Reactions to Strange New Worlds Season 4 Episode 1

 So I did not post anything all last week because I’ve been writing a Star Trek fan fiction with my writing time instead. When I finish that I will post it, but I was feeling a little lazy today so instead of adding more to my fan fiction, I decided I’d write up my reactions to Strange New Worlds Season 4 Episode 1, which has the added benefit of I can update y’all on why I haven’t been posting - don’t worry, I’m not being lazy, I’m being ambitious.

I have written down “twirling effect is weird” which refers to when they enter the storm or whatever and it spins the ship around in a circle. I don’t hate it but it definitely feels like something I’ve never quite seen on a Star Trek before effects wise, but hey, its pretty mind bending and probably very cheap so as a way to signify time shenanigans I’m down for it. I am not opposed to Star Trek being silly and cheap, if anything they should be sillier and cheaper.

I also have written down “name drop already?” because at two different points in this episode Una says “Strange New World(s)” and… its kinda dumb. I know I just said I’m okay with dumb stuff but name dropping twice in one episode seems like it was just so they could have a clip for the ad, and to be honest its dumb in the ad too. Obviously not a big deal, but it rubbed me the wrong way.

I also have written down “Why is there Iridium on Earth? Earth was notably low on Iridium until the meteor which killed the dinosaurs struck.” But that’s actually the episode writers being a step ahead of me, since this is explained when it turns out the source of the iridium is an alien ship, AND then later a chunk of that alien homeworld becomes the meteor that kills the dinosaurs. Honestly a clever way to show you did your homework science wise for this episode even if this is a fictional world that posits Mars used to host an alien civilization and the asteroid belt used to be a planet full of insectoids. I suppose though I would be remiss if I did not mention they call them both Insectoids and Arachnids and arachnids are not insects, a mistake which my oldest kid won’t shut up about. Its a minor thing but in general I do think Star Trek should -try- to get what actual science it mentions as correct as possible, even if that is a standard literally no Star Trek ever has managed to hit. But like, they SHOULD be trying, and I do think that despite that this episode clearly did try, what with the iridium as well as the feathered theropod, even if they fell short, both in that way and in other small ways - the pterodactyls were not alive at the time the asteroid hit, for instance. But still, overall I am pleased that they clearly put effort into not making mistakes even if they did not do a perfect job.

Overall, I enjoyed this episode. It was a great tribute to classic pulp science fiction - albeit perhaps not as emotionally resonant and politically meaningful as when DS9 rid a tribute to pulp science fiction in Far Beyond the Stars. The Martians were fun, the dinosaurs were fun, and the discussions about ways to solve conflicts without violence was very Star Trek. I do have two major complaints though.

First of all, the resolution left a bad taste in my mouth because it comes across as sensing the message that there are some situations where you have to allow a genocide to happen. This plays into a very common theme in Strange New Worlds about the immutability of history and fate and destiny what with Pike’d time crystal foretold doom, and I hate it every time it comes up. Here, though, it was an unforced error. This has nothing to do with the time crystal, but yet again they are sent back in time and they “have” to let the Martians genocide the insectoids because it will lead to our future. Pike actually says he was not even sure that he HAD to do it but chose to anyway - why? Why was his gut judgment call to let a genocide occur? Later on M’Benga is like, no worries, you had to do it to create our future, and those bug guys definitely would have killed off so many other races, but he doesn’t know that. They did not even attempt to communicate with them. And what is the actual lesson suppose to be here? Time loops don’t exist in real life, and as Steve Shives says, Star Trek is suppose to be about the present, not the future (or the past in this case) - we should be interpreting any messages as applying to our lives, so the most literal meaning of the episode - that sometimes you’ll get stuck in a time loop and have to let a genocide occur because it is a lynchpin of history - is meaningless, but trying to generalize that to the present leaves us with, as mention, “sometimes a genocide is necessary and you shouldn’t worry too much about it?”

I mean, I think the actual lesson is suppose to be about seeking other ways of resolving conflict and the ending is merely a way to reset the timeline and we are not actually suppose to draw any conclusions from it. They needed to finish the plot and they couldn’t just go and let them change the timeline. But its actually way more common than you would think for Star Trek to accidentally write in a required genocide and justify it in various ways, and I’m sick of it. Casually endorsing genocide isn't something Star Trek should do, even by accident, and there are literally infinite stories you can tell which don’t accidentally have he unintentional message that there are some circumstances where a genocide is necessary. They could have written it differently, but these writers chose to tell this story about a time loop cause by a genocide and thus forced their own hands into writing a storyline that requires the captain to allow a genocide lest he change the timeline. 

But that brings me to my second point. Let them fucking change the timeline! This is literally the first Star Trek I can think of where they not only try not to change the timeline but actually succeed. Like Sisko became Bell! The TOS crew stole whales! O’Brian got replaced by a couple seconds off time travel clone! Discovery literally changed the timeline by time traveling to the future to eliminate control as a major plot arc, and this is a spin off of that show! Picard let that one dude stay in the past, in a season all about restoring the timeline! Yet Strange New Worlds has a real stick up its ass about preserving the timeline it seems. The way, way more fun way to end this episode is for them to have taught the Martians how to communicate with the insectoids and then when they come back, now the Federation has Martians and insectoids as members, and dinosaurs never went extinct. Why not? Let the nerds argue about what that means for the timeline and canon, it makes the setting more fun to let the writers do silly things like that. Star Trek constantly handwaves stuff like that in older series and sure, it drove fans crazy, but they also loved those series. Modern series wringing their hands about preserving the timeline serves absolutely no one.

But yeah, I did like the episode. I just wish it were bold enough to ignore the timeline in order to tell a better, more Starfleet story where the captain doesn’t shoot from the hip and allow a genocide, is all.