to watch anything on All Access, it'll be Big Brother and The Good Fight, both of which seem far more worthwhile than Discovery. It's a shame because I really like TOS and DS9, and TNG was pretty good.

    1. Re:Pure Incompetence by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      They should have thrown some cash to Star Trek Continues for another season of that. They could do an entire season for what it costs Discovery to do one episode.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    2. Re:Pure Incompetence by dj245 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      The episode order has been increased to 15. That's 15 too many, in my opinion. The development of Discovery has been marked by pure incompetence, despite having some really good people involved. I had high hopes with Bryan Fuller and Nicholas Meyer, who did really good work previously with Star Trek. I thought Rod Roddenberry might have a good feel how to run the show because he had praised Star Trek Continues, which is really well done. Fuller is gone and the show keeps sounding less interesting as more news comes out. It wasn't that long ago that Michael Dorn passed on being cast for Discovery as one of Worf's ancestors because they gave him an insulting lowball offer, about 65% of what he was paid on TNG and DS9. Between seven seasons on TNG and four on DS9, I don't think anyone else has come close to appearing in as many episodes as Dorn has. It's embarrassing.

      I have no confidence in the people developing Discovery that it's going to be worthwhile. There's nothing in the trailer that impresses me. There's a lot of action but I'm not convinced there's an interesting story to go along with it. CBS hasn't given much information on the actual premise for Discovery, and I don't see a whole lot in this trailer to provide any more information about it. It doesn't matter how diverse your cast is or how much you include special effects and combat if you don't have good writing and an interesting story to tell. With all of the delays and personnel changes, there has been more than enough time to devise a compelling premise. If there was truly an interesting premise to this show, I would expect CBS to provide more information on what that is to attract viewers. The trailer doesn't do that at all. This just seems like more incompetence to me.

      I wish this show interested me. But I have yet to see anything that makes me think it's worth watching. If I'm going to watch anything on All Access, it'll be Big Brother and The Good Fight, both of which seem far more worthwhile than Discovery. It's a shame because I really like TOS and DS9, and TNG was pretty good.

      The TV market has changed a lot since the last Star Trek series ended. Unless Amazon, Netflix, HBO, AMC or some other network that prioritizes quality picks up the franchise, the budget can be expected to not be sufficient. Star Trek has historically had a reasonably large cast of generally good actors, significant use of CGI, liberal use of guest actors, alien makeup and costumes, mostly decent writing, and a variety of custom-built sets of a generally professional nature. All of which cost money. They could cut any of these elements to save costs. My solution would be a smaller core cast of very good actors. This is a bit outside of the standard Star Trek formula, however.

      --
      Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
    3. Re:Pure Incompetence by MistrX · · Score: 1

      I think you should at least give a few episodes a watch and decide afterwards. Plot, writing and storytelling are entirely different things then CBS's business decisions. The latter where most complaints stem from.

    4. Re:Pure Incompetence by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Same AC here. Discovery has a pretty large budget, reportedly $6-7 million per episode. My understanding is that Netflix is actually paying the production budget to get the streaming rights internationally. Shows typically get more expensive in later seasons, especially as cast salaries increase. In 1992, TNG had a budget of roughly $2 million per episode, which was a large budget for the time. Adjusted to today's dollars, it's still nearly half of the budget of Discovery. Enterprise had a relatively high budget, around $5 million per episode. That large budget probably didn't work in the favor of Enterprise, because an expensive show with declining ratings is an easy target for cancellation. Any money that CBS gets from people subscribing to All Access for Discovery is a bonus, but the success of the show really seems to depend on international viewers on Netflix.

      I agree that budget compromises have to be made, and that's true even with a large budget. I believe viewers will probably accept fewer special effects if it means better writing and a good cast. It also wouldn't be a bad idea to start off with a smaller cast, especially with a short season. Having only 15 episodes instead of 22 leaves a bit less time for character development. One of DS9's strengths was the excellent character development, and would definitely benefit the show. If the show is successful and is renewed for a longer second season, it's always possible to expand the cast a bit. The trailer suggests they've spent a lot on effects, which is fine provided that the writing, directing, and acting are good.

    5. Re:Pure Incompetence by Reziac · · Score: 1

      ST Continues or Axanar or any of a dozen other good fan/semi-pro projects. But Hollywood is not about making film and TV; it's about sucking budget into a black hole, and while you can do an excellent series on a fraction of the money, this makes the unions unhappy and eliminates all the graft and waste that's where the real profit lies. So it won't happen on Big Hollywood's watch.

      --
      ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
  20. So there's such a limited supply? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Or do you think that among the tens of thousands of accomplished actors that so very very few of them are female or asian or whatever you're crying like a whiney little bitch under their redneck daddy's hairy sweaty fist being raped, that it's not possible to get good actors to fill the roles unless we go all white?

    Because me, not being a bigoted asshole like yourself, can quite easily believe that they could fill the roles and get their quota even if they had to hunt for the lesbian black furrie transgendered raelian quota filling applicant.

    I think there are enough talented black, asian, muslim, jewish, german, latin, african, australian, european lesbian, gay, poly, angrogyne, scientologist, mormon, bhuddist, atheist, whatever else actors out there to fill each role in a TV series' regular cast to have good actors in each role, whether they fit demographics or not.

    Hell, they could exclude every male or half-white actor and actress in the USA and STILL manage to get a cast of good actors for each and every role.

    The only difference would be that this would be discrimination you would be crying over.

    1. Re:So there's such a limited supply? by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

      But the Star Trek audience is white male nerds. Who would watch this show? When the writers have gone out of their way to explicitly exclude stand-ins for the main audience in the cast, and then probably shoehorn in random digs at the white male nerd audience? When did escapism become masochism?

      --
      We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
    2. Re:So there's such a limited supply? by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      But the Star Trek audience is white male nerds.

      Shakes head sadly at your lack of knowledge again, points to earlier response.

  21. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Star Trek was always diverse and inclusive, which was great. What they didn't do before now was to feel exclusive of anyone who can't check off their proper SJW victimhood credentials. If they follow the Hollywood pattern of late, there won't be one straight white human male in the main cast (unless he's a villain).

    It saddens me to think of a Star Trek universe where this lifelong fan is villainized just because I was born with white skin and a dick. Excluding people ain't Trek.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  22. Honest trailer by TheEden · · Score: 1

    I'll just wait for a Honest trailer...

  23. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    >In the pilot Majel Barret played the second in command of the ship.

    Yeah, but he was tapping that on the side, so it's not like the casting is untainted.

    The guy was morally flexible when it came to sheathing his penis or filling his wallet. He was not a moral compass guiding us towards utopia as he is usually portrayed,

  24. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The Trek series before now have always felt inclusive. This one feels exclusive. Big difference.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  25. Re: The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 1

    I don't see how you get that from a trailer. You have a captain and a first officer who are both women, which would happen 25% of the time if men and women reached that rank equally often. Looking at the cast on IMDB, there are more women than in TOS, but more than half the characters are men.

    And looking who they chose... Michelle Yeoh. If you can't see Michelle Yeoh in the captain's chair, you don't know who she is.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  26. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yes, and it obviously worked, as 200something episodes will tell.

    What Star Trek did right back then, and what it utterly fails at here, is that diversity is a good thing, but beating it into people with a sledgehammer is not. You see, people don't like that. Uhura was a black female as the communications officer. Back then that was an "impossibility". Not only a woman, not only a black person, but a black woman as an officer!

    The real impact of it all was, though, that it was treated as a non-issue. They didn't parade her and try to "make a point" out of it, "look we are so progressive, we have a black female officer!". No, it was treated as normal. Which made in my opinion the even stronger point. The message was simply that in the future, black female officers are so normal that we needn't even talk about it anymore. It's a given. Nobody questioned her ability. Hell, if there was a mobbing victim on the ship, it probably was Chekov.

    That was a pretty big statement for the 1960s, a decade when the civil rights movement still had to fight to at least get equal treatment of black and white people by law. And as we know, it still didn't really arrive in all heads.

    What bothers me about the "new" Star Trek is that this message is now delivered by sledgehammer. Look, we're progressive, we have an asian female nonbinary transgender captain. If it was at least an alien... but for some odd reason, alien captains are still a nono.

    Why not?

    Why not have a nonhuman captain and a crew of humans and aliens that has to deal with it?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  27. Re:The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 1

    TOS felt inclusive to people who'd been excluded.

    Exactly what are you numerical requirements for you not feel excluded?

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  28. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Melodrama much?

    In the end, movies are a business. If people like to watch it, it will be made. If audiences fail to show up, they will turn to different stories. It actually IS that simple.

    Hollywood makes movies not to "push agendas" but first and foremost to make money. Yes, certain filmmakers may have their pet agendas, but at the end of the day, the studio wants a ROI. If your agenda sells, great, make more of it. If it doesn't, not great, get lost.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  29. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    With the difference maybe being that the average 1967 audience was a bit more racist (or at the very least way more tolerant to racism) than people are today...

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  30. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 1

    Hey idiot, Star Trek already had a black captain who everyone *loved*. Does the name Benjamin Sisko ring a bell?

    No one is threatened by a black captain, or a woman captain, or a Hindu lesbian captain, or whatever. The problem is that the casting of this particular series doesn't feel inclusive, it feels exclusive (intentionally excluding straight white human males). That's goes against the utopian Trek ideal of a society in which everyone plays a positive part.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  31. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Actually I was hoping to see the first purple nonbinary alien captain. But I guess Star Trek isn't ready for that yet.

    The problem I have with the more recent development of Star Trek isn't that we have a more and more diverse crew. Far from it. What bothers me is that it becomes the focus of the show. We're not exploring exciting new worlds, we're exploring our feelings and how others hurt them.

    I don't really need science fiction for that.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  32. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 1

    Exactly what are you numerical requirements for you not feel excluded?

    Enough to make the cast feel natural, not like they were assembled based on an SJW victimhood checklist.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  33. Not interested, i am no longer a trekkie by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    JJ cured me.

  34. Damn it JJ Look what you have done! by Danathar · · Score: 2

    The whole JJ Abrams action and re-hash old plot lines (even to the point to duplicating them like the half-vulcan thing) is disappointing. I guess that is what we get for paying our $$$ at the theater to see Abrams STW and ST films. Management at the studio is certain if they just duplicate that in the series, everybody will be happy and the money will roll in.

    1. Re:Damn it JJ Look what you have done! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Management at the studio is certain if they just duplicate that in the series, everybody will be happy and the money will roll in.

      Then they are half-right, and to them, it's the only half that matters.

  35. Re:The Quota Show by Rockoon · · Score: 1

    Excluding people is very SJW tho

    --
    "His name was James Damore."
  36. Let us not forget THE ORVILLE! by wjcofkc · · Score: 3, Interesting
    --
    Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
    1. Re:Let us not forget THE ORVILLE! by mykepredko · · Score: 1

      Just looking at the trailers - I'm a lot more excited about the Orville than Discovery...

    2. Re:Let us not forget THE ORVILLE! by freeze128 · · Score: 1

      ...and yet the trailer doesn't really punch like other Macfarlane properties do. If it's *REALLY* about the captain bickering with his ex the whole time, that's not enough to make it funny.

    3. Re:Let us not forget THE ORVILLE! by mykepredko · · Score: 1

      Agreed - but it still comes across better than ST Discovery.

  37. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't really see how you can say having a black female officer at a time when it was unthinkable wasn't really hammering it home. And I don't know where you got that stuff about the captain being nonbinary transgender, but it doesn't seem to be the case at all.

    The trailer and the marketing so far doesn't push the diversity side at all. In fact I don't think it does anything new at all really, since the new movies have an openly gay character.

    Really, what makes you think they are hammering this in any way? Almost all the discussion I've seen about it has been anti-progressives complaining about it, with basically zero from the studio.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  38. Re:The Quota Show by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    When I read the reactions to the casting, it seems like the reactions in some of the comments aren't that far off from the way Sesame Street was received. That show had an intentionally diverse cast, so much so that the state of Mississippi banned it from their PBS station in 1970. I disagree with criticizing a show for having a diverse cast or addressing societal issues.

    The real issue here is whether the characters are well-written and the actors portray them well. The success of Sesame Street wasn't because it had a diverse cast, but because it was a high quality show for educating young children. The success of TOS wasn't because of the diversity of the cast but because of the premise was imaginative and the writing was generally good (especially in the first two seasons).

    By the way, TOS generally didn't directly address the racism of the mid-20th century, but they used allegories for it. Balance Of Terror is one of the great Star Trek episodes in any series and also made a huge contribution to the continuity of the series. In that episode, the racism is directed by Lt. Stiles toward Spock, because the Vulcans were the ancestors of the Romulans. It's a great episode because it tells a very suspenseful story about the first Romulan encounter in 80 years and the first visual encounter ever with Romulans, who have an extremely powerful disruptor and a cloaking device, and are attacking an underpowered Federation. It wouldn't be a great episode if it didn't have such strong writing and a compelling plot to go along with the social message.

    It's also why, aside from the Native American spirituality in Voyager, I seem to recall Star Trek steering away from including anything that could be considered a human religion. Make no mistake, they addressed religious issues, especially in DS9, but they were addressed through the allegory of other races and their religions.

    Basically, a diverse cast is a plus, and I disagree with the criticism of it. However, it cannot substitute for well-written characters, good acting, and compelling stories. It's also best when the societal and social issues are addressed through the allegory of other races, for which science fiction provides a unique platform not available to other genres of fiction.

  39. Re:The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 1

    So, your objective standard is your feeling?

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  40. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 5, Informative

    Why do you feel excluded from it? Half the cast is white males. Confirmed so far:

    Sonequa Martin-Green (black female)
    Terry Serpico (white male)
    Maulik Pancholy (Asian American male)
    Sam Vartholomeos (white male)
    James Frain (white male)
    Doug Jones (white male)
    Michelle Yeoh (east Asian female)
    Anthony Rapp (white male)
    Chris Obi (black male)
    Shazad Latif (British Asian male)
    Mary Chieffo (white female)
    Jason Isaacs (white male)
    Mary Wiseman (white female)
    Rainn Wilson (white male)
    Kenneth Mitchell (white male)
    Rekha Sharma (Asian female)
    Damon Runyan (white male)
    Clare McConnell (white female)

    So the main confirmed cast is 50% white male, and 66% white. One character is gay, or 94% straight.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  41. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Discovery doesn't seem to be particularly diverse though. There is one gay character, but it's not been made a big deal of, at least not by the studio. Lots of other series have had more diverse casts, openly gay characters and so on before. The main cast of Discovery is 50% white males, which doesn't exactly scream "quota", does it?

    Where is all this coming from? Did the studio throw a pride parade I missed?

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  42. Re:The Quota Show by frank_adrian314159 · · Score: 1

    Why not have a nonhuman captain and a crew of humans and aliens that has to deal with it?

    Why? Because makeup for a large number of nonhuman crew would take too much time out of the shooting schedule. They have a sci-fi show to make, not "Make-up Time for Geeks". Don't be an idiot. It's about the money.

    --
    That is all.
  43. Re:The Quota Show by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    And it looks like it's set in the Kelvin timeline what with it not resembling Enterprise or TOS (despite being set 10 years prior to the latter). Oh and the lens flares. The massive, massive amount of lens flares used to disguise the fact that everything is so bland.

  44. Star Track by AlisaSoll · · Score: 1

    Hi boys! I’m looking for my lovely man! You can get my contacts here: http://xxx2017.top/ Also, all my photos and some hot videos are available after registration! I’m waiting for you !!!

    1. Re:Star Track by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

      Hi boys! I’m looking for my lovely man!

      Then you came to the wrong place, this is Slashdot, hope you like fat hairy unwashed bellies, scruffy neckbeards, and cheeto stained scrotums.

      --
      "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  45. Re:The Quota Show by Rockoon · · Score: 1

    Why did you just ignore the majority of the viewing population completely?


    Now it doesnt.

    We get it. It doesnt matter how big a white male population is, it can still be easily ignored... neigh even simply forgotten about... by the likes of you. So forggoten that you argue not just as if they didnt matter, but as if they didnt even exist.

    --
    "His name was James Damore."
  46. Not for me in the USA by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

    CBS has blocked it on copyright grounds, apparently they don't want me to be excited about their show. Mission accomplished!

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    1. Re:Not for me in the USA by Thanatiel · · Score: 1

      You are probably more exited about the show that you would be if you watched that deplorable trailer.

      --
      Irrelevant news and morons using moderation to mod down what they disagree on. 2018 resolution: so long.
  47. Re:The Quota Show by tehcyder · · Score: 1

    the original star trek was nothing more than racial awareness propaganda

    Yes, having one black woman character and one Asian male character was just early Political Correctness gone mad.

    Star Trek? SJW Trek more like!

    --
    To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
  48. Re:The Quota Show by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why not have a nonhuman captain and a crew of humans and aliens that has to deal with it?

    Because, ultimately, Star Trek, like many Science Fiction shows has always been about "humanity" and the "human condition". Most of the best science fiction is about looking at humanity through a different angle (hence the "sci-fi" part is usually to look at humans in a "what if" scenario, it's easier to examine issues and morality by separating it from the everyday normal).

    Now, what's that got to do with your question? Well, if the alien is captain it takes the spotlight off humanity since the captain frequently becomes the focus. All the Star Trek characters had aliens, not to look at aliens, but to look at humans.

    Data is the classic example, he's the Pinocchio of the series, the puppet that wanted to be human.
    Seven-Of-Nine another classic example, a human separated from humanity by the Borg trying to rediscover what it is to be human.

    These characters were loosely based on Spock, not to be like him but to fill the same role. Spock didn't want to be human of course, but his "differentness" was frequently a plot device to compare him to humans and humanity.

    You probably COULD have an alien captain, but then the screenwriters would have to work harder and more creatively to write stories about humanity and human morals. A human captain makes it easier to work those into the plots.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  49. Re:The Quota Show by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

    So, your objective standard is your feeling?

    I believe that you will find that almost everyone has an objective standard, and it is their feeling.

    Not having watched the trailer, since CBS is putting out some effort to prevent me from doing that because they apparently don't want me watching their show, I can't even tell you what my feeling about this cast is. So far the only emotion I'm feeling related to this show is anger at CBS still being stuck in the past so badly that they're sending takedown notices for content which they ostensibly actually want people to see because it is an advertisement. But if the racial mix is overwhelmingly nonwhite then that's going to make the show differ from most of what's on television (except for shows targeted at specific racial groups) and cause some people to feel upset about it.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  50. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 1

    That captain probably won't even survive the pilot and most of the other white guys are hidden behind alien makeup. AFAICT, the only two human white guys in the cast are an Academy cadet and a science officer, and they've already announced that the science officer will be gay. Pretty sure that cadet's days are numbered too, or it will turn out that he's a villain, or an alien, or a transsexual, or gay.

    Sad day.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  51. Almost there by jbmartin6 · · Score: 1

    A black female lead is fine with me. In fact, I think in a true united earth future almost everyone would be darker skinned and Asian or African looking. The white Europeans appearance would be a small minority. Why not include a character who looks Chinese but was raised Norse? Anyway, what I hated about this trailer is the lead character's ridiculous eyelashes. What does an eyelash curler look like centuries in the future?

    --
    This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    1. Re:Almost there by denzacar · · Score: 4, Funny

      Anyway, what I hated about this trailer is the lead character's ridiculous eyelashes. What does an eyelash curler look like centuries in the future?

      It's a genetic trait left over from Max Factor - L'Oreal wars of the late 21st century.

      Why not include a character who looks Chinese but was raised Norse?

      Said character could be from a binary star system.
      And he or she could have a representation of Thor's hammer in his/her quarters, which could be a running gag in the show, with said character often threatening to "Grab Thor's hammer and..."

      --
      Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
    2. Re: Almost there by jbmartin6 · · Score: 1

      That would be awesome, except DS9 already did the wormhole aliens perceived as gods thing. Or was that the Simpsons?

      --
      This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
    3. Re:Almost there by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

      What does an eyelash curler look like centuries in the future?

      Probably the same, the things have looked pretty much the same ever since they were invented in 1931

    4. Re:Almost there by mfnickster · · Score: 1

      I think Star Trek made a conscious decision to just portray people as pretty much the same as they were at the time it was being made, and just make the technology futuristic.

      This makes the characters more relatable to a contemporary audience, and avoids the problem of making lots of wrong predictions. Of course in hindsight it feels pretty quaint... Space Hippies, anyone?? :)

      --
      "Slow down, Cowboy! It has been 3 years, 7 months and 26 days since you last successfully posted a comment."
  52. Re:Operation is impossible :-/ by phayes · · Score: 1

    Does the 2017 definition of nerd includes those unable to type 4 words into a search engine?

    This is "Slashdot, news for nerds...". Idiots should go elsewhere on the web.

    --
    Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
  53. Re:The Quota Show by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

    With the difference maybe being that the average 1967 audience was a bit more racist (or at the very least way more tolerant to racism) than people are today...

    Based on most of the tone in this thread where so many people are up in arms and angry that the lead role went to a black woman, I'm not sure the 1967 audience WAS more racist than the current audience.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  54. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Hammering it home would have meant that they used every other episode to showcase how they're not as backwards as they "used to be" (read: as they are in the 1960s) and making a point about Uhura being black. Actually, I don't even remember a single occasion where her skin color became an issue in the show.

    You can't really say that about the more recent past, even in TNG we had to be lectured about how backwards humans were (read: are in the reality) and how lucky they are that they overcame it.

    Take a hint. People don't like being lectured. It creates resistance.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  55. This looks absolutely terrible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I'm a huge Star Trek fan and was so looking forward to this. What a disaster. I want to cry.

  56. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    I somehow doubt that many of them care that a black woman got the lead role. Else they would have been up in arms about Sisko and Janeway, too.

    My guess is that they fear that this becomes the main topic of the show. Look, we are so cool, hip and progressive, we have a black captain, look at her, she is so great, she is so awesome, she is so black and she is so female!

    Yes. We got it. We don't give a shit. Can we now have, you know, A PLOT?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  57. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Maybe because we had to sit through a few too many movies where "diversity" became the main theme with everything else, from franchise to plot, had to take a back seat, and we fear that this may be just the next one in a line of stinkers that had zero plot, zero idea, zero investment in the characters, zero character developments, all sacrificed on the altar of the all important diversity?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  58. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Informative

    2 words: Babylon 5.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  59. Re:The Quota Show by WheezyJoe · · Score: 4, Interesting

    decided that they would have the child-like Yeoman Rand, and then got rid of her to make way for a love-interest-of-the-week (which is how Kirk got his reputation)

    Uhh, kinda no. Been reviewing TOS, like actually watching them, and the whole Kirk-boinks-a-green-chick-each-episode thing really doesn't hold up; even when Kirk does get some action, it almost always ends badly. This regrettable myth that Kirk was a jack-ass cowboy instead of a hard officer has overshadowed much of what made TOS so successful in the first place, so much so that studio idiots are still trying to beat life out of this dead horse.

    As for "child-like" Yeoman Rand, it's a toss-up whether actress Grace Lee Whitney was written out because of some creative decision or because she was sexually assaulted on the studio lot by an still-not-identified executive associated with the series.

    --
    Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
  60. Re:Operation is impossible :-/ by 91degrees · · Score: 1

    No. I'm sure it's well within the capability of most users to do so.

    What's your point? Because my understanding of the AC's point is that it's rather rubbish of Slashdot and CBS to provide a link that doesn't actually work for a large percentage of visitors.

    Finding the link independently does not make this any less of a failure on the part of Slashdot. Granted, the Slashdot editor had no way of knowing so perhaps AC's complaint was a little unfair in that respect.

  61. Re:The Quota Show by tehcyder · · Score: 2
    Indeed, the SJWs have taken over and it is now literally impossible for a straight white male to get any role in a movie or TV series. If there is a need for a character who is, in fact, a straight white male, the Studios just get a black lesbian to put on white makeup.

    This is true.

    --
    To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
  62. Re:The Quota Show by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Why does a show need to be filled with white males for you to enjoy it?

  63. Re:The Quota Show by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1

    We'll under 50% of the Earth's population are White males, yet half the cast of this show are. That's only underrepresentation if you can't do math.

  64. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Yes, all the Star Trek series had its "odd man out" character. TOS had Spock, TNG had Data, DS9 had Odo and Voyager had the Doctor (along with Torres, 7of9 and the rest of the aliens).

    None of them had an alien captain.

    The exploration angle could be just that: How do you deal with someone who is in command who does NOT share your particular point of view, your moral code, your history and your beliefs? In our time where we more and more clash with others over petty things, the solution to this problem, i.e. how to cooperate and even more accept the leadership of someone who does NOT share your point of view totally, would definitely be an interesting concept.

    But I guess accepting other points of view, allowing diverging ideals and morals and even letting them get away with being in command with all these "wrong" ideas, that's not really progressive...

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  65. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 1

    Hollywood makes movies not to "push agendas" but first and foremost to make money

    Actually, of late, there are certain companies (most notably Disney) who seem to have adopted such a pro-SJW stance that they seem willing to actually lose money to advance that agenda. Maybe it's a personal thing for their CEO's/boards or maybe they think they're playing the long-game with millennials, but there are a number of recent examples where they seem willing to take a financial hit just to show their SJW cred.

    A great example is with Disney's Marvel Comics division (the actual comic books, not the movie division). Marvel Comics has taken a HUGE financial hit from switching almost all of their main characters over to females and minorities in the last few years. Sales for some of their biggest titles have dropped to all-time lows (we're talking monthly sales of under 20,000 for titles that used to routinely sell in the 900,000+ range in their heydey). Yet they seem determined to stay this course, even going as far as chiding their own long-time fans for not getting onboard the SJW train. It's really a truly bizarre situation. Some have even speculated that Disney is intentionally trying to bankrupt the division as a tax write-off or something.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  66. Re:The Quota Show by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

    I somehow doubt that many of them care that a black woman got the lead role. Else they would have been up in arms about Sisko and Janeway, too.

    My guess is that they fear that this becomes the main topic of the show. Look, we are so cool, hip and progressive, we have a black captain, look at her, she is so great, she is so awesome, she is so black and she is so female!

    Yes. We got it. We don't give a shit. Can we now have, you know, A PLOT?

    If that happens- I will pan it. But to assume that that will happen just because she is black is worrying.

    I didn't watch DS9 much because it was so boring a soap-opera-y but I don't recall the plots being about him being black.
    Voyager wasn't about Janeway being a woman either.

    I somehow think it rather presumptuous for so many people to assume this is going to be ABOUT either of those things. The world is definitely a lot more racist than it was when those two shows were on the air. In a world with Brexit, and Trump winning, and someone as blatantly racist as Marine Le Pen in France putting in a strong fight, I would say the world IS a racist exclusionist place right now. Certainly moreso than the 90's when we as a species were trying to be more inclusive. I think we ARE facing a backlash against too much political correctness and the result is a wave of racism, sexism, and otherthingsism.

    If Star Trek cast a black female captain in 1999 people wouldn't be bitching about it as much as they are now.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  67. Re:The Quota Show by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    Take a hint. People don't like being lectured. It creates resistance.

    Resistance is futile you will be assimilated

  68. Re:The Quota Show by PvtVoid · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This was so idiotic it made my brain bleed.

    black female officers are so normal that we needn't even talk about it anymore

    ... except that if you actually put a black female officer on the show, all the Bros are going to whinge about what a SJW you are!

    Apparently, the message did't stick.

  69. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

    There's likely lots of people who disagree with me on this (such as those morons who are modding my original post 'troll' despite it being an accurate report of the original press releases...)
    but Sisko and Janeway sucked.

    Not because Sisko was black, but because Avery Brooks' delivery was odd and I personally didn't like it. Not because Janeway was a woman, but because the show's writing was atrociously bad and they wrote her making some of the dumbest possible decisions

    Trek may have put women in important positions, but they've rarely taken them and written what I've found to be a compelling character. 7 was hot ass-kicking cyborg and emotionally a child... wow, so a nerd fantasy chick. B'Elanna had squandered potential. I kind of liked Nerys, but the whole cultural/religious angle felt too forced.

    Maybe Uhura, but due to the times Nichols didn't really get much to work with... it's decades of time and a few cool movie lines that have retroactively made her great.

  70. Re:The Quota Show by elrous0 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You joke, but in the last two Star Wars films there hasn't been a single white male character who wasn't either grandfathered in (Han Solo and Luke Skywalker) or a villain.

    Think of it this way: If Luke dies in the next Star Wars movie, there won't be a single white male left in the Star Wars universe who isn't a villain.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  71. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Again, we've come to associate a "diverse" cast with it becoming the main topic of the movie. It's sad that this is the case, but sadly it is. Personally I love the idea of having a space ship full of interesting, rich characters with diverse backgrounds, intricate background stories that offer many exciting plot hooks, old friends, old enemies, character flaws that they have to overcome and so on. Because what makes a character interesting is not his strengths but his weaknesses.

    The problem is now that in the more recent past, certain character groups are not allowed to have weaknesses anymore. And that makes them formulaic and boring.

    And far too often did this happen in the recent past with movies where diversity was a corner stone element. Which would be great, but it has become absolute anathema to give a "minority" character any flaws. Dare to and be prepared for the backlash. We had a slew of formulaic 50s TV-show heroes who could do no wrong, who could never make a mistake and who in turn cannot develop anywhere because, well, how do you improve perfection?

    On the other side, we have had a stream of twirling-moustache villains that were evil for evil's sake. No motivation other than spitting in our great hero's soup. Complete with the bumbling fool sidekick. Whose side he's on doesn't really matter.

    And the more "diverse" a movie presented itself, the more this held true.

    I'd like to have a diverse crew with interesting background stories to explore. What bothers me is that they're mostly a stream of differently colored Wesley Crushers with varying gender.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  72. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Let's see how long shareholders are willing to play along. CEOs are easily replaced when they don't perform.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  73. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Informative

    What about the episode where Kirk kissed Uhura? It was the first interracial kiss on US TV, a major and shocking moment.

    They softened it by making the characters be forced to do it, but still, they were clearly pushing hard there. In fact Roddenberry and some of the other writers made it a point to push the limits on the show, resulting in a great deal of friction with the studio. It's all been extensively documented in the various books about the show.

    By comparison, TNG and what we have seen of Discovery are pretty tame. Discovery has done basically nothing so far. By modern standards the casting is not shocking or even surprising in the least.

    Take a hint. People don't like being lectured.

    Unfortunately people seem to imagine being lectured and then blame the imaginary lecturer in real life for it.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  74. Why the past? by svendsen · · Score: 1

    Given how much material the star trek universe has you think they would either branch out to another sector of the galaxy (i.e voyager) or jump a few generations ahead and show a future federation. THey are going to break some story timeline with this show by having someone do X which is contradicted in any future star trek series.

    We know how the Klingon war went, we know all the back stories. It will be hard to really tell something big. And I already know there will be some story about the half vulcan/human being conflicted. Surprise surprise.

    1. Re:Why the past? by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

      > or jump a few generations ahead and show a future federation.

      Problem: The tech is already ridiculous. As of the recent movies, (set in TOS era!) they can beam anywhere without a star ship. They can resurrect the dead. We know in Kirk's time they develop planet-destroying weaponry and full AI. In Picard's era they have replicators and holodecks.

      There's already not much point in getting out of bed in the Star Trek universe - it'd make a lot more sense to climb into a life support unit in orbit around a non-descript star and live an eternity in the simulated reality of your choice.

      >We know how the Klingon war went, we know all the back stories.

      We know how WWII ended... but there are a lot of movies out there about it.

      > I already know there will be some story about the half vulcan/human being conflicted.

      Yep. With the original Spock's popularity, Star Trek pretty much ensured that a Pinocchio character would be a significant part of most sci-fi for the foreseeable future.

    2. Re:Why the past? by svendsen · · Score: 1

      All very valid points.

      Perhaps a star trek in the future where the hit a dark ages because of the ever perfect starfleet morality? All empires die. So a story line showing the federation slowly dieing and the conflicts around survival vs. their beliefs. Technology degrades because the support infrastructure to build and maintain all the cool technology you mention no longer exists?

      Least it would be something new :-)

    3. Re:Why the past? by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

      >Perhaps a star trek in the future where the hit a dark ages because of the ever perfect starfleet morality? All empires die. So a story line showing the federation slowly dieing and the conflicts around survival vs. their beliefs. Technology degrades because the support infrastructure to build and maintain all the cool technology you mention no longer exists?

      So... Andromeda? :)

    4. Re:Why the past? by svendsen · · Score: 1

      I totally forgot about that show. Ya take Andromeda, sprinkle some real dark stuff in it, put it in the official star trek world, could be interesting if done right. And they could still have the half human/vulcan issues if they really needed. lol.

    5. Re:Why the past? by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

      >I totally forgot about that show.

      Which it kind of deserved. They set it in a dark future and STILL made it bland. And they didn't commit to it, either, as evidenced by all the changes they threw in as the show was crashing.

      That's rarely good. Building on what you have in a new direction? OK. Trashing what you have and attempting what amounts to a soft reboot? Pretty much guaranteed to lose whoever is still hanging on as a fan.

    6. Re:Why the past? by westlake · · Score: 1

      Why the past? Because it is recognizable to the audience. The tech has limits, the characters and their world are flawed in ways that are least distantly familiar and plausible. The series can offer hope for the future but it doesn't run on magic.

    7. Re:Why the past? by sheramil · · Score: 1

      > or jump a few generations ahead and show a future federation.

      Problem: The tech is already ridiculous. As of the recent movies, (set in TOS era!) they can beam anywhere without a star ship. They can resurrect the dead. We know in Kirk's time they develop planet-destroying weaponry and full AI. In Picard's era they have replicators and holodecks.

      A fix exists for that:

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butlerian_Jihad

  75. Re:The Quota Show by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

    The guy was morally flexible when it came to sheathing his penis

    Is it "morally flexible" when ST at least appears to be partly a free love utopia? One man's different morals are another man's "flexible" morals?

    --
    Ezekiel 23:20
  76. Re:The Quota Show by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

    Look at the leads in the last two Star Wars movies, they were both white, and both built up as perfect Mary-Sues, they could do no wrong. You don't have to be a minority to be portrayed as an infallible character. I'm trying to think back to the last show I watched with a minority lead (embarrassingly, I think it was Luther about 6 months ago, or Marco Polo I watched around the same time... I don't watch much TV though).

    Luther is certainly a very flawed individual. In Marco Polo, Kublai (who is arguably more central to Marco Polo than Marco Polo is) is well developed, despite being portrayed as a wise leader, he certainly had plenty of flaws. His evil arab adopted son is certainly VERY flawed.

    Will the new leading lady in Star Trek be flawed? Hard to say, but Star Trek has a long history of creating characters that are nearly perfect. It's very rare for Star Trek to have any characters with major flaws, black or white. (at least not if they're good guys).

    When they do have flawed good guys, they normally use it to spin their flaw as being a positive thing.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  77. Re:The Quota Show by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 2

    I'd actually complain much more about the wasted potential of getting to keep Michelle Yeoh as the protagonist.

    --
    Ezekiel 23:20
  78. Re:The Quota Show by FictionPimp · · Score: 1

    Except we are human, so the whole show would become about how we can force our morals on the alien captain as they 'soften' to our views over time.

  79. Re:The Quota Show by WheezyJoe · · Score: 1

    Where the show was designed by the actor's race and sex instead of a plot and a casting call. Because blatant sexism and racism is good so long as it isn't favouring white males!

    Why is this a thing? picked up from a two-minute trailer? It's like the people who trolled Force Awakens because the leads were a girl and a black guy. What is the fucking problem? Should humans boycott Pixar movies because the lead characters are fish???

    Nobody complained 30 years ago when Alien and Aliens had a strong woman in the lead role. Why do white males have their balls bunched in their briefs now, over a fucking TV show that hasn't even aired yet?

    I don't think this new Trek is gonna be any better than any of the others, but "designed by the actor's race and sex" isn't the reason. Been-there, done-that, endless dialog and forgettable go-nowhere stories, littered with cynical easter-eggs to TOS that tease but never satisfy, that will sink the series. But a couple of women appear in a teaser-trailer, and a fella gets all pissy and won't eat his veggies anymore?

    Try this experiment: bottle of Tequila and Mad Max: Fury Road. If you find yourself bored because it's Charlize Theron at the wheel and not Steven Seagal, check your pulse cause you're probably dead.

    --
    Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
  80. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    Can you name some of these movies? It's hard to evaluate your argument when I don't know what you are referring to.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  81. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    It ain't the year 2200 yet. Give it time.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  82. Changed the Klingons? Again? by CAHutch · · Score: 1

    I really don't like that they changed what the Klingons looked like. According to canon, following STE and 10 years before TOS, the Klingons should look like they did in TOS. I would be fine with either way but not with a third mutation that makes then unrecognizable as Klingons. I'm totally skeptical about this new series. I don't expect them to respect traditions or canon. 10 years before TOS means it could be in JJ Abrams alternate timeline and the bridge lighting would seem to support this.

  83. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 2

    Free love is fine when everyone consents, but Roddenberry was cheating on his spouse with someone over whom he had significant authority.

    I mean, yeah, it ultimately seems to have worked out for Majel, but it was a skeezy start.

  84. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

    >Why is this a thing? picked up from a two-minute trailer?

    No, from the original press releases where that's literally all they had.

  85. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Now wouldn't that be a show that tells us more about our character than its characters? I think that would be a very interesting concept to explore.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  86. More SJW Crap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Let me guess: a female captain to show how women are equal in the Star Trek universe, complete with a cast of POCs ruling over white men to demonstrate how SJWs have won the culture war in the future. No thanks. Ask Marvel how catering to that crowd goes. They have a lot of voice to scream with but no dollars to buy.

  87. Leave the Era of Origins Behind by Man+In+A+Small+House · · Score: 1

    It's time for Star Trek to move on...into the future...the far future. We have had several series (beginning with TOS) and movies that take place in what I call The Era of Origins. It's time to take the series into the FAR future, say the 47th or 51st Century or beyond. Let's put those imaginations into overdrive and think of what Star Trek could be in those time periods. What would the ships be like? Would they even have ships? How much more of the universe will be explored by then? Come on Paramount...stretch that imagination!

  88. Re:The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 2

    Except that if you look at humanity as a whole, "white male" is hardly the dominant category. Suppose we have a officer candidate pool of a 100 individuals. What would the demographics be like if that reflected the demographics of the human race as a whole?

    You'd have about 15 white male candidates, and 28 Asian female candidates. And yet we have never seen a regular Asian woman character in command; in fact we've never seen any Asian woman in a command track position. They've been present, but entirely in technical support jobs: nurse, communications specialist, botanist.

    About 14 candidates are either African or are of African descent, so that means about 7 of our candidates are African women -- assuming 2017 demographics and not accounting for the effect of Africa's greater fertility rate on future demographics. The probability of pairing an Asian woman with an African woman is about 20%, so it's not surprising to see this combination. The probability of a having a Captain/First Officer pairing that consists of a white man paired with another white man is about 2%. And yet we have seen this once in five series so far (TNG), but not the Asian woman/African woman combination which is 10x more likely.

    Let's just look at male/female. The probability of a M/M or F/F combination is 25%, and of some M/F mix about 50%. Here's how the captain/first officer pairings have worked out for ST series:

    TOS: M/M
    TNG: M/M
    DS9: M/F
    VOY: F/M
    ENT: M/F

    Now thus far we've seen M/M over-represented, but not at a statistically significant rate. The absence of a F/F combination however is significant (p 0.032). Adding an F/F combination makes this combination of outcomes non-significant (e.g. you can't reject the null hypothesis that the assignment of sex to role is unbiased).

    And here's the kicker: Michelle freakin' badass Yeoh. If you have trouble picturing her in the captain's chair, you don't know who she is.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  89. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    For Marvel, they don't care. They make so much money off the movies the comics are a rounding error.

    Still, it's insane when they're shitting on their fans. Nobody wants to buy stories to be preached at. Everything else is already preaching at us. "Gee, the 20,000 hours of anti-racist anti-sexist indoctrination in school, the constant preachiness of every show on TV and the nightly news and my own life experiences didn't do anything to temper my irrational hatred for asians, but now that the Hulk is a Korean guy my racist days are over!"

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  90. Re:The Quota Show by houghi · · Score: 1

    Why not mention "The kiss" in the original series. Diverse? It is right out controversial.

    --
    Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
  91. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    We've been told over and over again that we need diverse role models in entertainment, because minority youth can't relate to the white hero on screen. So we need black heroes for blacks, and female heroes for girls. Since I'm a white male, I can't relate so well to the struggles of the strong independent black and asian wymynz running the spaceship, so I probably won't find it interesting. This show is not directed at me, it's directed at the little black and asian girls who want to fly a spaceship, and I'm fine with that. They will watch it (or not), and I'll watch something else. Not everything has to be made for me.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  92. Not Interested, and I AM a Trekkie by WheezyJoe · · Score: 1

    Was disappointed many, many times before JJ put the nail in the coffin. The magic is gone, long long gone and ain't coming back. Yet Paramount (or whoever owns them this time) keeps trying to press more life out of a series that the suits thought to kill back almost 40 years ago. Fuck. Nearly everyone who had anything to do with TOS that inspired such unprecedented fandom in syndicated re-runs are now, quite literally, dead - and yet studio execs slap a Trademark on a pilot and stick a few Trekkie easter-eggs in the script, and it's gotta get the green-light.

    I've learned my lesson. If they have to slap "Star Trek(R)" and related paraphernalia on it to make you give it a second look, it's junk designed to take your money. There's better stuff out there like The Expanse or Oasis that don't need to name-drop to a 40-year old three-season TV show in order to get people to wanna watch it.

    Trek Is Dead. Let it rest for fuck's sake. But you can't stop studio suits from squeezing "value" out of a Copyright and a Trademark property. Shit, Netflix is working on doing a remake of *cough* Lost In Space for fuck's sake. You could have a stroke thinking what sludge could spill out of that, but they're gonna produce it, probably at the expense of something original and good.

    --
    Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
    1. Re:Not Interested, and I AM a Trekkie by Thanatiel · · Score: 1

      Indeed. Using a name and betraying its spirit just shows how little they understand its nature and its appeal.

      And thanks for the two suggestions. I'll take a look.

      --
      Irrelevant news and morons using moderation to mod down what they disagree on. 2018 resolution: so long.
  93. Re:The Quota Show by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Wait, Poe isn't a white male? Or was he somehow a villain? Or was he grandfathered in?
    Maybe you're just self-selecting to confirm your biases?

  94. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I don't think Ghostbusters 2016 has much to do with pushing a social justice agenda. They just wanted to make the film appeal to a younger audience, which meant upping the comedy aspect and reducing the horror/dry humour of the original. So they needed comedy actors to fill that role, and at this point a lot of the male talent is tainted by flops and turning everything they are in into just "another Ben Stiller movie" etc.

    The acts they went with were coming up via the usual routes, TV shows like SNL and so forth. They made a reasonable choice, and then the internet found out and blew it up into a huge social justice male-genocide slactivist movement.

    It's actually quite ironic... People complaining about "SJWs", while demanding more social justice for men and to have the film banned or boycotted. It's as if people who use that acronym only think other people are like that because it's how their own minds work... But I digress.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  95. Re:The Quota Show by penandpaper · · Score: 1

    TNG still tried to address the social issues of the day but a lot if not most of social fights have been won. The trans issue was brought up way before it was a major talking point is one example. There are only so many social issues to talk about when so many are resolved.

    Discovery almost seems like they are marketing for a Chinese market with their social message. Hollywood has been pushing harder to a larger foot print in that demographic with varying success. This seems like another iteration in that attempt to woo the Chinese market.

    not bad or good, just my 2 cents.

  96. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    Look at the leads in the last two Star Wars movies, they were both white, and both built up as perfect Mary-Sues, they could do no wrong.

    Because they were women, and a female character with X character flaw is proof the writers believe all women have X character flaw. This also made the movies boring. See Galbrush Threepwood.

    The problem isn't diversity, it's when diversity becomes the replacement for the plot. And the marketing department knows it. If the movie's funny, push the funny. If it sucks, push the diversity. And they do it. The female ghostbusters movie was shit because the jokes were awful or non-existent. Replace the female cast with a male cast and it would still be awful. But when people pointed out that it was awful, the studio and their media whores pushed the "if you don't like this garbage it's because you hate women" narrative.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  97. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 3, Interesting

    but the whole cultural/religious angle felt too forced.

    Here's some diversity that might actually make for an interesting character on STar Trek: human characters that aren't all atheists/agnostics. Give me a Catholic science officer. Or maybe the weapons officer is a muslim and he goes Space Jihad on fuckers.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  98. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    What's the demographics of the target audience though?

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    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  99. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    What's the demographics of the audience though? What's the demographics of slashdot?

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  100. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    It had pretty much the same flaws that I get to see in too many movies today: We're returning to the movie stereotypes of the early days of cinema. Perfect heroes and villains doing evil for evil's sake. One dimensional, boring characters with zero room for development.

    It had another problem with expectation vs. delivery (in all honesty, it wasn't a bad movie if you ask me, and it did actually work out as a slapstick comedy, it just didn't deliver to me what hearing "Ghostbusters" makes me expect). Imagine a Star Trek movie with a Star Wars setting. Both great franchises on their own, but imagine a Star Trek movie with the focus on a good vs. evil struggle and magic users and swordplay. You'd probably want your money back.

    I also don't complain about SJWs and don't want "justice for men". Actually, I don't really care much for either. I just want interesting characters in my movies. Characters that have flaws they struggle with, that they have to overcome. Villains that have a goal and their own vision, despite being evil. A really good example thereof was Ledger's Joker in the Dark Knight. Yes, he was an insane comic supervillain, but he gave him a purpose, an idea, a goal that he wanted to achieve. He wanted to show the world that everyone is, in his core, as bad as he is. And that's something I'm missing in more contemporary movies.

    What we get today is more and more Mary-Sue heroes with unbelievably evil villains to contrast them. I'm sorry, but I want to understand the purpose of the characters. Without purpose, I cannot really care about them. And if I can't care about the characters in a movie, why bother watching it?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  101. Re:The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 1

    You always have to disaggregate reactions like this. Sure, the outright sexist/racists will hate the idea, but I think people who don't hole racist/sexist views could also feel that way. I think people underestimate their own capacity as an audience.

    People are complex and multifaceted, and so are compellingly written characters. And that's how you enter into an emotional attachment to a character, not just through your superficial resemblance to them. That's how people identify with Spock, who is a member of a species that doesn't even exist. They even feel attachment to the Mars Exploration Rovers. They see themselves in these things, even though we know they aren't alive or even sentient.

    It's the storyteller's job to engage this ability people have to identify with characters who are different from them. Often this is pure wish fulfillment, and the characters are stronger and more ruthless than we dare to be. In the case of Star Trek the characters are more resourceful and more principled than we dare to be. Next to that differences in sex and skin tone are nothing.

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    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  102. Re:The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 1

    For star trek, the audience is global, and at the very least both men and women are strongly represented.

    But you're assuming people will only identify with characters who superficially resemble them. By that argument, Spock should never have existed as a character, and in fact the network wasn't happy about him because they had exactly those kinds of overly literal assumptions about audience identification.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  103. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    For star trek, the audience is global, and at the very least both men and women are strongly represented.

    So the stereotype of Star Trek fans being white male basement dwelling virgins is false? It's actually all the colors of the rainbow equally represented? Huh. Today I learned.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  104. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    You did notice that it was one kiss in one episode of a 200+ episode show, I am confident. And while "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" was another show that picked racial tensions and slavery as a topic, it was by no means something that permeated the show.

    I also consider Let That Be... a much stronger statement against racism and racial hate than that "notorious" kiss.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  105. I'm calling it now... by denzacar · · Score: 1

    Alex Kurtzman will get all passive aggressive when faced with criticism.

    "Everyone keeps asking for something new and innovative, but when you actually give it to them they complain that it is different."
    Or...
    "People complain that it doesn't look and feel right. Cause they've know how the space is supposed to be like."
    Or...
    "It's only a show. Not a science lesson."

    It is after all how his palls Jar Jar and Lindelof reacted to criticism.
    "Storytellers" who can't even come up with an excuse.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  106. Re:The Quota Show by Moridineas · · Score: 1

    I actually agree with most of your post, but I did want to add one thing.

    What bothers me about the "new" Star Trek is that this message is now delivered by sledgehammer. Look, we're progressive, we have an asian female nonbinary transgender captain. If it was at least an alien... but for some odd reason, alien captains are still a nono.

    There seems to be a good chance that the male captain will be an alien (there was apparently some deleted tweet showing the captain with molding goo on his face).

  107. Re:The Quota Show by Moridineas · · Score: 1

    Imagine a Star Trek movie with a Star Wars setting

    You mean JJ-trek? zing

  108. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    If Luke dies in the next Star Wars movie, there won't be a single white male left in the Star Wars universe who isn't a villain.

    Really, you are going to ignore all the white male Rebel pilots and troops from those movies? What's-her-face's father?

    If you are going to ignore the wider cast, then you have a sample size of 4 new human characters.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  109. Re:The Quota Show by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 2

    The problem isn't diversity, it's when diversity becomes the replacement for the plot. And the marketing department knows it. If the movie's funny, push the funny. If it sucks, push the diversity. And they do it.

    I guess we'll find out when it is released (or in my case, I'll find out a few years later when it's on Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon Prime because I sure as hell won't be paying for a CBS equivalent of Netflix).

    My problem with most people's reactions is that they're assuming it's all about race and gender without any plot when a single episode hasn't even been made yet. By leaping to those assumptions people are essentially saying black woman are incapable of playing a leading role without making it about race and gender.

    If the show does turn out to just be about "look how black I am, and look how female I am" without having a plot... then I will agree, that people have a write to pan the show. However, I think it's quite a leap for so many people to be saying it's all about race and gender when a single episode hasn't even aired yet.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  110. Re:The Quota Show by Oswald+McWeany · · Score: 1

    "a RIGHT" not "a WRITE".

    / insert Picard palm face here.

    --
    "That's the way to do it" - Punch
  111. good news, and bad news by j2.718ff · · Score: 1

    The good news is this trailer strongly implies the series is actually going to be made.

    The bad news is, I'm not optimistic about its quality. (Well, the trailer itself did nothing to change my opinion there. I'll see what happens once the episodes are out.)

  112. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 2

    They believe lots of things that are not rational, like "all life is precious." That's a transcendent religious belief that you cannot derive rationally. There's nothing irrational about naked self-interest in which my tribe of humans murders or enslaves opposing tribes of humans (or non-humans). Secular humanists (both modern and on Star Trek) also believe in irrational things, so belief in a different religion isn't that much more irrational than the other irrational things they do. At least it might be interesting to have some kind of diversity of thought among the humans on Star Trek. Just about every Star Fleet human believes exactly the same things.

    Also, in Star Trek V I'm pretty sure the "god" in the center of the galaxy was pretending to be God after the fact. The concept of God on earth didn't come from the space monster thousands of years ago. I can pretend to be God right now...that doesn't mean ~meta-monkey caused humans to come up with the concept of God.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  113. Re:The Quota Show by Malggi · · Score: 1

    What do you mean they didn't hammer it home? They had the first interracial kiss on American Television. That kiss was definitely the 1960's equivalent of a sledgehammer.

  114. Sorry, not watching by p51d007 · · Score: 1

    Looks like it could be ok, but, if CBS thinks I'm going to shell out MONEY...forget it!

  115. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    However, I think it's quite a leap for so many people to be saying it's all about race and gender when a single episode hasn't even aired yet.

    But we can also notice patterns in Hollywood writing. Marvel (comics not movies), Star Wars, Ghostbusters, etc. Nerd franchise + shit writing + diverse cast + "IF YOU DON'T LIKE THIS YOU'RE RACIST" marketing. Over and over and over again.

    If Star Trek Discovery has decent writing and a plot and isn't full of heavy handed references to the race/gender make up of the cast it will be breaking the pattern. I'm not saying it's a duck, but it's looking like a duck and it's walking like a duck, and when it comes out we'll see how it quacks.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  116. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    Star Trek is an interesting example. The reboot movies aren't really Trek as many fans thought of it, just action movies. Kinda like Ghostbusters.

    As for Mary-Sue heroes... That's pretty much the basis of Star Wars. Like/Anakin/Ray seem ordinary, but it turns out they have super powers. They actually toned it down a lot in Force Awakens, for example she isn't a particularly good pilot (just a good mechanic, which is believable due to her job) and instead that role is left to Poe. But if you don't like Mary-Sue characters, you don't like Star Wars.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  117. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    About 5% of humans are gay. It's about right.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  118. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    That episode with the Trill you mean?

    I think it might have been better if a) it wasn't that creep Riker, and b) Crusher hadn't been so shocked or instantly decided to end the relationship when the Trill became a woman.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  119. H-1B by DarthVain · · Score: 1

    Considering there is supposed to be a "World" government, and there had been no indications of a radical shift of that make up, one would think that there would be vastly more Chinese and India crew members simply by the numbers. That said, perhaps it can be explained away a bit in that the HQ of Starfleet was somehow positioned in SF, but even then, not a lot of Mexicans on the crew either. Considering all these are US TV shows, and the demographics today, one would think they might throw in some Latin Americans or something if for nothing more than to cater to a larger audience.

    However the jerk in me wants an episode where top brass at Star Fleet need to save some money (or credits, or resources or whatever) due to the conflict with the Klingons or something, and replace all the crew with Indians, and how that all turns out...

    Also no Canadians? Give me some stereotypical Canadian (space)hockey lovin', lumberjack, apologist! "Oh is he some sort of alien?" "No, he's just Canadian..."

  120. Trailers are supposed to sell a serie ... by Thanatiel · · Score: 1

    There was a Stargate SG1 episode where they were reluctantly trying to make a movie. There were several kind of parodies like the Wizard of Oz, Farscape, ... One was a 'teenager' spin, unanimously rejected by the team.
    This trailer I feels the same to me.

    All I saw was bad/over acting, several 'poseur' scenes there just to look 'cool' (for teenagers) and a few screams.

    When I think 'Star Trek', I think TNG, OG or even Voyager : not J.J. Abrams, not this.

    I really hope I'm wrong, but with the current productions mind set, as far as Star Trek is concerned, I can only quote this one:

    It's dead, Jim.

    --
    Irrelevant news and morons using moderation to mod down what they disagree on. 2018 resolution: so long.
  121. Re:The Quota Show by denzacar · · Score: 1

    i.e. how to cooperate and even more accept the leadership of someone who does NOT share your point of view totally, would definitely be an interesting concept.

    It's Starfleet. There's a selection process.

    Also, they did the "particular point of view, your moral code, your history and your beliefs" with Voyager. Half of the crew were Maquis.
    SPOILER: They adapted to the more "by the book" Starfleet point of view, which proved more beneficial to their survival than the alternative approach.
    Still, some rules were broken.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
  122. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

    >So the stereotype of Star Trek fans being white male basement dwelling virgins is false?

    It's been something like 15 years since I last went to a convention... but the attendees were from pretty much every walk of life regardless of whether you sliced by economic class, ethnicity, sexual orientation, age, or job.

    There was a statistical deviation from the normal distribution when it came to social skills (and yes, some inept guys creeping harmlessly but still creepily on the girls) and physical fitness (lots of obese and painfully thin people, muscles were far and few between), but there was still a bell curve with all points represented. Mostly younger, because it's less likely a whole family will want to go to a con, or a spouse will be pleased with losing their partner for a few days. (I stopped going because of kids... who grew up to not be scifi fans).

    I'd definitely have to say that they tended to be nicer and more accepting than the average random person you might meet.

    My understanding is that these days it's skewing closer to the norm as being 'nerdy' about things has lost a fair bit of the old stigma that used to apply.

  123. Saved me from watching! by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 2

    I started to get interested, then this one character says his entire race was engineered for the sole purpose of "sensing death".

    That's the stupidest thing I've heard on TV this year. Is there a writer's strike going on and the producer's fourteen-year-old nephew got the screenplay job?

    Fire the script editor (and at least one writer) if you want this show to last seven years.

    --
    My God, it's Full of Source!
    OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    1. Re:Saved me from watching! by Reziac · · Score: 1

      I thought that was interesting (and a nice crosscurrent to the character's unappealing face) but I suspect it'll be used as the series' deus ex machina.

      --
      ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
  124. Re:The Quota Show by freeze128 · · Score: 1

    And Janeway was originally going to be French too, but they replaced the actor after some test footage didn't turn out as they had hoped.

    The Janeway CHARACTER wasn't going to be French, but the actress was! They replaced her because she wasn't willing to dedicate herself to the show. The French are used to all sorts of workers rights that we don't have in the US. They have limited work hours, more mandatory time off, etc.

    While the other actors would be putting in 12 hour days for shooting, she would go home after 8.

  125. Re:The Quota Show by freeze128 · · Score: 1

    Do you consider Admiral Ackbar 'white'?

  126. Re:The Quota Show by penandpaper · · Score: 1

    Well there is that one. I was thinking of "The Outsider" (I think). Still with Riker though.

  127. Re:Trailers are supposed to sell a serie ... by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

    >There was a Stargate SG1 episode where they were reluctantly trying to make a movie. There were several kind of parodies like the Wizard of Oz, Farscape

    Some of my favourite Stargate memories are the self-aware stuff they threw in. Especially 'Wormhole X-Treme'.

    It hasn't aged well, though. I mean, the basic concepts are solid but going back and re-watching a lot of it comes across as 'filler', low-effort stuff. And certainly low budget... most of the alien ship interiors were so Spartan they were barely there.

    But it was always fun, wasn't it?

  128. Re:The Quota Show by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 2, Informative

    You, like most Americans, overestimate the size of the gay population. This is not surprising, as gays have done an extraordinary job seeing to it that they are over-represented in pop culture (as I have indicated above). The Washington Post -- hardly a bastion of evangelical redneck conservatism -- reports that "More specifically, 1.8 percent of men self-identify as gay and 0.4 percent as bisexual, and 1.5 percent of women self-identify as lesbian and 0.9 percent as bisexual." So, yeah, 1-2 percent, like I said; less than half of the 5% you indicated. No where's near the percentage as portrayed in pop culture.

    All that said, having worked in media and entertainment industries for my entire adult life, I would make an educated estimation that 25-30 percent of the "creatives" working professionally are openly gay (...and the remaining 70-75 percent are terrified of saying or writing something that will piss them off). So the fact that the "gay population" of pop culture characters skews so fabulously wrong is no surprise.

    The History books were written by straight white Christian men; the Future History (science fiction) is being written by multi-racial gay people. Ironic...

  129. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    One sledgehammer in 200+ episodes vs. a dozen sledgehammers in a single movie. Compare.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  130. Re:The Quota Show by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

    Roddenberry was cheating on his spouse with someone over whom he had significant authority.

    To be fair, he was already in a relationship with Barrett before she was cast in the show. So the "cheating" preceded the authority.

  131. Re:The Quota Show by Wulf2k · · Score: 1

    I have no stake in the racial makeup of the cast, but I still have no clue what the show's about.

    From day one, all I've heard about this show is that they were looking to check all the appropriate diversity boxes. Long before they had a premise, director, scriptwriter, etc, they were damn sure it was going to be about a certain mix of races and genders.

    And that's really still all I know about the show.

  132. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Actually, all the all-powerful Jedi in Star Wars have their weak points. Usually hubris, which makes a lot of sense considering that they wield incredible powers compared to the average Joe Gunslinger.

    That's also the basic theme of Star Wars, when you look at it closely. Break the rules and it will be your downfall. Also that prophecies will come true in ways that you don't expect. Because Anakin DID bring balance to the force, which was tipped incredibly far towards the light side before he turned Sith.

    But that's not really the topic now.

    With all their power, all Jedi have shortcomings that allow for character development and growth. I can't really say the same for some Star Trek characters I had to endure, especially in the more recent past.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  133. Re:The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 1

    Just use your common sense. Sure minorities can identify with white male leads. They've been doing it for years. In fact I've been doing it for years and I'm not white. And it goes both ways. How many white kids grew up on Jackie Chan movies?

    But common sense should also tell you that there's a big difference between identifying with a protagonist who happens to look like you and never seeing anyone like you in a lead role. You can't logically defend the position that minorities should be satisfied with nothing but white male protagonists but that white males can't put up with anything else. If minority women can identify with a white male character then white men can identify with a minority woman character. In fact, some of my favorite characters are white women, like Granny Weatherwax in the Discworld novels.

    Let me be clear: it's perfectly OK by me if a protagonist is a white male. Representation of minorities in non-traditional roles is a praiseworthy thing, but shouldn't be compulsory. The solution to representation isn't to set yourself up as the diversity (or uniformity) police. It's to seek out the kind of stories you want, or better yet, write them.

    But even if you do seek out stories with a certain kind of protagonist, don't write off ones that don't fit that narrow profile. That's just narrow-minded. Think of how much you'd miss if you had such a superficial filter. For all you know this black female captain might end up being your favorite. That's not likely, but it's not because she's a black woman, it's because making a character with broad appeal is really, really difficult.

    --
    Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
  134. Re:The Quota Show by FictionPimp · · Score: 1

    Doctor Who? An alien with a different set of values takes along everyday humans who try to persuaded him that their human values are the 'right' way to do things, often he relents and becomes 'more human'.

  135. Re:The Quota Show by Tesen · · Score: 1

    Thank you for being willing to say this on your main account. I'm still not.

    Still not openly racist eh?

  136. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    In my job, like in my movies, I want the person that fits best for whatever is to be done. As far as I'm concerned, he/she/it/insertpronounofchoicehere can be pink and purple polka dotted.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  137. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    So the male hero falling in love with a dumb blonde bombshell is sexist against women and the female heroine falling in love with the dumb hunka-hunka muscle shirt idiot is sexist against women.

    Could anyone give me an example what would NOT be?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  138. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

    I'm British. It's around 5%, maybe a little more.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  139. Re:The Quota Show by Vegan+Cyclist · · Score: 1

    You joke (I hope), because you're wrong..

  140. Re:Operation is impossible :-/ by phayes · · Score: 1

    The point is that the AC I replied to is a lazy twerp.

    For articles that are paywalled, putting in the non-paywalled version in the summary is preferable and when this is forgotten and I have mod points, I reward the first to post it. However, I do not expect people from the U.S to log into a proxy outside the U.S. just to check if an article's embedded video link is region limited*. When someone without the balls to log in posts "Hey it's not available here, you suck" -- WITHOUT even making the effort to post the results of a 4 word web search, well that's stupidity worthy of mockery.

    * Were _you_ to post an article containing an embedded video to slashdot, would _you_ use proxies to make sure that the embedded video works in South America, Africa, Eastern & Western Europe, Africa, the Near east, Japan, Australia & China? No, me neither.

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  141. Re:The Quota Show by snookiex · · Score: 1

    I've heard that in this version, Q is Mexican and he's not going to pay for his force fields.

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  142. Re:The Quota Show by Powercntrl · · Score: 2

    94% straight? In other words, 6% gay. Which means that the show over-represents gays in the ship's population by a factor of 2x to 3x, compared to current conventional population stats.

    There are zero crewed interstellar capable starships today, too. Are you going to claim this show over-represents our space program by such-and-such factor, too?

    Let me help you out here: The show is science fiction. Notice the "fiction". If the writers wanted to make the crew all black, or all British, or entirely talking dogs - they can. See, that's what fiction means - there's no need for the writing to based in fact.

    But if you badly need a real-world example, go to Disney World in Orlando, and witness that a significant portion of the employees ("cast members" in Disney newspeak) are gay. Bonus points if you run around the park shouting "Statistically, this is inconceivable!"

    --

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  143. Re:The Quota Show by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 1

    You must be new to this whole online forum thing, sweet pea. Read the whole thread through before you respond indignantly to just one post in it. Animojo and I covered the whole "gays-in-the-entertainment-industry" numbers in a later post.

  144. Re:Operation is impossible :-/ by 91degrees · · Score: 1

    WITHOUT even making the effort to post the results of a 4 word web search, well that's stupidity worthy of mockery.

    That's fair enough.

  145. Re:The Quota Show by barc0001 · · Score: 1

    There's a LOT of problems I see with this show from the trailer. Racial quotas isn't one of them.

    The biggest issue is it's JJVerse Trek as a series. All shiny, no substance and if it follows the movies' lead, plot holes big enough to drive a planet through.

  146. Re:The Quota Show by cyberchondriac · · Score: 1

    Yes, and it obviously worked, as 200something episodes will tell.

    What Star Trek did right back then, and what it utterly fails at here, is that diversity is a good thing, but beating it into people with a sledgehammer is not. You see, people don't like that. Uhura was a black female as the communications officer. Back then that was an "impossibility". Not only a woman, not only a black person, but a black woman as an officer!

    The real impact of it all was, though, that it was treated as a non-issue. They didn't parade her and try to "make a point" out of it, "look we are so progressive, we have a black female officer!". No, it was treated as normal. Which made in my opinion the even stronger point.

    On one hand, I agree: they did it right; they didn't make a big deal of Lt. Uhuru's character; she was treated as equally as anyone else on the ship without so much as a second thought, which was so well done. She got no more or no less attention than a character of her rank and position would warrant. She was just another character of the cast. I think that made it easier to accept for a lot of people.
    OTOH, back in the wider real world, this casting was still a bit of culture shock, and could hit like a sledgehammer just by it's very existence. Nichelle Nichol's recalls how at one point, she was going to quit the show (I don't remember why) but MLK talked her into staying, because of the message it sent. But I guess you're right in that the show wasn't promoted ad nauseum with social justice mantras like shows today sometimes are, everyone tripping over each other to out virtue-signal the other. It just was. That's the best way to integrate.
    Or as Morgan Freeman says, "The way to stop racism is to stop talking about it". Of course by that he didn't mean ignore it, but for everyone to simply make race a non-issue, stop stirring the pot, and just treat everyone the same.

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  147. Re:The Quota Show by jellomizer · · Score: 1

    If you are portraying the future, then having a cast of mixed race indivuals vs the token minority makes more sense.
    Over half of our population is Asian, Africans have a wider genetic biodiversity. As transportation increases people are going to be hooking up across skin color shades.
    They are also a large pool of talented actors who belong to minority groups who get forced to play token parts. Perhaps for this they found the best actors for the show regardless of their race, and happen to get a more diverse team.

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  148. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

    >plot holes big enough to drive a planet through.

    That's nothing new to Trek, even from the very early days of the original series.

    Then again, TOS was pretty much an anthology series with a consistent cast and set dressing. With the heavily episodic nature, I don't think they worried too much about individual story problems that would just be ignored the next week anyway.

  149. Re:The Quota Show by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 2

    Yes! Mustn't exclude the trans population!

    But seriously, learn some math, or at least some statistics: 1.8 percent of MEN, i.e., 1.8 percent of 50 percent of the population, or just 0.9 percent of the overall population. 1.5 percent of WOMEN, same thing...

    Thanks for playing.

  150. Not on OTA broadcast? Too bad.. by Rick+Schumann · · Score: 1

    If it's not available on OTA broadcast, then I guess I'll never see this, even if it's good. Maybe if someone pirates it for me (I'd never do such a thing myself, though, LOL, that would be breaking the law!) or someone else I know is willing to actually pay, I might go see it at their house, but otherwise? I stopped paying for cable for a reason, and paying for 'streaming' is just like paying for cable. No thanks.

    No worries. Chances are it'll be garbage anyway. The Rick Berman era of Star Trek movies and series was far from perfect, but it also had some pretty great moments in it. The new generation of millennial-driven content leaves me flat; it's all 'artificially Star Trek-flavored', ersatz, not the real thing so far as I'm concerned. Reboots don't always work.

  151. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

    Star Trek has never really been about the future of humanity, though. It's been about the future of humanity, if the future is entirely descended from the present-day USA, and a thinly-veiled reflection of the society that is creating the show.

    By that measure, 72% of the cast should be white, 12% black, 5% Asian, and 9% 'mixed or other' (figures rounded). And women should make up 5-15% of the command-level (lower as you go up the authority scale).

    There's a reason TOS had space-hippies and miniskirts, no women in command, and a couple of half-white, half-black guys trying to kill each other for all eternity. And Klingons were more or less Russian analogues and Romulans stand-ins for the Chinese. (Though sometimes it felt like the writers mixed the two group's traits fairly freely)

    It is kind of funny that the wholesome American Christian farm-boy hero from Iowa was played by a Canadian Jew from Quebec, though.

  152. Re:The Quota Show by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    It's mandatory to be a lesbian?

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  153. Errr by bhcompy · · Score: 1

    I thought Jason Isaacs was advertised as the captain?

  154. Re:The Quota Show by OhSoLaMeow · · Score: 1

    Resistance is futile you will be assimilated

    How about capacitance? Is that futile?

    --
    They can take my LifeAlert pendant when they pry it from my cold dead fingers.
  155. Re:The Quota Show by rhazz · · Score: 1

    You joke, but in the last two Star Wars films there hasn't been a single white male character who wasn't either grandfathered in (Han Solo and Luke Skywalker) or a villain.

    Actually there were. Sure, white male characters no longer make up the vast majority of roles like they used to, but they are hardly under-represented unless you're cherry-picking. Also, what is wrong with playing a villain? Was Heath Ledger's Joker a secret SJW plot to make white people look like psychotic murderers?

  156. Re:The Quota Show by rhazz · · Score: 1

    Unfortunately people seem to imagine being lectured and then blame the imaginary lecturer in real life for it.

    This is what I don't understand. Is there any point that a black person be in a role without people whining about quotas? What about Will Smith, Denzel Washington, Wesley Snipes... did people make the same complaints in the 90s?

  157. Re:The Quota Show by sh00z · · Score: 1

    Thanks. Terry Serpico alone turns it into a non-watcher. I forgot how awful he is until he appeared again on "Designated Survivor." Sure, he could do a mirror-universe Anthony Michael Hall, but that's it.

  158. Re:The Quota Show by Mordaximus · · Score: 1

    Star Trek has always been quite diverse, by TV standards.

    Pilot - Number One was a woman
    Original Series - Black woman, east Asian man, Russian and Scot in the main cast
    Next Generation - Many female and black characters, Picard was French
    Deep Space 9 - Black captain
    Voyager - Female captain and chief engineer, Native American second in command

    I didn't even mention the black/east Asian members of the crew in the later ones, they were so normal (for Trek) by that point. And Janeway was originally going to be French too, but they replaced the actor after some test footage didn't turn out as they had hoped.

    They were diverse, but up until Voyager, they weren't pushing an agenda. I remember an interview with Kate Mulgrew, slightly before the premiere of Voyager. To paraphrase "[Janeway] is a woman and the best captain in starfleet." But it was toned in such a way that you would expect that the woman part was a disadvantage where the Treks before had already, at least in the fiction, dissolved that prejudice. Voyager felt very forced; black vulcan, woman half Klingon, native american. As though there were trying to make a point of how diverse they were being, rather than just being diverse."

  159. Re:The Quota Show by sh00z · · Score: 1

    ... AFAICT, the only two human white guys in the cast are an Academy cadet and a science officer, and they've already announced that the science officer will be gay.

    The word is that Rainn Wilson is playing Harry Mudd.

  160. Re:The Quota Show by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 1

    No, because social CURRENT leads the societal POTENTIAL for change...

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  161. Re:The Quota Show by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 1

    Ok, but what would the demographics be like post-Eugenics Wars?

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  162. Re:Trailers are supposed to sell a serie ... by Thanatiel · · Score: 1

    It was.

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  163. Re:The Quota Show by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 4, Informative

    You're trying to say that Oscar Issac Hernandez Estrada, born to a Guatemalan mother and Cuban father, in Guatemala, is white?

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  164. Re:The Quota Show by barc0001 · · Score: 1

    >>plot holes big enough to drive a planet through.

    >That's nothing new to Trek, even from the very early days of the original series.

    Sure, but I'd argue the JJ movies were an order of magnitude worse. Or two. Basic logic doesn't even come into it because the movies were focused on creating a spectacle regardless of whether it made sense or not, so much so that I truly believe Abrams and the rest of the writers worked backwards from a cool visual to make it fit.

    Example: "Starship crashing into the ocean in San Fran? How do we make that happen?" "They have a fight in the area of lunar orbit, lose power and fall to Earth". "COOL, run with it!" Which ignores things a 10 year old with an interest in space could point out.

    - If they were in lunar orbit when they lost power, they're not going anywhere. They're in ORBIT.
    - If they were only in lunar 'space' and weren't actually in orbit, they aren't going to crash to Earth, they'll fall into the lunar surface
    - Assuming they had enough velocity before power loss to exceed lunar escape velocity, the Earth is a tiny target about the size of a golf ball held at arms length from the Moon. The chances of hitting it are pretty damn small
    - Even if they do hit the Earth it'll take DAYS to get there.

    And my biggest problem with that scene, two starships - including the Federation flagship - just had a shit kicking battle with each other in plain sight of the Federation's seat of power, the headquarters of Starfleet, and the biggest shipyard in the Federation that sits in Earth orbit. You don't think MAYBE someone would have noticed? And then watched an uncontrolled starship headed for San Francisco and gotten a couple of tugs out there to stop it, or slapped a monster tractor beam on it right from spacedock? Of course they would have. But that wouldn't have been cool and let the super roided freak Khan run around after crashing into San Fran.

  165. Re:The Quota Show by Powercntrl · · Score: 1

    Read the whole thread through before you respond indignantly to just one post in it. Animojo and I covered the whole "gays-in-the-entertainment-industry" numbers in a later post.

    Don't care where the thread started or to which level of hell it sinks to - your argument is logical fallacy, plain and simple. The percentage of gays depicted in a work of fiction requires no more basis in reality than the number of talking animals, wizards, aliens, trolls, non-corporeal entities, etc.

    If inaccurate depictions of social demographics in a sci-fi show (where people regularly risk their lives on interstellar space missions, encounter hostile aliens, and don't even get paid for it) bothers you so much, don't watch it. I'm sure there's some great documentaries on Netflix you can watch instead.

    BTW, for future reference, if you and Animojo don't want people just jumping in with their 2, exchange phone numbers and have your glorious gays-in-Trek arguments over text. Whatever charges your anti-matter converter...

    --

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    DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
  166. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    we had to sit through a few too many movies where "diversity" became the main theme with everything else

    #define "few too many" and "which movies.

  167. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    So... "a few too many is "just one movie that revisited a franchise with an all female cast for the main 4 characters"?

  168. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    1. male hero falling in love with a smart blonde woman
    2. female hero falling in love with a smart blonde man
    3. male hero falling in love with a smart blonde man
    4. female hero falling in love with a smart blonde woman

  169. Re:The Quota Show by Powercntrl · · Score: 1

    Maybe because we had to sit through a few too many movies where "diversity" became the main theme

    Actually, the most compelling argument I've heard as to why Hollywood movies feature "diverse" casts and more CGI eye-candy than substance, is because it translates well when released globally.

    In other words, they're not trying to appeal to the average straight, white US male because there's money to be made elsewhere.

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  170. Re: The Quota Show by NotInfinitumLabs · · Score: 2

    That unnamed executive was almost certainly Gene Roddenberry.

  171. Re:The Quota Show by ranton · · Score: 1

    He certainly did mess up the math, but then again so did you. Nearly all of the studies and surveys listed in the Wiki page posted above put the total percentage of non-heterosexual at around 5%. Even the Gallup poll you linked to put the number at 3.8%, and their methodology didn't include anyone who refused to answer the question (4.4% in 2012).

    There are many methodologies for trying to estimate an accurate size of the LGBT community, but all of them at least agree the number is around 5%.

    This TV show has only one gay person, putting it at around 5.6%. Since the only possibilities are 0%, 5.6%, 11.1% ... 5.6% was clearly the closest figure. Even if the real number was only 3.8%, with 18 crew members there would be a 50% chance of zero LGBT crew members, 35% chance of one, 12% chance of two, and so on. There is certainly nothing odd about a show with at least one LGBT cast member if probably around half of all shows should have at least one LGBT cast member. And probably around a quarter of them should have at least two (at least ones with a dozen+ cast members).

    --
    -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
  172. Re:The Quota Show by hey! · · Score: 1

    In a scorched earth war you attack the enemy's most valuable assets. This likely isn't going to be shantytowns in South Asia or Africa, it's going to be the greatest concentrations of wealth you can find. This would be bad for North America, Europe, Japan, and coastal China.

    H. Beam Piper's future history series posits exactly such a war, which is why in his later stories people with Northern European surnames are a rarity (although somewhat more likely to be a protagonist). It's a small detail, but it makes sense.

    It was in this vein that I asked the author of an unpublished manuscript I'd been given to review, why is there nobody with a Hispanic surname? He got all huffy about "political correctness", but my problem was that this was a post-apocalyptic story set in Southern California, where already Latinos outnumber Anglos. It was OK by me if he didn't want to write any Latino characters, but it made no sense that the apocalypse would selectively wipe out everyone with a Spanish name. All he needed was to come up with some plausible explanation, like an India/Pakistan style partition.

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  173. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    You're mostly talking about aliens. As far as I can tell, in the entire Star Trek universe, Chakotay was the only religious human. And his religion was lame. I'm not even sure it counts as a "religion" so much as "I'm holding on to some neat stories from my distant ancestors but don't really believe in any of this spirit crap."

    Remember, Starfleet is an organization working for the Federation government, which takes queues from the principles of the US government where church and state are kept separate.

    Starfleet is also a pseudo-military organization, if not in name then in practice. The military isn't your liberalized college campus. It's not about building a home here. It's out there to do its job, and its job doesn't/isn't supposed to involve religion.

    But there's chaplains for every faith in the military. So if Star Fleet were like the modern military, there would still be a chapel and a chaplain on the Enterprise.

    Regardless, all I'm saying is the argument that humans in Star Trek wouldn't have religion because religion is irrational isn't a good argument because they wouldn't have their irrational "life is precious" values or the Prime Directive if they were purely rational. Hell, believing "life is precious just because" is less rational than believing "life is precious because God."

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  174. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Hammering it home would have meant that they used every other episode to showcase how they're not as backwards as they "used to be" (read: as they are in the 1960s) and making a point about Uhura being black. Actually, I don't even remember a single occasion where her skin color became an issue in the show.

    While her skin color/ethnicity might not have been an issue it was brought up in the show.

    SULU: Iâ(TM)ll protect you, fair maiden!
    UHURA: Sorry, neither.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    KIRK: Lieutenant Uhura of communications.
    TRELANE: Ah a Nubian prize. (he kisses her hand) Taken on one of your raids of conquest, no doubt, Captain.
    KIRK: No doubt.

    UHURA (to crewmen) The door to my quarters still rattles when it opens. Would you stop by and see if you can do something about it? Thanks, Bobby. (Green changes into African crewman) Crewman, do I know you?
    CREWMAN: In a way, ma'am. You were just thinking of someone like me. I'm guessing of course, but you do look a little lonely.
    UHURA: I see. So naturally, when I'm lonely I think of you.
    CREWMAN: Ina cuvanea mwanamke turee.
    UHURA: Una kafeeri Hur. You're Swahili?

    You can't really say that about the more recent past, even in TNG we had to be lectured about how backwards humans were (read: are in the reality) and how lucky they are that they overcame it.

    Aren't we backwards? and will we not be judged by our descendants like we judge our predecessors for their failings?

    Take a hint. People don't like being lectured. It creates resistance.

    You know what, all this anti-SJW stuff is basically a bunch of white guys complaining because having an african-american president and a woman running for said office "bothered" them on a subconsciously racist level.

    Those guys may not be "actively" bigoted, but the changes in society over time bothered them on a subconsciously bigoted level. And other things also subconsciously bothered them.

    more visible ethnic minorites in leading roles

    more women in leading roles

    women in leadership positions in business and politics

    women criticizing developer stupidity in the medium that you subconsciously think of as "belonging to guys"

    You get the picture. It's why the gamergaters often used "invaders" language in regards to women.

    Heck, in this very discussion I've seen Meta-monkey claim that Star Trek is basically a guy thing... for goshsakes, Star Trek of all things. Well known for having a large fanbase of women since the 60's!

    http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/...!

    Note that the book's authors are: Jacqueline Lichtenberg, Sondra Marshak, and Joan Winston.

  175. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    You did notice that it was one kiss in one episode of a 200+ episode show, I am confident.

    Yes, that kiss that was so unimportant that some TV stations across the South refused to show the episode with it. You forgot the context of HISTORY!

    Having Uhura...on the bridge as a comissioned officer itself was a HUGE statement in the context of HISTORY.,

    How soon we forget.

  176. Re:The Quota Show by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    It's just a way to undermine black people. Anything they achieve can be dismissed as someone filling a quota.

    --
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    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  177. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    It's Starfleet. There's a selection process.

    And note that the other candidates are:

    A Human woman, Oliana Mirren (the character became an Ops officer under Captain Dax on the Aventine)

    A Vulcan woman, T'Shanik (the character became flight controller on the Excalibur)

    A Benzite male, Mordock.

    Also note that one of the tests was to see if candidate Crusher would notice a minor difference of anatomy (webbed hands), and realize that someone who bumped into him wasn't human, but a near-human alien and know/remember the customs of that species.

  178. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    What movie? What are you talking about, the trailer for the SERIES?

    Geez louise, is the very presence of non-white/non-male characters that troubling to some people? I think it takes a special kind of "snowflake"..., to be that troubled by just SEEING non-male/non-white faces without any dialog to back up the justification for "dozen sledgehammers"

  179. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    I'm just talking about the show demographics. It doesn't matter who goes to conventions. What matters is people turning on the TV to watch a Star Trek show every week.

    What's the demographics of the target audience of Star Trek Discovery?

    Traditionally I'm pretty sure Star Trek TV show viewers skewed heavily white and male. If that hasn't changed, then are those white males going to identify enough with the diverse cast to keep them tuning in?

    If the target demographic has a different make up, is the number of people in that demographic that would watch a sci-fi TV show large enough to keep the show on the air?

    --
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  180. Re:The Quota Show by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 1

    Well, depends on the kind of war. If you're performing genocides, 'genetic cleansings' or what not, you'll likely absolutely be targeting the shanty towns and what not with NBC attacks (no pun intended.)

    And even if you aren't, those shanty towns aren't going to do so good when armies are marching and nukes are flying.

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  181. Re:The Quota Show by Baron_Yam · · Score: 1

    You know... there could have been a whole monster-type movie made with Khan on board the Enterprise as it spends a week falling towards Earth. (Let's say it had the appropriate velocity to intersect)

    Imagine Khan sneaking about the ship, killing off the crew and attempting to subvert systems. Lights flickering out, crew hunkering down in defensive positions, and Kirk knowing he has to kill Khan before the rescue ship / space tug arrives and provides a way to get to Earth.

    A little bit of script work and they could have pulled two or three good science fiction movies out of one mediocre action flick.

  182. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    What they didn't do before now was to feel exclusive of anyone who can't check off their proper SJW victimhood credentials.

    Why do you feel excluded? Really, there's white guys in that trailer, a LOT of them. For Goshsakes, there's over a BILLION people in China...there should be a LOT more chinese faces. Hell, did you hate on Firefly with all the Chinese influences?

    Geez louise, is the very presence of non-white/non-male characters that troubling to some people? I think it takes a special kind of "snowflake"..., to be that troubled by just SEEING non-male/non-white faces

    You know what, all this anti-SJW stuff is basically a bunch of white guys complaining because having an african-american president and a woman running for said office "bothered" them on a subconsciously racist level.

    Those guys may not be "actively" bigoted, but the changes in society over time bothered them on a subconsciously bigoted level. And other things also subconsciously bothered them.

    more visible ethnic minorites in leading roles

    more women in leading roles

    women in leadership positions in business and politics

    women criticizing developer stupidity in the medium that you subconsciously think of as "belonging to guys"

    You get the picture. It's why the gamergaters often used "invaders" language in regards to women.

    Heck, in this very discussion I've seen Meta-monkey claim that Star Trek is basically a guy thing... for goshsakes, Star Trek of all things. Well known for having a large fanbase of women since the 60's!

    http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/...!

    Note that the book's authors are: Jacqueline Lichtenberg, Sondra Marshak, and Joan Winston.

    It saddens me to think of a Star Trek universe where this lifelong fan is villainized just because I was born with white skin and a dick.

    No one would villainize you, if you didn't hop on the anti-SJW bandwagon because you're subconsciously BOTHERED seeing a few less white male faces.

  183. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    The Star Trek universe and fans had no problem with Captain Janeway,

    That's revisionist history. There were plenty of male fans complaining about Janeway, Sisko, Tuvok, and B'lanna, comments about feminism invading star trek or "affirmative action" casting. I even read comments about how there weren't any "black vulcans"

    * How many episodes feature themes of "social justice"? Because everyone who is a fan of TOS, TNG, DS9, and Voyager will puke.

    You obviously were only paying attention to the phaser blasts, explosions, the Theiss costumes on the women, if you don't realize how much all Star Trek is about Social Justice.

    Why do we know the sexual orientation of anyone in the series? Not one single person on any other Star Trek episode or movie ever announced their sexual orientation.

    The announced their orientation by their VERY actions. Kirk and various women, McCoy and "Nancy" in "The Man Trap" and Uhura in the same episode, Spock and Lela, Scotty and his girlfriend, Chekov and that girl in "The Apple". For goshsakes a couple got MARRIED on the ship in "Balance of Terror"

    You're so clueless you didn't even realize that heterosexuals do their announcing ALL THE TIME and don't even realize it.

  184. Re:The Quota Show by Darinbob · · Score: 1

    I didn't notice any sledgehammer in the preview.

  185. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    AFAICT, the only two human white guys in the cast are an Academy cadet and a science officer

    This is Star Trek, Earth is only one planet in a HUGE Federation...by all rights, there SHOULD be FEWER human white guys.

    Pretty sure that cadet's days are numbered too, or it will turn out that he's a villain, or an alien, or a transsexual, or gay.

    I'm transgender myself and you're all butthurt because ONE character on this show, after having Star Trek be around for over 50 years, is gay?

    Don't be a bigoted jerk, it goes against EVERYTHING Star Trek stands for.

  186. Re:The Quota Show by Darinbob · · Score: 1

    It was and wasn't unthinkable, depending upon where in the US you lived. In the south they hated that show with a passion. When Kirk and Uhura had a kiss, against their will, stations didn't air that episode. In other parts of the country it wasn't nearly as controversial, black officers had been in the US military for some time.

  187. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    They were diverse, but up until Voyager, they weren't pushing an agenda.......Voyager felt very forced; black vulcan, woman half Klingon, native american. As though there were trying to make a point of how diverse they were being, rather than just being diverse."

    Ah ha so you were one of these guys, (quoting myself)

    "There were plenty of male fans complaining about Janeway, Sisko, Tuvok, and B'lanna, comments about feminism invading star trek or "affirmative action" casting. I even read comments about how there weren't any "black vulcans""

    Dude...our entire Planet is diverse. There's over a billion Chinese and close a Billion people in India....and having a "black vulcan" and a "half klingon" is "very forced" in a Federation composed of a HUGE number of planets and races?

    YOU, dudebro, are the whiny snowflake.

  188. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Marvel Comics has taken a HUGE financial hit from switching almost all of their main characters over to females and minorities in the last few years.

    That's an exaggeration, there have been some "temporary" fill ins. Don't worry, dudebro, you'll still be able to have your comics with some overly muscled guy with pouches, a grimace, a sword AND a claw AND guns and a cyberlimb going all grimdark on everyone. "GRR I'm so grimdark and anti-heroic GRRR, my female partner with one half of her body pink and one half purple has breasts like volleyballs, GRRR. I'm DETHKYLL SLYCEBLUD and I rule!"

    (we're talking monthly sales of under 20,000 for titles that used to routinely sell in the 900,000+ range in their heydey).

    That's taken out of context and you know it, because you're comparing sales today to sales in the 80's/early 90's when comics sold more overall. And the decline is because of comics going all grimdark and dork age during the 90's not SJW's.

  189. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Why do you feel excluded? I mean after all, women outnumber men on our planet, and there are more non-white people than white people. Are you saying that as a white male, your kind should be "favored"

    See, that's the problem, you WERE and still are to a certain extent and you don't even realize it.

    And now, you see a few non-white/non-male faces on a TV show that you subconsciously think "belongs" to white male nerds and get all butthurt.

    Who is being the special snowflake here?

  190. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    This cast is actually demographically MORE natural than any of the other casts and it STILL doesn't reflect the reality of human demographics. You know, the demographics of there being over a BILLION Chinese people and close to a Billion people in India?

    The only one playing the victim here, is you.

  191. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    But if the racial mix is overwhelmingly nonwhite

    Dude Humanity is overwhelmingly non-white and this is a also a show set in multi-species FEDERATION for goshsakes.

    then that's going to make the show differ from most of what's on television (except for shows targeted at specific racial groups) and cause some people to feel upset about it.

    Some people meaning....racists?

  192. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Dude, did you just time travel from before Star Trek? Women have been HEAVILY involved in Star Trek fandom since the beginning!

    http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/...!

    Note that the book's authors are: Jacqueline Lichtenberg, Sondra Marshak, and Joan Winston.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    Star Trek: The New Voyages (1976) is an anthology of short fiction based on Star Trek edited by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath featuring work by fan fiction authors.[clarification needed] It was the first Star Trek short story collection, and the first original Star Trek prose to be published since Spock Must Die! published in 1970. The commissioning editor was Frederik Pohl, at Bantam Books. It was followed in 1978 by Star Trek: The New Voyages 2.[1]

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

    Star Trek: The New Voyages 2 edited by Sondra Marshak and Myrna Culbreath was the 1978 followup to the 1976 anthology Star Trek: The New Voyages. The editors contributed stories to the anthology, and had previously published a Star Trek novel, The Price of the Phoenix.

    Of the first 10 of Pocket's Star Trek books, starting with the novelization of the Motion picture, only 3 were written by men.

    Of the next 10, only 4 were written by men.

    A slightly more accurate stereotype of Star Trek fans would be "white female slashfic writers"

    I kid I kid.

  193. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Since I'm a white male, I can't relate so well to the struggles of the strong independent black and asian wymynz running the spaceship, so I probably won't find it interesting.

    Really? Did you just dismiss a show just because it doesn't have someone who looks like you in the captains chair?

    This show is not directed at me, it's directed at the little black and asian girls who want to fly a spaceship, and I'm fine with that.

    Really? Did you not watch Men in Black because Will Smith was the star? Did you not watch DS9 or Voyager? Did you not watch the original trek because Roddenberry, Shatner, Nimoy and Koenig were Jewish?

  194. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Else they would have been up in arms about Sisko and Janeway, too.

    You don't remember? The dudebro demographic WAS up in arms about Sisko and Janeway back in the day.

    Look, we are so cool, hip and progressive, we have a black captain, look at her, she is so great, she is so awesome, she is so black and she is so female!

    Yes. We got it. We don't give a shit. Can we now have, you know, A PLOT?

    You're making those statements based on just the trailer you know, perhaps you shouldn't prejudge the series based on the casting....or you might just come across as one of those alt-right ant-SJW types desperately trying to not appear as one, but who really is one.

    Just sayin.

  195. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    I think your subconscious biases towards wanting to see characters look like you is making you see patterns that aren't there.

    After all there were plenty of low-budget badly written and plotted white male muscle-y dude with a buzzcut beats up faceless commies/ islamic terrorist movies over the past decades but that was okay?

    But there's a non-white/non-male person in the captains chair in the new Star Trek show and it's the end of Nerdosity as we know it?

    Perhaps YOU are the snowflake that wants to be pandered to.

  196. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    I point you to my previous response to you in regards to Star Trek fandom and I must admit that I am VERY suprised as nerd that YOU didn't already know all of that as a nerd. Hand in your nerd card.

    Star Trek doesn't "belong" just to white male basement dwelling nerd virgins.

  197. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    What bothers me is that it becomes the focus of the show. We're not exploring exciting new worlds, we're exploring our feelings and how others hurt them.

    You got all that from the trailer, really? Before any episode of the show has aired? Don't you think you're letting your subconscious biases run amuck here?

  198. mod parent up by bussdriver · · Score: 1

    Parent is right. What bothers me most is that so many people seem to have completely missed the essentials of Star Trek -- they clearly didn't get it even if they liked it... somebody can just slap together an bizzaro Star Trek but put in some shallow references and fool way too many people.

    The curiosity of fans has CREATED these problems because that $$$ proved to the execs that there isn't anything there; they were right -- it's just the exploitation of pop culture and nothing more.

  199. Re: The Quota Show by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    You have a captain and a first officer who are both women, which would happen 25% of the time if men and women reached that rank equally often.

    Better hope their cycles don't get synchronised.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  200. Re:The Quota Show by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    Did you know all that, or did you have to look it up? If it's the former I totally bow to your awesome nerdosity.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  201. Meh by wirehead_rick · · Score: 1

    *yawn*

    Next . . .

    --
    -- Mean People Suck
  202. Re:The Quota Show by Half-pint+HAL · · Score: 1

    ...and this is why this whole notion of "race" makes no sense whatsoever. Someone who is pale-skinned and probably descended from white European settlers is not white because of the country of his origin.

    --
    Got them moderator blues I blieve I walk out the do', With these mod-points I been gettin', I 'most never post no mo'
  203. Re: The Quota Show by WheezyJoe · · Score: 1

    That unnamed executive was almost certainly Gene Roddenberry.

    Got anything that sheds light on that theory? Anything to cite? Ms. Whitney was scarred for life by that incident.
    Not saying you're wrong, per se, 'cause the truth has likely gone to the grave. But that's a hell of a thing to accuse a man of without something to back it.

    --
    Take it easy, Charlie, I've got an Angle...
  204. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Gender is what is in your head, not your genetics, join the 21st century sometime.

    What you are describing are called intersex conditions.

    And before you go on some kind of anti-SJW/hipster/milleniel/snowflake/GLBT rant, "the trans" has been around throughout human history. In fact one of the seminal works about it was written over a century ago, in 1910. This isn't some "new" thing being "forced" on you here.

  205. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    I remembered the scenes in general, but only remembered the exact dialog for the Uhura-Sulu scene and Lincoln's "charming negress" line. There is one other that I thought of after the fact:

    When Uhura got her brain scrambled by the probe Nomad, she ended up in sickbay having to relearn things. (IIRC the Blish novelization says she didn't lose her memories, just some of the connections between them....lost the novelizations in a move) A scene happens where she is being taught reading (in English) and is having bit of trouble she speaks Swahili at Nurse Chapel who says something like "Not Swahili, in English". Uhura looks at the page and says something about a ball.

    The book I remembered because I owned it at one time, lost it in the same move as above, had to look up the authors to be sure though I did remember that Marshak was one of them.

  206. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    I've always wondered if Roddenberry had a "thing" for Diana Muldaur as well.

  207. Galaxy Quest by antdude · · Score: 1

    Basically, it's Galaxy Quest movie for TV. Not sure if this Orville will be good. I didn't find its preview funny. Same for Young Sheldon as a TBBT fan.

    --
    Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
  208. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    How? All I did was point out HIS subconscious bigotry, which isn't racist no matter what you alt-right/gamergater/anti-SJW's think.

  209. Re: The Quota Show by Antique+Geekmeister · · Score: 1

    Especially if you consider his wife, Majel Barrett. I find it difficult to picture that amazing woman tolerating a husband who behaved so poorly.

  210. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Let's just wait and see how it pans out. Maybe they finally notice that plot and character development are more important than the all holy grail of diversity.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  211. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Frankly, I don't give a shit what I come across to you, or anyone. If you want to attach a label to me, put it on the pile behind me, I'll ignore it later. I think there's still some room between fascist, communist, treehugger and neocon.

    I would really love to see a series again that isn't concerned with not huwting a widdle feeling but actually manages to deliver an entertaining plot and convincing characters. Yes, that includes that characters have flaws and will face obstacles. Because without it is the same bland bullshit we've been fed time and again recently. I don't want a feelgood show, I want one where I can actually have some emotional attachments to the characters because they are human.

    Fuck, I wouldn't be surprised if the aliens are the most human beings in this show because they are still "allowed" to have flaws without having to be totally evil.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  212. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Less subconscious, more an expectation extrapolated from the rubbish produced recently. It seems to me that character flaws and character development have been outlawed in Hollywood.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  213. Re: The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Where can you still watch that episode? After all, Lincoln uses the N-word to describe Uhura, you can't have that on TV!

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  214. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Odd. Last time I checked I was neither in the US nor an average, straight, white male. And it still doesn't appeal to me.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  215. Re: The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    I just had this mental picture of Obama fucking Merkel...

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  216. Re:The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    Want to discuss my problem with unbelievable, stereotypical, bland and flawless characters now?

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  217. Re: The Quota Show by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    If we're talking about a love story, great idea.

    If we're talking any other genre, please let me get to the exit.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  218. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    Perhaps YOU are the snowflake that wants to be pandered to.

    Yes. Lots of things that used to pander to me, like comic books, they replaced with stuff that panders to someone else and changed the plots to revolve around how people like me are evil. So I don't really want to buy them so much any more. Escapism shouldn't be masochism.

    I don't expect feminist power fantasy shows to have plots about how feminists are bitchy man haters. I don't expect black power fantasy shows to have plots about how blacks are lazy and stupid. When my white male nerd power fantasy show has the white male nerds replaced with black women, it kind of makes me wonder what the plots are going to be like. If it fits the recent patterns of formerly geek-oriented comics and movies, it's going to be full of snarky asides about how awful people like me are, and I'm probably not going to want to watch it. I'll give Discovery a shot because Star Trek, but my expectations are low because Hollywood SJWs.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  219. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    Do you have any stats for the demographics of the viewership of the shows, though? Ratings are what keep shows on the air. What's the breakdown by race and gender of the people watching at home?

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  220. Re:The Quota Show by Antique+Geekmeister · · Score: 1

    There are also Diane Duane's thoughtful and true to the original series 10 novels. These included "Spock's World" and "My Enemy, My Ally" that gave historical and thoughtful structure to Vulcans, to Romulans, and to their relationship.

  221. 000-DESTRUCT-1 by VirtualJWN · · Score: 1

    WELL the CHICOM / UBER LIBERAL takeover of Hollywood is complete. This is unwatchable FUBAR! Count me out. What a pathetic trailer. CBS should have the NETFLIX team develop the show. This "Re-Imagine horse crap" (aka pirate someone else's idea and EFF it up) is wearing thin with me. SO many other directions the series could take they picked THIS? What about Midway between Enterprise and TOS??? introducing a whole new set of characters. Child Spock....really! What a cop out. Looks like an activists dream platform though, yet another interpretation of Klingons. Whos the "social consultant" Barbara Walters? Sort of reminds me of "The View'" in space. Continuity full reverse!! Enterprise was the last Star Trek "Anything" that I truly felt was Roddenberry's vision. Abrams movies could literally have been slightly rewritten to fit in ANY story universe. This looks like a sexist racist approach to a new audience using a much loved backstory with 50 years of fans. "new" Ghostbusters goes in space could be the title! I WONT BE WATCHING THIS CRAP!

    --
    "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Arthur C. Clarke
  222. Re:The Quota Show by Reziac · · Score: 1

    Doesn't matter -- he has the requisite surname to check off that 'minority' box.

    --
    ~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
  223. I look much more forward to..... by MerlTurkin · · Score: 1

    "The Orville" on FOX! Star Trek is over done. You can't beat the original.

  224. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    Except comic book sales are in the toilet. So if capitalism is to blame, it's capitalism done very poorly.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  225. Re: The Quota Show by interstellarsurfer · · Score: 1

    So the white males are hidden under alien makeup? Does that even count? I dont think it did with Michael Dorn.

  226. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Don't forget her Rihannsu series!

  227. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    I think you're looking at the past with rose colored glasses. Plenty of modern TV shows and movies have characters with flaws.

    Besides there was plenty of dreck in the past that everyone forgets because it doesn't get re-run.

  228. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    In fact it was the Dark Age that lowered sale comic books, before that readership was higher AND more diverse, so you can't blame SJW's.

    http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmw...

    http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmw...

    Besides comic sales today are HIGHER than they were in 2001.

  229. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Yes. Lots of things that used to pander to me, like comic books, they replaced with stuff that panders to someone else and changed the plots to revolve around how people like me are evil.

    Why should comics pander to YOU specifically, why can't they be for EVERYONE? What makes you, the white male nerd who calls others "normies" such a "special snowflake"

    When my white male nerd power fantasy show has the white male nerds replaced with black women, it kind of makes me wonder what the plots are going to be like.

    What? Star Trek wasn't supposed to be a Nerd Power Fantasy show, the entire premise is one of Tolerance, Justice, mercy, compassion, the search for knowledge, helping others. Star Trek NEVER belonged to just one group of fans. So you've decided against a show...JUST because it doesn't have someone who looks like you in the Captains chair?

    Hey, maybe you shouldn't have watched TOS because after all, Shatner, Nimoy, Koenig AND Roddenberry are Jewish, and thusly not like you.

    but my expectations are low because Hollywood SJWs.
    Flag as Inappropriate

    Why are you blaming SJW's for changes due to Capitalism? There's more money in making shows for EVERYONE, not just the stereotypical neckbearded fedora wearing, linux using aspies who call others "normies"

    I say that as someone who DOES have "asperger's features" and DOES use Linux.

  230. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    I would really love to see a series again that isn't concerned with not huwting a widdle feeling but actually manages to deliver an entertaining plot and convincing characters. Yes, that includes that characters have flaws and will face obstacles. Because without it is the same bland bullshit we've been fed time and again recently. I don't want a feelgood show, I want one where I can actually have some emotional attachments to the characters because they are human.

    I'm sorry, are we watching the same modern TV? Did you time travel from an alternate universe or something? Modern TV most certainly has characters with flaws and obstacles. I think you're letting your subconscious biases cause you to look at the past with rose colored glasses and overlook some of the great modern TV.

    There has always been badly plotted and badly characterized drek, it's not just an "SJW caused problem" as you seem to think.

  231. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    I know you're wanting justification for your "Star Trek belongs to white male nerds" mindset.

    Just stop, really, stop. Star Trek belongs to everyone, its fandom is and always has been diverse for the TV shows and books. Star Trek is not just for basement dwelling nerds, can't you get it through your head?

  232. Re:The Quota Show by radarskiy · · Score: 1

    Max von Sydow, Mads Mikkelsen, and Greg Gundberg aren't white?

    Huge if true!

    (I left out Alan Tudyk who did mo-cap, to avoid the obvious goalpost-moving)

  233. Re:The Quota Show by mjwx · · Score: 1

    2 words: Babylon 5.

    Andreas Katsulas (RIP, died 11 years ago yesterday) spent 3 hours per shooting day in a makup chair to look like Ambassador G'Kar. Because this was expensive and time consuming, most of the aliens ended up looking quite human in most SciFi shows.

    CGI hasn't changed this much, but we haven't had any Sci-Fi quite like Star Trek or Babylon 5 in many years so it hasn't been given a chance.

    --
    Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
  234. Re:The Quota Show by mjwx · · Score: 1

    but the whole cultural/religious angle felt too forced.

    Here's some diversity that might actually make for an interesting character on STar Trek: human characters that aren't all atheists/agnostics. Give me a Catholic science officer. Or maybe the weapons officer is a muslim and he goes Space Jihad on fuckers.

    I'd like to think that by the 24th century, we'd be beyond things like that.

    At an interview before ST:TNG launched he was asked by the interviewer about Patrick Stewart "By the 24th century, wouldn't they have found a cure for male pattern baldness". His response was"By the 24th century, no-one would care".

    That's the brilliant thing about ST, its not the diversity, but the fact that they carry on as if none of it matters, living in a diverse environment is not even thought about and differences in skin colour are no big deal. ST, especially with the later series often touched the subject of spirituality but usually did so using the aliens instead of humans (the Prophets were a central plot line in DS9). I think this was a decision by the studios, writers tend to have fewer fears about offending snowflakes.

    Related to this, the Mass Effect series of games had a few controversial choices, whilst gay characters got all the press, I thought it was the inclusion of how to react to one characters Christianity was the boldest thing they did.

    --
    Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
  235. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    I'm just wondering if anyone will watch the show.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  236. Re:The Quota Show by meta-monkey · · Score: 1

    Why should comics pander to YOU specifically, why can't they be for EVERYONE? What makes you, the white male nerd who calls others "normies" such a "special snowflake"

    I'd say mainly because I actually like the things, and watch the shows. Being a superhero or a space captain seems to be a white male nerd fantasy, not a black woman fantasy. So they replace Tony Stark in the Iron Man comics with a black girl and sales tank. The white males reading Iron Man didn't identify with the black girl, and it seems black girls don't identify with Iron Man, at least not enough to go buy comic books.

    So you've decided against a show...JUST because it doesn't have someone who looks like you in the Captains chair?

    I said I'd watch it. But my prediction is I won't enjoy it as much as I would have if the characters were people I could more easily identify with, so my interest may wane. And that not enough people who do identify with the people they put in the captain's chair will identify with sci-fi space exploration stuff. The ratings will suffer and the show will go off the air. Nobody will get what they want. We'll then get articles from HuffPo about how the show failed because people like me are evil racist sexists.

    I don't know why I'm required to like something that's been changed to no longer be something I identify with. Very few white rappers are successful. We don't go yelling at black people that they're somehow wrong or "special snowflakes" because while they like lots of black rappers, they don't like many white rappers.

    I'll give the show a shot, sure. But I'm expecting them to do the same thing they did with comic books and female ghostbusters and all that kind of stuff. Race/gender swap the characters, lazy and shitty writing, and then lots of snarky asides about how white men like me are assholes. Finding enjoyment in that seems masochistic, and I'm not a masochist.

    There's more money in making shows for EVERYONE

    That has not been the case with regards to comic book sales. They replaced Thor with a woman, Tony Stark with a black girl, Captain Britain with a muslim woman, Hulk with a Korean guy, and book sales are absolutely in the toilet. They kept the traditional characters for the movies and it's the most profitable movie franchise of all time. SJWism costs money, it doesn't make it.

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  237. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    Why? Really, Why are you wondering? it is fucking Star Trek. One of the most famous media franchises on the ENTIRE PLANET.

    A fucking RL astronaut wore a Voyager uniform on the International Space Station......a FEMALE astronaut. http://www.space.com/29161-ast...

    The fucking Dalai Lama has visited the set.

    ST:TNG is on RIGHT NOW on BBC America, episode that first aired 27 years ago. When I first watched ST, the oldest episodes were only 8 years old.

    There have been games both tabletop and electronic inspired by and based on Star Trek ever since 1965. I personally play Star Trek Online on the PS4.

    Star Trek has had MANY novels based on the various series...and some NOT based directly on the series, but showcasing OTHER vessels.

    This is a franchise that has lasted 50 years. It survived the Animated Series, The Motionless Picture and the trainwreck that was V and You are wondering if anyone will watch the show? That will be able to be seen in 190 countries?

    What is wrong with you?

  238. Re:The Quota Show by cthulhu11 · · Score: 1

    My understanding was that Rand disappeared due to Grace's substance problems; maybe I'm confused. She had been intended as a romantic interest for Kirk.

  239. Re:The Quota Show by CronoCloud · · Score: 1

    You've mentioned the comic book thing before. You know the All New All Different characters are temporary right? Some of these characters have had temp replacements before, after all RiRi is not the first african american to wear the Iron Man armor. Besides how many more times can they use the Tony relapses into alcoholism bit.

    And Jane Foster (who was once bonded to Sif by the way) is not the first person to replace Thor for a goodly period of time before Thor takes up the mantle again. And she's practically the best choice, having bravely and courageously helped Donald Blake/Thor for YEARS.

    And Amadeus Cho is an AMERICAN of korean ancestry.

    As for sales tanking, comic sales are higher than they were in 2001. And I'd like to see your numbers...and if they include digital. Because most people DON'T have access to print comics, that's the real reason sales are lower not some kind of SJW plot.

  240. Re:The Quota Show by Godwin+O'Hitler · · Score: 1

    Next Generation - Many female and black characters, Also, Picard was a disastrous attempt at portraying a Frenchman,

    FTFY

    --
    No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.