Star Trek: Discovery

[Darth_Andrea Owned by Natu Find all posts View Profile Close Darth_Andrea]

So I watched the first episode of Star Trek Discovery, I'm not impressed and will not be paying for CBS's service in order to continue. It isn't Trek, It has the skin of Trek and all the expected trappings. However the show is very much a mix of the Battlestar Galactia Reboot and Space Above and Beyond. It's a decent Sci-Fi series, but it isn't Trek.

The show itself is supposedly set 10 years before Kirk took command of the Enterprise. And it was supposed to be in the "Prime" universe (William Shatner and Patrick Stewart) However the uniforms, the tech, and the designs of the Klingons all scream JJ-verse. There is a reason for that.

Netflix funded the series on the promise it was a Prime universe prequel series that takes place in the same television universe we have watched for decades. However Paramount Pictures produced the series, not CBS.

For those who don't know there is a split in the rights to Trek. Paramount Pictures owns rights to everything that's appeared on Film, while CBS holds the rights to everything that has appeared on television.

Because of this split Paramount needs to license certain things from CBS in order to put them in anything when it comes to Trek. In this case Paramount did not licence anything and just used their already established JJ-verse designs. This decision strictly puts Discovery in the JJ-Verse no matter what they say.

Because of all of that Netflix is preparing a law suit against CBS to attempt to recoup the production cost of this first season of Discovery, which was filmed in it's entirety before release. And Netflix has pulled out of funding a second season of the series.

This has all been a grand and expensive experiment on the part of CBS to see if Trek on it's own was viable enough to draw people to pay for their streaming service. It won't be. And even if the show draws 10 million subscribers to CBS All Access, that will not be enough funds to justify CBS on it's own funding a second season. This will be a single season series and CBS pretty much designed it that way.

Avoid this show and the streaming service .. it isn't worth your time if you are looking for a Trek Series like we have had in the past. This isn't it, not by any stretch of the imagination.



Darth_Andrea

[Space Cop The Dandy Find all posts View Profile Close Space Cop]

Good to know, thanks. I'll watch the pilot with the fam because we DVRed it, but I suspect I'll be fine with just catching up with it when the DVDs hit Netflix.

Speaking of, what does Netflix have to do with it? Why would they be involved in funding if they don't get the streaming rights until way later? If I heard that, I don't remember.

[Darth_Andrea Owned by Natu Find all posts View Profile Close Darth_Andrea]

Good to know, thanks. I'll watch the pilot with the fam because we DVRed it, but I suspect I'll be fine with just catching up with it when the DVDs hit Netflix.

Speaking of, what does Netflix have to do with it? Why would they be involved in funding if they don't get the streaming rights until way later? If I heard that, I don't remember.

Netflix funded the series, and has exclusive rights to distribute the show outside of North America. As such, you will never find Discovery on Netflix inside the U.S. or Canada. CBS All Access will be the only streaming service in North America and Hawaii to air the series online. DvD's will eventually be released. But if they follow the previous series track records, each season set will be roughly $100 USD.

CBS convinced Netflix that if it funded the series it would be a Prime Universe adventure set in a Classic Trek Era and tie in directly with the continuity of the already existing tv series universe. That is however not what Netflix has gotten. So their gearing up to sue CBS to recoup the production costs from the season. And as I stated have already make it public they will not fund a second season of this series.




Darth_Andrea

[Space Cop The Dandy Find all posts View Profile Close Space Cop]

^Yeah, it's shameful. I had hoped the early ending of Enterprise would be the franchise's last big screw-up.

[Big Daddy Dave Skywalker Moisture Farmer Find all posts View Profile Close Big Daddy Dave Skywalker]

Thats too bad. I don't want to watch a mash up of the two timelines/universes. I dvr'd it and I'll watch it sometime this week, and then I'll wash my hands of it.

[Darth_Andrea Owned by Natu Find all posts View Profile Close Darth_Andrea]

Many may remember when CBS sue a fan film a couple years ago,
that was because of Discovery. Axanar was going to cover the 4yrs war. A major event in the history of Trek. Books have been written about it. But Discovery is going to cover those events so CBS didn't want a better, competing Fan Film so they sue and set new fan film rules to ensure they couldn't continue with their production.

And Axanar would have been better. This is their "Trailer" it's a long video, In Universe it's a "History" program documentary style as a proof of concept.


Watch it ..

+ YouTube Video

Darth_Andrea

[Gray Lantern Senior Corps Member Find all posts View Profile Close Gray Lantern]

I watched the first episode and liked it well enough. I'm by no means a die hard Star Trek fan. In fact, I'm really not that into to TOS. Anyway, the Klingons were way different, but I overall appreciated what they were doing with them. The fact that they spoke entirely in Klingon was really cool. Klingon history and mythos is already filled with contradictions and inconsistencies, so I'm pretty okay with what's happening here.

The show didn't feel like the Abrams movies to me. Sure, there are superficial similarities. The show has a large budget and modern makeup and CGI. It didn't quite feel like TV Trek either, which I'm okay with too because I was interested in what they're doing. Like I love the title sequence. I fully expected the standard "ship flying through space with optional voice over." But that's not what this was and I liked that. It's not running solely off of nostalgia. It's very much trying to do its own thing.

Something I really appreciated with the show is how deliberate it was. So much with TNG, it took awhile to figure out what to do with the show and their characters. They really should have played the second episode though. It really felt like I was only getting to see half the pilot.

I felt the tone was pretty on point. There's a hope and optimism that I hadn't recognized initially. It was only upon watching some other, more depressing shows that I realized that.

So yeah, I'd really like to watch more... but I'm not going to. CBS All Access is really, really bad. CBS has terrible programming on the whole and All Access is just giant garbage dump of programming. There is nothing on the streaming service I'd watch besides Discovery. If this were on Hulu or Prime, I'd have it for awhile since those have other things I'd be interested in watching.

[Sylent_Asassin Black Lantern Find all posts View Profile Close Sylent_Asassin]

Meh. I didn't find any of these characters interesting or compelling. I was disappointed that they didn't set the timeline after Voyager and give us new alien species, new ships and new stories. This felt like a rehashing of an already-told story, and there's no way I'm subscribing or paying to see it... and I had a problem with the first officer betraying the Captain in that fashion, no matter the intentions. Also, shouldn't the Vulcan nerve pinch last for more than a few minutes?

As much as I thought the Oroville was stupid and juvenile, that held my interest longer than Discovery.

[Darth_Primus Guardian of the Universe Find all posts View Profile Close Darth_Primus]

Like Gray Lantern, I'm not a huge Star Trek fan and haven't watched an episode of the original series; only the movies, so I don't have a preconceived idea of what Star Trek should feel like. However, I do understand the feelings, as the Star Wars prequels don't feel like Star Wars films. And to me personally, "Discovery" does feel like it's inline with the JJ universe (which I do like).

I watched the pilot episode last night of "Discovery" and enjoyed it very much, probably because of the "Battlestar Galactica" reboot feels that Darth Andrea pointed out above. I thought the production of the episode was very cinematic and drew me into the world it was presenting. Again, since I'm not a huge fan of Star Trek, I thought the warring Houses among the Klingons new and intriguing. Moreover, there were different shades of Klingons which added a new dynamic to the story. Also the "Vulcan Hello" (IIRC) to the Klingons was an amusing story. And the cliffhanger at the episode definitely made me want to see the next episode to see how things unfold and the further development of the characters. But, like everyone else here, I won't be subscribing to CBS' paying streaming service. I'll wait for the DVDs or whatever.

As for the lawsuit between Netflix and CBS, it has no bearing for me on my opinion of "Discovery."

[IonFan Forum Member Find all posts View Profile Close IonFan]

finally got to see both episodes, i liked it, it was ok but i like the 1st ship, the Shenzhou, more then the ship we're getting for the rest of the series, i for one could do without ever seeing it ever again ()

now as to how i'll be seeing it going forwarded i'll be seeing it for free, i'll be d@mned if i start paying for sh!t i'm use to getting for free on top of everything else i'm paying for

[Mister Ed Horse of a Different Color Find all posts View Profile Close Mister Ed]

I'm curious where the info on this lawsuit is coming from. I'd like to read more about it, but can't find any mention of it in a Google search.

[W.West Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close W.West]

Me either. CBS doesn't need Netflix to foot any production bill, they've been happy to let Warners do that for them for years. Asking Netflix to produce content (even if they have foreign rights) seems off.

(Spoilers below)

I enjoyed the second episode. The first was boring but like others, I'm not a big Star Trek fan. I'm coming from only seeing the JJ era movies and only really liking the first one. The supporting characters need to be fleshed out immediately, because out of a couple being alien they don't get much screen time. I do love the Klingon pride angle they are going with and the guy serving as a martyr and the one predicting it being the one who caused it. Without any expectations, I'll definitely try to continue watching until its no longer worth it for me.

The Netflix/CBS arrangement is an issue though. Watching on All Access is bothersome. There isn't a lot of value in the back catalog or the current live programming for me to use it strictly for Star Trek. This series will have to be really good, really fast to justify (almost) half the price of HBO which is THE KING of content.

[Ωmega Man Guardian of the Universe Find all posts View Profile Close Ωmega Man]

I'm curious where the info on this lawsuit is coming from. I'd like to read more about it, but can't find any mention of it in a Google search.

I heard about the lawsuit on YouTube.

Haven't watched the series yet but it looks like Enterprise meets JJ's movies... I don't even like the sound of that.

The lawsuit is supposedly because Netflix co produced the series under the agreement it was tied to the original series and TNG, and that they would get to stream the show outside of North America.

~//V\\~

[Darth_Andrea Owned by Natu Find all posts View Profile Close Darth_Andrea]

The law suit hasn't been filed yet. However internally Netflix has been talking quite loudly about bringing a suit. Netflix did fund the 1st season of the series under the expectation the series would be created in such a way to be obviously linked to the TV universe that people would know.

However as I previously stated the split rights to Trek between CBS and Paramount made it nearly impossible for the show to be made with the TV universe look and feel. Simply because CBS owns all the rights to everything that's appeared on television.
While Paramount owns everything that's appeared in film.

Paramount needed to license those TV rights in order to do this series but they didn't. So everything they did, look and feel, as well as design of the Klingons was pulled from the JJ-verse toned down a little in hopes people wouldn't notice.

As it has been explained to me, Netflix feels the product that was delivered was not what the contracts promised would be. And they want CBS who's main name is on the series (not paramount) to pay them back the production costs they expended.




Darth_Andrea

[Lantern of Gallifrey Senior Corps Member Find all posts View Profile Close Lantern of Gallifrey]

I know that the show isn't real Trek but why on Earth are they doing prequels. Isn't Trek about the future and going forward? Pushing the bounds and all that. If they are going to make a new series they need to take a look at Star Trek Online. They have kept the story going.