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BonHair posted:Are there any serious (as in not explicitly comedy or for kids) sci-fi/fantasy that is not terribly written with world ending stakes? The real issue is that everyone is too focused on plot twists and effects and no one cares about characters and stories. The setting is less important, it's about what you do with it.
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Apr 24, 2023 01:58
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Gaz-L posted:This is what has me dreading Starfleet Academy. The stakes in that should be "one of the leads is being framed by the lovely upperclassmen for cheating" and that will work if the characters are worth caring about. But nope, more "fate of the galaxy" bullshit based on the logline They should have one of those “days since accident” counters but for Stardates because apparently it gets reset back to 1 at the end of every season of a NuTrek show now due to HOW EPIC OF A STORY IT WAS!!!!
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Apr 24, 2023 05:52
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2 to 1 odds that the big arching story of season 1 of Starfleet Academy is that one of the cadets stumbles upon a conspiracy within Starfleet to (insert rehashed evil Admiral(s) story here). It can't just be some neat story about young people going to Space College and experiencing college things but with sci-fi plot devices. It's gotta involve some planet getting destroyed by a superweapon and the season finale will be the motley group of untested students banding together to save the day. And also one of them will die terribly and provide a Phil Coulson-esque morale boost to the rest of them.
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Apr 24, 2023 06:00
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Modern Trek's actually been pretty good about avoiding the evil admiral cliche. It's something that I was really pleased about with Discovery, that Future Starfleet didn't have some deep dark secret, and Admiral Vance, the President, and Cronenberg were all on the up-and-up.
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Apr 24, 2023 06:09
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What a Starfleet Academy show set in the 31st century should feature: A prank in which the gravity is turned off in the cafeteria, prompting a zero-G food fight. Maybe a sideplot or two featuring characters who are apprehensive about joining Starfleet after Starfleet was a non-factor for centuries after the Dilithium Rapture. Maybe new alien races who have recently joined the Federation becoming the first of their kind to join Starfleet and the various fish out of water scenarios that can be explored as a result. What a Starfleet Academy show set in the 31st century will probably feature: A whole shuttlecraft full of students being exploded by a Magnetar. The Federation President being melted somehow while giving a speech. Boothby XXII being a triple agent for the Breen Confederacy (and shooting a quantum laser rocket at someone). Some militant offshoot of a long-forgotten species will appear and melt some capitol city like Rome or Paris or Gary, Indiana. Elements of Starfleet will be in league with said long-forgotten species and they will justify it by explaining that times are tough since the status quo has been re-established and that the Federation has become soft again blah blah blah.
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Apr 24, 2023 06:11
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Angry Salami posted:Modern Trek's actually been pretty good about avoiding the evil admiral cliche. It's something that I was really pleased about with Discovery, that Future Starfleet didn't have some deep dark secret, and Admiral Vance, the President, and Cronenberg were all on the up-and-up. This is true, and I don't disagree with you, but you have to assume that the writers were contorting themselves every which way to avoid falling into that story trap. Every atom in their bodies wanted to do it, and it took obscene self control to NOT do that. The whole writer's room was probably just people covered in cold flop sweats and stifiling screams because of how painful it must've been to not do "Evil Admirals: Version 20". I fear that the Starfleet Academy show won't be so lucky. But I hope i'm wrong!
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Apr 24, 2023 06:13
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Disco did not avoid it. Section 31 is exactly the badmirals thing, they've just spun it off into specific Evil Organization for bureaucratic convenience.
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Apr 24, 2023 06:15
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And there was Evil Admiral Romulan in Picard S1. Also Lower Decks did pull an evil admiral too with Admiral Beunamigo but TBH that was probably an evil admiral tribute, he was even named Admiral Goodfriend. MikeJF fucked around with this message at 06:26 on Apr 24, 2023 |
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Apr 24, 2023 06:24
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What’s his name in the Discovery future was definitely portrayed as a possible badmiral for his first several appearances and is occasionally still portrayed as a meddler.
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Apr 24, 2023 06:24
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Gonz posted:It can't just be some neat story about young people going to Space College and experiencing college things No because that's Prodigy.
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Apr 24, 2023 06:36
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I realized out of the blue that Darmok can be seen as kind of a commentary on Arena (Kirk vs the Gorn). It kind of encapsulates what the series are about, where TOS is more of a Space Adventure. TNG doesn't really lose that, but it's showing that risking it all just for the chance mutual understanding, is the radical idea the series is about. As much as I think DS9 has better ongoing story, characters and almost everything, I can't think of any episodes that embody a philosophy like this.
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Apr 24, 2023 08:46
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Gonz posted:2 to 1 odds that the big arching story of season 1 of Starfleet Academy is that one of the cadets stumbles upon a conspiracy within Starfleet to (insert rehashed evil Admiral(s) story here). Its going to do 100% the same steps as that Addams family franchise spinoff Wednesday just recently did. Our main protag has a troubling past or bad reputation, and instead of monster eating students its going to be "Galaxy is at peril" and by the fourth episode of the ten episode season the Starfleet Academy is just a backdrop that might as well not exist for the rest of the season. Through the story arc our protagonist finds a love and reluctantly makes new best friends, and in the final being rescued by them understands that friendships makes the starships better. The stereotypical bubbly girl/kawaii friend who appears utterly useless idiot or comic relieve turns out to be a huge badass when she needs to rescue her friends. And the badly shoehorned love interest will actually be the main villain. I may need to lay down and/or vomit. Der Kyhe fucked around with this message at 09:41 on Apr 24, 2023 |
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Apr 24, 2023 09:12
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Oh man, I am so mad at this plot summary I just made up!
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Apr 24, 2023 09:52
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Angry Salami posted:Oh man, I am so mad at this plot summary I just made up! "Made up", its a collection of all hacky writing stereotypes that are currently en vogue. Not to mention its literally the plot of the Wednesday Season 1. Well, not the starship part but the rest of it. I have no confidence on Star Trek writers on trying to come up with anything even approaching original, if they get the work done by blatantly copypasting tropes and storylines from more successful shows. Especially since another "fish out of water ends up in a boarding school/college" just topped all of the metrics and charts world-wide.
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Apr 24, 2023 10:23
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I'm always mad about Star Trek.
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Apr 24, 2023 13:46
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Beachcomber posted:I realized out of the blue that Darmok can be seen as kind of a commentary on Arena (Kirk vs the Gorn). It kind of encapsulates what the series are about, where TOS is more of a Space Adventure. I've had the same idea. The neat thing too is that the aliens are striving to make themselves understood, while the humans are misinterpreting. "I will not fight you." Rather than having to convince the aliens.
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Apr 24, 2023 13:59
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CainFortea posted:No because that's Prodigy. Nah, Prodigy s2 is gonna be Janeway taking her motley band of prodigies on Voyager to go and find Chakotay in the bad future. The other problem with a 'fate of the universe' plot in Academy is that it seems pretty likely at least Mary Wiseman is gonna be in the show. So, like, the cadets should just tell Lt Cdr Tilly (I assume they'll promote her again between Discos S5 and Academy S1) about the conspiracy and she tells Admiral Vance or Captain Saru or Burnham and... the problem gets solved by actual officers? Gaz-L fucked around with this message at 14:23 on Apr 24, 2023 |
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Apr 24, 2023 14:20
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They should make Starfleet Academy in the style of an 80's summer camp/highschool movie but without the sexual harassment stuff.
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Apr 24, 2023 14:22
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John F Bennett posted:They should make Starfleet Academy in the style of an 80's summer camp/highschool movie but without the sexual harassment stuff. That's hardly true to Roddenberry's vision
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Apr 24, 2023 14:26
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John F Bennett posted:They should make Starfleet Academy in the style of an 80's summer camp/highschool movie but without the sexual harassment stuff. If you stripped the sexual harassment out of 80s teen summer movies you would be left with the end credits.
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Apr 24, 2023 14:28
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Watched The Undiscovered Country last night. Though I don't mean to drag nu-trek into this thread, it struck me how quite different the approaches of the movie are when compared to Picard. Both of them are thematically about old characters having one last adventure, but whereas STVI is about old timers struggling, but at the end optimistically accepting the future to come, Picard is...well...
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Apr 24, 2023 14:28
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Communist Bear posted:Watched The Undiscovered Country last night. Though I don't mean to drag nu-trek into this thread, it struck me how quite different the approaches of the movie are when compared to Picard. Both of them are thematically about old characters having one last adventure, but whereas STVI is about old timers struggling, but at the end optimistically accepting the future to come, Picard is...well... Because Nick Meyer is a good writer.
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Apr 24, 2023 14:39
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I have no issues with the character beats of Picard Season 3, they are largely thematically appropriate and give the characters a send-off they were cheated out of by Nemesis bombing as hard as it did. It's just the plot progression that was bad. They either did a poor job at conveying how much control the Borg Queen had over Jack, making him go to her, or Jack is basically an irredeemable monster for voluntarily going down a path that he knew would kill tens of thousands of people because he was having a hissy fit at his parents. I just don't know why they didn't have Vadic successfully capture him and take him to the Borg. Then it could have lead to a scene with the Queen double crossing Vadic and answering the question once and for all if a changeling can be assimilated.
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Apr 24, 2023 14:45
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bull3964 posted:I have no issues with the character beats of Picard Season 3, they are largely thematically appropriate and give the characters a send-off they were cheated out of by Nemesis bombing as hard as it did. I dunno to be honest, the character beats of Worf, Riker etc were pretty much fine, but Picard has been completely off. I guess they're thematically appropriate if you pretend he's suffering from dementia and everyone is just playing along. EDIT: Anyway i'll drop it, this is not the right thread. Communist Bear fucked around with this message at 14:53 on Apr 24, 2023 |
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Apr 24, 2023 14:49
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I thought Endgame was fine, but ending the whole thing just ending with them being escorted to earth was a real gently caress up. They should've had at least a full episode of them dealing with returning to the AQ.
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Apr 24, 2023 14:58
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zoux posted:I thought Endgame was fine, but ending the whole thing just ending with them being escorted to earth was a real gently caress up. They should've had at least a full episode of them dealing with returning to the AQ. Or a television miniseries. Voyager: Homecoming
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Apr 24, 2023 15:03
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Also combining the birth of baby Paris with the achievement of the singular goal of the show was a real miss, do that 3 episodes prior. The best part of Endgame was all the future stuff where we found out what happened to everyone in the original timeline, to just skip that for a hasty 5 minute wrap up that doesn't feel like the end of anything is stupid. At least All Good Things and What you Leave Behind ended with some sort of stylized shot, Voyager gets home from the Delta Quadrant and their reward is a Congartulations! from Lt. Cdr. Broccoli.
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Apr 24, 2023 15:13
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Tunicate posted:That's hardly true to Roddenberry's vision Hastily scrawls "ps everyone consented, it was all role playing" at the end of the script.
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Apr 24, 2023 15:13
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I only have preemptive strike and all good things to go. I’m trying to wait for when I can sit for awhile and do them uninterrupted. This is more difficult than it sounds because hockey playoffs, but I’ll get there.
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Apr 24, 2023 15:20
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zoux posted:I thought Endgame was fine, but ending the whole thing just ending with them being escorted to earth was a real gently caress up. They should've had at least a full episode of them dealing with returning to the AQ. Or if they really wanted to end the show there, instead of doing a time travel episode, do an in media res thing where the episode goes back and forth between their return to Earth and the events that brought them back.
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Apr 24, 2023 15:29
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Endgame starts with a very underwhelming bit of Voyager in the other timeline returning and flying under San Francisco, I always thought that what they should've done was a fakeout of the opening credits: start with the same shot past the sun, but then she's followed by Starfleet ships escorting her in, and the opening credits are her approaching earth, with beats that mirror the normal credits, and she lands at the same moment she normally goes to warp.
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Apr 24, 2023 15:32
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Endgame did get Janeway crossing wits with the only villain she hadn't yet, herself. So that was fun.
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Apr 24, 2023 15:34
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Making the finale a Janeway/Seven episode is at least fitting, why break the pattern of the last four seasons
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Apr 24, 2023 15:38
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I suppose it is fitting that a show that barely engaged with its own premise would barely acknowledge the resolution of that premise.
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Apr 24, 2023 15:43
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magic school bus academy show teaching science and engineering concepts
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Apr 24, 2023 18:21
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If they’d skipped some of the poorer Season 7 episodes (would anyone miss Captain Harry Kim or Tom Paris takes a driving test), they could have had a few episodes on Earth - personally I’d have liked to see ‘The Court-Martial of Kathryn Janeway’, where she’s forced to justify things like murdering Tuvix, making a deal with the Borg or the whole Equinox situation. End with her being found guilty, but due to the public goodwill surrounding the whole Voyager story she’s promoted to Admiral and given a desk job.
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Apr 24, 2023 18:34
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Tom Paris takes a driving test owns, especially since the other half of that episode is Chakotay Bullshit
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Apr 24, 2023 18:40
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What's to justify? Tuvix was a monster who's existence was a perpetual murder of two crewmen. The deal with the borg was the only way to deal with a threat greater than the borg, and dealing with Captain Ransom by chasing him down and stopping him from brutally murdering any more aliens was the right move.
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Apr 24, 2023 18:41
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zoux posted:Tom Paris takes a driving test owns, especially since the other half of that episode is Chakotay Bullshit
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Apr 24, 2023 18:44
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CainFortea posted:What's to justify? Tuvix was a monster who's existence was a perpetual murder of two crewmen. The deal with the borg was the only way to deal with a threat greater than the borg, and dealing with Captain Ransom by chasing him down and stopping him from brutally murdering any more aliens was the right move. yes but have you considered that this way we can make a clip show ep?
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Apr 24, 2023 18:46
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