Discovery 2x02 - "New Eden" [** SPOILERS WITHIN **]

FutureGuy

AMKC wrote: »

but what was happening with the phaser?

I took it that it was on overload maybe just not a full power overload.

If they are going to make a fetish out of sticking to canon (Spock, the Enterprise etc) then they need to look after these details.

I agree they should.

In some ways this ep was too traditional, too conventional?

I disagree there. Its the type of episodes they need to do more. It was almost a perfect episode if they could just get rid of the silly spore drive and any thing connected to the spore drive it would be much better.

They way I look at the spore drive is as follows.

The USS Excelsior had the prototype for Starfleet’s first transwarp engine. An engine that had been undoubtedly tested to show it works.

Scotty pulled a few pieces out of the engine and that was THE LAST TIME WE EVER HEARD ABOUT THE TRANSWARP ENGINE.

I think Trek fans these days are far less forgiving of the this type of thing. The spore drive may cause a huge problem in series to come, rendering the tech useless.

Spear

I think I see why the asteroid fragment suddenly weighs so much, yet Burnham could pick up a chunk previously.

Tilly explicitly, but briefly, comments that the fragment grabbed into the shuttle bay was heavily charged with metreon particles causing it to generate extreme gravity.

Presumably the fist sized chunk Burnham grabbed wasn't carrying a charge, leaving just the dark matter remnant.

Blazer

Really enjoying Pike as the new Captain.
Saru was a bit off and unsure of himself in this one..which is strange as he captained the ship and is 2nd in command so crap writing there.

Can take Michael or leave..bit of a know it all is annoying but not even close to Tilly who is a completely ridiculous character in a Star trek show.
I'm dreading the thoughts of her getting more airtime in it as she's a major turnoff in any of her scenes.

Sonics2k

Okay, I'm being a little bit nit-picky here, but is it just me or did Saru's mouth prosthesis seem a little bit... off?

Sonics2k

Sonics2k wrote: »

Okay, I'm being a little bit nit-picky here, but is it just me or did Saru's mouth prosthesis seem a little bit... off?

A small bit stiffer looking?

pixelburp

The mouth piece / part did seem a little stiffer or badly attached, could just have been an honest mistake during filming as in the premiere he seemed fine.

Gotta respect Doug Jones for his commitment to these sort of unconventional roles.

Goodshape

Huh, I noticed a difference with Saru alright but I thought it was an improvement. Was a fleeting scene though and I forgot to pay any more attention to it.

I've not really been a fan of the makeup on this show so far anyway though. It's all too heavy.

TheIrishGrover

I enjoyed that episode also. As many have stated, it was quite traditional Trek fare. Again, very high production values for an episode that could have been done on the cheap (How many Trek episodes rely on the auld Humans-where-they-shouldn't-be-replicating-nice-and-reusable-sets-from-other-period-TV-show)

So my usual overvalues two cents worth:

• Liked the overall tone of the episode.
• Stamets again. Easily one of my favourite characters
• The soldier video footage
• I liked that the people knew where they came from without reverting to the typical Sci-Fi trope: "In the time before the remember-time there was a terrible war. Iron birds dropped new clear eggs and they burned everything" and all that kind of stuff ("Waaaaaaalker!!!!!!").
  
  Interestingly I liked that this version of the WWIII is quite a 60's version(In keeping with TOS I suppose). In that it was planes dropping nuclear weapons and a huge casualty-rate as opposed to the Mutually Assured Destruction of ICBM warfare. Thought it was a nice nod to 60s thinking. That WWIII would be survivable.
• The new doctor. Obviously trying to go McCoy grumpy without doing Polaski unlikeable.
• Liked that the officer who went down with Burnham and Pike (I am TERRIBLE with names) wasn't a Redshirt.
• Liked Pike's respectful attitude to the locals' beliefs.

Didn't Like/Meh

• Yeah, Pike surviving the Phaser Overload.
• Dial back the chippy chippy chatter just a little bit. Just a bit: The whole Donut scenes.
• No Tig whatshername. (I don't know if she is scheduled to reappear again)

It is interesting to see some people complain that the episode was a little too old school. They can never win

So yeah, I really liked that episode but then I've liked the series from the start.

_Kaiser_

Well I watched it the other night, and credit where it's due, it was a decent episode. A lot more classic Trek in tone than anything Discovery has done so far.

Aside from the reliance on fancy CGI and 'splosions to carry the show which was thankfully dialed back in this episode, my main problem I think is I just don't like the characters - with the exception of Pike and Saru.
Burnham continues to grate every time she opens her mouth (again with the "I know better" openly questioning the natives beliefs in what would be a delicate situation), Tilly is still woefully out of place and irritating whenever she's on screen, Staments is a bit of a "meh" character that if he wasn't there I don't think anyone would really miss him. The rest of the bridge crew now seem to be backup comedy relief as opposed to just anonymous.

Agree with the above though that Pike is stealing the show at this point. Lorca was equally great in that role. I think having Burnham being the centre of the universe/show just isn't working out and if they reduced that, or even killed her off (and Tilly - maybe in a tragic transporter or shuttle accident ), the show would be a lot better for it.

pixelburp

Something tells me in 20 years time fans will still be debating / arguing over Tilly. Definitely a marmite character. ..

Or she would be, only she's awesome and anyone who says otherwise is wrong :P

Sonics2k

Deleted User wrote: »

A small bit stiffer looking?

Stiffer, but also looser at the same time. There was one scene in particular and I swear I could see his mouth behind it. Again, really just nitpicking as overall I really enjoyed the episode.

Pike is really growing on me, he's stealing the show.

PhiloCypher

_Kaiser_ wrote: »

Well I watched it the other night, and credit where it's due, it was a decent episode. A lot more classic Trek in tone than anything Discovery has done so far.

Aside from the reliance on fancy CGI and 'splosions to carry the show which was thankfully dialed back in this episode, my main problem I think is I just don't like the characters - with the exception of Pike and Saru.
Burnham continues to grate every time she opens her mouth (again with the "I know better" openly questioning the natives beliefs in what would be a delicate situation), Tilly is still woefully out of place and irritating whenever she's on screen, Staments is a bit of a "meh" character that if he wasn't there I don't think anyone would really miss him. The rest of the bridge crew now seem to be backup comedy relief as opposed to just anonymous.

Agree with the above though that Pike is stealing the show at this point. Lorca was equally great in that role. I think having Burnham being the centre of the universe/show just isn't working out and if they reduced that, or even killed her off (and Tilly - maybe in a tragic transporter or shuttle accident ), the show would be a lot better for it.

I'll take an interesting characters like Saru or a flawed character like Burnham over a bunch of likeable Mayweathers any day of the week. People are far too obsessed with having characters be likeable right off the bat. Just like the Roddenberry no conflict edict hamstrung the TNG writers early on, the Discovery writers would be typing with one hand tied behind their back if they just made them all bland ciphers. Could they dial Burnham's know it all-ness sure, but then Spock lectured Kirk all the time too, and given Burnham is his Vulcan raised step sister and also a fellow science officer it's an entirely intentional parallel by the writers, and not just them making her randomly abrasive .

seamus

Kudos to Anson Mount. As I saw said on reddit, the portrayal of Pike feels like slipping into an old comfortable jacket. He's got exactly the right mix of Kirk and Picard - brash and honest but with a strong sense of duty and responsibility to his crew. We never really knew much about Pike except for the appearance in TOS, and to be fair it was Bruce Greenwood in the reboot films that set the template.

But it works, really well.

Mount's mannerisms constantly remind me of Billy Bob Thornton

CramCycle

PhiloCypher wrote: »

I'll take an interesting characters like Saru or a flawed character like Burnham over a bunch of likeable Mayweathers any day of the week. People are far too obsessed with having characters be likeable right off the bat. Just like the Roddenberry no conflict edict hamstrung the TNG writers early on, the Discovery writers would be typing with one hand tied behind their back if they just made them all bland ciphers. Could they dial Burnham's know it all-ness sure, but then Spock lectured Kirk all the time too, and given Burnham is his Vulcan raised step sister and also a fellow science officer it's an entirely intentional parallel by the writers, and not just them making her randomly abrasive .

Mayweather was likeable? I thought he was an annoyance and not someone you'd ever hang around with in the real world. Like most of the Enterprise, 1D characters were the flavour at the time, it was like watching a TV version of Twilight (but in Space)

PhiloCypher

CramCycle wrote: »

Mayweather was likeable? I thought he was an annoyance and not someone you'd ever hang around with in the real world. Like most of the Enterprise, 1D characters were the flavour at the time, it was like watching a TV version of Twilight (but in Space)

He was the writers idea of likeable, their Harry Kim , someone so anodyne nobody could dislike or possibly be offended by. The problem with that is characters that bland just aren't relatable.

TheValeyard

PhiloCypher wrote: »

He was the writers idea of likeable, their Harry Kim , someone so anodyne nobody could dislike or possibly be offended by. The problem with that is characters that bland just aren't relatable.

Harry Kim was dull in every universe he's been in.

Stark

I wonder would a Mirror Universe Harry Kim been as dull.

TheValeyard

Stark wrote: »

I wonder would a Mirror Universe Harry Kim been as dull.

He is the one constant throughout the multiverse. He is the anchor of dullness.

CramCycle

I bet you mirror Kim was awesome, everyone loved him, really interesting, always said the right thing, comedy wit that somehow humoured without offending everyone. Died a hero when a warp core ejection failed, he had to go in and kick a coupling loose, getting dragged out with it. Disabled the transporters before he did as he knew he would be to irradiated to bring back to the ship safely. Real world Kim was that guy no one liked but couldn't actually justify why they didn't like him so they awkwardly tolerated him, probably arrested a few years after getting back to earth by a serious crimes unit for cutting people but not for any reason, just because he snapped when left to his own devices, they found a number of flayed animals in his basement and videos of him pretending their intestines were parts of sub space and he was flying a toy voyager around like the way a kid plays with toy cars.

Real world Kim reminds me of if Arnold Rimmer was made into a realistic character and stripped of all humanity. Mirror Kim would have been like Ace Rimmer.

CramCycle

CramCycle wrote: »

I bet you mirror Kim was awesome, everyone loved him, really interesting, always said the right thing, comedy wit that somehow humoured without offending everyone. Died a hero when a warp core ejection failed, he had to go in and kick a coupling loose, getting dragged out with it. Disabled the transporters before he did as he knew he would be to irradiated to bring back to the ship safely. Real world Kim was that guy no one liked but couldn't actually justify why they didn't like him so they awkwardly tolerated him, probably arrested a few years after getting back to earth by a serious crimes unit for cutting people but not for any reason, just because he snapped when left to his own devices, they found a number of flayed animals in his basement and videos of him pretending their intestines were parts of sub space and he was flying a toy voyager around like the way a kid plays with toy cars.

Real world Kim reminds me of if Arnold Rimmer was made into a realistic character and stripped of all humanity. Mirror Kim would have been like Ace Rimmer.

Smoke me a kipper

Roar

Who else noticed Samantha Coleman from Die Hard 2 in this ep?



Really enjoyed the episode, felt like a proper old Star Trek episode. It's a bit frantic though, you'd wish it would slow down a bit, there was a lot crammed into that hour.

I'm not getting the Tilly hate that some people feel, and I don't mind Burnham either to be honest.

OK I was able to do a DSC S2Ep2 Vs Orville S2Ep2 and oh sweet jesus the difference.

I was bored out of my mind with Orville, it was every trope and cliché going. Where was the fun from last year?

Goodshape

Yeah, I zoned out on episode 3 of The Orville :-/

I've less time for TV at the moment anyway and it just felt like nothing I hadn't seen before. I might catch up again sometime whenever.

Season 2 of Orville has 100% on Rotten Tomatoes?

I'm sorry but how?? That episode was so fecking bad, I'm watching the 3 tonight hoping it's better

Inviere

Watched it last night. It was, ok. Better than the season opener. It's just so jarring, a whole new tone, a new Captain, a new problem (this is problem #3 - the Klingon War, the Mirror Universe, and now the Red Angel). Three different arcs in seventeen episodes. I don't feel the show has settled down at all, with the angst behind the cameras being clearly evident in the constant direction changes. This is made worse by the fact that we know Pike won't remain on in command either, as canon tells us he returns to command the Enterprise at some stage.

It's all a bit annoying, because while Season 1 had it's issues, I enjoyed it more so than Season 2 so far. Lorca had a real mystery about him, the Spore Drive, I loved the Klingons, etc etc. Now it's just another ship, with another all American Captain, saving the day.

CramCycle

I found the non believer statement odd, it's just not something you'd say now, let alone in a few hundred years where it is presumably quite normal. The normal answer would have been a simple no captain. It's weird but it simply grates as something that would not be said naturally. Maybe there is a reason but I just thought it weird, particularly in a universe with so many conflicting beliefs and interpretations of higher powers.

brainfreeze

It's all starting to come together now. Pretty sure in these last two episodes they just re-introduced the Iconians from from TNG and DS9.

I just watched the DS9 episode to justify my thoughts.

A rundown of the episode:

The crew comes upon a disabled Jem'Hadar warship which is transmitting a distress signal. The Defiant then transports aboard the survivors: six Jem'Hadar soldiers and Weyoun, their Vorta master. Weyoun reveals that they were attacked by the same Jem'Hadar who surprised Deep Space Nine. He then tells Sisko privately that the attackers are Jem'Hadar renegades who have turned against the Dominion and are trying to restore an ancient Iconian Gateway - a sophisticated Transporter that would give them the power to go anywhere instantaneously. This could give them the potential to take over the Gamma Quadrant and eventually even the Federation. Sisko agrees to join Weyoun and destroy the Gateway, which is located on the surface of a remote planet.

In the episode sisko destroys the Iconian technology so the dominion couldn't just surround all federation planets instantly, forcing them to still use the wormhole that they control.


The Iconians first appear in TNG when Picard assumes they are extinct, the Romulans are also investigating them to get hold of this "appear anywhere in the milkyway" technology"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contagion_(Star_Trek:_The_Next_Generation)

fritzelly wrote: »

Really enjoyed that episode, Red Angel is becoming very interesting.

The Iconians are described exactly like that:

The Iconians were an ancient and highly advanced civilization that was presumably destroyed some 200,000 years ago by the orbital bombardment of their homeworld, Iconia. Ancient texts called the Iconians "Demons of Air and Darkness", who were said to have the ability to appear at will on far-flung planets without the use of starships. Later this was found to be a reference to the Iconians' gateway technology, whose instant teleportation allowed them to establish outposts at least as far as Vandros IV in the Gamma Quadrant. Until the discovery of Iconia in 2365, the Iconians were still dismissed by many as nothing more than myth.

Looks like using the mycelial network got their attention.

AMKC

Deleted User wrote: »

OK I was able to do a DSC S2Ep2 Vs Orville S2Ep2 and oh sweet jesus the difference.

I was bored out of my mind with Orville, it was every trope and cliché going. Where was the fun from last year?

That's not really a good comparison do or a fair one as The Orville has been out a bit longer. If they had both aired at the same day then maybe. A better comparison would be episode 5 of The Orville with episode 2 of Discovery.

Goodshape wrote: »

Yeah, I zoned out on episode 3 of The Orville :-/

I've less time for TV at the moment anyway and it just felt like nothing I hadn't seen before. I might catch up again sometime whenever.

Episode 4 and 5 are much much better.

Deleted User wrote: »

Season 2 of Orville has 100% on Rotten Tomatoes?

I'm sorry but how?? That episode was so fecking bad, I'm watching the 3 tonight hoping it's better

4 and 5 are really good.

Inviere wrote: »

Watched it last night. It was, ok. Better than the season opener. It's just so jarring, a whole new tone, a new Captain, a new problem (this is problem #3 - the Klingon War, the Mirror Universe, and now the Red Angel). Three different arcs in seventeen episodes. I don't feel the show has settled down at all, with the angst behind the cameras being clearly evident in the constant direction changes. This is made worse by the fact that we know Pike won't remain on in command either, as canon tells us he returns to command the Enterprise at some stage.

It's all a bit annoying, because while Season 1 had it's issues, I enjoyed it more so than Season 2 so far. Lorca had a real mystery about him, the Spore Drive, I loved the Klingons, etc etc. Now it's just another ship, with another all American Captain, saving the day.

I agree that they could have and should have let Saru become Captain but otherwise I prefer Season 2 of Discovery so far over Season 1 which I think is mostly unwatchable except for 3 or 4 episodes. I did and do not like the fake Klingons, the spore drive, the magic network or any of that.

AMKC

AMKC wrote: »

That's not really a good comparison do or a fair one as The Orville has been out a bit longer. If they had both aired at the same day then maybe. A better comparison would be episode 5 of The Orville with episode 2 of Discovery.

I am only on ep 2 of both shows. So back to back viewing and comparison