The only thing that can happen to make this series make any sense at all is if they reveal the fact that it takes place in yet another parallel universe, and not the one known to fans of Star Trek. The Continuity Errors are through the roof, even if the constant addition of little nods in every episode to some past incarnation of Star Trek. The tech is too advanced, the unifroms are too different, and the Klingons-well, they just aren’t Klingons as we know them, Jim.
Each Star Trek series has veered a little farther from the fun, heroic, colorful Original Series. But most of them kept a few things solid. We had a handful of main characters we cared about, we grew to know and love the ship/station, and there were always one or two episodes that were just fun to watch. Discovery lacks all of that. I can name three, maybe four characters after watching the entire series. I’m not even sure most of the characters actually have names. I can’t say I have any great fondness for any of them. The ship is kind of goofy, from it’s Romulan like design to the fact that it’s crew members wear t-shirts that say Disco. There were only ten episodes and all of them were grim, dark, and ultimately pointless. From fun loving rogue Harry Mudd being turned into a murderous monster to our Captain being shown to be a murderous monster himself.
So what was good? Ok, setting aside the writing and the acting, it was damn near perfect. Great sets, great music, great special effects. Like almost all modern Hollywood spectacles, they got the details perfect, but somehow forgot that no one watched Star Trek for it’s special effects. It was all about the Story, all about the Characters, all about the Relationships. ST:D is all about the Special Effects. It’s the difference between The Matrix, were a handful of special effects were put to great use in service to the story, and The Matrix Revolutions were there was nothing but special effects and there was no story at all.
I could have liked Star Trek Discovery if they had set it a hundred years after Star Trek The Next Generation. I understand that they didn’t want to use old style Star Trek sets and props, painted cardboard and matte painting would look pretty silly now, but if you didn’t want to do that, why the hell did you want to set it ten years before Kirk and Spock? You can’t have it both ways.
Or maybe if they hadn’t used the Star Trek name at all, that would have been fine. Because, like the last Star Trek movie, this isn’t really Star Trek at all.
