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McSpanky posted:Not enough Akira hate in here. Yeah, but if you simply ignore the carrier bullshit (There is no such thing as a carrier in Star Trek, gently caress you) it's a pretty cool design. It's a shame they lost the Norway model data after First Contact. It's the only one of the new FC ships that didn't shop up in DS9 and it was an interesting design in its own right.
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Feb 2, 2017 18:45
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I'm really glad they went with Kira rather than Ro. Ro was a good character but I can't see starfleet or really anyone trusting her. Career wise (and probably emotionally too) she was damaged goods. Kira was just a grizzled ol freedom fighting terrorist but had her poo poo together and was adult enough to actually work together as a team and sometimes actually obey the chain of command even when she didn't like it unless it was as important as farm equipment.
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Feb 2, 2017 19:06
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Baronjutter posted:I'm really glad they went with Kira rather than Ro. Ro was a good character but I can't see starfleet or really anyone trusting her. Career wise (and probably emotionally too) she was damaged goods. Kira was just a grizzled ol freedom fighting terrorist but had her poo poo together and was adult enough to actually work together as a team and sometimes actually obey the chain of command even when she didn't like it unless it was as important as farm equipment. Kira's record for obeying the chain of command on things that aren't day to day station operations is pretty bad. Admittedly it's part of why I like her, she's willing to give Starfleet's tight rear end rules the bird if she feels it's in the right for what she has to do, but she does it like, three times a season.
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Feb 2, 2017 19:50
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The Bajoran government should have stopped sending Kira to negotiate with farmers after the second time she joined them in a rebellion. She has a pretty bad track record when it comes to that.
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Feb 2, 2017 19:55
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The role was originally intended to be for Ro, but Michelle Forbes was done with this Star Trek poo poo. Kira ended up being a character more suited to DS9, but I really wish they had done more with Ro. I would have loved to see an argument between the two about fighting the occupation versus fleeing to make a new life, where both sides are sympathetic and make valid points. After Ro's first episode, you never hear about the Bajora(n) diaspora, and that could have led to some interesting stories as they try to reintegrate with Bajoran culture... or chose not to. Another thing with Ro, someone in a different thread (I think) once pointed out how few angry female characters you see, and wished that there had been more growing up that they could identify with. You had some of that with Kira, but it was mostly frustration with the job and its hassles, and it wasn't a part of her personality and background the same way. Of course, it's obvious how that grates with the Perfectly Behaved, Pristine Pedigree TNG characters, but they should have tried to do more with her, especially when she could have made the crew uncomfortable with their complacency and privileged backgrounds. It's amazing to see how often TNG could creep up to DS9 territory (especially in seasons 3-5), then panic and back off. Pakled posted:The Bajoran government should have stopped sending Kira to negotiate with farmers after the second time she joined them in a rebellion. She has a pretty bad track record when it comes to that. Since she seemed to be the only one not trying to actively oust the government, she was probably the best they had.
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Feb 2, 2017 19:59
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Fact: I've never met anyone who claimed they hated kira because she was "always angry" that didn't turn out to have a bunch of sexist views. Fact: Kira is good, most of the time she's angry it's fully justified given her history and loyalties and the only authorities she's ever grown up with were nazi's and then corrupt failed provisional idiots. Fact: Sometimes the worst sort of dick dorkins new-atheists hate her because she believes that the wormhole aliens that are scientifically proven to exist and have time powers exit, and have time powers. But she calls them by a non-scientific name which makes her a fundie idiot. Fact: Ro is a baby who runs away from all her problems and probably ran away from the Maqui the moment it got tough or someone didn't like her. Baronjutter fucked around with this message at 20:29 on Feb 2, 2017 |
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Feb 2, 2017 20:21
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Counterpoit: Kira has anger issues.
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Feb 2, 2017 20:38
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Pakled posted:Kira is basically a slightly retooled Ro Laren. Yes, which is why the character somehow works despite being a really, really lovely character on paper. Why would a ground based terrorist have any busniess doing a job on a space station as a first officer? I mean the real answer is "to get her off of Bajor" but she should still be incopetant at her job since she just set up raids and suicide bombs while fighting for a pre-warp society who has no loving clue how to run a space station. And then, they let someone WITH NO STARFLEET TRAINING become first officer on a heavily armed defiant class starship! That's just retarded! Thats like giving Che Guevara command of a US naval destroyer like it's cool. Then you have her rebellious streak which almost caused her to have every Bajoran wiped out by the Dominion because she's a goddamned stupid bitch willing to sacrifice millions of lives because she isn't comfortable hanging out on a station run by Jem'Hadar and Cardassians, despite it being the only solution that keeps Bajor from becoming an inhospitable toxic lump of rock. "Oh you know that former terrorist who is willing to sacrifice HER ENTIRE POPULATION to the Dominion because she's stupid enough to think she's still fighting the occupation as opposed to a group willing to glass Bajor without a second thought? Yeah, we want that stupid person still working on the station." Despite Kira being the single worst thought out character in Star Trek as far as basic function within a general story, she was interesting enough to be cool and Nana Vistor added enough to the character that she's difficult to hate.
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Feb 2, 2017 20:40
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Arglebargle III posted:Counterpoit: Kira has anger issues. Counter-counterpoint, way too much of Star Trek is a lot of "whoa, these women with their crazy emotions, amirite, fellas?" And I'm talking TNG here, not even TOS.
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Feb 2, 2017 20:41
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Baronjutter posted:Fact: I've never met anyone who claimed they hated kira because she was "always angry" that didn't turn out to have a bunch of sexist views. Agreed on everything. But the third point kind of stands out to me. Wouldn't a scientifically proven deity go the other way for Atheism? I mean, here are beings that are, for all intents and purposes godlike, and yet they verifiably exist, unlike every other god in at least human memory. That would seem to take a lot of the air out of the ol' "god is dead" balloon. Seen this way, Kira seems more enlightened than anyone giving her poo poo about her gods. At least hers are real, and not believing in them is as nonsensical as not believing in any other observable phenomena. I say this as an atheist, but one who isn't a huge dickbag about it and who actually reads and appreciates theology sometimes.
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Feb 2, 2017 20:47
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Arglebargle III posted:Counterpoit: Kira has anger issues. Counter-counterpoint: So does Sisko, and people love him for it.
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Feb 2, 2017 20:48
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WampaLord posted:Counter-counterpoint, way too much of Star Trek is a lot of "whoa, these women with their crazy emotions, amirite, fellas?" Drink-Mix Man posted:Counter-counterpoint: So does Sisko, and people love him for it.
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Feb 2, 2017 20:50
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Railing Kill posted:Agreed on everything. But the third point kind of stands out to me. Wouldn't a scientifically proven deity go the other way for Atheism? I mean, here are beings that are, for all intents and purposes godlike, and yet they verifiably exist, unlike every other god in at least human memory. That would seem to take a lot of the air out of the ol' "god is dead" balloon. Seen this way, Kira seems more enlightened than anyone giving her poo poo about her gods. At least hers are real, and not believing in them is as nonsensical as not believing in any other observable phenomena. I say this as an atheist, but one who isn't a huge dickbag about it and who actually reads and appreciates theology sometimes. No because Q is more of a god in every way and has visited the station showing that he is far more powerful than the prophets. If anything the Q continuum should have made Atheism more apparent since you can argue with gods, and win, limiting their functions as almighty beings as Kira looks upon them as such. It's easy to just wave off the prophets as "worm hole aliens" because unless you are a prophet gently caress baby like Sisko, they don't do any poo poo outside of the wormhole and you have met creatures that function as actual deities.
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Feb 2, 2017 20:54
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MrJacobs posted:No because Q is more of a god in every way and has visited the station showing that he is far more powerful than the prophets. If anything the Q continuum should have made Atheism more apparent since you can argue with gods, and win, limiting their functions as almighty beings as Kira looks upon them as such. It's easy to just wave off the prophets as "worm hole aliens" because unless you are a prophet gently caress baby like Sisko, they don't do any poo poo outside of the wormhole and you have met creatures that function as actual deities. There is way too much focus by Atheist writers on poking holes in the all powerful God thing when that is pretty much only a fixture of having a poor understanding of Christianity. One would never accuse Zeus of being omnipotent nor any of that pantheon for instance, all were able to be bested by humans, even if those people often did pay for it. The Christian God isn't even written as perfectly omnipotent, what with his regret at creating man and his wagers over Abraham, so attacking the concept of gods in this way comes across as a weird straw man argument. Actual religious texts are full of examples of Gods not always being perfect, the idea that pointing that out will change peoples minds is kind of goofy. remusclaw fucked around with this message at 22:56 on Feb 2, 2017 |
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Feb 2, 2017 21:06
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Edit: ^^^ Yes!MrJacobs posted:No because Q is more of a god in every way and has visited the station showing that he is far more powerful than the prophets. If anything the Q continuum should have made Atheism more apparent since you can argue with gods, and win, limiting their functions as almighty beings as Kira looks upon them as such. It's easy to just wave off the prophets as "worm hole aliens" because unless you are a prophet gently caress baby like Sisko, they don't do any poo poo outside of the wormhole and you have met creatures that function as actual deities. That's a good point. I forgot about Q. I still think that beings like Q and any number of things in TOS would render atheism as we know it obsolete. It would either have to morph into something like Luciferianism (which accepts that god/gods exist, but knowingly and willfully rejects their power, if not their existence), or mass conversion to "Q-ism" or the Bajoran religion. Being able to argue with them shouldn't have much bearing, because the gods of human history were argued with successfully in mythology all the time. After an entire Dominion fleet vanishes at the wrath of the Prophets, though, I would think a ton of people in the galaxy would seriously reconsider what god or gods they placed stock in. That was dope as hell, and way more of a tangible benevolence than whatever vague, metaphorical poo poo human (or Vulcan or Betazoid, etc) gods had been peddling for millennia.
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Feb 2, 2017 21:11
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Railing Kill posted:Edit: ^^^ Yes! Yes, but the Q WERE that metaphorical human poo poo for millennia, because they could and thought it was fun to gently caress with Earth.
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Feb 2, 2017 21:14
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Railing Kill posted:Agreed on everything. But the third point kind of stands out to me. Wouldn't a scientifically proven deity go the other way for Atheism? I mean, here are beings that are, for all intents and purposes godlike, and yet they verifiably exist, unlike every other god in at least human memory. That would seem to take a lot of the air out of the ol' "god is dead" balloon. Seen this way, Kira seems more enlightened than anyone giving her poo poo about her gods. At least hers are real, and not believing in them is as nonsensical as not believing in any other observable phenomena. I say this as an atheist, but one who isn't a huge dickbag about it and who actually reads and appreciates theology sometimes. It's unrealistic there's ANY sort of religion or spiritualism in the future everyone should be a 100% logical atheist with views only based on pure science like that its an evo psych fact that angry women are illogical and annoying. Who cares if the bajoran's culture was massively influenced by the prophets who took an interest in them and gifted them orbs and gave people visions and poo poo to direct their culture, the moment it was proven that their gods are actually real they should have abandoned their entire culture for some reason despite the fact that proving their gods are real and all the prophecies are true would only strengthen people's faith. No, they should simply study the wormhole aliens with in a detached and objective way because all culture and religion is dumb.
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Feb 2, 2017 21:16
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Kira and Sisko both get over their anger issues by the end of the show.
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Feb 2, 2017 21:16
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Baronjutter posted:It's unrealistic there's ANY sort of religion or spiritualism in the future everyone should be a 100% logical atheist with views only based on pure science like that its an evo psych fact that angry women are illogical and annoying. Who cares if the bajoran's culture was massively influenced by the prophets who took an interest in them and gifted them orbs and gave people visions and poo poo to direct their culture, the moment it was proven that their gods are actually real they should have abandoned their entire culture for some reason despite the fact that proving their gods are real and all the prophecies are true would only strengthen people's faith. No, they should simply study the wormhole aliens with in a detached and objective way because all culture and religion is dumb. Hahahaha Man, I still have almost three seasons of ENT to watch, and now all I want to do is watch DS9. 
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Feb 2, 2017 21:19
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Yeah, season 1 kira is quite different from season 7 kira. She learns cardassians aren't all evil, she comes to trust sisko and the federation, she realizes the organized religion side of her faith is full of bullshit and politics, becomes less racist against ferengi coming to actually respect rom as a fellow brave terrorist and not hate quark anymore. Tons of growth and mellowing and it all makes sense because ds9 is good.
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Feb 2, 2017 21:22
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Well, valid points aside, I think there's a much bigger issue we're ignoring here. Most of the Prophets and Pah wraiths stuff in DS9 is kind of rear end. I think that at times the writers were making good points about spirituality's role in culture or the power of faith or the ambiguity of divinity, but holy poo poo all that Chosen One bullshit is annoying. Babylon 5 has the same issues (from the half of it I've seen), but that at least has the excuse of having all that Lord of the Rings stuff baked right into its DNA. Trek's treatment of mysticism, fate, and the sublime has always been more about the power of free will and rational thought to overcome the seemingly insurmountable, so suddenly having all that "follow the path" stuff in there isn't an easy fit (especially since the writers couldn't decide how much they wanted Sisko to listen to it). Also, ultimate struggles between good and evil are annoying and trite and the whole thing where there's a preordained destiny often feels like lazy "mythic" writing at the best of times and doesn't really work that well in a show that's not written very far in advance. There are a lot of individual good episodes dealing with prophet and orb stuff, but there's also a lot of crap in there (making Sisko a loving demigod is top of the list) and I don't think the overall "myth arc" works particularly well. Turning the Bajorans into the Planet of Pope Hats was also a huge disservice to what could have been a fascinating and nuanced culture. Exploring organized religion is fine, but whole sectors of Bajoran society (commerce, entertainment secular art, urban life, etc.) never got fleshed out at all and they always felt really flat as a result. For all it's good intentions, DS9 really reinforced the stereotype that "spiritual" people are all either hypocrites, fanatics, or noble salt of the earth types who only care about God, family, and farming.
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Feb 2, 2017 21:45
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Yeah after watching BSG all the way through I wonder if they actually needed a Berman-like figure to push back on some of that poo poo. I sometimes wonder if berman wasn't there being an idiot who didn't "get" ds9 if ds9 would have just gone fully up its religious prophesy rear end in a top hat like BSG did.
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Feb 2, 2017 21:54
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Baronjutter posted:Yeah after watching BSG all the way through I wonder if they actually needed a Berman-like figure to push back on some of that poo poo. I sometimes wonder if berman wasn't there being an idiot who didn't "get" ds9 if ds9 would have just gone fully up its religious prophesy rear end in a top hat like BSG did. Well, Ron Moore ran BSG, but he wasn't in charge of DS9, that's a big difference right there.
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Feb 2, 2017 22:30
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Baronjutter posted:Yeah after watching BSG all the way through I wonder if they actually needed a Berman-like figure to push back on some of that poo poo. I sometimes wonder if berman wasn't there being an idiot who didn't "get" ds9 if ds9 would have just gone fully up its religious prophesy rear end in a top hat like BSG did. If Rick Berman's involvement got us Voyager, and his absence got us BSG (or DS9 resembling it at times), I'd like to double down on my desire to shoot Rick Berman into the sun. I mean, I get that the mystical stuff in BSG fell flat most of the time, but that show was still good overall, even with its flaws.
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Feb 2, 2017 22:31
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The religious aspects of BSG aren't nearly as weak as the entire cast of supposed adults acting like teenagers all the time
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Feb 2, 2017 22:39
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Tsaedje posted:The religious aspects of BSG aren't nearly as weak as the entire cast of supposed adults acting like teenagers all the time There needs to be constant drama and tension all the time! If a single second goes by without serious drama just, just make something happen happen. Humans are emotional and weird, don't bother about consistent characters or motivation, just make them do random stupid poo poo to create drama. Crank that up to 11 in every scene, never let up. If anyone questions it say a space god did it.
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Feb 2, 2017 22:41
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A lot of BSG's problems with its spiritual stuff can be solved by removing all references to any kind of Cylon plan. As soon as that word shows up you start setting up expectations of explanations because how could the Cylons have a plan if they didn't understand it? Also Kira is great. She isn't at her best in the first season though. Either through acting, direction, or both a lot of her anger comes down to just yelling a lot but then you have moments like that time she knocks Damar right the gently caress out.
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Feb 2, 2017 23:33
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Also the fact that she was able to work closely with Damar after all the poo poo he did was not something early seasons Kira could have done. Damar is also another character that has a hell of an arc. In ds9 even minor characters can get the spotlight and more growth than the entire cast of Voyager combined.
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Feb 2, 2017 23:36
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Also, the best romance in all of Star Trek is Quark and Grilka.
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Feb 2, 2017 23:46
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Pakled posted:Also, the best romance in all of Star Trek is Quark and Grilka.
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Feb 2, 2017 23:52
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Tsaedje posted:The religious aspects of BSG aren't nearly as weak as the entire cast of supposed adults acting like teenagers all the time I dunno this is pretty accurate to what most adults are like in my experience
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Feb 2, 2017 23:52
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I liked BSG's religious stuff because it was a consistent through-line throughout the series, was never explained away, and still were surprised and annoyed that the series ended with "Yeah, God did it. That dude mentioned all the time".
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Feb 3, 2017 00:00
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Kira is incredibly diplomatic imo, she pretends to actually give a poo poo about anything Kai Winn has to say on at least two occasions. I think that's more than any other character. Besides Dukat of course.
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Feb 3, 2017 01:37
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Tighclops posted:I dunno this is pretty accurate to what most adults are like in my experience
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Feb 3, 2017 01:49
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Pwnstar posted:Kira is incredibly diplomatic imo, she pretends to actually give a poo poo about anything Kai Winn has to say on at least two occasions. I think that's more than any other character. Besides Dukat of course. If I remember correctly, she actually agreed with Winn theologically and supported her bid to become Kai until the whole "trying to assassinate Bareil" thing.
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Feb 3, 2017 01:56
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Pakled posted:If I remember correctly, she actually agreed with Winn theologically and supported her bid to become Kai until the whole "trying to assassinate Bareil" thing. There wasn't a lot of theological debate beyond very simple "are they gods or aliens or whatever". Like, we never got any arguments about how many inches should be circumcised from male Bajorans or whatever, the stuff that really makes up interreligious conflict.
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Feb 3, 2017 02:02
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Double post
WickedHate fucked around with this message at 02:07 on Feb 3, 2017 |
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Feb 3, 2017 02:02
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Tighclops posted:I dunno this is pretty accurate to what most adults are like in my experience There was probably less high school drama among grown-rear end adults in BSG than there was at my last retail job. And that's not even including the loving customers. But I've always figured that if you blow up the world and toss the only survivors onto a collection of lovely tin cans for a few years, people will eventually break down a bit whether they're career military or teenage civilians or anything else.
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Feb 3, 2017 02:06
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Most of the survivors on BSG spent the entire four years on the space equivalent of a 747. It's amazing they hadn't all killed each other after six weeks of being cooped up like that. There is a ship in that fleet full of people who caught their connection out of the 12 Colonies equivalent of Atlanta after a six hour delay wishing they had caught a Cylon nuke before the end of 33. sunday at work fucked around with this message at 02:23 on Feb 3, 2017 |
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Feb 3, 2017 02:14
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Kai Winn's leadership of Bajor is basically Trump; flipping her poo poo over minor things, threatening everyone, complaining about people not respecting her when all she does is poo poo on everyone.
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Feb 3, 2017 02:15
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