I appreciate the long answer - this is supposed to be a space for discussion!

I appreciate your perspective, too - I think if there’s a difference in our perspectives, it might be that I prefer to see aspiration through struggle. The TNG “sunny ways” were fine for its time, but I think it’s more meaningful - especially in the times we’re living through - to portray the eternal vigilance and struggle to get to the Federation “utopia” (I kind of hate that word, but you know what I mean) - and to maintain it once you’ve got it.

It’s interesting - I guess in my mind, the stuff SNW is doing is about as close to “traditional” Star Trek as it’s possible to get in the current landscape. What do you feel is missing?

I haven’t liked everything to some out of this era, but on balance I think Kurtzman has done a very good job with the franchise. One streaming movie that’s a bit of a dud (assuming I don’t like it when I actually see it) isn’t likely to change my opinion on that.

The Verge: Star Trek: Section 31 is firing on all cylinders

Go on…

To be honest, that’s always been the core argument.

I don’t know where the line is - obviously, the morphogenic virus in DS9 was beyond the pale, but is it wise to expect hostile neighbours to be won over by sunshine and rainbows?

We have a thread set up to collect advance reviews - please feel free to share this there.

TrekMovie: Early Thoughts On ‘Star Trek: Section 31’

TrekCore: Star Trek: Section 31 Is a Dreary, Unfortunate Misfire

io9: Section 31 Is a Mediocre Action Movie, and an Even Worse Star Trek One

The Federation didn’t need 31 to win the war

Do we know that for certain? The cure to the virus was actually pretty fundamental to the Female Changeling ordering the Jem’Hadar to stand down. She refused to surrender until Odo linked with her and cured her.

I completely agree.

I’ve often thought that there must have been plenty of Section 31 operations that didn’t rise to the level of, you know, genocide, and that those operations were likely more ambiguous.

I’m hoping that whatever they’re up to in this movie is more in that vein - almost certainly illegal, but probably more ethically murky?

They were definitely villains in the series…but I don’t think DS9 ever made a strong case that they weren’t necessary (nor do I think they were trying to).

Right up until the end, the morphogenic virus was critical to the end of the war.

It’s quite difficult to describe the character of Fuzz. This is a species that we have never seen before.

…Huh. So neither Vulcan nor Romulan, apparently. It’s been a while since the word “Vulcanoid” has been on my mind.

So could any given episode of “My Little Pony” - in fact, the number of things that could say “Star Wars” on it is literally endless!

Tractor beams and force fields are actually both supposed to be applications of graviton technology, so…kinda?

But no, I don’t think that bit of the Technical Manual is very consistent with how we saw the holodecks actually being used.

It thankfully stops short of “meat”:

Such animated characters are composed of solid matter arranged by transporter-based replicators and manipulated by highly articulated computer-driven tractor beams. The results are exceptionally realistic “puppets,” which exhibit behaviors almost exactly like those of living beings, depending on software limits.

Objects created on the Holodeck that are pure holographic images cannot be removed from the Holodeck, even if they appear to possess physical reality because of the focused forcebeam imagery. Objects created by replicator matter conversion do have physical reality and can indeed be removed from the Holodeck, even though they will no longer be under computer control.

Obviously, there is an inconsistency here, as we saw that later holographic characters could not be removed from the holodeck, and therefore must not have been replicated.

I don’t think so - I’ve never been able to find it.

That isn’t actually stated anywhere, but…it kind of has to be true in order for latinum to work.

The Technical Manual explanation is not that replicators create matter out of pure energy - they are a type of transporter that dematerializes raw material and rematerializes it to match a molecular pattern. They are “matter-energy converters” only in the sense that the stream of particles during the materialization process could be called an energy stream.

These replicator system headends are located on Deck 12 in the Saucer Module [of the Enterprise-D] and on Deck 34 in the Engineering Section. These systems operate by using a phase-transition coil chamber in which a measured quantity of raw material is dematerialized in a manner similar to that of a standard transporter.

Instead of using a molecular imaging scanner to determine the patterns of the raw stock, however, a quantum geometry transformational matrix field is used to modify the matter stream to conform to a digitally stored molecular pattern matrix. The matter stream is then routed through a network of waveguide conduits that direct the signal to a replicator terminal at which the desired article is materialized within another phase transition chamber.

Yeah…I think a lot of that will depend on what the actual plot of the thing is, and they’ve been keeping a surprisingly tight lid on that.

The covert mission to destroy Cardassian weapons that Starfleet Intelligence sent Picard, Crusher, and Worf on in “Chain of Command” was probably illegal, but I never hear people complaining about it.

Yeah, I only really thought of them because (a) the Memory Alpha page for “Exoskeleton” mentioned them, and (b) people have been comparing Zeph here to the Borg since images first came out.