At the end of its second season, Star Trek: Discovery sent its ship and crew through a wormhole and 900 years into the future. (It was a whole “save all life in the galaxy” kind of a thing. Don’t worry about it.) Star Trek: Discovery is only a few episodes in to its third season, but it’s wasted no time in setting up the new status quo for its main cast of characters and the for the Star Trek universe as a whole. Short version: warp fuel is scarce, the Federation fell apart, and it’s all gone very Wild West. It’s a stark change from the Star Trek audiences are used to, but it is the perfect blank slate for both the show, and the franchise going forward.
During its first two seasons, some fans criticized Discovery for inconsistencies in canon, like black ops organization Section 31 being an open secret in Starfleet, or the use of holographic technology before it was supposed to be widely used. By being set hundreds of years later than of the previous Star Trek shows, Discovery’s third season looks set to completely side track such criticism, while still building the show around familiar elements. The best example of this potential came in the season’s opening episode; main character Michael Burnham is surprised to see two species (the Andorians and the Orions) working together when previously they wouldn’t have. The alien races are familiar to the character and the audience, but that doesn’t mean they both know how those alien races will act in this changed galaxy the show is creating. The same can be said for the technology on display; the main characters have personal teleporters now, and the holograms appear to be made out of actual matter rather than just light projections. For the first time in a long time, the writers and designers get to just imagine the future without worrying about the restrictions placed on them by the universe which past Star Trek media has already created.
Setting the show at a time when the old rules and alliances no longer apply isn’t just good for the freedom it gives the creative team. It also gives Star Trek a sense of mystery again. The universe isn’t some well travelled thing in which going from one planet to the next is a simple convenience anymore. The crew will have to make new discoveries and adapt to what they find as they go along. That familiar line often repeated in various captain’s logs “to seek out new life and civilizations” feels especially true of Discovery now. Not only will audiences get to see an old galaxy made new again through this season, but they will also get to enjoy how the characters react to it all; to prove that they are intrepid explorers, in the same mold as other characters who have come before them in the franchise.
Much has already been made this season of the Federation’s absence. In episode one, Michael comes across Aditya Sahil, a man who has been serving as a federation liaison, despite never being official commissioned to the post. In episode two Saru, Tilly, and Georgiou come across someone who still hopes for and believes in the Federation’s return. The Federation clearly hasn’t been forgotten in the decades since its absence, but the characters will have to fight for it. In showing the characters actively working for a better future, Discovery reminds us that it is something we can achieve rather than some distant, abstract notion. Fighting to keep the utopian vision promised by Star Trek since its beginning alive has always been part of Discovery‘s DNA. Season three is just upping the stakes a bit.
It is possible that this won’t be enough for some viewers, and that’s entirely fair. Star Trek has been built around the idea of the Federation, and there may be viewers who are turned off from Discovery by this shift. However, not only might it return one day, but rumors of its demise may turn out to be greatly exaggerated. When Aditya Sahil, and Michael meet, the former reveals that “long-range sensors failed decades ago”, so the characters only know that what they have discovered about this new time period is true for the sector they find themselves stranded in. Starfleet may be alive and well in other sectors. In some of them it might have back slid into tyranny, in others it might be prospering as much as it ever did, though in a more localized way than it used to. The possibility is just as open for the main characters to discover that the Federation isn’t as gone as it appears, to them discovering that yes, it really did fully disband. Just as with the changes to continuity, they won’t find out until they go looking.
Setting their new season in a galaxy in which everything which was familiar had changed or been replaced was a bold move for the writers to take. However, in completely upending the status quo they have allowed themselves to take the show back to its roots of discovery and wonder. They can explore the same themes the franchise has always reflected on without seeming tired, and if they decide one day that they want to make the status quo resemble what it looked like before this massive shift, they have given themselves the option to do so. With this latest season of Discovery the show’s creative team has managed to make a show which is both incredibly true to the spirit of Star Trek while still moving away from the well worn setting which has made up the franchise for over fifty years. That is pretty cool.
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