Star Trek Strange New Worlds season 1 available for free!

[MGibster]

I cannot even begin to comprehend how someone can complain about Star Tek "going woke" except to postulate that they never wat he'd any kind of Star Trek, EVER. I'm not what one would call "leftwing" on most scales, but if you enjoy Trek you know that it's always been a progressive thought experiment: like, that's the whole point.

I started watching Star Trek in the early 80s when I was around six years old. Even as I grew older, I didn't realize how progressive it was to have a black man, Dr. Daystrom, as the Federation's top computer expert, and that's especially true when the series first aired in the 60s. As an army brat, it didn't occur to me that a bridge crew with a black woman, a Japanese man, or an alien was a big deal. Other than the Russian, who was our enemy at the time, the kids in my classes were white, black, brown, and yellow so the bridge didn't look weird to me. I just took it for granted that these things were normal. And when something looks normal, it's easy to forget that at one time it might have been called "woke."

 

[Parmandur]

I started watching Star Trek in the early 80s when I was around six years old. Even as I grew older, I didn't realize how progressive it was to have a black man, Dr. Daystrom, as the Federation's top computer expert, and that's especially true when the series first aired in the 60s. As an army brat, it didn't occur to me that a bridge crew with a black woman, a Japanese man, or an alien was a big deal. Other than the Russian, who was our enemy at the time, the kids in my classes were white, black, brown, and yellow so the bridge didn't look weird to me. I just took it for granted that these things were normal. And when something looks normal, it's easy to forget that at one time it might have been called "woke."

When I was 6 in the early 90's, Paramount made a lot of self-congratulary documentaries on how cutting edge Star Trek was socially, that aired on the local UHF station during marathons. They were very eager to let it ve known how out of the ordinary it was.

 

[AnotherGuy]

And I'm going to complain about the wokeness! Wait, complain? No, what I meant to say was that having a diverse crew actually helps makes everything look bigger. Again, something that Trek has always been pretty decent at.

There is a Men Behaving Badly episode* (a UK series from the 90's) in which the protagonists (2 couples) sit down to watch one of the Star Trek movies. Gary, played by Martin Clunes, makes a comment about how Star Trek teaches us how a diverse crew can work together harmoniously especially when there is one particular nationality absent
It's a reference, I think, to the healthy football competitiveness that exists between the 2 nations.

I'm not going to spoil it. I'd rather people search it, because the entire episode is a gem.

*4th Episode in Season 6, called "Watching TV"

 

[Umbran]

As an army brat, it didn't occur to me that a bridge crew with a black woman, a Japanese man, or an alien was a big deal. Other than the Russian, who was our enemy at the time, the kids in my classes were white, black, brown, and yellow so the bridge didn't look weird to me. I just took it for granted that these things were normal. And when something looks normal, it's easy to forget that at one time it might have been called "woke."

As the song says, you've got to be carefully taught.

 

[Ryujin]

I started watching Star Trek in the early 80s when I was around six years old. Even as I grew older, I didn't realize how progressive it was to have a black man, Dr. Daystrom, as the Federation's top computer expert, and that's especially true when the series first aired in the 60s. As an army brat, it didn't occur to me that a bridge crew with a black woman, a Japanese man, or an alien was a big deal. Other than the Russian, who was our enemy at the time, the kids in my classes were white, black, brown, and yellow so the bridge didn't look weird to me. I just took it for granted that these things were normal. And when something looks normal, it's easy to forget that at one time it might have been called "woke."

As a kid of the '60s, I fully realized how progressive ST:TOS was. I lived in a poor area of Toronto, at the time, so my class looked more like a United Nations school than most Canadian schools at the time. Not just a woman, but a Black woman was an officer on the bridge, whose commands and opinions mattered. We were still deep in the Cold War, so a Russian on the bridge felt like a security risk. Something that many who did not live during that time may easily forget, is that the last Japanese Internment Camp was only closed 20 years before TOS premiered. George Takei was interned in one of those camps, along with his family. He now played an officer on the bridge of a para military organization. This was about as "woke" as American TV got at the time.

 

[Dire Bare]

Discovery turned off alot of folks, I enjoyed it, but its very experimental, Strange New Worlds is way more old school, but with better special effects and more together in season 1 then any other live action trek.

ST: Discovery turned off SOME folks, not a LOT.

Dude, it's going on 5 seasons now, and its success encouraged Paramount to greenlight the rest of "nu-Trek" including Strange New Worlds (a Discovery spin-off), Picard, Lower Decks, Prodigy, and the upcoming Section 31 and Star Fleet Academy shows.

It's okay if you like one show and not the other . . . . Discovery has its issues, as does all of Star Trek . . . . but the grumpy rumblings of some older fans over Discovery hardly takes away from how popular the show has been.

 

[LordEntrails]

I can't speak to your experience, but I have never had any issues with P+.

I tried it again last night. Still lots of lag when browsing the menu and starting an episode. But at least no buffering issues during play. Maybe it's an issue with whatever datacenter I'm being fed from. But it's discouraging.

 

[Mort]

As a follow-up,

The season will remain free (on youtube) until Midnight June 30th.

 

[MarkB]

I tried it again last night. Still lots of lag when browsing the menu and starting an episode. But at least no buffering issues during play. Maybe it's an issue with whatever datacenter I'm being fed from. But it's discouraging.

I found their interface not so great, particularly the way videos would buffer when switching in or out of fullscreen.

Amazon carry Paramount+ as a subscription service on Prime, in which case you're using their interface, which is still not great, but better than P+.

 

[Henadic Theologian]

ST: Discovery turned off SOME folks, not a LOT.

Dude, it's going on 5 seasons now, and its success encouraged Paramount to greenlight the rest of "nu-Trek" including Strange New Worlds (a Discovery spin-off), Picard, Lower Decks, Prodigy, and the upcoming Section 31 and Star Fleet Academy shows.

It's okay if you like one show and not the other . . . . Discovery has its issues, as does all of Star Trek . . . . but the grumpy rumblings of some older fans over Discovery hardly takes away from how popular the show has been.

No it turned off alot of folks, I actually like Discovery for all its flaws, but its critics are legion, not a few people, and more painfully many of the folks it drove off were merch collectors.

But I agree Discovery drove millions of nee subscribers to Paramount+ (an
d its predessor), mostly new fans which was its purpose (although it was more divisive then I think they expected), same with P2 & 3 and upcoming SFA & Section 31 movie, just as SNWs and P3 and Star Trek Legacy were to draw back old school fans and their families and the cartoons have their own target demographics.

That was Kurtzmen's whole plan from day 1, he knew to build his empire he couldn't please everyone with a single show and drag in new demographics on top of that, so different series (and in Picard and Short Trek's case seasons/episodes) are targeted to different groups, but its a core segment like myself who watches all of it!