Last year, around spring time or so, I started watching Star Trek Discovery Season 2. Got about 6 episodes before I stopped. There were just so many things about it that irked me from the direction, the writing and the characters. Started watching Homeland Season 6 (which is not great. Worst season of that show but better than Discovery.) Watched Homeland Season 7. Watched all of Barry. Actually went back and watched all Veep. I stopped watching Veep after the third episode back when it first aired but always kind of followed along some of the story line from reviews and it seemed to get more interesting as it went on. Watched the 3rd season of True Detective. Watched half the series of The Goldbergs. Kept up with watching Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Survivor, The Amazing Race, Tosh.0, Brooklyn Nine Nine, The Good Place, Rick & Morty, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy. Started watching the Goldbergs spin-off Schooled and have seen its first two seasons now. Watched Season 4 of Mr. Robot (absolutely inspired. Probably the best show I watched in this time frame.). Watched the 5th season Better Call Saul. Watched all episodes of the British series Prime Suspect. Saw the first (and possibly only) season of HBO's Watchmen. Finally watched the last couple episodes of season 6 and then all of Season 7 for Voyager. Finally completed that series last month during the Good Friday long weekend. There's probably a bit more I'm forgetting in that not to mention movies I've watched and games I've played.
But since I completed Voyager, I figured why not go and finish Discovery Season 2? There were only 8 episodes to go and then I'd have basically seen all of Trek now aside from a large chunk of the original series and the latest Picard series that has started. (I guess there is an Animated Trek based on the original but no one seems to care or count that as any important Trek.)
What. A. Mistake.
Even though I had moved on to all that better programming (and yes, everything I listed above is better than STD), I was still mildly curious about the mystery it had started building of the red angel and the seven signals. But, as the saying goes, curiosity killed the cat and I should have known better instead of giving this show the benefit of the doubt which I only gave it because of Lorca from Season 1. That mystery unfolded terribly and, by the end, it has basically killed any interest I have in this new era of Trek. I had thought about checking out Picard but forget it. Star Trek is clearly done.
I had thought about starting a thread on Discovery just to start bagging on it but I figured there wasn't much point as oohhboy's pretty much got that on lockdown. I suppose I'd sum it up as this. When watching Voyager, you could see how TV still struggled with incorporating early CGI. It got better by Enterprise's time. CGI was used sparingly so the shows had to rely more on keeping people entertained by the dialogue and ideas. Now the graphics have gotten to movie blockbuster quality and have taken over so that everything can be whiz-bang AMAZING action and the dialogue between characters has decreased in quality to move things all in a perfunctory manner while any deep issues or questions raised during the series are barely explored or are treated like that is a homage to past Trek series. Like the people behind are saying to the fans, remember in past shows how the crew would go to a foreign planet and get in a tricky situation? Look we did that quickly in an episode as well. We're still the same Trek as before because we paid that thing lip service. Sure, the old series would explore the issues or conundrums they faced on those missions but who's got time to think when we can show spaceships go BOOOM!? The effects have now taken over and it is a hollow shell of what the series was meant to be and the direction it had followed for decades through multiple series up until now.