Jammer's Blog

Yes! We are finally living in a world where we are getting a post-Nemesis Star Trek show! I would say this is the most excited that I’ve been for “new” Star Trek in ages.

If this can pull everything off and replace Nemesis as the final “chapter” for TNG, then I am all for it. Nemesis is still so… ugh.

I posted in the other section, but it looks pretty good. Seeing Spiner though, makes me wonder how much de-aging CGI is going to be used. Sirtis should be fine, but Frakes looks completely different now – maybe he can get in shape and they won’t need the CGI body double stuff.

I’m not really interested in what happened to Voyager, DS9, Post-Nemesis, etc. I hope they put it in a significantly different time period where we aren’t visited by callbacks from “Oh hey, the Hirogen, remember these guys? Yuk, Yuk”. The story so far looks promising in that respect.

Well, to be fair, the Hirogen were some of the more interesting aliens in VOY. Would have been fun to see them take on the Jem’Hadar.

But, hey, I digress!

Why would Frakes need a CGI body? Riker ages. Data does not.

@Destructor

You’re right, I just had the topic on my mind because it’s been used in a few things I saw. Unless they wanted to show an earlier time period like in “All Good Things”, Frakes could just play an old Riker whose put on some weight.

It’s interesting though, in Star Trek, characters are supposedly healthy enough that they live well over 130 (see McCoy), so I wonder if they consider that when doing make-up? I mean technically even Picard should have a good 60 years to go in his life.

I know I post Redlettermedia often but this covers my feelings pretty accurately
(starts at min 4 to min 18)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70SSJLG72Q0

The only worry is this series could end up like the X Files Revival series (Season 10 – 11) which apparently was pretty bad and from what little of it I’ve seen it was bad.

Picard judging from the trailer at the very least looks interesting and idea of seeing Seven and Data again is exciting. So I’m cautiously excited to see it.
Hopefully the series will sooth over the bitter taste of Nemesis which did feel like a somewhat disappointing end to TNG.

I am really excited for this. Data, Seven, and apparently Riker and Troi all making appearances (brief ones from what I understand, thankfully) is great but I am more excited by the story and the return of Picard, my favorite captain of all Trek.

I am also glad that (at least what I can gather from the two-minute trailer) it looks different than TNG in terms of storytelling and structure. I loved TNG when it aired and I still enjoy the reruns but its style of episodic story-telling has been done too many times by other reincarnations and many episodes in VOY and ENT began to look and sound like remakes of TNG plots. I’m also ready for Picard’s problem-solving skills without being in the safe environment of the Enterprise and the captain’s uniform.

Bring it on!

@Chrome:

“Sirtis should be fine”

I was gonna make a joke about Marina Sirtis being beautiful, but I’m better than that. I really hope they do more things with RIker and Troi’s characters, to be honest. They were basically rewrites of Decker and Ilea from Motion Picture (shudder) that turned out to be marginally better characters in the end, but I feel like Frakes and Sirtis are better actors than the writing for TNG typically let them act.

The return of Data seems interesting no matter how you slice it. Data was the glue that held TNG together. Seven of Nine coming back is a fine choice, especially since, just based on the quick line we hear, nobody is gonna stop a take and tell her to “Do it more like a Borg” this time.

That bears some scrutiny, in a good way, actually. The fact that Seven of Nine has been written to have developed as a character in the nearly 20 year interim since we last saw her gives me some hope that this won’t be such a slapdash writing job as DISCO.

If anything, Star Trek needs to stop toying with its fans. We have seen enough ‘nods’ to older series and ‘Easter Eggs’ of series lore at this point to staff an entire agency of sleep-deprived Delivery Rabbits (ok that was the worlds most overcooked metaphor but gimme a break, I’m tired ok).

I feel like the parent whose kid has discovered a new thing in Minecraft and is desperately hoping this will finally get me interested in it, when in reality, I wonder why they haven’t beaten Super Mario Brothers yet.

Just write a good story. Forget about all the extras, add those in later if you feel like it. WRITE A GOOD STORY. I’m

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORED

“Picard can’t kick people. So let’s have a young girl in there. And she’s half-borg. And she’s the chosen one. She’s the key to all this.”

lol@that RedLetterMedia link.

Picard could be interesting. However, the Borg were overdone in Voyager, were shameless in Enterprise, and comical in First Contact. I’m glad they were kept out of DS9, and I’d hate to see them again in any capacity other than a total destruction or even a total saving of the individuals from the collective.

Anything else and they will make the show a failure.

Topics I’d love to see actually covered: the federation/Starfleet adjustment from dominion war. Gamma and Delta quadrant relations. Chancellor Martok? Instructor Miles O’Brien. Romulan and Federation policy after Nemesis. Further, did section 31 play a part in it?

..after looking at what I typed, I guess I just want DS9.

So many possibilities here. For now, I’m stoked. If we can get a continuation of DS9 out of this even better.

Second the desire to carry forward some of the DS9 themes and storylines. Wish we could have a post Nemesis show in that style again

Does anyone else think the mystery girl is Picard’s daughter with the Borg queen???

@Sidney, regrettably I doubt we’ll get any acknowledgement of DS9 whatsoever. Maybe a throwaway line here and there. I fear it’s destined to always be the black sheep of Trek.

I don’t think I’ve seen anyone bring this up anywhere, but I’m pretty sure the person saying “Sometimes I worry you have forgotten who you are” is Troi.

Is anybody else amazed at how amazing Jeri Ryan still looks considering Voyager ended nearly 20 years ago???

I’m a fan of DS9. Would be nice if there’s an episode where they visit the station (if there’s a logical reason to do so.) I would like some update on what’s going on with Cardassia and what is the status between the Federation and the Dominion.

@DexterMorgan Right here. She still looks awesome. Aged very gracefully, I’d say.

Trailer #2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2xF4w9tSWk

In case the links Yanks left does not work (didn’t for me):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FySrgrKJguE

It’s looking good, I can’t wait. And it premieres sooner than I thought (Jan 23rd). I thought it was supposed to come out in March. Even better!!

Still mixed. I really wish they’d at least tried to match the TNG aesthetics a bit more. The Romulans look silly. But it’ll be fun to see the TNG family back together again, at least for a bit.

@Dom:

‘I really wish they’d at least tried to match the TNG aesthetics a bit more.’

I didn’t mind this *too* much to be honest, and the specific TNG elements we did see (uniforms in the dream sequence, Seven’s make-up, Borg cube, etc) are sufficiently left un-tweaked to make me happy. But, overall, I think it would be odd to see TNG’s overall neutral-toned aesthetic in this day and age.

I’m not quite sure what the make-up department was thinking with Brent Spiner, though, that looks really slipshod.

All in all, though — despite my initial reservations — I think I’m rather looking forward to this.

Forget all our other questions. What’s the deal with the TOS-era Warbird??!! I immediately demand to know more!

Also noteworthy for continuity nerds: an old-school TNG-era warp drive effect, rather than Disco’s Abramsverse effect.

It’s the little things that please me. 😀

@MadManMUC, I get that they’re limited in how closely they can mimic TNG and I don’t expect it to look like the late 80s. But visually it’s such a big disconnect that I can’t quite believe that they’re the same story. I imagine TOS fans felt this way when they first saw TMP in theaters.

I have to agree with the Redlettermedia that Boooming posted.

Fighting, explosions, interpersonal conflict. This is not TNG. This is very much seeming like it will be action-scifi with people who say ‘Starfleet’ once in a while.

BUT, the episode or two that it looks like we’ll get of TNG reunion will be worth something.

What this trailer really kindles in me is the wish for a proper TNG finale movie or season. It would be so nice to see that.

I guess we’ll have to take what we can get.

The last time TNG was great was 1994. 1 film was pretty good, but the characters were off. The other three were mediocre to poor. Show me greatness. I couldn’t care less about hype.

No lasmelter. You really don’t need to do that.

Looks like a lot of fun. I’m not going to dismiss it on the basis of a trailer. There is enough in this to make me want to watch it and that is the job of a trailer. If it ends up being crap then I’ll speak out.

The Riker-Picard reunion was nice but yegads — Sirtis’ voice just sounds wrong.

When will we see reviews of:

– “Short Treks season 1” (2018/19) x4 episodes
– “Short Treks season 2” (2019/20) x6 episodes, the first two of which have now aired (and are amazing IMO)
– “What We Left Behind” (DS9 retrospective doc…just watched on Blu-ray…the full-screen remastered space battle from The Sacrifice Of Angel’s made me lose my damn mind…And the storyboarded 8th season premiere sketched out by Ron Moore, Rene E, etc.. is epic and thoughtful all at once…death, life, Captain Nog & Captain Ezri and more)
– discussion board for Picard trailer 2 (or 3 if you count the teaser)

Has anyone else seen them?

The HD remastered battle from Sacrifice of Angel, alluded to above, can be see here:

https://i.imgur.com/2PPhcrr.gifv

I’ve had time to properly digest all this, now, and I’m thinking…

The only way to make this all take a decent turn towards anything remotely dramatic in nature…

This woobie-looking chick who kung fu kicks people of balconies?

Kill her.

This is kind of the basic problem with all of Star Trek at this point is that there is never any dramatic price paid by the protagonists. Everything is reset back to status quo by the end of the episode/season/series/etc./what have you, these days.

I went into Discovery hoping Star Trek had decided to grow up. It didn’t.

You know what? No, Sir Patrick.

No, I will not watch this right away. I will wait for a good review. If I do not see a good review, I’m not wasting my time. You all suck. I am going to just assume that Star Trek is going to suck, hard, no matter what, from now on, because it has proven that it sucks.

I’m not going to be taken in this time. No thank you, no tickets to the hype train for me.

I don’t necessarily assume a-priori that it is going to suck. But I’m not willing to get sucked by hype, either.

Like you, I’ll be waiting for the reviews. I’m always open for the possibilities of being brought back to the flock, if you pardon my metaphor. But they’re going to need to work pretty hard for this to happen.

Yes! Patrick Stewart is the executive producer, and Roddenberry’s son is also on the team. Best part of all, Rick Berman, Branan Braga and the other clowns who ruined Star Trek are nowhere near this production. They weren’t even offered a role in its creation. Thank god!

I am hopeful!

“Best part of all, Rick Berman, Branan Braga and the other clowns who ruined Star Trek are nowhere near this production.”

I’ll take Berman and Bragga over Kurtzman and Goldsman, any day.

B&B may have created their share of stinkers, but they also gave us quite few masterpieces like “Cause and Effect” and “Parallels” and the movie “First Contact”.

What did Kurtzman give us that’s comparable to that?

And Rod Roddenberry is nothing to be look forward for, either. Isn’t he the guy who got all misty-eyed about how season 1 of Discovery continues his father dream? Father must be rolling in his grave at transwarp speeds… His own son saying something like this.

(reminds me of Simon Well’s involvement in the 2002 remake of “The Time Machine” and how people raved that it must be a great adaptation because the guy was a descendant of H.G. Wells. Of-course it was a horrible adaptation. I have no respect to show-runners who pull this kind of cheap publicity stunts. It felt dirty in 2002, and it feels just as dirty now)

The only two names which are promising on the current list are Patrick Stewart and Michael Chabon. But the minute I allow myself to feel hope, I’m reminded that Leonard Nimoy agreed to star in ST2009… apparently, you cannot trust anyone in this mad new world. Not even Sir Patrick (and I have the uttermost respect for the man).

Well, I guess they did do one thing right: They are keeping people like me interested in how things will go. 🙂

@OmicronThetaDeltaPhi agreed. I’m not going to pretend everything Star Trek that’s come out after 2009 was horrible, but is there anything that’s universally regarded as great or on the level of “First Contact,” “All Good Things,” etc? Even at its best, Discovery was merely an OK sci-fi show, not a memorable work of art we’ll still be talking about 30 years later.

@OmicronThetaDeltaPhi, Amen!! Compared to the current custodians of Star Trek, I’d DEFINITELY take Rick Berman and company any day. At least they tried to connect all the series together for the most part. Let’s not forget that it was Les Moonves who killed Star Trek. Remember viewership numbers and quality was improving by Enterprise season 4. Les was the one who canceled Star Trek. I’m sure Rick Berman and company would’ve kept it going if they could have. I actually wish CBS would hire Ronald D Moore, Ira Steven Behr, Naren Shankar and Brannon Braga as Showrunners.

MidshipmanNorris – concur with you.

Think I’m going to do this the old school way. I’ll watch it, then formulate my opinion.

Then I’ll read Jammer’s review 🙂

@Jimmy

With Braga you kinda got your wish, as he is the exec producer on the Orville. He’s doing a pretty good job there, too 🙂

Given it was the one major plot thread DS9 failed to address in the end I wonder if there will be a throw away line explaining whether Bajor ever joined the Federation? I’d also love it if they’d confirm if Ro survived the Dominion wiping out the Maquis!y

@OmicronThetaDeltaPhi, true . I can see we share similar views about the what I consider the sad state of Star Trek. I guess you can say I’m a hard lined Star Trek purist. I believe you can’t just cherrypick what’s canon and what isn’t. For me everything that was shown or said on screen is canon, period. Aesthetics and story are all equally important. I know there are inconsistencies in the previous trek series but at least they tried somewhat. For me Discovery feels like bad fan fiction

“Daaad!”
Riker: “Stop yelling!”
“It’s Jean Luc Picard”
You bet you arse it is…Cant wait for Jan 23

RE “No, Sir Patrick.
No, I will not watch this right away. I will wait for a good review”

Whoa dude, lighten up

P.s. the pregnant woman in Data’s painting (in Picard’s dream/holodeck recreation…probably dream…what a poor broken soul if so) is the Borg queen…the woman coming to Picard for help is his daughter who was conceived between Picard and said queen…callin’ it

P.s.

RE “No, Sir Patrick.
No, I will not watch this right away. I will wait for a good review”

Don’t worry, I will write a good review so you can have permission to watch this show

@Pm

It’d be hilarious to think that you are Patrick Stewart, posting this.

https://www.radiotimes.com/news/on-demand/2019-11-22/star-trek-films-tv-shows-canon/

Interesting article.

I think the writer is right for the wrong reason.

I don’t think that having half a dozen non-related Trek projects is – in itself – a bad thing. There is ALREADY a fascinating interlinked Star Trek world, which can serve as a bridge between the different new series.

I also think that branching like this could be potentially cool, had it been done by a team that’s up to such an enormous task. The only problem is that the people who are currently at the helm of Star Trek are simply not capable of such a complicated worldbuilding project.

I mean, these are the guys who promised to fix the timeline problems that were introduced in DSC S1, and their “solution” ended up being a total cop-out (basically “Everybody is ordered to never talk about it, so we can all pertend it never happened”). There’s simply no way these people could juggle half a dozen different eras without turning it all into a total mess.

Lets all hope that the new show isn’t a complete dumpster fire like the last one and we all end up contracting a nasty STD again.

On a rather somber note, we lost some notable people formerly involved in (real!) Star Trek this month.

As of December 10, 2019:

Dec. 8: René Auberjonois – actor who played Odo in Deep Space Nine
Dec. 5: Robert Walker – actor who played Charlie in the TOS episode, “Charlie-X”
Dec. 2: D.C. Fontana – writer of TOS episodes, as well as TAS, TNG and DS9

Rather sadden me to hear about Auberjonois. Deep Space Nine was one of my all time favorite Trek shows, and always hoped there might be a movie, sequel of some sort of continuation. His passing really lessens the possibility of that, and just sad in general to lose such a great actor and Trek personality.

D.C. Fontana is another hard loss, there are just so many great stories and ideas she contributed to Trek lore, in fact she embodied a lot of what Star Trek was.

@Mitch… Amen. They will all surly be missed ?

@ Jimmy – It’s also the first time we’ve lost a main cast member from the post-TOS era Trek (TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT). Hard to believe so much time has past that we’re at that point…

Which brings up the point, Picard could very well be the LAST chance for any kind of TNG send off (Nemesis certainly wasn’t it). How long before Stewart, Frakes, McFadden, Dorn, Spiner, Siritis and Burton are too old to act, or pass away? And sadly, with STP, it looks like we’re getting more non-canon (and more nonsense!) Trek, in the same vein of STD. I would prefer at this point if they just left things alone, unless they bring back classic Trek writers or at least people who know what Trek was about.

I think at this point I’m going to consider “All Good Things…” the final ending to TNG and make believe everything past it never happened (like I’ve done post Aliens, Terminator 2, Ghostbusters 2, and so many other ruined franchises). At any rate, seeing the original actors and writers die just makes me realize the Trek we knew and loved is slowly fading away.

@Mitch

I agree that “All Good Things…” was the perfect send-off for the TNG crew. But personally, I think it would be a shame to pretend that “First Contact” never happened.

At any rate, the Trek we knew and loved is never going to fade away. Not any more than the works of Shakespeare, Jules Verne, or Akorem Laan will fade away. That’s what books, DVDs and Blu-Rays are for.

@Mitch and OmicronThetaDeltaPhi…

I absolutely loved “All Good Things” but I admit I also love all the TNG movies. I know I’m in the minority but I do like and accept “Nemesis” as the ending to the TNG era. On a side note I have every Star Trek series and movie on DVD/Blue-Ray and re-watch them frequently. The classic Treks will live on forever ?

Renewed for a second series before and episode has aired.

@Jimmy

I wan’t go as far as saying I *liked* Nemesis, but it wasn’t as bad as most people make it to be. I can still accept it as a bona-fide Trek film, and it is still far better than everything that came afterwords…

@Latex Zebra

Of-course it has.

Ah, how I long for the old days were a TV show actually had to prove itself in front of an actual audience before it was renewed or cancelled.

Guess I’m not in Kansas anymore 😉

Jammer–is–at–it–again—but—why??
Did–I–miss–an–announcement???
Picard—second—season—has—the—green—light?!Disturbing—news—indeed—but—is—that—it??

Hmmm control has only taken over the comment stream apparently…

I gotta admit, that control thing was awesome.

I have a feeling that it’s just a glitch this time. Maybe Jammer triggered that old script by mistake.

Either that, or Control has taken over the world and the End of Life as We Know It is at hand. 😉

My bad. Re-uploaded an old copy of the April 1 script by mistake while making other changes. Went to bed and didn’t realize the error for 12 hours.

@OmicronThetaDeltaPhi and Jimmy

I’ll admit I enjoyed Generations and First Contact, despite their flawed writing. I’m less forgiving of Insurrection and Nemesis, though if I watched any of these film again today, I might have a differing opinion. Especially in contrast to JJ-Trek and STD, I think Nemesis is likely to feel like Casablanca now! 😉

I think I should have phrased that as…”the people who gave us the Trek we knew and loved are slowly fading away”. Doesn’t mean we can’t have a new generation of writers and actors to keep what they started going. It’s just discouraging seeing those people pass away and the new ones replacing them literally vandalizing the very notion of Star Trek. I want to hope and believe one day, somehow, we get back real Star Trek. Maybe that’s wishful thinking at this point…

Thumbs up for the comment about books, DVD’s and Blu-rays! I actually bought the TNG series boxset and the first 10 movies on Blu-ray and planning to sit and re-watch them soon! Still hoping to pick up TOS and TAS series on Blu-ray if they drop in price (guess I’ll have to settle for DVD’s for DS9).

@Mitch
“I want to hope and believe one day, somehow, we get back real Star Trek. Maybe that’s wishful thinking at this point…”

I ain’t going to happen any time soon, but it’s good to have hope. Perhaps an avid Trek fan will invent a new kind of spaceship, sell it for a trillion dollars, and use the money to by the franchise from CBS. 😉

Personally, though, I’m betting that the spirit of Star Trek will live on in other shows. I guess from your comments that you don’t like the Orville, but that show will no doubt pave the way to other attempts which you might find more palatable.

@OmicronThetaDeltaPhi

I hoped once STD flopped (and boy, did it ever!), CBS might rethink their strategy and give us back real Trek. Instead, looks like they’re doubling-down with STP, sigh. So yeah, you’re probably right that real Star Trek isn’t coming back for a very long time…if ever.

Not sure why you think that. I actually REALLY like the Orville! It has its flaws, and at times reminds of Voyager, but I’m actually enjoying it for the fact it basically *IS* Star Trek (just the generic no-name brand of it). I feel like I’m back in the early 90’s, watching new episodes of TNG or VOY! Hasn’t quite hit the level of TNG at its peak, but if the writing keeps improving, as it has, it just might come close! (won’t say close to DS9, the writing and stories on that show were just masterful, some of the best TV watching ever).

Midnight’s Edge released a very interesting video on the current state of CBS / Trek:

WARNING: POSSIBLE SPOILERS !!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d96RFiA-x3M

Yeah… Super-reliable source.. LOL

https://variety.com/2020/tv/features/patrick-stewart-star-trek-picard-cbs-all-access-1203459573/

“The Next Generation” presented a humanist future in which issues like poverty, race and class have long been sorted out, and conflicts are more often resolved through negotiation and problem-solving than at the point of a phaser pistol.

Stewart had no desire to go there again.

“I think what we’re trying to say is important,” he says. “The world of ‘Next Generation’ doesn’t exist anymore. It’s different. Nothing is really safe. Nothing is really secure.”

“In a way, the world of ‘Next Generation’ had been too perfect and too protected,” he says. “It was the Enterprise. It was a safe world of respect and communication and care and, sometimes, fun.” In “Picard,” the Federation — a union of planets bonded by shared democratic values — has taken an isolationist turn. The new show, Stewart says, “was me responding to the world of Brexit and Trump and feeling, ‘Why hasn’t the Federation changed? Why hasn’t Starfleet changed?’ Maybe they’re not as reliable and trustworthy as we all thought.” “

Just great… More dystopia-Trek with Discovery-style aesthetics. Who the heck thought that this is a good idea?

Oh, right: Sir Patrick Stewart. I still have trouble accepting that this entire mess was his idea.

Guess it’s just another sign of the insane times we live in. We can put it up there with the fact that the renown creator of offensive low-brow cartoons had suddenly become the sole torch-bearer of the Trek spirit. It’s like the entire universe has gone crazy (as if we really needed more proof for that).

I’m excited to watch this. Loved TNG and especially DS9 but after 25+ years I don’t really ever want to watch Star Trek in that format again, and if I do, a rewatch will suffice. Even though I think The Orville gets it right, I never feel compelled to watch those episodes right away.

And though Discovery has been uneven the first two seasons, its the only Trek show my long time S/O will watch all the way through with me. Falls asleep during the old shows and asks too many questions during the movies. So Disco is a huge win for me and I hope it lasts for a while.

More good news…

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/live-feed/star-trek-picard-renewed-season-2-at-cbs-all-access-1268720

Hardly “news” given that it was already mentioned on this very page nearly a month ago…

Further good news..

https://screenrant.com/star-trek-tv-shows-after-picard/

First clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xP_AovfhD3Y

IMO this makes it look really good; mature and thoughtful, and beautifully scored.

Fingers crossed; Chabon might pull a Piller. He’s strong enough an auteur to keep Kurtzman at bay.

https://www.rollingstone.com/tv/tv-features/star-trek-picard-michael-chabon-interview-937028/

Chabon seems a massive TNG fanboy.

… Ok.

You’ve got my attention. But you better write a (gosh-darn) story.

I’m not kidding. No more ‘easter-egg’ ‘roller coaster ride’ bs. Write a gd story.

New teaser has Stewart…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=easFD2yEeaw&feature=emb_title

…showing off his mighty acting chops.

I’m surprised there hasn’t been more comments here recently. Maybe I missed a thread somewhere.

Anyway, Picard premiered in the US today and is coming here to Europe tomorrow, so I look forward to discussing with you guys. I’ve seen all of the trailers, excerpts and info I could find and I am really interested to see where this is headed.

@Flip

CBS All Access still says “New Series Tomorrow” from my vantage point, ensconced deep within the plak tow… I mean the Central USA…

So, no, it hasn’t launched just yet…

I will open up a place to comment on the series premiere on Thursday evening. Until then, I am closing this thread. Please don’t post anywhere else on the site about Picard until I open the dedicated new location.