Saturday, September 16, 2017

Today in 'I really hope this doesn't suck...'

Ok, you know the drill, buckle your nerd belts. I have some, well let's say potentially not great news. If you didn't click, it's-huh? I know you didn't click, don't lie to me, I can tell. Anyway, CBS is not sending out screening copies of Star Trek: Discovery's pilot episode which premiers next week.
"Oh shit..."
-Data, Star Trek: Generations,
Act III, scene ii
"What? No, don't even worry, about
 it. It's gonna be great, trust me..."
-Producer Alex Kurtzman
...who wrote Transformers 2
It may be nothing, garbled communications, but it seems like a bad sign that the producers of the series don't want anyone to see it ahead of time. What's more is that even people who see it at the premier screenings won't be allowed to talk about it until after it's released. Sure, this could be because CBS wants to avoid screening audiences giving away some big plot twist or spoiler or something. It could be that. But it could also be that they don't have a lot of confidence in the show's quality and are worried that bad word of mouth might drive down viewership and subscriptions to their stupid CBS All Access service.

I'd rather pay to not have access to The
Big Bang Theory, thank you very much.
You heard me. Yeah, if you live in the U.S. you can't just watch Star Trek: Discovery on Netflix or whatever like a civilized person. Instead you have to sign up for CBS's special streaming service. Yes, another subscription but one that offers all the inconvenience of watching broadcast television like commercials and the privilege of paying for a bunch of tv shows you don't want. It's sort of like what HBO does with Game of Thrones, except now, thanks to non-disclosure agreements and review embargoes, the concern is that Discovery might be terrible.

Oh don't look at me like that,
I mean did you even watch the one
where Trip gets pregnant? 
Ok, cards on the table, I still have high hopes that Discovery will be awesome. And as an obsessed fan, I'll watch anything, pay anything, literally anything Star Trek. Even if it is crap. I stuck with Star Trek through some objective crap during TNG's first couple seasons. I dutifully sat through Insurrection in the theatre not once, but twice, just in case I missed some reason it wasn't terrible. I even watched all four seasons of Star Trek: Enterprise. Four seasons. I fast forwarded thought the theme song, but still, I did it and I'm prepared to do it again although I resent having to sign-up for All Access to do it.

But that's why they call us fans instead of, you know, normal people. Anyway, I want this to be good. I need this to be good. It's just that the pre-release secrecy is troublesome.
It's ok, I can say that. These are my people.

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