Beyond The Plot

Star Trek: First time watching Star Trek and we are starting here. ‘Strange New Worlds’ Season 1 discussion:

Disclaimer: I never remember character names until season 2 (ish) so bear with me. Also Spoilers!! I’m reviewing in detail — storyline will be spoiled, plots will be revealed. 

Journey at your own risk. 

> This is kind of a ‘live’ review, as I am watching it and updating my post as I go. 

We will see how the end product turns out. 

Definitely drop a comment on whether this style is readable or enjoyable. Love feedback and am always down to do better. 

> Okay I’m jumping into this blind and on fire. 

You can judge, it’s fine. It will not change my behavior. I did the same with Doctor Who. Free will. *maniacal cackle*

So we are starting our Star Trek journey with ‘Strange New Worlds’. So far I’m really liking it. 

– Now, at some points it seems like they are nodding to something I should know as the viewer. I’m not sure if these current characters appear elsewhere or if it’s just written that way. I’m into it though. 

It gives the same vibes as Comic Book movies, when they do fan service. I’m in the same boat with those movies. I usually know very little about the source material and haven’t watched most of the in-universe shows/movies but I appreciate it nonetheless. 

Things I don’t like:

• This Nurse flirting thing. I assume Spock doesn’t end up marrying because the little tidbits I know from pop culture references never mention a wife. But hopefully they aren’t saying the engagement ends with him going for the nurse instead. I’m just not feeling the connection there. 

• The “I know when I die” thing: I’m just not feeling it. Perhaps because I’m missing some key ingredient maybe another series that explains how he knows he’s going to die and why it’s so important. 

> The first episode of the season shows us that they have the ability to access the future. I’m assuming we saw how that wormhole was opened in another series and this is the spinoff of that. It’s still not really doing anything for me. It’s really affecting the Captain but everyone else seems very ‘eh’ about it, so that’s playing into it not really being of interest to me. 

> Okay just realized Chris is Pike and from my knowledge he’s lives because isn’t Spok old in the original Star Trek. And I’m pretty sure Spok and Pike are buds that whole time so he must not die when he thinks he will. 

Interesting tidbits:

• So Spock has a half brother(?) and he most likely had a sister that sacrificed herself at some point. 

> The doctors daughter: He now has some info from those beings that have cured all diseases on their planet. So I’m interested in seeing how he saves his daughter. 

Okay… so her being taken by a random space goddess/being was not on my list of options. What in the world was that? It feels like they were over the storyline and just kind wrote whatever. I don’t think I’m a fan of this storyline. Though I am curious what that means for her. Will she come back into play later?

   > Speaking of: I want to deep dive on why they need a child to run their entire planet that way. (the planet where the woman had a prior relationship with captain Pike) And why haven’t they found an alternative yet? They seem like a collectively very smart bunch, they can’t find any alternatives? Or simply move to another planet so they don’t have to keep sacrificing children in the most horrific manner. 

• Number 1 (Una)- I get that the federation is against gene splicing. Seems like it led to a large eugenics genocide at some point. What I don’t get is… they (federation) have come across a multitude of people and have a large history to pull from. Why are they bigoted? It just seems so dumb. Especially since not everyone will come from the same background, so why demonize another culture for your cultures failings?

From my very minimal understanding it seems that the (Una’s People) aren’t killing off their people if they think them “undesirable”, though they are changing themselves. So if it’s done ethically, with consent and without destroying others, why can’t they keep on keeping on and join the federation. 

We saw that one colony was trying to revert back to the original selves but that caused them to be altered by a disease and now they are almost ghostly being a that zip around Ion storms. 

It is interesting that Number 1 has gone this long without anyone finding out her true race. Did she always hold back in fights? She seems significantly stronger than humans. Did they not check her blood before? 

I guess I just don’t know enough about her race to understand how no one took note of her various attributes that should have raised a red flag or two. 

All that to say, I’m curious to how this storyline plays out. 

• I like that interns study multiple roles in the ship. I’m not sure if I missed information and Nyuta decided to take up this task or if it was actually something new recruits do. 

> I do understand the oddness of her not truly wanting to be there. It seems like being part of the fleet is a really big deal, so someone kind of just “running” away to it seems a bit flippant. So this is also a storyline I’m interesting in seeing playing out. 

• I don’t understand the whole Klingon thing because from what I know from fan stuff is that people speak Klingon for funsies. For whatever reason I was under the impression that Spok was Klingon. So that was already a bit of a realization but now I’m trying to figure out if Klingon are good or bad. I think I thought Spok was the doctor in the original, I’m pretty sure the doctor is Klingon.
• Also in this last episode of the season future Pike comes back and he’s like yeah the Klingon sent me so they have to be working with him but in the episodes prior it seems like they’re actively working against them so now I’m a little confused.
• well, now there’s a Kirk a captain Kirk and that sounds familiar so maybe I’m tripping about the pike thing and that’s just from the movies. Perhaps he does die pike maybe he does actually die.
• Not spok with the nurse. Please… spare me this storyline. She notably didn’t want a relationship so it makes sense she is going after Spok who is engaged and goin through major life changes. Definitely not a relationship that’s going to work. Very disappointed in Spok. Dude aren’t you suppose to be the master of logic. What’s logical about this. He should know she is not in it for the long haul.