Josh Reviews Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season Two

Coming off of the excellent Picard season three, I was curious to see if similar improvements would be in evidence for the second season of Strange New Worlds, the prequel series set on Captain Pike’s Enterprise, several years before TOS.  Many critics, as well as my friends who are Star Trek fans, seem to really like this show.  But while I thought season two was an improvement over season one, I still find this show to be exceedingly mediocre.  I’ve given up on Discovery (the only Trek show since the premiere of Next Generation in 1987 that I have not watched every episode of) and I’m not sure I’ll be continuing with season three of SNW.  We’ll see.

What works? The cast is terrific. I really like pretty much every one of these performers, and I’m interested in the characters they’ve created.  I like the show’s balance of episodic adventures with character arcs that carry between episodes.  While I strongly dislike the show’s design sensibility, the visual effects are strong, and it’s fun seeing new Trek adventures brought to life with such impressive production values.  I like the show’s efforts at bringing a new Strange New World to life each week and using the digital stage (a version of “the volume,” pioneered by The Mandalorian) to create expansive new locations for the stories.

I enjoyed the show’s willingness to create very different types of stories, with very different tones, from week to week.  I liked that one episode could be a screwball comedy, and one a lawyer show, and one a horror movie.  That was fun.

I was THRILLED by the insane crossover with the animated Lower Decks (the only modern Star Trek show I truly love).  This should not have worked.  The idea of a crossover between a live-action show and an animated show is nuts.  But the execution was brilliant, and I loved it.  I also quite enjoyed the musical episode!  I was dubious — I prefer my sci-fi and my Star Trek to be serious — but I really enjoyed the music and was impressed by the creativity on display.

What doesn’t work?  I just can’t get over the show’s disregard for Star Trek canon.  Why is this show a prequel to The Original Series if the people involved can’t be bothered to actually want to be consistent with the events of The Original Series in either their design approach or their storytelling choices?

The original series Enterprise is one of the most iconic space-ship designs of all time.  The bridge of the Starship Enterprise is one of the most well-known locations in all of TV and sci-fi history; same goes for the Enterprise transporter room, and Sickbay, and Engineering, and the corridors.  None of those places on Strange New Worlds look anything like they did on TOS.  This is a huge mistake in my opinion.  Yes, those 1960’s sets can and should be modernized for a 2023 TV show.  But the basic design should be respected, whereas on SNW it’s ignored.

Same goes for the characters.  SNW is drowning in TOS characters (why is James T. Kirk on this show at all??), and none of them seem to me to be remotely in continuity with what we knew of them from TOS.  Spock had a descendant of Khan as a shipmate for years and that never came up when they encountered Khan in “Space Seed” or Star Trek II?  Spock and Chapel were romantically involved and yet Spock basically ignores her on TOS?

The show seems to be positioning the Gorn as their main villains.  On the one hand, the Gorn are a great choice for an alien race to use — they have a cool look and a well-known name, yet we’ve seen very little of them in Trek to this point.  They’re ripe for further exploration.  The problem is that, when Kirk & co. encounter the Gorn in “Arena”, it’s a major plot point that they’ve never seen the Gorn before.  SNW totally ignores that.  Even worse, the SNW version of the Gorn is a total rip-off of the Xenomorph from Alien & Aliens.  It’s frankly embarrassing.  (There’s a shot in the finale of the Gorn’s spiny tail — since when do the Gorn have tails?? — coming down from the ceiling behind Spock that is a direct lift of an iconic shot from James Cameron’s Aliens.)  Star Trek used to be the thing that other shows and movies stole from.  It’s sad to me to see it be the other way around in most modern Star Trek.  (Even the musical episode, which I really liked, is an example of the show’s imitating other shows that did this before, like the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.)

All of which leads me to ask the same fundamental question that I had about Discovery, and about the first season of Strange New Worlds.  If the makers of these shows don’t know or like the Original Series, then WHY make a Star Trek show set in this era???  Set the show in a future era and give these characters different names, and then they could have the freedom to do whatever they’d like and create whatever look they’d like!  I truly don’t get it.

If you’re a fan of this show and are interested to see where we agree/disagree about the ten season two episodes, read on for my thoughts.

01 —The Broken Circle

• The opening visual effects shot is cool, but right away I am annoyed by the design choices made.  What are all those circular-shaped ships zipping around?  Why does Enterprise look a dull metal grey instead of awesome and cool?
• Spock immediately jumps to disobeying orders and stealing the Enterprise?  That feels totally out of character to me.  This was significant when Spock took that action in “The Menagerie”.  It dilutes that act to make this a regular pattern for Spock.  In TOS Spock was assiduous in following Starfleet regulations to the letter; see “The Doomsday Machine” for a great example.
• I love Carol Kane and I’m intrigued to see her join this series.  I like her intro scene… though what is with her accent??  Wow!
• Everyone in the chair has a thing?  Ugh.  Not funny.
• I like the look of the planet.  This show always gives us cool new planets; I really like that.
• I love seeing the classic Klingon look again (as opposed to the abomination that were the Klingons on Discovery); this looks great on a modern show.  I really like the look of the Klingons buying weapons.
• The bald-faced rehash of Marion drinking scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark is lame.
• I like the plot of war profiteers trying to restart the Federation-Klingon war.
• I’m unclear how La’an wound up in the middle of this; what does this have to do with the little girl and her parents?  It’s a stretch her parents just happened to be on this planet.
• La’an pulls the old “holding a thermal detonator” trick, another bald-faced rehash of a famous movie scene, this time from Return of the Jedi.
• I liked the cool shot of the starship the Klingons are building in the dilithium cave.
• I liked learning some interesting new details about M’Benga and his past experiences in the Klingon war.
• Mbenga and Chapel inject themselves with Venom like Bane?  Huh??  Is this a callback to something? Why doesn’t the show explain this?  (After having seen the whole season I understand this was laying pipe for a story they’d explore later.  This could have been handled better here, I think.)
• I don’t understand the story with the Klingons buying weapons — if they’re about to launch a starship to start a war, why worry about buying a few phasers?
• I loved the cool shot of the Klingon D7 battle cruiser.  I love seeing this classic Klingon ship on screen.
• But seeing the Enterprise zipping through ice debris like an X-wing is all wrong.  This show consistently gets the motion of the Enterprise (which is a HUGE starship) all wrong.  The Enterprise should be slow and graceful like a battleship.
• I liked the emotional scene between Chapel and M’Benga when they think they’re about to die.  (How did they survive?  Forget not dying by freezing to death in space or asphyxiating, wouldn’t they have been incinerated by huge explosion when the Enterprise destroys the fake Starfleet ship?)
• How does Spock get to the transporter room before the medical staff?  It seems selfish (and unprofessional) to show him in a panic about Chapel but ignoring M’Benga.  Once again, this feels out of character for Spock.
• I like the Klingon captain.  I like that the story ends with them drinking blood wine.  (Why doesn’t Ortegas get to drink with them too?  I wanted to see her partying with the Klingons.)
• I liked Pelia’s last scene with Spock.
• It was a weird choice to have Pike absent from the season premiere!  (Particularly after the dreadful season one finale whose whole point seemed to be that Kirk was a much better captain than Pike.)  I love Pike on this show, but I didn’t miss him!  It was nice to see the other characters get some attention. It was nice to see Spock in command of the Enterprise.  (But we’re back in the show’s consistent prequel problem, as Spock is learning lessons about command now that he didn’t shouldn’t learn till years later, in TOS episodes like “The Galileo Seven”.)
• I see we have a new transporter chief, Jay.  What happened to Kyle?  (The actor is on another show, apparently.)

02 — Ad Astra Per Aspera

• I like Yetide Badaki as the lawyer Neera.  She’s a strong guest star.  I like that a civil rights lawyer still exists.
• I like most of the legal stuff in this episode.
• Why doesn’t this episide take the time to explain what Una’s race, Illyrians, are??  Did Una choose to undergo genetic modification?  Was it done without her consent?  Was it not done to her at all, but it’s just that she’s descended from a genetically modified species?  Mid-way through the episode, we get one line from Neera in which she says genetic modifications are done to Illyrian children before they’re born, for survival.  Why?  How?  What do they change?  Tell us more!!  These details are important!!
• Similarly, why doesn’t La’an’s own genertically-modified background factor into the story????  Why is she allowed to be in Starfleet without a problem?  I don’t understand this at all.  The prosecutor asks La’an if she’s related to Khan.  She says yes.  And still they don’t tell us how???  (Has this ever been clearly established by this show?)  La’an’s later scene with Neera in Una’s quarters confirms La’an carries genetic augmentation.  So how can she be in Starfleet??  I don’t understand this at all.
• Two episodes in a row now we’ve had Starfleet admirals who are dumb/bad.  I had enough of this evil admiral Trek trope decades ago.
• I like that Neera used Robert April’s violations of the Prime Directive as part if her case.  I guess all great captains have broken the Prime Directive at one time or another!
• But April is a jerk to condemn Una. This is the heroic first captain of the Enterprise, Robert April?  Ugh.  No thanks.
• I didn’t like that Short Trek but nevertheless I appreciated the call-back to Una’s love of Gilbert & Sullivan.
• Una’s story of her childhood doesn’t make sense to me.  She describes hiding her heritage — her friend was outed and his family arrested — then she describes racism against her.  So was she in hiding or not?  It’s a problem that Una’s backstory, and the nature of her genetic augmentation, is so vague and poorly depicted on this show and in this episode specifically.
• It’s interesting that Una gets off on a technicality.  I like the legal twist.  Of course this is the show’s prequel problem rearing its head again because we know these anti-Augment laws are still in place 100 years later during DS9 time, because of what happens with Bashir.  So it takes the wind out of the sails of this show’s story for me.  I knew from the start that Una and Neera weren’t going to succeed in changing starfleet’s anti-genetic-engineering laws.
• Pike was absent episode one and is weirdly passive here.  They even make a point of having him be told “no big speeches.”  But this is a Star Trek trial episode, one about values important to us today.  I WANT the captain to make a big inspiring speech!!!

03 — Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow

• This is a weird episode.  I fundamentally don’t understand why they devoted one out of this season’s ten episode to Kirk, who isn’t even a main character on the show.  Why isn’t this adventure happening with Pike or another actual character on this show??  (Frankly, I’ve never understood why Kirk is on this show at all!!)  I actually thought this episode was very well-made, and while Kirk was out of character at first (see my next note), by the end of the episode I was quite taken with the La’an-Kirk romance.  The actress who plays La’an, Christina Chong, was terrific.  But here again, the show’s being a prequel totally hamstrings the storytelling for me.  Just like last week we knew Una wasn’t going to succeed at changing Starfleet’s laws against genetic engineering (because we know they still exist during DS9), here we know Kirk and La’an are not going to end up together.  So why are we watching this story?  I feels like a total waste of time.  It’s skillfully made!!  But a waste of time nonetheless.  (I could have more easily rolled with this in an old-style 24-episode season.  But in a season of only ten episodes, I don’t think they can afford to waste any!!)  How much better would this show be if we weren’t locked into these prequel characters?  An episode like this would have worked much better had the writers been able to have the freedom to further explore this romantic pairing.
• Kirk callously dismisses Spock’s plea for aid, which feels weird to me.  Then he just tries to grab the device from La’an, like a bully?  Ugh.  Then he’s in a total panic when they’re thrown back in time?  Double ugh.  (You could say this alternate universe Kirk is a totally different character so this weird behavior isn’t out of character, he’s just different from our Kirk.  But the rest of the episode seems to suggest that this Kirk is very much like our Kirk.  They can’t have it both ways.)
• I like the idea that Carol Kane’s character Pelia is a thief.
• That someone filed a noise complaint against Spock’s lyre playing us silly.  His cabin isn’t soundproof?  Come on.
• M’Benga is a better fighter than La’an??  That seems weird to me.  But I like how tough M’Benga is.
• La’an doesn’t call for medical assistance the instant she sees the shot, bleeding dude in the corridor???
• This Kirk was born in space on the U.S.S. Iowa.  Hardy har har.
• Kirk gets caught in a revolving door.  Ugh.  Why are we playing Kirk as the butt of the joke?
• I do like seeing Kirk kick ass at chess though!
• I like that Sam’s being alive is what convinces Kirk to help La’an rewrite his timeline.
• I like the dual meaning of “get to the bridge.”
• “I can also make plomeek soup in the toilet!” is a very funny line!
• Is Kirk’s trouble starting the car a callback to “A Piece of the Action”?
• Wait a second, Sam is Kirk’s brother’s middle name?  Most people call him George?  I thought George Kirk was their father?  Is this a reference to something or a change to continuity?
• There was just a terrorist attack on the bridge!!  Why aren’t a thousand cops all over Kirk when he’s driving crazily through the city immediately in the aftermath??
• The Romulan involvement is interesting.
• That the crazy woman just happens to be the woman whose camera La’an asks to see, and she just happens to have a perfectly clear photo of a Romulan ship (because we’ll later learn she’s a Romulan herself) is a bit too much of a stretch for me.
• I sort of wanted La’an to look up Guinan!  Looking up Carol Kane’s Pelia is fun, though.
• I did not like that the Romulan spy kills Kirk.  No Kirk should die this easily.
• I liked hearing the Romulan mention the Temporal Cold War (from Enterprise); I’d wondered if this was going to connect to that.
• Khan’s rise was supposed to happen in 1992.  It’s an interesting retcon to push that back.  That makes sense, because Star Trek should always be happening in OUR future, not some alternate future.  Also, in my head, this now confirms that the universe of SNW and Discovery ISN’T the prime timeline after all!!  So that makes me happy!
• Where’s the security in the place that created Khan?  Who created Khan?  Why in Toronto?  Why destroy a bridge if Khan was the target?  I am confused.
• La’an uses her time travel device in front of Khan AND then leaves her gun in his room.  Sigh!
• Do the writers not remember that no one knows what Romulans look like in this time period?
• How did the Department of Temporal Investigations, who don’t travel in time themselves, arrive on the Enterprise minutes after La’an got back and without anyone else on the ship knowing?  They don’t have superpowers!!
• That La’an can’t tell anyone about what happened to her feels like lame narrative cop out, and emotionally unsatisfying after an episode spent getting me as viewer to invest in the La’an-Kirk relationship.  (I’m glad future episodes this season did address this.)

04 — Among the Lotus Eaters

• I love the idea of returning to Rigel VII, where “The Cage” took place.  It’s interesting to dig deeper into this bit of backstory.  The situation on Rigel is not what I expected (clearly by design).  I don’t love the weird memory-loss story they came up with, but I like that they’re trying to do something different and original here.
• Pike winds up back in a cage.  Funny.
• I like seeing a modern version of the classic Rigel matte painting of the castle, plus the huge modern-looking new tower.
• The costumes look good; they do a nice job honoring what we saw in the sixties.
• The main guest star, Reed Birney as the Kalar Luq, is terrific.  The scene in which he explains his reason for not wanting to remember his past is a fantastic scene; very emotional.  I wish the show was always this good.
• It’s nice to see Pike back in center stage for first time this season.
• We get some good action.
• There’s strong, interesting stuff happening both on planet and up on the Enterprise.
• I wish the Zach character was in it more.  I wanted him to feel like a more dangerous villain, and I wanted to know more about what happened to him.  How did he take over without forgetting who he was?
• Good stuff with Ortegas.
• I liked the sweet ending in which Pike reunites with captain Batel.  I wish we knew her better.  The season one finale seemed to set her up to be at odds with Pike, but the trial episode didn’t really lean into that.  She was on the prosecutor’s side but wasn’t happy about it.  I guess that feels correct for the character, but narratively it was a little dull.
•  Wow, Ortegas’ quarters are huge.  I complained in season one how unbelievable huge Pike’s quarters were.  But maybe I can roll with that for the captain; it seems insane for a junior officer.

05 — Charades

• I was not excited to dive back into the T’Pring-Spock-Chapel love triangle.
• Though I do love Chapel!  Jess Bush is great.
• Spock as a human?  On the one hand, it feels like a rehash of the body-swap episode from season one.  I don’t love seeing Spock used as a source of comedy.  On the other hand, Ethan Peck plays the comedy very well, and watching Spock get overwhelmed by his emotions is quite funny in this episode.
• But I just feel these writers don’t understand Spock at all.  For instance, Spock is 100% the wrong character to say “what the f–“.  Ugh.
• There’s a huge space vortex anomaly right in the Vulcan system and they call Starfleet to investigate, instead of doing it themselves?  I don’t buy that.
• I don’t love the actress they cast as Amanda, Mia Kirshner.  (She first played the character in Discovery.  She’s never felt right to me for Amanda.)
• They go out of their way to mention in a previous episode that Carol Kane’s Pelia was friends with Amanda; so I am stunned that Carol Kane is missing from this episode!!  What a weird choice!!
• This Vulcan ritual of pointing out all the kids’ flaws before they get married is pretty ridiculous.
• The idea of a hen-pecked Vulcan husband is silly.
• I did find it emotional at the end that Christine has to give up the human-Spock who maybe could be with her.
• Charades??  Oh boy.
• It’s nice to hear Spock stand up for his mother in the end.
• T’Pring is right to be pissed that Spock didn’t tell her the truth.
• After all that, Spock and T’Pring decide to take a break?  Then why have I been watching this?
• Oh, it’s all a set-up to getting Spock and Chapel together.  SNW has made me root for them as a couple, and seeing them finally kiss is very satisfying.  BUT.  Again we have the prequel problem, in that we know Spock and Chapel are not going to wind up together.  So what is the point of all this?  I don’t understand the arc they’re trying to create for these characters.  It all just makes Spock’s treatment of Chapel in TOS — in which he basically ignores her — look totally cruel.
• I’m also bummed the actual aliens (the Kerkhovians) and what happened to them wasn’t further explored.
• The idea that Vulcans hate the smell of humans and take nasal suppressants was an Enterprise reference I wish they’d ignored.  I always thought that was a dumb idea on Enterprise.

I’ll be back tomorrow with my thoughts on the rest of the season!

Please support my website by clicking through one of our Amazon links the next time you need to shop!  As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.  That means I’ll receive a small percentage from any product you purchase from Amazon within 24 hours after clicking through.  Thank you!