Online Series: Star Trek: Discovery - III - Spock's Beard

[LeafalCrusader]

The Empress sucks ass. Horrible cartoonish character. Star Trek deserves better.

 

[RobBrown4PM]

Wait...Tilly was made first officer?

Ensign Tilly being the first officer would be like if Nog was promoted to first officer of DS9 in season 7 when Colonel Kira went to help the Cardassians, difference is Nog was actually shown to be competent.

What's funny is Nog talks with O'Brien about the CoC and how he be able to command the defiant. O'Brien goes onto explain that while he might he might be able to in certain circumstances, those circumstances involve literally everyone else being dead on the bridge.

 

[CaptainCrunch67]

Damn it, I really liked Empress Philippa. Perfect combination of a true asshole and a badass.

I liked her last year, but it was clear this year that they were lost on her, instead they made her into a insult comic that looked like she was suffering from near fatal constipation. They pretty much could have run a laugh track whenever she flung an insult.

She had become a nothing burger in the end, and that episode was frankly about putting a bullet into a character that they had lost momentum on.

Even the wake scene at the end felt like a combination of a waste of time, and a victory lap by the writers over finding a clever way to get rid of a character that could have stolen time from Michael.

 

[CaptainCrunch67]

After a strong start to the season, the last three episodes have sunk back into low standards of the first two seasons, hopefully they can gain some momentum back.

 

[Blender]

What's funny is Nog talks with O'Brien about the CoC and how he be able to command the defiant. O'Brien goes onto explain that while he might he might be able to in certain circumstances, those circumstances involve literally everyone else being dead on the bridge.

I think that is when he was a cadet still, funny conversation.

 

[Finlandia WOAT]

What's funny is Nog talks with O'Brien about the CoC and how he be able to command the defiant. O'Brien goes onto explain that while he might he might be able to in certain circumstances, those circumstances involve literally everyone else being dead on the bridge.

This is one of my favorite anecdotes from DS9 so I have to butt in: in Season 6 when the Dominion held DS9, Sisko became Admiral Ross' adjutant, leaving Lieutenant Commander Dax in charge of the Defiant. Cadet Nog addresses Dax as Lieutenant, leading O'Brien to explain the old (and true) naval tradition of a commander of a ship being addressed as 'Captain' regardless of rank.

"So then...if I were in command, I would be the Captain?"
"Cadet, by the time you'd have to take command, there wouldn't be anyone left to call you 'Captain'. "
"Oh...right"

 

[Guardian17]

The Empress sucks ass. Horrible cartoonish character. Star Trek deserves better.

I liked her last year, but it was clear this year that they were lost on her, instead they made her into a insult comic that looked like she was suffering from near fatal constipation. They pretty much could have run a laugh track whenever she flung an insult.

She had become a nothing burger in the end, and that episode was frankly about putting a bullet into a character that they had lost momentum on.

Even the wake scene at the end felt like a combination of a waste of time, and a victory lap by the writers over finding a clever way to get rid of a character that could have stolen time from Michael.

Did anyone find it disturbing that the Discovery crew actually celebrated Georgiou's departure?

As the Terran Empress she killed or ordered the deaths of thousands of Terrans including the previous Emperor / Empress.

She murdered, enslaved and occasionally ate millions of non-Terrans across the Terran Empire.

She was worse than, Khan, Mao, Stalin and Hitler.

And yet here is the Discovery crew toasting her and calling her a "badass" as if she was a cool person to be admired instead of a monster.

Even worse, Carl aka the Guardian of Forever seemed to be okay with all the blood on her hands because of her sudden change of heart in her remaining days and decided to spare her life.

It's almost like the writers are trying to tell us that dictators and dictatorships are cool and the preferred method of governance.

 

[Osprey]

I just watched the last two episodes, which made up a two parter. Basically, for those like Blender who stopped watching and don't seem to care if it's spoiled, Georgiou is going mad from being both in the wrong universe and wrong time period, so she's to be left on an uninhabited planet like Khan, but there happens to be a TOS-like time portal there that she goes through and winds up back in her mirror universe as Empress. Because she's apparently learned to be a good person from the righteous Discovery crew, she acts more compassionately ala Ebenezer Scrooge, only to die, wake up at the portal and discover that that she was out for only a few moments ala The Inner Light. Because it was just a test and she passed, the portal keeper opens up a portal to a time in the past before the Prime and mirror universes diverged (i.e. when her body would be more comfortable) and lets her go through it.

It has to be one of the worst redemption arcs that I've ever seen. As pointed out, she's murdered countless Terrans and non-Terrans, but she saves one person's life (slave Saru in the mirror universe) and that's enough redemption to let a former female Genghis Khan loose not just in this universe, but in the distant past, when she might be tempted to use her knowledge of the future to claim power, become an Empress again and screw up the timeline as we know it.

Also, I thought that it was obvious and stupid how evil Georgiou suddenly lost her edge, started acting like real Georgiou and even hugged Burnham in the final scene so that the writers could make it more emotional. Do they think that we forget that that's not really her and that she was extraordinarily rude to Tilly earlier in the episode? Also, it didn't make sense to me for Burnham to get so emotional when everyone was celebrating her memory. If she loved and respected Georgiou so much, why did she mutiny against the real Georgiou in the first place and how could she have possibly formed a deeper bond with the standoffish, evil version who killed her in the mirror universe? This has been its own redemption arc for two seasons now--Burnham presumably trying to redeem herself with evil Georgiou for betraying the real Georgiou and getting her killed--and it just doesn't make nearly the sense that the writers seem to think that it does. Maybe it would've if evil Georgiou had softened up and grown close to Burnham, but that didn't happen until the final episode. It reminded me of Airiam's final episode and how the writers fast-tracked her development to make her a sympathetic character mere moments before getting rid of her and to allow for a melodramatic funeral.

As dumb as it all was, at least Georgiou is gone now. She never should've been brought back, IMO.

 

[Osprey]

Did anyone find it disturbing that the Discovery crew actually celebrated Georgiou's departure?

As the Terran Empress she killed or ordered the deaths of thousands of Terrans including the previous Emperor / Empress.

She murdered, enslaved and occasionally ate millions of non-Terrans across the Terran Empire.

She was worse than, Khan, Mao, Stalin and Hitler.

And yet here is the Discovery crew toasting her and calling her a "badass" as if she was a cool person to be admired instead of a monster.

Even worse, Carl aka the Guardian of Forever seemed to be okay with all the blood on her hands because of her sudden change of heart in her remaining days and decided to spare her life.

It's almost like the writers are trying to tell us that dictators and dictatorships are cool and the preferred method of governance.

Something to think about: would the writers have done this if she were a he? If Georgiou were a brutally honest, vindictive and megalomaniac man (hmm), would the writers have made him into a sympathetic character who went through a redemption arc and whose loss was mourned? No, he'd be branded a monster, made the villain and defeated like Lorca was.

Georgiou's past crimes and recent demeanor were excused because she was a strong female character, IMO. That's seemingly more important than any of her awful traits. It's the same with Burnham. Each time that she stands up to authority and does her own thing, we're supposed to admire what a strong, independent woman she is. There's nothing admirable about either character, though. Both are irritating and full of themselves and have no business being on Starfleet ships (unless in the brig), yet the writers seem to have no sense of that or how to write a strong and independent female character without making her a rude rogue.

 

[Blender]

How do the writers think that a character that committed genocide and ate tons of sentient species is redeemable?

 

[RobBrown4PM]

How do the writers think that a character that committed genocide and ate tons of sentient species is redeemable?

Blizzard did the same trash story line with Kerrigan in SC2. Reaped the galaxy and killed tens of millions (If not far more), but no, she's a misunderstood person who needs saving.

Oh yeah, she also betrayed and then murdered Raynor's best friend, along with countless others she manipulated in her grand scheme.

 

[Osprey]

Blizzard did the same trash story line with Kerrigan in SC2. Reaped the galaxy and killed tens of millions (If not far more), but no, she's a misunderstood person who needs saving.

Oh yeah, she also betrayed and then murdered Raynor's best friend, along with countless others she manipulated in her grand scheme.

Wow, that's inexcusable. If Kerrigan really did all of that, I don't blame Tonya Harding one bit for trying to break her leg.

 

[The Nemesis]

I hadn't even really thought about the ethical ramifications of the extremely dumb wake where all these crew members who Eeeeeevil Georgiou was an utter bastard to were all gushing about how amazing she was. I was too hung up on just how stupid everyone was that they celebrated someone who had nothing but contempt and disregard for them for the last 2 seasons. Whose petty, scathing bluntness was turned into idealized radical honesty. Whose unfettered and amoral actions were reframed as strong-willed go-getter-iness. And whose manipulative, sociopathic nature suddenly became respectable ambition.

And no amount of Burnham bluntly (but still incredibly euphemistically) calling her a "pain in the ass" validates the abrupt and completely unearned manufactured sentiment.

Also I was rolling my eyes so hard at the lazy Guardian of Forever shoehorn. We'll just take something from TOS and change almost everything about it so we can go "WEEEE FANSERVICE!!!!!!" like some kind of lazy make-good for everything else they do that dissociates this show from the Treks before it.


It's a shame everything went this way too. I like Michelle Yeoh a lot. She deserved better than to play a legitimately tragic character for 20 minutes followed by the world's laziest cardboard cutout "draco in leather pants" redemption-path villain for the next 2 seasons.

 

[The Nemesis]

Burnham presumably trying to redeem herself with evil Georgiou for betraying the real Georgiou and getting her killed--and it just doesn't make nearly the sense that the writers seem to think that it does. Maybe it would've if evil Georgiou had softened up and grown close to Burnham, but that didn't happen until the final episode.

I think there was something interesting here if they go in a different direction. Have Burnham try to redeem herself by "saving" mirror Georgiou and constantly attempting to get close to her while looking for foregiveness for her actions. But in the end make it that mirror Georgiou plays her guilt like a fiddle and screws Burnham over to get something that she wants, with one last twist of the knife before her departure in the form of chastising Burnham for being dumb enough to think that she could get absolution for her sins through attempting to save a) a person who doesn't want that kind of saving, and b) someone who isn't even the same person as the one who was actually wronged (ie the prime Georgiou) and thus is in no position to offer that absolution even if she wanted to give it.

There. You've avoided turning Georgiou into a lazy fanfiction writer's "I can change the villain into a sympathetic character by remaking them in a distorted image" plot device and you've provided something approximating an actual growth opportunity for Burnham which would serve to humanize her rather than reaffirming her perfect-being-walking-mary-sue status.

actually, the more I think about it, the more the kinds of writing flaws I see in this show are the sorts of things I expect from terrible fanfiction. It makes me wonder how many of the series' writers cut their teeth writing shitty stories on fanfiction.net. It's worked so far for new-era mainstream published authors, so why not TV writers too?

 

[Canadiens Ghost]

I haven't watched the latest episode, I was waiting to see the reactions to it. From what I am reading, Georgiou dies and then the entire crew of Discovery ends up praising her. Are you effing kidding me?!? This is so stupid. She treated them all like $hit.
As satisfying as it would be to see Georgiou dying, I'm gonna skip this one and I'll wait for the reactions to the future episodes before deciding if I'll watch them or not. I'm probably at the last step before totally giving up on this show.

 

[Guardian17]

Something to think about: would the writers have done this if she were a he? If Georgiou were a brutally honest, vindictive and megalomaniac man (hmm), would the writers have made him into a sympathetic character who went through a redemption arc and whose loss was mourned? No, he'd be branded a monster, made the villain and defeated like Lorca was.

Georgiou's past crimes and recent demeanor were excused because she was a strong female character, IMO. That's seemingly more important than any of her awful traits. It's the same with Burnham. Each time that she stands up to authority and does her own thing, we're supposed to admire what a strong, independent woman she is. There's nothing admirable about either character, though. Both are irritating and full of themselves and have no business being on Starfleet ships (unless in the brig), yet the writers seem to have no sense of that or how to write a strong and independent female character without making her a rude rogue.

Remember the contrived fight scene in the corridor between the two Terran officers, black female and white male?

Before the fight started did anyone watching the show not know who the winner of the fight would be?


The writers think that being a "badass" means acting like a bully and walking into a bar and beating people up just because he can and everyone is scared.

In reality, a true "badass" would walk into a bar, the staff would welcome him, clear a table and serve him his usual drink while the other patrons would relax knowing that no one will start any trouble when the "badass" is around.


What about the scene in engineering where one character is told you can't eat liquorish there and basically tells her superior that she doesn't care if anyone doesn't like it. Her neutered superior does nothing, just like the rest of the crew did nothing when Ensign Tilly was promoted to first officer.

The writers clearly have never worked in the military, or a sports team or an oil rig or a commercial fishing boat or any group of people with any sort of hierarchy.

Promoting inferior officers and ignoring group rules is not "badass" or "strong" or "independent" it is, in fact, selfish, reckless and dangerous.

Captain Saru should be removed from command for allowing such a lax attitude and for his ill advised promotion.


It's sad that I now watch Agenda Trek Discovery because it amuses me to see how anti Star Trek it is and how clueless the writers are.

I can't wait to see what other "fan-service" tropes they use and how important Magic Michael is to the Federation.

 

[RobBrown4PM]

Wow, that's inexcusable. If Kerrigan really did all of that, I don't blame Tonya Harding one bit for trying to break her leg.

Yep, sure was. Turn's out Kerrigan is the savior of the universe as well, didn't yah know. Oh, and the Overmind, yeah, not actually a bad guy after all, completely misunderstood. Turn's out he was a mind slave of some big universal bad. Good thing Tassadar, one of the most beloved characters in the franchise, didn't just go and sacrifice himself for nothing

 

[Osprey]

I think there was something interesting here if they go in a different direction. Have Burnham try to redeem herself by "saving" mirror Georgiou and constantly attempting to get close to her while looking for foregiveness for her actions. But in the end make it that mirror Georgiou plays her guilt like a fiddle and screws Burnham over to get something that she wants, with one last twist of the knife before her departure in the form of chastising Burnham for being dumb enough to think that she could get absolution for her sins through attempting to save a) a person who doesn't want that kind of saving, and b) someone who isn't even the same person as the one who was actually wronged (ie the prime Georgiou) and thus is in no position to offer that absolution even if she wanted to give it.

There. You've avoided turning Georgiou into a lazy fanfiction writer's "I can change the villain into a sympathetic character by remaking them in a distorted image" plot device and you've provided something approximating an actual growth opportunity for Burnham which would serve to humanize her rather than reaffirming her perfect-being-walking-mary-sue status.

Yeah, I didn't think of your alternative, but it did seem to me that the premise had some potential that the writers didn't explore. I still don't like the idea of a Starfleet officer mutinying against her Captain, but the show could've still used and turned that into a better storyline. As you suggested, a more tragic outcome probably would've been more realistic.

What we got, instead, is Burnham successfully turning evil Georgiou into a better person just as she made Spock into the person that he would become. I believe that she also convinced Pike to not dwell on his fate, so we have her to thank for the spinoff series and the good things that Pike does in it. Basically, Burnham is just going around the universe(s) and time periods blessing people who come into contact with her as if she's the Pope.

 

[Blender]

Yeah, I didn't think of your alternative, but it did seem to me that the premise had some potential that the writers didn't explore. I still don't like the idea of a Starfleet officer mutinying against her Captain and getting her killed, but the show could've used and turned that into a better storyline. As you suggested, a tragic outcome probably would've been more realistic.

What we got is Burnham turning evil Georgiou into a better person just as she made Spock into the person that he would become. I believe that she also convinced Pike to not dwell on his fate, so we also have her to thank for the spinoff series and what Pike does in it. Basically, Burnham is just going around the universe(s) and time periods blessing people who come into contact with her as if she's the Pope.

"Blessing people she comes into contact with" is pretty accurate. Unlike previous Star Trek shows which were very character driven, almost every character story in Discovery has revolved around how the character interacts with the lead.

I much would have preferred her getting her captain killed because of a poor decision and accident, rather than mutiny and starting an interstellar war. I didn't think the events presented were actually forgivable in the way they were brushed off.

 

[Osprey]

I haven't watched the latest episode, I was waiting to see the reactions to it. From what I am reading, Georgiou dies and then the entire crew of Discovery ends up praising her. Are you effing kidding me?!? This is so stupid. She treated them all like $hit.

Georgiou doesn't actually die, but she does leave forever by going through a time portal to an unspecified point in the past and the Discovery crew members do gather in the mess hall to raise glasses to her memory and praise her.

Remember the contrived fight scene in the corridor between the two Terran officers, black female and white male?

Before the fight started did anyone watching the show not know who the winner of the fight would be?

I believe that he's Asian, but, yeah, I thought the very same thing, that there's no way that the writers would let the male get the upper hand on the female and pummel her into bloody submission like she ended up doing to him.

Did you notice, in one of the group battle scenes, when mirror Tilly got the best of the taller, thinner, more athletic female officer in hand to hand combat? You can't have the pretty girl beating up the overweight girl.

 

[CaptainCrunch67]

I really rolled my eyes at evil Tilly, I mean the one in the normal universe is horrible, and has in my mind become even less watchable this year, but evil her was literally a mustache twirling 20's exagerrated silent film snidley whiplash villain.

while this season has been better, the last three episodes have been pretty poor and exposed how bad the actors in this show really are. Doug Jones as Saru is the best of the bunch. But watching these people overact in the mirror universe was painful.

 

[Cloned]

It's a shame everything went this way too. I like Michelle Yeoh a lot. She deserved better than to play a legitimately tragic character for 20 minutes followed by the world's laziest cardboard cutout "draco in leather pants" redemption-path villain for the next 2 seasons.

Luckily for you, you'll be able to see her in the new Section 31 series.

 

[peate]

What I wouldn't give for the return of the Orville right now.

 

[Jussi]

How do the writers think that a character that committed genocide and ate tons of sentient species is redeemable?

Meanwhile in the Star Wars thread: "WE WANT TO SEE MORE OF VADER KILLING PEOPLE!!" "SO ANAKIN KILLED CHILDREN, WHO CARES! HE KILLED THE EMPEROR!""

 

[CaptainCrunch67]

Ok, the last three episodes have been terrible, but so far the season has been a lot better then the last two. Then the writers . . .

Spoiler

Said hold my beer, merry christmas jerkfaces

The Burn, the big storyline with promise, well it was a mutated kid that had a bad day and his temper tantrum caused the burn.
Michael questioning Saru's objectivity and his emotions compromising him. Pretty freaking laughable as that's her MO, and you can just tell they writers want Burnham in the Captain's chair badly.
Tilly, worst Captain ever, Fire all sarcasm weapons, as the battle between her and the villain, was basically an episode of 90210 between mean girl in a cafeteria.
Nobody on the away mission knows what's going on, Saru tells Burnham to stay as he's the Captain, she tells him he needs to stay with the deranged Burn baby because they're the same species, and Saru agrees, Thereby leaving Tilly in charge with Michael intending to once again save the day.
Oh what else, the B roll story of Aidra and her boyfriend the Force Ghost, seriously who cares anymore.
I can see the next episode will be about Tilly the terrible Captain trying to redeem herself. Saru will probably fracking sacrifice himself and that leaves Burnham as Captain of the Discovery rubbing the dent or spur on the Captains Chair.
Last year the writers did the same thing, took a strong story line, and then completely wrecked the last half of the season.
Same thing here.