Star Trek: Discovery - New Klingons & Mudd

Star Trek: Discovery - New Klingons & Mudd

With the developments, recent and varied, it seemed time to stick my oar in once again and see how my anticipation is shaping up for this decade-plus awaited series, especially as the news has mainly been negatively skewed, from my perspective. First big deal was a leaked behind the scenes photo which appeared to show a group of Klingons (a herd? A stampede? A swarm? I was not aware twelve Klingons constitutes a swarm…), from an extra who was part of the production. It's not been confirmed or denied, as far as I know, simply ignored, but the key thing here was that they didn't even look much like Klingons! They had pointy ears, were completely bald, and looked more like Orcs than members of the great warrior race of Qo'noS. They were wearing some kind of spiky battle armour and while we don't know for certain they were actually what this person said they were, from the early months of production it had been stated, worryingly, that established Trek aliens were going to have a makeover to 'update' them. If this were a simple case of adding texture and detail (think the Kelvin Timeline uniform shirts with their Starfleet chevron pattern), then it would be an obvious development for the greater scrutiny of High Definition viewing. If that means altering the races so they only bear a passing resemblance to their namesakes it's something entirely different.

It's not like this hasn't happened before (obviously the whole Klingons gaining foreheads in 'The Motion Picture,' or Romulans the same in 'TNG'), with 'Enterprise' leading the way in terms of updating the look of much-loved races. That series did it right nine times out of ten: just think of the wonderful improvements made to the Andorians, the Tholians, and expanding the Orions to include the males, that showed just what a modern budget could achieve (I personally wasn't quite as keen on the Tellarites as I prefer the faces from 'TOS' where the eyes were so deeply sunken they couldn't be seen, and the fact they had trotters rather than fingers). These updates were adaptations of existing designs, smoothed out, given extra personality and generally improved without altering the overall formula, but if these aliens seen in the picture were indeed Klingons they've done far more than a simple brush up and paint job! If they came up with an in-universe explanation I could certainly get on board with the new look, and my hope is that if they do turn out to be genuine Klingons there will be some kind of a twist - they're from another time or have been awoken from hibernation. Or maybe a long-forgotten branch of Klingon DNA, perhaps a result of cross-pollination with the legendary Hur'q - that would be exciting!

If the warning sign of the potential diversion from canon that this represents was putting me on Yellow Alert, there was another, official announcement that took me up to Red: they proudly trotted out the news of the casting of a character from 'TOS' who will be making a comeback. I'm not talking about Sarek here, I already mentioned that he'd be a reasonable addition given the time frame and his ambassadorial duties. No, it was Harry Mudd, intergalactic conman of the space-lanes. Now, Roger C. Carmel did a great job of imbuing this vast rogue with personality and providing Kirk and crew with an adversary that tested their morals and patience in equal measure. But once again, to recast such a role that was entirely made up of Carmel's performance and was far from being a bland, forgettable character, is to say that any can be recast, lazily regurgitating old characters to take advantage of name recognition and branding. There are so many characters that could be brought back to great acclaim, and not just from the 'TOS' era: how about Wesley Crusher, who, as a Traveller, can appear in any time and space; or Q, for the same reason; or Guinan, since she was alive at that time? What about the Dax host of the time? My point is there is so much more to the Trek universe than the small corner of 'TOS,' and I get that they've chosen that niche as the place to launch a new series, but Harry Mudd isn't even one of the 'TOS' characters I'd first think about bringing back. Or even the second, third, fourth, etc.

I was in half a mind that it could be an April Fool, but the release date was a day earlier on the 31st March, so I don't know what to think! And it was the way they seemed so keen to get it out there as if to point to the series not being what you thought it was going to be: as in a serious attempt to bring Trek back, but going more for the parody style of the Kelvin Timeline films. A couple of other little oddities are that the main character, not the Captain, but First Officer, will be named Michael Burnham. Except it's a she, and Michael isn't a female name, so that's a bit weird unless it's short for Michaela! It's not that big a deal to have the main lead not be a Captain, as Commander Sisko proved on 'DS9' - he took three seasons to attain the rank we traditionally associate with the main role, so it gives them somewhere to go. I was actually expecting her to be an even lower rank than First Officer, but this reveal suggests we won't be getting a 'Lower Decks' style of storytelling which some wondered about, and hoped for. I'm in two minds, as you are limited in what you can show or do with exclusively lower-ranked officers, but at the same time that episode was a great one in a weaker season of 'TNG.' They've probably made the right decision there and with the various ranks, even up to Admiral and Ambassador that we're going to see, there could be a nice broad spectrum of command and experience on the series.

The other little thing was Michael Dorn mentioning he had been in talks to make an appearance, but that they didn't work out. This would have been brilliant, even if he wasn't playing Worf, as he already had a character in the 23rd Century (Colonel Worf, Worf's Grandfather who, as a lawyer, defended Kirk and McCoy at the Klingon trial in 'Star Trek VI'), and every Trek series has had a character from a previous series to kickstart the next, even the Kelvin Timeline films - and not just a character, but one played by the actor who originated the role. For 'Enterprise' they even pushed the boat out to get James Cromwell back as Zefram Cochrane, which was impressive, so I wait to see what a bigger modern budget could do for us… With all this stuff trundling out I was beginning to feel my anticipation wane, and was about to reduce my rating to **, but the truth is I'm still intrigued, there's still so much to be revealed and hope springs eternal that this series will genuinely continue the historical saga and add to the canon, not ignore or detract from it.

Anticipation Rating: ***