Comment Stream

Re: TNG S6: The Chase

Jammer: "but will never be mentioned afterward, despite its jaw-dropping implications."

Discovery: "hold my blood wine."

Re: DSC S5: Red Directive / Under the Twin Moons

Burnham tumbling through space right into the bridge of Discovery and onto the captain's chair is one of the dumbest things I've seen in Star Trek. Also two starships crashing into the desert to stop an avalanche without taking major damage. Seriously, there's no sense of realism of plausibility in these shows. It doesn't seem like the writers care if viewers suspend their disbelief or about world-building.

Re: SNW S2: Hegemony

This episode was fne. Not great, not horrible, but just ok. I think it's missing that something extra that makes it more than just an action episode. The best Star Trek action cliffhangers still had interesting character development or social commentary. "Best of Both Worlds" was exciting because of the Borg invasion and assimilation of Picard - but it still holds up because it's a character study of Riker. DS9's "Die is Cast" was one of the coolest space battles on TV - but had riveting personal dynamics between Odo and Garak. This episode was missing that.

Re: SNW S2: Subspace Rhapsody

This musical episode was a bold choice and the writers, actors, and everyone involved absolutely nailed it. It's a sign of the show's confidence and the strength of these characters that SNW trusts the audience to remain invested in the drama despite the silliness of the premise.

This episode and the previous one cemented SNW for me as a worthy heir to 90s Trek. Is it as good as DS9 or post-season 3 TNG? Nope, not yet. But it's finding its identity in a way the other new Trek shows haven't. It's got the episodic format of 90s Trek with the richer character development of 21st century TV. A few stinkers aside, it's storytelling is tight and entertaining.

I wouldn't rate any episode of SNW as among the top 20 all-time Trek greats, but wouldn't be surprised if SNW manages to pull off at least one great before it's all over.

Re: SNW S2: Lost in Translation

I thought this episode was fine, but could have been so much better with a few changes. First, SNW's Kirk just doesn't work. The actor doesn't have the charisma and his appearances feel like poorly executed fan service. Nothing in TOS suggested to me that Kirk and Uhura had such a close friendship. Pretty much everything Kirk did in this episode could have been done by one of SNW's core cast, all much more interesting characters.

The other drag is the show still seems afraid to take its time and replicate the success of 90s era Trek. As Jammer noted in his review, there's still a need to cram in action/horror scenes.

SNW is much, much better than Disco or Picard, and I've found most of the episodes entertaining, but a few self-inflicted wounds prevent it from being great.

Re: SNW S2: Ad Astra Per Aspera

As an academic ethicist, I found this episode revolting. There is a widespread and very deep opposition to most forms of genetic engineering among philosophers that write about and study the subject.
To compare that opposition to (particularly racial) bigotry is not only illogical, it is perversely ironic given the racist underpinnings of many historical Western eugenics programs. Notably, opposition to genetic engineering comes from many different schools of thought: feminist, liberal, conservative, queer theory, etc.

As with most issues, it is reasonable to have differing views on genetic engineering of sentient life. This episode did not do that. I generally like SNW, it it really seems like the writers here specifically wanted to continue Picard & Discovery's bizarre compulsion to take a dump all over the Federation.

Well, they really picked the wrong policy to go after this time.

Re: PIC S3: The Last Generation

anyone else surprised that we didn't get any references to Tasha Yar or even a Commander Sela cameo? I mean we got Michelle Forbes as Ro Laren!

Re: PIC S3: The Last Generation

Am I the only one disappointed that this show teased a code to the Changelings and Dominion War arc from DS9, only to not deliver? I really thought we'd get to learn more about the state of the Dominion and its relations with the Federation 20 years after the events of DS9. While the TNG fan service was entertaining, I still feel like there's a huge missed opportunity. I really do hope one day we get a modern Trek show that takes world-building seriously.

Re: PIC S3: The Bounty

please ignore the last comment. That was intended for the Mandalorian episode.

Re: PIC S3: The Bounty

This season is a big step down. Four episodes in and it seems so aimless. There are a bunch of weird decisions, like mashing large flashback scenes with serialized story arcs in one episode, without any thematic or plot thread connecting them. I just don't get how the same crew that brought us seasons 1 and 2 are now doing this.

Re: PIC S3: The Bounty

I admit I'm enjoying this season more than I thought. It's easily the best season of nuTrek other than SNW so far. Yet, the writing still leaves so much to be desired. So much of the humor feels like forced "Marvel-style" quips that don't feel true to TNG Trek. And, to top it off, this season isn't exploring any interesting new ideas, social commentary, or sci-fi twists. I enjoy the nostalgia and the chance to say goodbye to these characters, but feel like I won't ever have a need to revisit this story.

Re: ORV S3: Midnight Blue

I watched the first season of Orville and didn't get into it. Is it worth trying again? Most of Jammers reviews for this show are negative, but this one piqued my interest.

Re: Star Wars: Obi-Wan Kenobi

I agree with this for the most part, except I do think the actress playing young Leia was pretty good. About as good as could be expected for a child actor who also had to look just like Leia. Otherwise, yeah this entire show felt underwhelming. I also could not stand the shaky cam. The camera moved around so much and took me right out of the episode.

Re: SNW S1: The Serene Squall

@AMA, I agree, I enjoyed this episode, but kept wondering why this show seems so focused on Spock. I don't dislike what they're doing, but also kind of check out because Spock has been analyzed to death in Trek. We have 3 TOS seasons, 1 animated season, 6 movies with Nimoy, 3 movies with Quinto, 2 TNG episodes, 1 season of Discovery, and dozens of novels, comics, etc about this character. What else is there to learn?

SNW is easily the best of the new Trek shows and I am enjoying it. But I'm not completely in its thrall, and I think some of that might be because it's still retreading old ground with characters whose fates we know. The show works really well when it leans into that (Pike's fate haunting him in the first few episodes). It's not as good when it pretends we don't already know the future (the Spock-T'Pring-Chapel "will they or won't they"). I can't help but feel this show would have been even better with a completely new cast of characters.

Re: SNW S1: Memento Mori

@Galadriel, do you speak Burmese? I noticed that the characters you used were Burmese (but the English alphabet letters didn't match up to the Burmese characters).

Re: SNW S1: Children of the Comet

It’s like the writers dared themselves to put some Star Trek in their Star Trek. And it worked! Really good episode. Not up there with the best of TNG or DS9, but still really solid

Re: PIC S2: Farewell

There are so many plot contrivances in this show. The whole season could have been avoided if characters just communicated at a basic level. And it retroactively makes the first episode - easily the best of the season - much worse.

- Why when Jurati contacted Picard wouldn't she just say there's a massive galactic threat, here are the coordinates, and let's go fix it? Why wouldn't she explain what she was doing when assimilating the ship instead of acting like a threat and suddenly whipping out her tentacles?

- Why exactly does Rios like 21st century Earth when his main experience was getting detained by ICE? Dr. Teresa is cute, but their relationship just didn't seem so amazing that Rios would basically give up his life in the future.

- Would NASA or any other space agency really let a rich donor meet an astronaut uninvited minutes before the launch of a major mission? How does he just happen to have drones that can take out the spaceship (also, we don't have that tech in 2022)?

- And why is Q dying? Didn't Voyager establish that death is a foreign concept for the Q.

On the whole, this season just feels like plot salad. The writers threw some ideas at a wall and didn't bother to develop them or craft them into a narrative that flowed well. It's remarkably bad writing. I would really urge the writers to take a moment before season 3 and figure out what they want to do with this story. They have the whole TNG crew back together. Don't waste their time!

Re: PIC S2: Hide and Seek

@Paul M., unfortunately I agree. Season 1 of TNG had some very bad episodes... but it also had some good episodes. 11001001, The Big Goodbye, and Heart of Glory are all pretty good. Other episodes like Encounter at Farpoint and Datalore pay off later in the show for the world-building. In short, I can derive some joy from Season 1 of TNG. And, because TNG was an episodic show, I can ignore the bad episodes.

But there isn't a single episode in Picard Season 2 that I really liked. The first episode was pretty decent, but even that is retroactively undermined by where the rest of the season went. And it all went downhill from there. There isn't even anything comparable to Nepenthe in Season 1, which was a nice character piece. The whole season is just mediocrity.

Re: PIC S2: Mercy

Much more entertaining overall, but this still feels like a plot salad. Stuff is starting to connect - like Soong and Jurati teaming up - but it doesn't feel like it's building up to anything larger or more interesting. There's no themes or interesting ideas here.

Re: PIC S2: Monsters

@Greg M, I agree and I personally won't be going out of my way to watch SNW. One reason I took a chance on Picard Season 2 - despite being really disappointed in Season 1 - is because I thought Discovery was getting better. Picard is two steps backwards. And nothing about SNW suggests it'll be a big leap in quality from the other shows. It has the same writers and creative team.

Re: PIC S2: Monsters

I agree with those who think two-stars is a bit high given Jammer's writeup of this episode. But I'd also remind you Jammer is fair and he gave two stars to notorious clunkers in DS9 like "Move Along Home."

What's really striking to me is just how many episodes this season - and in Discovery - are getting 2 stars or fewer from Jammer. Each season of DS9 had about 2-3 episodes rated at 2 stars or less, but each season of DS9 was 2.5 times as long. By contrast, Picard Season 2 already has two 2-star and one 1.5 star episodes. Even if the final three episodes of this season are great, that's a very high proportion of terrible episodes.

Re: PIC S2: Two of One

@Jason R & Flipsider, you both make great points about Picard. The Picard show seems to alternate between belittling Picard and making him into a paragon of grandfatherly kindness. Picard in TNG was a statesman and an intellectual. He strove to do what was right, but that sense of rightness came from principles and thoughtful arguments about what was in humanity's long-term interest. He wasn't naive and he wasn't just sentimental.

In one of my favorite TNG episodes, "The Wounded," Picard stops Starfleet Captain Ben Maxwell from attacking Cardassian ships. Maxwell claimed that the Cardassians were illegally transporting weapons, which the Cardassians deny. When Gul Macet thanks Picard for stopping Maxwell, Picard makes clear that he wasn't fooled by the Cardassian denials. He stopped Maxwell because Picard cared more about preserving the peace and was willing to take a risk for peace. Picard made an ethical decision rooted in a clear-eyed understanding of the facts. I think modern Trek would doing a similar scene would reinterpret that scene and have Picard claim he stopped Maxwell because that's what good guys do.

Re: PIC S2: Fly Me to the Moon

This whole discussion is evidence for the problems with this show. All we're talking about is continuity and whether or not Star Trek canon is in our timeline. Who cares? The best episodes of Star Trek inspired us to talk about ethics and philosophy and politics.

Re: The Expanse: 'Dulcinea'

The only victim of this April Fool's Joke is Jammer. I spent my time watching a great science fiction show, as opposed to Paramount+ Trek.

Re: PIC S2: Fly Me to the Moon

The overall story and episodes this season are oddly structured. What was this episode about, other than moving the plot forward incrementally? Why spend so much time on Rios getting captured only for him to be rescued five minutes into this episode? What growth did Rios experience from that incident? Since when is Jurati a desperate lonely woman? What character arcs are happening in this show aside from characters moving from one mission to the next? There’s stuff happening on screen, but none of it ever coheres into anything thematically interesting.