Make It Blow – Star Trek: Picard
The Ruse There’s a sheer artistry about the latest Star Trek instalment, Star Trek: Picard (2020 – ), but it has nothing to do with storytelling. We begin with shots of space. They’re gorgeous. Then it’s the Enterprise 1701-D, which we last saw way back in Star Trek: Generations (1994). Specials effects have come some way since then. This shot is amazing. I imagine fans of The Original Series (1966 – 1969) felt this way when they saw the Enterprise 1701 on the big screen for the first time in Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979). There’s something epic about the Enterprise 1701-D navigating the deepest reaches of space (or,…
Discovering How to Ruin Star Trek
I’m interrupting my overblown series on ranting at Star Wars to rant this week about another ruined franchise: Star Trek: Discovery. The second season just finished and I cannot contain myself. The first season was so bad that it almost killed any possibility of improvement. Almost. They then changed the showrunner. They changed writers. They had feedback from the fans. They had feedback from the licensees. Hmmm. Okay, all that amounted to a glimmer of hope. Maybe they could take all that on board and do something with Discovery and make it … Star Trek. Right? Right? Unfortunately, not. The second season isn’t just an indictment on the second season,…