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Post by nombrecomun on Mar 25, 2023 4:28:01 GMT
I'm trying to remember, did ANYTHING in the second season affect this season now? Other than some cast members not coming back? Like we could watch S1, skip S2, and start S3 without missing a damn thing? I think you can basically skip S1 as well. The only thing that might matter is that Picard is some type of synth...but even that doesn't seem to really matter. At least to this point anyway. |
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Post by Prometheus59650 on Mar 25, 2023 4:49:46 GMT
I'm trying to remember, did ANYTHING in the second season affect this season now? Other than some cast members not coming back? Like we could watch S1, skip S2, and start S3 without missing a damn thing? I think you can basically skip S1 as well. The only thing that might matter is that Picard is some type of synth...but even that doesn't seem to really matter. At least to this point anyway. Alison Pill mentions it in S2, E1 and I think deLancie makes an offhand remark, but that's it. The fact basically doesn't matter at all. |
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Post by Garak Nephew on Mar 25, 2023 14:35:43 GMT
The reviews are in and they are not kind, well, not all of them (I like James Whitbrook but in his weekly take on Picard he misses and treat the episode very lightly), but many of them are pounding with the glaring flop that "Bounty" is.
This one bellow put forward an interesting term that I find useful and that hadn't read before: "continuity porn". It is "when the writers expend too much time making references and not enough time telling a compelling story." I think this applies to this season of "Picard" but specially to this episode.
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Post by Garak Nephew on Mar 25, 2023 15:23:48 GMT
This episode is perfect. Try this thought experiment. I am going to ask you to consider the image or images that come to mind when I type the following. The nineteen fifties. Do you have an image or images in mind in mind? Okay, next. The nineteen sixties. What do you see? Next. The nineteen seventies. Got it? Next. The nineteen eighties. Okay? The nineteen nineties. Were they very distinct? Unmistakable for one another in both big and fine brush strokes. What did you think of? Cars? From bulky and round, to sleek and winged, to blocky, to compact? TV: black and white to colour, of course, serious anthologies giving way to fantasy sit-coms, then espionage shows to gritty cop shows, to game changers like Seinfeld. Fashion: men with hats to no men with hats, women’s skirts going up, then down again, suits to flairs to pastels, no to mention people’s hair. No try the same thing for the previous two decades. The 2000s Now the 2010s. What did you see? Did you have to think a little harder? Did you have to hone in on detail? The devices? Particular movies or TV shows? Sure, there was the rise of streaming and some of the outstanding shows to be found there. Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, Games of Thrones. But what about the look? The feel? The difference between the 50s and 60s is so much starker that that of the 2000s to 2010s. Hence Picard: The Bounty. I don’t know how many times I’ve reflected on the concept of “cultural stagnation” after seeing a YouTube video on that subject a while back. We seem to have gone from bold strokes to, fearful minor tweaks. Major financial investment in movies rarely happens without reaching back into the safe past with its history of profit. What are the creations that have started in the past few years that will be fondly revisited and expanded upon in fifty? The 1960s Star Trek was a bold adventure trying to be innovative, at least to the extent allowed by the broadcast restrictions of the time. Picard: The Bounty was a call-back museum because because Star Trek doesn’t know how to be anything else any more. This is despite, in theory, a landscape where you’re allowed to show and do virtually anything. Allowed by the broadcast laws. By the corporate overlords, not so much. It’s not Star Trek’s fault. There are four or five giant corporate organisms controlling 90% of everything, at least in the cultural west. You can do a cheap out-there production, but when there’s serious money involved, you’ve gotta have some guarantees. Nostalgia, member-berries, tropes and so on. For all the talk and sometimes complaints by grumpy YouTubers about the detrimental ascendency of “diversity,” the one place where it is the most lacking and the most missed is in creativity - stories and ideas. I miss watching the 1960s Star Trek in the 1970s as a kid and having one of its ideas blow my mind. Duplicate Earths, parallel universes, time paradoxes, a twentieth-century Roman Empire. The new(er) Battlestar Galactica did that too in my 30s, and in a different way Better Call Saul did that a couple of months ago - Howard Hamlin’s last scenes and how I felt about his character’s fate. But Galactica is now a couple of decades back (which is hard to believe) and BCS was a magnificent but relatively modest production. Picard: The Bounty did something like that too (spoilers): someone rebuilt the Genesis Device (*aside - if they did that, they’re so idiotic that maybe Starfleet or whoever deserves everything that happens to them), Kirk’s body, 1701-A etc. I felt a little excited, you know? The member-berries released their endorphins. But almost at once I felt I was being drawn to the Dark Side. It wasn’t the same, just a cheap imitation, old synthahol that had been kept on a shelf too long. Then along comes the USS New Jersey which shorted out all the wiring in my OCD system: so, we’re NOT meant to see the SNW Enterprise is THE Enterprise? It WILL get a refit to look like the TOS ship? Which it already looked like when Pike visited Talos IV? So Picard: The Bounty was perfect. A perfect encapsulation of everything that our culture has become, as Picard and Kirk have been stored in capsules. Why? We have to preserve the bodies of the dead, dying, old and tired because we need to keep using them. It’s too risky to do otherwise. This is a great take!! Your should polish it, give it a more discursive form, tighten up the Trek lore allusions and send it for publication. I bet venues like Gizmodo, Ars Technica or even Vulture will want to publish it. |
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Post by nombrecomun on Mar 25, 2023 18:25:25 GMT
This episode is perfect. Try this thought experiment. I am going to ask you to consider the image or images that come to mind when I type the following. The nineteen fifties. Do you have an image or images in mind in mind? Okay, next. The nineteen sixties. What do you see? Next. The nineteen seventies. Got it? Next. The nineteen eighties. Okay? The nineteen nineties. Were they very distinct? Unmistakable for one another in both big and fine brush strokes. What did you think of? Cars? From bulky and round, to sleek and winged, to blocky, to compact? TV: black and white to colour, of course, serious anthologies giving way to fantasy sit-coms, then espionage shows to gritty cop shows, to game changers like Seinfeld. Fashion: men with hats to no men with hats, women’s skirts going up, then down again, suits to flairs to pastels, no to mention people’s hair. No try the same thing for the previous two decades. The 2000s Now the 2010s. What did you see? Did you have to think a little harder? Did you have to hone in on detail? The devices? Particular movies or TV shows? Sure, there was the rise of streaming and some of the outstanding shows to be found there. Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, Games of Thrones. But what about the look? The feel? The difference between the 50s and 60s is so much starker that that of the 2000s to 2010s. Hence Picard: The Bounty. I don’t know how many times I’ve reflected on the concept of “cultural stagnation” after seeing a YouTube video on that subject a while back. We seem to have gone from bold strokes to, fearful minor tweaks. Major financial investment in movies rarely happens without reaching back into the safe past with its history of profit. What are the creations that have started in the past few years that will be fondly revisited and expanded upon in fifty? The 1960s Star Trek was a bold adventure trying to be innovative, at least to the extent allowed by the broadcast restrictions of the time. Picard: The Bounty was a call-back museum because because Star Trek doesn’t know how to be anything else any more. This is despite, in theory, a landscape where you’re allowed to show and do virtually anything. Allowed by the broadcast laws. By the corporate overlords, not so much. It’s not Star Trek’s fault. There are four or five giant corporate organisms controlling 90% of everything, at least in the cultural west. You can do a cheap out-there production, but when there’s serious money involved, you’ve gotta have some guarantees. Nostalgia, member-berries, tropes and so on. For all the talk and sometimes complaints by grumpy YouTubers about the detrimental ascendency of “diversity,” the one place where it is the most lacking and the most missed is in creativity - stories and ideas. I miss watching the 1960s Star Trek in the 1970s as a kid and having one of its ideas blow my mind. Duplicate Earths, parallel universes, time paradoxes, a twentieth-century Roman Empire. The new(er) Battlestar Galactica did that too in my 30s, and in a different way Better Call Saul did that a couple of months ago - Howard Hamlin’s last scenes and how I felt about his character’s fate. But Galactica is now a couple of decades back (which is hard to believe) and BCS was a magnificent but relatively modest production. Picard: The Bounty did something like that too (spoilers): someone rebuilt the Genesis Device (*aside - if they did that, they’re so idiotic that maybe Starfleet or whoever deserves everything that happens to them), Kirk’s body, 1701-A etc. I felt a little excited, you know? The member-berries released their endorphins. But almost at once I felt I was being drawn to the Dark Side. It wasn’t the same, just a cheap imitation, old synthahol that had been kept on a shelf too long. Then along comes the USS New Jersey which shorted out all the wiring in my OCD system: so, we’re NOT meant to see the SNW Enterprise is THE Enterprise? It WILL get a refit to look like the TOS ship? Which it already looked like when Pike visited Talos IV? So Picard: The Bounty was perfect. A perfect encapsulation of everything that our culture has become, as Picard and Kirk have been stored in capsules. Why? We have to preserve the bodies of the dead, dying, old and tired because we need to keep using them. It’s too risky to do otherwise. Well said and I generally agree. I think this speaks for many of us in our 40's, 50's, and beyond BUT, and here's the pushback, talk to anyone under 30 and to them the decades that you mention are mushy as well. They can't distinguish them as we can. It's too far in the past for them. They don't necessarily consume that media to be familiar with what that age looked like. In contrast they can tell you differences the 2000's, '10's, and so far 20's because it's their youth. We don't see certain advances but they see others. What I mean to say is that after a couple of decades of existence it is normal for these more recent decades to blur and be undistinguishable but not for anyone living the moment if that makes sense. I'm on a couple of Star Trek pages on FB and I'm constantly surprised of how many Star Trek fans have never seen TNG, DS9, etc...Some say it's too antiquated, outdated, etc... I can't imagine what they think of TOS and other such shows. |
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Post by scenario on Mar 25, 2023 19:28:10 GMT
I watch Picard like I used to watch lower decks. Looking at the pieces not the whole. Like with lower decks, if you're on a ship with deck to deck transport and an almost magical sick bay, why use protection while practicing hand to hand combat? Anything short of decapitation or vaporization can be cured in sickbay pretty quickly.
I liked the scene where 7 was looking at the old ships. I disliked the scene with Picard and his son. Seven's scene felt earned. Picard's didn't. I liked Geordie's relationship with his daughters. Geordie was always written as a person with poor social skills and more that a bit sexist. It makes sense to me that he'd be overprotective with his daughters and not really listen to them. It fits the character. It was just done so poorly.
I don't remember most of it. It was annoying with a few mildly interesting scenes.
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Post by Sehlat Vie on Mar 26, 2023 13:10:34 GMT
I couldn't find Engadget's comments, but that is a good article. A straight-up POV that is largely disagreed with in the comments. ... I'm still reeling from the idea that Starfleet would put James T Kirk's body in a vault and that there were TOS-style "life signs" sound FX emanating from it. Or that there's suddenly a second Genesis device because... well, because it's "cool." Don't shoot me, folks... there were bits I enjoyed. Again. Scenes. Disjointed moments, like the thrill of pleasure I got when Geordi saw Data. Or SuperPsychoData or whatever he is now. That was nice, tickling my deep nostalgia biology. I always really liked these two characters and their friendship so, yeah, that's gonna get me. I even liked Sidney's disagreement with her father, for the moment of heightened soap it provided. (Because nothin' here is drama.) I liked seeing the LaForge family together. I liked Seven zooming in on Voyager because NOSTALGIA and I certainly got the feels for the 1701-A. But this whole teleplay is reliant on such tricks. This is bad fanfic. No insult intended to writers of fanfic - I've read better out there than this hogwash. I agree completely with GarakNephew's assessment of callbacks and how they can work. Disengaged from meaning within a story, such devices become carnival pieces, attention-seeking devices that cause in the viewer a brief glow of pleasurable nostalgia. Cheap thrills. I actually like the idea of Geordi being the curator of a space museum in his later life. But why is Quo'nos I there? How? Why a Romulan Bird of Prey? Are these trophies? Are the governments of those star empires aware of their inclusion in a Starfleet museum? It's a bit like if the National Air and Space Museum put the Buran on display right now. (I discounted the idea of 'The Bounty' beforehand ever referring to the BoP from the movies. I didn't think anyone would go there. More fool me.) Nostalgia clearly sells. You don't even really need stories to make much sense anymore. All of the fan service made me feel as if I'd just eaten a dinner composed entirely of sugar cubes. |
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Post by Sehlat Vie on Mar 26, 2023 13:13:27 GMT
Why didn't they take the Defiant's cloaking device instead of one from a ship that's about 150 years old? (Why am I doing this to myself?) Your pain runs deep... (hehe). I half-expected one of those vaults to read "God, from the Center of the Galaxy."  |
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Post by Sehlat Vie on Mar 26, 2023 13:16:24 GMT
This episode is perfect. Try this thought experiment. I am going to ask you to consider the image or images that come to mind when I type the following. The nineteen fifties. Do you have an image or images in mind in mind? Okay, next. The nineteen sixties. What do you see? Next. The nineteen seventies. Got it? Next. The nineteen eighties. Okay? The nineteen nineties. Were they very distinct? Unmistakable for one another in both big and fine brush strokes. What did you think of? Cars? From bulky and round, to sleek and winged, to blocky, to compact? TV: black and white to colour, of course, serious anthologies giving way to fantasy sit-coms, then espionage shows to gritty cop shows, to game changers like Seinfeld. Fashion: men with hats to no men with hats, women’s skirts going up, then down again, suits to flairs to pastels, no to mention people’s hair. No try the same thing for the previous two decades. The 2000s Now the 2010s. What did you see? Did you have to think a little harder? Did you have to hone in on detail? The devices? Particular movies or TV shows? Sure, there was the rise of streaming and some of the outstanding shows to be found there. Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, Games of Thrones. But what about the look? The feel? The difference between the 50s and 60s is so much starker that that of the 2000s to 2010s. Hence Picard: The Bounty. I don’t know how many times I’ve reflected on the concept of “cultural stagnation” after seeing a YouTube video on that subject a while back. We seem to have gone from bold strokes to, fearful minor tweaks. Major financial investment in movies rarely happens without reaching back into the safe past with its history of profit. What are the creations that have started in the past few years that will be fondly revisited and expanded upon in fifty? The 1960s Star Trek was a bold adventure trying to be innovative, at least to the extent allowed by the broadcast restrictions of the time. Picard: The Bounty was a call-back museum because because Star Trek doesn’t know how to be anything else any more. This is despite, in theory, a landscape where you’re allowed to show and do virtually anything. Allowed by the broadcast laws. By the corporate overlords, not so much. It’s not Star Trek’s fault. There are four or five giant corporate organisms controlling 90% of everything, at least in the cultural west. You can do a cheap out-there production, but when there’s serious money involved, you’ve gotta have some guarantees. Nostalgia, member-berries, tropes and so on. For all the talk and sometimes complaints by grumpy YouTubers about the detrimental ascendency of “diversity,” the one place where it is the most lacking and the most missed is in creativity - stories and ideas. I miss watching the 1960s Star Trek in the 1970s as a kid and having one of its ideas blow my mind. Duplicate Earths, parallel universes, time paradoxes, a twentieth-century Roman Empire. The new(er) Battlestar Galactica did that too in my 30s, and in a different way Better Call Saul did that a couple of months ago - Howard Hamlin’s last scenes and how I felt about his character’s fate. But Galactica is now a couple of decades back (which is hard to believe) and BCS was a magnificent but relatively modest production. Picard: The Bounty did something like that too (spoilers): someone rebuilt the Genesis Device (*aside - if they did that, they’re so idiotic that maybe Starfleet or whoever deserves everything that happens to them), Kirk’s body, 1701-A etc. I felt a little excited, you know? The member-berries released their endorphins. But almost at once I felt I was being drawn to the Dark Side. It wasn’t the same, just a cheap imitation, old synthahol that had been kept on a shelf too long. Then along comes the USS New Jersey which shorted out all the wiring in my OCD system: so, we’re NOT meant to see the SNW Enterprise is THE Enterprise? It WILL get a refit to look like the TOS ship? Which it already looked like when Pike visited Talos IV? So Picard: The Bounty was perfect. A perfect encapsulation of everything that our culture has become, as Picard and Kirk have been stored in capsules. Why? We have to preserve the bodies of the dead, dying, old and tired because we need to keep using them. It’s too risky to do otherwise. ^^ This.  |
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Post by Yorick on Mar 26, 2023 18:38:30 GMT
This episode is perfect. Try this thought experiment. I am going to ask you to consider the image or images that come to mind when I type the following. The nineteen fifties. Do you have an image or images in mind in mind? Okay, next. The nineteen sixties. What do you see? Next. The nineteen seventies. Got it? Next. The nineteen eighties. Okay? The nineteen nineties. Were they very distinct? Unmistakable for one another in both big and fine brush strokes. What did you think of? Cars? From bulky and round, to sleek and winged, to blocky, to compact? TV: black and white to colour, of course, serious anthologies giving way to fantasy sit-coms, then espionage shows to gritty cop shows, to game changers like Seinfeld. Fashion: men with hats to no men with hats, women’s skirts going up, then down again, suits to flairs to pastels, no to mention people’s hair. No try the same thing for the previous two decades. The 2000s Now the 2010s. What did you see? Did you have to think a little harder? Did you have to hone in on detail? The devices? Particular movies or TV shows? Sure, there was the rise of streaming and some of the outstanding shows to be found there. Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, Games of Thrones. But what about the look? The feel? The difference between the 50s and 60s is so much starker that that of the 2000s to 2010s. Hence Picard: The Bounty. I don’t know how many times I’ve reflected on the concept of “cultural stagnation” after seeing a YouTube video on that subject a while back. We seem to have gone from bold strokes to, fearful minor tweaks. Major financial investment in movies rarely happens without reaching back into the safe past with its history of profit. What are the creations that have started in the past few years that will be fondly revisited and expanded upon in fifty? The 1960s Star Trek was a bold adventure trying to be innovative, at least to the extent allowed by the broadcast restrictions of the time. Picard: The Bounty was a call-back museum because because Star Trek doesn’t know how to be anything else any more. This is despite, in theory, a landscape where you’re allowed to show and do virtually anything. Allowed by the broadcast laws. By the corporate overlords, not so much. It’s not Star Trek’s fault. There are four or five giant corporate organisms controlling 90% of everything, at least in the cultural west. You can do a cheap out-there production, but when there’s serious money involved, you’ve gotta have some guarantees. Nostalgia, member-berries, tropes and so on. For all the talk and sometimes complaints by grumpy YouTubers about the detrimental ascendency of “diversity,” the one place where it is the most lacking and the most missed is in creativity - stories and ideas. I miss watching the 1960s Star Trek in the 1970s as a kid and having one of its ideas blow my mind. Duplicate Earths, parallel universes, time paradoxes, a twentieth-century Roman Empire. The new(er) Battlestar Galactica did that too in my 30s, and in a different way Better Call Saul did that a couple of months ago - Howard Hamlin’s last scenes and how I felt about his character’s fate. But Galactica is now a couple of decades back (which is hard to believe) and BCS was a magnificent but relatively modest production. Picard: The Bounty did something like that too (spoilers): someone rebuilt the Genesis Device (*aside - if they did that, they’re so idiotic that maybe Starfleet or whoever deserves everything that happens to them), Kirk’s body, 1701-A etc. I felt a little excited, you know? The member-berries released their endorphins. But almost at once I felt I was being drawn to the Dark Side. It wasn’t the same, just a cheap imitation, old synthahol that had been kept on a shelf too long. Then along comes the USS New Jersey which shorted out all the wiring in my OCD system: so, we’re NOT meant to see the SNW Enterprise is THE Enterprise? It WILL get a refit to look like the TOS ship? Which it already looked like when Pike visited Talos IV? So Picard: The Bounty was perfect. A perfect encapsulation of everything that our culture has become, as Picard and Kirk have been stored in capsules. Why? We have to preserve the bodies of the dead, dying, old and tired because we need to keep using them. It’s too risky to do otherwise. Well said and I generally agree. I think this speaks for many of us in our 40's, 50's, and beyond BUT, and here's the pushback, talk to anyone under 30 and to them the decades that you mention are mushy as well. They can't distinguish them as we can. It's too far in the past for them. They don't necessarily consume that media to be familiar with what that age looked like. In contrast they can tell you differences the 2000's, '10's, and so far 20's because it's their youth. We don't see certain advances but they see others. What I mean to say is that after a couple of decades of existence it is normal for these more recent decades to blur and be undistinguishable but not for anyone living the moment if that makes sense. I'm on a couple of Star Trek pages on FB and I'm constantly surprised of how many Star Trek fans have never seen TNG, DS9, etc...Some say it's too antiquated, outdated, etc... I can't imagine what they think of TOS and other such shows. Great point. The means by which we were exposed to those times has changed so much that the ability to discern them is dulled. Back in the day we were presented with images of the past via old TV - The Adventures of Superman, Warner Bros. Cartoons, etc - now there is so much choice, and it’s much more difficult to learn the language of watching older product. We grew up bi-lingual on Abbott & Costello and Laurel & Hardly movies, could “understand” B&W and they way people spoke in films back then, different pacing etc. I speak from experience when I say it’s necessary to teach this to someone monolingual young people. I have taught HG Wells and have to set up a detailed cultural context before screening the George Pal movies. Yet, well worth it and suddenly the appreciation is there. But it does have to be taught rather than being acquired naturally. This, I guess, is part of the insight in why we have the cultural stagnation. The younger audience ne doesn’t see that that’s what it is, whereas the creators - who would certainly be old enough and aware enough to have the perception I outlined - are as I described. In it for the bucks. I remain fascinated that I can talk about media culture from my childhood with my students - Star Trek, Star Wars, Dr Who, Spider-Man, Superman - and have them fully relate. When I was a kid, a teacher of roughly the same age as me now would be reaching back to the early 1920s. I might have recognised Tarzan, Sherlock Holmes or the Wizard of Oz if he’d talked about them, but only as artefacts. All those childhood markers mentioned above for me are relentlessly ongoing franchises, hence the feeling that we’ve veered off the main road into the FROM loop seeing that same decaying down again and again. Thanks for all the positive comments, folks. 🙏 |
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Post by Garak Nephew on Mar 29, 2023 0:57:41 GMT
I am just baffled at how much people (trekkers all around) are drooling on Twitter over this episode. I have no reason to doubt the intellectual acuity of these strangers but I can't denied the evidence presented to my eyes: I rewatched it and I still believed it is not a good one. Could it be that I am just "out of touch" with what is going on in TV and how things are "done" today? I don't think so, a story is a story and there are many ways to tell one but I am a man of certain age and certain tastes and proclivities and I think I am able to gather HOW a story is being told and if that form is satisfying. This episode is not. The main organizing principle of "Bounty" is nostalgia, that's it. Recognizable objects are scattered throughout the tale to make the trekker soul go "ahhh", "ohhh", all of it to keep the mystery hanging and your eyeballs hook (trekkers eyeballs). The merits of the story as a self-contained entity are not there. If this is a TNG callback or homage, why not callback to the FORM of many of TNG stories? The morality tale, for example? [Thought experiment: Keep in your mind a classic TNG episode "The Measure of Man": An ethical dilemma:: Strong positions are taken.
"Picard" Stand alone episode: Take one of the nostalgic objects from "Bounty": The Genesis Device II, presented there with no context at all, other than a sort of Section 31 trophy. Imagine the possibility of an objection from one of the character, presented somewhat phrased like "this weapon of mass destruction should not be allow to continue existing." You would still have the object but you would spin a conflict around it. Groups would form, some would be for its destruction (my position), others would argue that Starfleet should keep it
for leverage, or strategic, or scientific reasons. At the end some shadow operative would steal the specs to hide them on the Mirror Universe... My point is TNG was really great at creating
dilemmas, situations that stay in your head. To this day "The Measure of Man" remains an acute commentary on the nature of selfhood and sentience. While "Bounty" is a commentary... on... what?... Trek? On how to devour your own entrails?]
I'll say this. On second watching Seven scene about Voyager resonated more, it feels authentic, we know what she is talking about when she said "I was reborn there". But, again, it is so isolated that it ends up on the same level as those object floating on the vacuum on Daystrom, a nostalgic trope... Ed Speeler acting is really sharp, it have some ironic bite, and his flirtatious take on Sidney is playful and smart... And not much more to say.
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Post by RobinBland on Mar 29, 2023 18:50:34 GMT
I am just baffled at how much people (trekkers all around) are drooling on Twitter over this episode. I have no reason to doubt the intellectual acuity of these strangers but I can't denied the evidence presented to my eyes: I rewatched it and I still believed it is not a good one. Could it be that I am just "out of touch" with what is going on in TV and how things are "done" today? I don't think so, a story is a story and there are many ways to tell one but I am a man of certain age and certain tastes and proclivities and I think I am able to gather HOW a story is being told and if that form is satisfying. This episode is not. The main organizing principle of "Bounty" is nostalgia, that's it. Recognizable objects are scattered throughout the tale to make the trekker soul go "ahhh", "ohhh", all of it to keep the mystery hanging and your eyeballs hook (trekkers eyeballs). The merits of the story as a self-contained entity are not there. If this is a TNG callback or homage, why not callback to the FORM of many of TNG stories? The morality tale, for example? [Thought experiment: Keep in your mind a classic TNG episode "The Measure of Man": An ethical dilemma:: Strong positions are taken.
"Picard" Stand alone episode: Take one of the nostalgic objects from "Bounty": The Genesis Device II, presented there with no context at all, other than a sort of Section 31 trophy. Imagine the possibility of an objection from one of the character, presented somewhat phrased like "this weapon of mass destruction should not be allow to continue existing." You would still have the object but you would spin a conflict around it. Groups would form, some would be for its destruction (my position), others would argue that Starfleet should keep it
for leverage, or strategic, or scientific reasons. At the end some shadow operative would steal the specs to hide them on the Mirror Universe... My point is TNG was really great at creating
dilemmas, situations that stay in your head. To this day "The Measure of Man" remains an acute commentary on the nature of selfhood and sentience. While "Bounty" is a commentary... on... what?... Trek? On how to devour your own entrails?]
I'll say this. On second watching Seven scene about Voyager resonated more, it feels authentic, we know what she is talking about when she said "I was reborn there". But, again, it is so isolated that it ends up on the same level as those object floating on the vacuum on Daystrom, a nostalgic trope... Ed Speeler acting is really sharp, it have some ironic bite, and his flirtatious take on Sidney is playful and smart... And not much more to say.
If it helps, I feel the same way. I simply don't understand how most Trekmedia and much of social media fandom is saying this is "good" when it's objectively not. There's nothing original here and it's mediocre at absolute best. Especially when held to Star Trek's previous standards, in all the ways you detail. It's full of good actors, and good acting, production values and all the rest. But it's poor storytelling. Maybe we're just out of step with the times and this what people want now. "Cultural stagnation," as Yorick named it. I dunno, maybe there are just more philistines now? More people prepared to accept mediocrity and nostalgia as a norm, but it feels okay because everyone says it is. Steve Bannon, when desiring to obscure truths during the Donald Trump presidency coined that term, "flooding the zone with shit," and as much as I hate to quote such living excrement, I think he nailed something. It speaks to a phenomenon of the age of the Internet and social media. There is now so much "content" out there it's difficult to celebrate anything with higher principles which might require a bit of thought to fully appreciate and understand. All that matters is if it's "popular." Then everyone can belong to the fandom and feel safe about it. Morality plays are out, because they require an internal ethical barometer; to actually know one's own attitudes to things or at least have a stance. No-one wants to think about that sort of thing anymore unless their local herd on the Internet acknowledges it. There's no nuance, because no-one has the time for it. We're all too busy attempting to find the next hit while monitoring all our shows and feeds, and quality, such as it is, earned depth and resonance - none of these things matter any longer. We're turning into the perfect consumerist Eloi and if the Morlocks say it's good, then we eat it up. |
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Post by Prometheus59650 on Mar 29, 2023 19:06:17 GMT
I am just baffled at how much people (trekkers all around) are drooling on Twitter over this episode. I have no reason to doubt the intellectual acuity of these strangers but I can't denied the evidence presented to my eyes: I rewatched it and I still believed it is not a good one. Could it be that I am just "out of touch" with what is going on in TV and how things are "done" today? I don't think so, a story is a story and there are many ways to tell one but I am a man of certain age and certain tastes and proclivities and I think I am able to gather HOW a story is being told and if that form is satisfying. This episode is not. The main organizing principle of "Bounty" is nostalgia, that's it. Recognizable objects are scattered throughout the tale to make the trekker soul go "ahhh", "ohhh", all of it to keep the mystery hanging and your eyeballs hook (trekkers eyeballs). The merits of the story as a self-contained entity are not there. If this is a TNG callback or homage, why not callback to the FORM of many of TNG stories? The morality tale, for example? [Thought experiment: Keep in your mind a classic TNG episode "The Measure of Man": An ethical dilemma:: Strong positions are taken.
"Picard" Stand alone episode: Take one of the nostalgic objects from "Bounty": The Genesis Device II, presented there with no context at all, other than a sort of Section 31 trophy. Imagine the possibility of an objection from one of the character, presented somewhat phrased like "this weapon of mass destruction should not be allow to continue existing." You would still have the object but you would spin a conflict around it. Groups would form, some would be for its destruction (my position), others would argue that Starfleet should keep it
for leverage, or strategic, or scientific reasons. At the end some shadow operative would steal the specs to hide them on the Mirror Universe... My point is TNG was really great at creating
dilemmas, situations that stay in your head. To this day "The Measure of Man" remains an acute commentary on the nature of selfhood and sentience. While "Bounty" is a commentary... on... what?... Trek? On how to devour your own entrails?] I'll say this. On second watching Seven scene about Voyager resonated more, it feels authentic, we know what she is talking about when she said "I was reborn there". But, again, it is so isolated that it ends up on the same level as those object floating on the vacuum on Daystrom, a nostalgic trope... Ed Speeler acting is really sharp, it have some ironic bite, and his flirtatious take on Sidney is playful and smart... And not much more to say.
If it helps, I feel the same way. I simply don't understand how most Trekmedia and much of social media fandom is saying this is "good" when it's objectively not. There's nothing original here and it's mediocre at absolute best. Especially when held to Star Trek's previous standards, in all the ways you detail. It's full of good actors, and good acting, production values and all the rest. But it's poor storytelling. Maybe we're just out of step with the times and this what people want now. "Cultural stagnation," as Yorick named it. I dunno, maybe there are just more philistines now? More people prepared to accept mediocrity and nostalgia as a norm, but it feels okay because everyone says it is. Steve Bannon, when desiring to obscure truths during the Donald Trump presidency coined that term, "flooding the zone with shit," and as much as I hate to quote such living excrement, I think he nailed something. It speaks to a phenomenon of the age of the Internet and social media. There is now so much "content" out there it's difficult to celebrate anything with higher principles which might require a bit of thought to fully appreciate and understand. All that matters is if it's "popular." Then everyone can belong to the fandom and feel safe about it. Morality plays are out, because they require an internal ethical barometer; to actually know one's own attitudes to things or at least have a stance. No-one wants to think about that sort of thing anymore unless their local herd on the Internet acknowledges it. There's no nuance, because no-one has the time for it. We're all too busy attempting to find the next hit while monitoring all our shows and feeds, and quality, such as it is, earned depth and resonance - none of these things matter any longer. We're turning into the perfect consumerist Eloi and if the Morlocks say it's good, then we eat it up. Nuance requires thought and, for the most part, people aren't seeming to want that. They want straightforward heroes and villains and explosions, and fights and all that. In a world of 10-second clips and 280 characters and news snippets and bobbleheads, that's all there's room for. All I can really say about this generation of Star Trek with any certainty is that it couldn't produce "The Visitor" or "The Inner Light." And it doesn't want to. |
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Post by nombrecomun on Mar 29, 2023 21:11:52 GMT
Nuance requires thought and, for the most part, people aren't seeming to want that. They want straightforward heroes and villains and explosions, and fights and all that. In a world of 10-second clips and 280 characters and news snippets and bobbleheads, that's all there's room for. All I can really say about this generation of Star Trek with any certainty is that it couldn't produce "The Visitor" or "The Inner Light." And it doesn't want to. Those types of episodes would be amazingly boring to younger generation of viewers. Whatever Star Trek is to become, it has to appeal to younger people and this is what we get if businesses want to continue to make money. I keep forgetting this is a younger generation that grew up on shows like Smallville, and generally the WB DC type of shows that weren't really about the scifi/fantasy elements but more of a teen soap opera disguised as scifi. This is simply the next step to those. And it's not just under 30. I have friends in their 40's that just are happy to get any content. All content is good content. |
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Post by scenario on Mar 30, 2023 1:14:50 GMT
I think entertainment is cyclical. I grew up in the 60's and 70's where people were questioning society. This is more like movies in the 1930's and 40's. Cowboy movies. Good guys wear white hats and bad guys wear black hats. The same dozen plots recycled over and over. People didn't want to think. They want to be entertained by familiar things.
The 30's were the depression and the 40s were a world war. The 50s were a time of change under the surface which started to be reflected in movies.
The 2020s are a time of great change. Culture is fragmenting. Its difficult to do satire because many people just wouldn't get it. You can't do a morality tale because there is no one morality. People want shows to escape from reality not confront it. They want comfort food. They don't want politics but with no one morality everything is politics so its tough to write a real plot that makes any kind of point at all.
So they made a clear black hat villain (no motivation needed. Motivation looks like politics which must be avoided at all cost.) Not much of a plot, just wallow in nice comfortable nostalgia.
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Post by nombrecomun on Mar 30, 2023 2:49:31 GMT
I think entertainment is cyclical. I grew up in the 60's and 70's where people were questioning society. This is more like movies in the 1930's and 40's. Cowboy movies. Good guys wear white hats and bad guys wear black hats. The same dozen plots recycled over and over. People didn't want to think. They want to be entertained by familiar things. The 30's were the depression and the 40s were a world war. The 50s were a time of change under the surface which started to be reflected in movies. The 2020s are a time of great change. Culture is fragmenting. Its difficult to do satire because many people just wouldn't get it. You can't do a morality tale because there is no one morality. People want shows to escape from reality not confront it. They want comfort food. They don't want politics but with no one morality everything is politics so its tough to write a real plot that makes any kind of point at all. So they made a clear black hat villain (no motivation needed. Motivation looks like politics which must be avoided at all cost.) Not much of a plot, just wallow in nice comfortable nostalgia. You know....that makes total sense from the perspective of younger people(maybe they were in under 10 or just about) when 9/11 happened. The result is now very light entertainment, stuff to take your mind off from heavy stuff. |
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Post by Yorick on Mar 30, 2023 8:41:48 GMT
I think entertainment is cyclical. I grew up in the 60's and 70's where people were questioning society. This is more like movies in the 1930's and 40's. Cowboy movies. Good guys wear white hats and bad guys wear black hats. The same dozen plots recycled over and over. People didn't want to think. They want to be entertained by familiar things. The 30's were the depression and the 40s were a world war. The 50s were a time of change under the surface which started to be reflected in movies. The 2020s are a time of great change. Culture is fragmenting. Its difficult to do satire because many people just wouldn't get it. You can't do a morality tale because there is no one morality. People want shows to escape from reality not confront it. They want comfort food. They don't want politics but with no one morality everything is politics so its tough to write a real plot that makes any kind of point at all. So they made a clear black hat villain (no motivation needed. Motivation looks like politics which must be avoided at all cost.) Not much of a plot, just wallow in nice comfortable nostalgia. “All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again.” Looking forward to coming out of this long tunnel someday then. Hope I’m still around when the light starts to filter through again. |
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Post by Sehlat Vie on Mar 30, 2023 13:01:35 GMT
If it helps, I feel the same way. I simply don't understand how most Trekmedia and much of social media fandom is saying this is "good" when it's objectively not. There's nothing original here and it's mediocre at absolute best. Especially when held to Star Trek's previous standards, in all the ways you detail. It's full of good actors, and good acting, production values and all the rest. But it's poor storytelling. Maybe we're just out of step with the times and this what people want now. "Cultural stagnation," as Yorick named it. I dunno, maybe there are just more philistines now? More people prepared to accept mediocrity and nostalgia as a norm, but it feels okay because everyone says it is. Steve Bannon, when desiring to obscure truths during the Donald Trump presidency coined that term, "flooding the zone with shit," and as much as I hate to quote such living excrement, I think he nailed something. It speaks to a phenomenon of the age of the Internet and social media. There is now so much "content" out there it's difficult to celebrate anything with higher principles which might require a bit of thought to fully appreciate and understand. All that matters is if it's "popular." Then everyone can belong to the fandom and feel safe about it. Morality plays are out, because they require an internal ethical barometer; to actually know one's own attitudes to things or at least have a stance. No-one wants to think about that sort of thing anymore unless their local herd on the Internet acknowledges it. There's no nuance, because no-one has the time for it. We're all too busy attempting to find the next hit while monitoring all our shows and feeds, and quality, such as it is, earned depth and resonance - none of these things matter any longer. We're turning into the perfect consumerist Eloi and if the Morlocks say it's good, then we eat it up. Nuance requires thought and, for the most part, people aren't seeming to want that. They want straightforward heroes and villains and explosions, and fights and all that. In a world of 10-second clips and 280 characters and news snippets and bobbleheads, that's all there's room for. All I can really say about this generation of Star Trek with any certainty is that it couldn't produce "The Visitor" or "The Inner Light." And it doesn't want to. I wish I could disagree with you and Robin, but I can't, since you're both absolutely right on this. We're living in a media age where heaps of references and nostalgia porn smashed together now seem to count as stories. We have audiences that measure entertainment in TikToks; if it's not digestible in a few minutes or less, it's a bore. This is a problem Mrs. Vie faces when she tries to show animated movies in her art class. Within a few minutes, her kids are on their phones. Star Trek fans today seem to need constant streams of Easter eggs and references to keep them watching; it's become a game of "Where's Waldo?" No one seems to have the patience for original, quality content anymore--just serve them quickly reheated leftovers of what they enjoyed 20-30 years ago, and you're good. |
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Post by Prometheus59650 on Mar 30, 2023 17:28:24 GMT
Nuance requires thought and, for the most part, people aren't seeming to want that. They want straightforward heroes and villains and explosions, and fights and all that. In a world of 10-second clips and 280 characters and news snippets and bobbleheads, that's all there's room for. All I can really say about this generation of Star Trek with any certainty is that it couldn't produce "The Visitor" or "The Inner Light." And it doesn't want to. I wish I could disagree with you and Robin, but I can't, since you're both absolutely right on this. We're living in a media age where heaps of references and nostalgia porn smashed together now seem to count as stories. We have audiences that measure entertainment in TikToks; if it's not digestible in a few minutes or less, it's a bore. This is a problem Mrs. Vie faces when she tries to show animated movies in her art class. Within a few minutes, her kids are on their phones. Star Trek fans today seem to need constant streams of Easter eggs and references to keep them watching; it's become a game of "Where's Waldo?" No one seems to have the patience for original, quality content anymore--just serve them quickly reheated leftovers of what they enjoyed 20-30 years ago, and you're good. You know, with thought, this is ultimately why we noted things like Ariam. Or, like, as I noted last season of DSC, when Tilly said goodbye to Georgiou, the latter looked a little uncomfortable and more than a little sad that she'd not be seeing Tilly again. Lots of people watched that and "Awww, she cares. She's gonna miss Tilly." Or Ariam really only shows up as a person for one hour before she dies and we see the crew heartbroken over her loss. While we lament not seeing snippets over seasons with Ariam bonding with various crew, or watching how and why the Empress ends up being in a place where Tilly goes from the equivalent of a puppy that she has no use for besides something to torment relatively benignly to someone that she sees value in, cares for, and will miss, for at least a generation of viewers, they don't need any of that. It's enough that they see Georgiou care for six seconds. It's enough that the whole crew mourns Ariam for two minutes. That's moving. That's great. That's satisfying. That's why Lower Decks works. "Hahahahahaha, they know what a Mugato is." "Oh, man. they really GET that Scotty likes green booze." That's enough. That makes it funny and worth watching. It's not about building anything anymore, it's the TNG ep "The Game" writ large. It's just a bunch of dopamine hits strung together. |
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Post by Garak Nephew on Mar 30, 2023 20:17:11 GMT
I see Lower Decks getting trashed and I must take a stand because my brethren are seeing through a glass darkly! ... I am joking but just half-joking. It is no secret that I really enjoy LD, it is smart and funny and, it is true, ultra meta, but I am not going to beat that bush now because I already know it gets zero appreciation here. (I think that from Omega Sector only Mutai showed it some love from time to time, but he didn't made the transition so I am utterly alone as LD fan). I just want to point out that, in my opinion, "Bounty" is so bad (among many other reasons) because it is off-key: it is a comedy script that fails miserably at being drama. On LD it would have being brilliant! |
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Post by Garak Nephew on Mar 30, 2023 20:39:41 GMT
Nuance requires thought and, for the most part, people aren't seeming to want that. They want straightforward heroes and villains and explosions, and fights and all that. In a world of 10-second clips and 280 characters and news snippets and bobbleheads, that's all there's room for. All I can really say about this generation of Star Trek with any certainty is that it couldn't produce "The Visitor" or "The Inner Light." And it doesn't want to. Those types of episodes would be amazingly boring to younger generation of viewers. Whatever Star Trek is to become, it has to appeal to younger people and this is what we get if businesses want to continue to make money. I keep forgetting this is a younger generation that grew up on shows like Smallville, and generally the WB DC type of shows that weren't really about the scifi/fantasy elements but more of a teen soap opera disguised as scifi. This is simply the next step to those. And it's not just under 30. I have friends in their 40's that just are happy to get any content. All content is good content. Nah, I don't believe that. I bet that if you transplant "The Inner Light" script to a new, modern setting it would blew everybody's minds, young and old. The exact script to the letter on a shinny new series, sleek, with some budget, good young actors with recognizable faces, it would shine. Younger folks are not dumb, they are just being fed subpar content because what matter now it quantity not quality. |
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Post by Prometheus59650 on Mar 30, 2023 20:45:37 GMT
Those types of episodes would be amazingly boring to younger generation of viewers. Whatever Star Trek is to become, it has to appeal to younger people and this is what we get if businesses want to continue to make money. I keep forgetting this is a younger generation that grew up on shows like Smallville, and generally the WB DC type of shows that weren't really about the scifi/fantasy elements but more of a teen soap opera disguised as scifi. This is simply the next step to those. And it's not just under 30. I have friends in their 40's that just are happy to get any content. All content is good content. Nah, I don't believe that. I bet that if you transplant "The Inner Light" script to a new, modern setting it would blew everybody's minds, young and old. The exact script to the letter on a shinny new series, sleek, with some budget, good young actors with recognizable faces, it would shine. Younger folks are not dumb, they are just being fed subpar content because what matter now it quantity not quality. I don't think so. I think, in 2023, it would come off as plodding and dumb. But I suspect you just have more faith in humanity than I do.  |
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I am so sorry...
Jul 14, 2024 1:18:27 GMT