That’s a good question. There have been two attempts at targeting younger viewers in recent years, and neither seems to have made enough of an impact to stick around.

And I don’t think it’s a question of quality - Prodigy and Academy were both quite enjoyable.

I think an important difference is the characters’ motivations, though - for Reeger, it’s personal, while Ramsey in “Crimson Tide” is merely hawkish and reckless.

At one point, it sounded like Paramount+ was pretty high on the idea.

Unfortunately, that was 2 or 3 regime changes ago.

It also lays a foundation for his actions to (arguably) come back to bite him in the ass in “Balance of Terror,” when (presumably) the same Romulan ship reappears and starts wiping out colonies. I’ll leave it up for debate whether this is a good thing.

I’m guessing this episode drawing from old war films, in particular I am getting flavours of submarine hunts, chasing after wakes, and handling big questions of WMDs, the sanity of the chain of command.

Maybe it’s just because the writers of the (alleged) next Trek film have been talking about it, but I did think of “Crimson Tide” several times during this one.

A’Sha leaving is fine, I guess, she didn’t feel very present throughout the season anyway.

I can’t help but think there’s still more to come with her - they haven’t dropped her off yet, after all. Something about it seems unfinished, somehow.

A pretty good episode that got a lot more interesting in the final act.

For the most part, it came off as a story that we’ve seen before, albeit a well-told one. But the reveal that Kirk drugged Reeger in order to make him unfit for commend is a genuinely compelling idea, as is the idea that M’Benga just torpedoed his career to cover it up.

The B-plot was decent, too - it was good to see Uhura do some ass-kicking.

They sure do like to talk about the Klingon War as if it’s ancient history when it only ended about five years ago, though.

Until next year.

Quarries.

I saw an article a few days ago that said that sales of physical media (specifically CDs, IIRC) are up significantly, but there doesn’t seem to be a corresponding decrease in streaming popularity.

That piece suggested that the “collectible” factor may be greater than any streaming backlash.

If anyone’s counting, this is the third episode this season involving hallucinations (SNW: “The Griffin incident” and SNW: “Level Five Transporter Accident” being the other two).

We can add Spock’s hallucinations of Ortegas and Scotty as plants in “Human Best Friend” to that list.

I actually had no idea who Deidre Hall was

For those who have never seen it, she’s been on “Days of Our Lives” for 50(!) years.

The key line is “Space adventures leave little time for humans to deal with their inner struggles”. This line is important because it is wrong.

It’s a little odd - I agree that it’s the key line of the episode, but I don’t think it’s necessarily meant to be universally true (though it does reflect Pike’s beliefs, or at least his avoidance of dealing with his own stuff [Edit: This is almost universally true of our captains over the years]), and I don’t think it’s really the point of the episode.

What I took away from it is a meditation on reality and perception - in a way, maybe the key line was actually what Pike said about the details fading, but the memories remaining. I think anyone who has experienced enough loss in their lives would find that pretty impactful.

I was enjoing the soap opera silliness up until that point, but I ended up really respecting the statements they were making through Pike’s journey. It takes on an added dimension when you consider where he ends up, living out the rest of his days in a Talosian illusion. I wonder if Juliet will be there…

What the heck, I might as well make this my top-level comment and include some other scattered thoughts:

• Soap operas deserve more respect than they generally get - those people work.

• On that note, it was great to see Marlena herself, Deidre Hall, as the counselor. It’s hard to imagine a better choice.

• I’m glad Spock slept through this one - he’s hallucinated more than enough this season. And Ethan Peck crushed it as Evil Twin Sybok.

• One thing I do think has been missing this season is connective tissue for the character arcs. I suppose it’s been there for La’An, but she’s mostly been treading water. It was nice to see her dealing with the fallout of a breakout she initiated, but it still seems fragmented. The same can be said for pretty much everybody else.

I haven’t actually seen “Training Day,” but I suppose both films have entrenched authority figures with outdated and/or corrupt ideas of How Things Are Done, and younger subordinates who have to walk through the ethical minefield that’s been laid.

And I agree, that could be good Trek.

Wasn’t the big complaint against Star Trek: Section 31 was that people didn’t want to watch Corrupt Space CIA?

I think the much bigger complaints are that it was boring, derivative, and had nothing to say?

The good news is, the word “glorify” does not appear in this article.

Yeah, I mean it’s barely a description at all - we’re surviving on scraps over here.

playing the hits

"…while this [script] isn’t a cynical or nihilistic take on it, I think it does acknowledge that there are some bad apples in every institution that can have a strong voice and can really make an impact on that institution and everything it stands for.”

How could they possibly think this is relevant subject matter in the year 2026?

Oh jeepers, I hadn’t considered the Yelchin angle.

My thoughts on this are lengthy, complicated, and probably a little bit self-contradictory, but I think some of the accusations of “gimmicks” are a tad overblown. But also a tad not overblown?

“Valles Marineris” - A pretty standard Trek episode IMO, albeit one with time travel and a twist.

“The Griffin Incident” - A horror episode, but not really a gimmicky one. Star Trek does those all the time.

“Human Best Friend” - Definitely pulling from a specific comedy genre, YMMV.

“A Case of Chiaroscuro” - I won’t argue with accusations of “gimmick” here, but I thought its use of the genre was in service of a pretty damn good Star Trek story. And DS9 in particular went to the noir well a few times over the years.

“Level Five Transporter Accident” - perfectly normal, nothing to see here.

“Off-Hour” - Pretty standard Trek.

But they definitely do a lot of genre play, and recent interviews with the showrunners indicate that it’s completely intentional, and unlikely to change any time soon.

I’ve been reconciling it by focusing on each episode as its own thing, independent of the others, and hot damn, it’s surprising how hard that’s become for me.