#also michael burnham is an amazing character and one of the most interesting captains in all of star trek

[lostyesterday]

It kind of irritates me that there is a broad expectation in Star Trek spaces that everyone should automatically agree that Discovery is a messy show that wasn’t made very well. Even a lot of people who like the show will preface their statements with “I know it has a lot of problems” or something similar. Personally, I think Discovery is great and one of the least messy Trek shows writing-wise. I have no problem with people who disagree with that sentiment and don’t like Discovery (as long as it’s for non-bigoted reasons), I just wish there wasn’t this base assumption that no one actually completely likes Discovery or thinks it’s genuinely good.

Well, I like Discovery, and I think it’s genuinely good.

[nebulouscoffee]

7, 23, 27, and 33 for the Star Trek ask meme?

Thank you for the ask!

7. Who would make up your crew dream team?

You know, this is something I've thought about before (shoutout to @fancy-a-dance-brigadier for always asking the real questions lol) - but I could never quite find an answer I was satisfied with! Because I don't think taking all my favourites and smushing them together works, they just aren't as interesting together as mixups between characters who have bigger ideological differences. Like, he might be my fav captain but I don't want to choose Sisko over Janeway and Picard, I want to see him interact with Janeway and Picard, you know? So here's a sort of half-cooked, this-would-change-every-time-you-asked-me answer:

Captain: Ben Sisko First Officer: Michael Burnham (I wanna see them interact!!) Chief of Operations: Data Chief Xenoanthropologist: Chakotay (I know this is not an actual position in Star Trek but it should be!! The dude who makes sure dealings with alien cultures are being handled with respect, basically) Chief of Security: La'an Singh (trying to mix and match here) Chief Science Officer: Jadzia Dax (ft. Harry Kim always giving her ideas) Counsellor: Deanna Troi (ft. trainee Ezri Tigan) Chief Medical Officer: Julian Bashir (ft. Kes starting graphic and unhinged conversations about autopsies with him) Chief Engineer: Geordi La Forge (ft. B'Elanna on staff. Drama!!!) Helmsman: Ro Laren Communications: Hoshi Sato Also There: Kira Nerys (recurring character who works with them when it's relevant), Guinan (bartender), Admiral Picard (recurring character that makes Sisko do the iconic "Kai Winn is boarding the station" facepalm), Jake Sisko (son), Garak (local menace), and Admiral Janeway (temporal menace)

23. Favorite tropes?

Character's past comes back to haunt them. Character is forced to confront their inner demons in a way that blurs the line between imagination and reality. Member of an alien society seeks asylum. A peek into the world from the "outsider" character's eyes. Two people from opposite sides are forced to spend time together (and the guest character SLAPS). Captain is out of commission and the unlikeliest people are forced to step up. Oh no the holodeck isn't shutting down and the only way we can save everyone's life is to LARP through this thing fully committing to the bit. Here is a spacial anomaly that makes everyone act weird one by one (either revealing important hidden truths about the characters, or just letting the actors have too much fun). ALL of us have to go back in time together for some stupid reason (and it's amazing)

27. What do you wish they had handled differently?

SO many potential answers- but since it's always on my mind, I wish they'd followed through on the thread of Jem'Hadar dissent. In 'The Abandoned' we find out they're genetically engineered to (rapidly) grow very strong, be dependant on drugs, and loyal to the Founders while demanding no individual rights, which frames them as tragic victims. Then we get a Jem'Hadar character who not only broke free of the Dominion's hold on him, not only expresses but also acts on the dream of freeing his fellow soldiers- and a lead character (Julian) risks his career for him! Sisko tries to get through to them in 'Rocks and Shoals'. They're so clearly complex beings with unique thoughts & personalities & feelings & needs, and are constantly fighting this inhumanely imposed programming that tells them they're just killing machines who live to serve their masters. Even in lighthearted episodes like 'One Little Ship' we see conflict between the Gamma and Alpha Quadrant soldiers, for example. We could've had this be relevant to the Dominion War's resolution! We could've had a defector Jem'Hadar as a recurring character! We could've had Julian finally make that breakthrough & help start a Jem'Hadar revolt!! It could've been so much more interesting (and so much less racist)

33. Whose twitter feed would you most want to follow?

My first instinct was Dax, but I'm leaning more towards Jake Sisko- I feel like because he's the son of a Starfleet officer (but not in the service himself) he'd have absolutely zero fear of authority & he'd just post the most savage things about prominent Starfleet officers and blow up incredibly unflattering pics of all the admirals lol

[mylittleredgirl]

trekathon: disco 1x04

“the butcher’s knife cares not for the lamb’s cry”:

okay

remember how in the last post i was like “context is for kings” is a title for the star trek hall of fame

“the butcher’s knife cares not for the lamb’s cry” is the opposite. banished. no joke, i stopped watching discovery when it aired the first time around for like a month because i saw that title and went “actually i am a fragile soul and i do not want to see what’s behind a door labeled the butcher’s knife cares not for the lamb’s cry.” 

which is a shame because that was a month of my life in which i did not know that michael made friends with a tardigrade the size of a small car.

EvilWatch 2255:

michael gets invited to lorca’s chamber of horrors, which features the deadliest weapons in the galaxy and what may or may not be a cardassian vole vivisected on a table

“i study war,” he explains, which -- in my experience -- is exactly what one can expect an angry white man to say when they show you the functioning arsenal they keep in their garage

i love knowing that lorca is a long-suffering mirror universe transplant because his frustration at discovery’s lack of battle-readiness makes sense in context -- he’s a military-minded captain trying to helm a science ship in a bloody war -- but it’s hilarious when you realize he’s looking around at these meek science softies like “i have seen ALL of you murder AT LEAST one person with your bare hands can you PLEASE up your game a little”

meanwhile, klingons:

i remember being surprised to learn that voq and l’rell had a love affair, so i’m keeping an eye on it this time

that’s definitely the most sexually charged removal of a dilithium processor i’ve ever seen so i buy it

i don’t know what kind of awards we should be giving these actors for creating such vibrant performances in another language under 90 pounds of latex and contacts that fill their entire eyes but uhhhh i’m fucking impressed

i recall people being WILDLY upset about the exo-cannibalism thing as non-canon, as though klingons in all series do not regularly exchange recipes for eating the hearts of their enemies

that said? toss a dollar in the tip jar of whichever writer went “you know what, this should probably be one of those tell-don’t-show narrative beats”

michael burnham must suffer:

her shoving the package under the bed and walking away as soon as she hears “last will and testament” is unfortunately the most relatable thing

petition for michael to lovingly install that magical telescope in her ready room in season 4 🔭😍 

i’m fascinated by michael and saru’s conversation when they seem to agree that she was dismissive of him (she calls herself “selfish”) on the shenzhou. i wish we’d gotten to see more of that in flashbacks so we can better appreciate how she’s grown over the series.

“you will fit in very well with captain lorca” is a lot to say when lorca has just played the audio of dying children screaming for their dying parents over the entire comm system to shame one dude

but nnngggg it’s so INTERESTING how lorca chose these mirror images of the deranged people he knew and tries to enhance the darkest parts of them.

other characters:

lines for owo!! hugh is here! 

we really should not have been surprised that detmer eventually has a nervous breakdown

honestly i love paul’s prickliness in a way i didn’t the first time around. he just wants to talk to his mushrooms and not to people, ok.

admiral cornwell is somehow already exhausted

saru like u USE me?? for my GANGLIA????

we hardly knew ye: “lorca thought you and i would make a good team,” landry says, and i can only assume that in the mirror universe their team dynamics work better than michael as the screaming voice of reason while landry tries to bum-rush an unstoppable living tank and then dies about it.

an ongoing list of ~It’s Not Canon~ things i have chosen to ignore:

“the nature of humanity is just that every so often someone accidentally invents holographic communications again” (see also: those three episodes of deep space nine; the 32nd century)

other moments of delight:

landry saying “weps are double-hot” to announce that tactical is on-line is amazing and i will now imagine tuvok saying that every time janeway asks him to ready phasers

michael getting slurped at by the tardigrade

free-range tardigrade in the spore garden!! 

[discotreque]

Disco 3.3: People of Earth

That's three for three on episodes making me sob-while-smiling through the credits. Like sure, I'll cry at anything, including plenty of times in the past two seasons, but this bittersweet grief-spiked hope is new to the show's emotional repertoire. And maybe it's where I'm at in my personal life these days, maybe it's a little more universal—but for some reason "grief-spiked hope" is really hitting right now.

Spoilers from Stardate 865211.3(!):

This season continues to just luxuriate in character moments that used to feel conspicuously rushed. Saru and Michael have been rivals-turned-friends and colleagues for close to a decade now, through some of the worst shit of both of their lives, and here the script finally lets them show all the love and tenderness and camaraderie that so far have mostly been between the lines of Sonequa and Doug's performances.

And her reunion with Tilly? And the conversation in front of the memorial wall, and Tilly understanding that she might never understand what's happened to Michael, but accepting it anyway, and loving her as fiercely and unconditionally as ever??? 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

And then Georgiou tries to give Book the shovel talk re: Michael and he just shuts. her. DOWN. And manages to do it with such smooth charm that I didn't even fear for his life? Grudge is a queen and I think we've found our king, folks.

Not to MENTION how every Bookham(?) interaction just fucking sparkles with chemistry. I'm almost always Team "Let Men and Women Be Platonic" but I mean... I'll make an exception for these two 🥵 And it's not just how desperately I need them to smash—I'm not sure if Michael herself realized it this episode, not in so many words, but it was painfully clear to me that Discovery isn't her home anymore: Book is. And that's beautiful, tbh—everyone should have someone who feels like that, especially Michael Burnham—but it's also a heavy moment of change, and I just really want to see her come out the other side of this happy.

Hey Paul! I know Hugh's not in this episode, but you could at least ask your partner before you go ahead and adopt a whole-ass teenager. I must have rtmisunderstood the pre-season press: I went into this assuming Adira was a Trill, or at least (in the absence of spots) a host, so the big "twist" didn't really land for me. But I already like Blu in "cute chaotic nerd kid" mode, so I'm interested to see what they'll do with "old soul Starfleet admiral" if the plot takes us there.

(I guess I'm just going to avoid using pronouns for the character of Adira until that whole situation is a little clearer? I'm assuming we go to Trill next week, dip Adira in worm juice or something to integrate Admiral Tal's consciousness, and then "Adira Tal" will start using they/them pronouns—but who fucking knows. Mainly I wish Disco would stop issuing self-congratulatory press releases every time they do the bare fucking minimum, but I’m a cranky old queer lady like that.)

Anyway. They're striking a better balance so far this season between episodic plots and an overarching, uh, arc—not so surprising, maybe, given steadier leadership in the writers' room—and I thought the hostile, isolationist United Earth and the Ndoye-vs.-Wen story in this ep were the perfect size and shape to fit between all the longer-term plot points swirling around.

Good news and bad news: I'm back to being more worried about Detmer's fictional well-being than meta-concerned the writers are going to bring back Control via her implant. If you think about it, except for the proximity to her head wound, there's been no in-text suggestion that anything's wrong with her actual cybernetics, and those frightened outbursts this week seemed 100% psychological. So that's promising for the quality of the story, I guess, but I can also tell Emily Coutts and Oyin Oladejo are both winding up to smack me right in the feels with this storyline :(

Okay, so let's talk about what turned out to be the emotional centre of the episode for me: Saru becoming captain of Discovery. And I'm conflicted. I love Saru, and I'd bet he's going to be one of the all-time great Star Trek captains, but... Michael Burnham should have been captain from the very beginning of the series. Or at least by the end of Season 1. And I don't doubt that changed when the concept of the whole show changed during development, from an anthology with standalone seasons to what we actually got. Michael was originally conceived to be a one-season character with a one-season arc, and in the process of writing themselves out of that corner, they wrote themselves into a few new ones.

And I guess it makes sense for both characters at this point in their narratives. And all other factors being equal, a non-ensemble Star Trek with a first officer protagonist is more compelling to me than one focused on a captain. Also, I suspect Michael has even more interesting things to do this season than captain a starship.

But... I don't know. It was a nice moment, and well-executed. There were just too many meta-issues floating around—which have been floating around since 2016, tbh—for me to fully enjoy it. Especially compared to the scene of Michael joining Saru on the bridge at the end, in which Sonequa and Doug outdid themselves yet again <3, and which told us even more about each character and their (beautiful, painful, familial) relationship, and which didn't leave me feeling nearly as :/

I spent most of Picard S1 waiting for the whole season to be released to decide how I felt about it, very much in a "hopefully I'll like it by then" kind of way. Lower Decks started out pretty good, got great, then ended the season halfway through becoming fucking amazing, and I had so much fun I barely even stopped to think about how much fun I was having.

So far Disco S3 has me consciously waiting to form an overall opinion, but not because I'm waiting to like it—because I'm pretty sure I'm going to love it. I've loved each of the three episodes so far, but they're clearly parts of a larger whole, of which I'm really, really excited to see more.

Next week: I don't actually remember, lol. I have a strict only-watch-the-trailer-once policy, and when I watched it yesterday morning, the only part of my brain not still crying about Michael and Saru was distracted by how much I love this season's new STAR TREK: DISCOVERY logotype. I think they go to Trill? Culber is back, and Tilly was definitely there... and that's about all I got. Should be fun!

[thespaceace124]

Tv shows I watched this year, my favorite character from each, and why I like each character.

Since my past few posts about Fandom/TV shows have been kinda negative/ criticism, to end off the year, I wanted to make a few posts about things that I like in media. So today we’ll be taking a look at all the shows I watched/finished this year and my favorite characters from each.

Space Force: Captain Angela Ali. Its been a hot minute since I watched Space force, but iirc she’s just… done like 99% of the time with all of her superiors, but in the ten episodes we get, we see some fun little character moments from her. Like in the war games episode where she has to grapple with being an amazing book student, but has a hard time applying some of the stuff she learned at the military academy in a “combat” situation and has to sort of learn and take the lead from one of her “underlings” who is better in that sort of situation. Also, the bonding moments she has with Chan, like when they’re on the road trip, and when she asks him for help learning some science stuff so she can be more useful on missions and stuff. (again, its been a while since I’ve watched this one so my memory of it is a little foggy)

Stargate SG-1: Colonel Jack O’Neill. I like the tope he falls into of the very surface level sort of gruff military man, doesn’t like talking about his feelings, makes smart ass remarks, asks people who talk to much to get to the point, he’s a very fun character, and adds a lot of fun lightheartedness to the show and is generally enjoyable to have on screen. Also tends to get the most character development, at least regarding his past and sort of why the way that he is. (I would say Teal’c gets the second most), also the reason I got into stargate, as my dad showed me a compilation of him being a smart ass and I was like “oh ho ho, I gotta see more of this guy”

Doctor Who (specifically seasons 11 and 12): The Doctor. I like this version of the Doctor, I like that she a little more lighthearted chaotic as opposed to the previous Doctor, who I would describe as dark chaotic, (at least in s11) and just very fun to be around and watch on screen. Also, I think that the rest of the fam is a little bit underdeveloped? Like, we got a lot of fun stuff for Ryan and Graham in the premier with them being a part of a family unit and then at the end of the season we got a nice little scene of them bonding and Ryan calling him grandad and then in s12 there’s like none of that??? And with Yaz we get that she’s kinda got the usual female companion backstory (not a big fan of her job, not happy living with her family, wants *More* out of life) and then we learn that she got bullied as a kid, and at one point she tried to run away, but a kindhearted cop and her sister??? Managed to keep her in Sheffield. So, I feel a little bit like the doctor is my favorite as a default just because we already know the doctors story, so we’ve just pasted a new personality onto a familiar character.

Deep Space Nine (started 2019): Major Kira Nerys. Straight up the reason this character is my favorite is because my dad said I remind him of her and that makes me feel nice. Also, Nana Visitor is very pretty. Also I like that she takes 0 shit from anyone, including Sisko, but we also get to see her learn and grow  from “I will always voice my disagreement no matter what” to “There is a time and a place to object” and also a little bit of learning that sometimes you have to work with people who’ve hurt you and sometimes that sucks. Anyway, she’s a grade A badass and I love her.

Voyager (started 2019): Captain Kathryn Janeway. Like my reasons for Kira, I think Janeway is a badass, and that Kate Mulgrew is very pretty. But also, I think Janeway is a badass in a different way than Kira is, simply because their characters are in very different situations. But I think Janeway is portrayed to be handling things extremely well, and doing what needs be done, obviously that wasn’t super looked at as they did want to keep the tone of voyager relatively light, but anyway, I like Janeway because she’s someone to look up to, to want to incorporate traits of into your own behavior.

Picard: Rafaella “Raffi” Musiker. I like Raffi because she is one of the most consistent characters in Picard. See imo Picard suffers from having too much on its plate, and also it drops/ abandons too many characters. With a show that has only 10 episodes, especially in a first season, you can’t do that. So, with Raffi being in the majority of the episodes, with consistent characterization that makes sense, and working as someone who can actually keep Picard in check? That’s the best character in the show. Also, I think of actors not seen in Star Trek before, she’s one of the better ones and that makes her better.

Lower Decks: Ensign Beckett Mariner. I love a chaotic smartass. Also, for as much as I love LD being a relatively slice of life comedy, I love that Mariner got a ton of characterization in the last few episodes, especially exploring her relationship with her mom, and people who knew her at the academy. She’s super fun, I love how she’s almost always dunking on Boimler, but also really cares for him and doesn’t want to see him hurt. Again, she’s just super fun to see on screen, I love that she doesn’t really like authority figures, and is content to figure herself out while being a relatively low-ranking officer. I like Mariner because she is both sure of herself, but not totally sure what she wants to do with her career, which is something that Star Trek has never explored before, and I think its super interesting.

Discovery: Commander Michael Burnham. I think a trend with a lot of the characters on this list is that I personally find them cool and/or pretty, and once again that also applies to Michael here, but also, I like her because Michael as a concept is fascinating. Like the idea of being a child who goes through a trauma and then is immediately whisked away to a place where she can’t actually process it? And then as a result grows up emotionally constipated and only in her 30s, is sort of finally able to shed that and actually learn how to be healthy with her emotions? Absolutely fascinating, I love that. I also love that we can kind of see that her upbringing and the suppression of emotions as a child still effects the choices that she’s made to this day. Its super cool, and I think one of the best parts of discovery.

Ratched: Nurse Mildred Ratched. I don’t have anything really important to say here, I just tend to like the main characters of tv shows because by default they get the most development/ back story or whatever, and honestly this is one of those shows that I enjoyed enough to watch all ten episodes, and then never picked it up again, so. Ehhh

Dexter: Dexter Morgan. I like Dexter Morgan because he’s a man who has always been told he doesn’t have emotions, but as the show goes on you can totally see that he does have emotions, he just doesn’t know how to handle them, and that they don’t present themselves in the same way that “normal” people’s do. Like, I fully believe that Dexter did actually love Rita, Harry jr., Deb, and Hannah. But I also believe he didn’t fully know how to cope with those emotions, because instead of getting his son help Harry Morgan decided to turn his son into a killing machine, which was a Choice.

Hannibal: Will Graham. I liked watching him kinda fall into Hannibal’s co-dependency trap. Character regression baybee. But like, that’s what happens, I’m pretty sure at one point they both admit that they aren’t healthy for each other, but they also cant live w/o each other. Which is not a dynamic I personally had seen delved into in media before I watched this show. I just think he’s neat.

ATLA: Toph Beifong. I like Toph because I think she provides a nice foil to Aang, whilst also not going too far into the opposite direction. She’s decisive, she knows for the most part what she wants from this adventure, and mostly how to go about getting it, while also discovering a new family along the way. I also just like the way that she can and will throw a boulder at you if she thinks you deserve it.

Chilling Adventures of Sabrina: Sabrina Spellman. Again, sort of falling into the “I tend to like the main character by default folder” It’s also been a hot minute since I watched this show, so I’m just gonna say that I like Sabrina because she is always the one getting her own self into trouble by being Different. And while I’m not saying that it is always good to conform and do what is expected of you, all of the issues in the show are caused by Sabrina (for the most part). Season one is all about shit falling apart if she doesn’t sign the book, season two is her shaking things up at the witch academy and also not wanting to be the princess of hell (understandable, but again, still her fault) and the whole plot of season 3 is the fallout of her imprisoning the devil and then also being too cocky with the guy made of clay. She’s far too cocky, and I think that’s super funny in regards to how it gets her into situations she’s not really prepared for.

The Coroner (BBC): Beth Kennedy. I watched this show with my stepmom, and in this show, Beth tends to be the one who lightens the mood a lot, so she’s my favorite character b/c of that.

[aion-rsa]

Star Trek Discovery Season 4: What to Expect

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J

Yes, we’re already looking forward to Star Trek: Discovery Season 4. Season 3 saw the show go where no Star Trek has gone before – literally. Flung almost a thousand years into the future after saving all sentient life as we know it, Michael Burnham and her crewmates had to navigate a new and alien reality that bore little resemblance to the one they left behind.

Yet, the decision to send Discovery to the future is possibly the best decision the series has ever made, giving the show a much-needed narrative reset that cut ties to things like Klingon wars and The Original Series legacy characters and sends it off to blaze its own path, unencumbered by the strings of existing canon. But now that Discovery is firmly established in the 32nd century, what can we expect from Star Trek: Discovery‘s upcoming Season 4? We have a few educated guesses…

Michael Burnham Finds Her Feet as Captain

Despite her colorful history as an officer – replete with mutiny, insubordination, and general recklessness – it’s been obvious for a long time that Michael Burnham was destined for the Discovery captain’s chair. The only question was a matter of when. But now that she’s there – what kind of captain will she be?

She could very easily turn out to be one of the Starfleet greats. Despite her flaws, Michael has proven time again that she is smart, capable, and brave. A risk-taker who always comes through in the clutch, she has saved her crew more times than most of us can count and she is a shining example of someone who absolutely believes in the mission of the Federation and the good it can do.

But she’s also often rash and impulsive, and just a few short episodes ago wasn’t even all that certain that she belonged in Starfleet anymore. Granted, many successful male Starfleet captains (cough cough James Kirk cough) are remembered as great precisely because they weren’t huge fans of following the rules, either, so there’s certainly precedent that generally refusing to play things safe is a workable leadership strategy.

Yet, Michael has always found her greatest success as a character when she has an authority figure or structure that is set in opposition to her, so it will be interesting to see how she evolves now that she is the authority she once pushed back against.

What’s Next for Saru?

At the conclusion of “That Hope Is You, Part 2,” Saru took a leave of absence from the Starfleet to go with the young Kelpian refugee Su’Kal back to their home planet of Kaminar. What’s next for him is unclear, but there’s no way Discovery’s planning on writing off this character completely – or losing the talents of actor Doug Jones.

So what’s next for Saru? If he does return to the Discovery, what role can he fulfill now that he’s no longer captain? Does his future lie in the Federation hierarchy somehow, possibly working for Admiral Vance or serving as some sort of ambassador to his people?

A third option could involve Saru taking on an entirely different kind of mission, one that looks a lot like fatherhood of a sort. Ever since his arrival in the 32nd century, Saru has longed to reconnect with his people. Perhaps showing young Su’Kal the stars he’s missed out on all his life is something that might allow him to do just that on a smaller, more intimate scale. (And indulge his dorky dad vibes at the same time.)

Gray Will Return Somehow

During Adira’s trip to the dilithium planet to ferry medicine to Saru and Culber, we learned that the holodeck program on the abandoned Kelpian ship could extrapolate Gray’s consciousness and give him a holographic form. This allowed him to be seen by the other Discovery crew members present, which means that the technology clearly exists which can bring Gray back to life again. Sort of, anyway.

 Because, of course, Gray is technically dead and his consciousness only exists as part of the Tal symbiont inside of Adira, which raises many questions this subplot will eventually have to answer, including how much agency and sentience post-Burn holograms even have to begin with. (Eli the Federation lie detector hologram certainly seems independent enough.)

Culber has promised both Adira and Gray that he will find a way for him to be seen again. But what that will ultimately look like, we don’t yet know. There is precedent for the idea that one part of a Trill’s symbiont memories can live outside it, but does that mean Gray will become a hologram himself permanently? Or can his consciousness be housed in something that has a more physical form?

What’s Book’s Actual Job Now Anyway?

Now that Cleveland Book – and we’re still waiting for the story behind that name, btw – is officially a part of the Discovery crew, it’s time for the series to define his role in this universe beyond his relationship with Michael. Is he technically part of Starfleet now? Is he an officer on Discovery? Does Grudge get a tiny decorated insignia collar? (Please say yes!)

Much of Book’s role in Season 3 was to support Michael in one way or another, whether that meant to literally help introduce her to the new rules of the 32nd century or to provide emotional and tactical help when needed. And don’t get me wrong, Book and Michael have somehow managed to form one of the most functional, normal relationships in Star Trek history. They’re honestly great together. But David Ajala is a tremendously appealing actor and if he’s going to stick around – which I think we’re all in agreement he should – Book needs a meaningful story of his own.

Tilly’s Promotion

Following Michael’s promotion to the Captain’s chair, it certainly looks like Tilly is getting some sort of command-level promotion in Season 4.

Technically she was still an Ensign when serving as Saru’s Acting First Officer, and while she conducted herself admirably during, well, everything, if she’s going to be Michael’s legitimate First Officer – which that last scene would definitely seem to indicate – she deserves to at least become a lieutenant.

Stamets and Michael Will Have to Work Out Their Issues

One of the lingering unresolved plotlines from Season 3 is the massive rift that formed between Paul Stamets and Michael following her decision to physically jettison him from Discovery while it was under Osyraa’s control. To be fair, her choice was completely the correct one, as he was the only one capable of operating the spore drive, and removing him from the equation meant that the Emerald Chain couldn’t just jump back to the Verubin Nebula and all its dilithium.

But, Stamets basically took that decision to mean that Michael was fine with condemning his family to horrific radiation deaths, and that’s going to be a hard thing for him to get over. If you notice, he’s the only person who doesn’t exactly look thrilled at Captain Burnham’s promotion, and we don’t see the two interact again once the ship is reclaimed.

There’s also the question of the spore drive itself. Stamets has tied his own identity – and his worth as part of the Discovery team – pretty tightly to his ability to communicate with the Mycelial network. Now that Book can do the same thing, how will this change things for him?

We’ll Probably See More Episodic Storytelling

Solving the mystery of The Burn and battling the villainous Emerald Chain were both season-long arcs that helped establish Discovery’s place in the future, and allowed Discovery the show to set up the new rules and players of its universe. But now that both those tasks have been accomplished, don’t be surprised if we see a shift toward more episodic storytelling in Season 4.

After all, with a fresh new supply of dilithium to distribute and the entire future to explore, isn’t it time we spent some time seeing what the 32nd century looks like? Some of the most entertaining moments of this season came when Michael and the rest of the Discovery crew found themselves on new planets or adjusting to changed cultures (including their own). Since Discovery purposefully removed itself from all known Star Trek canon, isn’t it time the show got about really establishing some new ones? The revelation that Vulcan and Romulan reunification has indeed happened feels like it should be just the beginning of the surprises this universe has in store for us. What has happened to other species such as Klingons or the Borg? Wouldn’t it be fun to find out?

The Grudge Content We Deserve

One of the few things Discovery fans of all stripes can agree on: Grudge is amazing. And we deserve to see more of her. Whether that means all our initial speculation turns out to be true and she’s actually the secret god of a planet full of telepathic felines we’ve yet to visit or just that she gets her own bridge-safe cat basket so she can hang out with Book and Michael next season, just give the people what they want.

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

Can we at least find out how she and Book ended up together? Throw me a bone – or I guess a cat treat – here, show. (Truly, if we don’t at least get a Short Treks episode about Grudge what are we even doing here?)

The post Star Trek Discovery Season 4: What to Expect appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[biscuitreviews]

Biscuit Reviews Star Trek Discovery (Season 2) (SPOILERS)

After watching the first season of Discovery, I thought, “what first season of Trek isn’t awful, maybe Discovery will hit its stride in the second season.” Then I watched the second season... 

That was a thing.

As mentioned previously in my season one review, technological inconsistencies will not matter and Lore will be taken on a case by case basis. Season 2 will be judged on Season 2 alone, but I will bring up Season 1 events if appropriate. I won’t be going over every episode as Season 2 had a continuing storyline.

Spoilers will be discussed so if you haven’t watched either the first or second season, you’ve been warned.

Season 2 immediately picks up where Season 1 left off, with the USS Discovery answering a distress signal from the USS Enterprise under the command of Captain Christopher Pike. With the Enterprise heavily damaged, Starfleet has tasked Pike to take command of Discovery to continue his mission on investigating seven signals that mysteriously appeared with no explanation.

Having Pike come in is once again an excellent way to bridge this series with the TOS timeline. We also get to see more of Pike himself as our only experience seeing Pike in action is the TOS pilot. Pike is a Captain that will do anything for the crew he serves. He upholds Starfleet’s ideals of peace and exploration. We even get to see Pike still continue to carry the guilt of being able to do nothing during the Federation/Klingon war, something that we also saw in the pilot episode of TOS which was a really nice touch of connecting that this Pike we are seeing is the same Pike from the pilot.

As for where we are exactly in accordance to the TOS timeline, Season 2 takes place at an undetermined amount of time after the events of the TOS pilot. However, from what I have observed with what Discovery presents to us, my guess would be we are about 8 years away from the first episode of Kirk’s command of the Enterprise which we saw in “The Man Trap”. Which would put the events of the pilot happening around the first or second year of Pike’s command of the Enterprise. Take that little detail with a grain of salt, but again, with what we’re presented, I feel this makes the most sense in terms of the timeline of the Prime Universe.

However, despite how awesome Pike was, I felt season 2 used him as a crutch to keep the series up. It seems that the second season wanted to highlight Pike as the main character rather than Michael Burnham, you know, who the series is actually supposed to be about?

Speaking of Michael, what’s her story this season? Finding Spock after he broke out of a psychiatric hospital. Why is Spock in a psychiatric hospital you might ask. He’s there because he’s connected to the seven signals somehow and believes that the creator of the signals, known as the “Red Angel” is communicating with him. Spock also enters a “logic breakdown” trying to figure out if the Red Angel is real or not, seeing how he’s the only person that has had any form of contact with this being.

We’ll get more to Michael’s story soon, but first let’s go ahead and address the elephant in the room. How is Spock in Discovery? He’s fine. I don’t have a problem with this Spock showing more of his emotional side as it lines up more with how Spock was portrayed in the pilot of TOS. However, what I do have a problem with the conflict he has with Michael Burnham and how the writers handled the rest of Spock’s family. Spock resents Michael, why does he resent Michael? The reason for said resentment is what I consider to be one of the most offensive things to happen to Spock himself.

Amanda Grayson, Spock’s mother, saying how she couldn’t give all her love and support to Spock because she didn’t want to confuse him with his Vulcan/Human heritages and being raised the Vulcan way.

What the fuck.

Look, I know canon established that Amanda had difficulties with raising Spock and how she faced challenges with the Vulcan upbringing. But even through all of that, she still showed her love towards Spock and did her best to give Spock the support he needed during his formative years. We’ve even seen Spock in TOS and the movies be very warm towards his mother, even AOS reflected this. To have Amanda say she gave everything to Michael not only gives more unnecessary resentment Michael faces to the longtime Trek audience, but also does a disservice to the established relationship between Amanda and Spock that we see in TOS and the movies.

Let’s not forget the other reason Spock has resentful towards Michael, because she called him a half-breed when they were kids. The reason Michael did that was also really weird, which was for the sake of protecting him from the Logic Extremists to show that they hated each other. I’m sorry, but I don’t think that would stop a terrorist organization trying to harm Spock. This seems like another case of the writers needing a patchwork reason to show why they never went after Spock as a child to uphold established Lore and that was what they came up with.

As for Spock himself, well my complaints for Spock are the same as Pike’s. He was used as a crutch for the season to keep interest, which was not necessary. A Spock appearance was inevitable with the adoptive nature he shares with Michael, but to have him play the large role was unnecessary, especially with what we learn about Michael’s connection with the Red Angel.

Now Sarek, this season, I will have to admit, he was handled much better than the previous season. We see a Sarek that cares for Spock, even partaking in Vulcan rituals to attempt to reach out to his son when Spock is missing. We see Sarek doing everything possible to help Spock. Even when he’s faced with a dilemma between turning Spock over to the Federation for questioning, we see that internal conflict he faces on whether it’s the best course of action. 

However, his reason for turning him over was a really dumb reason. 

“Because the Federation can take better care of Spock.” 

I’m sorry, but every piece of Lore, every Star Trek series, has shown that nothing can take care of a Vulcan better than another Vulcan when it comes to these mental issues. We see this in TOS, we see this in DS9, we see this in Voyager, and we see this in the movies. But it’s the thought that counts I guess? Not really.

Another reason for turning Spock over is that it’s because he believes in Spock’s innocence and that he believed it was logical to have Spock, Pike, and Michael provide their evidence regarding the Red Angel and why Spock didn’t commit the murders he was framed for. He knew that for Spock to be cleared, it was logical to appear cooperative and with the Discovery crew actively investigating the Red Angel and Spock’s alleged crime, it made sense. That part I get, and I wish that was just the reasoning, instead of tacking on the whole “Federation can take better care of Spock because of his condition.” It would have really highlighted Sarek’s loyalties to the Federation, while at the same time showing his love for Spock. But we didn’t get that. Instead we got the Federation can take better care of a Vulcan than another Vulcan.

Now, what about the other characters? Staments’ storyline dealing with the revival of his husband Dr. Culber I’ll admit is something I was not a big fan of. If anything the revival of Dr. Culber, got rid of the development and drive Staments had in the end of the first season and the need to want to leave Starfleet at the beginning of Season 2. It had the potential to tackle a sci-fi issue, is this alternate version of a character the same person, or are they a completely different person?

The initial answer I’ll admit was rather intriguing. Dr. Culber can recall the experiences, but those experiences are not his and he even stated as such. He even moves out of the shared quarters with Staments to figure out who he is as well as show that this Dr. Culber is indeed a different person. I was looking forward to the two of them getting reacquainted and see a new type of relationship develop. A new romance, a friendship, or maybe not get together at all. Instead, we got the new Culber picking the relationship back up with Staments without any real meaningful development or reasoning as to why he chose to re-enter said relationship. 

Now Trek has always played with character deaths. In fact, Voyager is a series that played with it alot, at least every character died at some point, but got revived because of either breaking time loops, changing the past, or having alternate universe versions just take over. The reason it worked with Voyager is because the crew were in an unknown part of galaxy and were doing everything possible to get back home. All of it was written and ingrained in Voyager’s story and DNA.

With Discovery, this felt more like a mistake they were trying to correct in season one by negating the “killing the gay” trope to be like “see, he’s not dead. It’s Trek, just write it off!” No, I’m not going to write that off, Alex Kurtzman, you just did more of a disservice towards these two characters just like the disservice that happened to them in season one.

Saru’s arc is not only amazing, but also in many ways relatable to his self-discovery as a Kelpian. We learn that Saru’s planet, his species actually used to be the oppressors towards the Ba’ul many years ago. Now that the Ba’ul have risen to power, they have turned their revenge on the Kelpians and are now oppressing them. Saru begins to enter a stage in a Kelpian’s life where it has been long believed that he is entering death. Instead he’s entering an evolution in his species. The fact that he doesn’t know what this new stage will do or how to go about it is very relatable. As a human person, I sometimes don’t know the inner workings of my body. Everytime we see a species in Trek, they know everything about their biology so to see an alien species actually not know something about theirs is very relatable.

I did love Tilly’s arc with communicating with the mycelinal network. Thinking she’s losing her grip of reality little by little, coming up with the conclusion on what was happening, reaching out for help when she needed it and the Discovery crew giving her actual honest help. If only they actually provided that level of support for another character that reached out for help. Don’t worry, I’ll be getting to Ash Tyler later. Hell, when Tilly was taken into the mycelinal network, Discovery did everything they could to get her out. The second part of her arc, which occured in the finale, was handled terribly in the writing sense as it actually required you to watch another series known as “Short Treks” to understand as it introduces a new character, Me Hani Iki Hali Ka Po (which I will refer to as Queen Po moving forward).

Yeah, I’ll deviate from Discovery a little to briefly mention Short Treks. Short Treks was meant to be more of a supplemental series telling short stories within the Trek universe. It’s a great idea for lore building but to have one episode required to understand how something in the finale happened left a bad taste in my mouth. 

Take Saru for example. He had a Short Trek episode that showed how he joined Starfleet. Yet it’s not required to watch as Saru gives what you need to know in the main series, but if you want the full experience you can watch the Short Trek episode or don’t, either way, you have everything you need. Even the Picard prologue episode doesn't require you to watch it first as again, what you need to know is in the series itself.

But Tilly’s episode regarding Queen Po, if you don’t watch it, you’ll be lost as to why this new character is important as well as her connection to Tilly.

So what about Ash Tyler, what’s he up to. He’s on Kronos!  Maybe he’s acting as a liaison between the Federation and the Klingons? Nope, he’s now the husband of the new Klingon Chancellor, who was his rapist. He forgave his rapist and then married her. 

Do the writers just not know what to do with him? 

I’m sorry are we going to forget everything that he went through in season 1? How he would enter a mental breakdown at the mere mention or sight of her. Are we going to forget all of the physical and mental abuse that was done to him, just sweep it under the rug and forget that everything happened because they now love each other? 

Look, I know canon established that Klingon women are very violent and physical towards their mates. But you know what Trek also established, that it was consensual when someone would engage with a Klingon in any sort of courtship or sexual relationship. But everything that happened to Ash Tyler wasn’t a part of Klingon culture and courting, it was not consensual, it was torture and rape in a time of war!

Look, the writers need to do better. He had some great potential to highlight issues such as PTSD and male rape victims. But it got bungled so hard that I don't even know how they can fix the mess they have made of his narrative. Would certainly be better for him if the writers stop trying to have him be a posterboy of issues that they clearly do not understand how to convey. 

Oh, they have a kid too. But the father was the Klingon who’s personality and soul was fused into Ash Tyler and now he needs to protect the kid, because reasons. So he and the Chancellor fake Tyler’s death and the death of their child. Those events bring him to join Section 31.

Now, Section 31 has been mentioned here and there in Trek lore, we would see their presence every now and then in DS9. We learn that Emperor Georgiou has actually become a member of Section 31 and would be an ally to the Discovery crew. Seeing a Mirror Universe person try to acclimate themselves to the way of life in the Prime Universe, which is a very drastic change compared to what she’s used to was a very refreshing change of pace involving anything that deals with the Mirror Universe. 

From being a leader of an empire that nearly brought the galaxy to its knees, to now taking orders from Starfleet. Not only that, but she must also obey her superior officers and report to her commanding officer, Leland. Whom in classic Mirror Universe fashion, does what she can to become a new commanding officer of the ship.

I’ll admit seeing more of this is something that I would like and I really hope that the Section 31 series starring Emperor Georgiou really takes off.

Leland will actually be our “big bad” for the season. He will be killed and have his body taken over by a Section 31 AI known as Control. Control’s immediate goal is to obtain consciousness, however, it’s the connection with the Red Angel that explains why Control is a threat.

The Red Angel is Michael’s mother, Gabrielle, who was thought to be dead. This actually added a lot to Michael’s backstory. Michael’s mother worked for Section 31 and was developing a time travel suit. Why was she working on a time travel suit? Because Section 31 obtained evidence that the Klingons were developing time travel technology. That little part I’m a bit weirded out on as I don’t think Klingons would even waste their time on time travel tech. Honestly that seems more like something a Romulan would do than a Klingon, but ok, I guess we’ll go with that.

When the Klingons attacked, she attempted to use the suit to go back in time to get her family out before the Klingons came. But, instead of going into the past, she ends up 950 years into the future, where Control has evolved and eradicated all life in the galaxy.

With Michael hoping for a joyous reunion with her mother, we find Gabrielle determined with one mission and one mission only, to stop Control. I actually really liked Gabrielle’s coldness towards Michael as it shows that she has been trying to stop Control for a long time. The exhaustion on her face, the zero emotion she had when reuniting with Michael and the sharpness of her dialogue delivery show a woman that has seen everything she cares for die in front of her repeatedly. So much so that Michael’s attempts to reach out to her are met with a callous mindset that Gabrielle knows too well. Why should she bother trying to reconnect with her daughter, if to her she’s simply going to die soon anyway for what is probably the thousandth time?

We even see Michael desperately trying to find some sort of connection, some sort of in to allow her mother to feel what she is feeling and that moment right there you really feel for Michael and just wish that her mother would at least hug her or something. 

It’s these moments that help Michael grow more as a character and help her stand on our own, without the need of Sarek or Spock holding her back. These moments show a Michael that just wants to save her mother, and show her that this long battle she has fought can end and that the future can change. Michael has lost her mother once and she is now in a position to save her.

This is how you bring a reunion, this is how you make a character standout. By having Michael show herself and her feelings. Not attach her to something that she really doesn’t need to be attached to for the sake of creating a connection with legacy characters for the buy-in. 

After the final battle and stopping Control, we see the USS Discovery and its crew find themselves 900 years into the future and that is where season 2 ends and where season 3 will begin.

Once again my main complaint is terrible writing that disrespects the characters. It disrespected Michael by having her continue to be held back by Sarek, Amanda, and Spock. It disrespected Spock by completely trashing his relationship with his mother. It disrespected Staments and Culber by just negating a major death from the previous season, tackle an interesting topic, and then just back out and move on like nothing changed. It disrespected Ash Tyler by continuing to have him be a representative of not-so-much talked about issues and still doing everything wrong on bringing awareness. 

Hopefully being in the future can free Michael and allow her to grow now that Sarek and Spock are no longer holding her back since they’re now dead. Hopefully this allows Ash Tyler to no longer be tortured by the writers ignorance. Hopefully, they stop messing around with Staments and Culber and actually show both of them starting a new relationship, or just have them both remain friends or show them finding new love. Also, I hated that they used this to essentially “test the waters” on their version of Pike and Spock to see if a new “Strange New Worlds” series would be welcomed. Despicable!

But with how the first two seasons have been so far, I’m not holding my breath.

Star Trek: Discovery Season 2 receives a 2 out of 5

[douxreviews]

Star Trek: Discovery - ‘Brother’ Review

"Space: The Final Frontier. Above us, around us, within us. We have always looked to the stars to discover who we are."

By nature I love brevity: Star Trek: Discovery takes a long, clean breath of fresh air in this big, bold premiere that sheds the burdens of Season One and lets them roll down the hill behind.

Star Trek: Enterprise was canceled in 2005. And in the Fall of that year, as shows premiered, fans were faced with a sad reality: for the first time in 28 years, a new season of Star Trek was not among them. And for 12 years, this continued. And then we Discovered a new frontier. Breaking the silence of more than a decade, Star Trek: Discovery was a sign that Trek was not dead.

But of course, it was not without its flaws. Discovery Season One had issues with its tone and its dialogue. The crew, above and beyond their stilted, grandiose speech, rarely seemed like a family, or even a group of people who like each other. And the levels of anxiety and brooding were at dangerously high levels. We're talking Superman from Batman v. Superman levels of anxiety and brooding.

The fans pointed out these issues, though the good parts still remained (excepting the 'fans' who actively went out of their way to be openly hostile towards the series, its creators, and its viewers). And the team behind Discovery listened. 'Brother' benefits from a light and relaxed tone that feels like the lifting of a heavy curtain. The crew speaks in a generally human and natural manner, and they work together like a tight family. Brooding is nowhere to be seen, and the anxiety present is of a different sort than the cloud of deep worry that permeated Season One. Instead the viewer felt more of an empathetic concern about the characters and their lives.

The first and most immediate effect of 'Brother' is, in fact, to distance the show from its past mistakes. Associating these issues with the influence of Captain Lorca makes a lot of sense from a story perspective, even if the creators' insistence that all the darker elements were only a result of him doesn't quite sit right. From the outset, Captain Pike makes it clear that he is very different from Lorca. Everything about his manner and bearing suggests a completely different man from Jason Isaacs' power-hungry warmonger. But Pike is no Kirk, either, as one might anticipate. Anson Mount gives his Pike a humility and a grounded feel that Kirk never quite developed.

The other proverbial elephant on the starship is the presence of Spock. Though the adult version of our beloved half-Vulcan does not appear, his importance in the events of 'Brother' and the impact the mere allusion to the character has on the series is clear. We learn that he and Burnham's strained relationship is the result of her decisions, not his. It's clear she views him and his legacy as an oppressive force in her life, perhaps as a standard she could never live up to? There's a great shot that really sums this up, when young Spock makes his holo-dragon. The dragon moves toward Burnham, and roars at her, and Spock walks in through its mouth. I think that's how she sees Spock.

Sarek and Burnham's conversation about reverence also factors in. This show has decided to include a character that most fans undoubtedly have a lot of reverence for. But to make him a useful character, with an arc and a purpose, reverence is not enough. The massive weight of Spock's impact on Star Trek and the fans' adoration of him will be a problem that Discovery will have to deal with.

Moving to our regular cast, I loved how they were dealt with here. The other side of Lorca's effect on the Disco crew is that such a major and personal adversary has brought them together and made them rely on each other. All of the returning cast felt like a family around each other, and their interactions made the ship feel like a real workplace run by a real team. This is a major improvement from last season.

It looks like Burnham's journey this season will be thoroughly intertwined with Spock's. I look forward to seeing her relationship with him and how it develops, but I do hope they give her a role to play apart from and outside of the shadow of her foster brother. Likewise, Stamets seems overshadowed by the impact of someone else. Everything around him reminds him of his lost love Dr. Culber, and he's having a very hard time dealing with it. It seems like the end of this episode was enough to get him at least a little bit excited about science again, though it's unlikely that this is the end of his plotline about leaving the ship. With Wilson Cruz brought on as a full cast member for this season, it'll be interesting to see where this goes.

Tilly and Saru don't seem to have much in the way of an arc yet, but I'm sure this will change. I expect most of Tilly's story this season will have something to do with her enrollment in the Command Training Program. Saru mentioned his sister Siranna, from the Short Trek 'The Brightest Star,' and the showrunners have stated that we may see other Kelpians this season, so expect to see a visit to Saru's home planet of Kaminar sometime in the future. Maybe siblings will continue to be a theme this season.

Overall, 'Brother' was a pretty epic way to kick off the new season. It's fun and engaging, with a lot of potential. I can't wait to see where we go from here.

Strange New Worlds:

This section will record the planets the Disco visits and the places they go. Not a whole lot of that in this particular episode.

New Life and New Civilizations:

Here I'll keep track of all the new species, ideas, and cultures the crew encounters. Again, nothing in the way of that here.

Pensees (Thoughts):

-Mia Kirshner (Amanda) looks a lot like Amy Adams. She also really resembles Amanda from TOS, so that's nice.

-Stamets has a botanist friend aboard the Enterprise.

-In keeping with the Trek tradition of altering the intro, we have some brand new graphics added to the opening theme.

-Regulation 19, Section C allows a higher-ranking officer to take command of a starship in one of three contingencies: 1. An imminent threat; 2. The lives of Federation citizens are in danger; 3. There is no more qualified officer available to deal with the situation.

-I love Doug Jones' Saru walk. It's just so much fun to watch.

-That's the first shot we've gotten of a turbo lift running through a starship in all of Trek, if memory serves. Pretty cool, too.

-Another Alice in Wonderland nod. Also, holo-candles.

-Sarek mentioned that he's reached out to Klingon High Chancellor L'Rell (Mary Chieffo), and she had no explanation for the red bursts either.

-The Captain goes on the away mission, in true Trek tradition.

-There was a bit of Spock's Jellyfish ship from Star Trek (2009) in the design of the pods they flew.

-How cool was the pod sequence? Also, it was admittedly rather satisfying to see Olson Connelly get his comeuppance when he failed to pull his chute crashed and died because of the dumb risk he took.

-One of the ads loaded at the wrong time when I watched this the first time. The long ad break split a shot in half.

-I liked Reno (Tig Notaro). The idea of using an engineering approach to medicine is interesting, although I wouldn't want to be one of the first patients it was tried on.

-The Red Angel is still very much an unknown. I partially expect it will have something to do with the Klingons, if not only because they seem from the trailers to have a big role to play.

-The asteroid material wouldn't beam up. That's intriguing. It may be the key to fixing the spore drive, too, as it looks from the trailer that we'll be jumping again this season.

-'Not every cage is a prison, nor every loss eternal.' That's very interesting, and it has a lot of significance for Pike.

-It makes sense that the crew of the Enterprise would have issues with sitting out the war while on their five-year mission.

-The Disco's new Doctor is named Dr. Pollard.

-One of the names in the credits was 'Matt Decker.'

-A lot of references to faith/religion and related subjects in this episode. I don't think it's necessarily significant, but I thought it was worth noting.

-Alex Kurtzman directed this episode. I thought he did a great job; maybe he should stick to that instead of the whole coming up with ideas thing. I'm still baffled by the seriously weird and unsettling bits about Klingon anatomy from Season One.

Quotes:

Amanda: "I bless you, Michael... all my life."

Pike: "Do not covet thy neighbor's starship, Commander."

Pike: "Why didn't we think of that, Connelly? Think of all the syllables that gave their lives."

Pike: "Sometimes it's wise to keep your expectations low, Commander. That way we're never disappointed." Advice to the audience, perhaps?

Tilly: "I put her in a Utility closet, and I put you in there. I'm drunk on power."

Stamets: "Tilly, you are... incandescent. You're going to become a magnificent Captain because you do everything out of love. But I need you to repeat after me. I will say..." Tilly: "I will say..." Stamets: "Fewer things." Tilly: "Fewer thi- okay."

Sarek: "Spock has great reverence for his mother, but reverence tends to-" Burnham: "Fill up the room." It's the shot of Burnham's fairly empty quarters just as she interrupts that sells this one.

Pike: "Detmer - fly... good."

Pike: "I was expecting a red thing. Where's my damn red thing?"

Pike: "Spock asked the most amazing questions. It's completely logical, yet somehow able to make everyone see that logic was the beginning of the picture and not the end."

Burnham: "There are so many things I wish I'd said to you; so many things I want to say now. I'm too late, aren't I? I can only pray I don't lose you again... brother."

A strong, solid premiere. 5 out of 6 damn red things.

CoramDeo is interested in things.

[the-desolated-quill]

The Vulcan Hello - Star Trek: Discovery blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Well here I go. Boldly going where I’ve never gone before. My first ever Star Trek experience.

I can’t honestly say why Star Trek never really appealed to me before. I guess it’s because I’ve always associated it with being cheap and tacky. Some of its more hardcore fans might have put me off as well. There are some that love the show so much that they’ve actually learnt how to speak Klingon and stuff, which is what perpetuated the nerd stereotype and the perception that liking Star Trek is synonymous with being a loser. Or at least that was my understanding of it growing up. It wasn’t cool to like Star Trek in my neighbourhood.

Of course nowadays sci-fi and other areas of geekdom have become more mainstream, and when I heard about a new Star Trek TV series boasting both gender and ethnic diversity, curiosity got the better of me and I decided to give Star Trek: Discovery a go just to see what all the fuss is about.

One episode in… and I’m hooked! OMG! Bryan Fuller, Alex Kurtzman and Akiva Goldsman, I could bloody kiss you! I love it! I LOVE IT!

I must confess I didn’t think this was going to be very good during the first minute where we see these weird troll looking people with ridiculously large foreheads speaking OTT gibberish. I was getting ready to mock and snigger until the episode suddenly shifts to Sonequa Martin-Green and Michelle Yeoh walking across a desert planet, at which point my jaw hit the floor in amazement. It looks gorgeous. In fact the entire episode is visually breathtaking. The Federation spaceship, the binary star system, the Vulcan VR bubble thingies, the Klingon spaceship, they all look fucking incredible. I couldn’t believe this was a TV show. It looks like something out of a big budget movie.

It also helps that the writing is extremely good too. They waste no time in introducing newcomers like myself to this universe and absorbing us completely into the story, to the point where upon returning to the large foreheaded Klingons and their gibberish language, I was actually starting to take them seriously and becoming fascinated by their culture and history. But more on that later.

By far my favourite thing about The Vulcan Hello are the three main leads and their interactions with each other. First there’s Captain Philippa Georgiou, played by Michelle Yeoh. I really like her playfulness and witty behaviour, but at the same time she commands absolute authority. Yeoh is extremely impressive, being able to switch from light to dark effortlessly. The look on her face when she points that gun at Michael was incredibly intimidating. You have no trouble buying why she’s the leader.

Then there’s Saru, played by Doug Jones. The overly cautious and at times sarcastic Science Officer. At first glance he seems to be the no nonsense, voice of reason on the ship, but there’s a lot more to it than that. He’s at times prone to cowardice, but never to the point where he becomes annoying or counter-productive, and I love his little spats with Michael as they both subtly try to one up each other. He’s a very charming character that I can’t wait to learn more about.

And of course there’s Michael Burnham, played by Sonequa Martin-Green, who is by far the most intriguing and is clearly going to be the main focus of the show. What I find most refreshing about her as a protagonist is how demilitarised she is, if that makes sense. When we normally see quote/unquote ‘strong female characters,’ they’re normally these gun wielding badasses with no empathy whatsoever. Michael, however, is allowed to be compassionate. She’s clearly fascinated by the lives and cultures of other aliens and derives great pleasure and excitement from exploring space and visiting different worlds. Her empathy is established early on as her most defining character trait, made even stronger when we learn that her family were killed by the Klingons. She doesn’t let her history cloud her judgement when she interacts with other aliens or when she spots the UO, chastising Saru for making hasty assumptions about the potential threat. What makes this even more interesting is that she was adopted and raised by Vulcans (who as far as I can tell are these sort of emotionless space elves). Her adopted dad appears somewhat disappointed in her and her empathetic side due to him perceiving empathy as a weakness, but she’s very quick to rebuke this, saying that her emotions inform her logic. She’s a caring and compassionate individual, and is clearly proud of that fact, seeing her empathy as a strength that helps her to do her job. Clearly the dichotomy between Vulcan logic and human empathy is something that will continue to be explored over the course of this series, and I look forward to it immensely.

The relationships between the three are extremely well written and well performed. They feel like real people and I became invested in them almost instantly. I really wanted to spend time with them and get to know them, and its this emotional connection with the characters that helps to fuel the tension in The Vulcan Hello. Which brings us to the Klingons.

Once you get past the silly gibberish and foreheads, they’re really interesting too. The show really goes out of its way to make them as alien as possible. Whereas the Vulcans and Saru are relatable to varying degrees, the Klingons are utterly divorced from anything we could identify with, which is part of their intrigue. The language, the culture, the designs of their spaceships and their armour are all distinctly alien, effectively creating a ‘them and us’ scenario. Even the funeral for their torchbearer plays into this. A spaceship covered in coffins is an incredibly striking image that’s both morbidly dark and distinctly odd. (I presume if Vulcans are like space elves, then the Klingons are the space orcs). It’s not clear why the Klingons hate the Federation, but the writers do a really good job showing us the divide between the two sides and how the differences in their respective development and evolution have perhaps fuelled this underlying animosity between them.

There’s a lot to like about The Vulcan Hello, but what elevates it from a good episode to a great one for me is how it takes what could have been a simple good vs evil plot and turns it into a nail biting confrontation with potentially devastating consequences.

When Michael kills the torchbearer, she effectively creates a diplomatic incident, culminating in a cold war scenario where the Klingons are poised to invade Federation space. Philippa knows full well she doesn’t stand a chance against them in a fight because they would just overwhelm her, but at the same time the Klingons are so aggressive and hostile that diplomacy is not really an option. Neither is retreat because it would just give the Klingons a clear path. This is about as tense as it’s possible to get, but then it gets even more tense when Michael suggests firing the first shot, citing an incident where a Vulcan ship was destroyed by the Klingons and since then the Vulcans always fired first in order to command respect from their adversaries. There’s a certain logic to it if you squint hard enough, but naturally Michael’s colleagues aren’t too keen on this idea. The other options aren’t exactly ideal, but firing the first shot in the hopes that they’ll tiptoe respectfully away seems practically suicidal. It’s a great scenario because there’s no clear solution presenting itself, and while you want to side with Michael because she’s so damn likeable, it’s hard to shake off the barminess of her idea. And then things spiral further into chaos when Michael commits mutiny, knocking Philippa unconscious, in a desperate bid to save everyone. It’s hard to tell what’s driving Michael at this stage. Her determination and insistence that she’s in the right or her own emotional baggage regarding the Klingons. It’s so gripping you would have needed a crowbar to prise me away from the screen. When the episode ended on a cliffhanger, I swore very loudly in response because I was desperate to know what happened next. That’s how engaged I was.

The Vulcan Hello is the perfect way to start a series. The production values are staggering, the characters are all interesting and likeable, the actors bring them to life effortlessly, and the writing is absolutely impeccable. I loved every single second of this and now I’m going to abruptly end this review so I can watch Episode 2. Bye :D

[truestoriesaboutme]

Star Trek: Discovery - Initial reaction

Pros:

Sonequa Martin-Green as Michael Burnham. She gives an amazing performance and it’s a very well drawn character

Michelle Yeoh as Captain Georgiou. I would watch a whole show about her captain and am kind of sad that I can’t. She’s the platonic ideal of a Starfleet captain

the production design for the federation. Everything aboard the Federation ships looks great, in a way that manages to avoid the whole Apple Store Bridge look that the Abrams movies have. It’s also probably the most well-lit Starfleet bridge ever

the biggest one: It feels like Star Trek. It gets that Star Trek is more about tactics and moral dilemmas than action scenes, and that part of the appeal is watching competent people be competent in space. 

Cons:

Everything about the klingons. the production design on their ships was ridiculously ornate and overdesigned. Meanwhile, the makeup ranged from okay to Halloween mask, to the point where it hampered the performances

The direction was mostly fine, but occasionally tried too hard for dynamism. See: the conference room scene shot almost entirely in dutch angles. Also everything was so bronze looking.

the script works but feels almost too straightforward. At the very least it feels a bit like it’s stretching out one episode’s worth of plot over two episodes

I can’t decide:

Doug Jones as Saru: On one hand, the character is pretty much written to be unlikable. He’s exists to be the character that tells Burnham she can’t do something because it’s a bad idea and then she does it anyway. That’s not a fun character. On the other hand, Doug Jones is really charismatic in the role. We’ll see where it goes.

Overall, I liked it. It was an interesting start to the season. Still, it kind of kicked the can down the road in terms of introducing us to show, seeing how none of it actually takes place aboard the titular ship. It’d be like if DS9 started with a two parter showing the battle of Wolf 359 and then had Sisko show up at the station on episode three. But still, it’s anchored in a strong character and I’m interested to see where it goes.

[subostartrek]

STAR TREK DISCOVERY Review 01.04 - “The Butcher’s Knife Cares Not For the Lamb’s Cry”

This was a hard episode to write on, to the point where the next episode (”Choose Your Pain”) aired before I was finished. And I really don’t know why I have so much trouble expressing my thoughts on this one, given that out of the prior episodes, “TBKCNFTLC” is definitely the most straightforward (though that isn’t saying much; this episode still has plenty of material and depth in its forty minutes of runtime).

So this one’s gonna be short, partially because I’m busy as hell these days but also because I reaaaaaaaly want to get to the “Choose Your Pain” review.

(Also, after the frustration of gif making in my “Krill” review, I won’t try that until I’ve sat down and definitively taught myself how to do it.)

Spinning rims.

Captain Lorca is front-and-center in this episode. Or is Ripper the focal element? Either way, the purpose of the Discovery is examined, and it becomes obvious that the ship means different things to different people; Lorca sees it as a mercurial weapon of war, Stamets detests that anyone could use his research for this purpose, Michael sees it as her opportunity to continue serving Starfleet, and Landry doesn’t really give a damn about what ship she’s in as long as she can kick some ass.

Let’s talk about Landry for a second. The annoyance factor of nearly every non-Michael character was toned down here, and the result is that the characters can breathe free and express much more interesting ideas. This is most evident in Landry, who had some excellent dialogue with Michael as they discussed their attitudes towards Ripper.

Then they killed her. For no real reason, really, which makes me suspect that Rekha Sharma wanted to leave production so they wrote a quick way for her character to die. This moment has been dissected (and dismissed) by people much smarter and more patient than I, and I will not restate what has already been said.

This was a great shot.

The rest of the episode works quite well, though. The failed jump and the defense of Corvan II are both excellent scenes, allowing Jason Isaacs’ relaxed-but-not-lackadaisical interpretation of intensity to shine through. Meanwhile, the Klingons debate heresy, loyalty, and leadership, setting up L’Rell and Voq as an interesting duo for future episodes.

I enjoyed this episode at a 4.25 and assessed it at a 3.75, returning a final rating of 4 cochranes / 5.

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS:

“Shall we uncouple?” (Opening riff of Let’s Get it On plays)

Wait, how did that telescope get off the Shenzhou?

FAVORITE QUOTE:

Burnham: “Commander, this creature is an unknown alien. It can only be what it is, and not what you want it to be.”

Commander Ellen Landry: “It’s amazing how much I hate Vulcan proverbs.”

[orhelponefaintingrobin]

Star Trek: Discovery - Episodes 1-2: Review/Impressions/Thing

Right, so. I have watched the first two episode of Star Trek: Discovery, and these are my thoughts. The majority of my impressions are good, but there are a couple of nit-picks I had as well.

The overall quality of the show is, in my opinion, undeniable. It’s clear how much effort the production team have put into the show, and it’s even more evident how much passion they have for the show they’re making. Every aspect of the production, from costumes to props to sets to effects, had such a huge attention to detail, and with a show like Star Trek, with such a big budget Sci-Fi show, that’s such an important factor to preserve throughout the production.

The storyline in itself was very fresh, and I’m really glad about it. I know that some people won’t have enjoyed it, and would have preferred something more traditional Trek, but I’m glad that they’ve tried something so different with the format and tone of the show. I know that a lot of people want something along the lines of “Star Trek: The Next Next Generation”, but I have a rule that if someone tries to do something different, I always have to give them credit for it, and I really appreciate what they’ve done in trying to differentiate themselves from what came before. And that’s what this was. Something unlike anything we’ve seen from Star Trek before, while still, at least in my opinion, feeling very much like a part of the timeline. That said, I’m looking forward to seeing them start to bridge the gap more between this and TOS, but I have the upmost confidence that we’ll see things start to trickle in as the story unfolds.

I personally don’t care about the majority of the tweak to continuity. Yeah, the uniforms look different, the technology looks more advanced, and Klingons look different, but I’d rather they made these visual updates than keep the low-budget (at least by modern standards) look of The Original Series. It has its charm, sure, but I really don’t think it would have looked too amazing in a show of this scale. The only thing that annoys me a little on that front is the hologram conversations. It looks cool, and I do get why they’ve done it, as it does make these conversations a lot more dynamic, but unlike all the other tweaks, I’m finding it difficult to come up with an explanation for it. Like, the uniforms actually don’t take too much thinking (I’ve already made a post explaining my head-canon/theory for that), and I’m fine simply leaving the technology and Klingon designs to a slightly rebooted/refreshed visual style, because they don’t generally change any actual canon plot points. The Holograms are trickier to fit in… But, at the end of the day, that’s a pretty minor thing in the scheme of things, so I’m not too fussed about that.

We don’t actually get introduced to more than two of the main-billed cast in the first two episodes, but as far as the ones we have seen are concerned, I really like them. Michael Burnham is going to be a really interesting character to follow over the series, and Sonequa Martin-Green absolutely kills it in the role. Back when they were talking about her casting, the production said that she was the only one who could really get the balance between the emotional and logical sides of her character, and I can definitely see what they mean. A human raised on Vulcan is a pretty specific character description, but it is SO believable seeing Martin-Green play it. Saru, the only other main cast member we see, was also great fun. I loved how he played off Burnham, and Doug Jones, with all his experience, was a perfect casting choice for the character.

If I’m disappointed with anything, it’s that we didn’t actually get to see the Discovery and its crew in these first two episodes, but I’m fine with considering these two episodes to be more prequels to the main series anyway, and treating these episode like the Episode 0 of the show (Weird comparison, but think along the lines of the first three episodes of Soul Eater), with next weeks episode being the actual start to the show.

In all honesty, there was only one thing that GENUINELY annoyed me about the episode, which I’ll talk about under a ‘read more’ tag because spoilers.

But, all in all, I thought this was an AMAZING start to the show, and I’m definitely going to be looking forward to seeing it all really kick off in Episode 3

Okay, so, now we’re hidden from spoilers, I do want to talk about Captain Phillipa Georgiou. Excellent character, Michelle Yeoh killed it, but I definitely was annoyed that they killed her so early. I mean, I know that the signs were there, and it could have been handled well, but it just seemed to unnecessary. It didn’t provide much of a shock, and we didn’t really know enough about the character yet for it to have a huge amount of emotional depth. She was never supposed to be a main main character, but I was expecting her to at least be a recurring character, and I was interested in seeing how she would interact with Burnham after being betrayed, so I’m a little disappointed they cut her short like that.

Now, I know people are going to, quite reasonably, have an issue with the other issues surrounding killing of a PoC character, and we all know that killing off minority characters is a HUGE issue in TV and Film that really does need to be solved… But, being realistic, with the cast of the show, it’s going to be unlikely that we’re not going to see any other deaths like that, simply because of how the cast is balanced. Star Trek: Discovery does have a very diverse cast, and, given the tone and style of storytelling found in the show, not everyone is going to make it… I mean, I don’t think they’re going to be too trigger happy, but they definitely aren’t going to keep everyone perfect and happy all the way through…

And, to be fair, I think that the days of the only (Most likely) straight white guy in the show, Captain Lorca, are numbered already… I mean, they’re not going to keep the whole ‘not focusing on a captain’ thing forever, so Burnham is going to end up as Captain someday, though probably not this season…

[birdie-no]

Tilly is awesome. She's the "everyman" character the viewers are supposed to look at and see bits of themself, like Obrien...who can turn rocks into replicators...or so I heard from from a Volta once.

Tilly is highly qualified and extremely skilled, but she also has real flaws that a lot of people can identify with. Out of everyone on Disco, she feels like the most real character on the show. Yeah Burnham and Saru are amazing, but their flaws and their strengths are often story driven and feel less authentic.

I should add in here that I didn't like Saru much at first, but by the time he gave the crew his "Maiden Flight" speech, I'm definitely on team #captainSaru.

As for Michael, she is the driving force of the show and the narrative. She grows and changes as needed which can be difficult for any writer to balance properly. Michael is a great character, I love seeing the reverse side of the human/Vulcan struggle we saw with Spock. I hope we see more with Sarek and Amanda. Those scene were so amazing, seeing how they deal with a child who wasn't Spock and I can't wait to see how Spock and Michael react when they are reunited, particularly given how Sarek feels about his kids joining Starfleet. I wonder if Spock knows that Sarek choose him over Michael to be selected for entry to the science Academy and if so, is that why he joined Starfleet. It would be great to see their bond or their sibling rivalry/angst and how they respond together with not exactly getting along well with Sarek. Maybe it's the one thing they agree on, but I'd rather have them be like a tag team, bonded by the idea of being outcasts, logically concluding that being an outsider gives them a unique perspective on things.

Ok, back to Tilly. She was the character that clicked with me the fastest, aside from Geogiou. She fit the role of a Starfleet captain perfectly and while the Emperor was cool, I want to see more of Captain Geogiou. Bring on the flashbacks or episodes set before the Battle of the Binaries.

I like that despite Tilly's flaws, she has goals and objectives. We see her struggle with self confidence and being awkward, but dammit I believe her when she says she's gonna be a captain one day.

As Riker would say, she knows what she wants and she knows what she's got. And we'd all be lucky to do so well.

And yeah, like duh...have you even watched any other Star Trek? Cause it seem pretty standard for cadets to get field assignments and posting to startbases or starahips. We've seen multiple examples. It'd be like being at Uni and taking a semester to study abroad.

Arguing about cadets serving on active duty ships is about as pointless as arguing about captain's giving out field promotions and battlefield commisions. We've seen it happen multiple times, though why Kim wasn't promoted to lieutenant (even junior grade) is beyond me, particularly given the fluctuation in rank that Paris went through. How many other people did Janeway promote or demote during thier trip home? Come on, throw the guy a bone...I mean jeez, seven years as an ensign. That seems like a bit much. He should have been up for promotion through general means at some point during that time. How often did we hear Riker and Troi talking about slodging officer perfomance reviews? Coatrack, I mean Chakotay surely had to handle performance reviews at some point during thier trek home. And didn't Tuvok get promoted to Lieutenant Commander.

But now I'm getting off topic. One thing about Starfleet is certain, there don't seem to be many firm or set rules when it comes to rank and promotion. One day you're a lieutenant at Ops, the next you're first officer...maybe even captain.

Tangent time! As if I hadn't already derailed this post.

I always thought that an interesting idea for a novel would be to set it around the idea that because the of the losses during the Dominion war, Starfleet suddenly had this massive supply shortage of captain's with a great deal of experience.

So you'd have this fresh batch of new captain's that had all retained their battlefield commisions when the senior officers were KIA. And because Starfleet seems to honor any such commision or promotion, you'd have captain's that's only a year ago were lieutenants...then the war starts and now they have the weight of commanding a starship in a time of war. Some flourish and some fold, but they all feel this sense of not being sure if they're ready.

Anyway, just an idea I had that I thought could be worth exploring. Not sure what the main focus of the story would be...maybe like a Captains Table type or an anthology with multiple short stories...or maybe focus on a ship and crew about to head off into one of the bigger battles we heard about but never saw. The captain finds out there are something like a dozen other members of her graduating class out there in the fleet, a few captains, a chief engineer, a chief medical officer...all still young enough they should be lieutenants but now serving as senior officers because they had to step up when the officers above them were killed.

Since the theme is kinda dark, I think something more lighthearted would work best...the meet on a galaxy class and have a mini class renunion.

Now I just have to find the time to write it. Add it to the Story's that need to be written list.

I get the impulse sometimes to be Extremely Pedantic on Star Trek posts and then I’m like ‘oh no I’ve turned into the enemy’

[gokinjeespot]

off the rack #1227

Monday. August 27, 2018

 I noticed that the leaves are starting to change already. It seems early this year. Change is on the horizon and it's the only constant if life as they say. I seem to be more anxious as I get older when my comfortable routines are disrupted. I'm okay if I get fair warning to prepare myself but find that I freak out a little when something gets sprung on me. I used to be able to just go with the flow but avoiding even minor annoyances is what I most desire now. Maybe I'm turning into a clam. Thank god for family and friends who get me out of my shell.

 Silencer #8 - Dan Abnett (writer) Patrick Zircher (art) Mike Spicer (colours) Tom Napolitano (letters). Hell-iday Road part 1. Honor's mission to kill Talia runs into some unexpected resistance. I love the surprise department of Leviathan that pops up to complicate things and the Freaky Friday twist. It's rare that a brand new character strikes my fancy and this one does.

 Old Man Hawkeye #8 - Ethan Sacks (writer) Marco Checchetto (art) Andres Mossa (colours) VC's Joe Caramagna (letters). Eye For An Eye part 8. This issue features a stupendous battle between Bullseye and the Winter Soldier. It sets up the face to face next issue for Clint and Bullseye that I've been waiting for.

 The Life of Captain Marvel #2 - Margaret Stohl (writer) Marguerite Sauvage (art flashbacks) Carlos Pacheco (pencils present day) Rafael Fonteriz (inks present day) Marcio Menyz (colours) VC's Clayton Cowles (letters). There's a lot of family drama to slog through before any action happens. Next issue should be more exciting with the super powered alien landing on Earth and going on the hunt. I'm guessing that Carol is the prey.

 West Coast Avengers #1 - Kelly Thompson (writer) Stefano Caselli (art) Triona Farrell (colours) VC's Joe Caramagna (letters). Please welcome the latest team of West Coast Avengers to the racks with a big hand of applause. I liked this a lot but it's not quite standing ovation material. Kate Bishop assembles a team of super heroes to keep Los Angeles safe and they sure are a fun bunch. The core is made up of Kate/Hawkeye, her boyfriend Fuse, America and part-timer Clint/Hawkeye. The new members are Gwenpool and Quentin Quire ex-X-Man. I'm glad that Stefano Caselli is back on the racks. I was a big fan of his art on Ultimate Spider-Man. This book centered around Hollywood means that there are major media and pop culture references which makes things fun. It's the attack of the fifty foot woman as a giant sized Tigra menaces Santa Monica. I can't wait to find out more about B.R.O.D.O.K. next issue. I'm adding this to my "must read" list.

 Sandman Universe #1 - Neil Gaiman (story) Simon Spurrier, Kat Howard, Nola Hopkinson and Dan Watters (writers) Bilquis Evely, Tom Fowler, Dominike "Domo" Stanton, Max Fiumara and Sebastian Fiumara (art) Mat Lopes (colours) Simon Bowland (letters). Man, how I've missed these characters. Lucien the librarian, Mervyn the pumpkin-headed janitor, Matthew the raven, Tim Hunter the boy magician and all the other fascinating inhabitants of the Dreaming. I don't remember Dora so she might be new. This $4.99 US anthology will introduce you to four new comic books based on Neil Gaiman's wonderful creations. The Dreaming #1 hits the racks on September 5. House of Whispers #1 on September 12. Lucifer #1 October 17 and Books of Magic on October 24 which Ottawa's own Tom Fowler will be illustrating. Sandman fans should be very pleased.

 Die Die Die #2 - Robert Kirkman (writer) Scott M. Gimple (co-plot) Chris Burnham (art) Nathan Fairbairn (colours) Rus Wooton (letters). I haven't read a comic book with this much explicit violence since The Boys. It's a sign of a good comic when you can tell the origin story of three maybe four identical brother assassins in two pages. There's a lot of sibling rivalry which makes this story very interesting.

 Punisher #1/LGY #229 - Matthew Rosenberg (writer) Szymon Kudranski (art) Antonio Fabela (colours) VC's Cory Petit (letters). World War Frank part 1. Frank has gone through many changes recently. He's the Cosmic Ghost Rider now for instance. My favourite incarnation has always been the gun toting vigilante going after the bad guys and surviving every single attempt to stop him from killing. Matt brings back that bad ass to the racks and I'm happy. Frank fights Baron Zemo, Hydra and the Roxxon Corporation in this relaunch and it's just as bloody good as Die Die Die. The death of a major super villain here was a big surprise.

 Action Comics #1002 - Brian Michael Bendis (writer) Patrick Gleason (art) Alejandro Sanchez (colours) Josh Reed (letters). Invisible Mafia part 2. I like a good mystery thrown into a comic book to keep me interested and this issue has two. The cloudy demon is one because Superman is vulnerable to supernatural things. The surprise reunion on the last page is the other. This is the first time that Brian Bendis has given me that gotcha feeling in his DC work.

 Avengers #6/LGY #696 - Jason Aaron (writer) Ed McGuinness & Paco Medina (pencils) Mark Morales & Juan Vlasco (inks) David Curiel (colours) VC's Cory Petit (letters). "Planet of Pathogens" will give you a hint as to how the Avengers cure the Earth of the Horde infestation and defeat the Celestials. Boy, that was a close call. Next issue promises the origin of the Spirit of Vengeance, the very first Ghost Rider. I'm not a fan of Ghost Rider being on the team. I also don't like the new version of She-Hulk either. If it wasn't for the awesome art I would bench this book.

 Mr. & Mrs X #2 - Kelly Thompson (writer) Oscar Bazaldua (art) Frank D'Armata (colours) VC's Travis Lanham (letters). Love and Marriage part 2. The newlyweds team up, albeit reluctantly, with Deadpool to protect the egg. First of all, how did Deadpool wind up in space? Never mind, it's a comic book. They have to keep the egg out of the hands of Technet, a team of bad guys. How do they just happen to be out in space too? I love Oscar's art so I'm going to ignore all these silly coincidences and find out how this story ends.

 Amazing Spider-Man #4/LGY #805 - Nick Spencer (writer) Ryan Ottley (pencils) Cliff Rathburn (inks) Laura Martin (colours) VC's Joe Caramagna (letters). Back to Basics part 4. One look at the cover and I was thinking "didn't Marvel learn from the Clone Saga?". That was one of the most panned Spider-Man storylines and here they are doing it again. I am happy to report that this split isn't going to last as long and hopefully the Isotope Genome Accelerator will be mothballed for good after this. If they merge Spider-Man and Peter Parker back together in a dumb way I will not be very forgiving.