That last season of Penny Dreadful - I mean, the show already operated at such operatic heights of Grand Guignol, I found his Dr. Jekyll to be just that much more thinly sketched and one-note a character that already spent a lot of time playing against and into well-established genre archetypes. In Latif’s defense, I…

I don’t think it a certainty - but it’s certainly consistent with the nebulous ethic we’ve seen Lorca operating by these past few episodes. It’s part of what makes him a compelling, interesting character, that Isaacs’ performance and the writing support this view where we get to see both ruthless pragmatism and a…

I’m guessing you’ve seen Shatner’s Chaos on the Bridge documentary. Which mostly just crystallizes the rumors and open secrets that’ve floated about the anarchic first couple of seasons of TNG’s production. In that frame, it’s astounding that TNG managed to right its ship at all.

I beg to differ. The first season or two of DS9 had plenty enough clunkers - ‘Move Along Home’? ‘If Wishes Were Horses’? ‘Melora’? In your credit, though - those entries were probably no worse than anything the first season of TNG had to offer.

One realizes that the terrible tension Discovery has to walk upon being that there are fundamental, structural, tectonic issues with the Trek formula that this show has got to address. At least, that’s been to my eyes, the most distinct source of consternation going on amidst the fans in the months, years of buildup…

FWIW, Zack and the other AV Club writers that’ve given treatments to the various Trek shows over the years have a clear fondness for the property. But moreover, have given decent indication they approach each series as its own unique entity. But one that still exists within a meta-continuity and franchise that goes…

Walter White. Don Draper. Tony Soprano. Whatever iteration of Bruce Wayne is on television this week.

I mean- the tricky part about any prequel being that every word in every minute of every episode is by definition, ret-con. Some certainly more noteworthy than others. There are certainly more central criticisms in that vein - not the least of which being Spock’s adoptive human sister that he never mentioned.

Not that it’ll necessarily be consolation - but remember when TNG premiered? Essentially the same kinds of arguments were bandied about. And again, when DS9 premiered, if phrased differently. Voyager got off relatively scot-free in this regard, by virtue of prior spin-off successes. But Enterprise certainly took on a…

Speaking only for myself - I’m cool with the show putting the Klingons on a backburner for a bit, as we can stand to get to know the core ensemble on Discovery a little better. Even if I’m not certain this particular episode delivers so much on that regard.

I mean - I don’t think it’s unreasonable to acknowledge that certain franchise properties carry the weight of certain kinds of expectation surrounding them. For comparison, when Star Wars movies come out - the fan chorus of naysaying and fanboying swell operatically, even before the broad ubiquity of social media.…

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I don’t think your argument is without merit, but I’m reminded that DS9 and Voyager had premises that featured a certain degree of built-in conflict, even if those properties chose to progress with those arcs in very different ways.

I should probably clarify that I’m arguing from a position of general agreement. The list of most decorated captains felt more like a fanwank than anything particularly enriching, or an earned homage.

To my mind, the rotating storyboard for the ensemble sounds great in theory, and perhaps through the lens of nostalgia. But I also decidedly remembered at the time, it also just lampshaded the most significantly underserved, underwritten characters. Voyager seemed guilty of this often enough - Enterprise, to a similar…

This has me thinking about the ways conflict between characters has been evolving over the course of the series. The pilot was jarring, insofar as we hadn’t much time at all to get to know Burnham, Georgiou, Saru before putting their relationships to the test.

It’s not hard to imagine that future history operates not unlike our own - periods of relative calm, with regional conflicts, punctuated by more infrequent larger-scale conflict. The large span between TNG and Nemesis essentially depicts one of these shifts in galactic geopolitics, where what appears to be a period of…

This does seem like a potentially confuddling point. Burnham has zero clue about the spore drive when she comes aboard Discovery. Even being in the clink for six months, having zero clue about the project suggests some degree of compartmentalization. It doesn’t seem like the same kind of secrecy surrounded the…

The first several entries - Burnham being so central, at the cost of what we think of as a traditional Trek ensemble cast. Adding the ensemble, filling in around her seems like an interesting, smart decision to me - a natural outflow from choosing to keep Michael so central to the premise. This is the right time to…

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