2x01 Brother

Imagine two brothers. One is younger, the other is older. Imagine that they happen upon their late father's model trains. Their father was a huge model train fan, and he was very good at running several of them at once and making amazing dioramas for their tracks to travel through. It was always a joy to watch him play. Experts at conducting model trains aren't just playing with trains, they create a fantasy realm that you can watch for hours and get completely lost in. The brother take all of the trains and equipment out of storage and set it all up after years and years of disuse. It isn't quite how they remembered it though.

The younger brother wants to try. He knows he can do it. And while he can successfully make the trains run along the track, he clearly has no experience with any of it and it's just trains moving around in circles. All of the pleasantness and atmosphere their father created when he played just wasn't there. The older brother wants to try, but the younger brother insists on doing it again. Try after try, it just isn't working. After a train falls over taking a turn too fast, the younger brother finally relents and hands the controls to the older brother. The older brother is actually old enough to have spent time with his father, so he remembers what it looked like and the little lessons the father would give him as he played. Slowly, it starts to come back to the older brother and he gets two trains moving in harmony with each other, then a third, then a fourth.

The younger brother, who was pouting because he couldn't make it work, started to watch. As he watches, he begins to understand what he was doing wrong. It was so obvious. They go back and forth, telling the trains what to do and setting up the scenery. In a much smaller way, the magic that their father created comes back to life. But it is definitely there, so they must be doing something right. They finally agree to learn as much as they could so that, one day, maybe they will be as good at it as their father was.

For Discovery, there was almost nowhere to go but up. The Short Treks that have been trickling out for the past couple of months showed a marked improvement in pacing, storytelling, and character depth. So being better than itself should be a shoe-in. Now the moment of truth is here. Star Trek Discovery is no Original Series, no The Next Generation, nor Deep Space Nine, not even Voyager or Enterprise. But I am relieved to say that it is Star Trek in the Roddenberry sense of the term. Still a little too PEWPEWPEW! and "kewl" for the potential the source material offers it, still questionably adhering to the Kelvin Timeline's "Every god damned thing has a reflective surface" aesthetic, but gratefully leaning much heavier towards The Human Adventure.

I have so many minor complaints, even though it's only one episode so far... but that's it, only minor complaints. That's saying an awful lot. The cinematography, the character development and prominence, the music, the story, everything that truly matters is the polar opposite to an average episode of season 1. If you gave up at some point during the first season, I dare say that Discovery deserves one more chance.

(Now, understand that, as I write this, we are exactly one episode in and I may very well be eating those words by the time they shove Evil Georgeou and Voq back into the story. Because they just had to, right?)

It's just not the same without the father's touch. It will never be the same. But I saw the magic again today, even if just for a few moments. I hope that that's a sign of things to come. And I will always support a genuine effort to try again.

Nicely done CBS. Deftly blended in some characters (1 this episode) and iconography from TOS to squelch the discord from the nattering, canon fascist nabobs, and pique the curiosity of the undecided, while still remaining PRE-TOS and advancing the original "Discovery" premise. Well played..., well played indeed.

Of course the "purists" will be quick to point out everything wrong with this episode, just as they have all along, insisting that this is a show we shouldn't enjoy because it's not Trekie enough, or TOO futuristic for the timeline, or too politically correct, or too violent, or too gay, when perhaps the real problem is with those whose cranial contents simply haven't evolved enough to grasp the actual depth and awesomeness of the show.

Star Trek has ALWAYS been about "going BOLDLY where no man has gone before" yet, sadly, there are those who desperately try to squeeze it into the confines of what THEY say is correct, and would have the writer and producers restricted to the same tried, true, and BORING stories that were fed to the masses starting almost 50 years ago. Now imagine if they were allowed to restrict technology, or commerce, or just about any facet of life to where it was 5 decades ago. I for one like and embrace the changes that have occurred both IRL and on our screens of all various shapes and sizes. Just as I am willing to give each new generation of Star Trek writers the benefit of the doubt, and the chance to not just copy and paste, but to stretch the limits of possibility and imagination, and take us on new adventures, and to new frontiers.

If that gets some purists canonical panties in a wedgie, well, so be it. But I for one am willing to suspend disbelief, buckle up, lower my shields and enjoy the ride.

As for the episode itself, several nice head fakes, when those familiar with TOS would be expecting certain things to occur but... gotcha!
Kudos to Sonequa Martin-Green for continuing to evolve her portrayal of Michael Burnham, and showing some emotions when appropriate. To the always delightful Mary Wiseman, who, as newly minted officer trainee Tilly is "incandescent" as ever and never fails to make me smile when she's on screen. Anthony Rapp's Staments, is of course going through the stages of grief, and, had me worried for a moment, but, it looks like something new is about to bring him out of his funk. Doug Jones Saru, was, well... Saru, and, believe me when I say, I mean that as a GOOD thing. Anson Mount pulled his weight as Captain Pike, doing a yeoman's job of restraint when stepping into such an iconic (if short lived) role. And the addition of Tig Notaro's deadpan wit and whip-smart timing (as well as her characters apparent next level engineering chops) might have her hanging out in the Montgomery Scott wing of the Discovery, we shall see.

Overall a really good season premier, and, from the looks of the upcoming clips, it's gonna be fun.

So, Discovery is back and as I indicated last year I hadn't missed her much. But I am willing to give her a second chance. And I struggle with it, I already had the urge to stop during this episode.

I can't say anything about the story as it is clearly a season long arch. That new uniform looks much improved. That's about all the positives I find. What made me sigh a lot is those forced comedic element like in the elevator and those awkward moments fe between Tilly and Pike , again totally forced and not coming naturally. That almost felt like a sitcom.
Now, I understand that a new Star Trek show has to look more modern than a previous one. But the tech is just too much. It is basically just eye-candy. In every shot there is way too much happening on the screen. Way too many "uhh" and "Aahhh" moments. The quality is good but it's not nessessary, it's not Trek. And alltogether the show feels not unique, it feels ordinary.

Coming back to the story I still don't see how they can come up with a satisfying explanation that this is Prime Universe Star Trek. And since the general fate of Spock and Pike is established fact we are again in a situation that anything threatening to happen to this characters feels meaningless. And Burnham going through Spocks quarters - that's too much invasion of provacy. I didn't like that.

Honestly I don't know where to go. I want to like the show as there was too long of a time without Star Trek. Therefore I really look hard for reasons to like it but I only come up with reasons I don't. I will stroll along for a couple of episodes more but I won't force myself through the season.

It's quite clear they are backtracking on a lot of decisions made in season 1 but let's hope there's more to come in the future.
Introducing the uniforms and the bridge crew was a nice gesture as well as the mention of the ready room but this still doesn't feel quite like the Star Trek I love. There's too much action and happenstance going on to merely feed the plot, which is a far cry from the often scientific and ethical basis of old Star Trek.

Michael Burnham is still quite the unlikable character portraying not only the worse Vulcan ever but also one of the more arrogant and annoying humans there is (being "awesome" at everything doesn't mean you're not an asshole). Tilly is steadfast becoming equally annoying being chirpy and quip and funny in every other scene... The Felicity of the Federation. Saru remains to be, by far, the best character on the show as for now. Anson Mount is too new to give an opinion on but I did enjoy him telling Michael Burnham to shut up... up to the point where he was basically told he was being an ass...

I'll keep watching the show, hoping it'll get better but as is this is definately the least Star Trek of all Star Treks (not incl the recent movies). I hope they can find their footing and become as great as TOS, TNG, DS9 and VOY were (and hell, season 2 and 3 of ENT too!)
And I most definately hope they won't turn the Captain Picard show into a lensflare, SJW, actionpacked, one-liner, booyah motherfucker kinda monstrosity. In the meantime I'll watch the USS Orville on their 5-year mission and remind myself what real Star Trek feels like.

[7.3/10] Star Trek: Discovery is back and it is different! There is a new captain in town (well, technically he’s an old captain, arguably the original captain, but that’s another story! He does things differently from the last guy! We have a new resourceful and sarcastic engineer! We have familiar faces apt to leave! We have updated versions of the Original Series uniforms! We have unadulterated, non-stop action to blast directly at your eyeballs! And by god, we have fun!

It’s hard not to look past the text of “Brother”, the season premiere for season 2 of Discovery, and see most of the episode as an attempt to reassure folks who were lukewarm on the first season that there is a new sheriff (or rather sheriffs) in town behind the scenes, not just in front of the camera, and that this new season of Star Trek is going to be more like what you remembered except cooler and funnier!

With turnover among the showrunners (for good reason, if the reports are to be believed), efforts to harken back to more traditional Trek, and rampant reminders that things are going to run differently than they did before, it’s hard not to read this episode as something meant to be a corrective, to hook reluctant viewers with enough octane and crew-wide camaraderie to keep them coming. I can see the strings of that approach showing, and it makes me put my guard up.

But with that aside, I actually enjoyed the arrival of the famed Captain Pike on the Discovery. When I heard that Anson Mount had been cast in the role originated by Jeffrey Hunter in 1966’s “The Menagerie”, I had a fair bit of trepidation. Not only is it a tightrope walk to try to recreate a character who was originally crafted in the sixties, but I only knew Mount from the execrable Inhumans series where his character may as well have been played by a mannequin on a hand truck.

My fears were misplaced. Mount is full of life as Pike, and it’s interesting to see a little of the rough and tumble cowboy diplomacy that Kirk famously favored intersecting with the more rulebound professionalism of the Discovery. In a way, beyond even Star Trek Generations or the episode “Relics” from TNG, it feels like a collision course between the sensibilities of the 1960s series and the slicker bent that Trek took on in the 1980s and 1990s. Having Pike dispense with rank, speak with slang and a smirk, and inject his style of leadership on a ship used to a little more order makes for instant conflict and pressure point that seem promising.

There’s also way more humor than we had in the first season of Discovery here. Season 1 had a nicely dry sense of humor, and it’s not like there were no moments of levity. But everything from Tilly’s being flustered over Pike’s pinky to Burnham’s banter with her compatriots in the pods and the elevator (replete with sneezing alien), to the arch bent of Tig Notaro as Lt. Reno, there’s a looser vibe to this episode that comes off a little forced at times, but is at least different. High fives between Tilly and Stammitz, the ladies at helm looking stammering something supportive, and even the shape of the already warm dynamic between Burnham and Tilly here feels more slack and friendly than what we got in season 1, which could come off a little detached at times.

The show also throws in plenty of sops to longtime fans and continuity hawks. We get an explanation for why the Enterprise didn’t fight in the Klingon War (which seems primed to have emotional consequences, not just excuses for Pike & co’s absence from last season), an account of why the uniforms look different, and even a barb about the Enterprise crew looking at Discovery’s interior and deciding it’s clear where the Federation’s “pennies” are going. At the same time, “Brother” has more of the rhythm of a tradition Trek episode, with a mysterious phenomenon that must be investigated, a few deaths in the process, and a lesson learned after the inevitable triumph over the myriad obstacles in the way, with a ticking clock to up the tension.

And we can tell where Discovery is spending its pennies too. It seems unlikely that we’ll be entitled to this level of spectacle on a weekly basis, as “Brother” crams about a full movie’s worth of action sequences into sixty minutes. From the race to the asteroid and rescue from the debris, to the daring escape from the rock’s surface, to the efforts to secure a sample to potentially revitalize the spore drive, it’s clear that the show spared no expense in presenting a film-quality dose of CGI action to keep the fans salivating. It feels a little perfunctory in places, and gratuitous in others, but you can appreciate the efforts to keep up with the likes of the recent Trek films in terms of tension and interstellar fireworks.

But honestly, the parts I liked the most of “Brother” were the parts that felt more indebted to what the show was going for last season. I’d be lying if I said I relished the chance for more heavy-handed colloquies or the show’s ponderous voiceovers. But I had a greater appreciation for the slower moments before and after the nonstop explosions and danger when the core of the episode was Burnham and Sarek reacting to the prospect of reuniting with the estranged Spock rather than surviving or capturing the macguffin du jour.

It’s here where “Brother” ceases to feel like just another quippy action flick and where it feels more like a contemplative, even arty picture that seems more like the soul of Star Trek than the flashier tales that tend to dominate the franchise’s big screen offerings. It’s not that the visual acuity departs in these moments; the use of color in the flashbacks to Michael’s first visit to Sarek’s family home, juxtaposed with her visit to Spock’s quarters in the present, is striking, in a more measured, deliberate way that feels more cinematic than all the kinetic space rumbling the episode otherwise has on offer.

That comes with a heavily signposted theme of brotherhood, of not wanting to lose people close to you whether they’re colleagues or kin. It’s what unites Pike’s crew and Burnham’s crew despite their differences and bristly start, and it’s what drives Burnham to want to make things right with her foster brother after so much seems to have gone wrong between them. Star Trek Discovery is new, and good lord it wants you to know that. But the part of the episode that feels the most palpable, the most interesting, the most Trek, is the part of it feels like what we’ve already seen from the show.

9/10
Superb
OH BROTHER
THIS WAS AN AWESOME
START TO SEASON 2 OF ST-DISC,
GOD I LOVE THIS SHOW IT'S PHENOMENAL.
THIS WAS THE MOST TENSE AND BEST RESCUE MISSION IN STAR TREK
HISTORY. WOW AND WHAT'S WITH THAT RED HUMANOID FIGER MICHAEL SAW IN THE ASTEROID RIGHT BEFORE PIKE TURNED UP,
LOOKED LIKE ANGEL OR SOMETHING
WELL THE WINGS SLIGHTLY BECAME
VISIBLE, (LAST TIME I SAW SHADOW
WINGS WAS ON SUPERNATURAL),
I THOUGHT I SAW LIKE DEVIL HORNS AND ANGEL WINGS ARE SUMAT.
COULDN'T MAKE IT OUT
THEIR WAS TO MUCH DUST AND FIRE
AND SMOKE TO FULLY SEE BUT THERE
WAS DEFINITELY SOMETHING ELSE THERE.
AND WHAT'S WITH SPOCK SEEING THOSE ANOMALIES SO MANY YEARS BEFORE WHEN HE WAS SO MUCH YOUNGER.
I LOVED THE HUMOUR AND THE JOKES IN THIS EPISODE, IT REALLY WORKED FOR
"THIS" SEASON AND I HOPE
THERE IS MORE OF THAT WHEN
POSSIBLE.
ONCE AGAIN TILLY PULLED MY HEART STRINGS BLESS HER SHE'S AMAZING,
THIS SHOW IS THE BEST TREK EVER CREATED AND EACH EPISODE IS LIKE A FEATURE LENGTH MOVIE WITH HOW AWESOME THE VFX ARE AND THE STORY AND ACTING
AND I HAVE TO SAY THE BEGINNING OF THIS EPISODE WAS ONE OF THE BEST BEGINNINGS I HAVE EVER SEEN IN A STAR TREK MOVIE SORRY SHOW, YOU CAN CLEARLY
SEE WHY EACH EPISODE
COST 8 MILLION DOLLARS.
THIS SHOW IS FLAWLESS AND I'M SO READY
FOR THIS EPIC SEASON, ARGUABLY
THE BEST SEASON EVER, NOT JUST
IN THIS SHOW BUT EVERY OTHER
STAR TREK SHOW.

X FINAL THOUGHT:
WHEN ARE WE GOING TO GET MICHAEL IN THAT CHAIR AND WHAT ARE THESE MYSTERIOUS SIGNALS ALL ABOUT.
let's find out and have a little fun along the way.

S2 ep1 8/10