5 Star Trek Shows in Development, 1 Could Star Patrick Stewart, Reports Say (gizmodo.com)

An anonymous reader writes: In the wake of shocking allegations against Star Trek: Discovery's showrunners, producer Alex Kurtzman recently took over the role of showrunning the latest Trek series' sophomore season. But according to multiple reports today, he's just signed a new deal with CBS that could usher in multiple new Star Trek shows. Variety reports that Kurtzman has inked a $25 million deal with CBS as part of a five-year plan to bring more Trek shows to TV in the wake of Discovery's success. According to the site, five series are currently in early development: A teen-oriented series set at Starfleet Academy from Stephanie Savage and Josh Schwartz, the duo behind the recent Dynasty reboot and Marvel's Runaways adaptation. A limited series with a currently confidential plot. A limited series based around the beloved character Khan, from the original Star Trek and the classic film The Wrath of Khan -- something that's been rumored for a while as being spearheaded by Wrath of Khan director Nicholas Meyer. An animated series with another currently confidential plot.

Comments

Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

Looks like Paramount stole their business plans from Mel Brooks.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it even about money these days? Or is it just about pushing a divisive leftist narrative and agenda? We've seen numerous movies and video games where faux 'diversity' has been crammed in solely to try to promote a leftist agenda. Then there is little care from the creators when such propaganda pieces end up being commercial failures. I really wouldn't want to see Star Trek fall victim to this kind of manipulation.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

Definitely it's about money. The whole leftist conspiracy you allude to has more to do with media coverage and social media than it does with the political beliefs of rich executives at production companies. Ultimately all of them, left and right, worship the same god, the Almighty Dollar.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[ch0knuti]

I too am sick and tired of the overabundance of leftist narrative and agenda in media these days but wasn't Star Trek always filled with progressive leftist viewpoints? I liked the new discovery the only thing that stood out was no cisgendered white male in a major role (kid of sexists and racists isn't it?)

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[nitehawk214]

Pushing narratives gets views. Executives don't care if the watchers hate the product or love it. Causing controversy is much easier than producing a good product.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Dragonslicer]

diversity... I really wouldn't want to see Star Trek fall victim to this kind of manipulation.

You didn't watch the original Star Trek, did you? Diversity was a significant part of Roddenberry's conception of the future.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Instead the lead was an ugly unfeminine thing played by Sonequa Martin-Green. I don't remember if they ever revealed a guy named Michael was either a man or a woman, but either way it was so ugly that it was difficult to watch the show.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Then there is little care from the creators when such propaganda pieces end up being commercial failures. I really wouldn't want to see Star Trek fall victim to this kind of manipulation.

Yeah, ban the Vulcan Devil Ears!

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Mark of the North]

There's so much more media than one could possibly consume, with left or right narratives, that one can choose only that which supports their preference. And that's a problem.

I try to watch a bit of both camps to mix things up. But both Fox and MSNBC's Trump coverage make me lose my appetite. More Fox than MSNBC, but still...

And that's just televised news. Social media makes me violently ill.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Causing unwanted and artificial 'controversy' is also a very effective way to destroy a media property. A good example of this is literally right in front of our faces: the /. web site. This was once the premiere tech-oriented online destination. Industry leaders used to participate here on a daily basis. Getting your product or service noticed by the /. community used to be a huge deal. It's hard to believe it these days, but /. used to be an extremely important and influential media outlet. Then we started seeing more and more submissions, many of them politically charged, that appear to only have been on the front page to generate 'controversy'. While this did result in lots of discussion, and presumably lots of advertisment views, in the short term, it also has had serious long term repercussions. Many of the top individuals who were influential in the industry wanted no part of this nonsense, and they left for other discussion forums. The low quality submissions also started driving away other regular users who made positive contributions to the community here. As the community has continued to disintegrate due to this forced 'controversy', we've seen, in my opinion, things get quite bad around here. The submissions, comments and moderating are now the worst that I've ever seen here. The sense of community is long gone; all we get now is bickering and name calling. In my opinion, the generation of 'controversy' here shook the foundations of this community, ultimately fracturing it in a way that is likely irreparable. If manufactured 'controversy' could ruin /. so completely, I can see it doing the same to other media outlets and series. It's a very risky stunt to attempt.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[butchersong]

Definitely it's about money. The whole leftist conspiracy you allude to has more to do with media coverage and social media than it does with the political beliefs of rich executives at production companies. Ultimately all of them, left and right, worship the same god, the Almighty Dollar.

I'm not so sure about that. Let's take the Rosanne scandal for instance, she was the top show for ABC. Their next best show was almost half the numbers. Rosanne posted that twitter comment that could easily be taken as racist... in context she didn't intend it that way. She didn't realize that the Valerie J was like 25% African ancestry. You can tell this doing a postmortem on the whole deal by looking at her initial attempts to defend herself stating "muslim is not a race" of something to that effect. She didn't realize the "racist" comments had anything to do with the target of her remarks being "black" -I guess we're still practicing the 1% rule when it comes to such things.. Anyway, they canned her without any meetings, investigation or attempts to damage control.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

One would assume that Roseanne, or even Trump would understand that their tweets would almost always be "taken out of context", and that as a grown up it is the responsibility of the tweet sender to use even a fucking small amount of discretion or thought before sending something out that millions of people, including the press, would read.

I don't think that is too much to ask.

Trying to apologize for Roseanne is a job for the witless and the dickless.
Which are you?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a little of both, I expect. It was bad enough this happened to Star Wars, RIP Star Trek too, I guess. Pretty sad. :/

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[butchersong]

Other than being hastily typed out and containing several grammatical and spelling errors I don't see anything about my post that would cause a reasonable person object to it. Certainly not in the childish manner you did. Judging my your ID I'm going to guess you are not a minor so I'll just give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you're having a bad day.

Responding to your comment about Roseanne and Trump, I don't know that anyone imagines them having much in the way of discretion. I think bombastic people like that are good to have around though and useful as barometers for just how truly liberal/tolerant a society is.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it wasn't. It wasn't political in the slightest, in fact. It transcended all of that and told great stories. The U.S. wasn't a terribly polarized place back then compared to now. Count me among the group that thinks Discovery is trash. If they intend to continue down that road, they can count me out, I'll consider Trek to be dead and buried.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

To be honest ABC's quick response was a shock to me. And I do doubt in that instance that ABC's decision was driven by profit. Perhaps there is some risk to brand name that Disney at least perceived, but that's hard to put into numbers to weigh in the cold logic of profit.

It's certainly ABC's right to refuse to work with someone based on their behavior and politics. Political Affiliation Discrimination isn't normally a protected class, but it is illegal in California. Perhaps she could win if it is an extreme case and in the right court. (the show was filmed in the CBS Studio Center in Los Angeles, so pretty easy to use California as jurisdiction)

As to the original point. Most films are an investment that are expected to pay back. Individuals on the film may have additional motives besides profit. Usually producers aren't willing to sacrifice too much of their money or reputation on pushing a political agenda, especially if that turns it into a flop. I would take the Ghostbusters reboot as an example. An all female cast, is that a leftist agenda, or a gimmick to fuel a marketing campaign? Given how much marketing went into the film I really do suspect this was a carefully considered move, even if it didn't pan out. The Ghostbusters film missed breaking even, although some people still made a lot of money on it. Maybe it would have turned a profit if they wouldn't have spent $140 million on marketing, which was nearly as much as the film's regular budget.

"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity." -- Hanlon's razor

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank you for saying this. It's why the 1966 WorldCon attendees rallied to get the show continued aftr it was axed. And why Mr Chekov was added later - for fair representation of humanity. Adding a Russian at the height of the Cold War was controversial. On the other hand, not having representatives of all spacefaring nations at that time (total =2) was silly.

[Topic change]
The OP said "shocking". I don't mean to shitpost, but get a grip. Many things in life are shocking, and many things that Hollywood companies do are shocking (Sony breaking your computer, Disney buying politicians to keep copyright on that mouse). But anything they do to their own properties is not "shocking".

As said, OP needs to get a grip. Or get out more.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Tablizer]

pushing a divisive leftist narrative and agenda? We've seen numerous movies and video games where faux 'diversity' has been crammed in solely to try to promote a leftist agenda.

I don't get something about these kinds of claims. Maybe you can explain it. If the right is worried that the left controls Hollywood and most entertainment, why don't they make their own studios and produce right-leaning content?

John Wayne remakes/clones, Leave it to Beaver reboots, The Osmonds: The Next Generation, Lawrence Welk in Space, Hee Haw II, NASCAR++, Thurston Howell's Island, whatever floats your boats.

It's not like the right doesn't have start-up money; they probably have more than the left. Stop complaining and make your own.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks, that's what I have been telling my creimertard trools for quite a while now...

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[AmiMoJo]

TV shows are about making money. Thank you Captain Obvious.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[AmiMoJo]

Most of the series were. TNG had a French captain, female security officer, and Data's personhood was the basis of a few plots over the years.

DS9 had a black captain and did more than any other series to explore the lives of aliens and their cultures.

Voyager had women in several key roles including captain.

Enterprise was a bit of an anomaly and seemed to suffer from not having that strong social justice aspect to drive the stories.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Gavagai80]

I would take the Ghostbusters reboot as an example. An all female cast, is that a leftist agenda, or a gimmick to fuel a marketing campaign?

When a [non-comedy] show uses a cast of all unattractive overweight women, I'll believe they're pursuing a leftist agenda. Until then, they're just trying to simultaneously sell men on sex appeal and women on empowerment to take money from both.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

Was Harold Ramis and Dan Aykroyd considered attractive in the 1984 film? at least I don't think their characters were considered to have any sex appeal.

There is a thin line to walk when you make a film that caters men's desire for sex appeal. You have to do it in a way that doesn't alienate the 52% of female moviegoers. The naive approach is to make a film that appeals to 100% of people equally, but then the film might be bland and uninteresting. A polarizing film or at least one that caters to a particular niche is an old formula. And I feel like Ghostbusters 2016 couldn't decide if it was a film for women, or a film for everyone, or a film for Ghostbuster fans. That vagueness in finding an audience is probably where it went wrong. And if I had the rights to produce a Ghostbuster film I would have gone after people in their mid 30's to 40's who watched the Saturday morning cartoon series as a kid, of course that isn't at all what Dan Aykroyd wanted to see. (P.S. probably good reason I'm not in charge of multi-million dollar film studio budgets)

Ultimately I think Ghostbusters 2016 was an experiment in marketing that was not successful in its goals and not an preview into a new world order of liberal-socialist PC police.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

Enterprise tl;dr - time travel == bad

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

why don't they make their own studios and produce right-leaning content

They do, and they're usually garbage. Maybe they are too low budget. Or maybe making films when you put your political agenda first compromises the art and entertainment.

Now there are films that appeal to right and alt-right that are made by so-called liberal Hollywood. The right are experts are reading messages that aren't there. If you poke around at film lists of self-described ring wingers you'll see a lot of uncomplicated stories. Good versus evil. Solving problems by use of [righteous] superior force. And especially power fantasies. The film Taken is a popular choice among the alt-right because they read it as a power fantasy, despite being created by a leftist Frenchman.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[sexconker]

$140 million on marketing, which was nearly as much as the film's regular budget.

As a flat number, $140 million on marketing is fucking peanuts these days. As a percentage, many major films now spend as much on marketing as they do on production, if not more.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Iamthecheese]

Diversity was an important backdrop. It wasn't ever pushed in the viewer's face. There was a black woman on the bridge, and very little was said about that. I'm okay with that kind of diversity. The modern kind of "diversity" is fake. It's diverse like a wax apple is a fruit. Diversity of opinion is forbidden and a whole race and sex are strongly depreciated. It's sexism and racism by a different name. By all means have a diverse cast. If it's a good show I'll watch it. But make every third person a fat black lesbian otherkin and you're not only not diverse, you're clearly throwing the whole show under the bus.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Enterprise tl;dr - time travel == bad

Time travel is fine as a plot device to go new places and such. Time travel as a means to solve problems is just wrong.

Doctor Who has various rules that normally prevent most of the later, though has gotten careless at times.

Diversity in Star Trek should just be there. It shouldn't be about meeting a quota, or having a mix. Star Trek should be about what happens when all the prejudices are thrown away.

I'm wary when they say 5 are in development. That would be a good way to dilute a franchise down to nothing. Beyond that scifi needs good actors and good stories. Everything else comes second to that, though it is always nice when a story makes you think, such as when something is done quite differently in another culture.

Enterprise could have been a lot better with better stories. An arc is fine, as long as it isn't stupid. The temporal cold war thing was lame. There also seemed to be all the cheap appeals to sexual themes and such.

Now if all 5 shows have someone like Jay Michael Stransynski (sp?) behind them, plus a decent budget, well, then you have something.

Re:Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[blindseer]

Will there be a Star Trek flamethrower?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

it wasnt forced. it was blended in quite nicely. the new pc sjw snowflake stuff is just garbage. like Mary Sue Rey from TLJ.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[BasilBrush]

ABC's reaction with Rosanne was still a profit based decision. They feared losing advertisers.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Tablizer]

They do, and they're usually garbage

Garbage is in the eye of the beholder. If you feed people's fantasies and paranoias, they come back for more, even if their fantasies and paranoias are, well, odd.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[sysrammer]

The U.S. wasn't a terribly polarized place back then compared to now.

You don't remember the Generation Gap, do you? Four dead in Ohio? Silent Majority? Damned Hippies? 'Nam?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[BasilBrush]

Not just Uhuru, the regular cast also had Japanese, Russian, Scottish and of course Vulcan characters.

Hard to realise the significance of a Russian character as one of the good guys at the height of the cold war.

And then of course you had episodes that were dedicated to condemning racism, such as "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" where the aliens were half black, half white.

And of course having Kirk and Uhuru kiss was quite literally "pushing it in the viewer's face", at a time when segregation was still an issue in some US states.

If you have a problem with diversity in 2018, you are an asshole.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Ocker3]

And be nice to Data

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[currently_awake]

The Right wants to make money, and making shows for the 1% is a small market to get rich on.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Having Kirk and Uhura kiss was one data point. But most of the series, nobody commented on the (human) diversity of the crew because it didn't matter. That was the point. It didn't matter what race they all were; they were all human.

Compare that to Discovery. It's clearly important /to the characters/ that and how they are diverse. Science fiction is good at pointing to the ills of society by using aliens and the like as foils. Discovery does not do that.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[h33t l4x0r]

I wish they'd leave Roseanne on and cancel Trump. Why do we hold comedians to a higher standard than world leaders?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Mashiki]

I don't get something about these kinds of claims. Maybe you can explain it. If the right is worried that the left controls Hollywood and most entertainment, why don't they make their own studios and produce right-leaning content?

First problem, is that Hollywood and most entertainment is held exclusively by the left. That makes entrance very difficult, never mind the culture of "if you don't belong, they go after you" mentality in entertainment itself. Same hold in a lot of education as well, people don't seem to realize that in general the left has a hold on most of society and conservatives are the general minority outside of the population.

But, they have made their own stuff in the past. Most have moved to far more profitable fronts like video games, and we can see the problems there with gaming site gatekeepers trying to push the same garbage that "if you're not xyz inclusive, etc" they'll attempt to ruin your brand. See stuff like Detroit Become Human, and several other similar titles.

Let's not forget that conservatives already did what you suggested in scifi with pointing out the utter hypocrisy and circle-jerking, that was with sad puppies and rabid puppies. The entrenched leftists in the hugo's decided that burning everything down and ruining the brand rather then allowing conservatives to have a voice was the acceptable option.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[blindseer]

Enterprise suffered from not having much of a story.

Enterprise suffered for Starfleet not having much of a story. What is Starfleet? It's got a rank structure that we'd recognize as a navy, but then lots of noncombat organizations do. They fly around in ships that are armed, have science teams, do diplomacy, but they make it clear in many ways that they are not a military. They don't fight wars unless absolutely necessary. They don't have "soldiers" as we'd recognize them, only "security officers" or some such are armed with any regularity. It seems that there's more staff in stellar cartography than any other department on the ship. Not that you see these people, we see what the engineers, medics, and command officers are doing.

The Enterprise, in all it's iterations in the Trek-verse, is never described as a warship. It encounters warships and often it perseveres over the warships through some combination of smarts, luck, enemy incompetence or arrogance, or whatever combination of such that moves the plot. They are always on some kind of science mission, making way to some diplomatic function, responding to some call for assistance. What equivalent do we have in our world to this?

Probably the best approximation to Starfleet would be the Coast Guard. One of the biggest function of the Coast Guard is to assist in trade. They perform ship inspections, check paperwork, and so on. This is in addition to things we see Starfleet do like search and rescue, get called up to fight in wars, do science missions, and even in some cases have to be diplomats.

I believe that Enterprise would have been more interesting if it was described as a ship in what we'd recognize as something of a Coast Guard in space. They'd still be doing diplomatic missions, map out stars, respond to calls for assistance, and even fight as a light battleship and/or flying hospital in times of war. In addition they'd have to deal with things like make sure interstellar freighters met safety standards, check for people smuggling illegal aliens, and maybe even hand out citations for speeding. Maybe that sounds boring to many people but there were episodes of Enterprise where they did some of this stuff. Also, there's all kinds of TV shows about police forces. There's shows about ships at sea doing this kind of stuff, transfer that kind of plot to ships in space.

Seems to me that the powers that be tried real hard to not make Starfleet a military, and failed in many ways, and also didn't want Starfleet to look like "cops in space". Well, some organization needs to be the cops in space because people don't always behave. If that's not Starfleet then who is? Make a show about space police and I'd probably watch it.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[rtb61]

ie there is only one question I want answered about Star Trek, will Klingons continue to be ugly cannibals who clad their star ships in coffin armour and behave like idiotic Hollywood ideologues or change back. Not to forget, will star drives go back to being science based or push further into pixie dust territory and how long before captain nancy pants as a commanders name ie for the next expelled cadet that gets made captain of the federation of planet fleet flagsship by the commandant of that academy because he is too stupid to command a starship (well that is pretty self evident).

Will it be STEM Star Trek or liberal arts Stupid Trek. I'm betting liberal arts Stupid Trek where they strive to take the science out of science fiction not by choice simply by nature, that low IQ nature supported by nepotism nature.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Voyager529]

I don't think the issue is with diversity, but with presentation. Yes, TOS had "Plato's Stepchildren" and "Last Battlefield" and the one with the nuclear war fought within a computer...but how often was putting a Russian in charge of navigation and shields a point of contention? How many times was Sulu's Japanese heritage brought up (remember, we didn't like Japan much after WWII, and it was still very much in living memory)? Uhura being black during the civil rights movement is what everyone remembers, but how often did her gender come up in the context of her being a bridge officer and other than Plato's Stepchildren, did her race come up more than maybe once or twice? The answers to all of these questions are "It didn't", "It didn't", and "It didn't", and "I'll have to double check...but I'm pretty sure it didn't".

Roddenberry's most amazing statement throughout TOS was paradoxically the most subtle - these things were such non-issues that they weren't worthy of anyone's attention. Uhura wasn't perceived by the crew as "a black woman", she was "the communications officer, and a damn good one", and everyone from Kirk on down respected her as such. Same for Chekov and Sulu. The whole ship was egalitarian in that sense - skills and rank were respected, but nobody treated anyone else better or worse based on race or gender. As it should be.

I don't know the GP, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that he would have an issue with a diverse cast in itself. The issue is when that becomes such a point of focus that it starts being the defining characteristic of the individual at the expense of anything that would give the character any real amount of depth. When a show starts doing that, the push for diversity starts seeping into the scripts. Even then, there's presentation to be had. The infamous interracial kiss between Kirk and Uhura was controversial based on its existence, but the story itself didn't depend on the shock value of that scene. Roddenberry did this sort of thing well. Few today can say the same - characters intended to provide diversity tend to make that diversity a featured part of the story, rather than "the person doing the thing who happens to be a non-SWM".

Sometimes things do need to be pointed out directly, but most of the time, treating it like a non-issue is the best way to illustrate how normal something is in the future. Few directors can do this well.

Re:Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Imagine if Disney had the rights instead of CBS/Paramount - there'd be 25 shows in development.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

But the woman does look like the ape wo man. The joke was funny.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

And what does that tell you, when the educated of the country is predominantly left?

If your answer is "conspiracy"then I'd suggest you need a psychiatrist

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

His point, which I think you willfully missed, is that modern "diversity" is not diversity.
If you don't have a problem with modern "diversity" then you are ignorant.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[blindseer]

I don't think the issue is with diversity, but with presentation.

Precisely.

Roddenberry's most amazing statement throughout TOS was paradoxically the most subtle - these things were such non-issues that they weren't worthy of anyone's attention.

There was a bit of cultural differences pointed out in TOS where people made reference to their ancestry in what might be considered stereotypical ways. For example the Russian liked his vodka and spoke kind of funny. It was always played for laughs or a just to round the character out a bit. It wasn't tossed in your face. TNG and DS9 often took things a bit far. Voyager, Enterprise, and the movies seemed to have that subtlety return.

Roddenberry did this sort of thing well. Few today can say the same - characters intended to provide diversity tend to make that diversity a featured part of the story, rather than "the person doing the thing who happens to be a non-SWM".

Now that you mention single white male I noticed something, few or none of the crew in any Trek-verse show or movie were married. People had children but the spouse was often dead or, less often, the child was illegitimate. The few times we saw crew married to someone they were childless. A notable exception is O'Brian and his family. Where there any others?

I can see a need to have a number of crew members that are unmarried for the sake of having romantic tension among the crew and to allow them freedom to date others. Seems odd in a culture with faster than light travel, relative peace, and general abundance of resources, that more people didn't take advantage of that to have a family. Even if that meant leaving the family on some planet and going off on a lengthy tour in space. People in the military do that now, a quick Google search tells me about half of those in the military are married. I'd also expect more of the crew to pair up while serving and get married. We might see crew members share quarters (and a bed) for a while, but they rarely get married before or after this "shacking up".

This notable lack of married couples may in fact be a subtle commentary on diversity and the views of the people behind the shows. They may have simply thought that in the future people just didn't marry, or marriage was defined differently than it is now, as in people weren't considered married until they had children. Perhaps it was a view that married people didn't belong in a militaristic force like Starfleet, that if they married they left/retired or just didn't join. Perhaps those married were never deployed on long missions to space, there were married people in Starfleet but just not on five year missions.

If there is a "word from god" explanation for this somewhere then I'd like to see it.

Sometimes things do need to be pointed out directly, but most of the time, treating it like a non-issue is the best way to illustrate how normal something is in the future. Few directors can do this well.

Yep.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[AmiMoJo]

Causing unwanted and artificial 'controversy' is also a very effective way to destroy a media property.

Yes. That's why we get all this nonsense about Star Trek Discovery being some kind of "SJW nightmare". Anyone who has seen Trek will know that it's always been that way, the reboot movies excepted. And it's actually a lot less about that than previous series.

But that narrative works to convince people who haven't seen it that it's bad, so they keep pushing it. Anything to destroy shows starring non-white male leads it seems. I'm actually a bit shocked it's that bad, in 2018, but it's far from the only example of this campaign of manufactured outrage.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[AmiMoJo]

The original series episode "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" had aliens who were literally half black and half white, fighting a racist war with the half white half black ones. It was extremely "in your face" and obvious. Then there was the first on-screen interracial kiss, again very obvious and if you read the history of the episode something that Roddenberry had to push very hard to include.

In the TNG era you had episodes that were quite overtly about the oppression and "treatment" of LGBT people, featuring a genderless race of aliens and one who does not conform to their traditional concept. Not to mention episodes based around Data's rights as a person/machine, Trill relationships when their gender suddenly changes, respecting the rules and laws of other cultures, racial/genetic supremacists, travellers, Native Americans and so on.

DS9 introduced a lot of religious aspects, and looked at how a principled and progressive society could fight a war. Voyager was all over the place but did lots of social justice episodes, not least the recurring theme of criminal rehabilitation and examination of humanity from Seven's point of view.

So maybe Trek isn't for you, and that's fine.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[thegarbz]

We've seen numerous movies and video games where faux 'diversity' has been crammed in solely to try to promote a leftist agenda.

Yeah, one of those is known as the original series of Star Trek which among other things had the first black woman to kiss a white actor on screen.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

> female insecurity officer

Fixed t hat for you, Even the Klingon and the android had more feminine appeal than Denise Crosby's constant "did I have a line? I should blurt it out and look like the cue card is more important than anything else on the bridge" acting. Even Spot, data's cat, did her scenes better and had notably more personality.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Antique Geekmeister]

I'm old enough to remember that kiss. It caused quite a furor for many families, and was still widely discussed in re-runs years later. However, it wasn't the first interracial kiss on television, just the first on American television. See https://www.cnn.com/2015/11/20... for notes on a British television interacial kiss, six years earlier.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

ABC's reaction was to her attacking a member of Obama's family. If you attack Trump's family or Bush's family or any conservative/Republican's family it is totally fine. But attack the Obama's and no matter what you say you'll be labeled a racist and you are toast.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Carewolf]

And will the Klingon continue to be racist blackface villians? I was surpriced that they not only gave the a black textures (sure more different texture colors to alien races, and including black, yay), but then added negroid features and then made them culturally primitive psychopaths...

It is the most racist thing I have seen on TV in decades.

And then added on top with a toxic masculine main character that just happens to be female. The show was trolling the left.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sorry that there are people in this world that don't look exactly like you. What a hell existence must be.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[tbannist]

Because the people who can fire Trump are afraid of offending the people who vote for them. Specifically they refuse to cancel him because they're afraid that their voters will cancel them immediately afterwards (by voting for someone else in the primaries). This is fallout from gerrymandering and partisan propaganda being so successful that they fear primary challenges far more than general elections.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[mjwx]

diversity... I really wouldn't want to see Star Trek fall victim to this kind of manipulation.

You didn't watch the original Star Trek, did you? Diversity was a significant part of Roddenberry's conception of the future.

Shhhh,

Dont interrupt his baseless rant with facts. He's got an SJW to harass from the comfort of his trailer or some such before crying about the injustice of being born a white, middle class, educated male who's never had to feel real discrimination in their life on the MGTOW forums.

WRT diversity, it wasn't that in Gene Roddenbery's vision of the future that we simply had diversity... But no-one cared about it and the fact all were treated as equals was the status quo, no one on the bridge cared that Uhura was black or a woman, it simply didn't matter.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Mr. Slippery]

But that narrative works to convince people who haven't seen it that it's bad,

It is bad...but not for any social justice reasons. I had to quit on the show when they made Sarek of Vulcan a liar. Between "those aren't Klingons!" and "if your magic stardrive is so great why is no one using it later?" and "Vulcan suicide bombers!?!?!" , I was screaming at the TV too much.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

First problem, is that Hollywood and most entertainment is held exclusively by the left.

Isn't this the same argument feminists have used to try to take over previously male-dominated industries? They always try to shame and take over existing companies instead of starting their own, with excuses like the one you're presenting. "Oh we can't start our own tech company/video game company/etc because all the existing ones are dominated by men and it's a boy's club blah blah"

That makes entrance very difficult, never mind the culture of "if you don't belong, they go after you" mentality

Ah yes, this is totally the same argument feminists uses. The EEEEEVVVVVILLL misogynists men are always going after women who tries to join into "their" occupation/hobby/whatever.

Same hold in a lot of education as well, people don't seem to realize that in general the left has a hold on most of society and conservatives are the general minority outside of the population.

Now you're engaging in full blown oppression Olympics. No, MY people are the minority!

But, they have made their own stuff in the past. Most have moved to far more profitable fronts like video games

Except video games are one of the most inclusive hobbies. Now, by inclusive I don't mean they follow some leftist agenda of diversity, but that they accept BOTH left and right and anything in between.

Don't fall for the narrative pushed by people like Anita Sarkeesian. Gaming is neither a bastion for the left or the right.

and we can see the problems there with gaming site gatekeepers trying to push the same garbage

What gatekeepers? I think you're confusing journalists (who may not even be dedicated to cover gaming, they may just be some SJW who happens to be writing about gaming that one day) with the actual gatekeepers. It's the journalists who smear gaming and games they don't like and try to start campaigns to shame/censor/ban/etc the game, its makers, and its fans.

The actual gatekeepers are the likes of publishers, game devs, and companies that control gaming platform like Steam or console makers, and last I checked almost all of them would rather be able to release whatever they want that makes them money. Steam just recently pushed back against SJW pressure to censor games with sexual themes.

You mention Detroit Become Human. The calls for censorship are coming from politicians and activists, not the actual game dev or publisher or Sony/MS/Nintendo, who I wager would much rather not be hassled to do anything as that would just be extra costs to them with little to no benefit in return.

Let's not forget that conservatives already did what you suggested in scifi with pointing out the utter hypocrisy and circle-jerking, that was with sad puppies and rabid puppies.

How does not winning a Hugo mean conservatives do not have a voice? Winning an award offers prestige, but not winning one doesn't mean your voice isn't or can't be heard. People can still buy those sci-fi works with conservative ideas (I don't know what's so conservative about the ones selected by the puppies, I'm just taking you for your word)

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[meta-monkey]

I agree with you except for the gender bit. In the pilot episode Captain Pike opines that he has trouble getting used to the idea of women on the bridge. So blacks, aliens, no problem...but chicks?!?!?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a huge "Christian" entertainment industry for books, music, TV shows and movies, so it essentially already exists.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[JackieBrown]

Pushing narratives gets views. Executives don't care if the watchers hate the product or love it. Causing controversy is much easier than producing a good product.

Then Rosanne would not have been canceled

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[JackieBrown]

I wish they'd leave Roseanne on and cancel Trump. Why do we hold comedians to a higher standard than world leaders?

It depends on the politics. Michelle Wolf's show isn't being canceled.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Chris Mattern]

The U.S. wasn't a terribly polarized place back then compared to now.

I don't think you can talk about how the U.S. is more polarized now than it used to be until we fight another civil war.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Chris Mattern]

Uhura being black during the civil rights movement is what everyone remembers, but how often did her gender come up in the context of her being a bridge officer

In the first pilot ("The Cage"), the first officer was played by Majel Barrett (before she became Nurse Chapel) as "Number One". The network made Gene get rid of her because they didn't think a woman as the second in command would fly. Let's not even talk about "Turnabout Intruder".

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[JackieBrown]

Now if all 5 shows have someone like Jay Michael Stransynski (sp?) behind them, plus a decent budget, well, then you have something.

If he did it, you'd end of with 2 good seasons then he quit and bitch about the studio executives for the next 5 years

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

When will we have a transs Starfleet Captain?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[iamhassi]

Star Trek already fell for leftist manipulation, Discovery is based on Trump's election http://www.foxnews.com/enterta...

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

You didn't watch TOS episode called "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield", did you?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[iamhassi]

But... but... Discovery producers said Klingons are Trump supporters, so they're suppose to be racist...? http://www.foxnews.com/enterta...

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

Well sure I guess time travel can be an overused (bad) trope. But I meant that the plot for Enterprise is the lesson that when you travel through time bad things happen. My "tl;dr" is sort of crap if it I can't summarize unambiguously. oh well.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[nitehawk214]

The in-universe social justice of the Prime Directive and other moral dilemmas is part of what made TNG great. Even if you don't always agree with the Prime Directive as a concept, it makes for great drama. Its the real life social justice of Discovery that makes people cringe.

DS9 was pretty great, but its whole arc of "well akshully the federation was founded on lies and is run by evil people", was were it loses me. I like William Sadler as an actor and loved his character, but hated the entire idea of section 31. I hear that Discovery continues this crap. It fits in with the 90s to modern day "secret agents of the government are always evil, even if they want to do the right thing" concept that gets beat to freaking death in every movie that contains a government three letter agency. Evil secret agents is the exact opposite of the Federation. I don't think Gene would have approved.

Though a much bigger problem was CBS trying to use it to push their otherwise useless streaming service that was the real problem for me. I only watched the first couple episodes as a result.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Mike Van Pelt]

Make a show about space police and I'd probably watch it.

I'd love to see a reboot of the old BBC series "Starcops". Yeah, sort of an over-reaching name for a law enforcement agency that covered the Moon and/or space stations, and later Mars, but perhaps that's where the series might have headed in later seasons if it had lasted.

As long as they did it with as much intelligence as the original, of course. Alas, they'd probably give it to Jar Jar Abrams for him to excrete all over.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[terrycarlino]

Enterprise was not Starfleet. Starfleet didn't exist at that time. As a matter of fact in the last show (occurring 10 years after the rest of the show) Archer gives the speech that leads to the formation of Starfleet.

At best Enterprise describes an experimental ship sent out by a United Earth. After the terrorist attack which destroys Florida it becomes a more or less military platform with soldiers embarked sent on a specific mission to catch/stop the terrorists. The problem is that the story wasn't very impelling. it was obviously colored by the events of 9-11. Much of the first season was setup for the Original Series: Why do they use Red Alerts? Why does the captain have a special chair? Why is Vulcan society and government the way it is? What is the relationship between the Vulcans and the Andromidans?

Any social issues were well thought out and often solid answers on which side was right were left to the viewer to decide. Unlike modern shows where the SJW just want to preach to you. It's gotten so bad that I'm about done with the CW DC shows. I watch to see metahuman's kicking butt. I don't need to hear an LGTB lecture or why gun control is bad, in a story where the vigilantes are armed to the teeth and all the cops are crooked. How much sense does that make?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[terrycarlino]

I think the marriage thing had two causes. One was that characters not being married meant that it was easier for the writers to introduce guest stars as romantic interests. Look at other shows of the times. Unless the show was a specific family program, like Dick Van Dyke or Danny Thomas the protagonists were almost always single.

The other is the fact that through most of history sailors and other explorers who were separated from their homes were not married. As far back as the Roman Empire only senior officers were allowed to be married. There is an old saying in the military:Lieutenants can't marry, captains may marry, majors must marry. Often lower ranked enlisted were the same way with only seniors like sergeants and above being expected to marry.

O'Brian actually talk about how most Starfleet officers don't marry. Gordi talks to his parents several times and its made clear they are both Starfleet officers and are stationed at different places, but no mention is made if they are married or not, or whether they had ever been married.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[soc_cost_priv_gains]

Weren't there a bunch of shows in the 80's that worshiped the 1%?

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Bullshit. You're shoehorning SJW crap into your world where you want to see it.

Yes, Trek has a history of good social commentary and "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" is a good example of that among others, but let's not kid ourselves that every episode was like that, or that there really were TNG episodes espousing LGBTPTIP ideals.

So maybe Discovery isn't for you, and that's fine.

FTFY. If you want to see Trek done right in this decade, go watch The Orville.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

There are also a large number of Christian institutions of higher learning aka colleges and universities.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

$140m marketing for a $144m film is peanuts? It's 50%. That is typical and cited as a "rule of thumb", but it's not peanuts. The marking is a significant portion of the budget (even as you stated, it can be more than the film itself).

It doesn't take much looking to find articles that Hollywood struggles with these ballooning marketing budgets. Just because the industry does something doesn't mean it is the most profitable or best balance of risk versus investment. There is serious risk when film budgets are huge, and it's not clear that more marketing can guarantee a recoup of that capital.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't believe the "Coast Guard" "Cops in Space" angle has much merit for the type of stories Star Trek typically tells, and thus what kind of audience it would have. Especially at the early stages of development before Starfleet became that "Coast Guard" "Cops in Space" organization. The TNG era series actually seem to hint at that aspect a lot.

What I think you did hit on correctly is that Starfleet doesn't have much of a story. Or at least Enterprise centered around the most boring parts of it. Perhaps the problem was progression in "real time". The progression towards the Starfleet of the 23rd century would have likely been slow as humanity moved past the recent wars and prejudices, and began to recognize its place in an intergalactic society. Earth was still at the time a largely capitalist world. The world's economy would have to sustain a space exploration mission, which would mean a focus on asteroid mining and such, not on deep space exploration. Add to this the fact that alliances are not formed overnight, which would mean the Federation wouldn't be formed overnight, and politics are typically boring anyway.

Starfleet's story is one of a rekindled optimism, which would suggest a long period of mostly positive outcomes, and rather boring expansion. Many of the struggles of the Federation, and therefore Starfleet, didn't seem to crop up until the TNG era, when things started moving at the then speed of Warp 9. The galaxy had became a much smaller place.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

Enterprise was not Starfleet. Starfleet didn't exist at that time. As a matter of fact in the last show (occurring 10 years after the rest of the show) Archer gives the speech that leads to the formation of Starfleet.

Whatever it was called the mission was poorly defined and left a lot of questions unanswered. There mission was to "explore". Okay, but to what end? To colonize? That's implied to some extent but then they'd have Starfleet ships managing and/or policing the colonization. That doesn't have to be the Enterprise doing the colonization but they'd at least make note of things like what makes a good planet to colonize, lay out the best routes to take to get places.

If Starfleet was defined as a military force, to defend planets from invaders, then that would make sense and still allow for an interesting show. They tried to fix this in later episodes with "space marines" (or whatever they were called) being on Enterprise. When I was younger I didn't think too much of this and watched in awe. Later on the show didn't hold my attention because the universe they created didn't make much sense. For a species that was colonizing new planets it would make sense to have a Coast Guard style fleet to keep things moving as smoothly as it could. If that's not what Starfleet ended up being then that's fine but the precursor entity would likely be the lawmen on the frontier and/or the representative of the government for the colonists.

At best Enterprise describes an experimental ship sent out by a United Earth. After the terrorist attack which destroys Florida it becomes a more or less military platform with soldiers embarked sent on a specific mission to catch/stop the terrorists.
The problem is that the story wasn't very impelling. it was obviously colored by the events of 9-11. Much of the first season was setup for the Original Series: Why do they use Red Alerts? Why does the captain have a special chair? Why is Vulcan society and government the way it is? What is the relationship between the Vulcans and the Andromidans?

Of course the show was a way to tell the story of how we get from what we have today to how Earth looked in the original series. That was part of the problem, the story was already told once, they didn't have much to tell. The time war plot wasn't compelling because the viewer knew that it would all vanish in the end to maintain continuity. They could have used this time war to create a new continuity like they did with the movie reboot. They could have also shown that the pre-Starfleet ships were more militaristic and aggressive but changed into the more peaceful explorers we know of from TOS and TNG after Starfleet was created.

Any social issues were well thought out and often solid answers on which side was right were left to the viewer to decide. Unlike modern shows where the SJW just want to preach to you. It's gotten so bad that I'm about done with the CW DC shows. I watch to see metahuman's kicking butt. I don't need to hear an LGTB lecture or why gun control is bad, in a story where the vigilantes are armed to the teeth and all the cops are crooked. How much sense does that make?

I too lost interest in the CW DC shows. I watched Supergirl until they started to put the lesbian sister plot front and center. Enterprise did some of its own preaching but it wasn't so overwhelming that it drove me away. What drove me away was the silly "time war" plot that reset everything that happened in an entire season, a handful of episodes of people talking a lot in a single room because they spent all their budget on the previous episode, and my general inability to suspend disbelief over a poorly constructed universe that I just went over above.

Much of the problem was that they had been too confined by canon established by previous series. They couldn't introduce new species because then they'd have to explain why they didn't appear in the later series. It's poss

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[thegarbz]

It caused enough of a furor in the studio. Apparently they were never supposed to kiss according the the plan and it was supposed to cut beforehand. As the story goes they did several retakes each which Will Shatner purposely fouled up forcing them to use the actual kiss.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[sexconker]

As a flat number, $140,000,000 in marketing for a major film is peanuts. It's absurd, but that is the state the film industry is in.
If you want to profit from your film you need deep pockets or a lot of luck. Nothing gets sold without vast media junkets in the US and in Asia.

If you do not have this budget and no major studio will pick u your project and run with it, your best option is to beg Netflix for a deal that includes them slathering their main screen with a trailer for your shit.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

As a flat number, $140,000,000 in marketing for a major film is peanuts

"Average Movie Budget of these 33 movies: $139,084,697" -- http://hollywood-movies.yoexpe...

Being average is not the correct meaning of peanuts. You need to work harder on your vocabulary.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[sexconker]

Are those major movies? How much profit did they turn out for the studio?

Yes, it is fucking peanuts in Hollywood. Just because it's a big number to you doesn't mean it's not a small number for the industry. This has been a problem in Hollywood for along time, and it's only getting worse. They chase blockbusters and sequels as the only safe way to make money and target them at Asian markets because ticket sales (number of tickets) continue to plummet in the US. They prop up ticket sales buy spending big on media hype campaigns and ticket giveaways / deals.

I think there's one for buying two bags of Doritos to get a cheap / free ticket to Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom. Pizza Hut also has something going on because the latest spam email they sent me featured a glass of water with animated vibrations. (I actually intend to see this film this weekend, partly because I got cheap tickets, and partly because I've heard it's actually good. I'll be on the lookout for Pizza Hut boxes and Doritos bags.)

Hell, at Disney's grand premiere event for Solo, they had a 500 seat theater and fucking PAID 400 people to attend (mainly social media whores) because they couldn't find more than 100 people willing to buy a ticket.

If your cast isn't on every morning talk show, every late night talk show, in 3 video games, and generating "impressions" left and right on social media you're not gonna make any money in the US. A full on media blitz is expensive, and actors charge for their social media marketing of a project as a separate line item on their contract. (Because the value of the social media marketing comes from the actor's personal followers / audience, where as attachment to traditional media junkets are figured as the movie being central to the appeal of an interview, guest appearance, etc.)

Eyeballs are expensive. If you don't buy attention no one will fill the seats unless you get very, very lucky.
$140,000,000 in marketing for a major film is peanuts today.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[OrangeTide]

Take a peak at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... .. except for the top 5, there are dozens that fall in the $200m's. And these are considered very expensive films.

The other $139m number I cited came from "[A] list [of] the top 20 highest movie budgets of all time according to the best information gleaned from studios, and the top 20 movies with the lowest budgets that earned at least $1 Million at the US box office."

And finally from https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki...
peanuts :
2. (informal, figuratively) A very small or insufficient amount (especially of a salary). Synonyms: pittance, trifle

I'm not sure what sort of Trump-era math you use when $140m is very small versus say $380m for the most expensive film of all time (that number is likely $410m minus rebates). I can totally understand your position if films were $1B and we were only talking $100m. 10% is easier to argue as small than 50%. But on top of all this, typical films in Hollywood are not huge $380m films.

Basically you're being an ass about this. You don't have to concede, you could stop replying, but squawking bullshit does nobody any good.

Re: Spaceballs 2: the quest for more money

[Anonymous Coward]

"One man's trash is another man's treasure"

But we don't laud raccoons for eating out of the dumpster. And we shouldn't encourage the fanatical alt-right to subsist on toxic ideology. Obesity and an early demise is the result in either case.

dude I hope its flute guy

[Anonymous Coward]

the jean luc one should totally be about his life as flute guy

Re: dude I hope its flute guy

[Anonymous Coward]

One of the best episodes!

Re: dude I hope its flute guy

[Anonymous Coward]

Seven years of great acting and stories, and we get "I hope it's flute guy"....

Re:dude I hope its flute guy

[Anonymous Coward]

How much do you think they can expand on that story? They told the most interesting parts of it in one episode.

Stewart/Picard is a running joke now

[Anonymous Coward]

what with his American Dad role.

Oh, God. Not again.

[cre1mer]

CBS should stick to one show and polished that turd exceptionally well.

Re:Oh, God. Not again.

[NicknameUnavailable]

Surely if HBO can finish driving GoT into the ground CBS can reap the sweet revenue of 4-5 additional shows forked from a major franchise. I for one welcome the new series of space mushrooms which control warp and teleportation fields (not really, but it's tough to top the stupidity of STD.)

Re:Oh, God. Not again.

[Anonymous Coward]

Creimer should stick to one login and "polished" that turd as best he can.

PS: Chris, you wanted "polish". You gotta get those tenses to agree in a single sentence, Mr Published Author.

Re:Oh, God. Not again.

[Anonymous Coward]

Last month it was Anonymous Cashews. Then it was Tardeau Lardeau. Last week it was The Fat Bastard. This week it is cre1mer. Next week it will be cdre1mer.

FatCashewsLoveMe should stick to one login and "polish" that turds as best as he can.

Re:Oh, God. Not again.

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget A Fat Bastard, Chris. Try to keep up, you impending heart attack.

Re:Oh, God. Not again.

[Anonymous Coward]

Last month it was Anonymous Cashews. Then it was Tardeau Lardeau. Last week it was The Fat Bastard. This week it was cre1mer and A Fat Bastard. Next week it will be cdre1mer.

FatCashewsLoveMe should stick to one login and "polish" that turd as best as he can.

Is this a joke?

[Rick Schumann]

I think I'm going to vomit.

Re:Is this a joke?

[Rick Schumann]

Before any of you waste your mod points on me because you don't like my opinion read this:

A teen-oriented series set at Starfleet Academy from Stephanie Savage and Josh Schwartz, the duo behind the recent Dynasty reboot and Marvel's Runaways adaptation.

Now, do you really think that's such a great idea? Most of you hated Wesley Crusher on ST:TNG and wished his character would get killed. How can you get behind this bullshit? Garbage.

Re:Is this a joke?

[butchersong]

I haven't seen an episode of Dynasty but I was pretty underwhelmed by Marvel's Runaways. It.. isn't encouraging I'll grant you that but I don't think it's a terrible concept.

Re:Is this a joke?

[dgatwood]

A teen-oriented series set at Starfleet Academy from Stephanie Savage and Josh Schwartz, the duo behind the recent Dynasty reboot and Marvel's Runaways adaptation.

Now, do you really think that's such a great idea? Most of you hated Wesley Crusher on ST:TNG and wished his character would get killed. How can you get behind this bullshit? Garbage.

I could actually see this concept working, if it is done well.

Wesley was, indeed, annoying — to the point that IIRC there was a whole newsgroup dedicated to coming up with ways for his character to die — but it wasn't because the concept of kids in space was so horrible. No, Wesley was annoying because the writers didn't know what to do with him. As a result, nearly every Wesley episode could be summed up as "Wesley broke something. The ship is about to blow up. Wesley somehow figures out a way to fix what he broke. Everyone lives to see him break things another day."

I seem to vaguely remember the episode where Captain Picard got stuck in an elevator with a bunch of kids as an episode that worked reasonably well. In fact, I'm really hoping that the show involving Patrick Steward is the "teen-oriented" show. He could play an academy teacher or headmaster or similar, after having retired from active duty. I think the interaction between him and young people would play very well on TV when it isn't being forced by a character who doesn't really fit the context (Wesley).

I'm assuming such a show would be about Starfleet Academy, though it could also work approximately as well if it involved slightly younger people who were still in school and were studying in hopes of joining Starfleet Academy. Either way, the premise is easy, and reasonably well grounded in the Star Trek universe. The open question, of course, is whether they can come up with writers who are capable of coming up with plots that are both plausible sci-fi (in the context of the Trek universe) and involve young people, without getting so mired in angsty teen drama that nobody wants to watch it, and without the plots quickly devolving into "Saved By the Bell In Space" levels of superficiality under the mistaken belief that young people are incapable of conscious levels of thought.

Re:Is this a joke?

[AmiMoJo]

Well, the animated series had a few good episodes...

Okay, yeah, it sounds terrible. Maybe it could do something about some cadets who joined to be scientists and explorers but ended up fighting the Klingon war.

Re:Is this a joke?

[Anonymous Coward]

Like how that Michael character made all of us want to vomit on STD since it is so ugly.

Re:Is this a joke?

[magarity]

without the plots quickly devolving into "Saved By the Bell In Space" levels of superficiality under the mistaken belief that young people are incapable of conscious levels of thought.

I picture a semi-retired Picard as more of a Head of the Class kind of teacher.

Re:Is this a joke?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Recession Never Ended Picard.

Re:Is this a joke?

[dgatwood]

They did that as a side story in one of the movies twenty years ago. It works fine as a ten second "oh, that's so sad that the cadet died" story, but as a core plot line, it doesn't sound like it would appeal to young people much at all. If anything, you'd get a bunch of Wesley Crusher stories that will be hated equally by everyone, regardless of age.

Re:Is this a joke?

[BasilBrush]

Maybe it's not meant for you. Maybe it's, you know, meant for kids.

Has anyone insisted you watch it?

Re:Is this a joke?

[Anonymous Coward]

Most slashdot readers were watching TNG as kids or young people. Wesley Crusher was not a childhood fantasy character, so it is natural for that demographic to dislike him. He was a Perfect Child fantasy character aimed at your parents, who were probably watching the show with the whole family!

That's why you hated him. Your father would have loved you more if you were at least trying to be a good boy like Wesley!

Re:Is this a joke?

[darth.hunterix]

I seem to vaguely remember the episode where Captain Picard got stuck in an elevator with a bunch of kids as an episode that worked reasonably well. In fact, I'm really hoping that the show involving Patrick Steward is the "teen-oriented" show. He could play an academy teacher or headmaster or similar, after having retired from active duty. I think the interaction between him and young people would play very well on TV when it isn't being forced by a character who doesn't really fit the context (Wesley).

So pretty much "Star Trek: Hogwarts" with sir Patrick as Dumblecard? I'm in and I have some more suggestions:
1. Emma Watson as science teacher
2. David Tennant as humanities teacher, making him Keating (from Dead Poets Society) IN SPACE
3. Ian McKellen as Dumblecard's husband
4. Nathan Fillon as Hagrid-type character
5. Claudia Christian as McGonagall-type character
6. Sarah Michelle Gellar as janitor
7. Mark Hamill as one-time villain reprising his role as Joker, with obligatory Star Wars reference

Ultimate geekgasm!

Re:Is this a joke?

[JackieBrown]

Agreed. I actually liked quite a few of the animated stories. The episodes were hit or miss but most shows are.

Most of the good ones where sequals to some of the original episodes.

Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[magarity]

What's Discovery even like; I completely lost interest in the whole franchise after the "re-imagined' of Wrath of Khan.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[beheaderaswp]

What's Discovery even like; I completely lost interest in the whole franchise after the "re-imagined' of Wrath of Khan.

It's as if fungus was the core of the Standard Model. And tartigrades were the conduit of the universe.

I know... it doesn't make sense. Apparently a can of Lotrimin spray will collapse the entire universe... theoretically of course.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Drethon]

What's Discovery even like; I completely lost interest in the whole franchise after the "re-imagined' of Wrath of Khan.

It could be but mostly it is on the wait and see list these days. I even find myself somewhat nostalgic watching Voyager on Netflix (working on watching all episodes from each series just to do it once in my life), then they have a stupid episode I can hardly sit through, but at least it had the occasional real Star Trek feel.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[OzPeter]

What's Discovery even like; I completely lost interest in the whole franchise after the "re-imagined' of Wrath of Khan.

The whole "pay for the streaming service to just watch one program" thing kinda of stopped me*.

*That plus I thought the show sucked anyway. Between watching the first episode of that and also of The Orville .. I could see more potential in the latter.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[The Grim Reefer]

What's Discovery even like;

From what I could tell from the previews and have heard second hand, it's like Trek Continues. Except it has a lot more and better CGI, a bigger budget, nonsensical plot devices, maybe a bit better acting, worse stories, ignores a lot of Trek canon, and isn't made by people who actually enjoy Star Trek.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

Got half way then gave up on Discovery. I gave up on Voyager and Enterprise. TNQ and OS were the only decent ones for me, IMHO they needed to have stopped at or after DS9.

I think the problem with Star Trek is it’s trying show it’s modern with today’s modern day. But traditional Star Trek was pretty already diverse and tackled all these issues head on decades ago, Star Trek is the future under a techno-socialist way of living with their mission statement as peaceful explorers, seeking out new species and new civilizations and so on.

With Discovery it’s just a mess, it’s a bit gory which Star Trek wasn’t, it constantly undermines the position and stature of Captain. Star Trek is supposed to highlight a more advanced way of thinking with the whole no need for material wealth in the 23rd century.

Discovery is a good series, they should just call it something else. Same with Voyager in someways. Enterprise I can’t say too much about, it had its own problems when it tried to be like Stargate Universe and Battlestar Gallactica. But Voyager was an okay series. I just think they’d be better off just calling those series something different.

My take on the Abrams films is that they were fun, I liked them. Star Trek movies were never really big for me but to have something come out in the cinimas the way it did was cool. I did feel the respect was there with the new movies. I think they try to do the same with Discovery but they’ve gone too far and overdid it in someways. For example the Drive technology, that alone overdoes what should allow for a cleaner storyline about a pretty well known war with the Klingons.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

You definitely aren't making any sense. Taken any vacations to Alpha Ceti lately? Do you happen to have a slug in your ear?

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

Between watching the first episode of that and also of The Orville .. I could see more potential in the latter.

Orville had likable main characters. The main character in STD is disgusting looking so it makes you not want to watch the show so you don't have to see it. Plus they had a female actress play a male character which was unsettling. I'm a FtM, but even I couldn't relate to it.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Dragonslicer]

What's Discovery even like; I completely lost interest in the whole franchise after the "re-imagined' of Wrath of Khan.

I'm impressed you made it that far.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not the only thing that doesn't make sense in that show. I mean even from the pilot they had an exploration ship that had no probes/drones of any kind and "imaging sensors" that could be "scrambled" so only an ancient department store-quality telescope that happened to be on board could see something...

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

Discovery isn't Star Trek story telling. It's focused on one main character and lots of drama surrounding her, the issues she needs to deal with, and how she's the struggling, misunderstood hero. Star Trek was normally about a group of characters and how they solved issues together. Issues that came up in a futuristic, utopia-striving society interacting with other societies. Part of the point of STNG was to solve things without using violence. Violence was the last resort on our path to becoming better humans. Discovery is an action/drama flick. It completely ignores all the values Star Trek had. A crew suddenly standing up for their captain isn't the same thing.

It also has a dumb species which is supposed to sense death coming in the near future. That doesn't many any sense. At least older shows tried to make things reasonable.

I expect all the new Star Trek shows are happening due to standard business cycles. There's been a lack of good space, sci-fi shows and marketers have finally seen that gap and are rushing in with a bunch of bullshit to try to fill it. They'll be a sudden influx which will over saturate the market leading it to collapse again as none of the shows get enough viewers to keep running. I doubt we'll see good quality content. By that I mean STNG style content where people spend more time thinking about solving problems than fighting their way through them and there isn't a single hero to love. Probably most of them will use the stories to drive crew drama rather than the stories being the main focus of the plot. There's enough TV where personal relationships are the main focus, not everyone wants that bullshit. Live and let live, so you can solve interesting problems instead of problems from people being idiots.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

I honestly don't know what to make of it. We got it on TV up here in Canadaland so - didn't have to buy into any streaming service. That said, it wasn't really worth tuning into just an episode or so. It's more of a big serialized story than episodic ones, as if it was designed to binge (oh right, STREAMING service.)

It doesn't really feel like Star Trek, or science-fiction, but it relies heavily on both. You can skip the first two episodes completely as they don't really set anything up. There's a plot twist of sorts that doesn't really amount to much. I've watched through it twice and nothing really sticks out at all as being exceptional or redeemable in any way. It's kinda like modern Star Wars in that way, it looks the part, it has many of the elements and beats from what inspired it but brotha it ain't the original or even, y'know, good.

To me it lacks passion, character and interesting stories. Y'know, what Star Trek used to be about...

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[oogoliegoogolie]

Discovery has redesigned Klingons that dress in King-Tut outfits and take 15 seconds to say every word, a Fungus drive that derives it's power from space-fungal spores, and an unlikable protagonist who routinely disobeys orders and stabs everyone she works with in the back yet somehow was promoted to being just one step away from being Captain. What's not to like?

They did do one cool episode, though, in the "Mirror-Mirror" alternate universe where some bridge-equivalent rebels hear about and set out to steal this new Empire warship being developed. It ends up being the Empire's equivalent of the original NCC-1701 Enterprise. They steal it and you finally get a feeling for Big-E's power, how far advanced it was compared to other ships at the time, and get to watch it do battle like never before! Oh wait, that's an episode from Enterprise.
 

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[TeknoHog]

It's as if fungus was the core of the Standard Model. And tartigrades were the conduit of the universe.

The tardigrade count is strong in this one.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[AmiMoJo]

The TV series has nothing to do with the new movies.

It's mostly about the Klingon war. It's good, worth watching on Netflix or DVD.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[jwhyche]

There was a rumor a while back to do a Star Trek Academy or something like that.

Personally, I would like to see a Star Trek from the point of view of the Klingons. Not those crappy Klingons from the discovery series, but real Klingons from TNG universe.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's good, worth watching on Netflix or DVD.

No. No it isn't. Not even for free.

If you want a good Star Trek series with a modern cast, watch The Orville.

If you want a bad action series with a ridiculous plot that tries to fill its holes with ultraviolent space-tardigrades, and where Folgers has secretly replaced your Klingons with the Dracs from Enemy Mine, then you either have or need a serious drug problem.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

That movie proved today's writers don't know what to do with Trek. Yet they want to keep milking that character?

I keep saying, it's too bad Star Trek didn't make it to its 50 year anniversary. Because whatever has been made since just before that date certainly doesn't qualify.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

I did feel the respect was there with the new movies.

Watch Wrath of Khan and Into Darkness back to back and tell me again about this so-called 'respect'.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

I watched Orville S1 and ST:D S1 as they aired. I was extremely disappointed with ST:D and sometimes it seriously felt like it was the satire comedy (the tardigrade stuff especially) while Orville was the serious thought provoking sci-fi (especially the 'social networking/popularity reputation' episode).

It blows. I wish Michael Dorn would have gotten the spin-off he wanted. He had several previous ST cast members interested.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

There are no real Klingons. Klingons do not exist. They are a fictional race. They can and will be whatever the intellectual property holders want them to be, and there is nothing you can do about it. :)

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[thegarbz]

Welcome to the USA. The rest of the world saw it on Netflix at a better quality and with surround sound that CBS never broadcast in their home country.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

well your reply disqualifies you as a sci-fi fan ;-P

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Dahlgil]

Yup. That's where I've semi-officially ended Star Trek. I continue to watch everything up to that movie, but have abandoned everything post.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Rhipf]

But at least they can follow some kind of continuity. You have the Klingons from TOS that look human. The Klingons from TNG that have cranial ridges (ok it takes place after TOS so maybe something happened to mutate them). Then the Klingons in Enterprise also have cranial ridges even though it takes place before TOS (but at least this is eventually explained). Then Discovery comes out and is supposed to take place 10 years before TOS (and in the same continuity universe) but the Klingons look nothing like previous Klingons. Some how they are going to be human looking in 10 years?

That is one of my big problems with Discovery. No one seems to have bothered to even try to maintain continuity.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[JackieBrown]

I completely lost interest in the whole franchise after the "re-imagined' of Wrath of Khan.

I'm fully aware I am in the minority but I actually liked the newest movie. I do agree that the Wrath of Khan reboot was horrible.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Mike Van Pelt]

Ugh. The Great Klingon Transmogrification was something that is utterly impossible to make sense out of. The DS9 crew was surprised at the human-looking Klingons and didn't know what they were for sure? Seriously? There were people alive in DS9 time who were alive in TOS time. At least three individual Klingons from TOS showed up on DS9, with bumpified foreheads.

The only plausible explanation is Roddenberry's: "The Klingons always had snapping turtle shell foreheads. We just didn't have the budget for all those snapping turtle shells back in 1968." In "The Trouble with Tribbles" it was a big surprise that Darvin was a Klingon, like it was a huge deal for a Klingon to pass as human. What? A shave is that improbable? But if they'd had to do serious plastic surgery on his forehead for him to pass as human... that plot point would make a lot more sense.

The proper thing for that "Back to the Tribbles" episode of DS9 was to have Michael Dorn be without the snapping turtle shell on his forehead when in the past, and no one make any mention of the difference. Or better, since they supposedly had a blank check for CGI for that episode, add digital snapping turtle shells to the foreheads of all the TOS Klingons. (Except Darvin, of course.)

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

Something did happen to mutate them. I think ST Enterprise explained it. The Klingons found the genetically altered humans embryos (think Khan) and tried to mix the genes with their own to become stronger, smarter, etc... It failed with the side effects of looking more human.

No clue how Discovery Klingons fit into the picture. Maintaining continuity means you have to think harder and can't just make up whatever you want. I think we're starting to run out of that type of writer in the industry. I certainly enjoy epic worlds and story arcs better than one-offs. I'm currently working through the disk world series. 30 books! Dragon Riders of Pern was great too.

Re:Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans?

[Anonymous Coward]

If by good you mean they totally reinvent the Klingons to the point they might as well be a completely different species. They also completely throw scientific plausibility out of the window on a regular basis, and their tech in many ways seems more advanced than Voyager's let alone the original series (which it was supposedly set before time-wise).

Basically it is a mediocre sci-fi series that bears little relation to the original Star Trek universe.

All Access?

[Thelasko]

Will it only be available on the infernal "All Access" app?

Re:All Access?

[olsmeister]

I never watched Discovery because of that. Shame.

Re:All Access?

[Anonymous Coward]

You didn't miss much.
I couldn't stand to watch more than the first half of the season.

Captcha: fifteen

Re:All Access?

[greenwow]

You didn't miss anything. The main character of STD was a gender-neutral somewhat more female looking it. It wasn't a likable character and started a war just because it was paranoid.

The captain Lorca was a much more interesting character (for reasons I won't say because they would be spoilers), but his role was deemphasized since he is a white male.

Re:All Access?

[Anonymous Coward]

> The main character of STD

And worse is disgusting looking. The actor playing the part of Michael is a woman, but I can't remember if STD ever confirmed it was a man or a woman.

Re:All Access?

[Anonymous Coward]

Plus Sonequa Martin-Green is vomit-inducing ugly. I don't understand why they picked a main character that is so disgusting that you had to look away from your TV to keep from getting sick. Looking away from the screen really takes you out of thse show. The rest of the casting, especially Cadet Tilly was great.

Re: All Access?

[Anonymous Coward]

That Michael was ugly.

Re:All Access?

[pr0fessor]

It was basically lens flare after lens flare. The Orville on the other hand was hilarious.

Re:All Access?

[MrL0G1C]

No, Pirate Bay will also have downloads available.

Re:All Access?

[Anonymous Coward]

You might want to seek professional help.

Re:All Access?

[Anonymous Coward]

I just looked at her picture on IMDB. My lunch is now in the trash can.

Re:All Access?

[CanadianMacFan]

Yes, each one will have it's own infernal "All Access" app requiring a separate monthly payment in addition to the one for Discovery (if that's still around).

Re:All Access?

[martinfb]

Really! This "All Access" crap is totally focused on gleaning more money out of an old idea.

Way too much crap (TV) is out there now. We'd watch more if it were not so poorly done, or at extra cost.

I refuse to pay for these special services and then watch commercial ads as well!
Your crap, and greed, are way to abusive.

What William Shatner as a JAG officer?

[Anonymous Coward]

Denny Crane's great great great great ...great grandson, Captain Denny Crane defending Klingons wrongfully accused of murder! Andorians wrongfully accused of terrorism! Vulcans wrongfully accused of that thing that gives them brain Aids.

No, thanks.

[Anonymous Coward]

At this point I'm extremely hesitant to spend any of my time watching newly-created media. Too much of it is basically leftist propaganda. It's especially sad to see Star Trek potentially fall victim to this idiocy. The Star Trek franchise has a long history of inclusivity, but without fomenting division like leftists aim to do so often today. We didn't think twice about a captain who kissed a black woman, or a captain who was black, or a captain who was a woman, or an engineer who was visually impaired, or an ensign who suffered from micropenis syndrome. Their uniqueness was a good thing, rather than something forced into these series just for the sake of inserting faux 'diversity' that the political left then tries to use to create division and strife.

Re:No, thanks.

[doconnor]

Star Trek has always been "leftist propaganda". The difference is the Internet is around to inflame people's passion.

--
proud subscriber of alt.ensign.wesley.die.die.die

Re: No, thanks.

[Anonymous Coward]

Absolutely wrong. Star Trek has traditionally portrayed a liberal ideology, not a leftist ideology. I know those two very different philosophies are often wrongly conflated with each other these days, so I can understand your confusion. Liberalism, as expressed in the Star Trek universe, is about independence, tolerance, acceptance and voluntary collaboration. Leftism, on the other hand, revolves around highlighting differences between people to try to cause disruption, anger, hatred and strife. They are polar opposites in most respects, with the term 'liberal' having been recently hijacked to try to create a positive, albeit false, veneer over the otherwise unpalatable negativity of leftist ideology.

Re:No, thanks.

[iczer1]

I don't think I read alt.ensign.wesley.die.die.die, but I remember seeing it when looking thru newsgroups to subscribe to. Good times back then.

Re: No, thanks.

[doconnor]

I don't know what you are talking about. Can you provide some examples?

Re:No, thanks.

[youngone]

Thanks A/C. I forgot that we're still pretending there's a "left" in US politics.

Re: No, thanks.

[Anonymous Coward]

If anything is missing from contemporary US politics, it's a true right-wing party. Today's Republicans would have traditionally been considered to be a center-left party, even as late as the 1990s. They only appear to be 'right wing' because the Democrats and their affiliates (like Sanders) have veered so hard to the left. Many Democrat supporters today would have been considered to be Communists throughout the 20th century. American politics has suffered a significant leftward shift over the last two decades.

Re: No, thanks.

[Anonymous Coward]

He did provide examples. You're asking to be spoonfed.

Re: No, thanks.

[doconnor]

He didn't really give any examples is bad "leftism". You don't get much more gratuitously diverse then having a Russian crew member in the middle of the Cold War.

Re: No, thanks.

[Gavagai80]

Having a comedically over-patriotic Russian and making minorities all obey all orders of a midwest American white man was not nearly as liberal as Roddenberry wanted to believe.

Re: No, thanks.

[doconnor]

You mean have mirror Chekov meet non-mirror Lorca? I look forward to your fanfic.

Re:No, thanks.

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't see it as "Leftist" but more Libertarian. People should be able to do what they want without hurting other people. However even in TOS there was still a military, people worked for a living. In DS9, there is still a lot of free enterprise (Quark especially).

Please, just let it die.

[sizzzzlerz]

So we've got 5 Star Trek shows in the works and 7, 8, or 9 Star Wars prequels, sequels, whatevers, as well. This isn't innovation. It's not new ideas. And it certainly not exciting. It's whipping a dead cow laying out in the desert somewhere for the past 2 years in order to get a few more drops of milk.

It's done, guys. It's over. Time to let go.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't have a problem with some of the ideas, though I don't really like the idea of a teen-oriented version at Starfleet Academy. Discovery really isn't that bad, it's just polarizing among fans. TNG was heavily criticized during its first couple of seasons, too. And the same can be said about DS9.

The limited series about Khan has been rumored for a long time. Nicholas Meyer directed Star Trek II and was heavily involved with its development. Carey Wilber created the Khan character, but Meyer's story was great. Meyer was also involved in Star Trek IV and VI, also good movies. I am optimistic that Meyer will do a good job.

As for the post-TNG series, if it involves Patrick Stewart at his age now, it's likely to be post-Voyager and post-Nemesis. A lot of fans said they didn't want a prequel like Discovery, but a continuation of the timeline after Voyager. I'd say it deserves a chance, at least.

At the end of the existing canon timeline, the Federation spans about 8,000 light years in the alpha and beta quadrants. The Borg control large swaths of the delta quadrant and certainly occupy some of the beta quadrant. That's shown in Q Who, when Q hurls the Enterprise-D 7,000 light years to system J-25 in the beta quadrant, where they first encounter the Borg. An interesting premise would be for the Federation to expand to the point where they approach Borg-controlled space and have a full scale war with the Federation. I know of at least one non-canon story involving a war with the Borg over the alpha and beta quadrants. It could make for a very interesting story, if that's where the developers wanted to go. There's the potential for such a show to be very interesting, so I'd say we should give it a chance.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[Anonymous Coward]

Somebody needs to come up with a new concept for the space/future of humanity story type. Something grittier and dirtier than Trek and less fairy princessy than Wars. Something with less hopefulness and more brutality. Something a bit more reflective of where we actually seem to be heading.

Maybe spin on the idea of a secret group jetting themselves off this rock just to get away from the crazy only to find out they brought they crazy with them. There, studios. Free idea that took me five seconds to dream up and is already more interesting than attempting to replicate the magic of a property that's been on life-support for several decades.

The only future concept I've seen that doesn't instantly make me turn off the TV is The 100, but that's well past jump the shark territory at this point and really only stays on because my wife is in love with it.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[Anonymous Coward]

The Expanse

Re:Please, just let it die.

[The Grim Reefer]

Somebody needs to come up with a new concept for the space/future of humanity story type. Something grittier and dirtier than Trek and less fairy princessy than Wars. Something with less hopefulness and more brutality.

I guess you missed the Battlestar Galactica remake.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[Anonymous Coward]

They haven't done a proper live action Gundam yet. Brutal, hopeless, and filled with terrible people on all sides, usually with someone trying to eradicate humanity (or at least the part of it still on Earth). Weapon manufacturers sell to both sides of every conflict, wealthy nobles control pretty much everything, and all hope rests in one kid with a super weapon who will end up crazy, a vegetable, dead, or some other kind of dead. Innocent people are killed of by the millions and every decent person gets a tragic death. And lots of fun toys for the kids!

Re:Please, just let it die.

[ArchieBunker]

Enough of shows being "gritty". Sometimes I want to watch an episode without it being part of a larger plot or ending on a cliffhanger.

Re: Please, just let it die.

[Anonymous Coward]

So a less shitty Pacific Rim then.

All in for Gundam live action. Plenty of source material for them to ignore and fuck up.

Re: Please, just let it die.

[Anonymous Coward]

Enough of shows being "politically correct". Star Trek is particularly bad about this. Sometimes I just want to watch a show and see níggers getting lynched all over the place. We don't need every show to appease minorities. They bitch and moan if a show doesn't have any níggers or wetbacks. Why aren't there more white people in black-ish? That's discriminatory as hell. And why are white people forced to pay for BET on their cable bills? It's more of this affirmative action bullshit. Let the níggers and wetbacks have their channels. And let white people avoid all of this political correctness bullshit and just watch níggers getting lynched without paying for their damn channels. What's next? Forcing everyone to pay for a sand nígger version of EWTN?

This is why I hate níggers, towelheads, kikes, chinks, wetbacks, dune coons, and all the other types of darkies. They hate us and want to kill us, then they cry about political correctness when they're told their culture is harmful. That's why I hate them, because they are clearly our enemy and then they play the race card whenever anyone complains. My hate is strong and I'm damned proud of it. In fact, my hate is getting stronger as I talk to you people. However, I'm not racist, and there's nothing racist about my post. That's the problem with Star Trek, it's just another excuse to shove this political correctness bullshit down everyone's throats. If I want to hate darkies, that's my right, and it's no one's right to tell me I shouldn't do so.

Get this Star Trek political correctness bullshit off my TV and let me watch níggers getting lynched.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[CanadianMacFan]

I wish I had. The first two seasons were good but then it found God and started with the religious theme. Mind you not as bad as Caprica.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[nmb3000]

Agreed, though I think BSG redeemed itself a little bit during the mid-fourth season with the trial of Baltar and some other stories.

The real problem is that Ron Moore just doesn't know how to wind down and end a TV series. You can see the exact same problems with Deep Space Nine -- a great show that floundered at the end and also ended up going down the religion rabbit hole.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[andydread]

lost in space. Dr Smith...

Re:Please, just let it die.

[HeckRuler]

I dunno man, I'm not so mad about there being yet another Star Trek series. The format of the show lends itself well to spinoffs. It was an engaging SETTING which fostered a lot of stories. I'm cool with that. I'd honestly be interested in hearing how the most devious Klingon and the most bloodthirsty Romulan managed to team up and keep their sides politically aligned during the ${ST_COLD_WAR_ANALOGY}. And it was cool to see how things played out after the collapse of the Klingon Empire and the war-hawks tried to flare it up. Some of the movies were good. There's room for the stories to continue.

Star Wars on the other hand... Well, honestly, same damn thing. It's an interesting (if less hard) setting. Bounty hunters and rogue squadrons and the Vong. Good stories. Some of them. But NONE of that was picked up by the corporate masters. All that was taken out back and shot. We got ep4, the retelling. A direct path to killing off all the old actors. And filling the gaps. (Personally, Rogue One was probably the best of Disney's effort). And star wars got the same treatment. A "reboot". Fuck your canon. THAT'S not innovative. They're literally retelling the SAME old ideas. They're trying to cash in on the fact that people know the name "spock". tch.

Although, it IS kinda cosmic justice if Picard got a ridiculously bad animated series. Something like the stiff flash graphics from Archer, but with Tribbles?

Re:Please, just let it die.

[HeckRuler]

the Federation to expand to the point where they approach Borg-controlled space and have a full scale war with the Federation.

With fringe worlds getting swamped with refugees fleeing the warfare. And an unsettling number coming into the Federation, any one of which could be a borg sleeper agent/spy. "All it takes is one self-replicating nanomachine hiding in their bloodstream and we've got neighborhoods in SanFran getting assimilated, RIGHT UNDER FEDERATION'S NOSE!"

Everyone is worried about subspace pollution causing planets to get stranded and cut off from the resulting subspace ruptures. International politics try to get the Ferengi traders to limit their freighters to no avail.

Meanwhile the Klingons are STILL there and still rattling sabers. And the Romulans are playing the markets, and undercutting Federation efforts by abusing the shit out of the Remans. And their spies keep stealing Federation tech.

It's like modern day issues could find a sort of PARALLEL in the Star Trek setting. **Cough**COLDWAR**Cough**. But what kind of corporation would have the balls to make meaningful social commentary? Nope, we get commander Michael instead.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[HeckRuler]

How about...... the crew of a spaceship are all indentured servants to a all-powerful master race that must be served? With a commissar on board to enforce that. Because most of the crew are AI constructs, with the nameless faceless background characters being more like scripts and drivers. Every bloody solenoid and tcp packet is a valve they need to manually turn or a package they need to deliver. And then they go rogue or something after their "admiral" fails to wake up from cryo.

Re: Please, just let it die.

[Anonymous Coward]

And get that damn black woman off of the bridge, she don't belong there! Keep that and they'll end up with a commie RUSSKI driving the whole thing.

I started out disgusted and ended up wondering if I was in an avaunt guard piece. Surely no one is.... THIS laughably bad?

Re:Please, just let it die.

[antdude]

OK, Kylo Ren.

Re:Please, just let it die.

[martinfb]

Agreed.
Unless someone there has ideas beyond just milking it, like an original story perhaps?!

Well

[Anonymous Coward]

I can now write off Star Trek as any interest of mine. Saying Discovery is a success was the final nail.

How about no

[Anonymous Coward]

Go away CBS, no one is going to buy your shitty version of Netflix

WTB Captain Worf

[Anonymous Coward]

I want Captain Worf. Five shows is so many, where is the one about Worf?

Re:WTB Captain Worf

[Anonymous Coward]

Yar > Worf

Re:WTB Captain Worf

[Anonymous Coward]

Captain Worf was a ridiculous idea.

We need a show that's just Chancellor Martok and Ambassador Worf sitting in a hunting cabin somewhere in the far reaches of Qo'noS, drinking blood wine, swapping stories, and generally getting into ridiculous hijinks.

Re: WTB Captain Worf

[Anonymous Coward]

Did that already. But better.

It was Picard and Dathon... at El-Adrel

Re:WTB Captain Worf

[HeckRuler]

Half flashbacks to crazy good-day-to-die war stories and half drunken Klingon version of.... are you thinking more Red-Green, Hee-Haw, or LetterKenny?

I'm impressed

[meglon]

5 Star Trek Shows in Development

I didn't know Seth MacFarlane could develop so many shows all at once.

Re:I'm impressed

[Anonymous Coward]

5 Star Trek Shows in Development

I didn't know Seth MacFarlane could develop so many shows all at once.

Of course he can; they're all just cookie cutters versions of Family Guy.

Re:I'm impressed

[mfearby]

And they're all far better than any of these new Star Trek series will ever be. I never thought I'd say this but "Enterprise" is almost watchable compared to "Discovery". I'll probably check out the one with Patrick Stewart, if it comes to pass, but I don't hold out a lot of hope for it, not unless they sack the Klingon makeup department and hire some better writers.

"beloved" character Khan

[fahrbot-bot]

A limited series based around the beloved character Khan ...

The series will revolve around Khan's earlier days as founder of a non-profit educational organization and the challenges he, and his students', faced in fast-paced the world of on-line academia and, later, how the stresses of life and continuing education drove him actualize his genetic-designed potential for world domination. The rest, as they say, will be History.

Re:"beloved" character Khan

[AmiMoJo]

Could be a really interesting story there. Khan started from a not unreasonable position - he and his people had been used, abused and discarded by humanity and deserved a life, a chance to live. But he's also been bred for war and despite his intelligence he can't suppress those instincts entirely.

Those things pulling him in different directions, and what Kirk unintentionally did to him made a great movie.

They did a good job with the first 3

[Anonymous Coward]

TOS, TNG, and DS9 are timeless, classic series. Voyager, Enterprise, and maybe Discovery, not so much. It will be hard to replicate their success.

at least put it on showtime if not CBS OTA!

[Joe_Dragon]

at least put it on showtime if not CBS OTA!

Re:at least put it on showtime if not CBS OTA!

[Anonymous Coward]

And the very first episode that was OTA CBS advertised it would start at 8:30pm PST. It actually started at 8pm instead. Having fans miss the first half of the first episode lost them a lot of viewers.

Re:at least put it on showtime if not CBS OTA!

[antdude]

Heck no. Leave it on OTA like older ST used to do!

The Eugenics Wars: The Rise and Fall of Khan ...

[Anomalous Co-worker]

I have long wanted the books by Greg Cox to be made into a TV series for two reasons: 1. It is centered on 20th century Earth, and has minimal alien involvement and only Kirk's influence from the future. 2. It can truly start with a clean slate.

Re: Is Star Trek still a real thing for scifi fans

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember that Voyager was created during the very early years of the public adoption of the Internet and the WWW. Although some episodes may seem dumb today, at the time it was pushing societal boundaries in many ways, before information traveled as quickly as it does today. One example is the depiction of Ensign Harry Kim. If I'm not mistaken, this was one of the first, if not the very first, character in a mainstream production to suffer from micropenis syndrome and the difficulties it entails, such as the inability to form and maintain romantic relationships with women. Instead of being ostracized, he was shown as receiving compassion and care from his fellow crewmates. For many viewers this was their first introduction to a physical disorder that can be particularly challenging to deal with. But that's really what Star Trek has long been about: challenging societal norms in a non-confrontational manner that serves to enlighten, rather than to anger.

Prequel

[Roger W Moore]

The series will revolve around Khan's earlier days as founder of a non-profit educational organization

I thought his early days involved leading hordes of horsemen from the Mongolian plains and performing so much rape and pillage that there is a fair chace you are related to him.

Re:Prequel

[sconeu]

Possibly also having something to do with building a stately pleasure dome.

Re:Prequel

[tbannist]

Hey! Don't spoil the overarching plot for Season 2.

Quick! Add a pansexual!

[Anonymous Coward]

Who falls in love with robots! It's a sure winner!

Re: Quick! Add a pansexual!

[Anonymous Coward]

TNG. People dated Data.
VOY. People data the hologram Doctor. Even married him in alternate future.

Great News!

[oldmac31310]

Hey everyone. Did you hear the news? William Shatner is getting married to Stevie Nicks? When asked if she would be keeping her name or not, a close friend said 'Stevie Shatner-Nicks'.

Plot reveal:

[CaptainDork]

To boldly go where no man has gone before ...

Shocking allegations?

[110010001000]

What were the shocking allegations? All I heard was that two guys got canned for making too much money and yelling at some Millenials.

Re:Shocking allegations?

[Topwiz]

Most of the stuff in the summary is not in the linked story so either msmash did a horrible job typing it up or made up things. The linked story doesn't say anything about Patrick Stewart or the reasons for the show runnner's dismissal.

Re:Shocking allegations?

[Anonymous Coward]

it sounds like the showrunners were tired of the shit scripts that the writers were coming up with and yelled mean things at them in the writers room. Why that's shocking is a mystery since I'm guessing it happens pretty frequently in hollywood.

Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[rally2xs]

If they can get it on my cable TV somehow, the cable I'm already paying big $$$$ for, then maybe I'll set the DVR. Oh, and despite the sexy graphics of the Discovery show, I stopped at the 1st episode where the female captain goes one-on-one with a Klingon and doesn't die. Female-lead combat command also ruined The Force Awakens for me, as it is seriously unrealistic in that, although women could probably do these things, you don't find many aspiring to such roles. Getting them "all over the place" in the flick... fantasy. Kirk could barely go 1-on-1 with Klingons, so its preposterous for a female sans Marvel Universe super-powers to be doing it. Wonder Woman yes, any other woman, no... Just gimmie a break, make it available without extra $$$, and don't do silly-s-stuff like women-lead combat units and then maybe...

Re: Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[TJHook3r]

If you stopped at the first episode you missed a good series. I would say the fight scenes are very well done and feature fairly believable physics.

Re:Quick! Add a pansexual!

[OzPeter]

Who falls in love with robots! It's a sure winner!

You never saw the films in high school.

Re:Trump 2 - Ivanka fucked her dad, wuuuut?

[Anonymous Coward]

You're quite taken with the God Emperor aint ya?

Please stop

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sick and tired of endless reboots remakes and sequels to the same hand full of IP.
TNG was great, but we really don't need a new picard series.
Go to a book store, or amazon and pick any of the hundreds of other universes and make a series of that.
Do we really need 5 fucking star treks at once?
How about a series about known space? Or the commonwealth? Heck, do some necroscope books.
Just fucking anything new at all.
These days I find myself watching korean television just to get something different.
Hollywood isn't any different.
They have now given up and are just regurgitating the same shitty movies but recast with women only, and no real character, making them even dumber than before.
Seriously. Female ghost busters and female oceans was the best you could come up with?
I find it hard to believe that there isn't a single script out there with some original characters that wouldn't be better than this rehashing.

Re:Please stop

[rally2xs]

Yeah, they _finally_ made a movie out of "Ender's Game." Waited decades for that. Now, if they would just do it for Footfall - they can do great pachyderm aliens with the CGI capabilities that the movie makers have now, and Archangel Michael at the end would be a very satisfying conclusion to the conflict. But yeah, there's great stories all over the place. I imagine, tho, that building a blockbuster from scratch, so's it makes several hundred million dollars to offset the production costs of the CGI and stuff is much harder than doing it for something with a familiar storyline. Now, Disney is totally f-ing up the Star Wars story line so they may be killing or may have killed that goose that was laying those golden eggs. I did like "Solo" tho, but I may be easy to please. Just don't like the overwhelming number of women in the main storyline now. And I can see how it might negatively impact the interest of boys in the series - I mean, the video game is advertised as, "Start Rhea's Journey..." As a boy, who would want to do that?

Re:Quick! Add a pansexual!

[DontBeAMoran]

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

Re:CRE1MER is a SPAMMER. FAQ

[Anonymous Coward]

Wrong venue Pasadena is a huge Reptilian Nazi Hive where the Borg Hiveheads eat Human people. A better location is Fry's Electronics in Burbank with the UFO crashed into the front. They should have rented out the huge parking lot for the 3 days and put up event tents. Plenty of hotels and transportation across the street at the Bob No Hope Airport.

One of those might be worth checking out

[imidan]

If Nicholas Meyer makes a Star Trek show, I may actually be excited about watching it. He did both Star Trek 2 and 6, the best of the movies IMO.

I've never seen Discovery. I'm certainly not going to pay for a streaming service for the purpose of watching one show. And I haven't heard anything positive enough about it to pirate it. I just don't care that much, which is a bit sad considering I've watched every Star Trek show up to this point.

Existed and killed

[SuperKendall]

Maybe spin on the idea of a secret group jetting themselves off this rock just to get away from the crazy only to find out they brought they crazy with them.

That is Firefly. Change my mind.

The only future concept I've seen that doesn't instantly make me turn off the TV is The 100, but that's well past jump the shark territory at this point

Yeah but come on, it is some epic shark-jumping they are doing on that show. If you are going to jump a shark, jump a whole pile of them or a mega-shark - and that is what that show does far better than any other from season to season... within each season I still feel like they are doing a pretty great job.

Re:Existed and killed

[Anonymous Coward]

Firefly was amazing, and Fox being Fox, and having the same fucking lunatic in charge at the time that later turned Ryan Reynolds Deadpool into Baraka and is currently working at killing off Spiderman's limited potential, they did what they do.

I have to admit on the 100, their ability season-to-season to utterly ignore what they've already established while pounding ever deeper into the ass-end of failure is pretty epic. But some episodes are just painful to watch, while others are amusing in a "Plan 9 From Outer Space" sort of way.

Is it about the future?

[0100010001010011]

I grew up on TNG and DS9 because it was about the 'future'. Both series had a good balance of soap opera in space and technobable. TNG brought us the Borg. Voyager the Delta quadrant. DS9 the changlings and the wormhole. And then they went and started redoing established history. Stop overwriting canon so that we can see "Kirk" on screen.

I want to see what happens after DS9. Something set as far ahead of DS9 as TNG was ahead of TOS.

Get some tech consultants and map out some future tech. Get out beyond the quadrants of the Milky Way. Make up some new aliens, in the future. It makes no sense to say "eh, in the past we had these aliens but they somehow don't exist anymore by time TOS, TNG, DS9 and VOY do".

There's so much existing IP that there should be no shortage of material. Borg, Cardassians or Changlings part of the Federation? Federation disbanded? Mirror universe travel 'normal' as interstellar travel? (Without being Sliders).

Time it right and you can still do cameos like Scotty in TNG (even if you screw up the episode so much that you have them beaming through a shield). The DS9, TNG and VOY crews should still be mostly alive, especially Data and the Doctor.

At this point they're just going to set a series in 2028 and call it 'ultrapre-history Federation'.

Re: Is it about the future?

[Anonymous Coward]

Data died in Nemesis. Unless you mean 'Data' as how he emerges from the memory transfer to B4.

Re:Is it about the future?

[dyslexicbunny]

That's something I would find interesting and wish people would actually think about and push towards.

I've watched all of TNG and DS9 in the last couple years and they're amazing shows. I watched TOS as well and I can appreciate it but I didn't enjoy it as much. Voyager has its flaws but I enjoy it enough too.

I really don't care about events in Kirk's time. Khan just feels lazy and wanting to build something based on name recognition. I likely won't watch the Academy show but it could be an interesting series as it's at least different from other series.

BITCH! You left out ST:tAS!

[Thud457]

More animamated modern liberated[1] Kzinti cat-gurlz plz!


[1] yeah, I know what I do there.

New Series?

[cashman73]

A series about Khan is risky, IMHO. The core fan-boys will either love it or hate it; there is no in between there.

A show about starfleet academy could be interesting. Might bring in some younger viewers. But it could also completely suck if they make it like Beverly Hills 90210 In Space ,. . .

Re:New Series?

[CaseCrash]

I'm going to go ahead and ignore my own sig as this does seem appropriate, but Penny Arcade called it, sort of:

Tormented, Science-Fiction Youth (https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/04/27)

Just one phrase from TFA

[bettodavis]

Teen-oriented series?

Uh-oh.

Sounds like the Teen Titans and Thudercats Roar treatment for Star Trek.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Anonymous Coward]

They would have just sent a combat droid over, shredded the Klingon and been done with it. Oh, and the Klingons would have had their own combat droids. No need for crew members to endanger themselves. Sci-Fi is so unimaginative and panders to our backwards outlook.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Anonymous Coward]

Female-lead combat command also ruined The Force Awakens for me, as it is seriously unrealistic in that, although women could probably do these things, you don't find many aspiring to such roles.

There are women who can do combat as well as a man. Those women will never get a lead role on a CBS show though. They're not conventionally attractive. They look like they could kick your ass. This does not sell soap very well. Or cars. I guess it's mostly cars, now.

Discovery?

[markdavis]

>"In the wake of shocking allegations against Star Trek: Discovery's showrunners"

Discovery? Is that really a thing? I am a huge Trekkie and have not seen a single episode. Their distribution model sucked, and I have heard it is nothing but "PC overkill" combined with total fantasy. Strangely, I don't know ANYONE who has actually watched "Discovery" and when I ask them, they have no interest in doing so, even the Trekkies like me. But....

Meanwhile, the Orville came along and THAT became my Star Trek after Enterprise. Enterprise was a bit shaky, but was just getting into its grove when they killed it. Reminded me of the issues with Deep Space 9, until STTNG ended and the writers apparently focused their attention on DS9 and it improved a lot. Anyway, who would have thought "Orville" would have somehow hit the Trek nail on the head??? I am still in disbelief.

I loved the original, REALLY REALLY loved ALL of The Next Generation, loved most of DS9, really loved all of Voyager, loved much of Enterprise, after the awkward start. Most of the original Trek movies were so-so (Wrath of Kahn clearly the best). The Next Generation movies were all quite good. And I really loved the reboot movies. But now it seems Paramount has really lost their way, at least with TV (and especially in combination with CBS).

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

I liked most Trek before Discovery. Including at least the first of the reboot (nothing like the old Trek, but very entertaining in its own right), although TNG the series and First Contact are my favourites. Sure DS9, Voyager and Enterprise had some boring/bad parts, but they were OK overall. I watched Discovery and it was the opposite, it was pretty bad overall, horrible at times and only had some good parts (mainly how they ended the season). The Orville is not as good as I expected, but it is much better and more Trek like.

Re: Discovery?

[AmiMoJo]

Don't let the "pc overkill" nonsense put you off. There is far less of it than the original series or TNG. It's just some people with an agenda saying that.

You can get it in DVD and it's worth watching.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

says slashdot's preeminent social justice warrior..

Re: Discovery?

[mfearby]

I agree with you about The Orville. It's 5 starts compared to Discovery, which I'd give 1 star. TNG, DS9, and VOY are all my favourites, but Enterprise had a weakling for a captain and it drove me mad. I watched a few episodes of Discovery (appropriate acronym: "STD") and regretted it. The Orville is where it's at, now.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

> Discovery? Is that really a thing? I am a huge Trekkie and have not seen a single episode.

It might've been an interesting sci-fi series if it stood its own ground. As far as I'm concerned, there was no reason to call this "Star Trek" because it holds no resemblance to what's expected of the name. Just like the reboot movies, they might've been mildly interesting sci-fi movies if they didn't try to shoe-horn *those* characters into *those* storylines.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ehhhhhhh not quite. I don't think it is 'agenda people' at all.

So in Star Trek TOS there were tons of unpopular viewpoints that Gene put in because (paraphrasing here from what I remember of what I've read of him over the years) he felt like if he just came out and said his unpopular opinion on social issues they would be immediately shot down by people who wouldn't really give them any thought just because they were so against the prevailing public viewpoints of the time (putting a black woman in a position of authority, having her kiss a white man/Captain in what is possibly the first interracial kiss on television). He thought if he could just put his viewpoints on social issues into an entertaining format that allowed people to take in the surrounding context before getting to the crux they might be better able to understand it and really start thinking about something that they would have immediately rejected if he came out and said it.

What we have with Star Trek Discovery on the other hand is pandering to what is already an extremely prevailing point of view. You say something expressing your disapproval of feminist ideology or LGBT rights on social media and you can lose your job in our day and age... so really it is in that aspect the exact opposite of ST:TOS. Said differently- Star Trek Discovery isn't cutting against social norms, it's embracing them because it knows that is what is going to sell in our day and age (whereas it was actually a major disadvantage and a liability in ST:TOS)

Re: Discovery?

[markdavis]

Enterprise had a weakling for a captain and it drove me mad

I liked most of the characters but had a REALLY hard time swallowing Scott Bakula. Although eventually he started getting into the role and I could deal with it. He sorta reminded me of Chapote on Voyager (my least liked character). One problem is that I kept thinking at any moment he would say "Oh Boy"....

Re: Discovery?

[skegg]

There's probably a dose of PC* injected into Discovery, but I very much enjoyed it and look forward to upcoming episodes. I think anyone who likes science fiction (and particularly a Trekkie) would be unnecessarily depriving themselves of entertainment by sidestepping this series.

* There's arguably an over-representation of strong and competent females vs males in the upper Starfleet ranks. Then again Janeway (and Admiral Nechayev) cleared this path years ago. (Our timeline ... Discovery is set before them in the Star Trek universe.) Anyhow, if that's not someone's cup of coffee (black) then "get off my ship!"

Re: Discovery?

[AHuxley]

STD could have done a good supporting cast with ideas like Saru, Airiam.
But then the plot had to work via Michael. For a good STD the rest of the cast would have had to have some role.
The new plots have to be more interesting than 5 times a STD with a winning Michael vs bad and evil monoculture.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

They overplayed the PC card big league. The last straw for me was the continuous in-your-face gay relationship story. If they want to write that into the plot then fine, but *stop harping on it every god damned second.*

Re: Discovery?

[rally2xs]

I had trouble with just 2 aspects of The Next Generation. I got tired of the lack of action - they were cruising all over the known universe in the most advanced battlewagon built by man, and worrying about Wesley Crusher's identity crisis. That sucked. And then there was the fact that they kept bouncing the broadcast times for it around unpredictably. I'd set of my VCR (remember those?) to record it, and instead I'd get a baseball game or somesuch. Got tired of chasing it for that, and for the lack of action.

There just isn't anything as great as the original series.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with DIS isn't the "PC overkill" (whatever that is), but bad storytelling. Without too many spoilers:

A. The emphasis on "tell not show". What kind of show needs to _tell_ viewer that in the Mirror Universe - where people all but walk with a huge neon sign "I am Evil" - the Fed parallel is a fascist empire? The status updates on the War, without any emotional involvement.The lead character's relations with a certain species, etc.

B. The show's emphasis on a single character borders on the cultish. While previous Trek shows did idolize the ship's personnel - there were plenty of flaws if one looked closely, decision making was collaborative, and plenty of perspectives. The shows goes back to Michael repeatedly, even when she's peripheral to the plot (!) , and you don't disagree with Michael or you get phasored.

C. The Klingon storyline is a failure, and nothing there makes any sense. The lead character didn't earn redemption in my book, but explaining that would spoil too much.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it's rife with SJW nonsense. You'd have to be blind not to see it. There's a serious agenda behind the show.

It's also definitely not worth watching, as it is horrendously written both in terms of overall plot, relation to other Star Trek lore/ideals, and characters. The characters are especially awful. The protagonist is the worst of all. This is what happens when your writing starts and stops with skin colour and genitals.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Orville's basically TNG fanfiction with some Family Guy humour sprinkled in. It's well done, catches the corniness of older Star Trek well while also building its own universe. But some of the parallels are too in-your-face; even the theme song sounds like the biggest TNG rip-off ever.

But you really haven't given Discovery a chance if what you're judging it on is its distribution model, and the MRA/anti-PC's hatred for it. Personally, I thought the tempo, drama, and spirituality of the show was what actually made it less interesting to follow.

Re: Discovery?

[AmiMoJo]

Can you give some specific examples of plot points that you consider to be "SJW nonsense"?

Re: Discovery?

[mjwx]

>"In the wake of shocking allegations against Star Trek: Discovery's showrunners"

Discovery? Is that really a thing? I am a huge Trekkie and have not seen a single episode. Their distribution model sucked, and I have heard it is nothing but "PC overkill" combined with total fantasy. Strangely, I don't know ANYONE who has actually watched "Discovery" and when I ask them, they have no interest in doing so, even the Trekkies like me. But....

Discovery sucked for many reasons, mainly because they tried to make it dark and gritty like BSG and the Trek universe doesn't fit in to that... But also a lot of production annoyances (like the Klingons speaking Klingon, but the Vulcans speaking English).

However the whole "PC overkill" thing was a complete and utter fallacy made up by people who wanted to cry about the world becoming less bigoted than the 1960's.

Watch it, it got slightly better towards the end but I honestly didn't think it deserved a second season.

Re: Discovery?

[Cro Magnon]

Totally agree! My biggest gripe about the Orville is, the season was too damn short.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

the gay relationship story is completely unrealistic simply because, in the future, there will be no LGBTQIABBQ. Teh gay and teh trans-whatever will be cured by an advanced version of CRISPR.

Re: Discovery?

[Mike Van Pelt]

I never gave The Orville a chance, because it was a creation of Seth McFartjoke, who I find insufferable at best.

What I heard about the first couple of episodes didn't give me any reason to give it a chance. However, people whose taste I ... am not entirely appalled by ... have said it got really good later on. So, I suppose I'll have to give it a try at some point.

After I've caught up with "The Expanse." Now that's *good*.

Re: Discovery?

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't let the "pc overkill" nonsense put you off. There is far less of it than the original series or TNG. It's just some people with an agenda saying that.

...says the most agenda-driven poster on this site.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay gramps, time for your meds and warm milk.

Star Trek: Hospital

[Anonymous Coward]

I hope one of the shows is set in an interstellar hospital, with a couple of holodocs, a couple of engineers to fiddle with them, and one or two Dr. House types thrown in. The latter could be geneered like Bashir.

The Orville... needs a backstory, fast. It feels a lot like ST:TNG's first season, but slightly lamer.

Re:Star Trek: Hospital

[Anonymous Coward]

If they actually went into field medicine as well as peacetime, like in DS9's "Nor the Battle to the Strong", I'd watch it. ... Probably not on a streaming service, though. :P

Re: Sure sure put down that cross Jesus

[Anonymous Coward]

We sure could use the firewood. /. was never important. /. was never influential.

You're talking out of your asshole. And your asshole stinks.

WASH YO ASS!

Will any of them be good?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yo we made a remake of a remake of your prequel remake remake kahhhhhhhhhhhn.

Re:Quick! Add a pansexual!

[blindseer]

There weren't any pansexuals in that video!

Here's a video with a pansexual wookie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

And just for fun here's Darth Vader on the accordion...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

For some reason I have a compelling desire to start cello lessons.

Humans with Klingons

[Tablizer]

They should make a series about two Federation human newbies stationed on a Klingon ship. A man and a woman. The culture clashes would be fun and interesting. The Earth man can date a Klingon woman, and he always walk out of their room with bruises but smiling.

Re:Humans with Klingons

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh no thanks. If you want that kind of garbage, go watch soaps with the women. There's no reason why video entertainment has to be about teenangsty relationships 24/7.

Re:Humans with Klingons

[Tablizer]

Entire show wouldn't be that, it would be kind of a side issue. Anyhow, can't please everyone.

If anything should be excised from Trek...

[Oligonicella]

it should be Patrick Stewart. His presence just made the Federation ooze pomposity.

total lack of imagination moving forward

[nnet]

once again no one is moving forward into the future with star trek.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Oligonicella]

Something a bit more reflective of where we actually seem to be heading.

You should read up on crime statistics then. We're heading *away* from violence, despite the 24/7 coverage on TV.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, well PSA-style edutainment just isn't that entertaining. Lets not do what the soviets did and make everything adhere to some marxist political ideology.

Counteroffer

[king neckbeard]

I have a counteroffer: 5 Patrick Stewart shows. 1 could be Star Trek.

Re:Counteroffer

[93 Escort Wagon]

Patrick Stewart is something like 110 years old. Let the poor guy enjoy retirement.

A recurring Picard (Re:Is this a joke?)

[blindseer]

I picture Picard as being a recurring character. Maybe he'd "bookend" each season, providing continuity with the larger Trek universe by playing a prominent role in these episodes but otherwise be largely absent. Maybe he'd bookend each episode by giving a "captain's log" style opening and/or Mork and Mindy style closing report to some authority on how things played out.

Why do I think Picard would be portrayed in such a way? Because Patrick Stewart is getting old. I saw an interview he had where he'd talk about sitting in a hotel room, watching a Star Trek episode he had been in and not remembering that episode being taped. While watching TV there would be a knock at the door and he'd see room service had brought him food that he didn't remember ordering. He was lighthearted about the experience, merely addressing that his memory isn't like it was.

If he's going to portray Picard then he's going to have to do so in a way that he can disappear for long periods and have the viewers not wonder where he's been. I was surprised to see that Stewart took on a new show, Blunt Talk, given his statements in that interview. I see it's been cancelled. I hadn't seen the show so I don't know how much screen time he had or how well he had performed. Was the show cancelled because Stewart couldn't keep up? Was he forgetting his lines? Or did Stewart's performance have nothing to do with it not continuing?

Even if Stewart felt he'd be up to being a main character on a new Trek-verse show there is still convincing the powers that be that someone that will hit 80 in the second season will be able to keep up.

Re:A recurring Picard (Re:Is this a joke?)

[dgatwood]

I saw an interview he had where he'd talk about sitting in a hotel room, watching a Star Trek episode he had been in and not remembering that episode being taped.

Meh. I'm O(half his age), and half the time, I couldn't tell you what I did at work last week. :-) Besides, I'm pretty sure he's not actually losing his marbles. Minor memory problems like those (including doing things while distracted and forgetting you did them) are actually reasonably normal at that age, and are not inherently a sign of anything serious.

Given his relatively good health (from all outward indications), I'm fully expecting him to out-age Betty White.

Re:A recurring Picard (Re:Is this a joke?)

[blindseer]

Besides, I'm pretty sure he's not actually losing his marbles.

I'm not saying he is either. Stewart was merely telling a little tale on how/when he recognized he's not as young as he used to be. It sounds like he's still active in theater and does acting on screens big and small. What he's unlikely to do though is be a main character in another sci-fi adventure show.

I've seen those behind the scenes shows that show what the main actors have to do everyday to produce a typical sci-fi adventure show. They'll work 10, 12, or even 16 hours on set for 4, 5, or 6 days a week for 12 to 20 weeks a year. These actors that are often between 20 and 50 years old find this difficult. When an actor gets to be in their 60s and 70s then they tend to take on roles with limited screen time. They'll be an admiral, school principal, precinct captain, or whatever in an office that shows up on screen for maybe 10 minutes total in a 45 minute episode. They'll stride into a conference room or something, hear what the main characters have to say, make a decision, and then disappear until the end of the episode where they congratulate the main characters for a job well done. That's assuming they show up at all in that week's episode. They might be mentioned in conversation, converse over a telephone, or make an announcement on a PA if they don't appear on screen.

Don't expect to see Captain Picard "star trekking" across the universe. What you'll see is Admiral Picard come out of his office once in a while to bestow his wisdom and intellect upon the rest of the cast and then disappear into his office to review TPS reports or something. Or maybe we'll see a retired Picard on a vineyard in France, tending to his vines, so that a troubled young Starfleet officer can beam in from wherever to seek his advice from time to time.

Re:A recurring Picard (Re:Is this a joke?)

[dgatwood]

I've seen those behind the scenes shows that show what the main actors have to do everyday to produce a typical sci-fi adventure show. They'll work 10, 12, or even 16 hours on set for 4, 5, or 6 days a week for 12 to 20 weeks a year. These actors that are often between 20 and 50 years old find this difficult. When an actor gets to be in their 60s and 70s then they tend to take on roles with limited screen time. They'll be an admiral, school principal, precinct captain, or whatever in an office that shows up on screen for maybe 10 minutes total in a 45 minute episode. They'll stride into a conference room or something, hear what the main characters have to say, make a decision, and then disappear until the end of the episode where they congratulate the main characters for a job well done.

That's the nice thing about an ensemble cast. You can have a number of characters who are still fairly major characters, without them all having to have them on screen for the entire episode. For example, he could be one of three or four teachers, and in a majority of scenes, there would be at least one of the teachers present, but rarely all four.

That said, from what I've read about him, if he asked for a less major role, I'd expect the reason to be so he could spend more time doing higher-calibre acting in the theater, rather than because he didn't want to act as much. :-) Just saying.

Course correction or garbage?

[Anonymous Coward]

So let me get this straight- They make some bad ST films, then a bad ST series. The network axes Star Trek Continues, which was excellent. And now there's 5 new shows greenlit? While Orville is kicking their butt? We don't know if this is the needed retooling, or more of the same garbage. "Gretchen Berg and Aaron Harberts soon took over showrunning duties for the series, but now both have been fired after complaints of verbal abuse in the writers room and an inflated budget." It looks like the studio can't even keep one show together. The guys with the 'abuse' charge were likely gentler about it then the fanbase.

Most hated character: Khaaaaan!!

[Anonymous Coward]

List of things that pissed me off about star trek:

1. Khaaaaaan. I always hated the character. They are still regurgitating him just to piss me off.

2. Lack of standalone episodes. When they drag out shit like borgs, never-ending quests to return home, missions to save earth, perpetual wars with Klingomulinardasians it means they are too lazy to come up with new plot material.

3. Bajoran religious crap.

4. Annyoing characters: Holographic doctors, Warf, Janeway, Jackotay, Roxana, Lore, ferrangis, Nero, Khhhhaaaannn

5. CGI demo scene quality nonsensical puke with no class: Star trek beyond, STD

6. F******ing retarded looking Klingons. Fuck off with this bullshit.

7. Lack of hot chicks in skimpy outfits.

8. Constant nonstop warp 11 fire and explosions. Star trek != black hawk down... enough already.

The best star trek movie ever by far was Star Trek IV.

5 shows?

[AHuxley]

5 times the STD for everyone?
With Michael crews and STD related plots?
Captain, First Officer, Lieutenant, Admiral, Tactical officer? All with their own Michael story.
Any civilian, ambassador, alien encountered will be out smarted by Michael.
In every explode and as a series plot arc.
5 times the Michael winning plots.

Re:5 shows?

[samwichse]

Make that Terry Crews and I'm sold

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[rally2xs]

I don't believe there are women that can do combat as well as _any_ man. Their exceptionals can do combat as well as an average man, but when you talk Rangers / Seals, or someone built like Rambo... nope, I don't think I've ever seen any. I've seen pix of the body builders, and the guys are _always_ bigger than the gals. In hand-to-hand fighting, size matters.

Patrick Stewart

[Anonymous Coward]

He and Kate Mulgrew are my favourite Star Trek captains. I hope they pay very careful attention to the writing on these shows and if they do I'm sure it will do well.

The more the better

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, I'm looking forward to new episodes of Star Trek with casts of nothing but plus-sized, big-breasted black women. I are serious.

Tardeau Lardeau and A Fat Bastard are FCLM

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course you know this because you're TardCr1mer
A Fat Bastard and Tardeau Lardeau are not CR!MER
The Fat Bastard and Anonymous Cashews are both CR!MER

--PAY OFF YOUR CREDIT CARDS TARD-CHRIS!

CR1MER FAQ

[Anonymous Coward]

__,.--=#[How to deal with CRIMER on Slashdot]#=--.,__1)Why-are-people-upset-with-him? 2)What-can-I-do 3)What-are-his-names 4)Who-is-FatCashewsLovesMe 5)How-to-defeat-his-hustles 6)Why-are-there-dashes 7)Pastebin-Copy

1)Why-are-people-upset-with-himHe makes frequent low quality posts for two reasons:
Money) BASICALLY: He made thousands of shitty posts & bragged about how much money it made him.
DETAILS: He wants u to folow his referer links & pick up his cookie. Even if u dont buy what he linked but do buy somthing else from that site later on he often makes money;He ALSO tries to drive TRAFFIC to his BLOGS & vlogs.
Karma)Hi krma helps him disply his ads. He believes karma acumulates infinitely So he makes lots of pointles posts that r not bad enuf to mod down;hoping they wil get moded up;He was a raging ahole when he thought he had a karma surplus

2)What-can-I-do DOWNMOD u wil usually get more mod points. If he is postng from a new sock acount w/ krma, get his oldst posts first. DOWNMOD him and AC in fresh thrads early on;Metmods wil reward u. METAMOD his posts. REPLY ONLY ANONYMOUSLY to the most deeply nested coments in his threds it helps hide his posts. Dwnvote his SUBMISSIONS, he uses to get krma. REPORT HIM to slshdot & the afiliate progrms he is usng. DONT MENTION his 'brand names' c**mer.

3)What-are-his-namesMost famous:Cre1mer Cdre|mer ILoveFatCashews, Anonymous Cashews, The Fat Bastard aka TCDR
4)Who-is-FatCashewsLoveMe AKA Tardu Lardo,FCLM Funny & anoying; Not me or crimer;He keeps lookout for infestation

5)How-can-I-avoid-his-hustles - --===DONT FOLLOW HIS LINKS!!!===-- -
IF YOU MUST:Use a privte tab & nevr buy anything on the same sesion. If he fools u, close tab, cler the cookies for that site. There r sites other than yutube that wil let u watch his videos. I dont know if people view his contnt but I can pictre his jowls jigling at the thot of people subvrting his 'business model'
6)Why-are-there-dashes & weird stuffI know most only skim thse posts. I want the most imprtnt infrmton to pop out at a glnce & to keep it shrt. I dont use TCDRs name becase he may think tht he benfits from geting it indxed by serch engnes. Id lik 2 thnk TCDR & FCLM for editrl advce 7)Copy: http://archive.is/HYiM2

Stretching too thin

[TJHook3r]

As has happened with the countless and generally crap Marvel spinoffs, sometimes less is more. The market will not support more than one or two shows running and certainly doesn't need any highschool settings!

LOL just more ships to buy ...

[MxMatrix]

... in star trek online.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[AmiMoJo]

female captain goes one-on-one with a Klingon and doesn't die

That didn't actually happen in the first episode, and in the second... Well, spoiler alert.

I'm also tempted to point out Klingons are not actually that great in hand-to-hand combat with other species. Worf kinda proved that but the basic issue is that they are big and slow. Against each other it doesn't matter, but against more nimble opponents with weapons it's a disadvantage.

You have to figure that their love of hand-to-hand combat is mostly traditional. If they really wanted to win they would use guns, but instead choose the more honourable bladed weapons. It makes even more sense in Discovery's time, with that particular group of Klingons being very religious and wrapping themselves in tradition and dogma.

I have lost faith in Star Trek

[Crookdotter]

..... but, somewhere deep down in the dark, alone in a corner crying, is the part of me that might just, maybe, reach out a hand to Star Trek again if Sir Pat Stew is the show lead as Capt (Admiral?) Picard. I hope.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, Females can't do anything. They should just stay in the kitchen and do what the man of the house says.....

Chateau Picard Wineries

[CanEHdian]

Patrick Stewart stars as Captain Picard in a 10-episode spin-off where the retired Starfleet dignitary will engage us in the art of wine-making. It's sponsored by the California winemaking industry, so it comes as no surprise the locale is California, Earth. A former SF training facility was gifted to Picard in recognition of his outstanding services, which was remade in to a 21st Century-style winery, dubbed Chateau Picard. Together with his Akkorexian assistant, Bh'arf, the duo will take us on an exciting journey which takes us from growing grapes to the bottling process. Four out of five stars.
[****O]

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Anonymous Coward]

Bullshit. My Kung Fu teacher is 140 pounds. He can knock you down without using his hands. In hand-to-hand fighting, reaction time matters. Size tends to slow you down. None of this has anything to do with gender.

No new ideas?

[biggaijin]

Don't the entertainment people ever have any new ideas? I was sick of Star Trek by 1971 and was never able to get interested in any of the interminable sequels. Yet, someone apparently does.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[doconnor]

Captain Georgiou was killed fighting the Klingons. First Office Burnham managed to escape, but she was trained in Vulcan martial arts. Almost everyone knows strength isn't everything in combat.

In the Star Wars universe, the ability to use the Force is the most important in combat. "Size matters not. Look at me. Judge me by my size, do you?" - Yoda

I wanted Axanar

[techm]

... but lawyers killed it. That was the last time I was interested in Star Trek. I am seriously not interested in CBS' offerings. I refuse to subscribe to their service just to watch it.

Re:Pay Streaming? No Thanks...

[Anonymous Coward]

>He can knock you down without using his hands.

yeah, but without his luck kick-to-the-balls attack, your "kung fu" teacher is a little pussy who I bet regularly gets his face beaten to a pulp.

Make It So

[maxbuzz]

Engage!

Yes

[OrangeTide]

Because it's not racist to make a simian comparison to a white person. Pointing out that a picture of G.W. Bush makes him look like a chimp, and that Trump looks like an orangutan is doesn't have the same historic baggage as comparison a black person to an "ape" or "gorilla".

I guess one solution is for you to open a book once in a while. If you want to avoid being turned into "toast" (whatever that means) and socially ostracized by polite society. If you're blind to the last few centuries of American history, then tread lightly.

The Academy

[DarthVain]

Well I've watch all the Star Trek, so I'm looking forward to a continuation of the Discovery series. As to the rest I guess we'll see.

A couple comments:

On the STTYG (Star Trek The Younger Generation) the first thing I thought of was that parody episode that Stargate did by replacing all the actors with sexy young counterparts where everything turned into sexy young angst and romantic relationships... Which when I watch the modern equivalents that have come out in the years since, really were not that far off the mark. Heck go young enough and you get a Hogworts spinoff! Though as soon as I heard Patrick Stewart's involvement while I hoped it might be a limited reprisal role in the main series (Discovery), many point out that he would be perfect headmaster materiel for Starfleet Academy... The producers could just save themselves a bunch of money and just make edits to the X-Men movies and have enough footage to last forever. They might have to find an excuse to put him in a wheel chair (Pike anyone?), and give him mind powers, but heck stranger things have happened in the Star Trek universe...

I would hope that the "animated" series would be Akira level of badassery, and not ProStars type level of consumption, but I would bet on the later than the former unfortunately... Animation directed at young kids, not to adults. For bonus points, if they are going to have inter-dimensional travel like the rest, PLEASE do a single Rick and Morty cross-over, as that would be *hilarious*!

The confidential plot looks intriguing... There was plenty of that on DS9 which were some of their better ideas... I'd no doubt give it a decent shot at least. Favorite quote from the article's comments: "To boldly skulk behind the scenes like no one has skulked before." lol nice!

As for the whole Khan idea... that seems a bad move. Come up with a new idea rather than beating that dead horse. It has been done numerous times already, even so much as to blame them for the changing Klingon looks over the years which is up there on the miticlorian level...

Finally only because there is the usual bashing of Discovery and their fungus warp, I get it... it is a bit silly. However it does have an "out" in that if the entire network is destroyed it would explain away why a technology in the prequel isn't around in later series, also it being top secret it wouldn't really be common canon.