I couldn’t disagree more. Roddenberry is just some guy, Star Trek has always been so much larger than him. And as The Orville demonstrates, there is no justification for a 2020s star trek to be grittier than a star trek that aired between the Korean and Vietnam war, with the second red scare with the existential threat of nuclear warfare.
Its utopian vision of the future has a backstory of humans fighting each other to near extinction in the Eugenics War and WW3, because that seemed where things were headed. The present has always been gritty, but Star Trek used to be about zooming out past the horrors of the present day to imagine a brighter future.
The franchise has simply switched hands from being propaganda by a bunch of left-leaning weirdos to being propaganda for huge corporations and the state they wear as a trench coat.
It is entirely possible to write Star Trek today that is as left-wing (relative to its time) and utopian as it used to be. The owners of the IP simply will not permit that.
Yeah, I don’t get this complaint. By the end of Discovery, my partner started referring to the episode wrap ups as “Care Bears moments” because of how saccharine they could get.
Disco and Picard both got pretty dark in their first seasons, but that’s a decade ago, and not appreciably darker than DS9 was known for.
Honestly nothing in Disco comes anywhere close to “Chain of Command”. Either they mean something else by “gritty” or they didn’t watch the actual shows and just watched youtube reviews.
Honestly, the eye gouging didn’t hit me all that hard. I’ll have to do a rewatch someday and see how I feel. But sure, if it were 2020 I wouldn’t really bother arguing against the “gritty” description. Looking back at this point, only about 10% of the Kurtzman era had that kind of tone.
I couldn’t disagree more. Roddenberry is just some guy, Star Trek has always been so much larger than him. And as The Orville demonstrates, there is no justification for a 2020s star trek to be grittier than a star trek that aired between the Korean and Vietnam war, with the second red scare with the existential threat of nuclear warfare.
Its utopian vision of the future has a backstory of humans fighting each other to near extinction in the Eugenics War and WW3, because that seemed where things were headed. The present has always been gritty, but Star Trek used to be about zooming out past the horrors of the present day to imagine a brighter future.
The franchise has simply switched hands from being propaganda by a bunch of left-leaning weirdos to being propaganda for huge corporations and the state they wear as a trench coat.
It is entirely possible to write Star Trek today that is as left-wing (relative to its time) and utopian as it used to be. The owners of the IP simply will not permit that.
dare I ask… gritty? If anything the new series (except Picard arguably) were a hyper hug fest compared to TOS, DS9 and Voyager
Yeah, I don’t get this complaint. By the end of Discovery, my partner started referring to the episode wrap ups as “Care Bears moments” because of how saccharine they could get.
Disco and Picard both got pretty dark in their first seasons, but that’s a decade ago, and not appreciably darker than DS9 was known for.
Honestly nothing in Disco comes anywhere close to “Chain of Command”. Either they mean something else by “gritty” or they didn’t watch the actual shows and just watched youtube reviews.
Picard’s torturer engaging in a “take your child to work day” exercise like it’s a normal 9 to 5 is so chilling.
Gritty, even!
Picard S1 was quite a bit darker than other Trek. Pointless death in just about every episode, even an on-screen eye pull moment.
I love Star Trek old and new, but I sincerely hope the writers who killed off Hugh and Icheb are never allowed near the franchise again.
Honestly, the eye gouging didn’t hit me all that hard. I’ll have to do a rewatch someday and see how I feel. But sure, if it were 2020 I wouldn’t really bother arguing against the “gritty” description. Looking back at this point, only about 10% of the Kurtzman era had that kind of tone.
He was indeed assisted by a brilliant, resourceful team of production people and actors, but yeah… okay. Lol.
Anyway, I’m glad you still find something to like, but I really couldn’t give a toss about more ST.