Star Trek Discovery: Season Three

[Zargon]

Well, just worse and worse.

It would have been bad enough if the Burn was some evil company, Spaceron, that was trying to make super dodexhexaderdron -ithium that 'cause galaxy warming" or if some beyond dumb bad guy was using the Brun as a way to rule the galaxy.

But it's beyond bad when it's a dumb little kidz. It's one of the worst tropes in Sci fi: that dumb kidz can destroy the world/galaxy. It's SO annoying. And if it WAS true.....the whole universe would be destroyed in less then a second....one kid does not want to eat brussel sprouts...and bam, everything gone. SO DUMB.

About as dumb as the writers, producers, and such of this show.

Just look at "the shields" So Discovery's shields get weakened by the "stuff". So they can't go pick everyone up as they don''t have shields. Yet when the bad guys show up...the ship still raises shields? And the shields don't block the 32nd century transporter anyway?

Saru gets his worst captain ever award again...going on the away team JUST to save ONE kid, and not caring about anyone else. As a captain, you don't become all emotional JUST as one little kids JUST HAPPENS to be of your race. IF your a member of the Federation, you see ALL races as equal beings. Your race is not super special.

And Tilly in command...really? It was dumb to have her as the "desk clerk" First Officer when that spot should have gone to ANY lieutenant commander on the ship. But as an ensign she has zero experience. The whole point of rank is you get real life experience and wisdom. I knew the approaching ship was hostile...why did not Tilly? Because she is a clueless little girl, that is why. I would have cloaked and jumped the ship right at the second too....

And again, we get the idiotic chain of command: When acting like a captain Orders Stamus to get in the mushroom room...he whines and complains like a little fool. That is not how order work. The captain says "go sit in the corner" and you say "aye, sir" : THAT is show it works.

Plus we get more rogue officers as trill girl just runs off. Gee too bad she could not take thirty seconds to ask the captain about her wacky plan?

And....um.....so WHY did Tilly NOT destroy Discovery. You know other then it would end this horrible show forever. She even makes the threat. So...why does she not do it? Other then the bad lazy writing? She could have cued up the auto destruct for a two second count down as soon as she said the word 'lollypop'. But she just stood there and let the ship be captured.

And they will time jump again in the next episode? Um....cool?

[Mabus]

This episode has too much dumb, so I'll just sum it up:
The almighty Emerald Chain uses chairs as makeshift brig (which are later reused as barricades) since they already exhausted their supply of handcuffs (which consists of one pair of large hand handcuffs) on Stamets and decides to make Discovery more secure by installing a transporter jammer which Tillie wasn't able to last episode because she ate the last transporter jam jar, while also upgrading the ship's security computer, which turned out so great that the ship's non-removable Sphere data can now remove itself into those bad robots that the hypercompetent Chain forgot they existed. The writers have decided that Michael is too perfect, so to fix that, they decided that when Michael knocks out a guy, she can't use the element of surprise and nerve pinch him like she does with Stamets 20 minutes later, because if she did that then people would be reminded that she has a collapsible phaser that she could have used instead, which she does 10 minutes before, no she has to warn the guy first, then gently tap him in the head exactly once, before headlocking him. That way she can get stabbed by the knife she could have removed since she literally sit on it before scissoring the guy, though I suppose that's why the knife doesn't appear on the floor when the fights him, that, it turned invisible for 3 seconds. And the guy only stabs her once, and then for the next 10 seconds he doesn't continue to stab her, because that would mean Michael could bleed to death, and we don't want to kill a main character just yet. And after Michael vents some bad guys, rather than maintaining radio silence by tossing the combadge and then going full Die Hard, nope she has to tell the bad guys she's still alive, how else would the crew be able to adore her, then toss the combadge away and only then sprint away, all while she's still bleeding. So despite getting stabbed in the leg and given the position, femural artery, meaning she would bleed to death in a few minutes tops, she manages not to bleed too much, set up a trap and kill more bad guys and even "disable" the spore drive by sending Stamets away. See, that's not perfect. Oh and buff Stephen Hawking is there, working for Grinch, only he doesn't know that space Mafia does Mafia things, because for the last 30-40 years he just floated through life. Oh and Starfleet doesn't decide to go full SWAT on Discovery, or cut off the power from distance, because then we won't have a plot. Instead they negotiate with the terrorists. Oh and the Andorian guy died. I guess he couldn't carry a tune to save his live.
"It's made of our shit, you know" Yeah, explains the quality of the show.

[Al-1701]

Ossayrus' actions at the end tell us all we need to know about the Chain and her position in it. If throwing her under the bus will open the Federation markets, they would do it in a heartbeat. Hence, when she is called on take responsibility for her ill-deeds, she tries to escape. She has also kept those of use to her out of the loop of what she really does for a living. Next week we are going to see her world collapse around her, but will she take Discovery down with her?

The anti-transporter thing made me wonder. Usually, shields are what keep external transporters at bay. However, this thing was also intent to prevent internal beaming. Which makes sense in one way to prevent someone managing to slip away into the armory and get weapons or even blow up the ship. However, it also made it a very bad day for the regulators who suddenly found themselves in space and couldn't beam back onboard. Since Starfleet uses transporters liberally, setting up anti-transporter fields wouldn't make sense.

And I'm actually fine with the robots now holding the sphere data. Ossayrus dismissed it as pointless data, and she and her people don't fully understand 23rd century tech. So, she probably figures the robots just answer to the ship, not realizing they can work independent of it. And, even then, they aren't a threat as far as they're concerned.

Michael is still a pain, though. I can't help but think of that line from Justice League when Batman forced Superman through the boom tube to escape Brainiac's destruction. "You're not always right."

[clearspira]

It amuses me that if you were to put any of the other main crews in this situation they probably would have already fixed it about two episodes in. I'm not criticising ''Discovery'' for once either, its more a general observation that the first five crews were basically superheroes whereas the DIS crew (Michael aside) kind of range from normal to incompetent.

I genuinely think (again not a criticism, this is just me musing) that if the USS Discovery was in one of the other shows it would be one of those nameless ships that the Enterprise/Voyager/Defiant has to go and rescue because its fallen into a Quantum Inverted Space Fissure or something.

[Al-1701]

Well, when everything can be solved by pulling out technobabble and pulling the solution out of the ether, you can get things done quickly. And Discovery's problems seem to never be that simple. In old shows, the Burn would have been caused by some quantum spectral thingie they can shoot with the deflector dish and be done with it.

Though, they are also often their worst enemies. Probably because they were all chosen for their skills rather than their ability to work together, and basically forced to work on an island. Really, I think this is more like what the Voyager crew would be like after a year in the Delta Quadrant than what we ended up getting.

Speaking of Voyager. The Emerald Chain would have had those people for lunch. They lost their ship at least three times to boarding action.

[Link8909]

First off, Happy New Year everyone.

Well, when everything can be solved by pulling out technobabble and pulling the solution out of the ether, you can get things done quickly. And Discovery's problems seem to never be that simple. In old shows, the Burn would have been caused by some quantum spectral thingie they can shoot with the deflector dish and be done with it.

One of my pet-peeves about Star Trek Voyager (and Star Trek in the Rick Berman era overall) is that they spend far to much time trying to justify their made up technobabble, and nearly all of it's getting real world science wrong but telling us that the wrong answer is right, like the infamous "Threshold" and how evolution works just to name one of many examples.

I'm personally fine with the cause of the Burn because one: they don't spend half an episode trying to justify it with technobabble, two: that there are so many unknown factors to it that there really isn't a real world example of how this should work, and from the start the series has made it clear that the Burn is breaking all the rules of physics, and three: that resolving this isn't going to be a simple as bouncing the Anti-Partial Beam off the Main Deflector Dish, and instead is setting up to Captain Saru, Doctor Culber, and Adira Tal helping Su'Kal with facing his demons and bring him back to the real world, connecting with him on an emotional level, which as I've said fits with season threes overall theme of reconnecting with those that are isolated.

Though, they are also often their worst enemies. Probably because they were all chosen for their skills rather than their ability to work together, and basically forced to work on an island. Really, I think this is more like what the Voyager crew would be like after a year in the Delta Quadrant than what we ended up getting.

Speaking of Voyager. The Emerald Chain would have had those people for lunch. They lost their ship at least three times to boarding action.

I'm definitely sure that they've lost control of the ship more times than that, I'd also like to point out that one can lock out Voyagers computer from the Mess Hall.

[Link8909]

Ossayrus' actions at the end tell us all we need to know about the Chain and her position in it. If throwing her under the bus will open the Federation markets, they would do it in a heartbeat. Hence, when she is called on take responsibility for her ill-deeds, she tries to escape. She has also kept those of use to her out of the loop of what she really does for a living. Next week we are going to see her world collapse around her, but will she take Discovery down with her?

The meeting scenes with Admiral Vance and Osyraa were great, not only do have more context for Osyraa's actions, but we see Admiral Vance standing for the Federations ideals, that bit with how the replicators work wasn't so people like Mabus and Zargon have a snarky quip to make each week against Discovery, it was showing that while she has been enjoying the fresh fruits and the good life on the backs of a brutal system of slavery, he and what remains of Starfleet have been literally eating s[RED ALERT]t to maintain what’s left of their moral core, I also really like some of Admiral Vance's quotes like “The past is the only light with which we could see the future”

I also really like Osyraa during this episode, we got to see a genuine friendship with Aurellio (who was also really good) and genuinely wanting to merge the Emerald Chain and the Federation, and was willing to concede to some of the Federations ideal, it adds a lot more to her character, but as you said she's not doing this out of altruism either.

Overall, I personally really like Osyraa and is a really good villain.

The anti-transporter thing made me wonder. Usually, shields are what keep external transporters at bay. However, this thing was also intent to prevent internal beaming. Which makes sense in one way to prevent someone managing to slip away into the armory and get weapons or even blow up the ship. However, it also made it a very bad day for the regulators who suddenly found themselves in space and couldn't beam back onboard. Since Starfleet uses transporters liberally, setting up anti-transporter fields wouldn't make sense.

And I'm actually fine with the robots now holding the sphere data. Ossayrus dismissed it as pointless data, and she and her people don't fully understand 23rd century tech. So, she probably figures the robots just answer to the ship, not realizing they can work independent of it. And, even then, they aren't a threat as far as they're concerned.

I like the 32nd century DOT droids, they're just adorable.

Michael is still a pain, though. I can't help but think of that line from Justice League when Batman forced Superman through the boom tube to escape Brainiac's destruction. "You're not always right"

For me personally what's heartbreaking about that ending with Burnham and Stamets is that they're both right, Stamets has already sacrificed and lost so much in coming to the future and losing Culber, and to ask him to risk doing so again is simply unbearable, but Stamets is the one Osyraa needs to use the Spore Drive and if she get that then she would be unstoppable and the Federation would truly die, without using the line in the episode this is very much the needs of the many outlaying the need of the few.

Overall I really like this episode, I enjoyed Michael John McClaneing her way throughout the ship, I like that the rest of the bridge crew plotted their own escape, as I said the meeting between Admiral Vance and Osyraa were great, and Aurellio and the return of Zareh were enjoyable, I'm looking forward to the season finally next week.

[Asvarduil]

For me personally what's heartbreaking about that ending with Burnham and Stamets is that they're both right, Stamets has already sacrificed and lost so much in coming to the future and losing Culber, and to ask him to risk doing so again is simply unbearable, but Stamets is the one Osyraa needs to use the Spore Drive and if she get that then she would be unstoppable and the Federation would truly die, without using the line in the episode this is very much the needs of the many outlaying the need of the few.

I'm waiting for the last episode of the season to do my little review of the Nebula arc.

With that said, the quote above requires I say something. In this thread, I've strongly lambasted the idiotic decisions of Science-Commando Burnham. In the early bits of the season, her decisions either had strong potential to make things worse, or actually did.

When she bubble-hearthed Stamets to Starfleet Command, that was not one of her bad decisions. However, once again, how that went down is still a character flaw that Burnham shouldn't have given her background and rank.

The reason that the Burnham Bubble Blast was not stupid, even though it may well have killed her relationship with Stamets, was because she had a key piece of information that Stamets didn't: Adira took a whole bunch of anti-radiation meds with her to the Nebula with Culber and Saru. While the meds don't add a lot of time, the crew of Discovery does have time to reassert control of their starship, and DASH back to the nebula to rescue the away team.

Additionally, I call Science-Commando Burnham that for a reason. The Emerald Chain needed Stamets to replicate the Spore Drive, which was among the primary objectives for their operation. By depriving the Chain of Stamets, she was directly denying the Chain one of, if not their primary, tactical/strategic objective.

With that said, though, once again: Burnham's actions don't jive with her former positions and Starfleet rank (even by 23rd century standards.) As a Commander who was formerly XO on the Shenzou and the Discovery, and thus should've been in the Command track, not to mention her established credentials as a xenoanthropologist, she should've been aware of Stamets' emotional state. I agree with her stunning him, as he was certainly not objective about the prospect of losing his husband and adopted child. I think where she failed is in empathizing with him and earning his cooperation. As he noted: they came to the future so that Burnham wouldn't be alone.

Granted, Burnham was single-handedly fighting a guerilla war against the Chain, with a wounded leg no less, and was winning. Don't fuck with the Burnham, you will get burned! Still, securing his loyalty would've eased the situation considerably. As it stands, I sincerely doubt that he will jump Discovery if Burnham is onboard in Episode 12.

Last note: We finally got to see Rhys in action, and he's every bit as much of a badass as I expected him to be! Sure, he might not have a STO specialization, or levels in a D&D character class, but still. He's proof that you don't need magic or skill point investments, if you've got a solid grasp of the basics: move, shoot, take cover, learn morse code in 1st year Starfleet Academy.

EDIT: Congratulations, everyone else who also survived 2020. Thank God that weeping anal fissure of a year is over!

[Al-1701]

Really, I think we had the most convincing boarding take over here where the Chain just transporting their troop to the precise points they needed to take control before the Discovery crew could counter. Anti-transporter fields in the bridge and engineering would be a good idea in the future.

[TGLS]

All I have to say is Die Hard in Space was more fun before the communicators could track position.