The last few months have been some of my most trying when it comes to the Star Trek franchise.
Yes, that's meant less time to write for SKoST and so reviews have been a little difficult to keep up with. Fear not, normal service will resume but possibly at a reduced rate.
Anyhow, I really, really struggled to get excited about Star Trek. Perhaps personal overkill, maybe just way too heavy immersion and effort on related projects but I had to stop. So I did and fairly abruptly which likely pissed a lot of people off. If it did and you were one of those, I apologise but it had to happen and while I won't lay my soul open here I hope you can understand my decisions.
So I did walk away for a while. There were a couple of reviews sprinkled in but the effort and the will just weren't behind them. For that, my apologies. Even the wonderful Prodigy didn't seem to lift my Trek spirits and the current season of Discovery felt as though it was dragging by the midpoint. Was I bothered about the 10-C? Did it feel like another Anomaly of the Season? Totally did. At least with the animated Prodigy it felt as though there was some form of closure to the first ten episodes.
Prodigy was better than I expected. The plot, the characters; I actually connected with the show and it's links into Voyager were a big win. A Moral Star was a brilliant closer with everything you could want - except for it being live action. For a kids show the ending wasn't 100% positive
So what has changed? What's reignited my flame?
Picard.
Only two episodes in (The Star Gazer and Penance) and it has delivered in blazing fashion. I would even go as far as to say that this is already building up to be the best season of Kurtzman-era Star Trek to date.
But why?
Season two feels more tightly written. The choice to skip 18 months has brought Starfleet back into the picture more and that initially seems to have helped the show regain more of its Star Trek qualities. Maybe that's a very superficial change yet having the USS Stargazer, that expanded fleet of multiple ship types, Raffi and Rios back in uniform - it all makes a massive difference to the ambience of the series. No more copy and paste Inquiry Class fleet and the images we've seen off the back of it are simply gorgeous and make rather superb PC wallpapers.
Robo-Picard doesn't feel as angry this year. Demons seem to have been exercised and he's at peace at least until a beautifully unhinged Q turns up. Picard never hit him but the boot is on the other foot this time. This is probably De Lancie's best performance as the omnipotent creation since Death Wish and to see this darker side of Q is addictive to relish.
Not since Q Who have the Borg and Q appeared in the same episode nor has the latter been as devilish in any way since that encounter back in TNG's second season.
A significant win for Picard in relation to its characters is that their "wokeness" is not the selling point. There's no "Look at Me I'm X, Y or Z" and instead the characters exist in their own right not because of a certain thing and might, in turn by X, Y or Z. Picard is dealing with situations and allowing its characters to evolve because of the things they encounter not in spite of them. Discovery might take a look and learn a few things - and it's not all down to one person winning the day. Looking at you, Michael.
But I don't want to dwell on that since it gets into all sorts of discussions and to be fair I have nothing against Discovery, but it's just not satisfying my Star Trek cravings at the moment.
I have a renewed sense of anticipation for the next episode of Picard and what it will hold. The trailers tell us it will be in the 21st Century (2024) and already there are some more humorous tones that have helped shape the season. Even the suggestion of a potential romance between Picard and Laris proved to be a highlight and we know that Orla Brady will be back.
For now Jean-Luc and his associates have lifted the bar of standards and expectations for the franchise in its latest incarnation. Looks like there's strong hope for it still and at least 18 more episodes of PIcard to keep us entertained.
I think it's safe to say that the post-2017 management of Star Trek has caused a crisis. You look around venerable blogs like this, things that have been running for years, and people who once loved Star Trek like it was their religion, and awaited new episodes as a highlight in their week, cannot be bothered to even watch the latest shows at all. They have just lost any hope or interest, after seeing the other shows ten times over. That is absolutely astonishing.
ReplyDeleteWe know the reason why; the new shows since 2017 have first 1). been incredibly divisive, seemingly deliberately contemptuous of Star Trek's time-tested axioms at times, ignoring Star Trek's scientific/skeptical philosophy in favor of 'soap operatic' melodrama, inauthentic emotionalism and huge leaps in logic, 2). after nothing changing for four-five years now, apathy has set in even among people like yourself and myself, for whom a new episode used to be a highlight in a week.
I would just caution you, a fellow fan who clearly cares, not to get too hopeful yet. We have been fooled multiple times at this point by superficial references to the past, that things are changing, only for shows to collapse into the same nonsense each and every time.
The same people, the same philosophical axioms and attitudes are still driving this franchise. How can a plant be healthy, or produce a good fruit, when it's roots are rotting? I'm not convinced it can.
Maybe even post-2009?
DeleteBut yes, that apathy absolutely exists. TOS to TNG was a change but not as drastic a re-envisioning as Disco has been. Yes, Star Trek needs to move with the times but there are certain principles it needs to stick with and sadly a lot of the new content doesn't in any way. Now, I love Lower Decks but I know it's a million galaxies away from Roddenberry's vision. Picard has turned the joy of the future into a bit of turmoil but a lot of it actually stems back to Abrams decision to destroy Romulus in the Prime(?) Timeline.
A new episode really was a weekly highlight but three weeks ago I realised how distant Disco had become to me as I didn't even click it was new episode day until three days after it had come out. That's how addicted I WASN'T.
Picard is at the least entertaining and has its heart in the right place thanks probably to Stewart and Kirsten Beyer plus actually learning from season one. I hope s2 keeps up the quality but I am also equally skeptical given the unplanned nature of s1's conclusion.
Yes, I would agree post-2009, as even though the Abrams movies are a little more tolerable than Discovery, they almost seemed to be a parody of Star Trek at times, with Kirk behaving more like Zapp Brannigan than the professional he really was in TOS. It's like Paramount came to believe the satire, rather than the reality - that Star Trek was a camp 'Lost in Space' (it only occasionally became like that in weaker episodes), rather than accept it as a serious attempt at procedural drama.
DeleteI would honestly like to believe that Kirsten Beyer and Patrick Stewart are keeping Star Trek true to it's ideals, but Hollywood is a confused place right now, where there is a lot of philosophical malaise due to how writers and actors are generally educated in deconstructionism, an ideology that posits there is no "objective truth", and seeks to cast doubt on all ideals or nobility. Without objective truth you can't have science, or journalism, or mutual understanding, etc, because there is no 'facts' to agree on; and casting doubt on all good or constructive things leaves people with no hope. Many of our favorite actors accepted this mindset unfortunately, because it's the culture that permeates the industry. This is why Starfleet has been portrayed so cynically of late. While producers and directors all ascribe to it, I'm not sure we can expect much drama like 90s Star Trek, or Babylon 5, or The Lord of the Rings for that matter.
Star Trek was kinda stoic too, so that while emotions were accepted (as ancient stoics were not like Vulcans at all, they accepted feeling), they maintained objective distance from certain feelings. Discovery is the poster child for people giving an emotional monologue in the middle of a crisis, like they do on certain teen shows.
I'm actually putting something together at the moment around s4 for Disco so I look forward to seeing your comments!
DeleteStewart et al seem to have a much better grasp on what works especially this year. While it's less than perfect they are aware that Picard needs to be a functional sequel to TNG and not just lip service. Maybe the present day setting is helping but there is a more realistic threat, a more tangible element to the show than Discovery is managing. That in turn is likely due to the extreme time jump which I think may well have challenged the writers more than they expected.
The far future tech is very out-of-the-box and has, for me, added a layer of alienation to the show. It's just a little too far advanced while the 23rd and 24th Century tech, even when "updated" still maintained a hand hold with the present day - and a sense of realism that Discovery has given away in favour of more Woke paths.
Totally agree on the technology being a bit too alienating. To be honest I already felt put off by the 23rd century DSC tech, where they were introducing fantasy/magic concepts like 'spore drive' (rumor has it the original Bryan Fuller was a terraforming technology, not a propulsion one) and magic crystals. It is a little too close to magic for my liking.
DeleteAs a side note, it's very model-maker unfriendly to have nacelles floating free of the rest of the ship, and I don't think a fan of the modelling side of Star Trek would ave done that for that practical reason :-)
I really like the new movies, but yeah, DSC is just bad. Picard season 2 seems to hand wave away season 1 and has had a promising start. Right now I'm excited for the imminent release of TMP DE and I hope fervently for HD versions of VOY and DS9
ReplyDeleteTMP in 4k? Yes please and now!
DeleteDS9 and Voyager HD is still hopelessly unlikely but even the remote chance it could happen is more exciting than 45 mins of Disco? Harsh perhaps?
Picard, as noted, has definitely learned from its mistakes while Discovery is adamant that it should continue to make them to see if we're all still watching and talking about it.