Shocker
I have no skin in the Star Wars vs. Star Trek game because I don’t care what people think, and I am happy when they find something entertaining.
When I play the game just for fun, I’d say:
Star Trek is better than Star Wars but Andor is better than anything Star Trek has ever done.
You are all mere worms writhing in the dirt at Stargate’s feet.
Ah yes, how could we forget about Team America: Space Police
Hey both are good mhm yes
Star Wars and Star Trek are really tangential fandoms except for the intersection in the name.
I respectfully disagree about Luke being a mary sue. Empire is literally him training, abandonding said training, and losing a hand and getting his friend frozen; all as a direct result of his established character traits
Yeah that’s a bizarre take.
It really isn’t if you actually look at the evidence.
Right? I usually hear people saying Rey is a Mary Sue, not Luke.
Which makes literally zero sense and is the most overwhelming evidence of Star Wars fans being unhinged and ignoring reality to fit their own narrative.
Luke was a nobody raised in a rural environment with no threats or signs of harm. Rey on the other hand raised herself on a desert planet by herself where no one protected her and she has to protect herself.
Yet no one has a problem with Luke piloting a military aircraft perfectly a couple days after his aunt and uncle were killed and every problem with Rey swinging a weapon.
I agree with you that if Rey is a Mary Sue, then Luke definitely is as well. But I’ve developed a huge distaste for the “Mary Sue” label due to how thoroughly abused it’s been, and would rather just push back against it being used at all.
The original concept referred to fan fiction self-inserts, and in my opinion it really only holds any water at all in the context of a new character being forced into an existing dynamic. If it’s the franchise’s main protagonist, it’s not a Mary Sue.
After all, if Luke’s a Mary Sue, why not Kirk? He’s the youngest captain ever in Starfleet, and has been given command of their most prestigious class of vessel. He’s unerringly appealing to women, to the point where gynoids will malfunction from his charms. He’s able to best his hyper-intelligent Vulcan science officer at chess. He can bluff his way around encounters with races far beyond Federation levels of development. He defeated a eugenic superhuman with ten times his strength in direct combat.
It’s fine, even normal, for a protagonist to be exceptional. It’s a meaningless criticism to me.
Yeah, Empire is about that. What about A New Hope though? You never commented on that.
Luke is presented as a character with no real flaws. He is able to wield a lightsaber shockingly quickly with surprisingly little combat ability despite not having any combat training. It isn’t explained, at all, where he got the experience from to pilot a military aircraft through a combat zone and avoid turrets. We’re just told that because he hunted vermin he can hit this exhaust port. Nothing else about his abilities are explained. He just flew on Tattooine so he’s the best pilot to ever exist.
People keep going THE CHOSEN ONE AND THE FORCE but he’s just a Mary Sue. Given a ton of abilities and importance from the start with no real explanation and Lucas then had to change his own story during the movies to give a reason for it. The Original Trilogy are rife with inconsistencies but nah. Nope. No one ever wants to talk about those because it’ll shatter the image that somehow the original trilogy is perfect.
I’m on the Trek side with this one. Tossing aside the EU was an absolutely insulting move by Disney. They could have had a field day with Corran Horn. His story covered everything from deep sci fi hunting down the Imperial Remnant in rag tag space skirmishes to high fantasy wielding a lightsaber made from a swoop bike handle that changed length when you twisted the throttle.
Instead they put out mindless drivel that holds consistency about as well as a sieve holds diarrhea. Sometimes there’s a nugget, but most shit just runs through.
As a Star Wars fan I’ve always considered Star Trek very classy with intelligent nuances and a solid backbone. I just never could get into it. Probably my penchant for high fantasy. My uncle and grandfather are proud trekkies, though.
The whole Star Wars vs. Star Trek thing is just apples and oranges anyway. Each also has it’s fair share of “that one fan” we all dread, as displayed by Stephanie here.
Tossing aside the EU was an absolutely insulting move by Disney.
No. It was literally the only thing they could have done.
You people always seem to willfully forget the abject fucking insanity of the Extended Universe. Let’s just take a single game. Force Unleashed. Starkiller murders every major character in the canon. Are they just supposed to roll with that dumbassery as their in world canon now? Just go “Well, that game executed Han Solo and Leia and Vader. Can never use em again because of a fan fiction game that was only made due to an off hand joke about Starkiller being the former name for Skywalker”?
The Extended Universe was a garbage heap and the people who scream about Disney de-canonizing it are people who were not familiar with it. They knew a couple of stories and loved those and thought it would be cool and I agree. Corran Horn would have been interesting but there’s nothing saying that they can’t be introduced in the future. They decanonized Revan but he’s canon again now and they’re moving forward on that.
The reason they suddenly cut the EU was because George Lucas is a shortminded fuckhead who had no goddamn plan for Star Wars despite any claim to the opposite. He allowed anyone and everyone to write whatever story they wanted about Star Wars. As long as it didn’t break a few specific rules then it was considered tacit canon. That is fan fiction, dude. A whole lot of fan fiction that was written by a ton of different people with overlapping narratives.
Disney had literally no other choice afforded to them because Lucas was a useless shithead who had a couple of ideas that he kneecapped as hard as humanly possible. I’m tired of pretending that dude had any plan at all when the three Original Trilogy movies are not even consistent in their own lore nevermind the Prequels.
Star Wars in general is a joke. Placing the blame solely at the feet of Disney is just giving Lucas a free pass for the multi-year stroke he had. Disney did NOT do the best job they had available, don’t get me wrong. Solo is a joke and a lot of their stuff they’ve made I cannot stand but it is just insane to blame them completely for it. Lucas had no idea what he was doing either.
I get you. I really do. It hurts a lot that Star Wars has become what it is today and the joke started at Phantom Menace.
I suppose what I’m getting at is that Star Wars is a cluster fuck no matter which way you slice it but at least EU occasionally made it a fun cluster fuck.
I’m not saying that Disney should have followed every canon that that walking fop of chest hair Lucas let through. They should have just left it alone and never mentioned it. Don’t think I’m a Lucas fan. I hate him. Countless authors just dropped trow and shit on his desk and he made it canon.
I mean, Lucas told RA Salvatore, one of my favorite authors, that he had to kill off Chewbacca after he took the contract. So Salvatore, insulted, killed Chewie in the most heroic but ridiculous way he could think of and ran him over with a goddamn moon. From then on Lucas banned Chewbacca from any future New Jedi Order series and we got Lumpawarump.
So whereas the EU was indeed mindless insanity, it was our mindless insanity. Most EU fans like me who are aware of the shitshow it was accepted that it wasn’t perfect and cherry picked our own headcanon from the books. Disney essentially ripped that from us and forced this inconsistent, uninteresting slop down our throats.
They lost a chunk of fanbase decanonizing it, receiving ridicule en masse, when they could have just ignored it and put out their own events anyway. I’m not just one of those “couple of stories” guys, but I will concede that I am one of those “couple of stories I actually really enjoyed” guys.
That’s fair. I just get frustrated when Disney gets the brunt of the blame for decanonizing it when they weren’t really presented with much of an option. In an ideal world we would have had Lucas keep it and actually do something with the IP instead of letting it wither away. No matter who bought it after the fact had to contend with the abject insanity that Lucas had wrought.
Disney deserves blame for some shit, don’t get me wrong. I will say I kinda like the Sequels to an extent, although by no means blind to the numerous flaws and way less of a fanboy than of newer Trek, but a lot of their other stuff was nonsensical. Some deserves praise (I personally am really enjoying the Cal Kestis story, minus the ‘twist’ in Survivor, and Andor was spectacular) and other stuff (Just gonna stare aggressively in Boba Fett’s direction) deserves some heavy mockery. I just never personally cared much about decanonization because I couldn’t see any alternative and I feel that the hate Disney gets for decanonizing should be more accurately directed towards Lucas for either causing that mess or selling it in the first place. Basically a shoot the messenger situation when no matter who bought it was gonna basically have to do that or do the same fuckheaded shit that Lucas already was.
How did Disney toss the EU aside?
Declared it no longer canon
Thought it meant the European Union
I don’t think the European Union was ever canon in a story that happened “a long time ago”, regarding that the EU founding date was 1993 or 1951 at the earliest.
/jk
Both parties in OPs screenshot sound like terrible people - First we have Stephanie the Peacemaker calling an entire fanbase “scum of the earth” (jeez, who peed in your cereal) and the reply is a flimsy hot take calling a character with a deliberate “hero’s journey” path a Mary Sue.
These types have made Twitter unbearable, and now they’re on Bluesky.
That is OP
No, I’m not talking about Lukes path being a Mary Sue. I am saying that he is from the start. He has abilities that make no sense and that he never gained during his life. It is said that because he is able to hit a womprat from a distance he is able to pilot a military vehicle through a massive battle, avoiding all fire and taking care of enemies while piloting into a trench and hitting an exhaust port.
He has abilities that he does not deserve nor did he earn throughout his life. Did he earn the abilities after the fact? Sure. But in A New Hope, Luke is the most aggressively Mary Sue character you can think of. Made even more hysterical by the fact that people will defend his insane military prowess that comes from nowhere but get genuinely angry at Rey for being able to swing a lightsaber like a baseball bat when she
checks notes
raised herself on a desert planet while using a quarterstaff as her primary method of defense.
Star Wars fans are just deluded
Hi. Lifelong Rebel Scum here.
We can live in harmony with our fellow sci-fi nerds. Both our respective favorites inspire real-world positive change. We have better things to fight over than why Luke and Rey suffer from the same bad writing, or the fact that Paramount has been scrambling to bury Star Trek’s communist roots for decades.
Besides… we can unite over our shared distaste for Warhammer 40K.
As a life long 40K fan, I will not publicly admit that I am a lifelong 40k fan. When you make the MTG, Yu Ghi O and middle aged pokemon players look well adjusted…
I can admit that I’m one, but I’m not really into space marines and definitely not the whole primarch thing. Also the imperium would suck to live in along with most other places. Some fans definitely have huge issues…
I like those aspects of the universe too. I really enjoy when we get stories of “normal” people just trying to survive in such an insane hellscape of a galaxy. Great world building.
Nobody hates 40K more than 40K fans.
[Full discretion, not my thing. Just know the mem-eology]
Star Wars is fantasy set in space. Star Trek is science fiction.
Star Wars is, in my opinion, more fun to watch. But I enjoy thinking about the concepts presented in Star Trek more.
Star Wars is a Western.
And Akira Kurosawa’s “The Hidden Fortress” (1958)
I still dont get why Star Wars is compared to Star Trek, its space themed fanatsy vs scifi and tbh I prefer scifi :3
It’s because their names are similar.
Yeah, it’s weird. Compare Star Wars to Lord of the Rings? Of course. Compare Star Trek to Doctor Who? I can see it. Compare Star Wars to Star Trek? Makes no sense to me.
Star Trek and Docter are very comparable, granted different premises and stories but still comparable . Also Star Wars and LODR are extremely comparable both in how they present alien races (as more fantasy) and how they present their political systems respectively.
LODR
Lord o’ dem Rings. Middle earth is Alabama, confirmed.
Edit:
Star Wars isn’t really SciFi. It’s just Wizards In Space. The Sci-Fi is never really the thrust of the story, it’s just the backdrop.
Thats my point, its all just fantasy. The “force” is a fancy way of saying magic, lightsabers are powered by a magic crystal and arent consistant, blasters have infinite ammo and are powered by magic, all the technology is seemingly powered by magic. Meanwhile the alien races are clearly fantasy inspired, there are magic space ghosts, and a religon that doesnt make any sense (it both has no rules whatsover and somehow follows a vague system of “be good and do good”).
I’d argue that Star Trek is much the same, they just put a veneer of grounded scientific explanation on top of it. Psychics/ESP is basically magic, being able to think your way to the edge of the universe and back is also magic, Q and their abilities are basically magic, the Megans literally just use magic, etc.
A Federation starship is basically powered by a magic crystal.
I’m gonna nitpick your blasters point-- has a phaser ever run out of juice on screen? I just assumed the power sources they found for both blasters and phasers was so advanced it just seems like they always have all the power they need.
Im pretty sure blasters do run out of power a few key points in star trek, also I do belive there are scenes were it appears that they’re charging.
They were the two big English language space franchises.
Careful, every time someone mentions star Wars being stuck on the same 20 years, paramount reboots Kirk’s timeline.
reboots Kirk’s timeline.
Didn’t we all agree that those reboots, to include the kelvin timeline, are just Paramount’s fanfiction with a high budget?
All Star Trek is just Forbidden Planet fanfiction.
Gatekeepers, maybe. The rest of us adults? No.
Edit: Y’all children need to grow up. Y’all act so petulant. You insult anyone who likes stuff you don’t, you claim that it isn’t real Trek, you forcefully bring it up at every possible opportunity. It’s genuinely just trolling. Get over yourself and stop pretending like you have any say on what is actually Trek.
I mean… you can argue that twice but one of them is an alternate dimension and the other is a prequel. How many Star Wars series have been set between the PT and OT eras, respectively, exactly? Skeleton Crew, Ahsoka, Andor, Kenobi, Mando, Book of Boba, Bad Batch, Resistance, Rebels, Clone Wars… Two or three shows during the High Republic/Old Republic era. They’re outright allergic to any other timeframe.
PT? OT?
Prequel Trilogy. Original Trilogy.
ahh danke. so ST for the next lot?
Skeleton crew, Mando, Boba, Ahsoka, and iirc Resistance are all set between OT and ST. Not disagreeing with your overall point, just that you have these in the wrong part of the cannon timeline for SW.
Sorry I was unclear on my wording. Totally on me. When I meant between I didn’t mean specifically took place in the time frame between those eras. I meant it in like a “Between Jim and Terry, they have 4 apples” type way.
Edit: Looking at my original message, I straight up said set between. Well I done goofed. My apologies. I definitely made that as unclear as humanly possible.
Tbh Star Trek also has a fair share of inconsistencies and flawless characters. But any argument about which is “better” is pointless.
Arguing about which popular thing is better is no different than yelling “my dad can beat up your dad!” on a playground.
Oh 100%. That was all my point was. That calling it Superior is a stretch when it has its own flaws. I just didn’t expect them to instantly respond in such a way that completely proved their original point.
Very true. That said, as someone who’s never seen star trek, Star wars is superior
There are no bigger haters of Star Wars then those who claim to be Star Wars fans.
Classic Doctor Who fans say hold my beer you screaming neophytes
This is true
I prefer Star Wars to Trek but Trek doesn’t have nearly as much bad material overall.
I dunno bout that…
knocks “Code of Honor” onto the floor
Trek is better on average, Star Wars has higher peaks and lower valleys.
I really like the space opera of star wars, but I also really like star trek, they are both good. except for the new star wars, at least the first 6 actually had a relatively consistent message.
