Star Trek Strange New Worlds, what did you think?

[Janx]

I thought that was an excellent episode. This show isn’t just the best Trek in decades, it’s the best TV on right now.

Amen. It also harkened back to some of the darker TOS tales where Enterprise doesn't sail off with a happy tune, like Balance of Terror.

I think the one challenge to the planet's plight is that they have space travel and know some people with a bigger truck. They could move.

If my entire way of life depended on sacrificing a kid to appease the local spirits or something, I think I'd move. Or at least expect somebody else to suggest it. and come up with a feeble reason why that's totally not practical.

An additional sign something is jack up with the setup, is how does a civilization develop and advance on such a planet? Odds are good they didn't make it. Heck, for as advanced as they claimed to be, their ships suck, and they didn't know how their own child-sucking machine worked.

But that's my nitpick after thinking about it. I enjoyed the episode.

 

[beancounter]

The episode was pretty good. One thing I noticed is tat in the end, Pike just accepted the child sacrifice and left. Other captains would have found a way to save the kid.

I would have also like a deeper explanation of why they did this other than "we've been doing it for generations, and that how our ancestors arranged it, but we don't know why"

 

[Umbran]

The episode was pretty good. One thing I noticed is tat in the end, Pike just accepted the child sacrifice and left. Other captains would have found a way to save the kid.

Other captains were being written in times with a greater myth of exceptionalism, that we always have the answer, and can fix things for other cultures. Never mind that they have been trying to find an answer for centuries, the captain of a starship can find a solution in 50 minutes!

 

[beancounter]

the captain of a starship can find a solution in 50 minutes!

50 minutes our time - days, perhaps weeks, their time.

 

[Ryujin]

Amen. It also harkened back to some of the darker TOS tales where Enterprise doesn't sail off with a happy tune, like Balance of Terror.

I think the one challenge to the planet's plight is that they have space travel and know some people with a bigger truck. They could move.

If my entire way of life depended on sacrificing a kid to appease the local spirits or something, I think I'd move. Or at least expect somebody else to suggest it. and come up with a feeble reason why that's totally not practical.

An additional sign something is jack up with the setup, is how does a civilization develop and advance on such a planet? Odds are good they didn't make it. Heck, for as advanced as they claimed to be, their ships suck, and they didn't know how their own child-sucking machine worked.

But that's my nitpick after thinking about it. I enjoyed the episode.

Even the "we don't know how it works" aspect was traditional Trek. Remember "Spock's Brain"? "Brain and brain. What is brain? It is Controller?" "The Paradise Syndrome" in which a tribe of Native Americans didn't know that their place of worship is an asteroid deflector? "For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky" in which the inhabitants of an asteroid spaceship don't know they're travelling through space? They're an insular society. They turned inward, where most others turned outward. Their medical tech advanced beyond that of The Federation. Their ships didn't, because they didn't need them.

Their 'machine' took away any of their needs in a post scarcity type society but as it's self sustaining, other than needing a child to eat every now and then, they lost the ability to understand, build, or repair it. We might see this planet get a revisit some time in the future, when they've lost their wonderful machine.

 

[Mallus]

I've only read the wiki summary, not the actual tale, so please correct me if I'm wrong. I would say the key difference here is....in the book, the people are gaining "peace and prosperity" through the child's sacrifice. Where again, in the show it was implied through Aurora's reaction to the child missing that the consequences were far more severe....suggesting that it could even lead to some kind of massive earth shattering event.

The consequences for not torturing the child are more severe in the SNW episode than in the original short story, but it's the same basic thought experiment.

Its hard to say "sorry your culture is just wrong for using a child like that", when using a child like that literally prevents thousands or millions of people from being killed in geologic earthquakes. This is an area I really wish they had pushed on a bit more, they left that part somewhat vague so its hard to know the stakes by which the child's sacrifice is being compared against.

But was the culture wrong for designing such a system in the first place? Were there other options that didn't require the sacrifice of a child? Alora admits her people have been searching for another solution, but haven't been able to find one.

All that said....where is the freakin backup child?????!!!! If this one child is so dang important, that the state of your planet is at stake, your going to have a spare, hell your going to have 5.

The thought experiment works better when you reduce the size of the disenfranchised population to one (child).

 

[Ondath]

Episode 6 really felt like a good TNG episode to me - in particular, "the fate of the future important figure of the planet is unpleasant for our sensibilities" is pretty much the same theme as The Dauphin and The Perfect Mate, only it's no longer about young, innocent alien girls falling for our exceptional Starfleet males and more about the unpleasant fate being a metaphor for our own social ills. It was really good commentary IMO, and it walked the fine line between having an interesting insight about today's political issues and being sci-fi enough to make it interesting. The romance plotline for Pike was also straight out of something Riker could've gone through. As a major TNG fan, this hit all the spots for me.

Six for six!

 

[Benjamin Olson]

Episode 6 really felt like a good TNG episode to me - in particular, "the fate of the future important figure of the planet is unpleasant for our sensibilities" is pretty much the same theme as The Dauphin and The Perfect Mate, only it's no longer about young, innocent alien girls falling for our exceptional Starfleet males and more about the unpleasant fate being a metaphor for our own social ills. It was really good commentary IMO, and it walked the fine line between having an interesting insight about today's political issues and being sci-fi enough to make it interesting. The romance plotline for Pike was also straight out of something Riker could've gone through. As a major TNG fan, this hit all the spots for me.

Six for six!

I agree completely, except to say that this was also much better than the equivalent episode of TNG probably would have been, because TNG romantic interest of the week characters were almost never as memorable or interesting as Alora was, because TNG also would have felt compelled to give her a more unambiguous villain turn, because TNG would struggle with not responding to her question of "can you honestly say no child suffers in poverty for your Federation" with "Yes, in our perfect Federation there is no poverty, we solved these problems long ago" (rather than PIke having no response and letting the audience sit with the discomfort of that), because TNG had a habit of undercutting moral dilemmas by solving them with some final act deus-ex-technobabble, and because the TNG version of the planet would have been like three fairly basic, vaguely futuristic sets redressed from earlier in the season. Maybe an equivalent TNG episode would have avoided some of these pitfalls, but it would have been quite the exceptional TNG episode to avoid all of them. I love that show, but it definitely had some habits and limitations that have not aged quite so well.

Which is all to say that this was a great episode and it feels like, with the more limited production runs, better tech, and higher budgets of modern Trek actually applied to good Trek storytelling fundamentals (but with a little more nuance than 90s Trek trusted the audience with) this series has every potential to be (massive nostalgia for other Treks aside) the best Star Trek series ever made.

 

[bloodtide]

S1E6

Oh....at the Edge of Federation Space, right where the ship should be

Pike is like lets go to the ready room....um, sick bay should be first and alien guy reminds him

So....did not Laan and Una MURDER Doc M'Bengas daughter when they played Enterprise Bingo last epsiode? They went to SICKBAY and USED the TRANSPORTER that daughter is stored in....so that ERASED HER PATTERN and KILLED her, right?

Maybe Cadet Uhura should not have been at the controls during a real action?

The Enterprise tractor beam just looks like a searchlight?

And everyone just forgets to fire phasers to take out the ships engines?

The Enterprise Deck 17 sure is filled with junk just sitting in the hallways?

The "Brig" is just a room with a sofa?

Um...so the question is "does not a single kid go hungry in the Federation?" Well.....the answer is NO, right?

And really does a hungry kid compare to....plugging a kid into a Death Machine?

So is not the alien guy going to save/cure Docs Daughter with his Super Science?

This epsiode sure did have classic Trek/Next Generation vibes.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

SNARFZODIACKILLER EPISODE 6 REVIEW

ALL KILLER, NO FILLER. SO AFTER AN EPISODE OF SHORE LEAVE THAT WAS CHOCK FULL O' JINX, IT WAS TIME TO GET BACK INTO THE ACTION.

AND LIKE AC/DC, THIS EPISODE WAS BACK IN BLACK. WHAT IS THAT? THE SOUND OF A SHUTTLE ... IN DISTRESS? OH YEAH! IT'S TIME TO GET IT ON. IT'S TIME FOR THE ENTERPRISE TO GET ALL PAX ROMANA ON SOME PEEPS.

KNOCK KNOCK.

WHO THERE?

IM SORRY, I CANT HERE YOU OVER THE SOUND OF MY CONSTITUTION-CLASS AWESOMENESS! SET PHASERS TO ACCIDENTALLY BLOW UP THE EVIDENCE, ENSIGN, WE COME IN PEACE (SHOOT TO KILL).

AND WHO DID WE RESCUE? LOOKS LIKE SOME ALIEN SPACE BABE. HAVENT SEEN EYES TRYING TO HAVE THE HOT LUVIN' SINCE THAT GREAT WHITESNAKE VIDEO. WHAT GREAT WHITESNAKE VIDEO?

TRICK QUESTION, UHURU. SECURITY KNOWS THAT ALL WHITESNAKE VIDEOS ARE GREAT.

BUT LOOK AT PIKE. HE KNOWS THAT HE IS GONNA GET UP IN THAT LADYS BIZNESS LIKE SHATKIRK. BUT HE PLAYS IT ALL COY. HES A MODERN KIRK, PLAYING HARD TO GET. BUT YOU KNOW ITS GOING TO GET REAL. BECAUSE THE LADY IS TOO NICE, AND THE MAN IS TOO MEAN AND SUSPICIOUS. GONNA HAFTA BE A SWITCHEROO BY THE END OF THIS EPISODE.

OH HEY- REMEMBER THAT THE DOC HAD A TRANSPORTER KID? I DIDNT EITHER. I THINK HER NAME IS DEUS EX. MAYBE SEE HER IN ANOTHER FIVE EPISODES?

SO PIKE GOES TO THE PLANET, AND THEY HAVE A BUDGET FOR PLANET SCENES. NICE. AND THE LADY TOTALLY SCORES HERSELF SOME PIKE. THAT MEANS THAT SHE HAS TO DIE OR IS THE BADDIE. CANT HAVE ROMANCE WEIGHING DOWN THE CAP.

BACK ON THE SPACESHIP, BABY KHAAN AND UHURU ARE BONDING LIKE #FREEHEMMER AND UHURU. JUST UNCOVERING SKULDUGGERY. AND THEN BOOM MAJOR TRANSPORTER SCENE. WOAH. ANON TRANSPORTER CREWMAN CANT STOP THE BEAMOUT.

AND ANON TRANSPORTER CREWMAN IS ALL LIKE IF IMA GET THIS LITTLE PERSONALITY AND SCREENTIME ON THIS CREW, IMA APPLY FOR A TRANSFER TO STAR TREK: BURNHAM. #GIVEHIMANUHURUEPISODE

SO OF COURSE PIKES NEW OLD NEW LADYFRIEND IS ALL EVIL. ALL ABOUT THE BABY KILLING. EXCEPT ONLY KIND OF SORT OF EVIL. WHICH .... I MEAN... SHES HOT. SHES INTO PIKE. SHES OKAY WITH THE OCCASIONAL CHILD SACRIFICE.

I THINK IM IN LOVE. SO METAL. LIKE AN ALIEN BOBBI BROWN.

BUT PIKE IS NOT DOWN WITH THAT. MAJOR MORAL DILEMMA. SURE, PIKE CAN SACRIIFICE HIS FEW TO SAVE THE MANY, BUT THIS IS A CHILD, AND DIFFERENT. BECAUSE REASONS!

AND THEN WE END ON A SCENE THAT TRULY ENCAPSULATES THE NUANCES AND MIXED EMOTIONS THAT THIS SHOW IS BRINGING OUT. LIKE HEARING GNR IS GETTING BACK TOGETHER AND THEN FINDING OUT THAT NO, ITS JUST AXL AGAIN.

PIKE, PENSING AND FURROWING AT THE WINDOW.
ON THE ONE HAND, THE CHILD DIED.
ON THE OTHER HAND ... HE SCORED. HE TOTALLY SCORED.

RATING: 8 1/2 BIZARRO STORMIES