When watching Trek with my teen about halfway through TNG S3, my kid says, “Dad, I think I like Star Trek more than Star Wars. Star Trek *means* something. Star Trek is about something.” I have never been a prouder father.

I was 9 when the original series premiered. I can't begin to express how much it meant to me as a little mixed-race girl to see Mr. Spock, also mixed-race. He became, and remains, one of my favorite characters in the franchise.

The inclusion of Stone was an especially cool move in TOS as it establishes that Kirk's boss is a black guy. The same goes for Daystrom and M'benga, it establishes a trend of depicting some of Starfleets best and brightest as black in a time of extreme racial tension.

An interesting story about Roddenberry creating Sulu. Roddenberry originally wanted Sulu to be ambiguous on his exact East Asian heritage. He was looking at a map and saw the Sulu Sea between several Asian countries and thought that was perfect to represent East Asian more generally.

Glad to see the mention of Devil in the Dark, that episode had such a profound impact on me when I was a kid. I learned when I was very young that even the acid-spewing rock monster was just another kind of person we could learn how to talk to. So years later when people tried to tell me that Black people were somehow fundamentally different and not as deserving of humanity, or that gay people were somehow fundamentally different and not as deserving of humanity, those ides never held much sway with me. I like to think I would have grown into a decent person anyway, but I know there are other kinds of prejudice that it took me a lot longer to understand and try to grow past. Devil in the Dark definitely primed the pump for accepting different kinds of people as just people.

I have heard scientists talk about looking at Star Trek and being inspired by the technology, and I have heard others talk about looking at Star Trek and being inspired by the society. I think a lot of Star Trek fans have not only imagined a better future, but have worked to create it. Some people may not like the current day Star Trek incarnations, but I guarantee there will be a time twenty, forty, sixty years from now when someone will be saying, "Star Trek inspired me." Quite a legacy it has left, and continues to leave.

The technobabble in Star Trek helps disguise the fact that it is pulp sci-fi. Add to that, the reference books beginning with Mr. Scott's Guide to the Enterprise to the various Technical Manuals and blueprints published for the ships, and you've got yourself the perfect recipe for fans taking the show as harder sci-fi than it actually is.

The influence of pulp science fiction is a great point. Star Trek's ultimate origin lies in Edmond Hamilton's Interstellar Patrol stories in Weird Tales magazine, published from 1928 - 1930. The Federation of Planets; the Captain and his diverse crew on the bridge; viewing everything in real time on a large radar-type screen; a cyborg crew member; an entire crew of every nightmarish shape and size who are totally cool with each other; and cat-and-mouse space battles that would make Khan drool. All within the crumbling pages of 1920's magazines. What a wild, mad leap from anything ever known before.

Generally speaking, there needs to be more frequent, casual references to Moon. Such a good film.

I wasn't born until 1998 and therefore obviously was not around to watch TOS or TNG while they were airing like my parents did. My first introduction to Star Trek was actually through the 2009 film, which I enjoyed quite a bit. Ever since then I've had a fondness for the franchise, and actually went back to watch every episode of TOS which is now one of my favorite shows of all time. However, my biggest disappointment was probably when I realized that Mr. Sulu never says "Oh my!," which I had always assumed was George Takei's catchphrase on the show

wonderful content Steve, I especially love your emphasis on Kirk's speech "the principals of liberty and equality must include everyone or it's meaningless"

As always, lovely video; thanks in particular this time for your bit in helping normalize "queer" rather than tripping over the lettersets. My mother recently used it while talking to me but not before nervously prefacing it with, "I've heard from others in your community that this word is okay so I'm just gonna go ahead and use it now." It's heartening to hear it not shouted in anger

I loved Disco since I watched the first episode. However, on subsequent rewatches, I've noticed an opportunity the writers missed. They expunged Burnham's record at the end so she could resume her Starfleet career, they should have left her record as it was and let her resume her career. It could have been a powerful message about how ex-cons rejoining society as full citizens with equal rights.

When I'm feeling charitable, I think a lot of the people complaining about an undefined missing element of Star Trekiness in newer Trek are talking about the comfort and nostalgia they get from the show. I don't think that's invalid, just impossible to address if you're making new content. You can't bake in 30 years of fond memories and cultural relevance.

I'm honestly not sure that I even like Star Trek. I feel all warm and tingly when I watch it because it was my dad's favorite show. Watching it makes me feel as though he's still here.

Star Trek to me is the Star Trek is always been the characters and their relationships and interactions

Steve! I wept at least three times watching this. I've watched every single star trek video you've made and I think this is the best and most important. We also said "nailed it" simultaneously. Thank you. Never stop.

These exact characteristics are always why I was so excited to see Star Trek come back to TV in 2017. Particularly the idea it puts forth that we have to be optimistic about the future, even in the face of what times can seem insurmountable challenges, is an argument I think the world needs to see more of (similarly; west wing). There has been such an explosion of "grimdark" TV/movies -- everything from game of thrones to Batman killing people -- and that both reflects both how we are feeling already, but can (I believe) contribute to societal apathy, nihilism, etc. Just as diverse representation matters, one of my FAVORITE things about Star Trek is that is constantly shows us that optimism matters too. Thank you for this video and all the great work you do! ❤

TNG did give us a hand waved explanation for why there are so many humanoid races…but it was cheesy and they never really mentioned it again. (I always refer to that as “The Letter From Mom episode “)

Interesting video! If there’s one other essence found in Star Trek, I’d say it’s a “joy for learning.” For me, Star Trek is one of the few shows that shows its characters excited to learn in a positive way. How often do you hear Picard fascinated about an archaeological dig? Or Archer wanting to investigate phenomena himself? The default in this universe is that knowledge is powerful and exciting. In my mind, this quality is why characters are open-minded and curious about diversity.

My dad was always a big Star Trek fan. I grew up watching re-runs of TOS with him. I was born in the middle of TNG's second season. My dad (who shared the name of our dear Captain K) was a staunch Republican who had served three tours in Vietnam and referred to the Peace Sign as "The foot of the American Chicken". I wish the existence of you and your channel was around about a decade ago. My pops passed away in 2019 and I would have loved to have talked about Star Trek in this context with him, to really dig in there and find out just what about this show and its "in your face" left wing politics appealed to him. Thank you for everything you do, Steve. It brings back happy memories of my dad, whom I miss very much.

As you did, it is always worth reminding the fierce backlash TNG had when it started... And now TNG is almost the gold standard of what Trek is for a lot of fans. This tells a lot about how us humans can be so so prejudiced against stuff.

I remember seeing a video on TikTok a while back of someone saying why they liked Star Trek and it was basically your fourth point that you made. He basically said so much sci-fi shows how humanity dooms ourselves in one way or another with wars or whatever, but Star Trek is the one franchise where we get things right and make a better world for ourselves and our kids. When I think of Star Trek, I think about that hope for a better tomorrow for myself and my kids. Also, SO EXCITED for your Generations video next month! Can’t wait! Your rewrites of the Enterprise and Voyager finales are some of my favorite videos you’ve done so very excited for this upcoming video!

Having only recently started watching Discovery, I can sort of see where people are coming from with this. But ultimately it still feels like star trek, even if a different flavor of it. The moment that really sold me on it having the general 'spirit' of it was when the Tartigrade turned out not to just be a rampaging monster, but a creature that had been in pain. And that arc ending with one of the crew taking the burden of hooking up to the network on himself rather than risk killing it and eventually setting the creature free. Discovery isn't perfect, it has flaws, it makes mistakes, but it does still ultimately feel like star trek to me.

This was superb. I *love* that you identify ST as "pulp", because that term needs to be embraced. Too many SciFi fans indeed have a snobbery about "real" sci fi and what they call "fantasy", but let us do what many have done successfully before us, embrace a term used by some derisively and claim it as our own. This is not to say that I don't also enjoy "hard" sci fi, like Arthur C. Clark (though even he stretches things on occasion), but *there is nothing wrong* with our genre. Changing gears now, your analysis was so spot on that you've identified (for me) the thing that makes ST: Discovery not "feel" like Star Trek. For many of us (and this of course is merely our perception), Discovery does not feel "optimistic". I completely respect arguments to the contrary, and without doubt, if examined piece by piece Discovery has fantastic elements of optimism. But it feels like it is in a darker place than most other Trek. Now I have only watched the first three seasons, so I'm limited by that experience, but while I love the characters, and might even argue that Michael Burnham has the single most amazing character arc in all of Trek, the universe in which she is placed *does* feel different than most other ST series. I watched Season 3 in hopes that this would be a way to change this, and while it was a genius decision to fly into the future (and should have been done from the start), but of course that future is one that is a bit bleak as well (though I'm hoping/guessing that Season 4 will turn that around at least a bit). But yes, Steve, I do think that's why so many people think Discovery doesn't "feel" like Trek.

I have always called Treks "(my) space soap opera". I was five when I saw my first Star Trek back in the 60's, and instantly fell in love with Spok and his pointy ears. Aaaand, I just got some new pointy ears for my zombie red-shirt costume for Halloween. Star Trek has always been huge influence for me and I'm happy for it.

First, I am an old fart. Growing up in the 1950's and early 1960's I really enjoyed movies like "The Thing", "War of the Worlds", "Them", etc. When Star Trek first aired, I was in Vietnam. It wasn't until the late 1970's that I saw the original Star Trek TV series on late nite TV. I have been hooked ever since. THANK YOU GENE RODDENBERRY!!

We've been wondering what conservatives could possibly enjoy about Star Trek. When you were talking about "The Omega Glory", and Kirk had to explain the people's constitution to them, and it was identical to the U.S. constitution, I had kind of a realization. There are a number of episodes like that, both from TOS and the TNG era. "A Taste of Armageddon" and "Justice" also come to mind. Some planet-of-the-week has a broken moral/legal/social/religious system, and the enterprise crew tries to fix it. Or sometimes they fail to fix it and have to leave, lamenting the bad situation they were unable to help. I think what the conservatives see here is the heroic Enterprise crew engaging in their own favorite hobby of minding everyone else's business. Just as they may support the U.S. invading a foreign country in order to "spread democracy", they also cheer for what they interpret as Kirk or Picard spreading their own morals at the point of a phaser. Never mind that those morals are the polar opposite of conservative values. That's not the important part. "We think we're right and you're wrong, and we're going to hit you until you stop being wrong." is how they see episodes like this, and that's as far as the thought process goes.

With the serialization of Disco, the progressive themes are woven throughout each season. In the 4th season, one that stood out to me was the progressive approach to criminal justice. Rather than being punitive, it's rehabilitative. The reasons, or context, for committing such acts matter. It wisely eschews the concept that justice should be blind.

So many interesting points. One I feel you kind of glossed over (probably due to time) was the bit about how sometimes the Federation creates the problems and isn't perfect. Nothing exemplifies this quite like the 4-part story of TNG's "Journey's End", DS9's two-parter "The Maquis", and TNG's "Preemptive Strike" which tells the story of the origins of the Maquis group. It covers how the treaty left Federation citizens in Cardassian territory, Picard's refusal to displace them created a tense situation which led to an unconventional war between the Federation colonists left behind and the Cardassian settlers and government moving in, and how the Federation ultimately lets the situation spin out of control. As Sisko later tells Eddington, the success of the Maquis is one of the factors that weakened the Cardassian Union eventually leading to them joining the Dominion. So much of the Dominion War has its roots in that earlier treaty and how Picard let the settlers stay behind.

I'd say the essential ingredient to Star Trek was the idea that humanity has stopped infighting and has finally learned to work together, everyone is included, everyone is valued, and no-one is left behind. Roddenberry's original idea that there should be no conflict within the crew at all was overly strict, but the essential premise was still honoured in TNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise, although DS9 deftly explored the possibility of corruption and dark forces within the Federation while still managing to feel like Star Trek. I think once you step away from this and start pitting your human characters against each other, as a natural state of affairs, now you're just making sci-fi, it's not really Star Trek any more.

Number Five: staff meetings. Star Trek is staff meetings. Kidding aside, the thing that means most to me is how problems get solved (some of the time and mostly TNG forward). A meeting, a consensus, a great speech, mutual compromise. I get that it is wrapped up the progressivism and optimism, but it such a distinct Star Trek way of story telling. Thanks for the excellent video essay!

Great work. Re-invigorates my love of the series and what it represents, and most importantly, the optimism it conveys. Especially in what seems like the darkest timeline, it's important to have this fiction to help us see what could be, and to have video essays like this to remind us that it's still there, guiding and buoying us. Thanks.

Nicely said, but I’m not going to lie. I wish you didn’t dislike Lower Decks so much. Of course it’s fan service. That’s the whole point of the show. Had to get that in. Great video.

It is nice to hear a philosophical take and discuss what true Star Trek at its core is which is the embetterment of humanity and the ability to reach for something better that benefits everyone

I was born overseas in 1966. Family lore has it that Star Trek was the first American television I ever saw, and I've been with it ever since, for all the same reasons you cite, from pulp sci-fi to telling stories of optimism and societal progress.

Space Opera is another common term for the type of SF Star Trek belongs to. And concerning Space Opera and FTL travel, my favorite FTL Drive is the Inertia-Less Drive for Doc Smith's Lensman stories. I'm pretty sure the concept for Inertial Dampers was inspired by that. The Lensman stories being far from Progressive, in fact being downright militaristic, also featured characters from numerous worlds and species cooperating as part of the Galactic Patrol. Another thing concerning "Genre Fiction" vs. "Realistic Fiction" is that even if you are dealing with imaginative and fantastic scenarios, there needs to be internal consistency and emotional plausibility. Books, TV shows, and movies that fail usually do so because the internal mechanics constantly change, or the characters do things simply to advance the plot.

The two most important things Star Trek taught me was how to critically think when presented with multiple viewpoints and how to be compassionate. I learned this at great personal risk in the 70s sneaking into the basement to watch late night showing of TOS on Sundays.

TNG often gets knocked for it's depiction of women in the earlier seasons. It might be worth looking into how that depiction changed and improved over time and with a few jarring exceptions was fairly good by the later seasons. Troi and Crusher both get to take command of the ship and their focus episodes give them far more heroic and proactive roles. It becomes far less common for their stories to focus primarily on romance or put them in a position to be rescued. They are also given more interesting things to do in general. We eventually get Ro, who takes on a similar role to Tasha but is on the receiving end of better writing. By seasons 6-7 the women of TNG are fairly well written.

I remember when I first saw The Omega Glory, it seemed like such a strange premise for an episode. It seemed like a weird combination of teaching solidarity and American exceptionalism. It was only when I was older and understood the context it was written in and the audience it was written for that I really got why it was what it was.

I've always held onto the concept of all the crap we're going through currently, no matter how bad it gets, that humanity will one day dig itself out. Get our collective heads on straight and actually work together instead of warring and fighting ourselves. The idea of a functioning world society, everyone having a voice, is what I consider Star Trek.

For me, the draw has always been the allegory, metaphors, moral conundrums. It’s what Trek is for as far as I’m concerned

I saw my first episodes of Star Trek during the first syndication in Germany. That was in 1972 and I was nine years old. The series was on in the early evening and I was allowed to watch it because it was considered a children's series. That was because all the "difficult" passages were cut out or defused by harmless dubbing. Many episodes that were considered brutal were not even shown - only about 40 episodes made it through the strict court of the censors. I only saw the complete and uncut TOS a few years ago, but then in English. Nevertheless, this series has had a very strong influence on me, possibly even more than many other series, films and books I have consumed since then. The diversity of the series, which was very striking for a German nine-year-old, made a particularly strong impression on me. Although I hadn't seen a black person at the time - and wouldn't meet one for a long time - everything seemed perfectly natural to me. I still remember the feeling from back then: Aliens, Afro-Americans, Asians, Russians - the future is being portrayed, it's all normal. Of course, that's exactly the effect Gene Rodenberry had in mind. In children's TV, such diversity was absolutely unusual in Germany at the time; the world was essentially white - and definitely male. Star Trek taught me an other lesson: Life forms are very different and it's a good idea to be open and friendly. That's how you make friends. That's how you avoid trouble. Maybe except with Tribbles.

I always think of Star Trek as a workplace drama in space. The space opera elements are the set dressing and plot catalysts. At core it's about the characters on the ship, the work they do, and their relationships.

"We make mistakes, but we're human, and maybe that's the word that best explains us." - Janes T Kirk Humanity in Star Trek isnt perfect and we dont always get everything right and there are times people fail, but as a whole humanity is trying to be better, to be more than they have been in the past. The journey never ends, but Star Trek reminds us that it is better to travel than to stay still.

I always thought science fiction and science fantasy were a bit different. But now that we're talking about it, I honestly don't know what would make them so different. So... Yeah. Thanks for giving me something to think about.

What makes Star Trek feel like Star Trek for me? Hope for the future, determination, perseverance in the face of adversity, doing the right thing in a difficult situation, except for when you don't, embracing differences and reversing the polarity on things.

This video brings tears to my eyes. I love this franchise so much.

Star Trek and I are almost the same age, and it's grown up just like i have. The attitudes of American society is reflected in the progress and improvement of ST, and I for one am glad to have my assumptions challenged by the philosophy of ST. I am appreciative of my growth as a person that was caused by the questions raised by the series that would not die.

I don't know if this would fit into your thesis, but another defining feature of Star Trek that sets it apart from other genre franchises is that it's all set within (or viewed through) the narrow scope of a hierarchical organization. The only exception I can think of is "Picard", where the protagonists are free agents acting independently-though even it is arguably post-hierarchical, with its lead being a former captain and member of the Borg collective, etc. It's a lot like "M.A.S.H." or "Hill Street Blues" in that regard; everybody exists primarily in terms of their relationship to The Organization and its mandates/strictures. In Star Wars, characters are farm boys and princesses and pirates. In Star Trek they're either officers or enlisted personnel, personnel belonging to similar hierarchical organizations, or some odd civilian or other encountered by said organizations. All inhabit a controlled and rigorously administered proprietary environment, either giving or getting orders while attending to their duties in rank uniform. It's odd that such a definitively conformist paradigm is used to express such enlightened, liberationist ideals. I find that watching a lot of Star Trek even tends to get me thinking in terms of Star Fleet and its prerogatives.

I've been a Trekkie my entire life. The original show, and the fans that helped keep it alive, are a big part of how I got to be myself very early. Thanks for your thoughtfulness and enthusiasm. LLAP

There is just so much to LOVE about the message Star Trek delivers! The world needs more!

If you REALLY want to see a Star Trek series that REALLY captures the Star Trek sweet spot, check out STAR TREK: CONTINUES. I swear I feel like a kid in the 60s again experiencing actual new episodes of the original series! For example, one of my favorite scenes: Three female ensigns walking down a neon-colored hallway, wearing mini-skirts and go-go boots, discussing what they're going to do later that "night". One says "I'm just gonna go to my quarters and get some sleep." The other responds "Yeah seven vodka martinis will do that to you." Soooo 60s!

Ad Astra Per Aspera is the only star trek anything which makes me cry.... and not just cry but BAWL. So powerful.

I would add a fifth criterion, one that many modern iterations have missed: Star Trek is theatrical. The best Star Trek actors have always been theatre actors, and the best scenes, the ones everyone remembers, are not usually planets blowing up but intense scenes of dialogue between characters.

My 50+ year old special needs brother's favorite show is Star Trek. We've attended conventions since the 80's ( what the hell is Comicon?) Back then the r-word and acceptance of demeaning those lesser than the norm was accepted if not dismissed as 'just the way things are'. Star Trek made my brother feel comfortable about who he is, regardless of societal ignorance. And when the taunting, hate speech, physical abuse, and marginalization just couldn't be explained away as 'that's just the way things are', his little brother would rock the shit out of many people's worlds. Remember, the Enterprise was still a kick ass military vessel that didn't take crap when pushed to far.

Steve I don't know how you do it. But you've done it more times than I can count on this channel you've taken thought and opinions that I've had for years and been unable to properly convey and then swap them into a KZfaq video it almost perfectly conveys one of those topics. Not saying we agree on everything but we for the most part and these videos whether they've Yvonne Star Trek or politics or the other insane things that our world throws at you that you address every now and then they have been a real help in my life it helps to have somebody say what I'm thinking and not sound half as crazy as when I say it simply because you can order your thoughts and presented far clear that I am capable. Keep up the Fantastic work❤

Every 5 minutes, I want to click that Like button, but then, damn, already clicked it.

Not Jeff again. Steve, I think an aspect of Trek that you missed is the sense of wonder. It's that feeling that there's something out there vast and mysterious and we're compelled to find it. Take away the Prophets from DS9, for example, and you have a nicely done show just about war and conflict. I like to use two scenes to illustrate the sense of wonder. The first is fairly early in the very first episode, The Cage, where the landing party encounters some quivering flowers that are singing. Spock touches them and holds them still, and the singing stops. And Spock looks around like, wow, look at that, and he smiles. The other is the end of Wrath of Khan, where everyone is gathered on the bridge, watching the rapid evolution of the Genesis planet. They stare in awe at this act of creation. Kirk looks on in wonder and says, "I feel young." That Trek has maintained that sense in an increasingly brutal world is a testament to it's concept.

The Omega Glory is one of my favourite original series episodes. Its themes of what our planet could've become had calmer minds not been in charge (Imagine Nixon winning instead of Kennedy in 1960 for example).

Star Trek was a western set in space. Rodenberry was into the strongly recognizable characters of westerns, and almost every actor had been in a lot of westerns. Very compatible with it's times, and operatic stories. there will be Star Trek fans for generations to come.

Another excellent essay! I always wondered how I turned out to be such a staunch progressive, I’m a child of Star Trek!

One of my problems with Strange New Worlds is that while they come up with interesting stories, but wrap them up quickly. Its not about limitations of episode length, it’s about trying to fill space with other plots to avoid modern concepts of pacing. It’s like they have good ideas but don’t know how to fully execute and conclude them. It doesn’t make them bad, just underwhelming.

This was a super awesome and informative video :) So glad you went to the obvious great effort to make it. I'm sure a lot of Trekkies appreciate all the hard work. I certainly did!

'That and Phasers' You SO landed the ending.

what makes star trek star trek is exactly every little thing star trek was doing while I was growing up and watching it

Wonderful! My first episode was the one set on Organia, so I didn't start with the first in Sept 1966. However, I did watch every episode after and the reruns when the series went into syndication. In 1966-67, I was in my Junior Year of High School.

Thanks, great piece. I'm a little surprised that there's no mention of Star Trek Continues. I know it's fan made, unofficial, and therefore not part of the canon, etc., but if you're going to talk about 'feeling like Star Trek,' and you don't even mention this series, well, it probably means you just haven't seen it yet. There are eleven episodes, I think, made in the mid 2010s. It takes place within the original Star Trek universe, on the Enterprise with its original crew. The actors are all decent, the guy who plays Kirk, Vic Mignogna, is great- he doesn't exactly imitate Shatner, but he's obviously drawing a lot of inspiration. The plots directly relate to, or follow within the timeline, episodes from the original series. They even got a couple of guest actors from the original series to reprise their roles. That, in itself, connects the two series in a real tangible, concrete way. They use the original theme, and the original monologue, (although it's almost immediately switched up in the second episode, a great sequel to the original one where a few of them get trapped in that parallel universe where the girls' uniforms are sexy and everyone's a dick) The sets, the effects, the way it's filmed- everything re-creates the original series. The familiar bridge, the uniforms, the corridors and elevators. There's even a Jeffries Tube. The same background music/ambient noise, the swishy noise when the doors open, the phasers, etc. I don't know anything about film, but it's like they dug out all the old cameras and filters- this looks eerily like the original. Hell, the actor who plays Scotty is Christopher Doohan. That's James Doohan's (the original Scotty) actual son. Here's the thing: they didn't skip the cheese. There are corny, inpassioned speeches, lazy alien design, oily lens filters, and yes, a green dancing girl, but it seems to me that this is completely in line with the original, makes it feel even more like Star Trek, and is a huge factor in defining/continuing its 'spirit'. Look, obviously, I can't say enough, so here's the last thing. I was a little kid when the original series aired. My TV content was highly monitored and limited by my parents, but Star Trek got a pass because the moms had a crush on Captain Kirk. I didn't get to watch 'trash', so Star Trek was special, I can remember the feeling of excitement and anticipation that just the first three notes of that theme brought on. I curiously watched the first episode of Continues. By the time the theme played for the second one, I could feel that seven year old's excitement. Check it out

Bruce Greenwood ‘s Pike is so underrated

This is completely unrelated to the reason of this video (which is fantastic BTW) but I love the Tom Servo figure on your dresser. That show formed roughly 80% of my sense of humor.

The thing that makes Discovery and Picard not feel like Star Trek, to me, is the relentless grimdark tone and suffering of the characters. To me, it feels like the darkness isn't there to make a point, like it is with DS9 [my favourite Star Trek series], to examine complicated situations with complicated characters. It feels more like it's there for pure shock value, no matter how contrived it ends up being, and, in the case of Picard, reaches such astronomically contrived levels that it feels like the universe itself has a grudge against the characters. Even amidst the Dominion War, there's still moments of levity and fun [episodes like Our Man Bashir, one of my favourite Star Trek episodes ever, or Take Me Out to the Holosuite], and it was the characters being as well-written and complex as they were, that made their struggles feel meaningful. The lack of optimism, particularly in Picard, is just depressing. The future shown in Picard is not a future I ever want.

As a 60 year old fan of Star Trek and it’s children and grandchildren. I agree with the great majority of this post. As a child I greatly enjoyed TOS and the re-runs of TOS and TAS in ‘73. When TNG came out in ‘87 I was then an adult (24 years old) and I absolutely loved it, as did my young children. Star Trek always presented a “This COULD BE” future. I was not moved by “Discovery” despite my desire to love it. I didn’t love or hate DS9, Voyager, DS9 or Enterprise. None of these drew me in like TOS or TNG. I wanted to be consumed by “Picard” but not until the last season did I look forward to the next episode. However, SNW finally pulled me in like TOS and TNG. I have to believe there is a community of us that absolutely loved TOS, TNG and SNW. Why doesn’t Paramount tap into that?

LL&P sir! I'm right there with ya, agree wholeheartedly. I'm currently playing Starfield and I'm getting Star trek vibes from the in-game faction, Constellation. It's like if NASA, SETI, & The Explorers Club had a love-child. Cheers!

For me, Star Trek is whatever my Head Cannon says it is. I like what I like. I'm generally silent about what I don't (because our tastes aren't the same).

I love Avery Brooks' comment that Sisko wasn't a Black station commander. He was a station commander who was Black.

Thank you very much for expertly putting in words what makes this franchise great.

One more piece of the puzzle for me is that Star Trek is Diplomatic. Star Trek characters do their best to resolve situations without violence, only resorting to it as a last resort. The Federation is very hesitant to ever engage their enemies, and usually will stop fighting if it is at all possible to do so. Elaan of Troyius, Kirk spares a Klingon vessel he had dead to rights to focus on his mission. The Defector: Tomalak manipulates the Enterprise into a position which is diplomatically disadvantageous to guarantee its destruction and Picard still manages to avoid a fight. In fact, the Enterprise-D never destroys a D'deridex class warbird, SAVING them on more than one occasion. Even the Borg - which is depicted as an enemy you cannot negotiate against, gets Hugh, which proves that even if your enemy won't negotiate, the Federation will respect your citizens. DS9 shows another side of this. War with the theocratic fascists of the dominion is inevitable, but the Federation does absolutely all it can in order to prevent it. Indeed, the Federation's hesitance to engage in open warfare, and their willingness to arbitrate peace between other powers is the only thing that keeps the Alpha Quadrant intact enough to stand a chance against the Dominion. The Klingons, despite being a military powerhouse, pre-emptively attack the Cardassians out of fear that they will be annexed by the Dominion, ironically making them feel like they were forced to join the Dominion in the first place. DS9 ultimately accepts the desperation of Sisko, a well-meaning man who jumps at the chance of peace when the Federation has the Dominion cornered but rejects that of Section 31, who would exterminate a race to save the Federation. Voyager also depicts how an isolated ship not backed up by its faction will struggle for diplomacy. They are shown trading with and helping out many neutral species, adhering to many of their principles even far away from home. Diplomacy is a little out of focus compared to the previous series, but it is nonetheless relevant. Diplomacy is also not really Archer's strong suit as the Federation hasn't even begun yet, but the foundation is constructed, as the four core member worlds come together. The movies are... not really the best showcase of this, with the exception of TMP, Voyage Home and Undiscovered Country. The movies, for the most part, force an unresolvable conflict that has to be solved with a bombastic ship-fight, never taking a moment to back down from the fight. Undiscovered Country does manage to have a fight which ends in violence, but the greater goal of the movie is the Khitomer Accords.

Star trek always gives a feeling that, though the federation isn't perfect, it tries hard to try to improve over time and maintain its existing standards. DS9 was something of a challenge to that vision, after all, it showed starfleet building its first ever pure warship to fight the Borg, and the dominion was an existential threat to the federation's existence. However, even that show generally shows the federation is full of good intentions, even if they don't always get executed well.

Star Trek is the short exchange in The Naked Time where Kirk loses his temper, snaps at Uhura, and then immediately catches himself and apologizes. Our big tough white guy captain apologizes to the African American lieutenant communications officer. That's the secret sauce.

What makes Star Trek Star Trek is that it's Star Trek. Unless it's DS9, in which case it's Star Loitering (but still Star Trek).

I admire Steve for even attempting this. It is like trying to separate out the ingredients of a complex recipe without a definitive list or at least being able to talk to the chef. For me, a big part of the success of Star Trek was due to 2 things happening at the time it came out. 1) We were on a national quest to the moon that had everyone enraptured by all things "space". 2) The country was in an ongoing and elevated battle for human rights. It is easy to forget that blacks and whites were not legally allowed to marry until 1967. Of course, it was more than just those elements that made Trek stand out, but there can be little doubt that they "struck while the iron was hot", so to speak. Trek melted itself into US history and there is no sign that it will ever fade away, which is great since we need the Trek message now more than ever.

Here's my controversial take - it literally all comes down to "How is the Movie/Show using it's budget and the available technology?" Every Trek show up from TOS to ENT was limited by its budget. Trek shows I believe have worked with higher budgets than a lot of other shows but there were still some distinct limitations to what was possible. You didn't see a lot of dynamic battles because that was expensive - there would be whole episodes where no one left the ship or repeatedly reused 'planet' sets. They had to work around the technological limitations and come up with clever, or sometimes a little goofy solutions to those limitations. And as a result, there's a distinct style to those old shows, there's aspects of the format that you see in every series that are there because they couldn't do things any other way. There's a smaller scope and a lot of the bigger grander stuff comes across via implication. You are told, not shown - but they kind of make it work in their favour where logically it shouldn't. During a battle someone would say "Shields down to 33%" and the room would shake - but you wouldn't always get an exterior shot of the ship being hit, and it would be even rarer to be shown distinct damage being done to the ship - just an explosion hitting it for the most part. However, post ENT... visual effects technology got INCREDIBLY advanced, you could do some really impressive shit with VFX all of a sudden, and for a lot cheaper than ever before. There were even a lot more options available with PRACTICAL effects and things like costume design, too. With all that available - the limiters are gone. Kelvinverse I don't necessarily want to count here because it's a movie, the expectations and budget and such were totally different to the shows and the comparison's not fair, so I'm just gonna use Disco as the first real example of this. Disco could do so much more than any other Trek series before it, so it did. Without those limitations, Disco ended up feeling sort of generic and indistinct. They could do anything and everything, so they did - and it lost the "feel" that Trek was known for. They could show you really cool effects, detailed ship-to-ship combat, HUGE sets, really impressive visuals - so obviously they took advantage. But the consequence was that the scope of the show suddenly got so massive that the actual focal point had to be a 'Main' character. I know people say "The Captains of each show are the main character" but I think it's reasonable to say that Discovery has a far more definitive PROTAGONIST than any other Trek show, with the ensemble cast having literally nothing to do until season 3. So you have a franchise that has previously been a lot of self contained space adventures, shifting focus between various members of an ensemble cast, usually with everything happening on a slightly smaller, closer scale - and then suddenly an entry in that franchise where everything is huge, everything is massively important, everything is serialised, and the ensemble is... essentially unimportant, basically. This isn't cuz Disco is bad, by the way, I don't like it but I'm not gonna begrudge anyone who does, I just wanna illustrate how different it is from what came before - and that that mostly came down to Disco being ABLE to do more than any Trek show ever had previously. But a few years later, when adjustments to the new status quo have been made - you then get a show like Strange New Worlds. SNW is very good at CHOOSING when to limit itself. Essentially SNW largely writes it's stories as though it were operating on the same sorts of restrictions as previous shows in the franchise - and then uses the tech and budget it has to make those stories look and feel amazing. But SNW will get a little silly! They'll do a whole episode where no one leaves the ship and the sets are reused, they keep things focused on the cast and characters more than focusing on some grand overarcing story. It doesn't refuse to do anything visually stunning or dip into a broad scope in terms of set design or vfx or whatever, but it doesn't focus so heavily on what it CAN do. The distinction for me is - you could take the script for any episode of SNW, and you could remake that episode using the resources available to the production crew of say, TNG. But if you tried to do the same with Disco - it would be impossible for 90% of the episodes of that series without radically changing a LOT of things. THAT to me is what makes Star Trek FEEL like Star Trek.

Star Trek is a diverse group of seemingly implacable foes learning to communicate in order to solve problems in a society in which the basic needs for survival are met without means testing. It shows that utopia is a process, not a destination, and that it requires constant vigilance to make sure that civil rights don't regress, because that's all a utopia could ever be. It shows that optimism isn't "good things happening," but how we react when bad things happen. It's literally impossible to show optimism on a bed of restful laurels. DS9, ENT, DSC, and PIC seasons one and two show both of these things, and how we can possibly overcome those bad things by peace through communication. To that end, I feel like we've only scratched the surface of what kinds of shows we could have in Trek. Here are shows I’d like to see: * following people traveling in space in a profession other than Starfleet: artists, actors, musicians, journalists, politicians, doctors, etc. * a show similar to TNG’s “First Contact,” in which a planet learns about the existence of aliens and that the UFP exists. * a show that takes place in the 2160s, as the UFP is just being formed, the people forming the government hire historian(s) to consult on the project, which allows that story to parallel with the unification of Earth after First Contact, in both timelines, we see the effects of the decisions made by the new government on the general public. ENT or First Contact characters could be in it. * an Earth-based series at any point in Trek history. * a show set on a colony. * West Wing: Rom I’d also be interested in spinoffs such as: * Wesley and Kore as Travelers * Rios, Teresa, and Ricardo fighting for medical equality in the 2020s. * Jurati’s adventures over the course of the 400 years where she crafts her own version of the Borg collective while staying out of history’s way, waiting to emerge and reintegrate with the rest of the galaxy. * Literally anyone on La Sirena, working for the Fenris Rangers, similar to the fanfilm series Star Trek: Aurora. I suppose Worf and Elnor are free agents and have familiarity with the ship. If it's the two of them, it could be a way for Worf to come to terms with his previous hate for Romulans, through training Elnor. I would have originally preferred Seven and Raffi, but they appear to be occupied with the Enterprise. * a show about Book’s relief efforts after the DMA attacks. * a show or miniseries that ties up the loose ends from “Calypso.” My theory is that the Discovery’s jump duplicated the ship, and that copy has been dormant and adrift up until the time when our Discovery emerged.

What makes Star Trek "Star Trek" is simply that it shows the future is possible, and will be better, no matter what we have to go through to get there. That, and phasers.

My favourite part of "Let He Who Is Without Sin..." is that this guy went to a vacation planet to criticize people on their laziness and decadence. a place where daring space explorers from all over the galaxy go to unwind for their death defying day jobs where they save colonies from starvation, pull giant meteors out of the sky before they destroy whole planets, fight off invading forces and explore mind bending space phenomena that would, to put it lightly, make this guy shit his pants. He caught these people while they were trying to desperately take a break from their everyday life or death existence and said "Hey! You're lazy! You're being lazy!" Imagine this bro walking into a place like DisneyLand and being like "I cannot believe that this is what life is like for everyone all of the time!"

I'm genuinely impressed by delivery of these ideas

To me Star Trek is a hopeful look at the future. Even at its darest moments the ideal of Star Trek is that the future will be good, that we will overcome all our current problems and come out much better because of it. Really that's why I love prodigy so much. Because it stars outsiders to the federation who are in a terrible place in lives they learn of the Federation, this better life, this near utopia that almost feels like its too good to be true. Yet it is true. It makes for in my opinion the most hopeful Star Trek series out there.

I guess I would say something like "in the future, perfect Humans from a utopian Earth travel to strange new worlds where they meet humanoid aliens that represent specific flaws of current Humans, and use progressive values to show how to fix the problem" It's not perfect but it sums up what I think Star Trek mostly is. It's why I think it's so important that the aliens we meet are just people with forehead ridges and why it's actually important their cultures are so 2-dimentional. We need to recognize ourselves in the aliens, and we need to focus on a specific flaw because that's the point in meeting them. Ferengi represent our greed and out of control capitalism. Klingons represent our aggression. Romulans represent our paranoia, and so on and so on. Star Trek magnifies the flaw and then uses our characters to show how a better version of Humanity can overcome those problems.

If you want a more realistic version of the Transporter, look at Galaxy Quest. You're enclosed in a gel then shot towards your destination.

I have been a fan for a very long time. I was watching syndications in the early seventies. When I was in the syfy club at middle school. I remember discussing every week the adventures of Captian Kirk and Mr Spock (who is my favourite character, by the way). I've enjoyed all the incarnations of Star Trek, some better than others. I must say that each incarnation has told its own story whether you liked them or not. I think not allowing disco to find its feet will be a missed opportunity to tell a uniquely different aspect to the continuing story. Having the show set that far in the future would have enabled us to explore different aspects of what Star Trek truly is. To be honest, I would like to see where Star Trek could actually take us into the future, creating new canon. This franchise needs to evolve and grow. Just like I am not that 12 year old anymore. Star Trek needs to evolve and grow. I want to go on a voyage with Discovery to new worlds, to new adventures. Sadly that will not be happening. I am looking forward to new content and adventures. Like Section 31, Star Trek Academy and fingers cross Star Trek Legacy. I do like Seven. The thing is, I am open to new content to new interpretations. This does not detract fròm the originals. It's adding more to Star trek universe. Thank you, Steve, for another insightful video on my favourite show❤

I am genuinely curious for a video where Steve addresses why he's more than disinterested in fantasy. I have a reasonable guess as to a few of them, but still left wanting the video. Speaking as a lifelong fantasy fan, who waddles over to Trek because of the characters and themes.

I was a fan of the original series, and even bought a little TV to take with me when I went off to college, so I wouldn't miss any episodes of the last season of Classic Trek. I also liked many of the following spin-offs, like Deep Space 9. However of all the versions of Star Trek, my favorite was Next Generation. The reason for this was because my family was military, with my dad a career Air Force officer, and my mother a WAC in WW II, and most of my other relatives military. I liked Next Gen best because I felt Picard was a much more realistic military officer than Kirk, who never convinced me he could actually hold a commission in any military organization.

Nice that you had mentioned Moon. One of my favorite movies.

This encapsulates why i felt Lower Decks to be more Trek than Picard.

Very interesting discussion, and one that I'm, for the most part, in agreement with. Where I would quibble a bit is just with terminology. I agree that Star Trek is "pulp sf," although "pulp sf" also includes a lot of what you would likely call "hard" sf or what some would call "technological sf." First, I've never liked the terms "hard sf" vs. "soft sf," and since I grew up to be a sociologist, I now grok that this is at least partly because it's entrenched in the same bias that calls the physical sciences "hard science" while considering the social and behavioral sciences "soft" (or even pseudo-sciences - although is is *much* easier to study something scientifically when the phenomenon being studied is easier to measure, as it more often is in the physical sciences than it is in the social and behavioral sciences, so from my perspective the terms seem inverted but that's a completely different discussion ;) ) But how I've always differentiated categorically has been to look at the story to see what science does it focus on extrapolating around. What you're referring to as "hard" science, or "technological" science fiction generally centers the discussion around extrapolations on technology, whereas sociological science fiction, like Star Trek, does incorporate technical advances, but the heart of the story is centered around extrapolations of how those changes affect things sociologically. So that's the difference to me. But as to them being "pulp sf", I would point out that a great deal of science fiction published in the "pulps," all the way back to the '20s-30s (when the science fiction pulps got their start) were stories that we would classify as "hard sf" today. Indeed, Hugo Gernsback, who published the first science fiction "pulp" magazine, Amazing Stories, preferred to focus on what we would today call "hard sf," as he believed that the stories should be instructive, apparently only adding more "fantastical and unscientific" fiction to Amazing Stories out of a need to attract readers. :) And most of the authors that we know of today as "hard sf" writers got their start in the pulps along with those we see as "soft sf writers. So I don't really see that being a defining difference. Some would call Star Trek "space opera," and in many ways that does apply, at least to the original series, but it was never *just* "space opera" (although an argument could be made that Roddenberry, with his pitch that it was "Wagon Train to the Stars" certainly framed it as such, but even ToS never remained *simply* a space opera, and the critical element of space opera (space warfare) was actually only present in a relatively small number of episodes in ToS. So really, the only place I really disagree with you is in how we classify Star Trek into a science fiction subgenre, and now-a-days that gets extremely complex and it has always been subjective. One might say it's the nature of the constantly evolving literary beast. And I freely admit that, as a sociologist, I'm biased. I actually credit Star Trek, which I've been watching since I was a wee child (I was born in 1961, and it's actually one of the first shows I remember watching and looking forward to (along with Lost in Space)) for being responsible for developing a natural "sociological imagination." :)

The Enterprise itself is astoundingly wonderful.

Steve, i saw this video when i was trying to figure out what to write a class paper on and you pinged my brain hard enough that I'm now writing an excessively intense series of papers about pulp and Trek

Best lower decks breakdown videos around. Other channels are not as thorough. Keep it up!!

Honestly as a huge Star Trek fan, post TNG/DS9, Star Trek discovery was the first modern star trek show/movie I got into… love the story, the character, the lore, etc. it’s just great. as a franchise for me, what makes Star Trek, Star Trek is the unknown … is not knowing what will/can/might happen :)

Perhaps this may be a bit superficial, but I think one of the fastest ways to make a Star Trek feel less Star Trek-y is to give it an adequate budget.