Star Trek Brave New Worlds

[geon]

Hi everyone,
I've just heard about this new series , Star Trek Brave New Worlds, so I scanned youtube for some episodes to see how bad, or good it is.

Specifically, I came across some clips from Series 1, Episode 10, which is basically a rehash of the TOS classic episode, 'Balance of Terror'

Below are some links:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPXVR2LYovU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhHbJq8THCo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSbHguI_1yY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ckP2pkkSfc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iF9vyPkeTEM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGZgVFRt6ik

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-G6GTAar5cA

First, the Good:
1) At least they're trying to keep the ships recognisable from the Prime Timeline. The Enterprise seems to be a slightly modernised standard Constitution with 'Refit' type engine struts. The Farragut could pass as a Miranda prototype

2) The actor playing Christopher Pike is trying to do a 'William Shatner' type captain decision making (I guess a homage to the original Captain Kirk)

Now the Bad;

1) The technology is still way too sophisticated for a pre TOS time. The viewscreen takes up the whole front wall!

2) James Kirk of the Farragut is represented as a brash, over aggressive individual hell bent on attacking the enemy regardless of the consequences (totally unlike what we learn of young Kirk in TOS 'Obsession')

3) The overall storyline and action sequences are lifted directly from TOS 'Balance of Terror'. Even Spock's dialogue and the Romulan Commander's speeches are taken literally word for word from the TOS episode (couldn't they think of something original)? In this episode, two ships, the Enterprise and Farragut, engage the Romulan Bird of Prey, instead of just the Enterprise.

4) When looking at the starmap of the sector, we can see the 'Romulan Star Empire' complete with Romulan TNG symbols. If Starfleet hasn't seen the Romulans in a century, how do they know what they call their Empire, or indeed what symbols they use?

5) The Romulan fleet that appears in front of Enterprise consists of some large weird designs and a couple of designs that might be FASA inspired models. But if the Romulans of this period have such large powerful ships already in their fleet, why send one Bird of Prey to attack a few outposts?

6) The Praetor (a female) declares war on the Federation. So there's going to be a Romulan war before the TOS era? Are you kidding me?

Frankly, I have again been disappointed. I had hoped that after the travesty of Star Trek Discovery (which I will never forgive for a multitude of reasons, not least the way they portrayed the Klingons), any following series would have at least tried to follow the events of the prime timeline. While some effort is made in Strange New Worlds to recapture the feel and dialogue of the original Star Trek series, simply reusing dialogue and plot devices from the 60's series shows that the writers have no original ideas for the series at all, and that any plot devices they do come up with will once again stuff up canon.

While this series isn't as bad as Star Trek Discovery, it is still just not good enough, and not what the die hard fans want or deserve. Fan based films stay much truer to the timeline levels of technology than these shows, yet thanks to CBS's clampdown on fan productions, we are only allowed these overpriced flights of sci fi fancy.

I still hope that one day they'll finally get it right. Perhaps I'm just too much of an optimist.

Regards
Geon

[Spocks-cuddly-tribble]

Hi Geon,

- most reviewers consider the first/earlier (1-4?) episodes of ST:SNW of better quality and see a quality drop after them

- you corrected it at the end of your post, it's 'Strange': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewFg5wUvkGI

- given your toughts on ST:SNW you should avoid ST:Picard for your own good

[Deimos]

I've enjoyed New worlds so far, there are some moments where I kinda frown, but the series is much, much better than that Discovery and Picard crap they've been running.

It's explained at the beginning of the episode by time travelling/crystal "Future" Pike that this war will happen if he continues his quest to stop himself being irradiated in a future accident.

So there won't be a war with the Romulans before the TOS era.

In the future he rescues a bunch of Starfleet cadets/officers from, what I assume is a breach of some radiation chamber, he himself is irradiated and ends up in that weird life support/wheel chair thing.

He's trying to prevent that from happening, but as a result of knowing the future and changing it, there will be a war with the Romulans.

If you want something more akin to the older style Trek, I'd recommend The Orville.

It starts off kinda rough (too much forced humour that's not funny), but Season 3 has been genuinely amazing.

[geon]

Hi Deimos,

Yes, I have been watching Orville and yes, it does remind me of the traditional Star Trek series. If Seth MacFarlane can do it, why oh why does CBS continue to give us crap?

[Axis]

Sounds like it's Boring old worlds

BUT, I like Star Trek somewhat, so, the more they say it's just crap, the more interested I seem to get, Discovery's first season was fine with me, I like Captain Lorca and the look of Klingons there (there's always something good in every one of those shows/movies, as little as it might be).
TOS, or TOS-like episodes made anew, with new effects, the Enterprise and such is not such a bad idea after all.
I haven't watched TOS for some time now, It's just become obsolete, in the sense of visual effects and other looks, and that slight chauvinism of that time period in which women are not supposed to be strong and dark, but frail blondes instead. There's still some good in stories, but these new ones are more complex, like the Mudd episode in Discovery.
Mudd himself was lacking humor, which was a real downer though.

[Deimos]

Some of the episodes in both Discovery and Picard were quite good, but it just turned into a "Who or what will have an emotional breakdown this episode?"

When they ran out of people, the computer itself got emotional and couldn't function.

Everyone seemed to have all this emotional baggage and half the time it was just not fitting with the characters or had any logical place in the storyline.

I couldn't stand Discovery, it was always "space jesus Michael Burnham" who had to save the day in nearly every episode.

I wanted to love Picard, after all Sir Patrick was involved and crew from the old ships were, but it was just a big let down for me.
To many stupid decisions, to many plot holes and yea, it was just badly written in my opinion.

I've made a point of watching a YouTube channel called The Critical Drinker, where he goes over new TV shows and movies, usually before I've watched them and 90% of the time I completely agree when he's either negative or positive.
Sometimes you don't realize how bad a show or movie is, until you watch his videos.
https://www.youtube.com/c/TheCriticalDrinker/videos

[Axis]

After having watched those first 4 episodes of Strange New Worlds, I think it is as the cover says: "Best Star Trek in decades", IMO it's even better than Picard in some sense, although I haven't watched the last season of it.

I like the visual look of SNW, that red color and some other details that look like from TOS Enterprise, a fresh look.
The stories have been good, maybe the fourth was a little messy, but I've enjoyed it so far.

[Deimos]

I'm really enjoying SNW as well, it sure did have some dark episodes though, the child sacrifice and the Gorn eggs bursting out of people, jeesh haha.

Not afraid to admit I got a bit emotional when we lost one of the main cast in the Gorn episode.

I love the shield effects on the ships too, like when the Enterprise is flying through the tail of that self aware comet thing, all the bits of rock hitting the shields.

And can't forget the awesome power of the Romulan's plasma torpedoes either.

[Axis]

Yeah, I hope the series don't end up "Strange Few Worlds", only a couple seasons, there should be at least five, it's five year mission after all.

[Axis]

The Gorn episode Deimos was talking about had horror elements which were kind of a mixture of Alien and Predator, those eggs bursting out of bodies plus that "infrared vision" of gorn.

But, that 10th episode was clearly a justification for a couple things to preserve the prime timeline, Pike must have that accident and Kirk must be the captain of the Enterprise, so that he can avoid the war with the romulans, "the logic is sound" as Spock would say.

[Deimos]

One good thing about SNW is I love all the characters, which is rare for a show.

If you can relate to and care about characters, I think you enjoy the show that much more.

Season 2's trailer is out and it looks like it'll be a fun season (Perhaps a little too jovial at times, but still) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJYPXuM-3JA

[Axis]

I do agree about those characters, women of course and they all have good and diverse personalities, Ethan Peck as Spock is a good one, he's kinda different from the others, almost like Nimoy was, Peck has a strong voice and Nimoy had a unique kind of voice too.

[Deimos]

I must be getting old and cranky, but I really thought the latest "Musical" episode was bloody stupid.

[Axis]

I don't mind people singing now and then in Star Trek, but a musical episode sounds like it's a bit too much,
I wasn't fond of that season 1 role play episode The Elysian Kingdom either.

[Deimos]

Yea, this episode is the same type of silliness, just greatly exaggerated.
I'm not really enjoying season 2 at all so far, well, there's only one episode left and that sounds very much like the start of a gorn conflict.
Just been kinda blah this season.