Topic: Ten Forward - The Star Trek Topic

@RogerRoger @KALofKRYPTON a little bit more of my old Trek stuff to share

first off my VHS Movies, i even found a promo VHS for First Contact (and i'm sure i have a behind the scenes tape for Generations somewhere too, i remember it showing how they did the crash scene)

next an old Star Trek Annual that i'm pretty sure was my Dads as i wasn't born until 1984

next one of my all time favourite Star Trek books

plus a couple of others i found and apparently that Starfleet Academy book is pretty rare

a 30th Anniversary Soundtrack CD

and last but not least my Star Trek The Next Generation Chess Set, i still use this quite often

@FullbringIchigo Good haul! Wow, and a trip down memory lane, too. Thanks for sharing!

@RogerRoger no problem, it's been nice going through the old stuff again

@FullbringIchigo So. Much. Stuff!

Bravo for hanging on to it all!

@KALofKRYPTON i have more you know

it's just sorting through it all

@FullbringIchigo Ha!

One of my greatest regrets is selling my Franklin Mint Tri-D Chess Set. Absolutely stunning if you can get one. Quite a good game too.

@KALofKRYPTON i was never able to get one of those

always wanted one though

So... I ended up in an older iO9 thread from when Picard was announced and came across this post. It pretty succinctly articulates my feelings on new things in general but specifically Kurtzman's (and those like him - Ryan Johnson for example) saviour complex when it comes to describing their 'new visions' for existing characters:

"There is nothing a “deconstruction” of Picard could do that hasn’t actually already been done by the show or the movies. Hell, there was nothing in the movies that hadn’t already been done by the show.

The entire exercise is pseudo-intellectual bulls**t. Deconstruct this, moral debate that... we did it already. Picard did it already. Multiple times. We had episodes where Picard was left doubting his own morality, episodes where he had to do something that challenged the core ideals of the Federation to uphold those ideals on a broader scale. We had episodes where he gave into hatred, and despair; episodes where he admits weakness and failure, and learns to overcome it; episodes where he finds love, grows old, rediscovers youth, makes peace, makes war... and at long last, concludes his journey by truly understanding that his crew is his family. The End.

But no. Everybody now has to mask their horrifying lack of imagination by digging up the same old stuff, and pretending that they’re being so terribly innovative by taking a completed character arc and unraveling somebody else’s work instead of coming up with their own.

It’s degenerate.

Everyone should go away and watch the Babylon 5 episode “The Deconstruction of Falling Stars” - we have all become the stupid, childish historians depicted therein, obsessed with proving that our parents weren’t so great anyway, and we could totally do it better."

@KALofKRYPTON you know it's sad to say i have never seen Babylon 5, it was on around the same time as DS9 so it completely passed me by

is it worth it?

@KALofKRYPTON As brutal as that post is, I could not agree with it more.

I'm still pumped to see Sir Patrick Stewart deliver an acting masterclass once again, wrestling with deep psychological questions and moral issues as he so brilliantly did, but I'm not expecting to be surprised by any of it (or if I am, it'll be for all the wrong reasons).

Here's hoping we're both wrong, eh?

@FullbringIchigo
Babylon 5 is absolutely worth it!
It hasn't aged too well visually, and the first season is pretty shaky - but it is worth the perseverance. It is a show that was planned, written and produced by essentially one person, and importantly, was designed to end.
Yeah... DS9 exists because JSM pitched B5 to Paramount

I'm probably going to re-watch it all again in the summer.

@RogerRoger There's always hope!

@KALofKRYPTON well TOS hasn't aged well visually either but it's still fun to watch

i'll give it a go i think

@FullbringIchigo
Well, I'd say that TOS has the advantage of 'vintage'.

B5 has the disadvantage of full CG space external/vehicular shots in 1994, TV first too I think (you may hear/read a bunch of stuff about Amigas being used for the CG - they were, in a way - but it was mostly down to the advanced video card and a separate server)

I do adore it, and some of the design work is still right at the top of my 'best' list!

OK serious question about Discovery Season 3

with Netflix not being happy about how CBS has handled the show AND with them refusing to pay for the Short Treks AND paying less for season 2, not to mention passing up on Picard because of it, do you think even when CBS make a season 3 of Discovery Netflix will pick it up? and if they don't would that mean we just wont get it or will it also go to Amazon Prime (that's even IF they can sell it to another streaming service)

@FullbringIchigo I suspect Discovery series 3 is probably already a part of the Picard deal with Amazon.

@KALofKRYPTON i dunno, i'm pretty sure i read a while ago that Netflix had first whack at ANY Discovery content so it's possible that right now it's sitting in limbo

@KALofKRYPTON @FullbringIchigo I'm about to start watching Babylon 5. Will inevitably post thoughts around here somewhere as I go.

As for the third season of Discovery, I'm sure Netflix will base their decision on internal revenue numbers which they rarely, if ever, make public. So whatever happens, we'll either be confused or it'll be real easy to deduce the reasoning.

@RogerRoger yeah i need to wait until pay day before i get round to buying Babylon 5 but i am interested in what you think of it once you watched a few

also i think Netflix will still pick up season 3 but i doubt they will pay anymore than the bare minimum for it

honestly after Picard releases and if it is a success CBS should cut their losses with Discovery and just end it

@FullbringIchigo I heard somewhere that they've got a three-year plan for Picard. That's probably the maximum length Sir Patrick would sign a contract for anyway, but if it's a success from the get-go, I'd rather that take the lead in shaping the future of the franchise than anything else.

@RogerRoger i thought a 3 year contract was the norm now a days anyway but yeah if it proves to be more successful and more popular than Discovery i can also see CBS using that as the bases for future shows too