And up until now, so much of this show has been depressing. This universe of Star Trek would pay lip service to "we are hopeful and kind!" but it was all dark and everyone is flawed and just as petty and awful as people today. I tried with this show, and Picard, and Lower Decks...but ever iteration of modern Trek just bummed me out. So after Picard's first season, and whatever hot mess that Lower Decks was, and Discovery's third season...I just felt like they finally did it, they finally made me stop caring about Star Trek. My brother was watching the shows too, and we'd chat on the phone about them, and while I watching each show week to week as they came out, and was increasingly souring on the experience. He, on the other hand, had waited to watch until the full seasons were out. He seemed to enjoy it more. He didn’t have a week to reflect on an episode and grump about it’s faults before a new onslaught came. He was just plowing through it and enjoying it a tad more.
So I thought maybe I’d take his approach. But then another season of Lower Decks looked awful, then another Picard looked like more of the same. I just found myself losing interest in returning to it. It was still CBS All Access when I gave up on it. There were two thing that made me intrigued to return: the first was Strange New Worlds. Pike was the shining light of Season 2 of Discovery, so I was interested to see a show centered on him. But the character reveals and trailer sort of turned me off a tad. Then Picard’s third season just came out and had a reunion of my TNG friends. When my brother’s Paramount+ account became available, the time was right.
And I didn’t hate this. In fact I would call this Disco’s best season. I was rather timid when it began because right off the bat they started a new mysterious doomsday weapon and it felt like this show would never change. But the episodes were often decent. There were still flaws and issues and characters and the occasional episode that didn’t work for me…but I was finding myself enjoying the show.
And they did a good job of undoing the doomsday weapon and making it feel like a good Star Trek concept. I liked how the story came to an end. Season 3 was okay as well, but I was just but I was just burnt out by then. I found myself liking concepts and the main characters a lot here. I mean mostly.
Gray felt pointless to me. Less like a character and more like tokenism. Adira was okay, but they are more like discount Tilly in a way. But if Tilly is taking a limited role from here on out, Adira is a decent replacement. But they were both characters that represented an issue many of the side characters had this year. Story wise most of them have little to do, so they would get some random scene or moment to try and showcase that “actually, I am a character and not an extra” and it always felt out of place and forced to me. It happened with a lot of characters this year, and it never felt normal to me.
This show has an issue with it’s characters…with such a focus on an ongoing story arc, they seem to only really be able to focus on developing a small handful of people…yet they have so many side characters and they keep trying to pretend they have depth but they really are mostly window dressing. Forget trying to make Detmer or Owosekun or Bryce or Reece actual character, and just keep the focus in on the main players. If your idea of making them actual characters is just some out of place moment where they say “my mom was this or that,” then you don’t really have a character.
But overall I feel more positive about this season than I have about any modern Trek thus far. Honestly, in the end this felt like Star Trek…and that is all I could hope for.
NEXT TIME: Let’s Take a Long Detour into Picard
Comments
Post a Comment