The greatest leader of our time (No, not split from the Trump thread - Picard)

[Morkonan]

Wait a sec...

Data is "dead?" "Spore Drive?"

I guess I've been out of the Star Trek loop for awhile. I watched the Nemesis movie... kind of. I guess that's why I missed that bit with Data dying in it? Because the movie was crap and I got tired of paying attention to it? Probably.

Why, exactly, do we need or want a new offering starring the Picard character? What are they going to explore that warrants that level of attention?

Rumors are it's because Stewart wants to work with Tarrantino:

http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/star-trek- ... k-stewart/

..."One of my dreams is to work with Tarantino. I admire his work so much, and to be in a Tarantino film would give me so much satisfaction. So, if he is going to direct something to do with Star Trek and there was the possibility of dear old Jean-Luc showing up again and doing that for Mr Tarantino, I would embrace it," Stewart said in 2017...

Tarrantino's Start Trek: https://www.businessinsider.com/quentin ... ow-2017-12

[Golden_Gonads]

"Spore Drive?"

The Spore Drive uses a galaxy-wide network of mushroom spores to teleport instantaneously around. For such a ludicrous idea, it works fairly well.


... Shrooms man... Shrooms...

[Morkonan]

"Spore Drive?"

The Spore Drive uses a galaxy-wide network of mushroom spores to teleport instantaneously around. For such a ludicrous idea, it works fairly well.


... Shrooms man... Shrooms...

Is that like the Hammerhead Drive?

If so, it sounds much less painful...

[Usenko]

The idea is utterly ridiculous. The effects and scripting sell the ridiculous idea somewhat, on their good days.

[brucewarren]

Meh. amateurs, What you need is sub-meson brain, an atomic vector plotter and a really hot cup of tea.

[pjknibbs]

Meh. amateurs, What you need is sub-meson brain, an atomic vector plotter and a really hot cup of tea.

That only gets you plain old finite improbability, though--you need infinite improbability to make a drive.

[Morkonan]

"Spore Drive?"

The Spore Drive uses a galaxy-wide network of mushroom spores to teleport instantaneously around. For such a ludicrous idea, it works fairly well.

... Shrooms man... Shrooms...

&

The idea is utterly ridiculous. The effects and scripting sell the ridiculous idea somewhat, on their good days.

HOLY @$T@$!

I thought you guys were kidding! Seriously - I had no knowledge of the "Spore Drive" and thought Golden_Gonads description was a "play on words." Then, with Usenko's post, I was prompted to go look it up...

THIS is the best they could come up with?

[pjknibbs]

It's not just the Spore Drive that makes me think Discovery is a third universe separate from the prime timeline and from reboot. There's the whole "Spock has a fully human adopted sister who's never been mentioned before" as well, plus the designs of the ships are not quite TOS style and not quite reboot style.

[Morkonan]

...There's the whole "Spock has a fully human adopted sister who's never been mentioned before" as well...

WAT?

What possible purpose does that serve?

"The Enemy was diminished with the destruction of The One Ring and wandered the wastes as nothing more than a raging spirit.

But now, his brother has come and he's planning to steal all the gold from the Federal Reserve Bank of the United States!"

The Lord of the Rings with a Vengeance in theaters, now!"

^--- This. I hate this. I hate it when they screw around with a good story that has lasted generations and great characters people have grown up with just so they can make a bit of cash for a few months.

..plus the designs of the ships are not quite TOS style and not quite reboot style.

Aerodynamics... in space? I hadn't seen the "Discovery" so took a look at it. Interesting ship design, I guess. Not quite sure "why" it has some of those features... Coolness factor, I guess. But, it ain't the beautiful simplicity of a classic TOS ship, that's for sure. It's too darn "busy." It looks like it's moving, standing still. I guess that's what they were going for, but a TOS Star Fleet Constitution class is prettier to me. (I am admittedly biased.)

[brucewarren]

When Discovery first came out I was sad because I would not be able to see it.

The more I hear about it the more I feel had a narrow escape.

There's a theory doing the rounds on the Youtube that the reason Discovery is so awful has something to do with a copyright problem. Something to do with one group having the rights to the characters and another imagery. This is apparently why it looks trash. If it looked like the original it would break copyright.

Of course this theory is on Youtube so it might well be trash.

For me the best looking ships are the Enterprise A and the E. A is simply sleeker than the original and the square nacelles look better than the old round ones. The Sovereign looks as if it was designed to kick the Borg back into the Delta Quadrant.

I never liked the Galaxy class.

* It was fat and ugly.
* Saucer separation was a serious design flaw. If you can't kick butt in your proper configuration then stay in Spacedock.
* Kids on a starship. No. Just No. Captain Picard was right to hate the idea.
* It took way too long to fire its main weapon. By the time that light has gone round the saucer section the bad guys will have dodged it.

[pjknibbs]

* Saucer separation was a serious design flaw. If you can't kick butt in your proper configuration then stay in Spacedock.

Saucer separation was never supposed to be a method of increasing the ship's firepower, it was supposed to be a method of keeping the families aboard safe while the drive section went into battle without them. Kind of spoiled by the fact the saucer section had no warp drive and was thus a sitting duck without the drive section, of course!

The only Starfleet ship that actually used splitting into segments to increase its firepower was the Prometheus class prototype.

[Usenko]

They DID use the saucer separation manoeuvre to give the Enterprise extra firepower *once* - against the Borg. But there were two caveats here:

1) There was no point in sending the families to safety. If the Borg had actually defeated the StarDrive section, there was nowhere safe for the Saucer to go. It was in for a penny, in for a pound.

2) It was a move borne of absolute desperation. The Borg had captured Picard and mind-ripped him, so they knew all the plans (and even the ideas of plans!) that had been hatched against them. Riker had to improvise and use tactics that the Borg weren't expecting. They expected him not to play dice with the lives of the families aboard the Enterprise, so[1] . . .

Those complaining about Spock's human foster sister: What? It's canon that he said nothing about his embarrassing VULCAN brother, and a human foster sibling would be humiliating to a Vulcan by definition. So firstly, that's the sort of information he wouldn't necessarily volunteer. Secondly, TOS didn't show us absolutely every moment of the lives of the original crew; who's to say that he DIDN'T tell his closest friends about his sister, only it was never relevant to the plot before now?

[1] Locutus: "A futile manuever. Incorrect strategy, Number One, to risk your crew and ship to retrieve only one man. Picard would never have approved."

[Morkonan]

Something prompted by the above posts involving characters and their backgrounds and something I read about storycrafting:

How much "character" is too much "character?"

Compared to TOS, TNG took "character" to a whole new level. Character background, backstories written from whole cloth pushed to the forefront, only important because they require viewer investment in the character, character relationships forming the basis for a story, character "development" spanning episodes, but then conspicuously absent when it would seem to matter most, etc...

IMO, TNG had some good episodes and storylines, but it was missing something when compared to TOS. So, what was it? I've sort of wrestled with that for awhile, given a new generation's enthusiasm for the series. Well, I think I found it - "Too much character stuffs." At least, in comparison.

Sure, TOS had many episodes dealing with characters, but not to the extent that TNG and, perhaps, DS9 (which I also didn't like much). TNG also had a penchant for running character development/exploration subplots, too, which watered down the story for me.

Anyway, obviously something for it's own thread if anyone really wanted to go in-depth. Besides the studio's penchant for trying to draw on nostalgia to increase interest, which all the IP-owners have done, I think this sort of thing is a major theme for series in the TNG/DS9 era and, perhaps, other series to come. Maybe?

Will we see Picard dealing with geriatric care and an argument with his physician over a new love interest and his heart condition? Maybe he can't take "Virile Pills" and is having problems defining himself as a man? (Sounds like a typical TNG subplot to me...)

Where's the... "adventure" in that?

[pjknibbs]

I think it would perhaps be truer to say "too many characters" rather than "too much character stuff"? TNG didn't really have a strong central set of characters equivalent to Spock, McCoy and Kirk--Picard barely interacted with his crew outside of strict Starfleet protocols until the final episode of the final series (when he joined the senior officer's poker game), and we had Worf, Riker, Data, LaForge, Troi, and Beverley Crusher who were all given more-or-less equal importance.