I find Pegasus a decent episode. I think that while utopian aspiration is a fundamental tenet of Star Trek, I think it’s a bit reducto e to call it completely a show about perfect humans.
Heck, from the get go we had Garry Mitchell doing pyscho god stuff and Charlie X groping people, and a captain who sacrificed his crew to the weird space Romans so he would survive.
I think in truth, Star Trek is both about the best humanity can be and how the best in humanity can overcome the worst in humanity - you can’t exactly do that without episodes where the protagonists or the Federation makes mistakes, sometimes small and sometimes on the magnitude of Pegasus.
In many ways, DS9, darker as it is, feels the most Trek - a team of very different people with different beliefs overcoming/respecting their differences and forming a beautiful community despite the folly and evil around and within them.
To be fair, not everything is played for laughs - I’d say pretty much every season finale gets moderately serious. I also think the Orion world building was top notch.
I enjoyed the crossover before I watched Lower Decks and still enjoy it, but I also feel like the way the characters were written at times reduced them to their basic archetype without the character development they would have had at that point in Lower Decks. I mean, it somewhat makes sense - probably a good idea to assume not everyone had watched Lower Decks and give an idea of who these people are - but I wonder if it could have been executed a bit better on that front.
Suffice it to say, I think late Lower Decks itself actually contains better examples of their “toned-down” real selves.
The whole Gumato!
Mostly - I find a lot of these quite funny, but I think LD is the least accurate one. TOS also is one of the less spot-on ones, but I think late TOS and especially the TOS films, it becomes very applicable.
I think the LD one really only applies to the early show, and mostly just Mariner and Boimler. Later on, it's often less they lack brain cells but often use them at the wrong time, but then their brain cells are good enough they actually make it out of the situation. I'd say none of the main characters are actually particularly mediocre except Boimler (not to hate on Bradward), as we slowly find out. Maybe some of the bridge crew stay within the box of mediocrity, but we still learn to love them as characters. I might put something for Lower Decks like "Pick one from each, and make it more dysfunctional".
Considering both the description of LD and there being no SNW, this was clearly written some time 2020 or 2021.
To be fair, the Romulans only showed up because this was an alternate timeline version of a TOS episode.
SNW is decent. S2 E2 is an especially strong episode.
It’s always a pleasure when Trek shark jumps and plops in a historical figure in an implausible way.
That’s half of what made the Amelia Earhart episode of VOY so fun. It’ll be really funny if we ever find out what actually happened to her.
Usually, I hate reposts of very common Trek memes, but Far Side’s just such a classic that I can’t help but love it.
Star Trek TOS, Season 3 Episode 1.5: “All at One Pantsuit”
Scotty: “Blast me bagpipes! Me eyes haven’t seen an outfit that tasteless since Starbase 41 back when I was on the Faerie Queene!”
Bones: “Jim, if we don’t replace Spock’s clothes soon, we’ll all be dead before we know it.”
Kirk: “Mr. Spock, for the safety of this entire crew, I’m ordering you to change your clothes immediately.”
Indeed, it was, followed by Ten Forward and This Might Be Lemmy.
Honestly, he probably didn’t anymore, especially if his kids were in Lakarian City.
cross-posted from: https://startrek.website/post/14985611
"Boss of Me" might be my favorite Flans song... besides "Put Your Hand Inside the Puppet Head"... and "Music Jail"... and "Let Me Tell You About My Operation"... and "If Day for Winnipeg". Nevermind. Please don't make me choose a favorite Flans song.
cross-posted from: https://startrek.website/post/19356345
I finally got around to watching some Discovery (though I'm only through the first few episodes of season 4). My thoughts:
- First three are a moderately enjoyable sci-fi drama
- I have to admit, season 3 just presented enough interesting ideas and mystery I was able to ignore most of its flaws
- I've really started to notice death by subplots, though. It feels like they try to do 4 different plots in an episode, 2 which they do okay and 2 which are way weaker than they should be. I would have rather they done 2 subplots really well.
- I felt season 4's conflict was really contrived. The plot could have almost written itself with what happened in season 3. Osyra died and we don't even talk about the aftermath in the Chain - the slavery isn't just going to magically disappear, and there's sure to be a power struggle. Also, killing Book's family was kind of idiotic - talking about grief and obsession again is like beating a dead horse. Heck, if you'd let his family live but still destroyed the planet, we could have had an interesting story on diasporas instead.
- Also, background character development feels a bit weak. I spent half the first couple seasons wondering who the heck Ariam was, and just when I did, they killed her before the audience could develop much of an attachment. They could have at least thrown in a few more crew barbecue scenes.
- I am now more impressed at what Lower Decks did with fewer, shorter episodes a season than Discovery. They really managed to create a sense that we'd been with these characters a long time and that they were growing despite the entire show being shorter than 1 TNG season. I do have a few gripes about season 5 (my main one being how does Ma'ah go from "Beckett is honorable" like, a few hours after meeting her to immediately distrusting her in the finale), but my respect for LD has only grown.
cross-posted from: https://startrek.website/post/19150268
The Parliament just feels like a more beautiful version of the Nebula - it is rather elegant while keeping that Galaxy-class kitbash feel, combined with a bit of Miranda in the square edges of the saucer and a smidge of Sovereign in the nacelles. Nebula just looks derpy by comparison
True, Nebula and Parliament have a bit different purposes. However, other than nacelles, they actually seem to be about the same size interior-wise (based on some very Memory Beta info).
cross-posted from: https://startrek.website/post/18851336
I usually don't post non-OCs, but this one seems relatively rare. The GIF quality was terrible, so I took the MP4 and encoded it into a high-quality animated WEBP. APNG was tempting, but when I tried that for my Prodigy meme, I ran into all sorts of issues. WEBP seems better supported.
Source: https://tenor.com/view/klingon-jump-rope-gif-7629146
Shut up and get with Garak, dude. (Also, a nod to the amusing show banter in the Live at the Music Hall of Williamsburg recording.)
I also posted this on the tmbw Discord.
While DS9 quality is an issue, I think Keevan is just a PS1 character- a beautiful one.