Discovery 1x10: Despite Yourself previews

The second chapter of the first season of Discovery is just hours away, and so naturally CBS have been teasing us with a new clip, images, and more, of episode ten, Despite Yourself. Plus we've got a few hints for the rest of the season, and the second season too!

But first, on Facebook they released a short video which features both a behind the scenes segment and clip from the show (but alas it's region locked so only viewable to those in the US, but...) Here's the clip segment (handily uploaded to Youtube by TrekSpace), with a surprise attack on the Discovery!:



CBS have also released a bunch of new stills, with a heavy focus on Lorca scenes, in engineering, on the bridge, and in sickbay. It looks like the condition of Stamets, and Tyler's relationship with L'Rell are also going to be key points in this episode.

The episode is directed by none other than Jonathan Frakes (TNG's Will Riker of course), and a video has been released just to highlight that aspect of the production! (Region locked alas)



Frakes also previewed the episode in an interview on StarTrek.com, given a short summary:

Lorca's depth of character continues and there’s this wonderful business with L’Rell, Mary Chieffo's character.

It's beautifully shot, it's a great story, and there's lots of loose ends tied up. Lots of questions are answered, and it's a… cliffhanger. I think I can tell you that.

Meanwhile in another interview, on Rotten Tomatoes, he off hand mentioned Michelle Yeoh was still around when he was filming (but isn't in his episode), make of that what you will, and also mentioned a death, and developments for Burnham and Tyler's relationship. He didn't mention details, but it's so on the edge of spoilers I don't want to quote, so proceed at your own risk!

Back on StarTrek.com he also gave a lovely account of how the new cast are gelling, and what it was like for him visiting as Trek alumni:

They reminded me of us, of Next Gen. They had unified for a number of reasons. One was the madness that’s part of the beginning of any show. The other is that most of them were from elsewhere and were now gathered on the bridge of Discovery -- or the Shenzhou at first -- in Toronto. Jason (Isaacs) was cooking dinner every Sunday for the entire cast, and they’d gather and debrief. They'd come in and watch each other work. It was so similar to the Next Gen family that it made me proud. And, from morning to night when I was there, they picked my brain about my Trek experiences.

This was all of them. Some of these guys had watched everything. Some of them were in the middle of watching the different shows and movies, and the key episodes. They’d watched a lot of Next Gen. They were working their way through Voyager and Deep Space and Enterprise, and there was a lot of discussion about what it was like on the set, specific things about the costumes and about ship shapes and about how the props work and makeup and hair. They asked about protocol and beaming and all the things that we did on our shows. They were fascinated by it all. Sort of like the people at a convention, they wanted to hear anecdotes about what happened with so-and-so, what happened off-camera, what happened when we did this. So, it was a joyous place to be, and by the time I got there, the show had found its legs and the train was running very, very smoothly.

Talking of the new cast, here they are in another promo video, chatting about their own Trek histories:



In other Discovery news, showrunners Gretchen J. Berg and Aaron Harberts recently spoke about this end of the season at the Television Critics Association winter press tour, as AV Club reported:

Berg advised fans to “buckle up,” because the show is “introducing a huge new development.” “It’ll be fun for Trek fans,” Harberts chimed in, teasing a “nice nod to stuff from [The Original Series]. This back half—what happens tomorrow night firmly anchors the back half to the season. It’s definitely again a war story, as far as how it’ll play out, but our characters find themselves in a place where their identities are challenged. It’s an emotionally wrought back half. Very intense. The cast has done some amazing work.”

If you're worried about the war story swallowing up the Federation, they also had words of encouragement:

“The other thing that’s a huge theme for us is taking the Federation from the darkness into the light. Everybody wants this optimistic version of Star Trek right out of the gate. And I feel that our show has a lot of hope in it from episode to episode, depending on storyline we’re tracking.” So if you’ve found the show somewhat grim (this particular writer hasn’t), stay tuned, because Harberts says “by season’s end, people will see the Federation they’ve come to know and love from TOS on.”

They also hinted at more Georgiou stuff in some form:

Berg calls the relationship between Georgiou and Burnham “such a core relationship for the entire spine. Our goal was always to keep Captain Georgiou alive on the show.” Cutting herself off to avoid revealing too much, Berg then says, “The joy is in the journey. I’d say, keep watching, because Georgiou is such a huge part of the heart who was Michael Burnham. If that’s something you’re invested in, keep watching because I think you hopefully will enjoy what we’re going to do.” “Once you watch episode 10, you’ll see the context that we’re playing in,” Harberts adds. “Another theme for the back half is second chances. As people are consuming the back half, keep that in mind.”

They also spoke a little about a theme for season two being "science versus faith".

In other season two news, Vaun Wilmott‏ recently tweeted to announced he has joined the production as a writer and producer. His previous credits include work on many episodes of Prison Break, and Dominion.

Finally, there's also a new development in how Discovery is delivered to US viewers. Amazon are now offering CBS All Access as an option in their Amazon Prime Channels service - Which allows users to pick and chose the subscription services they like all in one place. It doesn't effect the price, but does mean you can find Discovery, and other CBS stuff, inside the Amazon ecosystem, which might at least make it easier viewing for some.


For an overview of the series, behind the scenes coverage, and tie-in products, visit my Star Trek: Discovery guide page. Or for details of each episode, including links to previews and reviews, see my episode list.