Fortyseven

The music seemed to suggest she was some big character reveal, but instead I think they were just excited that they got Curtis to film something from her bathroom via Cameo for $50 so they could have her in the movie.

Despite my negative reaction to the trailer, and hearing all the early spoiler-free reviews validating that reaction, I went into it hoping for a guilty pleasure of some kind, where I can go "yeah that wasn't great, but I kinda liked it".

Not so much. (I wrote up a full thing over here. Spoiler: it's a 1 out of 5 for me.)

But here's some positives, since this group contains perhaps the most generous comments I've ever seen about it so far, and I don't want to spoil that vibe:

• I think the cast was decent; the guy playing Quasi especially stood out to me. Liked their casting for Rachel Garrett, and the bit of personality they gave her; it doesn't stomp on her TNG appearance, just adds to it. And she kinda looks like her if you squint.

• The core concept is fine, and with a huge overhaul they could have had something here. Yet by the end of this thing, I could almost see this going forward with more episodes. Few shows hit the ground running before finding the right balance. Unfortunately this will never get that chance.

• The sets and VFX are quite good for a streaming series at times.

• The angry face on the Deltan before she left was amazing? (I'm really struggling here.)

Probably should have made some Star Trek then. 😏

Admittedly I'm skeptical of it, but finding out Robert Picardo is involved makes my ears perk up.

Holy shit, I don't remember that at all. :O

Honestly, for me, the finale covered it enough. It's obvious they like each other. I don't think it needs to be directly confirmed in dialogue for it to be legit. :)

Curiosity rising. Just a little. But it's something. ;)

That works, too. (And probably closer to what I was thinking, honestly.)

There's room for it, under the right conditions, but... this feels completely wrong in almost every direction. Section 31, as a collective group, should not feel like a bad rip off of Guardians of the Galaxy. Absolutely the wrong tone.

I will give it a fair shot, however, since it won't cost me anything but my time. :P

I really, really, really hope this ends up being like Lower Decks where I was very skeptical of it going in, but ended up loving it.

Because everything about this is actively repelling me.

Ugh. Another sour bit of Picard trivia for the pile. Del Arco comes across as a decent fellow. I remember spending all season wondering where the hell this was all going and hoping his character's death -- in the full context -- would make more narrative sense. How blissfully naive I was. :P

It's crazy that the show I was most hyped for ended up being the one I'd erase from the timeline if I could. Visually gorgeous, with a great cast... but, IMHO, it was far too 'grimdark' for it's own good. That and it's shattershot kitchen-sink approach to storytelling makes it all feel like some fan fiction wet dream in retrospect. Anything positive I could take away from the series is almost completely lost in the noise.

(Keeping in mind that I keep S1/S2 distinct from S3, which while an improvement, has it's own things going on. 😏)

"Dr. Vance... are you wearing makeup...?" (Oops, wrong movie.)