What has the new series done to ruin Star Trek this time?

[Ray Hardgrit]

That 'Don't you sometimes get happy just because there are new series?' thread got me thinking about times a new series introduced, revealed or retconned something in a way that may have spoiled previous series and tainted Star Trek a bit overall. Maybe the choice was a good idea in the moment, for that particular episode, but with hindsight it was a Pandora's Box that should've stayed shut.

These are some of the things that jump to my mind:

• TNG - Changed the Prime Directive so that pre-warp civilisations shouldn't be saved from apocalyptic disasters. This then carried over to the other series and movies that came after, and it seems like we're stuck with it. Of course the heroes always save them anyway, because it's blatantly the right thing to do, but now they have to bend or break Starfleet's rules to do it. Here's a better idea, how about Starfleet has rules that benefit people.
• DS9 - Introduced Section 31. These guys were a bit controversial even at the time, but later series just won't leave them alone, making them more and more a crucial and accepted part of the Federation. It's immensely harmful to a franchise all about characters from a utopian society trying to live up to their ideals, when characters who betray those ideals are working in the background to make sure things work out for their side.
• Picard - Revealed that the transporter system stores DNA information that is common within each particular species to simplify processing. What? All this time I thought the transporter actually moved people, every atom of who they are returned to its original place, but now it turns out it takes massive shortcuts. This is legit horrifying, I hate this!

Also here are three positive choices, for the sake of balance, and because I actually like Star Trek:

• Voyager - Finished off the Borg and gave Starfleet much faster engine technology, setting up an exciting new status quo for a new chapter of Star Trek. We had to wait 20 years for that next chapter, but we got there in the end.
• Enterprise - Revealed that Kirk's world of starship captains had admitted women right from the start, which actually makes sense seeing as Pike had a female XO.
• Discovery - Finally resolved the Romulan unification arc from TNG, making that whole storyline more satisfying.

Can you think of any terrible things that happened to Trek when a new showrunner with fresh ideas took the conn? Any concepts that got out of hand to the detriment of previous shows? Any times the new series did not make you happy?

 

[BillJ]

Any times the new series did not make you happy?

I just find the current shows largely dull, and overly in love with showing off the writers knowledge writ large. Trek has become overly expensive fan fiction.

 

[somebuddyX]

I think they ruined Trek by making a second pilot. Everything since then has gone downhill.

 

[at Quark's]

TNG: Rather than doing, endless talking. Picard's sleep-inducing speeches.
DS9: We'll live up to our Starfleet ideals! Except to accommodate for some trivialities, such as, erm, survival.
VOY: To boldly try to go where all others already are.

(and no, I'm not serious here).

 

[Orphalesion]

From what I can gather TNG and ENT (and possibly SNW) committed the unforgivable sin of contradicting fanon, fan assumptions, and things established in old supplementary materials.
And that seems to rile up certain people more than any actual 'canon' contradiction.

 

[BillJ]

From what I can gather TNG and ENT (and possibly SNW) committed the unforgivable sin of contradicting fanon, fan assumptions, and things established in old supplementary materials.
And that seems to rile up certain people more than any actual 'canon' contradiction.

Sure. Many were with Star Trek through the franchises many lean years, they built narratives in their heads to help keep it alive because they loved it, then someone they've never heard of comes in and kicks it all over.

Some humans are funny that way.

 

[1001001]

I will never understand the idea that something new “ruins” something old.

All the old shows are still there, exactly how they were.

 

[BillJ]

I will never understand the idea that something new “ruins” something old.

All the old shows are still there, exactly how they were.

I used to agree with you on this stance, until Star Trek: Picard. Now, when I watch TNG all I see is Robot Picard. It really did ruin TNG for me.

 

[tomalak301]

The first thing that jumps to my mind is Hugh being killed off in Picard. They had a storyline with Hugh, the ExBs and Picard's PTSD and they went in a completely different direction. Heck, they could have carried all that through to Season 3 of Picard and not change the season very much. I know the showrunners wanted a GOT feel to Picard, but it was just really lame and upsetting.

 

[Greg Cox]

I will never understand the idea that something new “ruins” something old.

All the old shows are still there, exactly how they were.

Exactly. And this extends beyond Star Trek. The world is full of disappointing sequels to favorite movies. Doesn't mean I can't enjoy the original movies anymore. They're still just as well-made and entertaining as they ever were.

I just skip watching the sequels I don't like.

 

[fireproof78]

I will never understand the idea that something new “ruins” something old.

All the old shows are still there, exactly how they were.

Same


They are distinct entries in the franchise, and the connections do not override the independent nature of the shows, series or episodes.

Exactly. And this extends beyond Star Trek. The world is full of disappointing sequels to favorite movies. Doesn't mean I can't enjoy the original movies anymore. They're still just as well-made and entertaining as they ever were.

I just skip watching the sequels I don't like.

Indeed, yes.

 

[Greg Cox]

They are distinct entries in the franchise, and the connections do not override the independent nature of the shows, series or episodes.

Bingo. There's something to be said for just enjoying the individual episodes or movies (or books) on their own terms without worrying too much about how they fit into some larger picture.

 

[Citiprime]

I think the argument is that it's similar to some people's disappointment with season 8 of Game of Thrones. That show has some stellar episodes of television, and there's great character arcs over the course of the series, and people can still enjoy those moments for what they are.

But many fans feel like that season 8 "ruins" it, to the point that they don't get the same enjoyment out of the early episodes because they know it all leads to a mess at the end.

The argument for Star Trek would go something similar to this, which is that the choices some of the Paramount+ shows have made colors the stories in the same way. That, sure, you can still enjoy "Best of Both Worlds" for what it is. Or just enjoy Deep Space Nine for what it does with the Dominion and those character-based stories like "The Visitor."

But if you see Star Trek as a grand saga with connections and continuity, then Discovery basically locks the result of all of that into being mostly destroyed by "The Burn," Earth, Vulcan, and Andoria divided, and everything is basically the same technically except starships having detached nacelles, programable matter, and personal transporters that let people jump around Nightcrawler.

Some people just find that a disappointing end-point to have as canon.

 

[HotRod]

The appearance of the USS New Jersey in Picard Season 3.

I've got no problem with it, but it's certainly annoying how many use as proof that DSC and SNW must be an alternate timeline.

 

[James Cole]

No one hates Star Trek more than Star Trek fans. No one hates other (types of) Star Trek fans more than Star Trek fans. This is yet another example of the NuTrek meta-debate that has been going on since 2009, and certainly 2017. TOS vs TNG? That's largely left behind in the 1990s. B&B ruined TOS with ENT? Well Kurtzman and Goldsman have told B&B to more than hold their beer.

What are some of the major divides amongst the fanbase?

Politically, you have the "Star Trek was always woke" people versus the "Star Trek was always modernist liberal secular humanist" type people that encompass the broader center right to the center to the moderate liberal to the Old Left. Some see the current identity politics left as the present state of liberalism, others see it as fundamentally illiberal. In short the agitprop vs allegory people. But many people here actually care about the canon more than the politics, which brings us to...

The canon people vs the story people. For the former, Star Trek is greater than the sum of its parts. They're fans of the lore, the world building carefully built up over decades. Don't you mean continuity? Well the aforementioned Braga among others always called it canon. So canon it is. These are also the people that see Star Trek as a period piece, as an alternate future that gradually broke away from the real world in the 20th century. Yes, Star Trek's canon has never been perfect. TOS especially had some early installment weirdness. Yet alone among properties of such size, continuity flowed together well enough to have chronologies, tech manuals, and encyclopedias published. Tie-in novelists could then take on explaining why Trills looked different in "The Host" versus everything after. TOS may not exactly have been favored during the Berman era, but it was always treated as having happened and looked the way it did.

The story people don't seem to care too much about the world building. For them the interconnected worldbuilding could be more of a burden than an asset. When NuTrek started to explicitly overwrite TOS, they would pull the well your TOS DVDs etc are still there. So you have no grounds to complain. But, can you have a TOS novel if it's beholden to the bastardized revisionism established by SNW? It's no longer a TOS novel then, just a SNW sequel. The canon people also tend to be completionists. So they historically watched even bad runs of Star Trek. And many elements of NuTrek were not just bad in their own right, but wouldn't stay in their own lane, cross-polluting long established world-building.

DISCOVERY has been litigated to death. SNW seems to get a pass in comparison. But it's next to impossible to have a good faith debate when people are so far apart in their standing positions.

 

[Frontis]

I don't think any series ruined Star Trek.

 

[fireproof78]

Yet along among properties of such size, continuity flowed together well enough to have chronologies, tech manuals, and encyclopedias published.

Doesn't that rely on external lifting than actual "canon?"

 

[Orphalesion]

Sure. Many were with Star Trek through the franchises many lean years, they built narratives in their heads to help keep it alive because they loved it, then someone they've never heard of comes in and kicks it all over.

Some humans are funny that way.

Sorry, but people cannot expect a n ongoing franchise to respect ideas and concepts made up by the fans or to stifle their creativity just to avoid contradiction some passage from an old RPG supplement.
That's just not how those things work, and it's a reality of engaging with an ongoing franchise.

 

[fireproof78]

Sorry, but people cannot expect a n ongoing franchise to respect ideas and concepts made up by the fans or to stifle their creativity just to avoid contradiction some passage from an old RPG supplement.
That's just not how those things work, and it's a reality of engaging with an ongoing franchise.

Agreed.

More than that, to me, future installments cannot ruin a franchise because franchises by their nature, grow, change and develop. Star Trek initially was an Earth driven polity out and about, until the Federation showed up.

Star Trek is a wonderful franchise in that it fires the imagination but often times is strangled by past perceptions of it all hanging together, and external resources saying one thing is it must be correct. It hampers vision because it must squeeze in the tinier and tinier box of what is deemed "Star Trek", not by writers or producers but by fans who claim greater ownership because of greater knowledge.


It's frustrating in its limits places in enjoyable stories.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

I just find the current shows largely dull, and overly in love with showing off the writers knowledge writ large. Trek has become overly expensive fan fiction.

Or they just have interns look that shit up on Memory Alpha.