#i have no expectations about TNG

[fresh-rat]

the uniforms in enterprise make 0 sense to me.

through the passage of time in the shows the uniforms lose more and more color. so if we work backwards they gain MORE color :)

ex.

see???? just a little around the neck

then just the shoulders :)

torso! minus the shoulders.

whole shirt! entire shirt! its the whole entire shirt!

so OBVIOUSLY as we work backwards through the timeline you'd expect EVEN MORE COLOR based on this, right?

WRONG

they only have! little shoulder lines!!!! by logic these guys should be wearing full jumpsuits of color! a morph suit to show they're an engineer or something!!! BUT NO! it makes ZERO sense to me to jump from this style of uniform with the itty bitty bit of color to an entire shirt worth!!!!

put them in jump-suits! make them look stupid! make their shoes match their color, even! I want them to look ridiculous.

#i chose kira to be the ds9 uniform bc she is very pretty #thank you for coming to my ted talk #ANYWAYS #i remeber the first time i saw star trek #i was watching it on a channel that showed one episode from each series in order #so tos > tng > ds9 > voyager > enterprise #so i watched the progression of these uniforms in order #and the enterprise ones BLEW ME AWAY #i was not expecting the minimalization of color? #idk i felt very passionate about this #that was like years ago #but i have time now so here i am #screaming into the void #star trek #star trek the original series #tos #ds9 #deep space nine #voyager #enterprise #star trek: enterprise #star trek uniforms #star fleet uniforms

[avoidingdestiny]

Anyone else really struggling with the dialogue on Picard?

#TNG I believe was specifically written in an attempt to be timeless #Nothing even remotely resembling slang #And that was a great choice because the dialogue isn’t dated even thirty years later #But that pot/marijuana thing a feed weeks ago? #Geordi saying “’geek out’? #And that time last season Picard said ‘Hey guys’? #Even aside from the other problems I have with the show #(Inconsistent exploration of/commentary on themes) #(All these grandparent-aged people having ~23-year-old kids) #(The misogynistic refusal to utilize their female characters just like in TNG) #These dialogue problems are really driving me crazy #At least drop the one-liners for fuck’s sake #(There IS a lot I like about this season don’t get me wrong) #(But I still expect better) #Star Trek PIC #PIC

[skenpiel]

ok so! uh! normally this is the moment where id go "i have a normal amount of feelings about this movie [through tears]" but that actually isnt the case this time. guess i just didnt like it as much as all the other movies in the franchise

#there were a lot of things i didnt like #for example there were a handful of plot holes to me most notably the fact that scotty was on the enterprise b when kirk 'died' #because. if that was 73 years before the movie takes place‚ and THAT was roughly 2-3 years after the tng episode relics took place #then after being freed from the transporter pattern buffer after being in there for 80 YEARS #he would have KNOWN kirk was dead #but in the episode he says 'i bet jim kirk himself hauled the old gal out of mothballs to come looking for me' #thats usually not how you talk about someone who has (to you) been dead for 7 years. #now of course that kind of timeline fluke isnt the end of the world but. well........ i guess i kinda expected better? #i sound sooooo fuckin mean and nitpicky here but trust me thats not the only reason i was disappointed #i was also upset that they essentially made data a comic relief character throughout the majority of the movie? #he had like 3 actual emotional moments and the rest was just silly goofs. he doesnt deserve to be treated like that #(although his life form song was sick. i will admit) #and soran as a character was just kinda...... disappointing. he was a cheesy villain with a pretty iffy motive #not to mention they COMPLETELY missed the chance to give us the opportunity to explore guinan more. she DEFINITELY deserved more screentime #all she was in this movie was. well? just a support character who offered a little advice and explanation and then left #that upset me a bit too bc i love guinan soooo much #i guess overall it didnt. have like. a distinct feel to it. it kinda just felt like a long tng episode with a higher budget #(but evidently not that much to show for it) #the other star trek movies were so very obviously their own THING‚ separated from the original series #though i think that may have had a little to do with the movies taking place a while AFTER tos ended #whereas this movie took place like. really pretty shortly after the end of tng #that said i wanna make it clear i liked the movie. it just doesnt really hold much of a candle to the first 6 #also what kinda gayass last words are 'oh‚ my' like htrghoieruhgoug ok gayboy #ANYWAY!!!!! thats my thoughts on star trek generations i guess. it wasnt as good as id hoped but still good for the most part #i only cried like. once. and that wasnt even actual crying it was just tearing up a little bit -_- #and i didnt have to take that many hyperfixation stim breaks either.... #well either way im glad to have finished it! now i can go back to rewatching tos ^___^ #also reading first best destiny YAYYY #can u believe its only 4am. i finished this movie like. super quickly compared to the other ones LAWL

[ylizam]

trying to come up with a writing schedule / tracking scenario that I won’t fail out of the first time I don’t write when I’m supposed to or whatever, and I’m already stumped at “do I want to do this on my phone/laptop or in a notebook” stage so things are definitely going well.

#writing is a terrible hobby and i love it i hate it #i either fail out completely the first time i miss a day #or i start lying to my own accountability tool #but i did manage like 100 words a day for a stretch there just by tweeting about it #so i know i can do it #or something #i'm not expecting to suddenly finish things #but also i'll definitely never finish if i don't actually sit down and write #and going back to the office 3 days a week really fucked with my momentum so #anyway the tentative plan is weekends for tng cowriting #m-w-f for origiginal #t-th for other fanfic #(and then obvs with femslash and yuletide things will change) #(also if something really starts rolling i don't have to swap out it's just a framework) #anyway so that's my brain tonight #that and looking forward to my copagandas

[theglitchos]

soooo. at charmed this past january i learned what tng groups are. so i kinda. poked around a little, and have been occasionally going to a few of the less intimidating social events organized by the tng group here, mostly of the "let's go to this food place" variety. (soup thoughts 1)

which, it's been v neat (despite the internal screaming) to meet people and socialize outside of family/school/internet friends. and it's been hella nice to not have to deal with any preconceived expectations of who i am or have to be.

i somehow got up the courage to go to a party in feb, where my only goal was "walk in the door", which i did, and mostly lurked/talked with some folks i knew from the social events. and despite being extremely out of my comfort zone i didn't completely perish with anxiety or panic? (soup thoughts 2)

and last night was another party, where i did more of the same, tho i did more actual talking with folks than lurking this time. which was neat, as i haven't been able to go to the social events some of them frequent due to my wed night class. it was also weird that apparently i've been around enough that a couple people remembered/knew me, whether from the social events i'd been to or the discord? o.o

after the party finished some of them said "hey let's go to denny's"... and i ended up staying out til 3am XD

#glitch rambles #insert joking comment about “exposure therapy” here #i am self treating my social anxiety by forcing myself out of my comfort zone #but also i'm not kidding #the kink community is the most welcoming place i've found where i can just. exist. as me. #no expectations or judgement #related but tangential #i'm fucking terrified of one person going to the same event i do eventually #because he is a second year in the mba program #i knew who he was the moment he joined the tng discord #and have had background anxiety that he Knows ever since #but that bridge will be crossed if/when it appears

[billpottsismygf]

I think Where No Man Has Gone Before is my favourite episode so far of TNG. All the ideas at play and the character dynamics make such fantastic viewing.

The traveler in particular is so intriguing, bolstered by an amazing performance. He gives me Doctor vibes, but far more alien. His relationship with Kosinski is also really nicely done. I wanted to punch Kosinski for most of the episode, but once he's found out his arrogance was misplaced, his relationship with the traveler was actually really touching.

Something I'm really appreciating about this show is how much it allows its performances to shine. It trusts its actors, who are all phenomenal, to carry a scene without much score or spectacle. It is then broken up with more action based scenes, or something like the weird and wonderful sights out of the viewer screen, but it also just allows its cast to carry things. It helps the episodes feel really well paced and thought out, and I find that I can't look away.

#star trek #the next generation #star trek mine #where no man has gone before #star trek the next generation #I wasn't expecting to make so many posts about this show #I just keep having lots to say #mine #reactions #tng #tng mine

[vintagegeekculture]

RIP Tracy Tormé, Creator of the "Holodeck Malfunction Episode" and Sliders

Tracy Tormé’s most enduring legacy in popular culture is that, while a writer on TNG’s tempestuous first and second seasons, he created the entire concept of the Holodeck Malfunction Episode.

Yes, even people who suggest you skip TNG’s first couple seasons say that “The Big Goodbye” is one you don’t want to miss. And there was a very nice tribute to Tracy Torme in an episode of Picard, which had him as the author and creator of Dixon Hill… which he is, and deserves credit for this.

I suppose I should mention I had a personal encounter with Tracy Tormé at a convention. The main thing I remember was that he looked absolutely terrified when someone asked him about what happened with “The Royale,” far and away TNG’s worst episode except the clip show, about the crew getting trapped on a hotel they can’t leave from a badly written book. To his great credit, he took responsibility for the episode not working and did not pass on the problems to the production crew.

The most extraordinary thing about Tracy Torme is that he had a Forrest Gump like ability to appear in the background of scifi culture’s greatest moments.

Not only was he inside the TNG writers’ room in 1987-88, he was around during the production of Terminator with James Cameron. Tormé was the one who, hearing about the production of the film, squealed on it to Harlan Ellison, telling Ellison that it was based on his old Outer Limits episodes, with a visual based on his script for “Demon With a Glass Hand.” In other words, he was the Gavrilo Princip who got that entire conflict started, where two of the most proud personalities in scifi butted heads, James Cameron vs. Ellison. Cameron, to this day, insists that the film company gave Ellison money and a credit because it was easier to pay him off than to go through litigation (which rings true, frankly, for risk averse production companies), and to this day Cameron insists, with his absolutely expected big dick swagger, that Ellison is a “parasite” who received money for nothing, and if it had been up to him, he wouldn’t have given him a dime.

It’s also worth mentioning that Torme also created the TV series Sliders.

Has anyone else noticed that Sliders is an incredibly right wing show? Seriously, watch it again if you haven’t seen it in years. If you haven’t watched this show since the 90s and you were a kid and all that went over your head, it’s kind of amazing how Limbaugh/Newt Gingrich era right-wing Sliders actually was. It made 24 look like Doonesbury. The targets of Sliders were 90s New Right satire: health care systems, infuriating hippies, the nanny state disallowing the public smoking of cigars, California weirdness, the drug culture, the USSR. Torme’s right wing views were less John Millius-style “blood alone moves the wheel of history” stuff, but more like that of a slobby regular joe in the 90s, Dennis Leary’s character in Demolition Man for instance, who mostly just wants to smoke cigars, ogle girls, and eat hamburgers without getting scolded by his wife. He was less “Passion of the Christ” and more “Animal House.”

I am not saying this as a negative, but merely a description. Contrary to popular belief, right wingers driven by bizarre sexual pathology and weird grudges produce amazing art, as Millius and John Swartzwelder show. A lot of Steven Universe fans love to say things like “all good art is about empathy and kindness” and I reject that notion. Good art can also be about reflecting things in the human experience like fear, trauma, cruelty, and paranoia.

For that reason, it doesn’t surprise me that Tracy Torme’s best movie script was a horror film about a traumatic experience, Fire in the Sky. An ominous movie about a vanished ranch hand who was the victim of alien abduction, in the earned finale the film’s tension builds toward, our hero remembers the true cause of his missing time: an abduction by aliens, who’s motives are emotionless and incomprehensible, and who subject him to horrific vivisection that we see in excruciating detail. Travis Walton is treated not with sadism or cruelty, but with icy detachment, by alien superintellects that view him as no different than cattle, and are to him as we are to cattle. The most terrifying detail of the film is that the classic “gray alien” look turns out to be spacesuits, revealing a far more frightening appearance underneath.

#tracy torme #tng #sliders #terminator

[emonydeborah]

If the crew became kids

I doubt this is going to happen, especially because TNG already did it, but I would personally have such a great time.

An overarching theme would be Una's height because reasons, and because her talking to someone and suddenly having to look down at some child would be hilarious.

So some kidifying ray swept the ship, affecting them either one at a time or all at once.

Chris will not shut up about horses. He's swinging his legs on the biobed and chattering away. He accidentally interrupts and is so apologetic bc he never wants to be rude!!!! He wants to be friends!!! "Are we friends?" Spock has to look down at his captain/father figure and say "...yes. Chris." (Also Chris stares up at Una and says she's pretty bc he has more brains as a child than a grown man). He stares out at the stars with the biggest eyes.

Una the preteen is the same height as La'an and La'an is pretending not to be salty about it. They know she's Illyrian and she Freaks Out, and she and La'an have a talk about accepting themselves and not being defined by what others think that is more educational for La'an than for Una. What a gangly woman. She is out here constantly knocking things over, and the crew sees someone who had to grow into herself as much as anyone. Her default response is silence and big scared eyes but she can be tempted with some trivia. Erica spends hours showing her the flight controls.

Spock is a complete deadpan sassbucket and no one is prepared. the cute chubby cheeks. The bowlcut. His babysitters lose sight of him for sixty seconds and he disassembles a replicator because he heard a funny noise. Don't touch that. Why? *is touching it* They cannot make him believe he is in fact an adult and they're trying to fix him. "Mother says to find a mother with children and ask her for help if I get lost." Man asks Una for help because he's lost. Legend.

Uhura is such a little imp. Once she gets over being scared she disappears into the jeffries tubes. Her giggling echoes through the ship like the ghost of a demonic victorian child. Hemmer is down to let her roam but Una crawls in and drags her out. If any of the kids get a leash, it's Uhura. Erica distracts her with sweets. She needs to be occupied at all times or she will wander away.

Erica is the surliest eleven year old. Everyone expected her to be the easy child but she makes a point of being difficult. Una is tearing her hair out and Chris is like yes but have you considered. She is eleven. She's edgy and moody and everyone is like how did our Erica come from you. Una says she's the best pilot she's ever met and sits her at the helm and Erica stops her griping for a bit. She determinedly does not show interest but she does look at the buttons and subtly watch Jenna doing her job.

La'an has a lisp and sucks her thumb. Una insists she has to stay with her. For security reasons. Una has to go yell at people and La'an is holding her hand/on her hip the whole time. Everyone else is curious about little La'an but Una goes NO get your OWN. Little La'an wants hugs and cuddles and Una goes well if I must. For Starfleet. Chris does get custody for a while and he carries la'an around on his shoulders.

Christine and her big fat smart mouth. ackshually I read about this and you're wrong. Her sass is only matched by baby Spock. Grown Spock does not know how to handle it. This eight year old and her sassy little crossed arms leave everyone speechless with the sheer audacity. Joseph "don't touch that you'll break it" vs Christine "we use these at school all the time I know what to do" *breaks it* "... I didn't do that."

Joseph is the smiliest boy. He's having a great time. He follows Christine around and asks her about everything. Someone is in Sickbay with a sprained ankle or something and Joseph goes hmm. Looks like you're real sick. Do you have chicken soup here. He's the most charming little kid. Everything he does is cute. Everyone gets hugs and secret handshakes.

Hemmer, like Spock, takes stuff apart for the heck of it. Uhura tries to distract him by asking about Andoria and he could not care less. Man is tearing apart the EPS manifold and Uhura goes ...buddy let's not do that. Una says stop and he stops. All the deadpan blind jokes. Look away for two seconds and he is actively climbing into the warp core. What are you doing?!?!? Hemmer *shrugs*

Pelia is off like a shot all over the place. Talking a mile a minute. Young Pelia is such a foreign idea no one knows how to handle it. She's their wise old hermit and their wise old hermit is hanging upside down off the biobed. Now she's on the ground and her head hurts. Oh crap she's crying.

#snw #una chin riley #chris pike #spock #la'an noonien singh #pelia #nyota uhura #hemmer #erica ortegas #christine chapel #joseph m'benga #strange new worlds #snw au #for funsies #star trek

[starfleetskunkworks]

So I'm thinking about California-class starships again and Why They Are The Way They Are. I have a pet theory that they and the crews assigned to them are the result of personnel shortages during the war with the Dominion.

Starfleet took heavy losses in the early days of the war and had to press cadets into early service. It would make sense that they'd have to relax their standards for recruitment from what we see in TNG, and we meet a lot of colorful Starfleet characters during that time.

I think a lot of them got rushed through training. I think a lot were accepted to the Academy in the last year of the war when they otherwise wouldn't have been, and the Fleet decided to let them continue their education. I think they might not have had access to the best instructors or equipment due to the needs of the front-line.

So when the war ends, what do you do with these officers? Do you give up on them? Do you cashier them out? Those might be the things we'd expect but Starfleet seems to try to bring out the best in its officers, so I believe that's what they're trying to do.

They're taking these folks and assigning them to a sort of Auxiliary Program Lite, serviced by "new" ships made from old parts (there's a reason for that even in a post-scarcity economy that I want to make a separate post about). They are, crucially, mixed in with more traditional Starfleet officers. These are people who didn't get assigned to a ship of the line for whatever reason, but there's nothing really wrong with them.

For example, Rutherford is a great engineer. Tendi is extremely competent and also likely a political feather in Starfleet's cap. Boimler is Boimler. And Mariner is the kind of officer who would be serving on the Enterprise if it weren't for her desire to avoid promotion.

They all have things they need to learn, and it seems that they are, from the California program. And I think that may be the point.

#star trek #lower decks #uss cerritos #deep space nine #dominion war

[sirfrogsworth]

Thoughts on Live Action Avatar: TLA

I'm sure people are going to hate this. Some for valid reasons. Some because of endless nitpicking that really has no bearing on how good or bad it actually was. Some because they have already chosen to hate it and it's just a self-fulfilling prophecy.

But I always root for things to be good. I want them to succeed. And I always go into everything I watch with the hope and expectation it will be good. I turn off my critical brain and try to just experience the show for what it is. As I said, I saw no trailers. I read no reviews. I knew almost nothing about the production of this going in.

Initially, things were rough... buddy.

And I think that is a longstanding problem with live action TV shows in general. I am always reminded of Star Trek TNG and how it took two seasons (48 episodes) before they figured out what the hell they were doing. Back then shows were able to find their footing and grow and learn. Actors were given time to find their characters and understand them and finally become them.

But now, every show has to be amazing from the start or they get cancelled. And I think people have become very unforgiving of first seasons as well. I feel like not enough people consider the potential of something getting better. And I think that is a shame.

So, yes, Avatar started out rough. They tried to cram all of the exposition into the first 20 minutes. And that was unpleasant. The effects were jarring at first. It is incredibly difficult to translate animation into live action. And please don't say the CGI was "bad." It wasn't. There was just so much that needed to be packed into every frame of this show to make it work, and finding a way to make it all seamlessly blend is a monumental task. I think the artists did an amazing job with the constraints of essentially making an 8 hour movie in the time usually given a 2 hour one.

But as the show continued, the actors seemed more comfortable in their roles. The showrunners seemed to figure out what worked and what didn't. The quality across the board started to improve. Especially when they started to deviate a little bit from following the cartoon. I also noticed that the effects that were jarring in the beginning eventually stopped bothering me and breaking immersion. I got used to them and was able to just focus on the story. And I think they got a little better as well. The bending was much more convincing as the show progressed. And it was a bajillion times better than the slow-motion bending of that movie that shall not be named.

And by the final episode, I was all in. The Avatar monster was really cool. And I was crying my eyes out and having all kinds of emotions. And there were some changes they made to the story which I actually thought made more sense. And I was glad this show was doing a few things to differentiate rather than being an exact carbon copy.

It won me over.

And I know it won't do that for everyone. And perhaps I am forgiving a lot of sins just because I wanted it to be good. The original was my absolute favorite show of all time. I just liked spending time with these characters again.

But I liked it more than I didn't and I'm hoping that is the general consensus, but I fear that is not the case.

Things I really liked...

I thought the actor playing Sokka was really great. They didn't give him enough humorous material. But I think this kid absolutely nailed the role. And if this gets another season, I do hope he can show Sokka's lighter side a bit more.

Ken Leung also did amazing as Zhao. I think he surpassed his cartoon counterpart in villainy. I loved hating him.

The final battle was beautiful. I think they probably dedicated a lot of resources to that. Maybe at the expense of other things. But I think it was worth it to end strong.

In the first season of the cartoon, the trauma was often skipped over or kept very brief. I'm sure the idea of dealing with genocide and war time trauma was not an easy sell to Nickelodeon initially. But they did actually take the time to show some of that trauma, especially with Katara and Sokka. And I cried a bunch.

They seemed to go to considerable effort to have a diverse cast. I am glad they learned that lesson from the movie.

That said, they probably could have brought back Dee Bradley Baker to make the animal noises. This might have been an overcorrection...

I guess this will give the anti-wokesters something to complain about since the original was already super woke and it is probably a challenge to complain about the new thing being woke as well. Though I'm sure they are up to the challenge.

Things I didn't care for...

The compressed timeline caused a few stories to be combined and accelerated. I understand why that was necessary. But there were some important moments of character growth that got lost.

Sokka's missing sexism. I think it is much more useful to see someone grow and change and let go of their problematic traits than to pretend that never existed. Sokka's sexism was a symbol of the conservative views within water tribe culture in general. It was also foreshadowing for the conflict with Pakku (which was also minimized). I just think young viewers seeing a character overcome ingrained ideals has a greater influence than just erasing that aspect from the character.

Things I hated...

Princess Yue's hair. You get the amazing Amber Midthunder to play Yue, and she does an amazing job with extremely abbreviated screen time, but I couldn't stop staring at whatever that was they put on her noggin. I know I criticized people for nitpicking, but that was very distracting. I don't know exactly how it could have been done better, but I worry a great performance is going to get overshadowed by... hair.

In conclusion...

I think the people making this show loved the source material. I can see that love. I think they tried very hard to make the best show possible. And I also know they are probably going to get a lot of hate. I still haven't looked at the reviews because I didn't want to be influenced when writing this. But I can feel the review bombing as we speak.

But this was not a Witcher situation where the writers didn't respect the source material. This was displaying how incredibly difficult it is to convert one of the most beautifully animated shows in existence into live action. Maybe that is an argument for not making live action versions. Though I usually love them when they work and am happy both versions exist.

I really hope people can remember the original still exists and they can completely disregard this and watch the cartoon any time they wish. This doesn't have to "ruin their childhood." These two things can exist and everyone is perfectly capable of ignoring all of the live action material.

But I do hope this gets another season. I think that final episode showed the potential. I think the cast was getting comfortable in their roles and they deserve another chance to show what they can do.

I love Paul Sun-Hyung Lee and I think he was a great choice for Iroh. But Mako's shoes are probably the biggest shoes in the existence of shoes to try and fill. I do not envy the task he was given. But every once in a while I saw that Mako spirit come out in his performance and I think he could use another season to really find that and show us what he is capable of.

This felt a lot like The Phantom Menace to me. There was actually a ton of amazing stuff to love in that movie. But it didn't quite work the way the original movies did. But I think this was good enough to hope for the future.

[lyndentree63]

So I just finished re-watching Misfits and Magic, and I know a lot of people talk about how it's kind of sad that Jammer and Sam don't really have arcs like K and Evan. . . I have thoughts about that. In modern Western cinema, we expect protagonists to have an arc, where they change, grow, learn things and are different people from the beginning of the story to the end. This is most common in movies, and then books. But the thing is we also have a type of protagonist that's more common in TV shows, where the character stays mostly the same, and by doing so they affect the world around them or bring out interesting themes and call out issues in the world, just by being themselves. (Think the crew of the Enterprise in Star Trek TNG.) Misfits and Magic has BOTH of these kinds of characters. K and Evan are movie protagonists. Jammer and Sam are TV show protagonists. And I love that they coexist and both make each other's types of stories stronger. This time around, I really appreciated the constancy of Sam and Jammer, the way they don't really change, but seem to grow more solidly into who they already were at the beginning of the show. They expose the foibles of the world by having the world brush against THEM. They change the world and the characters around them, by staying true to who they are. K and Evan change the world because they are changing themselves. Both kinds of stories are valid, and both kinds of stories are needed.

#dimension 20 #dimension 20 spoilers #misfits and magic #d20 mismag #k tanaka #whitney jammer #sam black #evan kelmp #protagonist #film vs tv #storytelling #story theory

[multiverserift]

It's Star Trek time, so I watch a lot of Star Trek and write about it. You should too.

Today I saw the question "why does Star Trek: Discovery draw so much fire?"

It's quite easy. It was simply not what people were familiar with, and expected.

The Star Trek Formula™ is rougly: Ensemble Crew finds problem, beams over, solves problem. Next week, next problem. Of course there are strays from the path, but more or less, all Trek followed this.

Discovery doesn't have an ensemble crew. It has a main character and secondary characters. It has less Story of the Week™ and more serial storytelling. Well, this is how much TV stuff is structured today. Less episodes, less filler, more steamlined 8-hour-movies.

Nevermind that Discovery has some where excellent Star Trek moments, the dissapointment over all the changes kicked off a whole landslide of memetic feedback.

Which also fed into that was the casual racism ("why does it have to be a black woman???"), sexism ("why does it have to be a black woman???"), toxic views of emotions ("Burnham cries all the time!!!", which is funny because Ash Tyler cries way more, and I see no internet rambos giving him shit over that), casual fatshaming ("Tilly fat lol").

But I really think that the unprocessed, unreflected dissapointment is the core of it.

Didn't help that the New Klingons™ were somewhat debatable in style. In reality, Disco respects a lot of canon and did their homework. A lot of well done references in there. I could write a list.

What ALSO fed into it is that people simply don't like change. There are old news articles that take aim at TNG because it's simply a new crew. DS9 took a lot of fire (Black captain! Stationary station!), VOY (Woman captain! Janeway doesn't get a love interest!). Don't really know about ENT. Plenty of attacks, always. But back to Disco.

Now enter The Orville. Which gave the fanbase EXACTLY more of the Star Trek Formula™. Crew, problem of the week, ensemble cast. The fans who pit Orville against Disco also generously overlook that Seth McFarlane has his own problems.

So, bottom line: Dissapointment, unfulfilled expectations, The Orville rushing in, and all this in a culture with rising toxicity against progressive ideas.

Of course it's all a matter of taste. You don't have to like Star Trek Discovery. But if you give it a chance, there are some REALLY excellent stories, characters, space ship pr0n, sci-fi elements and other stuff in it. Also, Jett Reno. Just watch it for Jett Reno.

#star trek #star trek discovery #the orville

[lightshiningforth]

I low key think that Amanda and Sarek shouldn’t have had a kid.

I’m glad they did, of course! I love Spock with my whole heart.

But I think they’re an example of people who make good spouses but bad parents. They clearly love and respect each other. Amanda enjoys the Vulcan way of life. Sarek, though he’d never admit it, enjoys Amanda’s human modes of affection. They’re each comfortable in their own identities and how they coexist.

While they love Spock, though, they aren’t at all prepared to have a child of two worlds. Sarek expects Spock to behave 100% like a Vulcan, 100% of the time, never mind that he’s human too. Amanda is on board with this parenting strategy and doesn’t offer alternatives, except when she wants Spock to behave more humanly, at which point she gets frustrated that he doesn’t act contrary to the way she raised him. It doesn’t seem as though either of them really stood up for him when he was being tormented by their community, either - they just expected his eventual success to speak for itself. Sarek will never praise Spock to his face. Amanda will, but she also tells Spock that she wishes he’d visit more without telling her husband to get the hell over himself and stop stonewalling their son just bc he disapproves of Spock’s career.

As a result, Spock has such a complex, and who could blame him? He leans hard into his Vulcan identity and all but denies his humanity. He demands perfection from himself and refuses to acknowledge pain or weakness. In “The Naked Time,” he loses control of his inhibitions and the FIRST THING HE DOES is start crying and talking about how he wishes he could say he loves his mom and his friends. In “The Corbomite Maneuver,” he says that Balok - the alien giving them a 10 minute countdown to their deaths - reminds him of his father. In “This Side of Paradise,” he says that “for the first time in [his] life, [he] was happy” - happy only when under the influence of lovey-dovey spores! Granted, I don’t fully believe that Spock is NEVER happy otherwise - he has a loving group of friends on the Enterprise - but that says a lot about how tense and conflicted he always is in the background.

Again, Sarek and Amanda do love Spock. We painfully see that in TNG when Sarek shares his innermost feelings with Picard. And Amanda is always asking Spock how he feels and encouraging him to take care of himself, plus wishing he would come home. But neither of them really understands Spock, nor gives him the support he needs. They had a half human, half Vulcan child, loaded him with high expectations, and sent him into the world to figure himself out. Not great, guys. Not great.

#star trek #star trek tos #spock #sarek #amanda grayson

[colonel-kira-nerys]

Gates' Friendship Saved Marina's Life?

I started listening to Gates McFadden's podcast a few days ago, InvestiGates, and when I got to the Marina Sirtis episode I fully expected her and Gates to sort of just chat each other up and not actually do an interview, so to speak, because they're so close in real life, but I'm shocked by the number of new things I'm learning about Marina all at once.

One special moment that stood out to me, in particular, was when Marina makes one of her classic jokes about menopause doing a number on her brain, and so she has a terrible memory these days, and Gates says, "Did you ever watch that Wanda Sykes special I texted you? Her thing about menopause is so fricking funny!"

And Marina says "yes" and adds, "Gates-y, I literally at some points in that stand up, could not laugh loud enough to express how funny I thought it was."

To which Gates replies in a jokingly reproachful tone: "She was brilliant, but you never texted me back that you saw it!" (A true friend calling her out lmao)

Marina then good-humoredly jokes back, "I didn't realize it was a homework assignment, and I had to do a report back!" before she eventually reveals that actually, the reason she didn't respond was likely because Gates had texted her telling her to watch that special "serendipitously" on the day before her elderly dog, Puka, had a seizure, and Marina was an absolute mess, worrying that she was going to have to put her dog down that day, which also happened to be the anniversary of her husband having a heart attack and dying. So Marina was in a really, really bad place, right? But then, on Gates' recommendation, she watched the Wanda Sykes special, and she was laughing harder than she'd ever laughed before, on the anniversary of the day her husband died.

Marina says, "That night, I watched Wanda Sykes, and it was exactly what I needed. So, thank you, Gates-y. You saved my life that day, actually."

Gates then jokingly credits/thanks Wanda Sykes for that instead, before commending Marina on how well she has handled her grief over her husband's unexpected death, and the conversation moves on, but damn. Just thinking about Marina Sirtis being in that dark place, where she says she was praying to God: please, I know you wouldn't give me more than I can handle, but my dog dying the same day as my husband? Really? and then sitting down at the end of the day and remembering that her friend had texted her something funny to watch... and she says it literally "saved" her that day... I don't know. It just got me right in the gut, you know?

I always knew the TNG cast was close. They get together for Christmas every year, and meet up for so many other occasions and events in between, but there's something incredibly special about a simple text from Gates McFadden getting Marina Sirtis through the anniversary of one of the worst days of her life 🥺❤️🥹

#marina sirtis #gates mcfadden

[thegeminisage]

it is time for. NOT a tng update. but a ds9 update!!! wednesday* we watched "emissary" and actually i'm not clear on if we watched both parts or just one since my website is wonky but either way whatever we watched FUCKING RULED. i'm dispensing w the normal bullet points so i can ramble as much as i want

*it was last night actually but it took me all day to type this up so i'm scheduling it to go up later. it got looooong lol

the first most striking thing i noticed about ds9, or at least the first half of what we watched, is that it FEELS like a video game. someone tell me if this is insane. you're playing as sisko. you get flashbacks of his backstory, you get thrown into this starbase that's in shambles and it's Your Job to fix it up. you go around meeting all the secondary characters who will be in charge of this or that gameplay aspect or upgrade system or shop: kira, o'brien, quark, odo, jadzia, julian, etc. the FOLEY in this was insane. all the noise in the back CONSTANTLY suggested a lively and whole universe outside of our direct line of focus - it felt so alive in the way not even the enterprise in tos did. i could picture myself in the opening gameplay/cutscene like slowly walking my character through what will become a hub area that i gradually upgrade over time while kira or o'brien narrates the list of problems. you're starting at the bottom rung and expected to fail, but you can FEEL the potential even in just one brief walk through the promenade. IS THIS INSANE? it feels like an insane thing to say. someone PLEASE write in if you have ever had similar feelings. if they haven't made a ds9 game yet, they should.

i also notice that not only is the quality of the ds9 episodes worse than that of tng and tos - no one has remastered them into 1080p, apparently - but the lighting is very different, as well. it felt WEIRD to see picard and the enterprise D shot this way. but it also lends, perhaps unintentionally, perhaps not, a really gritty atmosphere to what is normally a very clean universe. i guess since we mostly see it from the inside of starships, it would feel like a sterile place to us, but you know how everyone always compliments star wars on how lived-in it feels? the buttons are wearing, sand is stuck in their fancy thingamajigs, etc? this was how ds9 felt to me.

okay. the characters. let's fucking get into it. what's so fun about ds9 in general is that in all other trek shows i have picked out my specialest little guy in 5 seconds flat. tos was spock EASILY. tng i knew it was data before i started. i already know seven's gonna be my favorite voyager character, but i have NO IDEA!!! who my precious little baby in ds9 will be. what a fun surprise for everyone involved. if anybody wants to place bets go ahead.

like, i thought tng had a pretty solid lineup (hence my eternal frustration with its wasted potential) but they're not anywhere as eclectic as ds9's core cast. iirc, sisko and o'brien are the ONLY humans who for once are outnumbered by trek's cool aliens. i'm saving sisko for last because that was the part of ds9 that touched me most profoundly, but for o'brien - it was a little sad to see him leave the enterprise, because picard was right, it WON'T feel the same without him, but i'm really excited to see why everybody says he suffers more than jesus and to find out if the eyepatch is a permanent thing or if it's just mirrorverse fuckery. either way, i win. like, o'brien is cool, and i always miss him when i don't see him in tng, and i'll continue to miss him in tng from here on out, but he could never shine in that show. it's too stiff and too reluctant to put its characters through any real development. it's a shame they can't ALL move to ds9, tbh.

the next person we met was kira, who was WONDERFUL. it took me a minute to warm up to her, not because there was anything wrong with her, but because i figured at first glance she was ds9's version of ro laren, the obligatory bajoran cast member to connect us with the bajoran/cardassian plot - which would of course be good because ro is awesome, but it's not necessarily anything new and i already love ro. BUT I WAS WRONG! kira's personality is very distinct from ro's; really the only thing they have in common is not liking cardassians which lmao Yeah. my favorite thing about kira is that she smiles when she's upset or angry. that's Such an acting choic, to have her grinning at the cardassians when she's almost certain they're about to blow her whole space station to smithereens. all love light and respect to ro laren my beloved, but i think i actually like kira BETTER.

odo: WHAT is that thing he can do oh my god...is this a changeling?? i got that result in a star trek quiz once. i really loved when he snuck aboard the enemy ship posing as a bag to hold gambling winnings. i was like oh they showed us the bag to show us it will get stolen soon BUT NO it was odo!!!!!!! such a fun surprise. the exposition on his backstory was a little slapdash but i enjoyed it all the same, i cannot wait to learn more

i was most nervous to meet quark because i hate hate HATE the ferengi in tng, but he was actually so entertaining! like, you're never gonna be able to entirely remove the antisemetic undertones from the ferengi as a whole, but he was smart, practical, and endearingly longsuffering. i love his wryness and deadpan humor. i have a feeling he is gonna be so much fun to torture lovingly.

meeting julian bashir felt like meeting a famous person. for the longest time all i knew about ds9 was that cardassian guy wanted to FUCK that gay little doctor, so it was a little hilarious that in his first scene he was asking a woman* out on a date. sir do you not know you're gay?? even funnier was the fact that out of everybody in the pilot he had the least lines. we barely know him, but we finally met him. relatedly, i can't to wait to meet more cardassians, especially The cardassian. so far, they're still all gay.

*jadzia!!! gnc/trans queen! the trill stuff is SO interesting and watching that worm slither in and out of people during those flashbacks was so wonderful but also made me wince. i love that she used to be an old man and the jokes about it are actually really funny without feeling transphobic or anything SO FAR. who knows if that changes. i feel like we haven't gotten much yet from her either but i cannot wait.

SISKO. damn. where do i even...first of all, he should be allowed to bite kick kill picard. i say this as someone who experienced a genuine THRILL of pleasure upon seeing picard's borged self again. i loved that whole thing, i'm obsessed with the borg. that it comes back in this small way in ds9, and has such a HUGE impact on the storyline, was so so so fucking good. i always say tng tells and not shows, but even after just knowing sisko for a few moments i felt keenly how much it devastated to find his wife like that and THAT WAS JUST FROM THE FIRST SCENE. and it only gets better! he's a great dad. he's FUNNY. he is not above manual labor. he wants to tear picard limb from limb. and he exists HERE.

the wormhole alien sequence was. so good. it was SO GOOD. explaining linear time to aliens. the aliens using his memories to talk to him. HE EXISTS HERE. back and back and BACK to finding his wife in the rubble because HE EXISTS HERE. he CHOOSES to exist here. he existed there when he applied for a transfer to earth. he existed there when he confronted picard. he never left the ship because HE NEVER LEFT THE SHIP. they dragged him out but they COULDN'T DRAG HIM OUT. he exists here because he won't leave her to exist here alone because damn it we can't just leave her here. that was the most insane series of events i ever watched. like, because at first you DO think it's the aliens taking him back there BUT IT'S HIM. HE IS DOING IT TO HIMSELF. when the penny dropped i got literal chill bumps and when the aliens said "it's not linear" and he, openly weeping, replied "it's NOT linear," i genuinely, truly, shed a tear along with him. TNG COULD NEVER. none of those miserable fucks EVER cry!!! sisko did it in the god damn pilot!!!!!!!

and like, the fact that he can choose to stay at the space station at the end, to shake picard's hand, to exist SOMEWHERE ELSE. AAAAAUGHGHGHG

i really loved the final confrontation, too. kira is so so so so good, again, i LOVE that she smiles when she's angry, when she's sad, and it's not a fake smile, it's genuine and honest emotion, and she's genuinely and honestly going to start eating the cardassians for sport if they don't leave her alone. it was very scrappy, them pretending to be bigger and badder than they actually were because they had no other choice. you get the feeling everybody on the station and indeed the station itself is barely holding together, and what little togetherness is present comes from sheer spite.

anyway, absolutely 10/10. i was so worried ds9 wouldn't be good but it not only met my most furtive hopes it surpassed them with flying colors. it's gonna be REAL hard to go back to tng after this.

#personal #star trek blogging #ds9 lb #what an exciting tag to finally get to use!

[v-e-l-v-e-t-g-o-l-d-m-i-n-e]

 I spoke about this before in my liveblogs, but I do think that, as sad as it is to witness it, the estrangement of the TNG crew does make sense, in-universe.

In the Trek universe, the two most tight-knit crews imo are the TOS and the TNG. These are the ones who stuck longer together - decades - and had very impactful relationships with each other.

And then we see them again in Picard, and they have this air of estrangement from each other, like they really didn’t get together for a long while, and I get why.

It’s because they lost Data.

Data’s essentially immortal nature was talked about several times in TNG. It was a constantly worry of his, that he would outlive all his human friends and stay alone. Everyone expected Data to be the last one standing, and suddenly they had to face the reality that he was the first one of them to go.

Grief can sometimes pull people closer together so they can share the pain together, but the problem here is that, well, this is not in Picard’s nature.

He blamed himself for Data’s death. Almost two decades later and he kept dreaming about Data, wishing their time together wouldn’t end.

He’s haunted by Data’s death, and spent over twenty years feeling this way.

And ultimately, he was haunted by the guilty of Data sacrificing his life for his own.

And in true Picard fashion, what all this guilty, all these feeligns of grief made him do?

It made him pull away from everyone who had essentially become his family for twenty years.

We saw bits of it before. He couldn’t even remember well the first time he saw Will and Deanna’s firstborn, and apparently he only saw him twice since his birth and him being five.

In this season, we learned that he and Beverly spent over twenty years having zero contact with each other, and Worf also remarked recently about Picard’s distance:

When he first saw Geordi’s daughter, it had been so long that he didn’t even recognized her.

And having Picard distance himself from them like this obviously made something shatter involving everyone else. First they lost Data, and Picard, everyone’s surrogate dad, pulls away; this is the family breaking up.

Will and Deanna had their son and his disease to worry about; Beverly was afraid of having her son involved with the trouble that follows Picard everywhere and pulled away from everyone else in her fear.

Geordi had lost his best friend of well over twenty years and resolved to dedicate himself totally to his work and his famly, too afraid to lose this family like he lost the other one.

It all goes back to Data, and how his death utterly shattered the sense of family they gained over the years, how it made Picard feel guilty and distance himself from everyone else, and how the literal loss of a member and the emotional loss of another made this once tight-knit crew become strangers to one another.

#bruna watching the picard show #Star Trek #Star Trek: Picard #star trek picard #long post #picard spoilers