The Problems Persist

I really hoped that after nearly 800 years the Klingon bullshit would have mellowed out some, but it's more like they quadrupled down on the bullshit.

I thought Jay-Den would be a savior, not an enabler.

Edit 1/30/26

I've been sitting with this for 24ish hours now and I have thoughts:

If we had been show Jay-Den practicing healing and getting smacked down by the Klingon bullshit, I would have been happier. I would have actually learned about Jay-Den. As it is, we are only told by his brother that Jay-Den likes science and healing and we see their dad calling healing a worthless pursuit. We never see Jay-Den's experience with what we are told he loves.

Imagine if there had been a scene where Jay-Den sets a broken leg of his family's pet targ and then places a spint. He smiles. He's proud. His brother is proud. And then his father come and kills the targ because it's a wounded beast. We would see his pain.

Or, going with what we see in the episode itself, what if shortly after Thar died Jay-Den said, probably under his breath, that it would have been more honorable for his brother to have been healed and to die in a real battle rather than being poisoned in a fight at some crap vendor on Krios.

As it is, Jay-Den did almost nothing in the episode. Other people do stuff for and to him. Thar give him the idea of going to the academy. Darem gets him to focus. One of his dads stops him from even trying to heal his brother. His family abandons him. He does nothing and I learn nothing about him.

Well, that's not quite true. I learned that he wants to kiss Darem, but is afraid to do it. I wholeheartedly support these two kissing. Sooner rather than later, please.

Klingons... Man, I have so much to more to say...

Less Phasers, More Politics

Since we know that Strange New Worlds will be ending in about 20 episodes and don't have a clue if Starfleet Academy will go beyond the first season, I've been thinking about what I'd like to come next for Star Trek.

If it were up to me, I'd like to expand Star Trek TV shows beyond Starfleet. One of the things I liked most about the first season of Picard (and I think the first season was the most interesting and the best season) was that many of our heroes may have come from Starfleet, but none of them were Starfleet officers. Starfleet was there, but wasn't central. I'd like to see more of that sort of thing.

If we're not on a Starfleet starship, I think we should focus on a group from the Federation's diplomatic corp.

A smallish diplomatic team of Federation citizens from many different worlds would have a starship and travel around the Alpha and Beta Quadrants to different worlds and starbases getting involved with political and diplomatic intrigue.

I'd set the series after Picard so the show can explore things like the Alpha Quadrant's recovery from the Dominion War, the destruction of Romulus (which was ignored after the first season of Picard), and the Ferengi joining the Federation.

New worlds would be visited.

Alliances would be forged.

If the series need to have a legacy character to be hung on, I'd bring back Molly O'Brien. After Picard she'd be in her late 30s/early 40s which is the perfect age for her to be leading a diplomatic team for the Federation. She was born on a starship. She grew up, practically, on Bajor and (if you count the relaunch books) Cardassia. She has experience with lots of non-humans and non-Federation citizens.

I don't know if Hana Hatae is still acting. It'd be great to use the same actress, but -- for no good reason that I know of -- they recast Bruce Maddox, so... you know, there's precedence.

I see great potential for political and spy stories with this setup. Which I guess means Section 31 could show up. If they do, can we please go back to how they were portrayed in Deep Space 9 and Enterprise? You know, when they were the bad guys. Section 31 is the antithesis to what the Federation and Starfleet stand for. They should always be the enemy. They are never in the right.

And, while I often enjoy serialization in TV shows, can we tone it down some? Take it back to an older style of TV serialization? One of the things I disliked about Picard and Discovery was how our heroes kept losing over and over until the last episode. Why can't they have some real victories? Wven if the victories don't relate to the season long arc? Maybe move to the Enterprise season 4 style of serialization and do 2-3 episode arcs. I thought that worked really well.

That's what I'd like to see out of a new Star Trek. I'll be there for whatever, though.

Captain Janeway

So, I'm watching the Star Trek: Voyager documentary, To the Journey: Looking Back At Start Trek: Voyager, and I had to pause to get a thought out. It's a thought I had before, but didn't share.

Kate Mulgrew was not the first Captain Janeway. Geneviève Bujold was the first Captain Janeway.

For the most part, I adore Kate Mulgrew's Janeway. She is the cool aunt who knows everything about anything and will tell you bawdy stories and sneak you sips of wine. She loves you unconditionally and will run into a fire to pull you out.

Geneviève Bujold, from the few scenes that I've watched, was not like this. Her Janeway was more like the quiet, stunningly beautiful librarian. She saw you and respected you and wanted you to achieve greatness, but she lets you succeed and fail on your own merits. She might not jump in if she sees you having a problem, but if you ask, she will help you to the best of her ability and you will be all the better for it.

It's interesting to think what Voyager could have been if Geneviève Bujold could have handled the schedule. I don't know if it would have been better, but it would have been spectacular, in a very different way.