Having watched a full season of Picard, a couple of seasons of Disvoery, a couple of episodes of Strange New Worlds and various clips from the animated series I find this article to ring true:

https://redshirtsalwaysdie.com/2022...es-discovery-through-strange-new-worlds/

One comment I've read/heard from several friends is that "The Orville" is more true to Star Trek than any of the currently running Star Trek shows. LOL

Star Trek Prodigy? How did i not know of this expansion? Oh no, another Kurtzman piece of work.
Oh gawd, I am growing old and not longer able to recognize current hot shows or music (what is this k-pop you speak of? )

IMHO, put away that hangin' rope and torches. STD was total s**t. Picard was even worse because they were able rope in Patrick Stewart as our beloved Picard. Brave New Worlds has potential (as did STD and Picard) but appears to be in decline thanks to the awful showrunners and plots.

As PM (PM = PanzerMeyer for the uninformed!) says above The Orville is where it is at.

Fine, I am off to watch and enjoy The Orville. Go check it out. A good show worth watching IMHO.

Ah Orville.... I'm afraid it has lost its way too. I've reviewed the first 2 episodes of season 3 here already: https://SimHQ.com/forum/ubbthreads....scovery-ill-be-watching-this#Post4600950


The remainder of the season is up and down, I found none of the episodes to be exceptionally good and there were several more stinkers (Two Topas / Dolly Parton)

My biggest issues are: the thinly veiled woke agenda, the sophomoric humor, the constant 20th century pop culture reference silliness, the fact that I don't buy McFarland... no, scratch that, I don't buy ANY of the characters as professional authority figures in the vein of Kirk, Picard, Riker, McCoy, Spock or even O'Brien/Sulu/Chekov... they're all goofballs to one degree or another. And the insistence of slipping in 2-4 "G-D" profanities into every episode is for me the last straw. We've come a long way, in the wrong direction, from Kirks dramatic and effective "Let's get the hell out of here" to the constant cursing for cursing's sake on recent offerings.

My ranking would be:

4: Picard - I only watched a few episodes and nothing at all grabbed me, which is bad for a 'one big continuous plot' show
3: Discovery - it was ok. I'd say it started well but then went downhill once they went to the future. Not bad, but no desire to rewatch it.
2: Lower decks S1 - I haven't watched S2, but S1 was entertaining. This surprised me, as I can't stand Rick & Morty, but the writers seemed to 'get' Star Trek.
1: Strange New Worlds - this finally felt like proper Star Trek. Interesting situations, moral dilemmas, weird random episodes, and not everything is a galaxy ending threat!

I haven't watched prodigy, so can't comment on it.

Edit: I find it amusing that the writer of that article complains about having to sit through a bunch of bad episodes or series to get to the good stuff, when TNG and DS9 are famous for seasons 1+2 being weak.

Very true, but I think the difference is when I was watching those early stinker seasons in TNG and DS9 I found enough there to keep going and looked forward to more. The newer stuff I just cannot stomach. Brave New Worlds might be good, but I loathed the others so much I can't muster the energy or time to give it a try.

The basic premise of TNG / DS9 was enough, along with the occasional early season episode that was good, to keep one interested. I can't say the same for Picard / Discovery. Both are fundamentally flawed.

I pretty much agree with the list, although I can't rate Prodigy and Lower Decks because I feel I'm not the targeted audience (pre-teens). A problem with modern Trek is that imo it is now a full blown franchise marketed at what specific segments have been identified by market research.

Discovery was an attempt to tap into a Game of Thrones like hype, with cruelty, murder, flawed characters and twisted story lines leading nowhere, like the espionage plot, whist trying to unify the Marvel and the Star Trek Universes; hence the time traveling superhero suit. All of this wrapped with episode long space battles and explosions. Consequently, the heroes weren't, they ranged from unlikeable to obnoxious and irredeemable, and storytelling was neglected.

Picard was equally disturbing and dysfunctional. Everything is the fault of Picard. And so far we're to accept that assimilation by the Borg is the greatest thing ever, because now they will assimilate you with caring and loving smile. Wont you, Agnes, you murdering little ......

Strange New Worlds is slightly more palatable in so far as the episodic format precludes long stupid drawn out plotlines, a sense of fun has been restored and the heroes are more relateable and Anson Mount is Stellar. No more impossible redemption arcs like from gum chewing mutineer to saviour of the Universe in three easy steps. But storywise there still are some huge clunkers.

The Orville has not benefited from going to Hulu/Disney. A lot of the time in the expanded time available per episode was wasted by endless recreations of the Star Wars "Bombing run" towards the centre of the Death Star. We know the heroes make it so there is absolutely no excitement watching such zipping left/right/up/down again and again. Put the kettle on and return when the action stops.

There were some good episodes, i.e. Gordon trapped in the 21st century, but the Dolly Parton stuff was a bit cheesy and far worse; so far Hyweena (or Hyeena) was not brought to justice for involving a child in espionage and endangering that child's life.

For what it's worth, I read an interview with Patrick Stewart where he said that the only reason he agreed to doing Picard was because the writers were going to explore new aspects of the character. He wasn't interested in doing the same Picard from TNG and the movies.

Patrick Stewart is a great actor and Picard is (or was) a great character, but Patrick Stewart the person isn't someone whose opinions should be taken seriously.
It kind of explains why 'Picard' sucked.

McGonigle, that was a superb post. I agree with all your points although I haven't seen 'Strange New Worlds' yet. Hopefully it will come to a channel I have access to sometime.

EDIT: I owe Patrick Stewart an apology. My impression over the years was he was a bit pompous in real life but that doesn't seem to be the case.
I'm still annoyed that we didn't the 'Picard' series that I was hoping for though. I thought that while we had 'Discovery' for the action stuff, we might have a got a more 'thoughtful' series with 'Picard' based on an extrapolation of his character 20 years after TNG with archaeological mysteries and diplomatic problems and such.

It's kind of like Danny Trejo only agreeing to do another 'Machete' movie if there's no violence in it.

I grew up on Star Trek. Science fiction was one of the very few things my father and I agreed on so my parents used to let me stay up late to watch the original series.
It took a while for The Next Generation to grow on me but it eventually did.
I generally enjoyed Deep Space 9 and Voyager Though they both had their cringy episodes. I generally liked Enterprise also though I absolutely hated the last episode. I even liked the movies to one extent or another.
The new stuff? I thought Strange New World was pretty good, I found Picard tolerable for the most part, I could not stand Discovery. I tried. I just couldn't do it.

I feel the same, Discovery started out great but the woke-ism just got too much and making Stacy Abrams the President of the Federation was the absolute last straw

I quit season 3 about 2 episodes in.


https://SimHQ.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/4588367/re-st-discovery-season-3#Post4588367

"My first and most lasting impression from this series is that the "Discovery" the Trek universe has made 900+ years hence is that straight white males are an endangered species since they so rarely make an appearance."