Star Trek

[Ursus mellifera]

Also, Asencia is my favorite character. Jameela Jamil does a hell of a job. I mean, all the voice actors are good, but she just chews up every scene she's in.

[Sparky Prime]

Also, Asencia is my favorite character. Jameela Jamil does a hell of a job. I mean, all the voice actors are good, but she just chews up every scene she's in.

For sure. Something about her reminds me of Grey DeLisle's performance of Azula in Avatar The Last Airbender. Which is high praise.

[Sparky Prime]

Prodigy season 2 episodes 15-20

Spoiler

Finally reunited, Chakotay debriefs with Admiral Janeway, Commander Tysess on Voyager-A with Admiral Jellico via subspace. Jellico explains Starfleet is going to hand over the mission to send the Protostar back in time to restore the timeline to another team. Janeway protests asking for options, but both Chakotay and Tysess believe they can't go rouge again. However, they get a transmission from Ilthuran on Solum, and he warns them that Asencia has somehow gotten time manipulation technology (it's later revealed she has captured Wesley when he tried to stop her and is probing his mind), allowing her to build a fleet of ships in a faction of the time that she plans to use to start a war with the Federation. Ilthuran is captured and Asencia sends a ship to destroy Voyager-A and the Protostar. Eventually the crews are able to destroy the Solum ship (and Zero returns to their orb body, but upgraded with sensory inputs so that Zero can still physically feel). Due to Starfleet orders and the Prime Directive, they still can't do anything, but since the kids aren't technically Starfleet officers yet, they can. But if captured, Starfleet would have to disavow any knowledge.

The kids manage to free Wesley and Ilthuran but are captured themselves and sent to be executed by a Loom somehow captured by Asencia. Thankfully, Janeway refuses to leave her cadets hanging, so she takes a team to free them. Asencia then launches her plan to open wormholes all over the Federation to send her fleet to in order to wipe them out. Rok figures out they can stop Asencia and restore the timeline at the same time if they use the device she's using to make wormholes, but first they need to take control of it as well as figure out when to send the Protostar. Voyager-A and the Protostar do what they can to prevent the Solum ships from entering the wormholes, while the kids split up, one team trying to figure out when to send the Protostar and another team to take the wormhole generator. Eventually Rok and Wesley figure out they don't have to be precise. As long as the big events in the timeline is maintained, the smaller details don't matter. With everything set, they prepare to send the Protostar through, but then the Loom move in/ Voyager-A escorts the Protostar through the wormhole, allowing history to correct itself.

Back at Earth, Admiral Janeway take an early retirement, Chakotay is given command of Voyager-A and the kids all return to Starfleet Academy. Unfortunately, the attack on Mars occurs (which we saw in season 1 of Picard) which takes out the Utopia Planitia fleet yards, and Starfleet decides to refocus on planetary defense rather than exploration. Janeway is recalled to service, and refusing to accept Starfleet would move away from exploration, gives the kids a promotion to Ensign and command of the second Protostar class ship, the Prodigy.

As I'd said at the conclusion of the first season, I think Prodigy is the best of the nuTrek era series. It's unfortunate that it was also the worst treated by Paramount. I still can't believe they cancelled it when they were nearly done working on season 2. Thankfully Netflix aired the episodes. This season was even better than the first, so it would have been a real shame if we didn't get to see this. I'd love for Netflix to give them a 3rd season, but I doubt that'll happen.

That said, it's not a perfect show...

Spoiler

I didn't follow the time travel stuff at the end. I mean, sending the Protostar back in time just so long as the kids find it was fine, but now that the civil war on Solum has been averted, and Ilthuran doesn't become The Diviner, wouldn't that still mean Gwyn shouldn't exist? Or, at least, wasn't born in the past like we saw, and was never on Tars Lamora? In fact, wouldn't Tars Lamora not exist without the Diviner as well, since it was just his ship parked on an asteroid? Which then makes sending the Protostar back in time no longer matter... I get the feeling the writers would explain this away as a nuTrek alternate reality idea of time travel, but it just doesn't work for me when that's not traditionally how time travel works in Star Trek.

Honestly, I think this show would be better if the episodes were close to an hour rather than about 25 minutes so that they could expand on things more. Yet, even with only 25 minutes, these writers do a better job with the story than the other nuTrek shows....

Anyway, I liked how they tied the ending into the events of Picard, and that Janeway opposed the direction Starfleet decided to go in as a result. It also worked really well as an explanation for why Starfleet stopped production of the Protostar class. Little odd they gave it to a ship of ensigns under the command of a hologram. But it seems like the Prodigy is sorta like the Valiant from DS9.

Loved that we got a scene with Wesley and Beverly and meeting his half-brother. Little disappointed we didn't get to see that in live action with Picard, but it was nice this series had it.

I have to wonder what happens to the Voyager-A... Picard season 3 established there was already a Voyager-B, and that was only about 15 years after this.

[Ursus mellifera]

I was wondering about this as well, and just assumed it was "wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey" stuff.

Spoiler

If Ilthuran never becomes the Diviner, then he doesn't go to Tars Lamora to look for the ship. Since he doesn't do that, he never kidnaps all the kids, AND he still never creates Gwyn (who seems to be stable anyway, now?). So it seems like the old standard "time travelers are immune from changes to the timeline" thing? Because it seems to me that the whole crew is now from an alternate future that's no longer happened. They sent it through the wormhole to Tars Lamora to an alternate timeline where all the shit from the first season still happened? But it doesn't happen in their timeline because there won't be a Diviner? I don't know. I love the show, but quantum mechanics (101 or otherwise) makes my head hurt.

[Sparky Prime]

I've seen people saying it's like Admiral Janeway's time traveling in "Endgame", in that her interference in past events still happens despite the timeline she came from ceasing to exist once events were successfully changed. But that ignores the situation in Prodigy involves multiple time travel events that changes what happens...

Spoiler

Originally, the Protostar was sent back in time alone, where it ended up on Tars Lamora and the Vau N'Akat went after it to recover the living construct.

First change the kids make to the timeline allows Chakotay and Adreek to escape on the Protostar instead, allowing them in turn to make sure the Vau N'Akat don't find it as well as keep it away from the Federation. Not that it matters because Voyager-A is ordered to collapse the wormhole, which prevents the Vau N'Akat from chasing after the Protostar. Gwyn is never born as a result.

Then the kids and Voyager-A prevent the civil war on Solum altogether and establish a peaceful first contact. So when the Protostar inadvertently ends up at Solum some 50 years in the future... None of the original events should happen anymore. Yet somehow, sending the Protostar back in time to Tars Lamora is still the only event that restores the timeline? Other than being the vehicle (literally) that brings the kids together, there's really no reason for the Protostar needs to end up there anymore.

So I dunno.... I appreciate that the show made it a point to explain temporal mechanics and multiverse theory, but I'm not sure if the writers really got it themselves since the time travel stuff still ended up confusing. But considering how good the rest of the story is, I'm more willing to forgive it as "timey-whimey", whatever the intended explanation.

[Ursus mellifera]

But considering how good the rest of the story is, I'm more willing to forgive it as "timey-whimey", whatever the intended explanation.

Absolutely.

[Sparky Prime]

Trailer for Section 31 - I don't understand why Alex Kurtzman has been pushing, for years, to get this made. This looks like some generic sci-fi thriller to me. It doesn't look at all like Star Trek. Not even clear what era of Star Trek this is supposed to take place in since there is no defining Star Trek technology or costumes to set it.

Teaser trailer for Lower Decks season 5 - Not much to say about this being just a teaser. Much of Lower Decks has either been hit or miss to me.

5 minutes of a Strange New Worlds season 3 episode - Not sure why they didn't do a trailer like the other two. Several crew members just genetically modified into Vulcans for a mission, which looks like they treat sorta like the super soldier serum Nurse Chapel and Dr. M'Benga used last season given they complete said mission at super human levels, even by Vulcan standards. The premise is alright, but the execution is bad. Why do their hair styles change when they get the ears and eyebrows? And just because their genetics have been modified doesn't mean they should automatically know how to behave as a Vulcan. This should be like DS9's "Apocalypse Rising", where Worf has to give Sisko, O'Brien, and Odo lessons on how to act Klingon. Granted, that was just their appearance that was altered, but still... And what's with them looking down on Spock for being half Vulcan? These are learned behaviors, not something linked to genetics.

In other Star Trek news... A new live action comedy series has been announced. Yet un-named, but it will be written by
Justin Simien and Tawny Newsome (who plays Beckett Mariner in Lower Decks). And Robert Picardo has joined the cast of the upcoming 32nd century Starfleet Academy series. Interesting to learn (presumably) the EMH (or one of his programs) is still around around 800 years. Hopefully this spin off is better than Discovery.

[andersonh1]

Nice to see Robert Picardo in the series. That has me interested in it, when nothing else about it got my attention.

[Shockwave]

I binged Prodigy a couple weeks ago and loved it. It was great to see Chakotay actually get some real character development, and nothing that involved a flute. Also, for some real Star Trek timey-wimey wibbly wobbly stuff, here's something that will bake your noodle: In Star Trek: The Next Generation, the timeline we see after Yesterday's Enterprise is no longer the Prime timeline. When Tasha goes back on the Enterprise-C, she alters the present, meaning the timeline we see at the start of the series is not the same one at the end.

[Ursus mellifera]

When Tasha goes back on the Enterprise-C, she alters the present, meaning the timeline we see at the start of the series is not the same one at the end.