Summary
The future isn’t what it’s all cracked up to be as Star Trek jumps even further forward in time to a place of scarce resources, civil unrest and lost hope. You know: science fiction.
The appeal of Star Trek, or at least one of them, has always been it’s optimistic pathway to the future. Still, following the unsuccessful Star Trek: Nemesis, the franchise has kept looking back through prequels, reboots and alternative histories.
So, with the third season of STAR TREK: DISCOVERY, along with revival show Star Trek: Picard and the animated Star Trek: Lower Decks, the franchise is finally moving forward again. Further than it’s ever been in fact. Following the dramatic events of the second season finale, the crew of the Discovery have been thrown 900 years into their future.
Warning: in order to really get into this season, there will be spoilers from here.
Yet the optimism of the 24th century has long passed. Sometime prior to 3188, something called ‘The Burn’ has occurred, destroying dilithium and most interstellar travel with it. The Federation has long since broken down, beautifully illustrated by a single man in an office waiting on the return of Starfleet. Earth is isolationist and protective, and they are definitely not alone in this stance.
While the setup is vaguely reminiscent of Voyager‘s stranding in the Delta Quadrant, the overarching narrative is not about getting home so much as restoring the Federation. The appeal of this future setting is that it finally sets Star Trek writers free of continuity. Where Enterprise and the early Discovery episodes were beholden to what came next, tying themselves in knots to introduce elements that canonically hadn’t happened yet, here we get to see the progress of seeds planted years ago.
The Trill play an important role in early episodes (‘Forget Me Not’), and the Vulcans and Romulans have finally put aside their differences thanks to the work begun by Spock (in the cleverly titled ‘Unification III’). Much of the season’s antagonism comes from the presence of the Emerald Chain, a successor to the Orion Syndicate so frequently mentioned in Deep Space Nine. This is a much darker future, as is the style of our times. Yet in a year of Covid anxiety and civil unrest, it was not the future we necessarily wanted.
Nevertheless, Trek continues to tackle social and political issues. A universe full of finite resources is at the core of this season, while Saru (Doug Jones), Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and Tilly (Mary Wiseman) all grapple with the burdens of leadership to various degrees. The season also made headlines for the introduction of the first trans and non-binary lead characters in the show’s history, a Trill named Gray (Ian Alexander) and a human host named Adira (Blu del Barrio) respectively.
However, if one thing defined this season, then it was the motivational speeches. So. Many. Speeches. It became almost a running gag to spot the moment when the inspirational monologue would drop, grinding any momentum of that particular episode to a screeching halt. To borrow a phrase from a friend of mine, we kind of want our Trek to be “less oratory, more exploratory.” There’s room for both, of course, but here was a season that seemed determinedly hampered by exposition.
One other thing that the show has struggled with is character development, or a lack thereof for anybody outside the main three or four crew. After being nothing more than background characters for two years, the rest of the bridge crew finally get some attention. Detmer (Emily Coutts) deals with survivor’s guilt and Owosekun (Oyin Oladejo) has a few hero moments. Still, Discovery‘s writers are far more interested in the introduction of future sailor Booker (the admittedly excellent David Ajala) and the Adira/Gray relationship.
Indeed, two whole episodes are virtually dedicated to setting up a spin-off with Michelle Yeoh’s Georgiou, who is being literally torn apart from living outside of her time and dimension. Despite the futuristic possibilities, these two episodes have the clearest lines back to the 1960s, directly referencing the classic ‘City on the Edge of Forever’ episode. The appearance of Paul Guilfoyle as the Guardian of Forever allows Georgiou to explore ‘what ifs’ in the mirror universe for a while, before ultimately sending her back to a time when the multiverse was more aligned. Cue debate as to when and where this will be. (My best guess is bringing her in line with Picard).
Despite these quibbles, the third season of STAR TREK: DISCOVERY is one of the coolest looking Star Trek shows to date. Even with some obvious effects being hampered by pandemic restrictions, the design team have really extrapolated on the 25th century tech of Picard and built some cool toys. Personal transporters and detached warp nacelles are some of my favourite new things.
Other highlights, in no particular order, include: David Cronenberg as a shadowy inquisitor, the badass Osyraa (Janet Kidder), getting to see the Trill home world, a phenomenally staged space battle in ‘The Sanctuary,’ and Booker’s gorgeous cat, a Maine Coon named Grudge (played by Leeu and Durban).
The finale feels more than a little anticlimactic, and rushes a denouement concerning the origin of the Burn. Much of it concerns a sheltered space child who caused it with his turbulent emotions, a petit deus ex machina that doesn’t feel authentic in the context of the season. Other elements, like the introduction of sentient robots, feel perfunctory. Yet the Emerald Chain threat, led by some Daft Punk looking foot soldiers, results in some pretty rad action sequences.
On the plus side, there’s no hard reset and send us back to where we started. There’s no sudden appearance of a CGI version of a classic character, or a massive cliffhanger to lead us into Season 4. It does, much like the end of Season 1, restore a little bit of hope to the future, one that Star Trek fans are going to get to see more of soon. Going into 2021, that’s pretty much the best we can ask for.
2020-2021 | US | SHOWRUNNERS: Alex Kurtzman and Michelle Paradise | CAST: Sonequa Martin-Green, Doug Jones, Anthony Rapp, Mary Wiseman, David Ajala, Wilson Cruz, Rachael Ancheril, Emily Coutts, Janet Kidder, Blu del Barrio, Oyin Oladejo, Ian Alexander| DISTRIBUTOR: CBS All Access (US), Netflix (AUS) | EPISODES: 13
