I was very moved at how Jake was a truly adult version of the youth we saw in DS9 but that he also had the posture and dignity that Avery Brooks brought to Sisko.

Cirroc Lofton really can act and it’s outrageous if he’s not been getting work if he wants it.

If you’ve seen him as himself in his podcast, there’s no doubt about his performance in this episode.

It makes me very much want to see him cast in something else.

Skydance only bought Paramount this past summer after production of SFA season one was well advanced and SNW was largely done seasons four production.

While there is genuine reason for concern regarding future Star Trek, it’s very hard to make the case regarding anything in pre production before 2025.

As if Star Trek wasn’t corporate from the beginning!

Every major difference between the original pilot ‘The Cage’ and the original series / TOS was rooted in corporate priorities.

The bright, primary coloured uniform tunics, bright colourful flashing lights on the bridge and other sets were designed to promote NBC’s ‘Living Color’ television broadcasts.

Kirk was younger, physically more vigorous and less cerebral than Pike, no matter what Roddenberry wanted. Action adventure hero, romancing women, was what the network wanted no matter that Roddenberry wanted Kirk to be a ‘stack of books with legs’ and for Yeoman Rand to be the original third principle character and long term romantic interest.

Hopefully this episode will satisfy the “what happened to the Klingons?!!” questions lingering from Discovery.

…And perhaps kickoff a new narrative with Jay-Den as Heart of Glory did for Worf in TNG season one.

That’s a point.

Although in the case of the introduction of the Cardassians, there were significant contradictions vs the geopolitical situation of the Federation as presented repeatedly in the earlier seasons of TNG.

In relation to fan outrage though, even modest ‘filling in gaps’ — or ‘dancing between the raindrops’ as the EPs of SNW call it, is frequently met with with complaint that “no one has ever mentioned that before.”

Well, I can see your point.

I also was always supportive of WW III being pushed back by a half century.

But you can’t argue that there haven’t been major retcons.

Oh, it definitely did contradict established continuity — certainly more than Spock having had a foster sister or Khan descendants that we hadn’t heard of previously.

TNG initially presented a stable and peaceful utopian civilization. Picard and his officers spoke repeatedly about this in the early seasons.

There were long term stable borders with the Romulans, established relations with the Klingons but no major armed conflicts in the lifetimes of the senior officers.

‘Yesterday’s Enterprise’ was given as the exemplary lesson on how the alternative, more violent, alternative history would have played out but even that was quite far back, with the Enterprise-C.

The Ferengi were in early TNG a new and mysterious alien group on the borders.

The Borg was the most disruptive threat in generations, one that required new technology and new more military forward leadership approaches.

And then suddenly it turns out there has been a major ongoing border conflict with Cardassia, marginalized refugees from occupied planets living in camps bordering Federation utopia, and Starfleet has had its serving crew in armed conflicts.

How can you sincerely argue that isn’t a ‘major change?’

It’s interesting though.

We get the perception in early TNG that it’s been a long stable period of peace, exploration and expansion that’s suddenly disrupted by the Borg.

Then, we find that there have been significant ongoing regional conflicts with the Cardassians, some in Starfleet service have seen combat and torture, and that there have been marginalized refugees that have been marginalized and largely forgotten the Utopian Federation worlds.

BUT we accepted at the time as an audience.

In fact, unlike many of the elements of TNG that were outraging TOS fans in 1987-1989, there was nary a murmur about this at the conventions or on the BBS about the introduction of the Cardassians and Bajorans or the significant retcons.

As someone who was around for the TOS fan backlash in the early years of TNG, I don’t think that this has anything at all to do with the cumulative weight of lore or lack thereof.

My thought rather is that a show at the height of its popularity can get away with a great deal in terms of retcons and rewriting its own canon/lore.

A new show that does that takes a larger risk and is more likely to attract backlash.

I was listening to the video and thought I heard “fighting” but that could have just been my misunderstanding.

I get the discomfort about speculation.

It definitely sounds like there’s been ‘stuff’ behind the scenes already. Not TNG Chaos on the Bridge or Disco season one and two level, but definitely frictions.

(The actor who plays Genesis recently let slip when asked about Jonathan Frakes, that he’d been originally scheduled to direct her character’s second season feature episode but there had been “fighting going on” and Frakes was pushed back to directing a later episode!)

If the backdoor pilot episode in Disco season four didn’t work the way they’d hoped, it would be unfortunate if the characters and their actors have paid the price for the ‘notes’ from the senior executives.

However, as we saw with Number One in ‘The Cage’ if the the television franchise head thinks it’s worthwhile to bring back a character or an actor, one or both will happen eventually.

My bet is firmly on Tribbles.

Jay-Den seems to be wearing some kind of House heirloom.

Are the Klingons finally in a position to eradicate Tribbles?

Is the honour of Jay-Den’s family somehow involved? Did one of his ancestors create the genetically engineered tribble predator called the glommer?

And as a TAS fan I want to know if we’ll finally see a live action glommer!

Not on this subject.

If we assume that season one of SFA is taking place at the same time as Discovery season two, then we might expect Tilly to join as a more frequent recurring character in future seasons.

My read of the situation is that the original backdoor trailer did SFA that was in Discovery season four was very much not viewed as a success by Paramount executives — to the point that the central roles for Adira and Tilly in the ensemble were written out and rethought entirely.

I am confident that their are overseas bot accounts intervening to magnify cultural and political conflicts in entertainment spaces.

Are you seriously suggesting that IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes weren’t review bombed globally?

Any rating that has a distribution of 38% 1/10s has no credibility whatsoever, zilch.

And the alleged non US ratings aren’t vettable.

Or older.

My partner and I are old enough to feel comfortable laughing at our young adult selves.

I really hope not. However, this generation of writers are firmly in the grip of ‘trauma is necessary for interesting characters’ and the Hero’s Journey Pop anthropological theory of the 1970s that took over film schools.

So sure, why wouldn’t everyone need to be traumatized by a Betazoid dying horribly?!! /s

I have a feeling that Ocam Sadal (played by Canadian Romeo Carrere) could be an interesting third wheel in the dynamic between Daren and Caleb.

He’s such a contrast to his sister Tarima, and really gives off that Lwaxana Betazoid, says whatever he’s thinking because he knows what you’re thinking vibe.

I don’t see Brazilian-Canadian actor Rafa Virago as Pritchard in any of these publicity stills but it looks like there may be one or two new background regulars that we’ll be seeing.

I would add Heart of Glory because it gives a crucial introduction to where the Klingons are as a society in the 24th century much as The Neutral Zone introduces the state of the relationship with the Romulans (and sets up the Borg threat).

One could restyle it but if this cadet is from a low gravity world, they may prefer to get around as they can on their own in this environment.