Star Trek

I like them. They're a parody of Star Trek more than anything. Lower Decks already does the "humor in Trek but sticking to the ideals behind Trek", this is Just "what if you'd put a normal person in a Trek position".

Aside from the excessive gore, I found the Spock episode actually quite well written for his character. Trying to fit in and understand humor is a Whole Thing with Spock, so I imagine his first take on "awkward humor" would go down something like that. I wouldn't have been surprised if "haha my fiancée left me, isn't that funny" would've appeared in SNW.

I don't think this is really targeted at TAS fans. Having only seen short bits of it, I'm impressed by how well they've replicated the art style, but this is clearly a marketing campaign for their running Trek properties and not at all a hommage to TAS.

Personally, I think TAS aged about as badly as TOS in terms of watchability for new fans. If Paramount would create the expectation of a modern cartoon in their callback material, I think quite a lot of fans would come out of that disappointed.

I hope you and the other TAS fans get the real homage you deserve but I don't think TAS has the popularity for Paramount to invest serious money into it. They tried to set up a Trek cartoon with Prodigy but they've already fucked that up spectacularly, I don't think they'll risk a cartoon again any time soon.

Have they stopped for a moment to think if this is what TAS fans want?

No.

I've seen some good reviews of the first couple - I think you have to be into a very specific type of Adult Swim-type humour that was in style about 15 years ago - but the only review I've seen of the latest one was not positive (and this was from a reviewer who quite enjoyed last week's instalment).

But whatever, they're ultimately inconsequential, having been described by Paramount from the very start as "promotional shorts".

Yeah they are pretty dumb. I've come to the conclusion that they were written by new writers, getting their feet wet....or something idk.

As an aside, I encourage everyone to check out the accompanying comics - they're not exactly deep, but I'm finding them much more entertaining than the actual shorts - they're basically a Star Trekkification of "Duck Amuck".

Issue 1

Issue 2

Issue 3

It very much feels like someone on the outside looking in and making jokes with their passing knowledge. In contrast to Lower Decks very much being injokes from people who love the series, it's philosophy and all its tiny details. They should have just given it to writers on Lower Decks. This makes me cringe so much.

It's like Teen Titans Go all over again

I just honestly recommend sticking to everything ENT and before these days, and if you want something new and exciting in the canon, I'd start reading the myriads of novels in the lit verse (although those are hit or miss).

All of these attempts at making Star Trek some kind of middle-of-the-road relatable mainstream-appeal quippy entertainment franchise is the exact opposite of what it should be in times like these. Star Trek in 2023 should be written, directed, produced and acted by a radically progressive counterculture to the right-wing swing across the world, attract major controversies and boycotts by conservatives and network executives to the point they wish they could blacklist actors for being commie sympathizers again. We need more Ira Steven Behr and Hans Beimler, and less JJ Abrams. We need more flawed, genuine working-class people like Bashir's parents or Miles O'Brien, or General Martok or Damar, and less characters who are relatable to the upper-class yass-kween American writing rooms. We need an internationalist view on space politics again, not Elon Musk worship.

Instead, we get toilet humor, sanitized and Americanized versions of the future, and CIA apologism in the shape of a sympathetic Section 31 and the Federation engaging in regime changes. Not that golden age Trek was always better, but at least they tried. It's just more of the same like DIS, PIC and SNW (Lower Decks is often fun though).

This week’s just felt designed to annoy us, what with getting the ranks wrong and all. Let alone the totally un-Trek message.

It's very transparently not meant to appeal to existing Trek fans, not that it's unenjoyable for all of them. It's outreach.