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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."
I guess that means that we're going to have to just talk about something else...
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
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
This one seems to work for me:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8mesUEFjas
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 ]
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
Wait the new Captain is a female with the name Michael? I am confused already.
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.)
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!
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
JJ cured me.
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.
https://youtu.be/d8aUuFsXRjU
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
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
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.
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
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
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.'"
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
2 words: Babylon 5.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
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...
This is true.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Take a hint. People don't like being lectured. It creates resistance.
Resistance is futile you will be assimilated
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.
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.
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.
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
I'd actually complain much more about the wasted potential of getting to keep Michelle Yeoh as the protagonist.
Ezekiel 23:20
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.
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.
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.
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?
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.
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
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
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.
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)
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...
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
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!"
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
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.
You're trying to say that Oscar Issac Hernandez Estrada, born to a Guatemalan mother and Cuban father, in Guatemala, is white?
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
That unnamed executive was almost certainly Gene Roddenberry.