Featured Essays Star Trek: Discovery WhyStar Trek: DiscoveryIs My Favorite 21st-Century Star Trek After a rocky start‚ Discovery has become a sterling example of Treks ability to ask big‚ challenging questions while still being a whole lot of fun.. By Charlie Jane Anders | Published on April 10‚ 2024 Credit: CBS / Paramount+ Comment 0 Share New Share Credit: CBS / Paramount+ Back in 2022‚I wrote a newslettersaying that you can loveStar Trek: Strange New Worldswithout putting down its sister show‚Discovery. Which is true! I love both shows a whole lot. I also am obsessed withLower Decks‚ which I rewatch pretty obsessively. I have a lot of love forStar Trek: Picardas well. And Ive grown to appreciateStar Trek: Prodigygreatly since it moved to Netflix. We are truly blessed to have so much amazingStar Trekright now‚ and theres no need to pick one show over the others.And yet‚ I still feel the need to come out and say it:Star Trek: Discoveryis my favoriteTrekof the 21st century so far.The final season ofDiscoverylaunched last week‚ and Ive been remembering why I adore this show so much. These characters have a special place in my heart‚ and Ive been loving the exploration of Starfleet in the 32nd century‚ centuries after the otherTrekshows.Discoveryhas become a thoughtful‚ expansive show that asks big‚ challenging questions‚ while also being a whole lot of fun.Minor spoilers for the most recent episodes ofDiscoverybelowCredit: CBS / Paramount+Discoverygot off to a rocky start‚ to say the least. Annalee Newitz and I discussed the first season inthe very first episode of our podcast Our Opinions Are Correct‚ and there was a lot to talk about. Season one leaned into being a war story‚ something thatDeep Space Ninehad already done brilliantly‚ and then veered into the Mirror Universe‚ which is one of those settings that gets less interesting the more you see of it. The first season featured a lot of upheaval behind the scenes‚ with co-creator Bryan Fuller leaving early on and the replacement showrunners being let go. Season two served as a backdoor pilot forStrange New Worlds‚ while also unspooling a somewhat tangled storyline about black ops and A.I. from the future.Much likeStar Trek: The Next Generation‚Discoveryreally hit its stride in its third season. Thats when the crew of the Discovery traveled forward into a far more distant future thanStar Trekhad ever explored before. The show gained a new lease on life and the Federation felt wide open once again‚ with so many new places and ideas to explore.Season three ofDiscoverytells a nuanced‚ brutal story about rebuilding the Federation after a huge setbackand questions how far our heroes are willing to go restore what has been lost. Season four is a rich story of first contact‚ in which aliens from outside the galaxy have unknowingly unleashed an anomaly that threatens civilized worlds‚ and we have to learn to communicate with them before its too late. Season five‚ without going into too much detail‚ is following up one of the most tantalizing stories fromTNG‚ about the Progenitors‚ those ancient humanoids who seeded the galaxy with humanoid life long ago.(Side note: this trope of ancient humanoids who spread their DNA around the galaxy is sorta adjacent to all those Ancient Aliens memes. It seems to emerge fromChariots of the Godsby Erich von Dniken‚ and it inspired the moviePrometheusas well. A huge part of my young-adult novelVictories Greater than Deathis my attempt to deconstruct and subvert this trope‚ by having my ancient superscientists turn out to be basically eugenicists who wanted to breed humanoids to be part of a bizarre weapon. I originally wanted to have everyone refer to my ancient beings as the First Humanoids‚ but theShe-Racartoon introduced some ancient creatures called the First Ones. So I decided to change them to the Shapers‚ which was honestly a little bit less catchy.)Anyway‚ at this point‚ I should probably lay out some criteria. What makes for a goodStar Trekshow‚ in my view?There are a few elements that seem really important. I loveStar Trekwhen it exploreshumanism‚ using huge cosmic stories to show the resilience and ingenuity of human beings‚ and to explore what it means to be human. Exploration feels like a key part ofStar Treks DNA as well: not just traveling to places where no human has gone‚ but also finding vastly different forms of life and learning to understand creatures who are nearly incomprehensible at first glance. Finally‚ I likeStar Trekwhen it explores the relationships among the crew‚ and lets us see how they help each other to grow and reach their full potential‚ something thatGene L. Coonwas keen to explore on the original series and which became a key element inTNG.Resilience and ingenuity have been at the core ofDiscovery‚ especially since the third season. The crew are forced to grapple with a radically different future‚ one in which the Federation has suffered some huge setbacks‚ and they use their wits and pure inventiveness to help the Federation rebuild and regain its ability to travel at warp speeds. The fight against the oppressive Emerald Chain‚ which enslaves people and exploits whole worlds‚ includes many temptations to compromise the Federations values‚ and its gripping to watch our heroes struggle to stay true to their beliefs.As mentioned above‚Discoverys storylines have also involved the struggle to understand creatures whose way of thinking and communicating is vastly different from our own‚ which forms the climax of season four.Credit: Michael Gibson/CBS 2020 CBS Interactive‚ Inc.At this point‚Discoveryhas a robust cast of science geeks. Engineering is actually getting a bit crowded‚ what with Stamets‚ Adira‚ and sometimes the wonderfully deadpan Jet Reno all standing around being geniusesand thats before you add Tilly‚ who is capable of being an absolute science mastermind in her own right. If you missed all those scenes inTNGwhere Data‚ Geordi and the other crew debate scientific problems and technical solutions‚ thenDiscoveryhas been serving up huge chunks of catnip for quite some time now.A lot has been written about just how gayDiscoveryreally is‚ from Stamets and Culbers marriage to the T4T relationship of Gray and Adira to Tillys lesbian fungus fling. Plus‚ again‚ theres Jet Reno. But the thing I really love aboutDiscovery‚ going into its final season‚ is just how much beautiful romance there is across the board in this showeven besides the stuff I just mentioned. Saru has been having a whirlwind courtship with TRina‚ the president of NiVar‚ which is the reunified Vulcan and Romulan homeworld. And Captain Michael Burnham has a stormy on-again-off-again love affair going with Book‚ a smuggler she met when she first arrived in the 32nd centuryIm really rooting for those two to work out their problems‚ because they have ridiculous chemistry.Im not used to seeingStar Trekput romance front and center for so many of its major characters‚ and I love it.Finally‚ the thing I love aboutDiscoveryis how its characters have been allowed to change and grow‚ something the first two episodes of season five take great pains to remind us of. Out of the characters whove been there since the first season‚ none of them is the same person they used to be‚ and weve gotten to see them evolve over time. In particular‚ theres a huge emphasis on redemption arcs‚ which is a subject close to my heart. Michael Burnham startsDiscoveryas a disgraced mutineer‚ and is now a highly respected captain with a twinkle in her eye. But a lot of these characters have been allowed to make terrible mistakes and learn from them‚ becoming better people as a result.When people callStar Trekan optimistic show‚ I dont think theyre just talking about fancy technology. I believeStar Treks true power is its optimism about people: our ability to keep being better than we were‚ and to choose kindness and understanding over brute force. More than any otherStar Trekshow right now‚Discoveryexemplifies this belief in our potential as a species‚ which is something that I personally really need right now.[end-mark]This article was originally published atHappy Dancing‚ Charlie Jane Anders newsletter‚ available on Buttondown.The post Why&;lt;i&;gt;Star Trek: Discovery&;lt;/i&;gt;Is My Favorite 21st-Century Star Trek appeared first on Reactor.