It’s pretty bad. Comparing it to other Trek or not. Writing is atrocious. Much of the acting is bad. Crying Captain crying damn near every episode. Not developing much of the bridge crew over 5 years. Not to mention not remembering their own rules (I remember once they said they couldn’t jump while cloaked, and then they did it).
Stamets, Saru, and Georgiou were they only ones that kept me watching.
If others can find joy in it, sounds good to me, but I’ll pass thanks.
It’s pretty terrible, not terrible enough to not see. The main problem is they made it very very difficult to care at all about anyone. Burnam is the most intollerable captain ever, they barely develop any character at all, and if they do, it’s only to kill them immediately after and try and squeeze some easy feelings from us. Well developed characters are instead falsely killed, but ultimately protected by plot armor. As you mentioned, Stamets and Saru are the only really decent guys.
The acting is fine. The issue is the genre.
Discovery is melodrama, something previous series explicitly were not.
I can’t tell you much about acting, because I see the shows subbed. However, the writing is terrible, in any language. Not only their choice don’t make sense and there are constant plot holes, they are supposed to be seasoned Starfleet veterans, yet they act to dramatically, so emotionally, illogically and scared all the time.
And it’s not a smart “logic vulcans vs illogic humans” confrontation, it’s not a quirk of well defined characters with balance in their emotions; they are simply badly written for dramatic and sitting-on-the-edge type of narrative, which is fine I guess, but it’s a cheap way to get traction in the narrative, which doesn’t hold well for fans of the series that enjoyed the professionalism of Starfleet captains, supposedly the best of the best, capable of facing every menace.
Again, you want to do such a series, do it. But brand it as Star Trek, and you will get this kind of criticism.
See, I’m torn. Because ST often gets weird and goofy, but DIS seemed to take that to another level with some REALLY questionable writing, directing, and acting at times. But that said, the big showpiece that DIS brings to the table - and imo, absolutely hits out of the park - is the pervasive theme of radical acceptance. For all the cringe and facepalm moments that the show has, THAT is a huge win - and in fact, goes to the very core of what the UFoP is supposed to represent both in-universe and in the context of fandom.
What exactly were you missing in other shows that was accepted here (besides wild subordination and actual mutiny)? I have to say I felt somewhat uncomfortable with the amount of emotion they show during their work. I have no problem with the show exploring that, but these people are supposed to be professionals, having them cry during every shift doesn’t really give that impression
That’s what I mean about the bad acting. That was regularly cringey for me.
But they DID very directly and prominently address acceptance of and compassion towards various mental heath conditions, neurodivergences, and non-traditional personal/sexual identities, the importance of which should not be understated in this day and age.
Personally, I was overall disappointed with DIS. But when watching it there was the occasional moment that I loved. Lorca was a great character (until they did the haha he’s actually super space Hitler rug-pull), much of the props, set designs, and costumes were great, Mudd was superb, it introduced us to Anson Mount’s Pike and led to SNW, Saru was genuinely one of the most interesting characters in all of Trek, etc.
It also had a bunch of stuff that I just really really didn’t like. But meh. That’s just, like, my opinion maaaaann.
(until they did the haha he’s actually super space Hitler rug-pull)
My guy, they had him admit to blowing up his own vessel and killing everyone on board. He openly ignored Starfleets protocols surrounding new life and sentient life by sanctioning the effective torture of a creature to power the spore drive. He rejected admirals and went against their orders frequently. He slept with a gun under his pillow. He was shown to be collecting torture implements that are psychotically illegal from the entire galaxy and having a creepy room filled with those implements that also happened to have its own independent brig.
It isn’t much of a rug pull if you looked down at any point…
Edit: -
He was also gathering navigational data the entire time and actively punched in extra coordinates into the Spore Drive from the Captains Chair. He then gave a long stare into the camera and said “Lets go home”.
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He was exceptionally pragmatic in military strategy which isn’t so common in Starfleet in general.
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The season is also littered with mirror imagery. First time Lorca is introduced is through a reflection in his window. Stamets has his mirror moment in episode 4.
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He’s also littered with scars, including ones that are consistent with the shape of an Agonizer. He showed extreme interest in someone willing to break one of the biggest rules in Starfleet and used his power to pull her into his reach through some wildly sketchy means.
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The light sensitivity wasn’t an obvious one as it was a new thing, it was used to canonize why all the Mirror Universe episodes in DS9 and Enterprise are dimly lit and darker, but even that hints that he’s not ‘normal’.
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He also behaved weirdly with Admiral Cornwall who knew him well and she even mentions that he’s not the same person she knew.
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He actively set her up for something he suspected to be an ambush and then refused to go save her despite risking the ship repeatedly before. Something Saru even questioned at the time.
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He’s even eating the same food that Burnham is served in the Mirror Universe.
Like I said. Isn’t much of a rug pull if you look down.
He was still far more interesting to me as a guy suffering from PTSD and having to often choose between two bad options. There are a lot of ways a character like that can grow and evolve.
But he was never that. Ash Tyler was the one set up for having PTSD but the only thing close to it for Lorca was when he jumped Admiral Cornwall when they were sleeping together. But at the end of that episode we see him purposefully set her up to fail and then abandon her.
It’s almost like people throw a fit over everything new for little reason other than not what they’re used to. TNG was whined about. Ds9. Voyager. Discovery is in good company. Still Trek, no matter what anyone whines otherwise
Ds9: where’s the exploring? They’re on a space station!
Voyager: where are all the aliens we know about?
Enterprise: it’s been a long road.
With time, they all got their space. (This is me agreeing)
All Trek is equal.
With the exception of Code of Honor and that racist ass shit they wrote for Chakotay
Is there anyone who dislikes Lower Decks? I’d say LD is more equal than the others.
All Trek is equal.
Yo them’s fighting words Stamets. Obviously Year of Hell is above all the rest.
Voyager is the only series, Kate Mulgrew & Robert Picardo will save us all.
Maybe it’s simply that the format changes a lot.
TNG is much different from TOS and some people don’t like that style.
I can honestly say that I find Discovery extremely frantic, boring and way too contemporary, but that’s just my expectation towards Trek. Others have different tastes.
Maybe it’s simply that the format changes a lot.
Then that makes the complaints even more pointless. If the format and style of the series changes continuously then what basis do people have for whining that it “doesn’t feel like Star Trek”?
I feel that frequently a lot of complaints about the show are directed towards the entire series as a whole. That Discovery doesn’t fit for whatever reason. Yet these people are the ones who are wrapping up so much variety throughout the shows to one ‘feeling’ and when it doesn’t fit they check out.
Yeah, if you don’t like that style that’s perfectly fine. Personally I don’t like the style of DS9. But I’m not out here saying that because it’s different than what I am used to and what I like that it “isn’t Star Trek” or “doesn’t feel like Star Trek.”
I’ve said this before but Star Trek shows off diversity through as many aliens and characters as they can. Why are people so angry when the shows themselves do the same thing?
I’d argue that there are different categories of Trek-feel. TOS is different from TNG and DS9, and the “new Treks” are different from those TNG/DS9.
The new Treks are all much more modern and contemporary. The production styles are completely different, the underlying topics are much closer to reality. It is a completely different category of show, that just happens to take place in the same universe.
Whether that’s a good thing or not, is up to debate. But arguing that “this is not my Trek anymore” is invalid, is just wrong.
I’m just happy to have new Trek shows after like 15 years lol and now there’s SO many
Plus, DIS really got into the groove after the first 2 seasons, which is a common problem IMO for many Trek series from TNG to ENT
Up until Lower Decks, no Star Trek show had a good first season. Most of them had a rocky second as well. Also why I balk everytime someone says “Yeah I watched the first couple episodes of the first season and gave up.” But you sat through the first season of TNG and the first 3 of Voyager with no issue?! Seasons that are twice as long?!
When The Last Jedi came out I went to see it with some friends who were big Star Wars fans. I thought it was fun, they hated all of it. I said to them “I guess I am not big enough of a Star Wars fan to hate Star Wars that much.” The same is true for almost everything.
I’ve been a Star Wars fan for almost three decades and I think almost all Disney Star Wars is “fine” at worst. Even most of the things I didn’t like had some sort of redeeming qualities, or I could recognize that I wasn’t the target audience. The only thing I truly hated was Rise of the Skywalker, which is quite possibly my least favourite Star Wars thing ever.
I realize this puts me in the very small minority among Star Wars fans, and it’s the reason I tend to avoid fan discussions these days - the relentless negativity is exhausting and leaves little room for discussing the things about Disney Star Wars I find good and/or interesting.
I’m with you buddy. On pretty much everything. There are things in Rise of Skywalker I like (Rey’s new lightsaber is bitching but I also actually do like her taking the name Skywalker) but most of it feels like it was written by 14 people at the same time. But the sequels in general I do like quite a bit. BB8 is adorable, Rey is awesome, Finn is hot as balls, Poe can equally get it and I loved seeing Carrie Fisher back in the saddle
Yup. Proudly love the Sequels too. There are some flaws in them, don’t get me wrong, but it’s new Star Wars that expanded on what we got. Personally I found that a thousand times more interesting than the endless void of fanfiction being peddled as ‘believe in whatever you prefer!’
Nah.
Lower Decks and SNW is generally well liked even though it’s new and not what people are used to (LD is a wacky cartoon comedy).
Both TNG and DS9 were bad shows in the beginning (DS9 could be described as ok-ish, but it ran concurrently to TNG in its prime, so looked worse in comparison). Fans didn’t dislike them because they were new and then got use to them, they disliked them because they started out bad and then liked them because they got better. VOY and Enterprise are generally considered bad to highly flawed (ENT 3rd season being the exception because, again, it was good).
There are PLENTY of reasons not to like Discovery. You enjoyed it? Great, have fun. No need to dismiss people not liking it because it’s new or whatever.
My main complaint is common to Picard: I don’t think the season long arcs were a good idea. I felt like maybe that had enough story for a “two parter” but stretched out to a season because “streamers binge”.
I did watch it, that’s how I know I don’t like it it didn’t take everyone else’s views and make them my own.
Same, I needed more after SNW and wasn’t quite ready for the way 80’s - '00s era Trek was filmed. I actually liked the first two seasons and thought season 3 was okay.
Spoiler alert:
But then we learned about the source of the burn.
And then season 4 happened. And then season 5 happened. It felt like all of these were leaning into my least favorite things about Discovery. By the finale, I was fast forwarding through everything just to get through it.
Watching TNG for the first time now and loving it way more than Disco :)
Yeah, I got through season 3 and just let it go after that. Like the other seasons, the first half had me, but the endings killed it for me. And the endings just kept. Getting. Worse.
Sounds like you saved yourself 2 more aneurysms haha.
I actually liked a lot of S1 and S2 (S2 being peak because enterprise crew just carry the hell out of everything) but I also like edgy and dark media and can overlook a lot if the tone is done in a way that grabs me.
S3 looked promising until the “big reveal”. Couldn’t take it seriously after that. Forced myself thorugh S4 and S5 but those were just straight up annoying. I can’t stand it when things go wrong just because the protagonists are being stupid, or getting held back by some weird moral stance they clearly didn’t have 3 episodes ago. What’s even worse is when it’s so generic I can accurately predict how a 40-60 minute episode will end within the first 10.
Watching TNG for the first time now and loving it way more than Disco :)
There’s so much to look forward to! It is a bit dated and I watch it through rose-colored glasses, but even with that in mind, it’s a good show.
Coming directly from Discovery and SNW, the sets and how everything was shot definitely felt dated at first I won’t lie. But it took a couple of false starts, and then actually watching it for more than 10 minutes for me to be super immersed and forget about all of that. Still on Season 1 and I really like the stories being told so far. I’m watching an episode here and there when I’m in the mood but I get the feeling I’m gonna reach a point where I binge the whole thing in an unhealthy amount of time haha.
My intro to Trek was Lower Decks so I’m also excited to see all of the crazy stuff they referenced in passing there :D
