I think the "woke" aspects of Discovery were jarring because there seemed to be a presumption that those aspects of a character were sufficient to define the character and make them compelling. Original series Star Trek writer David Gerrold wrote about this in his book "The Making of the Trouble with Tribbles": the power of Star Trek's diversity wasn't because a character is *a* Black or is *an* Asian or is *a* woman, but that you had characters who *are* Black, *are* Asian, *are* women. The assumption that identity is paramount is a quintessential feature of intersectional thinking, and that's what made Discovery "woke".
One of the things I've loved about Strange New Worlds is they haven't been slavishly set on previously established canon. Instead, they tend to make sure it rhymes with what's been previously established, giving them a lot more room for stories and characters. They even seem to have brilliantly set up an explanation for the deviations by linking it to plotlines about temporal cold wars from previous series: in the Season 2 episode "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow", La'an Noonien Singh and an alternate version of Kirk end up in 21st century Toronto trying to thwart a series of attacks that would change the future. In the end, a frustrated enemy agent notes that despite numerous attempts to change history, the best they're able to do is shift *when* key events happen. Suddenly there's a compelling explanation for why the Original Series talked about Eugenics Wars happening in the 1990s that isn't reflected in *our* history or the history of the later shows.
Characters, events, and technologies look different in SNW than TOS, but it's less jarring than the contrast of Discovery. We see many familiar characters, but they're given slightly different characterizations and spins than we got used to. Frankly, the new Kirk has been a real treat, sweeping away decades of a Kirk caricature based more on an impression of William Shatner and replacing it with a character much more like the serious, brilliant, charismatic officer from the Original Series.
Mount was also great in "Hell On Wheels". Filmed in Alberta, it's a western about building a railroad, good scripts along with strong character actors like Common alongside the charismatic Mount. It ranks up there with "Deadwood".
I subscribe for the perspective on politics but happy to read a perspective that would make the guys at Red Letter Media proud. Great break in my day for this read.
Since Star Trek dorks are being lured here to reveal themselves, here we go. First, we have to give Bruce Greenwood credit for being an exceptional Pike, a leader, mature and wise, setting himself up as a mentor for a rather callow version of Kirk. I agree that "diversity" isn't what did in Discovery. By 60s standards the original series was wildly diverse. Gurney is right about the underwritten characters and especially the emotions. I started calling it emo-trek. For God's sake you are supposed to be scientists and engineers, not the high school drama club. Finally, SNW is less in love with the darkness that seems endemic in sci-fi these days, with brighter and homier sets. Finally, carefully titrated humour goes a long way towards improving any story. Great piece, Matt; a bit of summer escapism in a concerning world.
ps One of the biggest surprises of my television viewing was discovery of how good the Orville was. Star Trek can take a few lessons from the straightforward aesthetic and characterization.
This is the worst Matt Gurney take I've ever seen. SNW is appalling. It's characterization of Spock show that the people making New Trek have no sense at all of the character. Peck is fine as an actor, but they have Spock being played as though he is a quasi-Autitic moron. They play him as somehow conflicted about being half-human and half-Vulcan; that was never how Nimoy played him. He understood humans profoundly because his mother was human but he chose the Vulcan path and he is the best Vulcan. As T'pring says in Amok Time "You have become much known among our people, Spock. Almost a legend. As as the years went by, I came to know that I did not want to be the consort of a legend." Why? Because he is so damned impressive. But they play him off as an idiot! When he takes command his catchphrase (don't even get me started on the stupid catchphrase stuff) was "I would like the ship to go... Now." They think Spock is stupid. Watch TOS, Spock is really funny, he isn't it of place with humans. That Spock's command would have been badass, not moronic.
And don't get me started on the Gorn. Because the people writing the show have zero imagination they basically turned the Gorn in the Xenomorphs from the Alien franchise. It's all derivative.
They can't seem to go 5 minutes without introducing an Original Series character. We've now seen Spock, Uhura, Kirk and Scotty and Chapel. Why? Because the writers have no imagination and can't create their own compelling characters.
Even the musical episode is just a derivative play off Buffy the Vampire Slayer's "Once More with Feeling." Except of course that OMWF was actually good, made sense in universe and seriously moved the plot forward. I'll side here with Robert Myers Burnett who rightly said that the problem with a lot of genre writing today is it is just trying to recreate Buffy/Angel because that is all the writers know. They have no real life experience, they haven't read much science fiction and so what they do have is 90s TV shows.
Don't even get me started on the fact that the writers stole Ursula K Le Guin's story "The Ones who Walk Away From Omelas" for the episode "Lift us Above Where Suffering Cannot Reach" with no attribution and therefore no royalties to her estate. So the writers are not only bad; they're thieves.
Anson Mount is fine. Good actor, plays the role will enough, but he is still saddled by the terrible writing that made Discovery unwatchable. And for what it's worth for a show called "Strange New World's" we haven't visited very many strange new worlds.
Ok I have to stop. But no, SNW isn't saving Star Trek. It's awful. The cast is great, but it's written by people who don't understand the franchise.
You make your points well, but I (mostly) disagree.
Of course SNW is derivative - every modern play, film, and TV show in history is derivative - every check out Greek mythology or Shakespearean theatre? Star Trek TOS was so derivative that they beat you over the head with it each episode / movie.
Spock's SNW characterization, au contraire, is a younger, more immature version of the character than we saw in TOS, just as the TOS movies showed a more seasoned character, which was again modified by his Genesis/rebirth experience, and ultimately the TNG Spock episodes and rebooted Star Trek movies showed our favourite Vulcan/Human hybrid in an elder, more wistful and reflective light. Why would SNW have Spock behave as he did in TOS or any subsequent incarnation? Remember how Nimoy played him in The Cage, or in the first few episodes of TOS?
SNW is it's own show, and no matter what, it's not going to have the tone / writing style of 1960s Trek - simply not possible, unless you're going to use scripts/screenplays that were unused from TOS with no reworks / massaging for today's audience.
Try to enjoy SNW for what it is, instead of hating it for what it isn't. As Matt notes, it's way more in the Trek sensibility than Discovery ever achieved.
No offense intended, but pining for Season 4 of TOS will not make it happen - at least, not until they perfect AI to the point where they e-clone all the original actors, music, and sets and generate AI 60's-era scripts/screenplays, which will of course have to come with a disclaimer for how un-PC they would be. In the meantime, enjoy the perpetual SciFi Channel reruns of what you think Trek is (was).
First of all... All the shows are on streaming... Who even has cable anymore. And I do enjoy the old shows, I've been watching them with my daughter who quite likes them
Second, the Spock in SNW is so much less mature than the Spock in TOS that it is hard to imagine how the character ever gets there. I think it's actually that the writers didn't bother to understand who Spock was so they just wrote him using modern "fish out of water" tropes.
Third, you are confusing inspiration and derivation in culture. For example, Shakespeare uses the story of Troilus and Cressida from Chaucer. But he uses the same story to speak to the important issues of his time among which are the growing obsession in Renaissance culture with Antiquity which seems to ignore the many flaws of the classical world.
What you are saying is akin to claiming that Joyce's Ulysses is derivative because it uses the structures of Homer's Odyssey. It's inspiration is the Odyssey (and through it all Western literature) but it isn't derivative.
Neither is the second season episode of TOS "Who Mourns for Adonis" derivative even though it clearly is inspired by Homer's Odyssey, specifically the episode where Odysseus and his men are lured into spending a year with Circe. But it very much echoes that structure with Lt. Palamas playing the role of Odysseus. But it breaks from this structure because Kirk and the crew are never taken in by Apollo and reject him outright. The point being humans in the post-Enlightment era have gone beyond needing to gods. They don't need the protection Apollo offers, they've moved beyond the need for it.
Please, I beg you, tell me what interesting question Subspace Rhapsody raises? Or Charades? Or Spock Amok?
What does turning the Gorn into mindless Xenomorphs do to advance anything culturally? Does it even pose interesting questions?
I don't think any of it does, because fundamentally the people writing it don't get Star Trek.
I don't actually want a fourth season of TOS. I think that series is great just as it is. I actually just want new stories with new characters. I'm over the fan service cheap thrills of having these shows bring characters like Scotty, Kirk et al to the screen and being like "Oh my God! That's Kirk and Spock's first meeting squeeeeeeewee." I'm not stupid enough to fall for cheap tricks like that in place of real stories that are interesting.
I want Star Trek to move on from the Legacy and be good again. It's always been allegorical science fiction / action adventure. I want it to be that again. None of the new shows have anything to say; not Discovery, not SNW, not Picard and certainly not Lower Decks (which I like but it's really dumb). I can't judge Prodigy because I haven't seen it. Picard season 3 came close to having something to say, but it was mostly just a farewell to old friends.
Right now what it is is immature drivel written by children. It's more JJ Abrams style big budget garbage. It totally lacks an authentic voice or message.
Thank you for the thoughtful responses. I won't drag this thread on debating each of your points, as you feel very strongly about them.
I live rural and still have a satellite subscription (for now) until our rural Internet is up to HD streaming...right now it's adequate about 75% of the time, so the sat dish may be obsolete soon.
Inspired by vs derivative is often debated, and their is a legal distinction. The line is more blurry to me than you seem to feel.
The (new) Gorn appear to be mindless xenomorphs at this stage of character development, much as the Borg were a collective set of hive-mind drones, until they were not as the various shows developed them further.
I have patience to see what comes next with Spock and the rest of SNW. You clearly do not, and that's just fine, and your prerogative. I hope someday the ST universe spawns a show that 'gets' Star Trek the way that you do.
The Gorn aren't mindless xenomorphs - you're conflating their rather horrifying breeding behavior with a species that's been shown to be tactically cunning, capable of building starships, and while territorially expansionist, able to negotiate with other governments like the Federation. The behavior of Gorn offspring is similar to reptiles like crocodiles, where there's a lot of fighting and cannibalism and only a small fraction survive to adulthood.
Excellent, correct take, although the biggest difference between Discovery and Strange New Worlds is better writing; Discovery's acting was mostly solid and occasionally excellent (yes, Mount best of all).
To this point, IMO the problem with Discovery's "wokeness" was largely bad writing. Some of it just seemed forced and awkward. The pronoun stuff was like a Saturday afternoon special. And there are gay married couples all over TV but it stands out when you start thinking wait a minute, how come this is the only married couple in the whole fleet?
I've been looking forward to this column, which you have hinted for some time you were writing / had written, and were waiting for an opportune moment to file.
Given the state of the world these days, where there are no slow news days anymore, now is as good a time as any.
I am a fellow Trek geek, and concur that SNW is franchise-saving. As you noted, not every episode is a 5 star, but many are, and it is a throwback to the appointment-television days.
I enjoyed Picard (even the second season, though the tonal shifts between all three were jarring). As you note, Picard (especially S3) was like saying goodbye to an old pair of comfortable shoes where they feel great, but the laces are fraying and the soles are starting to look like they might come off. While there may be some followup / spinoff from it as well, I truly hope they do not bring the Picard character back again - actor Patrick Stewart was a little too Joe Biden-esque, and it showed in S3.
Back to SNW - I've not been this into a sci-fi series since the reimagined Battlestar Galactica. Wondering what surprises are in store for S3 (and S4), and really can't wait to watch!
A follow up column from Jen Gerson is requested - how does she think Star Wars could be saved?
Thank you for this Matt. What a great piece of writing. As a fan of Star Trek in the 60’s, I was taken back to days when my University of Waterloo fellow engineering students gathered at the Place Pigale on Avenue Road (Toronto) to watch the new episodes.
I've been a Trekkie since TOS syndication days. The first season of TNG was rough, and I daresay that the only reason it got renewed was because it was the only kid on the block at the time. Remembering that, I gave DISCO a lot of leeway when it first aired. I've watched all but this last season, and I have to say that it really felt forced and heavy-handed. As you said, there were a bunch of characters whose sole characteristic was their diversity, and like you, I still don't know all their names because the writing isn't particularly great.
SNW on the other hand, has been really enjoyable, and as close to TOS as we've ever gotten. It's taken a while to get over the running roughshod over canon, but I'm content for the most part to just think it's an alternate timeline and have fun with it. I think my turning point was when they lost Hemmer, a character that I did not initially like, but then became one that I really, really did. And then La'an became a favourite with that time travel episode with Kirk. All of them have grown on me, which is a testimony of good writing and good characterizations. Are there diverse plots? Sure, but none of them have tried to sledgehammer them home like they have done in DISCO.
I think the "woke" aspects of Discovery were jarring because there seemed to be a presumption that those aspects of a character were sufficient to define the character and make them compelling. Original series Star Trek writer David Gerrold wrote about this in his book "The Making of the Trouble with Tribbles": the power of Star Trek's diversity wasn't because a character is *a* Black or is *an* Asian or is *a* woman, but that you had characters who *are* Black, *are* Asian, *are* women. The assumption that identity is paramount is a quintessential feature of intersectional thinking, and that's what made Discovery "woke".
One of the things I've loved about Strange New Worlds is they haven't been slavishly set on previously established canon. Instead, they tend to make sure it rhymes with what's been previously established, giving them a lot more room for stories and characters. They even seem to have brilliantly set up an explanation for the deviations by linking it to plotlines about temporal cold wars from previous series: in the Season 2 episode "Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow", La'an Noonien Singh and an alternate version of Kirk end up in 21st century Toronto trying to thwart a series of attacks that would change the future. In the end, a frustrated enemy agent notes that despite numerous attempts to change history, the best they're able to do is shift *when* key events happen. Suddenly there's a compelling explanation for why the Original Series talked about Eugenics Wars happening in the 1990s that isn't reflected in *our* history or the history of the later shows.
Characters, events, and technologies look different in SNW than TOS, but it's less jarring than the contrast of Discovery. We see many familiar characters, but they're given slightly different characterizations and spins than we got used to. Frankly, the new Kirk has been a real treat, sweeping away decades of a Kirk caricature based more on an impression of William Shatner and replacing it with a character much more like the serious, brilliant, charismatic officer from the Original Series.
Mount was also great in "Hell On Wheels". Filmed in Alberta, it's a western about building a railroad, good scripts along with strong character actors like Common alongside the charismatic Mount. It ranks up there with "Deadwood".
Hopefully you're not sleeping on Lower Decks, Matt. It is also the best Star Trek in years.
I subscribe for the perspective on politics but happy to read a perspective that would make the guys at Red Letter Media proud. Great break in my day for this read.
Since Star Trek dorks are being lured here to reveal themselves, here we go. First, we have to give Bruce Greenwood credit for being an exceptional Pike, a leader, mature and wise, setting himself up as a mentor for a rather callow version of Kirk. I agree that "diversity" isn't what did in Discovery. By 60s standards the original series was wildly diverse. Gurney is right about the underwritten characters and especially the emotions. I started calling it emo-trek. For God's sake you are supposed to be scientists and engineers, not the high school drama club. Finally, SNW is less in love with the darkness that seems endemic in sci-fi these days, with brighter and homier sets. Finally, carefully titrated humour goes a long way towards improving any story. Great piece, Matt; a bit of summer escapism in a concerning world.
ps One of the biggest surprises of my television viewing was discovery of how good the Orville was. Star Trek can take a few lessons from the straightforward aesthetic and characterization.
This is the worst Matt Gurney take I've ever seen. SNW is appalling. It's characterization of Spock show that the people making New Trek have no sense at all of the character. Peck is fine as an actor, but they have Spock being played as though he is a quasi-Autitic moron. They play him as somehow conflicted about being half-human and half-Vulcan; that was never how Nimoy played him. He understood humans profoundly because his mother was human but he chose the Vulcan path and he is the best Vulcan. As T'pring says in Amok Time "You have become much known among our people, Spock. Almost a legend. As as the years went by, I came to know that I did not want to be the consort of a legend." Why? Because he is so damned impressive. But they play him off as an idiot! When he takes command his catchphrase (don't even get me started on the stupid catchphrase stuff) was "I would like the ship to go... Now." They think Spock is stupid. Watch TOS, Spock is really funny, he isn't it of place with humans. That Spock's command would have been badass, not moronic.
And don't get me started on the Gorn. Because the people writing the show have zero imagination they basically turned the Gorn in the Xenomorphs from the Alien franchise. It's all derivative.
They can't seem to go 5 minutes without introducing an Original Series character. We've now seen Spock, Uhura, Kirk and Scotty and Chapel. Why? Because the writers have no imagination and can't create their own compelling characters.
Even the musical episode is just a derivative play off Buffy the Vampire Slayer's "Once More with Feeling." Except of course that OMWF was actually good, made sense in universe and seriously moved the plot forward. I'll side here with Robert Myers Burnett who rightly said that the problem with a lot of genre writing today is it is just trying to recreate Buffy/Angel because that is all the writers know. They have no real life experience, they haven't read much science fiction and so what they do have is 90s TV shows.
Don't even get me started on the fact that the writers stole Ursula K Le Guin's story "The Ones who Walk Away From Omelas" for the episode "Lift us Above Where Suffering Cannot Reach" with no attribution and therefore no royalties to her estate. So the writers are not only bad; they're thieves.
Anson Mount is fine. Good actor, plays the role will enough, but he is still saddled by the terrible writing that made Discovery unwatchable. And for what it's worth for a show called "Strange New World's" we haven't visited very many strange new worlds.
Ok I have to stop. But no, SNW isn't saving Star Trek. It's awful. The cast is great, but it's written by people who don't understand the franchise.
You make your points well, but I (mostly) disagree.
Of course SNW is derivative - every modern play, film, and TV show in history is derivative - every check out Greek mythology or Shakespearean theatre? Star Trek TOS was so derivative that they beat you over the head with it each episode / movie.
Spock's SNW characterization, au contraire, is a younger, more immature version of the character than we saw in TOS, just as the TOS movies showed a more seasoned character, which was again modified by his Genesis/rebirth experience, and ultimately the TNG Spock episodes and rebooted Star Trek movies showed our favourite Vulcan/Human hybrid in an elder, more wistful and reflective light. Why would SNW have Spock behave as he did in TOS or any subsequent incarnation? Remember how Nimoy played him in The Cage, or in the first few episodes of TOS?
SNW is it's own show, and no matter what, it's not going to have the tone / writing style of 1960s Trek - simply not possible, unless you're going to use scripts/screenplays that were unused from TOS with no reworks / massaging for today's audience.
Try to enjoy SNW for what it is, instead of hating it for what it isn't. As Matt notes, it's way more in the Trek sensibility than Discovery ever achieved.
No offense intended, but pining for Season 4 of TOS will not make it happen - at least, not until they perfect AI to the point where they e-clone all the original actors, music, and sets and generate AI 60's-era scripts/screenplays, which will of course have to come with a disclaimer for how un-PC they would be. In the meantime, enjoy the perpetual SciFi Channel reruns of what you think Trek is (was).
First of all... All the shows are on streaming... Who even has cable anymore. And I do enjoy the old shows, I've been watching them with my daughter who quite likes them
Second, the Spock in SNW is so much less mature than the Spock in TOS that it is hard to imagine how the character ever gets there. I think it's actually that the writers didn't bother to understand who Spock was so they just wrote him using modern "fish out of water" tropes.
Third, you are confusing inspiration and derivation in culture. For example, Shakespeare uses the story of Troilus and Cressida from Chaucer. But he uses the same story to speak to the important issues of his time among which are the growing obsession in Renaissance culture with Antiquity which seems to ignore the many flaws of the classical world.
What you are saying is akin to claiming that Joyce's Ulysses is derivative because it uses the structures of Homer's Odyssey. It's inspiration is the Odyssey (and through it all Western literature) but it isn't derivative.
Neither is the second season episode of TOS "Who Mourns for Adonis" derivative even though it clearly is inspired by Homer's Odyssey, specifically the episode where Odysseus and his men are lured into spending a year with Circe. But it very much echoes that structure with Lt. Palamas playing the role of Odysseus. But it breaks from this structure because Kirk and the crew are never taken in by Apollo and reject him outright. The point being humans in the post-Enlightment era have gone beyond needing to gods. They don't need the protection Apollo offers, they've moved beyond the need for it.
Please, I beg you, tell me what interesting question Subspace Rhapsody raises? Or Charades? Or Spock Amok?
What does turning the Gorn into mindless Xenomorphs do to advance anything culturally? Does it even pose interesting questions?
I don't think any of it does, because fundamentally the people writing it don't get Star Trek.
I don't actually want a fourth season of TOS. I think that series is great just as it is. I actually just want new stories with new characters. I'm over the fan service cheap thrills of having these shows bring characters like Scotty, Kirk et al to the screen and being like "Oh my God! That's Kirk and Spock's first meeting squeeeeeeewee." I'm not stupid enough to fall for cheap tricks like that in place of real stories that are interesting.
I want Star Trek to move on from the Legacy and be good again. It's always been allegorical science fiction / action adventure. I want it to be that again. None of the new shows have anything to say; not Discovery, not SNW, not Picard and certainly not Lower Decks (which I like but it's really dumb). I can't judge Prodigy because I haven't seen it. Picard season 3 came close to having something to say, but it was mostly just a farewell to old friends.
Right now what it is is immature drivel written by children. It's more JJ Abrams style big budget garbage. It totally lacks an authentic voice or message.
I don't know how I'm supposed to enjoy that.
Thank you for the thoughtful responses. I won't drag this thread on debating each of your points, as you feel very strongly about them.
I live rural and still have a satellite subscription (for now) until our rural Internet is up to HD streaming...right now it's adequate about 75% of the time, so the sat dish may be obsolete soon.
Inspired by vs derivative is often debated, and their is a legal distinction. The line is more blurry to me than you seem to feel.
The (new) Gorn appear to be mindless xenomorphs at this stage of character development, much as the Borg were a collective set of hive-mind drones, until they were not as the various shows developed them further.
I have patience to see what comes next with Spock and the rest of SNW. You clearly do not, and that's just fine, and your prerogative. I hope someday the ST universe spawns a show that 'gets' Star Trek the way that you do.
Cheers.
The Gorn aren't mindless xenomorphs - you're conflating their rather horrifying breeding behavior with a species that's been shown to be tactically cunning, capable of building starships, and while territorially expansionist, able to negotiate with other governments like the Federation. The behavior of Gorn offspring is similar to reptiles like crocodiles, where there's a lot of fighting and cannibalism and only a small fraction survive to adulthood.
Excellent, correct take, although the biggest difference between Discovery and Strange New Worlds is better writing; Discovery's acting was mostly solid and occasionally excellent (yes, Mount best of all).
To this point, IMO the problem with Discovery's "wokeness" was largely bad writing. Some of it just seemed forced and awkward. The pronoun stuff was like a Saturday afternoon special. And there are gay married couples all over TV but it stands out when you start thinking wait a minute, how come this is the only married couple in the whole fleet?
After this if you don't get a walk-on part when the next season films in Mississauga, I'll be disappointed for you.
I've been looking forward to this column, which you have hinted for some time you were writing / had written, and were waiting for an opportune moment to file.
Given the state of the world these days, where there are no slow news days anymore, now is as good a time as any.
I am a fellow Trek geek, and concur that SNW is franchise-saving. As you noted, not every episode is a 5 star, but many are, and it is a throwback to the appointment-television days.
I enjoyed Picard (even the second season, though the tonal shifts between all three were jarring). As you note, Picard (especially S3) was like saying goodbye to an old pair of comfortable shoes where they feel great, but the laces are fraying and the soles are starting to look like they might come off. While there may be some followup / spinoff from it as well, I truly hope they do not bring the Picard character back again - actor Patrick Stewart was a little too Joe Biden-esque, and it showed in S3.
Back to SNW - I've not been this into a sci-fi series since the reimagined Battlestar Galactica. Wondering what surprises are in store for S3 (and S4), and really can't wait to watch!
A follow up column from Jen Gerson is requested - how does she think Star Wars could be saved?
Thank you for this Matt. What a great piece of writing. As a fan of Star Trek in the 60’s, I was taken back to days when my University of Waterloo fellow engineering students gathered at the Place Pigale on Avenue Road (Toronto) to watch the new episodes.
Again, many thanks.
Here in Toronto I keep hoping to run into Mount in a coffee shop while he's here filming, but it hasn't happened (yet).
Couldn't agree more. What a great show.
I've been a Trekkie since TOS syndication days. The first season of TNG was rough, and I daresay that the only reason it got renewed was because it was the only kid on the block at the time. Remembering that, I gave DISCO a lot of leeway when it first aired. I've watched all but this last season, and I have to say that it really felt forced and heavy-handed. As you said, there were a bunch of characters whose sole characteristic was their diversity, and like you, I still don't know all their names because the writing isn't particularly great.
SNW on the other hand, has been really enjoyable, and as close to TOS as we've ever gotten. It's taken a while to get over the running roughshod over canon, but I'm content for the most part to just think it's an alternate timeline and have fun with it. I think my turning point was when they lost Hemmer, a character that I did not initially like, but then became one that I really, really did. And then La'an became a favourite with that time travel episode with Kirk. All of them have grown on me, which is a testimony of good writing and good characterizations. Are there diverse plots? Sure, but none of them have tried to sledgehammer them home like they have done in DISCO.
My sense is that you’ve been bottling up feelings around Star Trek for quite a while.
Agreed! I love Anson Mount and Strange New Worlds!