All-purpose, running Geek thread (formerly Battlestar Galactica thread)

The BBC has announced who will the next Doctor will be. I don't know this guy, but it sounds like he's an up-and-comer in the acting world.

https://www.doctorwho.tv/news-and-features/ncuti-gatwa-is-the-doctor

 

I just hope the writing improves for this Doctor. Jodi Whitaker was good but the stories weren’t great aside from a couple of episodes. Which really sucks because she was really good in Broadchurch and completely changed her tenor for Doctor Who it’s just the story telling was forgettable.

 

I watched a few of her early episodes and liked her and the chemistry between her and the companions. But I'd checked out on it the past couple of seasons.
From what I did see, one thing I liked was that they didn't lean too hard into the Doctor being a woman for the first time (or, apparently, at least the first time that we'd seen; from reading recaps it appears they retconned the Doctor's entire history this past season). They could have easily beaten people over the head with it and turned her entire run into "a very special episode of Doctor Who." Instead, it was just like, "Oh, hey, it's the Doctor and she's a woman now. Cool. Let's get back to timey-wimey space stuff."
Yet at the same time, they might have missed a fun opportunity to walk a middle ground and explore some new territory with the character. They didn't have to remind us she's a woman at every opportunity, but some remarks or minor plot points here and there referencing it might have been interesting. Maybe they did get there as things went along, I don't know.

And, honestly, I think the storytelling has been a mess since the end of David Tennant's tenure. Matt Smith was a good doctor, but his seasons became a convoluted mess. I liked Capaldi and Whitaker as well, and even though they had some good individual stories (Capaldi's "Heaven Sent/Hell Bent" two-parter was awesome) they never seemed to consistently find the right gear the way Tennant did.
Hopefully with Russell T. Davies coming back as showrunner they can find it again.

 

I really need to get Hulu.

 

Along with an old Doctor and his companion.

David Tennant and Catherine Tate returning to Doctor Who in 2023 | Radio Times

 

You wanna talk geek cred?

 

I really want to like Star Trek: Discovery but the writing is so predictable that I already know Michael Burnham is the only person in the entire universe who can wrap up everything in a neat little bow and nobody ever really dies.

Gwen and I just caught up to the Season 4 finale last night and it's basically The Burn 2.0. Alien species doesn't realize it's destroying Life As We Know It so Burnham and crew come to the rescue in the nick of time. Oh, and Cleveland Booker gets killed (but he doesn't) and the mutineering General of Earth somehow gets approval to ram Booker's ship in a suicide mission that gets her killed (but she doesn't). And nobody of consequence on either Earth or Ni'Var gets killed, either. Tilly and the Admiral even get to finish their drinks before the Eagles swoop in and take them back to Rivendell -- sorry, wrong plot.

Discovery sure does have a lot of internal explosions and hull breaches, and then within 10 minutes, everything's all cleaned up and in working order. Even stranded without a spore drive outside the galaxy would have been a nice lead-in to Season Five (and provide the impetus for the Short Treks "Calypso" episode) ... but the supposedly fantastically advanced 10-C -- who only communicate in complex hydrocarbons but can somehow get the nuances of bombastic soliloquies from the President of Starfleet, Burnham AND Booker -- are all too eager to shut down the DMA, repair the ship and send Discovery back to Starfleet for a weak-ass Ewok-like celebration sequence.

Just like Season One of Picard, if you're going to "kill" a key character in order to get an emotional response, only to declare "oh, he was only mostly dead," the writers not only telegraphed the punch but pulled it back as well. Picard is now tooling around in an android body, which doesn't make me at all interested in any further adventures if the writers can't come up with a better way of creating drama.

I can't even keep track of the number of Discovery characters that have seemingly "died," only to return either as themselves or in a Mirror Universe: Gorgeiou, Saru, the doctor, the trans boy, Michael's mom ....

At least Strange New Worlds appears to just be happy to solve things in a tidy 60 minute episode format. That's because Pike's already seen his "death," I guess.

 

I haven't seen Discovery because I just can't justify paying for another streaming service, but I did use my free trial to watch the first season of Picard. I thought it was well done right up to the point of the android body. Either don't write yourselves into that spot or have the guts to actually kill him off and make it just a one-season run. I have not heard good things about the second season.

The entire first episode of Strange New Worlds is on YouTube. I liked it. It certainly has more of an original series feel to it.

 

Yeah, it's a bit much. The thing that kills me though, is the whispering. The actress who plays Burnham has decided that whispering is a form of acting. I just can't deal with it. Discovery has a lot of fascinating characters, but she is not one of them. And I know I'm old school, but I will never get over the fact that we have known Spock for more than 50 years, and they introduce a sister. I mean, come on.

 

As awful as suddenly creating Spock's half-brother from the totally forgettable "The Final Frontier." (Or I wish I could forget it.)

And Michael Burnham is basically another Wesley Crusher, and about as irritating. No matter what the situation, she somehow is the only person who automatically pulls some fact/strategy/tool/weapon out of her apparently limitless brain.

Couldn't anybody else save the Galaxy just one freaking time?

 

I always forget about Anything Goes, but I need someone to discuss Picard Season 2, which I just completed.

Early in the season, I read one reviewer call it the most badly-paced season of television he'd ever seen, and I'm kind of inclined to agree with him at least in part. The stuff that makes no sense, though, is the ending. If the Nice Borg have been in existence since the 21st century, does that mean that the OG Borg never existed? Does that mean Wolf 359 never happened, or Voyager's various hijinks up to and including the creation of Seven herself? The entire existence of the Borg is not a thread the writers should have pulled on, at least not from that end.

I'm not one of those people who's like "I don't like the writing, so I'm going to stop watching in protest!" because I'm there for the characters but this season had the distinct feeling that they decided they were doing the equivalent of a 10-hour Q episode that included Guinan and the Borg and they were going to figure out the details later.

Picard Season 1 I would have given a solid B. The whole thing would have worked a lot better if Patrick Stewart and Brent Spiner were 10 years younger but I loved how they brought Seven back, and I'm not going to lie, Peyton List (aka Mrs. Roger Sterling) as a sexy badass Romulan was fun. This one? Maybe a C- at best?

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So I was slow to get to Picard because I was behind on Discovery. Season 4. Maybe it's because of the setting but this show seems to be crying out for a convincing antagonist. The Klingons in Season 1 were pretty good (I'm not one of those people who noped out just because the forehead ridges weren't the same). Control was great if hard to portray since it was basically an AI in the personification of one character, but the Emerald Chain was not at all convincing, and this season didn't really have an antagonist at all, because they weren't really fighting the 10-C, they were fighting a season-long misunderstanding.

Another very valid criticism I read this season was that not every damned episode has to have affirmations for everyone. I'm also kind of mad that they appear to have written out my favorite character (Tilly) and kind of cringing because I suspect there's a real-universe reason why (in short, Mary Wiseman's weight).

I'm not saying it's irredeemable like the angry Internet commenters, but yes, I could stand to have a big problem solved by someone other than Burnham. The fact that they had to dump the gray uniforms from the Season 3 finale before Season 4 because they matched the set too closely tells me they don't really have it together. The future stuff just needs to improve.

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I know almost nothing about Doctor Who, but Ncuti Gatwa made a name for himself as a scene-stealer in "Sex Education," a charming teen comedy in which he plays a character who is very gay and very African and the balance between the two. A very good actor. I doubt he'd play the Doctor so flamboyantly, but given that I know the character has a lot of flair, he'll probably have a lot of success.

I'll probably start Strange New Worlds this week. I've read nothing but good things about it, so I'm very optimistic.

 

So kenobi and stranger things four premier on the same day? That is going to be a lot of sitting on their asses Memorial Day weekend