Boldy Discovering A Modern Day Star Trek
Its crazy that we live at a time where Star Wars Episode 8 is about to come out, a new Blade Runner movie is out next week and a new Star Trek series just aired on TV/streaming services. Star Trek Discovery is a show that is surprising that it exists as I never thought there would be a new Star Trek show. The series got a half reboot when the JJ Abrams movies came out and the decision to keep them seperate from the rest of the Star Trek series allowed a new show to brew and eventually be made. Star Trek Discovery takes a few key aspects from both the original series as well as the new movies and that is what makes it so good.
Star Trek Discovery opens with basically a double episode cold open as you actually haven’t been introduced to the Discovery ship yet. Instead you get to meet the core character of the series, Michael Burnham, as she serves on the ship Shenzhou under the command of Captain Georgiou. The Shenzhou ship discovers an unknown vessel in space which leads to the return of the Klingon Empire and the series set up of the battle between The Federation and the Klingon Empire.
Discovery isn’t just exciting because its a new Star Trek Series but it is instead excting because of how well it is made. You can not only see but hear that there is a lot of heart and effort put into the series already. Everything from the design, which yes most people hate the design of the main ship even though they haven’t seen it in action in the show yet, as well as the sound, the visuals, the characters and story, which does an impressive effort to set up who the enemy is, why they are the enemy and who the main crew are in the story. Discovery takes aspects from the JJ Abrams Trek films in terms of design and cinematography as the shots are more stylised and pretty instead of looking cheaper and easy to do like previous series. This is obviously largely due to modern technology being able to create better visuals, aka the Alien to Prometheus effect.
What I dig most about the new series is probably a weird thing to relate to if you’re not a critic or constantly watching new shows. I’ve spent the last few weeks watching brand new shows and watching pilot episodes for those shows, lots of reviews coming soon, and one thing that I’m sick of is the pilot episode introduction to characters and their problems because a lot of the time its that episode where you tell your friend “oh and don’t worry it get better after the first episode”. Star Trek Discovery starts off so smartly by basically having a movie length cold open to what the series is. Instead of the boring pilot that could’ve been shown you instead get an action filled prologue where anyone’s life is on the line. The Discovery ship hasn’t even shown up and that leads to more excitement because its interesting to see where the show will go next because Michael isn’t the captain and she, at the end of the premiere, is not in a position she wants to be in.
I’m not a huge fan of the Star Trek series, I can’t go on and on about how the Klingons are different in this series compared to others and I don’t have the same gripes that Trekkies might have with the show but I understand what the show is to people and how important it is to get right. If you’re not a Star Trek fan but instead a fan of modern-day television that’s filled with drama and intensity to the point where you hope the next episode is leaked then this could actually be for you. If you’re a Trekkie who isn’t optimistic on it then I say give it some time because from the start it really does feel like they’re building a story and a series that will be worth watching and sticking with. Discovering new ground is the aim of Starfleet, as they are explorers, and the show, like it’s title explains, is already boldy discovering what a modern day Star Trek show is meant to be.