Star Trek: DiscoveryTV

[Famine]

Holy. Crap.

So the new ludicrous handwave is "the burn", which destroyed all dilithium at some point between the 24th and 31st centuries, making warp travel impossible.

Only this wouldn't have affected the Romulans, who use captive singularities in their warp engines. It also wouldn't affect the Borg's transwarp drives (which Janeway brought back with her to the Federation). But apparently it did somehow, because the Romulans and the Borg didn't take over with this giant tactical advantage.

The writers literally had access to a known thing from Star Trek canon that would have affected the Romulan and Borg ability to use warp travel: the Omega Particle, which destroys subspace and has affected two regions in the Alpha and Delta quadrants in Trek lore already, with a very small number of particles.

But no, they use one they made up which cannot have the effects they want because it simply wouldn't apply to every species.


These people have absolutely no idea about Star Trek. I mean, we already knew that courtesy of my previous post and the fact they're trumpeting the first trans/NB major character in Discovery - who is, just like Deep Space Nine's de facto second officer Jadzia/Ezri Dax, a Trill.

 

[EngieDiesel]

Holy. Crap.

So the new ludicrous handwave is "the burn", which destroyed all dilithium at some point between the 24th and 31st centuries, making warp travel impossible.

Only this wouldn't have affected the Romulans, who use captive singularities in their warp engines. It also wouldn't affect the Borg's transwarp drives (which Janeway brought back with her to the Federation). But apparently it did somehow, because the Romulans and the Borg didn't take over with this giant tactical advantage.

The worst part is that it's all just so they can do the "whoops, the Federation's dead" angle, which is something I've never understood the fascination that writers seem to have with. Taking the Federation out of Star Trek is like taking the referee out of a pro wrestling match; it seems strange because you expect it to be there, but it's a tertiary role and usually not the focal point of what you're watching, so it doesn't have nearly as big of an impact as you may think most of the time.

That said, I hope they do give some sort of explanation for whatever caused the burn. Not that I think it'll make it a better plot device (it's pretty dumb), but leaving a massively significant event like that as an off-hand comment seems to be a growing trope in modern sci-fi and I absolutely hate it. HATE. IT.

 

[TheCracker]

So. In Europe at least, Season 4 of Discovery, which started in the US last night, is now delayed until some time in 2022. Better still, its not going to feature on Netflix as it has done previously, it's going to be exclusively on yet another new streaming service - Paramount+. Even better! The previous 3 seasons have been pulled from Netflix as well.

Ahoy there, mateys!

 

[Rossell2]

I mean it's representative of the industry as a whole at the moment with all these streaming services. But come on though, changing the goalposts just before the season drops?

Sigh.

 

[TheCracker]

In a strange and annoying twist, Discovery Season 4 is now going to be shown on UK TV before Paramount+ arrives. Fan outcry has apparently made them change their approach.

However. It's showing now on the Pluto TV app... If anyone has ever come across the app and tried to use it's planner/guide to explore it's own series of channels (there's no search facility!) you'll know that this is not such good news. Aside from the app being just truly awful to navigate, Discovery is not going to feature on it's companion on-demand section, instead you'll have to catch it 'live' at 9pm on Friday night (repeated on Sat and Sun at the same time). Now my TV has Pluto built in, but without a DVR it can only be watched live. I have a DVR in the form of Sky Q, but you can't access Pluto through that, so there's no way i can record it to watch it at a more appropriate time. I believe it's also only available in glorious SD...

It's like being back in the 90's, but not in a good way.