Star Trek: Strange New Worlds - Season 3
Strange New Worlds Season 3 is out. So far 2 episodes have been released. I have seen the first episode.
I have some thoughts about the underlying themes of Strange New Worlds. This will not have spoilers because most of what I'm talking about appeared in previous seasons and in the trailer for season 3.
The main theme that I see in the show is that the people in the crew are actualized adults. They have empathy and compassion. If they do something heroic, it is in the spirit of self sacrifice for their friends and colleagues and the human race in general. They have some flaws, but when they find out about the flaws they try to work on self-improvement.
This is most completely embodied in Captain Pike. He expends much of his energy getting feedback from his crew. He gets opinions from experts in various fields, and then makes a decision without doubt. He is open to criticism and fights for what he believes in. He is the opposite of an authoritarian leader.
I would contrast this somewhat to the behavior of Captain Kirk from the original series. Kirk would go to his advisors (mostly Spock and McCoy), but usually as a secondary source. Pike makes a much larger effort to check with the crew first, and relies on more different opinions.
It can also be contrasted with the behavior of Captain Picard. Picard is much more authoritarian and has a very rigid moral code which seems largely based on tradition and values like honor and service.
I enjoy Strange New Worlds very much. I am aware that it is extremely "woke", and that I am being given an example how how we should treat each other and solve problems. I don't mind this at all, and it seems completely in line with the morality which has always driven the best Star Trek.
There is one other thing I noticed in S3e1: Captain Pike takes a moment to pray. I don't remember seeing this in Star Trek before (but it probably has happened). I haven't decided yet why the writers included this. It could be to show a little background about Pike's upbringing (he mentions his dad before doing it). It could be a concession to conservatives who watch the show. It could be that Pike will try all possible avenues in case they may help.
That seems very out of place for Star Trek, and not really in keeping with Roddenberry's secular humanist philosophy in my opinion, though I don't want to make claims about his beliefs without having a concrete source handy.
It's a fairly common theme in TNG and DS9 that one of the Federation's values for membership is that a society has reached a point where religion has become a cultural vestige and not an active part of society, and it was a sticking point with the consideration of Bajor's membership. (Sisko becoming embroiled in that was also an issue on two fronts: both for acting as a religious figure and for the issue that if Bajor was not seen as ready to be a member of the Federation, it's also getting into Prime Directive territory.)
Earth is portrayed as having mostly lost the tendency after WWIII/Eugenics Wars/etc, and the most glaring example of religiousness among their allies would be the Klingons. Who are largely shown as drawing upon those cultural roots when it serves their interests. Worf is an anomaly in his convictions to their warrior culture, and even he has multiple reality checks surrounding Kahless and the evolution of Klingon society over time.
But it's still the closest thing we've gotten to Star Trek in decades, so... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Addendum: As someone who tends to subscribe to secular humanist thought, largely because of Star Trek, I can say it's hubris to look at hundreds of religions that have existed (now or in the past) on our planet and say 999 out of 1000 are all false...but 1 out of 1000 is the one true blah blah. (Also, proof by induction.) Just as it's statistical hubris to assume a vast universe managed to end up with life on a singular planet, whether it's at an observable distance or not.
Now multiply that by an entire galaxy of worlds, with many more planets. And traveling in starships to see the many other planets that make a creation myth seem unimportant and cosmically comical.
At least, monotheism gets difficult. Something syncretic and polytheistic like Shinto probably holds up better. You can welcome the spirits of [insert planet] and build them their own shrines when you visit.
You either end up with the enlightened society Roddenberry dreamed of, or an evolved religion that's xenophobic and bent on destroying every civilization that makes it seem less important. (Warhammer, I guess?)
I grew up Catholic, which is apparently much more science-friendly than Evangelical Christianity or some other Christian variations. In Catholic school I learned about evolution and there was never any controversy about it. We just understood that was the way that God decided to create animals and people. If science ever had a different answer than religion, we would just assume that there is a different perspective to things, and that The Bible described things in terms that people could understand at the time it was written. The fundamental part was that the Bible was there to teach about morality, not to teach you how to do engineering or something. Of course there are places where most Catholics have beliefs that conflict with mainstream science, especially about abortion, and the Church as an organization is probably a net negative for science and humanity.
My point is that I don't think religion necessarily prevents a Star Trek utopian future. It's a lot to ask to take a higher power away from people, and when you do they attach to something else such as a "Dear Leader".
Copernicus has entered the chat.
You can say that about almost every piece of video entertainment pre-1970s. Western Christianity is the only "extra" reality occasionally revealed. Never the reality of other religions, let alone non-Abrahamic ones.
What you do have to keep in mind is that these take place almost a century
beforeafter Strange New Worlds. In TNG specifically they sometimes refer back to the generation of Kirk as the actual frontier and a younger "frontier" federation still in the progress of figuring it out.In fact, the second episode of this series refers to the federation centennial, meaning that Pike's father very well could have grown up before the federation was founded or at least close to it.
Given those time frames and assuming that the entirety of humanity would shed religion so easily, I think it is very reasonable that Pikes father was religious. In fact, since Pike clearly gives in out of some sort of desperation I feel like it describes the short dynamic you can expect around declining religion.
I believe you meant after?
Yes, mixed that up somehow.
I completely agree.....but, what about the Vulcan "religion". I guess you could see it as Vulcans following the philosophy of Surak, doing secular meditation, valuing logic and science. Ha ha, that is a good point, nevermind. I retract my "but".
I don't have anything to add about season 3, since I'm not even through season 1 yet, but...
After watching a few episodes, despite some campy writing here and there, I kept thinking to myself "this feels like Star Trek". A feeling I never really had with any of the other modern Star Trek shows (even Lower Decks, which I'm a sucker for).
Pike is absolutely my favorite captain, for the behaviors you describe above. He leads with humility and has a genuine interest in all of the people around him as valuable beings in their own right, not just tools to direct. Honestly, I would follow him anywhere.
I really like what they have done with the TOS characters, especially the female characters, but everyone seems as you say, and actualized adult but also a whole person. I appreciate that the show isn't all about the captain. I'm really glad they've got 2 more seasons approved!
I thought the prayer was mostly showing his willingness to try anything in ta situation where he was helpless to do anything else, and also his humanity and his attachment to the person he was praying for.
This is how it came across to me as well. I was raised religious but have left it behind, and have been a Star Trek fan since TNG was being released.
I liked Pike's little prayer because it is in line with his humility ("I can't do this in my own, I'll ask for help") and serves as an illustration of his desperation. At that point in the episode both he and the crew had tried literally everything else they can think of to save Patell, and he's so desperate and finally opening up to himself just how much he cares for her, that we get this bottom-of-the-barrel attempt to appeal to a higher power.
S3E2 spoilers, minor
I've no idea if there's supposed to be an implied connection here or not, but it's kind of hilarious if you think of the Q showing up in E2 as a direct result of Pike praying to god/higher power in E1!Funnily enough this is what I was missing in SNW. Two worst examples that I remember: first is when the crew is trapped inside I don't remember what, a comet, an alien vessel, an organism? And they rely on cadet Uhura to get them out. Instead of being either supportive or disciplined and measured they react rather rudely, putting no faith in her and basically saying "well, we're fucked then". The second is in the episode with the pathogen that feeds on light, Ortegas sees a crewmember behaving in a way that can only be explained by being on drugs or in medical distress and while she does ask him something, his response does not explain the situation and instead of acting on it she responds with "whatever tweaks your freak" and walks away. IIRC neither of those failures is then addressed as such.
Well we seem to have opposite tastes because this is the main thing that I dislike about Pike. He's a very likeable person, but I don't really like him as a captain. The federation is an organisation with an explicit military structure, being authoritarian to some degree is just part of being a captain and it doesn't remove the possibility of criticism and dialogue. Pike doesn't exactly feel like captain material compared to not just Kirk and Picard but also the other OldTrek captains except Archer who had a similar problem.
In general SNW (and NuTrek in general) seems to lack a lot of the military style discipline and competence that used to be present in Trek, and in my opinion it suffers for it.
I wonder if this might be directly due to being a product of its time. I mean, everybody who worked with the original series had been through World War 2, some probably on the front lines. For example, the series creator Gene Roddenberry was a bomber pilot in the Pacific, James Doohan was an artillery officer.
Yes, that's definitely where it comes from. I don't think we need to do things exactly the same way, but what I'd like to see is respect for those roots. Instead NuTrek feels to me more like it's made by people who feel slight disdain towards military structures and discipline, and that irks me.
I’d argue that even since early on Ttek had had a certain level of disdain for military structure in the way that captains are constantly defying orders, even the prime directive. Trek often goes out of its way to remind us that these are explorers first, and many captains over the years have bristled at the idea that these massive arsenals they command be used for war-making. The might of a federation starship has always been a fallback for the safety of the crew on the frontiers of space where anything can happen, rather than a means to an end. Which is why I think it’s fine when trek kinda turns its nose up at the military structure, these aren’t military-men made to explore, these are explorers who need a military-like structure for self-defense.
I did not say that the federation is a military in a traditional sense though.
Trek has always been idealistic, so the the military roots merged with the idealism in the ideas forming the federation. It also helped create some of the conflicts necessary for good stories - orders versus morality etc. But many of the idealized military principles were obviously shown in a good light (as is mentioned in this post - both Kirk and Picard being more of a singular authority than Pike, for example), which of course comes from Roddenberry having a military background.
This has obviously been toned down quite a bit because the creators do not feel about these values the same way, but they didn't seem to be able to insert anything else to properly replace these values. And that is the reason why I dislike the change. It toned down something that I consider good from a point of view that feels like a lack of respect for it, but then it didn't repleace it with something equally valuable.
Hmm I see what you are saying.
One thing that happened to me is that I saw some other new trek, specifically Discovery, where many of the characters have childlike personalities and share way too much too soon. SNW is somewhere in between them.
For sure different people see these things based on their own experiences too.
Yeah, SNW did seem like a big step up form what I've heard - it's the only NuTrek I watched. I think that if I watched it as a non-Trek show, without all the historical context, I may have enjoyed it as a chill show that's not to be taken that seriously.
But as it is it feels like they did not quite manage to achieve the things that I want in a Trek show despite trying in some aspects, and they didn't bring a lot of interesting new stuff either. It kind of felt like "let's do what the fans want, but we don't fully understand what it is exactly that they want and why", so it has a lot of references and fan service and classic characters. But I'd rather they let old characters be as they were and brought new ideas coherent in the spirit of the old show instead of using old ideas and bringing them into a more modern context.
I only watched the first season since it was free on youtube. I feel that it's a lot closer to earlier Star Trek in general themes than the Picard series ever was. The editing seems a lot faster paced with less time to reflect on events, I'm not sure if that is a result of trying to cram a lot into each episode or a more generational thing with newer media.
What I think it really needed more of is the heart of a good Sci-fi show to keep asking "What if?". Most of the episodes seem to re-hash well known tropes with both trek and other shows which while it was mostly well executed it didn't bring much new to the table.
It certainly wasn't enough for me to want to subscribe to Paramount for more.
Interesting, like overtly christian or more vague?
I seem to remember that the crew of Star Trek considered religion as primitive, but honored it like they did pretty much every other primitive thing that wasn't directly trying to kill them. Then again, I grew up with TNG, perhaps the others were different. At least the Bajorans of DS9 had a deeply religious twist to them.
So uh spoiler
Basically, he is sitting next to the sick bed of captain Marie Batel (who is also his love interest) and in desperation he mumbles something like "Okay dad, you win" and starts the first sentence of "our father" but at that point she already wakes up.Given that this all plays out a century before TNG I personally do think it isn't that far fetched, see also my comment here. If anything I feel like it was more of a message the subtly said that religion isn't needed. Though I also realize it is very much open to interpetation.
It has literally been several years since Season 2. A writers strike and some other things have happened since "they" decided to end Season 2 on a cliffhanger. I watched the Season 2 finale several times since then. I found Season 3, Episode 1 to be a bit anticlimactic. I can't explain why.
I think the way the Gorn were portrayed in the series Enterprise has been the best modern portrayal of the Gorn. I wasn't scared of the adult Gorns in Season 3. They seemed a bit goofy looking to me.
I didn't care for Episode 2 much. It seemed kind of pointless. It also seemed like an example of what I often don't like about Strange New Worlds - they don't take themselves seriously. I want a serious sci-fi odyssey. I want my imagination captured, I want a mind fuck that makes me think.
I only need to know one thing: now that its after COVID, is the ship populated beyond the main crew? Does it feel like a Star Trek ship? Because that is my main complaint of first season.
You mean as far as having background people doing stuff and walking through halls? Then yes, the ship feels occupied. The officers lounge is a particularly good example, lots of people just filling up background space.
It's very much a comfort food show. (Less show with the Paramount merger stuff going on, but I digress.) There's kind of an idea in season 1 that Pike is dealing with his inevitable fate, and any attempt to subvert that will end up poorly, but there doesn't seem to be much of that as of late or anything really hanging around in the background so far. That can be good in that it's more of the wacky episodic stuff you can get with episode 2, but it also kinda makes it feel like it's just a show where stuff happens to people if it's not really connecting to you.
To reply to /user/hobbes24's original post, my favorite Star Trek leaders have been Kirk ( ignoring his 1960s establishment politics ), Sisko, and Archer.
I've found Pike to be a bit too weak for my tastes. I liked that he is portrayed as enjoying cooking and has an equal partner he is in a hard relationship with. Those things were also elements of Sisko, but I never saw Sisko as weak. I guess I see Pike as being indecisive and not having a lot of internal strength.