I've been watching the various Star Trek shows for a while now, and while not finished I saw most of them, I believe. And I cannot shake off the feeling that the messages given by these shows, especially (and almost exclusively) recent ones are pushing horrible morals that most people seem to not care about.

Slavery

I posted before, in the middle of my watching of Enterprise, that the show was supporting slavery because of the Cogenitor episode. Many comments disagreed, some even saying that they don't remember anything supporting slavery at all in the show. That was before I watched more. The show contains a full episode that is just about showing that:

• Sex slaves are not only acceptable, they're "sexy" and cool and negotiating with slavers is a good thing

• Sex trafficking of individuals groomed since they are born into being sex slaves is the fault of the victims for "seducing" men ???

How is this show not fine with human trafficking at this point? Is all that you need to avoid controversy, to paint the slaves in green? I still cannot comprehend the lack of reaction on this show. Add to that the frequent crimes of war by Archer and you have a nice cocktail of humanity's finest horror.

Section 31

This is also something that seems absurd to me. When it first appeared, it was already a gestapo/kgb-like group that ignores the concept of democracy, laws, and justice - in other words a horrible group - but its existence as a starfleet element was blurry. But with modern shows, they keep on bringing it back, and directly saying that it is supported by starfleet, and a good thing, or at least a necessary one.

The thing is that what made starfleet supposedly admirable was, if not every single individual's morals, the morality of their concept, their laws, their structure. Having section 31 be condoned by starfleet transforms starfleet from "utopian future of humanity" (which it was supposed to be) to "dictatorship that pretends to be a democracy but supports crimes of war and above-the-law groups". In other words, it destroys the concept of starfleet.

Discriminations, sexism, and other shitty ideas, morals and behaviours

Now this one is maybe more blurry and subjective, but it is scattered all across, nonstop.

Let's start chronologically

DS9

For this show, the constant misogyny is nothing hard to see. But they still went out of their way to put some nasty things here and there.

The episode with Quark "becoming" a woman was interesting. Quark discovers a different point of view, gains insight and empathy, that's nice! Until the end of the episode directly says "no nevermind, he was like that because of hormones, and was just an overly emotional woman because of that". Because after all, women are hysterical, right? .

Other than that, we have the toxic relationship between Keiko and O'Brian, the toxic relationship between Dax and Worf, the toxic relationship between Odo and Kira, the toxic relationship between Sisco and his wife, Jake who constantly shows that when a teen boy is targeted by pedophiles, the teen is both responsible for it, and liking it (one second, I need to throw up in a corner), etc.

And of course there is the rest, between Cisco crimes against humanity, Bashir (that's all I'll say, nothing else needed), and the weird pro-religious message that doesn't make sense.

Enterprise

We already talked about their view of child/human trafficking which I think gives the tone of the show.

But of course that's not enough, so let's put some sexual scenes about the women in particular, rape scenes with TPol because who doesn't like rape culture, Malcolm "PoS" Reed talking like a creep about "bums", Reed and Tucker with their "haha lol, these alien women are ugly because you can't tell if they are women or not" and other toxic masculinity scenes, etc. Oh and I almost forgot about the sex scene between teen siblings that serve no other purpose than to show teens having incestuous sex.

Picard

What do we have here, more weird sibling sexual scenes, people getting manipulated mentally and sexually to extract information, murderers who get away with it because betraying the federation and killing innocents is fine if you're a scenario character (reminds me of something else...AhemelnorAhem)...

Oh, and I almost forgot the amazing scene with a white Picard in his white British empire colonist outfit, going on the planet of the tan refugees who hate the federation, kicks everything around and tries to show that he's the boss. I guess this show regrets colonies too, huh.

Discovery

Now I didn't finish this one yet, and it's hard.

We have klingons that start off as a weird racist stereotype of africans seen by colonialists from a century ago: black skin, tribal armors, weird "foreign" language that the show intentionally refuses to translate through the UT, and when they speak english it's with a strong guttural accent. And they're barbaric, scary cannibals who fight with sticks and knives, and are a bunch of disorganised tribes, with weird magic rituals that allow them to do weird brainwashing. I'm almost surprised they don't carry voodoo dolls while dancing around a bonfire. The fact that people describe this show as "woke" is funny to me.

We have very explicit rape and gore torture scenes, for what purpose, I don't know.

We have people forgiven of murder because it wasn't their mind, but then it is and everyone is fine with it.

And then there's more section 31 shit.

There's also the vision of asylum in this show that basically says "we grant asylum whenever we want, not based on the situation but on personal preferences", with Georgiou granting asylum despite the prime directive, and then Pike refusing asylum because of it. It's surprising that starfleet would allow that, but at least it's not Archer-level, sending people to death then blaming the ones who tried to help them.

SNW

As far as I remember, nothing as bad as the rest here. The take on eugenics and "augmented" individuals is really absurd though, showing starfleet hating on Una is fine because her species is augmented (like the denobulans who are in starfleet though, no?), but the stupid security officer who has DNA augmentations from a crazy evil dictator engineered to be violent and crazy, is allowed without any issue.

All of them

One thing that I struggle understanding is the constant of racist stereotypes. They're everywhere, because all the shows use them to define their characters.

Keiko wants to eat her traditional food in a kimono, Georgiou wears a big kimono-like dress that would barely fit in a Mulan movie, Elnor is a ridiculous samurai-ninja with the fitting outfit, etc. As if in hundreds of years, after earth is united and mixed with hundreds of alien species, "cultures" would not evolve and mix but instead go back to being very split apart and caricatural.

P.S.

I'm not saying that the shows are shit, but that I am worried about the lack of discussions concerning all those subjects. Star Trek is supposed to be progressive and show a better version of humanity, one that evolved and grew, and yet morals seem to not be a consideration of the shows anymore.

And why

Does anyone know when the new season starts?

It almost feels unnecessary to rave about "The City on the Edge of Forever" (S1E28) again, since it has been praised as one of the all-time best episodes of Star Trek for like 50+ years now, but I just rewatched it and want to specifically talk about how much I love the character Edith Keeler.

(If you haven't seen the episode, or it has been too long, some quick context: This is the one where they go back in time to 1930 and meet Edith Keeler, who is running a shelter.)

Within the first few few minutes that Edith is on screen, you find out that she's not only incredibly kind but also insightful and filled with hope about the future. She's a dreamer who tries to excitedly tell everyone about the things she believes humanity will accomplish in the years to come, including space exploration.

It's hard to watch this episode and not feel bad for Edith - dreaming of all these things while being stuck in the 1930s - knowing that she won't get to see the world that Kirk and Spock have traveled from. Then, for the first time, I realized that this makes her the perfect stand-in for the audience. My thought-process went from feeling bad for her in the 1930s -> to feeling bad for the people watching Star Trek in the 1960s -> to realizing that I'm watching this episode nearly 60 years later and am still living far too early to experience the times she's dreaming about. We are Edith Keeler.

This gave me a new appreciation for what they did with this episode, the series as a whole, and specifically Edith Keeler's character. Her inspiring and hopeful attitude truly represents the heart of what makes Star Trek so captivating.

• When we see Starfleet Academy in the open shot of the episode it is a recreation of the closing shot of “The First Duty”.

• In the flashback there is a figure in a straw hat and overalls tending the grounds. We only see them from the back, but based on their appearance I think we can assume it’s Boothby, the Academy’s head groundskeeper, and occasional advisor to both Picard and Janeway during their academy days. Boothby was introduced in “The First Duty”.

• We see all of Nova Squadron during the establishing shot, but Jean Hajar waves goodbye and runs back down the path before the close-up.

    • As we saw last episode, Robert Duncan McNeill reprises his roll as Nick Locarno.

    • Shannon Fill reprises her role as Sito Jaxa. This is her first acting credit since 1995.

    • Welsey Crusher is played Wil Wheaton, the host of Paramount+’s “The Ready Room”.

    • This is the only on screen appearance of Joshua Albert as he was dead before the USS Enterprise D arrived to Earth in “The First Duty”.

• “I don’t know Nick, the starburst maneuver is banned for a reason.” In “The First Duty” it was established that the Kolvoord Starburst was banned because an entire flight group was killed while attempting it some years earlier.

• Cadet Becket Mariner is excited to learn about various alien species’ history:

    • The Perseveres - First mentioned in “The Paradise Syndrome”, and have a habit of relocating Indigenous peoples and leaving their obelisks lying about

    • The Xindi - The Xindi attacked Earth in “The Expanse” and were the antagonists for much of season three of ENT

• Mariner is wearing the pips of a second year cadet, meaning she was in the same year as Wesley. Of course, at the end of “The First Duty” Picard informed Wesley that he would be losing all academic credit for the year and not advancing with his class.

• Nick’s Nova Fleet has a number of familiar alien vessels:

    • The vertically arranged Romulan-warship - “I Have No Bones Yet I Must Flee”

    • Cardassian Hideki-class starships - “Profit and Loss”

    • A Tellarite cruiser - “Babel One”

       • I am basing this on the arrangement of the impulse engines; the original Tellarite cruiser model was a redress of the CGI model used as an Arkonian warship in “Dawn”, and then a Xindi-Arboreal ship in “The Council” but both those models had slightly different impulse engines

    • A Pakled starship - “Samaritan Snare”

    • Klingon Birds-of-Prey - “Star Trek: The Search for Spock”

    • An Orion Interceptor - “Something Borrowed, Something Green”

    • Federation Sphinx-class workpods - Andy Probert made this particular design for TNG, but it was too expensive, and until now did not show up on screen, but was in the “TNG Technical Manual”

    • A Bynar ship - “A Few Badgeys More”

    • A Ferengi ship - “Parth Ferengi’s Heart Place”

• Admiral Vassery was introduced in “Moist Vessel”.

• Admiral Alonzo Freeman was introduced in “Second Contact”.

• There are a number minor characters who were introduced this season who make appearances this episode:

    • Risik was introduced in “Something Borrowed, Something Green”.

    • The three Bynar defectors were introduced in “A Few Badgeys More”.

    • Malok was introduced in “I Have No Bones Yet I Must Flee”

    • The female Romulan lower decker was introduced in “I Have No Bones Yet I Must Flee”

    • Livik was introduced in “I Have No Bones Yet I Must Flee”

    • Jeef was introduced in “Parth Ferengi’s Heart Place”

    • The second male Ferengi lower decker was introduced in “Parth Ferengi’s Heart Place”

• ”He looks like Tom Paris.” Personally, much like Boimler, “I don’t see it.”

• The Maquis were an independent, unaligned fleet fighting against Cardassian oppression and occupation, introduced in “The Maquis, Part I”.

• We saw Andorians wearing the uniforms here on on Tulgana IV in “Envoys”

• Petra Aberdeen was introduced in “Reflections”

• The PADD the Hysperians are using appears to be the same design as the Betazoid PADD seen in “Empathaological Fallacies” flipped horizontally and coloured peach as opposed to blue.

• The large Tamarian lower decker is wearing a towel, following the precedent established by Hans Federov (“Second Contact”), Big Merp (“First First Contact”), and one of the Klingons aboard the IKS Che’Ta’ (“wej Duj”).

• The black market Ferengi Genesis device was first seen in “Parth Ferengi’s Heart Place”.

• ”This guy sucks!” Mariner’s enthusiasm for Starfleet is frequently underestimated, such as when everyone assumed she purposefully made the crew of the USS Cerritos look bad in an interview in “Trusted Sources” be she was actually full of praise.

• It’s Goodgey! From Star Trek!

• Mariner is able to take control of the *USS Passaro” NCC-52670, a Sabrerunner-class starship.

    • The Sabrerunner-class bears a lot of visual similarity to the Steamrunner-class introduced in “Star Trek: First Contact” but is significantly smaller.

    • A Gagarin-class USS Passaro was seen PIC’s “The Last Generation”

    • Both Passaros are named for Fabio Passaro, a CG model maker for Eaglemoss Collections who passed away in October 2022. The Sabrerunner-class version’s registry reflects his birthday, May 26, 1970.

    • The Sabrerunner class name was provided by producer Brad Winters on the bad social media site. You know the one.

• Mariner is able to transfer controls to the captain’s chair, causing a stick to sprout from the chair. Riker was able to control the USS Enterprise E with a joystick in “Star Trek: Insurrection”.

• D’Erika was introduced in “Something Borrowed, Something Green”

• The tryna shield bears some resemblance to the Tholian web seen in “The Tholian Web” and Q’s energy net introduced in “Encounter at Farpoint”.

• ”What about Rule of Acquisition 91: Your boss is only worth what he pays you?” This is a new rule not from any previous source.

• ”You’re forgetting Rule 289: Shoot first, count profits later.” It was established in “Rules of Acquisition” that there are only 285 rules, though the Nagus can add or change them as they see fit, as in “Acquisition” there were only 173 in the 22nd century, and Zek was going to release an entirely new set in “Prophet Motive”.

• Twaining was established as a sometimes effective means of conflict resolution in “Something Borrowed, Something Green”.

• Mariner and Locarno playing cat & mouse inside the ion storm recalls the USS Reliant hunting the USS Enterprise through the Mutara nebula in “Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan”.

• Boimler has been made acting captain of the Cerritos despite being outranked by at least two other officers we see on the bridge, and several more besides. In “The Arsenal of Freedom” Geordi was made acting captain over chief engineer Logan, who outranked him.

• The Cerritos’ captain’s yacht is a similar design to that of the Enterprise E but distinct enough to assume they’re not supposed to be the same spaceframe.

• ”Wow, I’ve never actually seen someone use the captain’s yacht.” Apparently Boimler skipped watching any video logs recorded during the events of “Star Trek: Insurrection”. It’s hard to blame him, but it still seems out of character.

    • Mariner signed out the keys to the Cerritos’ captain’s yacht in Boimler’s name in “Terminal Provocations” and then invited him along, though it sounds like he was either able to prevent Mariner from actually taking the ship out for a joyride, or hid in his bunk until she returned it.

• The explosion of the Ferengi Genesis device recalls the original detonation in “Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan”.

    • Like that explosion, this one also creates a planet, seemingly from the material in the ion storm. Unlike Genesis, the planet Locarno is apparently stable.

• T’Lyn ignores a call from Captain Sokel. In “Empathological Fallacies” she was so stressed over not being able to transmit a message to him that she telepathically caused the crew to lose control of their inhibitions.

• The Orion ship that arrives to collect Tendi is inspired by the one introduced in “The Pirates of Orion”, but appears to be a more modern iteration of that craft, as well as being significantly larger.

Rob & Kev take shelter from a patch of knife rain and watch "The Inner Fight", the penultimate episode of season four of Star Trek: Lower Decks. Inspired by Mariner's ability to unite the clashing aliens trapped on Sherbal V, they discuss other conspicuous occasions of multi-species alliances in Star Trek, including "The Time Trap" (TAS), the Dominion War (DS9), "The Enemy" (TNG), "Allegiance" (TNG), and the Promenade (DS9).

I know that canonically, Jankom is a Tellarite and not a Talaxian, but I feel that his story's justification has a Tom Paris/Nick Locarno vibe, but I haven't been able to find any relationship on Google. There's a lot on Jankom that reminds me of Neelix:

• Delta quadrant
• Split nose
• Hair, sideburns and eyebrows
• Ears somewhat
• Spots

Also, I thought that Tellarites would look closer to what the doctor on Janeway's crew looked like.

Is some writer not being paid for the creation of Talaxian on Prodigy?

The listing went down quickly, and Roddenberry's son is trying to track it down.

This is a great story. 🖖🏻

How Star Trek Brought Back A Popular TNG Actress After 30 Years

https://screenrant.com/shannon-fill-sito-star-trek-lower-decks-return/

@startrek #StarTrek #StarTrekLowerDecks

For me it is the dinner-scene in "the undiscovered country".

https://youtu.be/uK2YyfJAdGo?si=FEyTLHzs95mVD2Iv

I've never seen Star Trek TOS so I don't know for sure if this is explained anywhere. Does anyone know why they made the switch from red shirts to yellow shirts between commanding officers and security between TOS and TNG?

Better place for discussion I suppose

YouTube link

As much as most of us have long had any remaining interest in a fourth Kelvin movie long exhausted by the endless repetition of hype and failure, there does seem to be more confirmation of significant creative differences on the script that was in development in 2022.

James MacKinnon, longtime makeup designer, shared some context during an interview on his work on Picard and future ambitions. He explained that he was hired by Matt Shankman in 2022 to work on preproduction but was fired after a week when the work shut down.

“We were supposed to shoot in the middle of [2022] and it was supposed to come out the following year [2023], but I think a script rewrite went in a different direction.”

This aligns with previous comments from Zoe Saldaña that creative issues around the script were a factor in the movie not going ahead.

The narrator for the “Previously on…” segment sounds like Jonathan Frakes.

Starfleet Academy was founded in 2161 and first appeared on-screen in TNG: “The First Duty”. The flashback takes place in 2368 (13 years prior to 2381), the same year that episode took place.

Josh is Joshua Albert, the member of Nova Squadron who died when rehearsing the Kolvoord Starburst maneuver which underpins “The First Duty”. He was already deceased when the episode began, so never made an appearance. With him are Nick Locarno, Sito Jaxa (voiced by Shannon Fill) and Wesley Crusher (voiced by Wil Wheaton). Jean Hajar is missing, but she could be the small figure that is walking with the group and then turns to jog away at the start of the flashback.

Since Locarno is planning the Starburst maneuver, this means that it’s nearing the end of the academic year of 2367-2368. Mariner’s presence confirms that the latest she could have joined the Academy is in 2367, and since the earliest age she could have joined is 17, she is at least 31 in the present day. Sito’s remark about Mariner sounding like her “when I was a first year” seems to confirm this is Mariner’s freshman year.

Mariner’s xeno-history class covers the Preservers, who were a precursor race that transplanted a group of Native Americans to another planet (named in the script but not on-screen as Amerind), leaving behind an obelisk to protect the planet from asteroids (TOS: “The Paradise Syndrome”). The Xindi were the multi-species race that were the principle antagonists in ENT’s third season.

Nova One and Nova Fleet are obviously named after Nova Squadron. Coupled with the Kolvoord Starburst logo on his jacket (and the Klingon Bird of Prey), it seems Nick has had trouble letting go of the past.

Admiral Vassery last appeared in LD: “Parth Ferengi’s Heart Place”. Admiral Alonzo Freeman, Mariner’s father, last appeared in LD: “Grounded” (although a photo of him also appeared in LD: “Mining the Mind’s Mines”).

Of course, Locarno looks like Tom Paris because both characters are acted by Robert Duncan McNeil. Let’s not go into the whole royalty urban myth here.

The Maquis were an insurgent movement trying to drive the Cardassians out of the Demilitarized Zone set up after the Federation-Cardassian wars. They were introduced in DS9 and played a major role in that series as well as in VOY.

Crews listening to Locarno’s address include Andorians, Independent Archeologist Petra Aberdeen (last seen in LD: “The Stars at Night”) and Tamarians. The “Detrion” system could be a misspelling of the Detrian system, a planetary system visited by the Enterprise-D in TNG: “Ship in a Bottle”.

Ransom summarizes Locarno’s sins from “The First Duty”.

Locarno unveils a black market Ferengi Genesis Device seen in “Parth Ferengi’s Heart Place”. The Genesis Device was first seen in ST II and is capable of terraforming planetary environments instantly, wiping out any existing ecosphere (which is why it was supposed to be tested on a currently lifeless planet). Potentially, it could create planets, and did once, albeit an unstable one, in ST III.

The Trynar Shield is so named because it has three Bynars operating it.

Goodgey, the good part of the now-ascended ex-homicidal AI Badgey, was last seen in LD: “For a Few Badgeys More”, where the other lower deckers were understandably cautious about his working on the ship.

“Cerritos strong” as a rallying cry was first used by a holographic version of Freeman in LD: “Crisis Point” and by the real Freeman in LD: “First First Contact”. T’Lyn has been reading the ship’s logs, one assumes.

The ship that Mariner commandeers is a Steamrunner-class, first seen in ST: FC. The ship itself is the USS Passaro, NCC-52670, named after Fabio Passaro, a CGI artist who has worked on Star Trek related media like the Eaglemoss models, but has since passed away. Another USS Passaro, a Gagarin-class, was seen in PIC: “The Last Generation” near Sol Station.

(According to @BradinLA on X, this Passaro is a Sabrerunner-class, with Steamrunner-class aesthetics in a Sabre-class size.)

Freeman’s command code override is 06107.2. Mariner has had a lot of practice escaping space stations and stealing ships. Her workout program on the holodeck is staging Cardassian prison breaks and stealing a starship to escape (LD: “Strange Energies”).

D’Erika and Orion last appeared in LD: “Something Borrowed, Something Green”. Sword and Scabbard is perhaps the melee weapon equivalent of Guns & Ammo magazine?

Mariner questions whether you can have three Bynars, since Bynars usually work and live in pairs (TNG: “11001001”). Her moving into the ring system of the planet is reminiscent of the Millennium Falcon hiding in an asteroid field in The Empire Strikes Back.

Rule of Acquisition 91: “Your boss is only worth what he pays you” and Rule 289: “Shoot first, count profits later” are new rules, never mentioned before on-screen or in beta canon.

Billups’ willingness to defend the Cerritos’s honor as her Chief Engineer is what Scotty did in TOS: “The Trouble with Tribbles”, where he kept his cool while the Klingons insulted Kirk, but finally lost it when they trash talked the Enterprise.

“Look at the size of that thing!” was Wedge Antilles’ reaction when first seeing the Death Star in Star Wars.

ENS Livik is Rutherford’s nemesis/rival, first introduced in LD: “I Have No Bones and I Must Flee”. Sorting things out with a stint on the Mark Twain riverboat holodeck program is from the same episode.

Ion storms are standard hazards in Star Trek, appearing in many episodes. This particular one is reminiscent of the Mutara Nebula in ST II, especially the camera angles, music, lighting, and static effects on the viewscreen when Locarno pursues Mariner into it.

Not exactly sure how 12-dimensional chess would work, but 3-dimensional chess is a regular game in Star Trek (first seen way back in TOS: “Where No Man Has Gone Before”), with the Four Dimension variant introduced in Diane Duane’s novel My Enemy, My Ally.

The James Horner ST II style music is strong in the Orion destroyer sequence. The shot of the destroyer crashing into the shield is like the Super Star Destroyer crashing into the Death Star in Return of the Jedi.

Boimler’s remark about never seeing someone actually using the captain’s yatch is true. We saw Cerritos’s captain’s yacht in several episodes but it was never taken out. Similarly, the Enterprise-D had one (the Calypso) but it was never used. The Enterprise-E’s yacht, the Cousteau, was used in ST: Insurrection.

Locarno points a pump-action phaser rifle at Mariner, the same type used by Beverley Crusher in PIC: “The Next Generation”.

“Mirab, with sails unfurled,” is Tamarian for “Let’s depart/travel,” (TNG: “Darmok”).

The Genesis Device detonates much the same way its predecessor blew up the Reliant at the end of ST II, with the same nebula rings accompanying it while the yacht zooms off like the Enterprise did. It even forms an M-class planet like the Genesis Planet, except this one seems stable. Starfleet names it Locarno, since his atoms are part of it. Start your speculations on whether this will bring him back to life.