Star Trek Discovery: Season Three

[Link8909]

Like I've said, for me personally Georgiou was a complicated character to get invested in, while she's fun to watch kick ass and snark at people, she still was the Empress of a fascist regime, but this two parter really was great for her character for showing that her time with the Discovery crew had changed her, not only wanting to save her Burnham, but even saving Mirror Saru, and I like that in the end she embrace that change.

I love that Carl was indeed THE Guardian of Forever, and I like that he hadn't gone unnoticed during the Temporal Cold War and that the series ties all this lore together, and that reveal was awesome as well.

Overall "Terra Firma" is a great two parter for me personally.

[clearspira]

Like I've said, for me personally Georgiou was a complicated character to get invested in, while she's fun to watch kick ass and snark at people, she still was the Empress of a fascist regime, but this two parter really was great for her character for showing that her time with the Discovery crew had changed her, not only wanting to save her Burnham, but even saving Mirror Saru, and I like that in the end she embrace that change.

I love that Carl was indeed THE Guardian of Forever, and I like that he hadn't gone unnoticed during the Temporal Cold War and that the series ties all this lore together, and that reveal was awesome as well.

Overall "Terra Firma" is a great two parter for me personally.

I'm not so closed minded as to say that she couldn't have been a good character as she is basically Dukat. And let us not forget that he himself is guilty of multiple rapes and murders. And yet, the man is easily one if the most beloved Star Trek villains, easily up there with Khan.

The difference is in execution - Dukat was introduced to us as layered. Very rarely until season 7 was he a cackling villain. He felt like a real man with drives and thoughts of his own beyond rape and murder.

Georgio was introduced as a cannibal sitting in a dark room. Like Tilly, she has evolved, but it does make one miss Ron Moore.

[Link8909]

I'm not so closed minded as to say that she couldn't have been a good character as she is basically Dukat. And let us not forget that he himself is guilty of multiple rapes and murders. And yet, the man is easily one if the most beloved Star Trek villains, easily up there with Khan.

The difference is in execution - Dukat was introduced to us as layered. Very rarely until season 7 was he a cackling villain. He felt like a real man with drives and thoughts of his own beyond rape and murder.

Georgio was introduced as a cannibal sitting in a dark room. Like Tilly, she has evolved, but it does make one miss Ron Moore.

That's a fair point, and is the reason for why I have mix feelings about her, and I do agree with what you said and think this is a stumbling on the part of season one of Discovery that season three has inherited, I do however appreciate that they didn't shy away from this aspect of her.

I also see the parallels between Georgiou and Dukat, and I think the major difference is that of Dukat's ego, he had far to much pride to ever really change, he always believing he is right no matter what, while Georgiou seems to embrace whatever comes, and was more open-minded to change, and while she may not have change through altruism, her time on Discovery did open her mind up to new possibilities that the Terran beliefs wouldn't have allowed.

I do like that season three has explored more of her character, and “Terra Firma" is a great look at not only Georgiou, but the Mirror Universe overall, and I have always like the idea of a Terran as part of the main cast, it wasn't a perfect trip, but it was an interesting and enjoyable one.

[Mabus]

A good way to tell if a main character had any real impact on a series is to see if after their departure, the series suffers. Anyone remember Ash Tyler? Yeah, me neither. His impact on the Control plot is practically non-existent (for a while I actually forgot that he was in the S2 finale battle) and in Season 1 his role has such little influence on the main plot, that you could replace him with a targ and not change much (oh wait, he killed Culbert, no wait they bring him back in the next season, nevermind).
I'm going out on a limb here and make a prediction: Georgiou's lack of presence on the show will have no effect on the plot in any significant way because her character arc had no effect on the main story and viceversa.
Oh and I just remembered (no joke, I only remembered this while I was writing the previous sentence), there was also the Yum-Yum lady, who left a few episodes ago and... well... I don't see any difference.

[Asvarduil]

I do like that season three has explored more of her character, and “Terra Firma" is a great look at not only Georgiou, but the Mirror Universe overall, and I have always like the idea of a Terran as part of the main cast, it wasn't a perfect trip, but it was an interesting and enjoyable one.

I have to agree with Georgiou on all counts. Unfortunately, Mirror Georgiou was pidgeonholed into being a low-level asshole, instead of being a counterbalance to the heroic ideals and values of the Federation. We got to see her be a combat pragmatist, sure, but in personal combat. Until Terra Firma (S3 E9-10), we never saw her in anything even approaching a strategic context. I think this set of decisions weakened her character - she's supposed to be an evil overlord, who ruled a massive empire, and was scarily competent at it. Old Terran Emperors don't get to be that way by being crazy, incompetent thugs.

I'm more interested that we got some lore on what happened with the Guardian of Forever in the interregnum between Picard and DISCO S3. Apparently, the Guardian of Forever was found and used to fight in the Temporal Wars, by someone. I don't think Starfleet would've done that, as they had their own temporal technology (as we saw in Voyager.) Given what we saw of the Temporal Cold War in ENT (...oh dear...) there were a few different factions in play, and probably more factions than we realize. With that said, I do hope that this backstory isn't well-explored, simply because Star Trek's writers aren't equal to the task of making it good or engaging.

With DISCO returning focus to the Discovery-A, I think an interesting point to bring up is that Burnham seems...more even-keeled at the end of Terra Firma than she did at the start. She's been forced to come to grips with her loss, and I think that slowly she's realizing for real that her choices have consequences, and that she needs to think things through. To this point in the series, she's been impulsive to the point of recklessness and stupidity, as I've discussed many times before. I think losing Georgiou for realzies, and with no possibility of take-backs, is going to affect the character. At least, I hope it will. S1 and early S3 Burnham were downright insufferable.

I also like how Burnham was used in Terra Firma. I suggested before that the writers refer to the DS9 style of writing episodes - choose a character, give them a story arc, and then have all the other characters support that story. While that's not what happened, Terra Firma was closer to that form than what we had before, and the juxtaposition of Mirror!Burnham with Prime!Burnham was helpful in telling the last Emperor Georgiou story...until Section 31 comes out.

Oh yeah. Let's talk about that. Before this started, I saw three possible trajectories for Georgiou:

A) Georgiou dies permanently, killing the in-universe context for the S31 series.
B) Georgiou lives and goes back to DISCO as a regular, postponing an in-universe context for the S31 series.
C) Georgiou lives and is thrown back to an earlier period, all but creating an in-universe context for the S31 series.

We got option C, with a fake-out towards A. With that said, there's still no guarantee that S31 will be a thing. With that said, though, yesterday when I woke up I thought S31 was vaporware. Now, I'm not so sure.

[TGLS]

A good way to tell if a main character had any real impact on a series is to see if after their departure, the series suffers.

So Wesley, Pulaski, Kes and Jadzia had no real impact?

[Makeshift Python]

The difference between Dukat and Georgiou is that Dukat liked to claim he was ALWAYS the good guy and that whatever evil he did was done for justice, whereas Georgiou had to be a barbarian because she was in a barbarous world where compassion was seen as a weakness, and once she got a taste of the Prime universe she could never truly go back home.

[clearspira]

A good way to tell if a main character had any real impact on a series is to see if after their departure, the series suffers.

So Wesley, Pulaski, Kes and Jadzia had no real impact?

Pulaski definitely had no impact on TNG. She is literally never brought up again. She isn't even at Riker and Troi's wedding - and Wesley stops being a god to attend that. It is also hard to argue that season 3 isn't massively better than season 2.

I would also say that Kes's only real impact on VOY was escaping Borg space. Barring her return as Evil Grandma, did VOY ever really acknowledge Kes after she left? I would argue that she is memorable because she's a hot elf nurse rather than because she was a memorable character. At least Seven has character layers behind the bulging catsuit.

[Asvarduil]

A good way to tell if a main character had any real impact on a series is to see if after their departure, the series suffers.

So Wesley, Pulaski, Kes and Jadzia had no real impact?

Pulaski definitely had no impact on TNG. She is literally never brought up again. She isn't even at Riker and Troi's wedding - and Wesley stops being a god to attend that. It is also hard to argue that season 3 isn't massively better than season 2.

I would also say that Kes's only real impact on VOY was escaping Borg space. Barring her return as Evil Grandma, did VOY ever really acknowledge Kes after she left? I would argue that she is memorable because she's a hot elf nurse rather than because she was a memorable character. At least Seven has character layers behind the bulging catsuit.

I can't help but notice that Jadzia was left out. Jadzia's death led to not one, but at least three or five character arcs!

1. The Sisko's relationship with the Dax symbiote changed from being someone who was soft-mentored by a fully-realized Joined Trill, to being a mentor to someone who was joined as an emergency.
2. Worf's relationship with the Dax symbiote changed from being married to Jadzia, to having to figure out his feelings towards Ezri, who further had very different feelings about the Klingon Empire than Jadzia did.
3. Bashir's relationship with the Dax symbiote changed from a co-worker of Jadzia's who, in the first seasons, he tried to date in as annoying of a manner as possible, to a full-on romantic interest with Ezri, and this time with everyone being aware that he's an Augment, and with him having a bit more world experience than those first, awkward passes at Jadzia
4. The Dax symbiote itself changed in prominence. As noted with the Sisko, Dax started off as a repository of knowledge and wisdom. At the end of the series, Dax was in a position of needing to adapt to an awkward situation as a result of the emergency joining.
5. Ezri herself had an ongoing character arc in DS9 S7, as she adapted to the reality of being a joined Trill, and dealing with all the personalities she carries within herself, as well as the consequences of a previous host dying.

...I think Jadzia singlehandedly demolishes the notion that a character leaving means they had no impact.

Of course as noted before: DS9's writers were simply better than those who wrote the other three characters on that list. Wesley is still one of the most hated characters in Trek due to sheer arrogance and creepiness. Pulaski the Gorgon is proof that, in the 24th century, humanity hasn't outgrown bigotry. Kes was literally written by writers whose approach to continuity was "f@#$ it."

Maybe a stronger argument that could be made is the opposite of what Mabus said. A good way to tell if a departure is going to have impact, is to know if the main character's presence or departure has implications on the story.

If a character doesn't matter, no one will really care that the character is gone. If the character is sufficiently bad, the story will improve for their leaving. If the character is sufficiently well-written, however, it will cause the story to adapt to the sudden loss.

[Link8909]

I do like that season three has explored more of her character, and “Terra Firma" is a great look at not only Georgiou, but the Mirror Universe overall, and I have always like the idea of a Terran as part of the main cast, it wasn't a perfect trip, but it was an interesting and enjoyable one.

I have to agree with Georgiou on all counts. Unfortunately, Mirror Georgiou was pidgeonholed into being a low-level asshole, instead of being a counterbalance to the heroic ideals and values of the Federation. We got to see her be a combat pragmatist, sure, but in personal combat. Until Terra Firma (S3 E9-10), we never saw her in anything even approaching a strategic context. I think this set of decisions weakened her character - she's supposed to be an evil overlord, who ruled a massive empire, and was scarily competent at it. Old Terran Emperors don't get to be that way by being crazy, incompetent thugs.

Very true, while I'm glade that season three has explored her character, and I do feel during this season Georgiou being a counter to the heroes was executed better, however this is something that should have happened in season two right after being stuck in the Prime Universe, and I do see how her introduction in season one would put others off on getting invested in her.