Shades of Green

 Blu-ray, Lower Decks S5 (Shades of Green)

Whoops. The kind of episode that makes me think maybe it's actually a good thing that Trek is no longer in production any more if this is the kind of extreme ideological stuff and weak plotting they were knocking out... It seems identifying the title with the weakest episode of 'TNG' may have been portentous! Where to start, then? I actually didn't have much to think about during this story, it just seemed to have so little of interest. Start with the good, I suppose: T'Lyn trying to keep Rutherford occupied since she's noticed he hasn't been himself since Tendi left. She may be the best character the series produced, and I've said it before, certainly the best Vulcan in modern Trek (not a high bar, admittedly, but she does a creditable job of being a believable example of the logical race, unlike most aliens who never seem that alien - case in point the Tellarite, Gorm, who doesn't argue incessantly!). I enjoyed the little tribute to Data standing and staring into space while waiting for Picard to go to sleep, in this case T'Lyn waiting patiently for Rutherford to finish his work - although... would that be an efficient use of her time, surely she could have done some work on a PADD or something? The fact I'm starting to nitpick shows I was at least invested in this C-plot of the episode, though I can't say as much for the A- and B-plots.

I can understand the writers poking fun at the ridiculousness of Trek's 'post-scarcity' future, since it's never made any sense, or why would there be wars for resources or control of areas? (For that matter, aren't gold and jewels all obsolete anyway since they can be replicated, that's why Latinum was precious: because it can't be! So why would Orions want this junk?). I always go back to Picard's mumbled, 'holier-than-thou' speech about how the Federation doesn't need money any more, or use it (and the fun 'DS9' ribbing of the concept when Jake wants to buy his Dad an antique baseball card, but doesn't have any money because he's an 'evolved' human of the 24th Century - 'if you don't need money,' says Nog, 'then you don't need my money!'). It demonstrated why it's best not to think too deeply into how Trek's universe works, details modern Trek has mistakenly shown too much of (not just regarding money, but even basic domestic details like people cleaning their teeth, the kind of thing it would be better to leave to the imagination, but lack of imagination is one of this era's defining characteristics!). The reality is there is still a cost to everything, and that's energy, and while we can say they have technology that enables vast amounts of energy to be released (warp, Phasers, etc), something doesn't come from nothing. If they were seriously pointing out how terrible capitalism is then I don't think they'd have had the questionable act at the end where Freeman hands over all the planet's wealth to the family of her crewmember! Nepotism? It comes across as if they 'conned' a planet out of its wealth with Replicators and then ditched their economy. All of which was a bit uncomfortable in today's polarised political climate.

It's always important to remember the series is primarily a comedy, and while it's 'supposed' to make sense in the world of Trek, and be considered canonical, they are going to be wacky at times. Frequent times. The real story, in any case, is Boimler trying to be a fun boss, never a sensible idea in the first place since authority needs to have some distance to enable it to function properly and enforce discipline. Not that discipline is high on the agenda of modern Trek where everyone does what they want and argues with their superiors as a matter of course, but generally 'LD' has been better at such things than the others, one reason I suspect it feels more like Trek than they do, and is so liked by many in consequence. With Boimler's four-hair moustache and the new 'Bointers' to give advice (the inspiration being Lefler's Laws from 'TNG,' but in this case he clearly got the idea from his alternate rather than her), Boimler's arc this season of trying to emulate his alternate self is rather transparent, and therefore somewhat pointless since you can see where that storyline would lead: just be yourself. I have to say I found his and Mariner's roles rather lacklustre, didn't really go anywhere (other than to a fancy hall in a posh house that looks like it was out of 'The Matrix Reloaded,' though perhaps it was merely a generic posh hall, since no martial arts take place, in slow motion or otherwise). No, nothing really to comment on, it was just the pair of them tracking down his lost Away Team.

The A-story is Tendi's messing up of her entire family's position in the Orion Syndicate (I suppose you could see loose parallels with Worf's discommendation, but if that was intended it wasn't very well executed). The war between her family and the blue 'Oree-ons' has meant less profits, or something, so they pull the old space race challenge out of the back pocket of discarded sci-fi concepts. It's never a good idea and suggests a series rather running out of them, even with the solar sailing ships that gives it a more piratical feel. Add to that the culture is incessantly and simplistically feministic (green Tendi girls good, blue 'Oree-on' men bad), and it quickly becomes tiresome, the two sisters competing with each other or Tendi trying to protect D'Erica since she's read her Personal Log and discovered her pregnancy. I also don't buy the Orions would have a Queen (Sabor, voiced by Debra Wilson, Captain Cusak in 'DS9,' her second and final role in modern Trek here), since the whole point was that the true situation of women being the dominant force was meant to be a closely guarded secret. The best we can suggest is they don't allow outsiders on their planet, but in an age of recording devices and easy broadcasting from anyone it's hard to see how the secret would stay secret. It's also all too girly with choice lines like D'Erica telling her sister at the end that she doesn't want her girl growing up to see her doing anything other than what her heart tells her. Ick. This is where Trek had come to, though to be fair 'DSC' started it all in that direction right from the beginning and 'LD' has still been far more realistic than the other recent series'.

It's rather rich of a mega-franchise that requires payment to watch nowadays to be pointing out the 'evil' of the system in which it's made, Trek being a product manufactured in order to make money! It's hard to take any satire about profit or the extremes of capitalism seriously in such a setting, but there's always been a tug-of-war between 'art' and 'profitability.' Still, some people do genuinely watch Trek believing this world will one day come to reality, but unfortunately that's meant modern Trek had to dumb characters down, and in keeping with the modern ideals of 'being yourself,' even if that encourages selfishness, focus on oneself, and lack of care towards anyone else, made them more like 'us,' to the extent people from old Treks that went back in time and found people to be so different to them, could now go to their fellow Trek series' and find the same thing: modern Trek characters are us now! (With the exception of the odd superhero character like Burnham who could almost do no wrong, and even when she did, escaped real punishment and was soon shown to be righter than right!). When an episode only leads me down the rabbit hole of denigrating its stablemates I know it hasn't succeeded, and while I wouldn't say it's on a par with the worst Treks of recent years, it is one of those episodes that shows up the weaknesses in the modern crowd. Not least the excessive swearing I noticed again! And the fact Tendi just turns up back in Starfleet as if you can waltz in and out however and whenever you feel like it (rather than the real world reason of having her leaving be a cliffhanger ending). But the real issue was barely seeing any of the supporting cast at all (even if some of them do voice other characters instead). The blazzard squawking was amusing. As was seeing Goodgey poking his head up in the Cargo Bay. Yep, that's all I've got.

**

Dos Cerritos

 Blu-ray, Lower Decks S5 (Dos Cerritos)

The final season of yet another Trek series begins already, but that seems to be the way with streamers, ten episodes a season and done in five seasons or less, a far cry from the depth and latitude afforded to the old 'factory' production of the 90s. It was meant to be a new Golden Era with all these different Treks, at one point five series' appearing in a single year, I think, but the quality just wasn't there, so in reality this Golden Era was much more factory-like than the so-called classic period which was bashing out greats on a regular basis. But there was one shining example in all the new Trek sludge... well, maybe a lightly glinting example, anyway, and that was this 'Lower Decks,' a series that had its ups and downs, for which we can be grateful there were ups at all since most were almost entirely downs, but as with this opener, even the stories I couldn't say were particularly outstanding had plenty of little pleasures to savour and if there was one bright spot of this era, this was it (and with the recent suggestion of a potential spinoff film from creator Mike McMahan, perhaps the days of 'LD' aren't quite over just yet?). To recap: I disliked Season 1 apart from the finale, which showed promise, grudgingly purchased Season 2 and was more than pleasantly surprised to find it the best modern season of Trek with a finale that was the single best episode of the Kurtzman Era, followed by a pretty good third season, a slightly disappointing fourth (with the caveat of a strong and Trekky resolution to all three of its homegrown villains), and so, while I was onboard for more 'LD' by this point, I also didn't have high expectations for the final season.

First impressions are the slickness (and sharpness of this beautiful Blu-ray edition - for all its faults, the series looks the best with its clean and gleaming Starfleet style), followed by remembering how much out of place swearing and inappropriate laxness there is! After watching 'Voyager' the last few months it takes some getting used to return to the low standards of modernity, but in fairness most of it comes from Mariner herself rather than being spread around, and somehow the casual or contemporary speech never bothered me quite as much in animation and with the fast-paced style of this series - it's not that I can overlook it, but I've got used to it much more and come to at least like the characters, something I can't say for any of the other casts of recent times! I'd forgotten what the overarching storyline was for the season until they mention the rift in space and then it all came flooding back. It's very lightly introduced here, no indication we'll be dealing with this sort of thing season-long. They'd done Cerritos doubles before on the series, but only the comedic way of other California-class ships (or ship, I can't remember which), having almost identical crews with slight differences (like a male version of Freeman or a Boimler that looks like a fly) - what am I saying? It's all comedic! But in this case it was played a little more seriously in that it's the old trope of them meeting an alternate reality version of their ship and selves, a time-honoured tradition in Trek that I felt missed a lot of opportunities to examine humorously in this episode.

They could hardly have Other T'Lyn with a beard! And we do get bearded Boimler (which also becomes a bit of a recurring theme for the season), an entirely cybernetic Otherford, Captain Becky (so is her full name Rebecca Mariner Freeman? Either way I actually largely preferred this professional version as it showed what she could be, minus the extreme discipline!), King Billups (why is he still serving on a starship - to avoid his regal duties?), but Freeman ended up at Starbase 80 (something else to be revisited later), and Tendi left to become a pirate, devastating Otherford and turning him inwards to become our Rutherford's warning. Some nice little character work going on and after an absence it is nice to get back to these people. I just don't think the story had that much going for it - very slight. Surprisingly, Tendi isn't back with the crew at end of episode as she refuses to leave her responsibilities behind when the blue 'Oree-ons' declare war against the greens (not environmentalists, the Orions!). The series has always shown a great love and affection for 'The Animated Series' of the 1970s, and this was up there with the return of the Kzinti to Trek. They really were ridiculous (even more than green aliens usually are), but their overconfident stupidity was somewhat endearing - they came across much like Pakleds so it would be interesting to go back to 'TAS' and see if they were potentially the seeds of inspiration for the least intelligent race in Trek (to the extent they were used for one 'TNG' episode, then only ever seen as background until 'LD' - even the great 'DS9' didn't see fit to expand upon them, a service they made to so many of the 'TNG' aliens).

Tendi shines through as the most Starfleet of all, constantly restraining her bloodthirsty crew from killing, secretly healing a casualty and generally striving to impart Starfleet values to a very un-Starfleet situation, but not looking like she was striving to impart Starfleet values to a very un-Starfleet situation! If you were drawing morals from the story, her emphasis on non-lethality and not being forced into extremes of enmity by others, wasn't a bad take-home. And we learn her crew secretly wish they weren't pirates anyway - they want to bake or dance (I thought she was going to break out in the famous 'Animal Woman' dance of 'The Cage'), or teach, all typically feminine practices, which was a nice way to show that even Orion women are 'human' at heart and are drawn to the things modern society considers stereotypical and 'beneath' them, which was a nice twist. Tendi's own sister, D'Erica, holding her in hock, sums up her sibling's true desires quite effectively, even couched as a teasing insult ("You miss debating the ethics of goop"), but Tendi earns respect for staying to deal with the 'Oree-ons' who call Tendi's tactics 'un-piratical' for using laughing gas to capture this old and rare Orion medical ship that may have been used to cure The Great Plague.

We know so little (probably nothing, actually), about Orion history, so any little detail concerning them is of interest, though modern Trek is so bad at world-building and the development of species that even if it was in full production rather than ground to a halt and limping to a closure with the final seasons of 'SNW' and 'Academy' I doubt they'd ever have expanded upon anything mentioned here. There are of course the usual little Trekferences put in for the fun of it, such as Captain Becky's swagger stick (or riding crop, here - hadn't we seen a similar callback to 'Star Trek III' before on the series?), or her statement that 'no interpersonal conflict is allowed on my ship,' a dig at the Roddenberry edict that has gradually been lost through such casual and loose interpretations of Trek in recent times, but which 'LD' excels at calling attention to. You could say they call attention to the Kelvin Universe again since they have Becky's crew standing at attention whenever she walks past, something we saw on the USS Kelvin (and one aspect I actually rather liked, amazingly!), and it made sense that this alternate Cerritos considered their existence as in the Prime Universe (another concept introduced, or at least named, in 'Star Trek XI'). It was very in keeping with this series that Freeman views their closing of these rifts as the kind of 'second tier' job the Cerritos is used to carrying out, describing them as fixing 'space-time potholes.' She has a way with words, but a shame she demeans her ship as a matter of course...

The big thing for Boimler is meeting his alternate who is much more like Riker - confident, an achiever, even wearing the same beard (it looked good!), while our self-doubting fellow is pushed out of a magazine feature on the top 30 under 30 officers in Starfleet - the greater insult being not only is he not in the top 30, he's not even in the honourable mentions below, pushed out by a ten-year old Naomi Wildman (I can believe it). This Official Starfleet Magazine, 'Fleet,' as it was called, was quite obviously a pastiche or tribute to the Titan mag made in England for almost thirty years, right down to the layout of the cover. Too sad that after finally getting as close as it could to appearing in Trek, the magazine itself ended just the year after this was made (2025), but I'm sure they wouldn't have been aware that was about to happen when they were making this episode. It was my constant companion during the height of Trek's greatness, through the declining years and the fallow period, and survived to see almost all the new Treks debut, so it was nice to see it acknowledged in some way. And in the same way we get other tributes with the 'LD' logo now sporting ghost trails behind it, duplicating the effect used for Season 5 of 'TNG' - and of course they add more to the major battle in the opening credits, now joined by the green hand of 'TOS,' the Tholian web and to cap it all, when you think it can't get any more extreme, V'Ger shows up to twang its presence. Even the use of a Palor Toff-like character (not Kivas Fajo - he's the name I always remember, but it was Toff who had the metal band woven in and out of his face. Hilarious when he cries it's 'prescription' when one of Tendi's women tries to rip it out!). But did they break canon when one of his Hupyrian servants speaks? It was speaking to him, but I thought they never uttered a word in front of anyone else due to a vow of silence?

Although there were some good morals on display, I also had to question Rutherford's tampering with Otherford to program him to want to make friends. That seems a bit presumptuous to force a change in someone like that, especially as it was to benefit Rutherford! It's only a brief moment and it was for his own good, but it stood out as a kind of un-Trekky thing to do that sometimes betrays that these modern writers don't always stick as close to Trek's manner of doing things in the good times. If nothing else it shows a disadvantage to being cybernetic if you can be so easily manipulated, and of course I'm making more of it than was meant since Rutherford saw he could do some good by interfering, but still, it would have been better if he could have used his charm or logic or something other than a direct adjustment to his program to help him make a change, though time was limited, I grant. Just a little nitpick, too: I don't see Hupyrians being bested by Orions in a fight. There's a reason the Grand Nagus used them as personal bodyguards - they were big and tough. I know, it's silly trying to maintain some semblance of Trek reality in something that's little more than a half hour comedy, but that's one of the tugs of war within the series that they want to be true to Trek, and are, in so many ways compared to the live action productions, so you want them to stay true in every aspect, so when they aren't, it can stick out. Otherwise it was a fine start to the season, nothing special, but that's also the point of 'LD': to be short, individual stories that can delve into any aspect of Trek, the way Trek used to be, allowing for the broad gamut of choice from week to week. But why is Gabrielle Ruiz (T'Lyn), still not in the opening credits, she steals the show? The slight twitch around the line of the mouth was like all-out merriment for a Vulcan!

**

Endgame (2)

 DVD, Voyager S7 (Endgame) (2)

First, I have to apologise to 'Star Trek: Picard' - I was so sure Seven of Nine ended 'Voyager' with a smaller Borg implant above her eye and ridiculed them for not staying true to that, and then I finally get around to the end of the series again and find she has just the same large implant as the rest of the series! I must have been confusing 'Human Error,' in which we see her without implants on the Holodeck, and the operation the Doctor wants to do on her in 'Endgame' which will unspool her emotional side, as strong and visual evidence Seven was adjusting to become more human, but there isn't a visual change and I wasn't even sure the Doc had had time to perform the op - my other complaints about the 'Picard' version of Seven still stand, so I'm not about to recant and come around to the awful choices they made with her, and I will say I found her to be at her most pleasant in this episode. But enough about Seven, it isn't really about her, other than her future death acting as a catalyst for the most grievous temporal violations from a regular temporal violator. Just as she used to wryly observe the 'TOS' era would all be kicked out of Starfleet in her day for their cowboy diplomacy, I can imagine a new generation saying the same thing about her for all her failures to abide by the Temporal Prime Directive. Or did that even exist at this point, I don't remember? Either way she'd be very harshly criticised for all the incursions and alterations, and I would too if there was potential for me not to exist based on a decision she made (except those 'unborn' voices would never get a chance to accuse).

If it isn't a Seven story then it has to be a Janeway story, and here we get two for the price of one: Admiral Janeway come from the future to make sure every member of her crew makes it back to the Alpha Quadrant. Except she seems to have forgotten that risk is part of life, no one can know what the future holds, that's entirely the point - the best line came from Chakotay when he states not even an Admiral from the future can guarantee what's going to happen tomorrow, and therein lies a critical flaw with the story. A Janeway that has forgotten what she was there for, lost sight of the bigger picture and the reality of life being death and loss, and typically stubborn Janeway, refusing to accept any defeat. At least there was some kind of backlash against her with Captain Janeway and the crew acknowledging it was the journey that was most important, not the destination, an uncharacteristically wise speech from Harry saying it best. And that Janeway's decision to strand her crew in the Delta Quadrant in the first place was not the wrong one, she did what was right which often carries a sacrifice making it even harder, but no less right. But Trek is supposed to be optimistic so of course it had to end happily in spite of the nefarious ways in which they got themselves there.

I do feel quite conflicted in a lot of ways about this as a finale. You can clearly see they were trying to duplicate the weight of the time-based story of 'All Good Things...' in which we jumped between different points of 'TNG,' its beginning, its current end, and the future beyond, only not to be quite so direct about it we only have the future beyond. That in itself was good to see as it reminds us of time and the passing of such, that bittersweetness of living out life, but also knowing everything ends, the changes, the heartaches, the losses, so it was fertile ground for a Trek finale to explore, even if it doesn't do it as effectively as 'TNG' did. They also had to bring in the Borg, and specifically the Borg Queen one last time as being the closest they had to a recurring villain, one of the disadvantages of the series being that they were always moving on, making it very tricky to be able to deal with the same people for long. We see the heart of the Borg's power with one of their Transwarp Hubs, something which enables them to travel anywhere in the Galaxy within minutes - it strikes me as a rather big plot hole that they haven't showed up at Earth to assimilate it again. Or Qo'noS. Or Vulcan. Or... you get the idea. When trying to work with big ideas you're more likely to slip up, and I don't recall any excuse for why the Borg don't just sweep the entire galaxy away (as they did in an alternate universe in 'Parallels').

It was a nice touch to have Alice Krige back as the originator of the Queen, even if the setting has none of the scale or menace of the past and in fact I found all the Borg stuff to be rather small fry, other than the actual Hub itself. I'm not sure we even saw any Borg drones with the Queen. It's a nice callback, but she's hardly Dukat to Janeway's Sisko, simply a confounded enemy who is quite petty. Another nice touch was in keeping with the future uniforms seen in 'All Good Things...' and the combadge, the latter of which would be the only part of the setup to make it to the 'actual' future as seen in 'Picard.' That's the thing, we've now gone beyond all this time period, even in the future and although we know here that the future will be changed, it's still a lessening of the impact the future scenes have when seeing them now. But with Trek seemingly about to come to an end (and not before time, many would cry), with only the dribs and drabs of a couple of poor series' to come, it seems the right time to be reaching the end of one of the great and classic series', the first I watched from the very beginning to the very end, and which will always hold a special place in my affections.

Seeing it end now is a very different feeling, the abruptness of the success at the very end was always galling, but back then there was still some hope they might continue into films when 'TNG' had had its fill, but of course it wasn't allowed that, 'Voyager' never given its dues. We've since had 'Prodigy' as an animated follow-up that brought back a few characters (and across all the modern Treks the only characters not to be reprised were B'Elanna and Neelix, so that's pretty good going when you think how few 'DS9' and 'Enterprise' cast-members were allowed to return), but none of the cameos or other can give us the satisfying conclusion the series needed. And I do like this episode - the technical qualities are there to see with the two Janeways acting off each other superbly, the beauty of the Hub, the pleasure to notice little details like future Reg Barclay being so much more assured, only reverting to his nervous tics under pressure. Old Janeway showing her mettle with the Klingons is one of my favourite things - we get to see Tom and B'Elanna's daughter, Miral Paris, setting things up for Janeway with the dishonourable Korath, protective of her commander, but when it comes to it Janeway goes in alone and doesn't need her 'protection.' If anything, I wished there was more of that side of things, Korath an atypical member of the race, an inventor, but one Janeway easily bests, and not through violence, but guile.

Something the episode does well is the personal: Janeway and Janeway, Tom and B'Elanna, Harry coming to the realisation he's already lost his best mate to marriage and Fatherhood even before the baby's born - that was one of the strongest parts of the episode, Tom's vehement belief that he's already home, Voyager is their home and he's not going to be doing anything to jeopardise it, himself or his family. Chakotay and Seven is a bit strange if we didn't already know Seven had been trying holo-Chakotay on for size recently. It does almost come out of nowhere, but that's another aping of the end of 'TNG' with its Worf and Deanna direction. I'm not sure the poignancy quite works as well for me now, there isn't much of it and the episode barrels along without as much of that necessary closing out of these people and the place they'd inhabited for so long. And of course it would have been so much more affecting if we could have seen them reach home, their families, set foot on Earth, the strangeness of leaving the confines of Voyager for good - they'd been off the ship many times, but always to return before long, it would be a huge wrench to suddenly find complete freedom again.

I've never been a fan of the future technology being used (though on this occasion I noted how the crew were doing all the work out on the hull themselves because there are no drones or robot assistants in this universe, unlike what was portrayed in modern Trek), and it seems all too easy they can have this physical shield come up around the ship, or blast Borg Cubes into oblivion with single Torpedoes. It was all a little easy. Which contrasts with the toughness of the future scenes, whether it be Janeway dealing with the Klingons (good use of the cave set once more!), to her mourning of Tuvok in his presence as his degenerative disorder has taken hold (she leaves him a cast photo as a parting gift - how thoughtful!). But it was clearly wrong what she did, as heroic as it was. At the same time there were unlikely to be any ramifications for the writers to deal with since the next series, they knew, was going to be in the past, and the 'TNG' films could stand alone (and as it happened would get only one more outing), so I can see why they did it. I can imagine that Kim speech closing out the episode if they hadn't forced the trip home and that the point was they were still out there. That would have been the more 'romantic' route to take and left the possibility open for further adventures in the future, and perhaps even the return home as a big draw for a film. I don't really know what was the right way to go, it's so long past that the end of the series has little relevance in Trek for good or ill, we haven't explored the ramifications because Trek has never fully returned to the science fiction, science-based, thoughtful, canonically sound world it had been.

Melodrama, comic book unreality, fantasy and emotion are what makes Trek these days, and you can see some of the seeds of what was to come even as far back as 'Voyager.' I think for me, the entirety of Trek has become less engaging in general. Partly for no longer being in want: either for new Trek or the ability to see any episode or film any time. It's lost its specialness. Part of that is ageing, but the far larger part is the poor directions and major flaws of what it became, so different to what I grew up with and that accompanied me on the journey, to the extent that even writing reviews has lost a lot of its joy. I no longer need to get out my thoughts on Trek because it's becoming increasingly less important - it still has importance, but it's as much about the nostalgia and sentiment, grabbing back to a time that is rapidly fading away, an unreal world and life where the joys of the past almost only exist in memory. That's quite sad, but I've really reviewed all the old Treks, and other than finishing 'Lower Decks,' have no interest in writing about modern Trek because it's too dreary, uninteresting and irrelevant to me. These last two seasons of 'Voyager' were actually my second run through at reviews since I started with them and felt I needed to expand on the shorter reviews I made in those days.

But I digress... Before I go, I do want to mention a few things: Neelix gets a small scene playing Kadis-Kot with Seven, a nice touch, and the same for Icheb with Tuvok and Harry, unaccountably beating the Vulcan and Kal-Toh (all futuristic games must begin with a 'K'!). Voyager's status as a museum would be borne out in 'LD.' Chell has volunteered to take over from Neelix as master of the Mess Hall, and it's a shame we never saw that as I imagine he'd have been a bit Neelix-like (only much more sensitive towards the crew's dislike of his dishes, I imagine). The Majel Barrett computer voice was still being used in Admiral Janeway's time, at least in this alternate timeline - in that same time the Doctor decided on 'Joe' as a name, but how could a computer man marry a flesh and blood living being? They throw in all kinds of issues like this knowing they'll never have to examine the workings of them, so it's a bit of a cheat. It's claimed Chakotay was never the same after the death of his wife, Seven, but that doesn't ring true for his character who was always so philosophical and capable of adapting to any situation, as seen by how quickly he bowed to Janeway's authority as Captain, or in 'Resolutions' he was much more ready to settle on a planet and make the best of it. The Doctor suggests Seven is running more simulations with holo-Chakotay, which still strikes me as wrong (even though we know the whole crew apparently has holographic templates in the ship's database according to the previous episode!), and I'm really not keen on the Admiral's micro SD in the brain so she can connect with a neural interface. Harry made it to Captain to shut up all the complainers he was still an Ensign (even then he was worried about being busted back down to that rank!). And Tuvok quotes Spock's needs of the many, but for me it was more special to have the symmetry of a scene with his Captain in her Ready Room, like the pilot.

They close out, typically, with some old faces on board, with Vaughn Armstrong in his eighth Trek role (and fourth on 'Voyager,' soon to become a recurring face on 'Enterprise' - it's truly unbelievable that not one single modern production has used him!), as Korath. Richard Herd (also known as a Klingon on 'TNG'), returned for his fourth appearance as Admiral Paris and his final Trek role (he died in 2020). Manu Intiraymi in his eleventh and final appearance as Icheb. Alice Krige as her second and last live-action appearance as the Borg Queen. And Dwight Schultz as his twelfth time playing Reg Barclay, the sixth on 'Voyager.' As I mentioned before, it was the last time Roxann Dawson played B'Elanna Torres and Ethan Phillips played Neelix. But how would I rank 'Endgame' with the other series finales? 'DS9' would still be king, 'TNG' second. I don't know, but I think I prefer 'Enterprise' to this one now, I'd have to watch again. I've since seen a further three Trek series end (four if you count 'Prodigy,' but that was cancelled), though none of those are even in the conversation! I felt generous with my former rating for 'Endgame,' so had to mark it down, but it also marks a definite end to childhood and transition to the next stage, so for all its flaws, easier to see with the passing of time, I still retain a fondness for it and the time in life it stands for, and the series as a whole remains my second best after 'DS9,' something that will never change.

***

No News Is Something News - The State of Star Trek

No News Is Something News - The State of Star Trek

Hearing nothing about the future of Trek beyond the limping out of the final seasons of 'Strange New Worlds' and 'Starfleet Academy' is bad news in the sense that it's sad news - no more Trek for the foreseeable future in a world where everything keeps being redone over and over? But it's good news for the fact that Trek has been done so badly for so long that we're at the stage where it's a relief not to have to watch any more of it. At one time I would have still held hope that the next iteration created by a different generation might recapture the essence and qualities so long lost, but now I don't even have that slight optimism, and in all likelihood when they do bring back the Trek name it'll be even worse: you like the fact that they brought back so many past Trek actors returning to their characters (even though there was a whole list of bizarre choices like the Punk on the bus, the outrageous Okona, or Shelby... okay, the last one I mention for being a poor way to finish out a character), well in the 4th generation it'll be all gender rebootings and recastings to better balance the ethnic mix of the world. You like canon (even though it's been broken, stomped underfoot and maybe even spat on), well it'll all be 'free' from canon, unrestrained and unconstrained, and if you think 'but they can't ever entirely get away from canon since everything they do becomes canon and they have to stick to their own internal logic and consistency even if it conflicts with past Trek's canon,' I would just refer you back to the 3rd generation of Trek (2009-2027: 'Star Trek XI'-'Academy'), in which they didn't even seem to regard their own details as important to stick to!

As you can see, I view the state of 'Star Trek' as not good, to put it lightly. Since last year's examination of its state I've finished two more series' and got up to date on another: 'Discovery' Season 5 was the usual stuff, the same old flaws, the same contemporary dialogue and manner, the same empty, meaningless 'adventure' for the sake of it, with the same annoying characters. 'Lower Decks' was at least more of the reasonably entertaining, but not going to set the Trek world alight, fun, but streaming series' never seem to be made to 'bed in,' have time to become a staple of viewer's lives in the way the 2nd generation did (1987-2005: 'TNG'-'Enterprise'), when they were making 26-52 episodes a year, watching on a weekly basis as part of life, where now it's about cramming in as many different TV shows and films as possible, bingeing them to keep up with everyone else for fear of missing out. In that landscape Trek is just one tiny morsel of flavour devoured in the mad rush to get to the next thing before it's spoiled for you, and where does Trek fit in a world where people no longer make an appointment (whether that be on TV or a trip down to the video shop to get the latest VHS tape), to view, can just watch whenever they want and move on to the next empty production?

When I think of old Trek I tend to think about the homeliness of it all, Tuvok sitting at his accustomed seat in the Mess Hall, or Bashir and O'Brien playing darts at the back of Quark's bar, those bits between all the adventures that made the adventures more real, more a part of their everyday lives, and by extension, ours. Every modern Trek series has its equivalent bar or Mess Hall, but the characters are so barely developed as people and the time is so much taken up with wacky stuff that there's so little reality to modern Trek, even if it weren't trying so hard to be 'hip' or relevant. It's become a parody of itself - intentionally with 'LD,' that's the whole point, and if anything it's pulled back on that a touch to allow those characters a little more room for growth, successfully or not, but with 'SNW' it's a whole different thing: we need to bring in Scotty and Korby and Trelane and the Gorn and the Metrons and... endless rehashing, and not for the sake of being true to the history since they're so far gone from that they seem not to even try. But then it is subtly hinted it's all an alternate universe, even if they publicly appear to claim it'll all marry up in the end.

I have no anticipation for how 'SNW' will end, presumably next year unless they're desperate to drag out the little new Trek content they have in the hopes people will still care for longer. The characters from the word go were not the characters from the 1st generation (hmmm, would that be 1966-1973, or 1966-1991, or 1965-1994...?: 'TOS'-?), but completely overhauled modern people that have no connection with the mythical 23rd Century at all. They talk like us, they think like us, they act like us... even the Vulcans are barely Vulcan and it's a real travesty to see how badly such classic characters could be handled, or mishandled. Not to say I didn't enjoy any of Season 3, but not as Trek in the style of 'TOS,' merely as less dull 'SNW,' and after the low points of Season 2 it could be argued it would've been difficult to sink that low again (though they tried).

This is all before the absent film series even enters the mix: what happened? They've claimed a film here and a film there nonstop for years, I can't even remember what the latest imaginary film production was aiming to be or when it was supposed to be coming, but then TV Trek has become the same as film Trek pretty much always was: only interested in the melodrama and big, sweeping grandness of visuals and action rather than the steady learning and getting to know the people over twenty-odd episodes a season. And it really is noticeable if you do go back and watch the old stuff (especially the 2nd gen), as I've been coming to the end of 'Voyager' (again), and enjoying it.

I'd actually forgotten that it will be the 60th Anniversary of Trek in September - not so much forgotten as phasing in and out of memory like I'm stuck in the Nexus or something, the echo of me recalling that things weren't always this way. Now and again I see something with a 60th logo on it, but in the same way as at the 50th we were slightly lost in terms of the celebratory traction, only 'Beyond' there to mark anything at all, and the promise of a new series still a year away, in the inverse of the 40th when we'd just lost series Trek, but a film was on the way. It seems the 30th will be the only 'recent' anniversary to succeed at making it feel special (even the 35th in 2001 was sort of between houses, 'Voyager' having ended, 'Enterprise' just begun, but not in a position to do something special for the whole of Trek, as it were). So it's hard to believe this year we'll be as far away from the 30th as it was from the first broadcast of 'TOS,' many more actors have been lost, not to mention creatives behind the camera (but William Shatner still goes on!), and it all just goes to show how short human life is, the space of two 30-year chunks has mostly taken a man's lifetime.

Why am I meandering away from Trek itself to philosophical musings on time? Because there's not really much to say. Trek in 3rd gen hasn't quite come to a stop, but that was simply the size of the train whose brakes had been pulled, and I expect most people had abandoned ship long ago as it grinds inexorably to a halt in the middle of nowhere, forgotten in the wilderness.

As I've taken to doing, I'll rank the 3rd gen seasons in merit order, with the caveat that after the first three they're all much of a muchness and mere guesswork to say where they stand (apart from the bottom three):

- Lower Decks S2
- Picard S3
- Lower Decks S3
- Lower Decks S4
- Lower Decks S5
- Lower Decks S1
- Picard S1
- DSC S4
- Prodigy S1
- DSC S5
- DSC S3
- SNW S1
- DSC S1
- Short Treks
- SNW 3
- DSC S2
- Prodigy S2
- SNW S2
- Picard S2
- very Short Treks

As expected, 'LD' S5 was in the upper tier since I do actually enjoy seeing most of those episodes and look forward to reviewing them soon, while 'DSC' S5 was about on the same level as S3, being quite unremarkable, but I liked the Vulcan woman Saru marries and I can't really think of anything else (other than Callum Keith Rennie failing to get anything to explore a very lightly established alien race from 'DS9,' a waste of talent and potential, and of course Tilly was back...). 'Prodigy' S2 never went anywhere for me. That leaves 'Academy' as a series I really don't want to watch, other than the shameless use of Jake Sisko to make me want to see that episode so I'll probably have to buy the season (even though I suspect Picardo will be wasted). Nothing really changes in my anticipation as new Trek is so unappealing, it's just about ticking it off the list rather than enjoying, hoping there'll be at least one episode a season I get something out of:

SNW S4: *
S31: -
SFA: *
next film: **
TNG Blu-ray: ****

Last year's anticipation was:

Lower Decks S5: ***
DSC S5: **
SNW S3: *
S31: -
SFA: *

I haven't touched on the business side of things with Paramount being under new management and a merger with Warner Bros. which will both have affected Trek's future, but whether for the good or bad, who knows? One thing's for sure, we're losing the Trek, and perhaps only a want of it is our only hope - failing that, forget all that's been made in the last twenty years and get stuck in on the old stuff! I got the 'TNG' Blu-ray collection for Christmas and it got me through Season 2 where I'd been languishing for literally years, every episode an undiscovered country thanks to the sharpness and detail on display. I'd certainly consider splashing out for 'Enterprise' on Blu-ray as it makes such a difference, and I now fully understand all those who've been bemoaning the lack of 'DS9' and 'Voyager' in such form. 'TNG' (and finishing up 'Voyager'), has by far been the highlight of my Trek viewing year and that's the way it's looking likely to be for the foreseeable future, maybe even forever!