The Big Picture
- Strange New Worlds is a great introduction to Star Trek for both new viewers and non-sci-fi fans, with a hopeful and optimistic tone.
- The episodic structure of the show allows for original and self-contained stories, moving away from the trend of 10-hour movies.
- The series embraces diversity and inclusivity effortlessly, showcasing a society that has moved past prejudice and bigotry.
Jumping into a new franchise may feel like a lot sometimes, especially one like Star Trek, that’s been around for more than 50 years. There are countless TV shows, movies, original series, and spin-offs to choose from, so it’s definitely overwhelming, we get it. Still, it has one of the absolute best series on television right now, one that’s a shame there aren’t more people watching. Even those who’ve never seen Star Trek before or don’t usually like sci-fi will enjoy Strange New Worlds. It just finished its second season on Paramount+, and it’s one of the most binge-worthy shows around.
Again, you don’t have to like or even know much about Star Trek to enjoy Strange New Worlds. Yours truly, for example, was never a Trekkie until Star Trek Discovery came out (I’ve always been more of a Star Wars person, you see), but it was Strange New Worlds that got me hooked. It shows the adventures of the USS Enterprise between the events of Discovery Season 2 and The Original Series, but what makes it great is that you don’t need to have watched either of those to have fun, making it the perfect introduction to the whole franchise and its multiple timelines. Its tone is hopeful and optimistic, and brings us closer to classic characters without making it about nostalgia itself. It’s all about the story, and a very fun one at that.
‘Strange New Worlds’ Pays Homage to ‘The Original Series’ Without Making It About the Classic Show
There’s no debate around the fact that Star Trek was one of the biggest cultural phenomena of the 1960s. The Original Series defined an era in television as a medium, taking the crew of the USS Enterprise around the galaxy and boldly going where no one had gone before. Every week, a new adventure saw classic characters such as James Kirk (William Shatner) and Spock (Leonard Nimoy) carve their names further into our collective imagination, along with sayings and gestures that ultimately became part of everyone’s lexicon, like the Vulcan greetings, “Live long and prosper.”
Strange New Worlds brings back that same kind of weirdness and expands a lot on the lore of the franchise. As a prequel to The Original Series, the purpose is to show us who all these iconic characters were before they became so important to us. Here, they are all much younger and still building up their experience as Starfleet officers. Some of them are at the very beginning of their journey. For example, we know Kirk to be the captain of the Enterprise and Spock his number one officer, but on Strange New Worlds Kirk (played by Paul Wesley) is the number one on another ship. The captain is actually Christopher Pike (Anson Mount), whom we first met on the pilot for The Original Series (then played by Jeffrey Hunter) and then again on Discovery. And his number one is definitely not Spock (now played by Ethan Peck), but the strong-willed and trustworthy Una Chin-Riley (Rebecca Romijn).
But while for fans these connections may be interesting, they are definitely not required knowledge for anyone to enjoy the series. Strange New Worlds not only brings back all those characters but also the adventure-of-the-week structure of The Original Series. Sure, sometimes there are two-episode arcs and cliffhangers like in any other show, but the episodes tend to be independent and tell stories that begin and end within themselves, making it more accessible than, for example, its sibling series Discovery. Of course, the overall story arc progresses as the season goes on, but the episodes are still pretty much self-contained.
‘Strange New Worlds’ Isn’t Afraid To Boldly Go Beyond Its Own Mold
One of the benefits of the episodic structure Strange New Worlds adapts from The Original Series is precisely the fact that it doesn’t have to build a single story that’s spread through 10 episodes, but instead tells 10 separate stories that connect at the end. There’s a big difference between these two types of storytelling; the first one is more akin to how a movie is written instead of a TV show. Nowadays, though, it’s become the trend even for television, which can feel rather tiresome after a while — not every series has to be a 10-hour movie, really.
This is one of the best things about Strange New Worlds: it can’t be a 10-hour movie and neither does it want to be one. The episodic nature of the series means writers have more freedom to come up with original stories with each new episode, and in Season 2 they’ve knocked it out of the park several times. For example, in Episode 9, “Subspace Rhapsody”, a subspace fold causes the whole crew of the Enterprise to burst out singing, and this isn’t there just because it’s weird or fun, but it actually moves the plot forward as singing makes characters more honest and helps them express feelings they couldn’t otherwise.
This is, of course, another thing Strange New Worlds inherited from The Original Series, as the classic Star Trek show also had plenty of weird and whacky episodes that completely broke from more traditional storytelling approaches for TV. Thanks to that, we’ve had joyful episodes like “Subspace Rhapsody,” the super fun crossover with the animated series Lower Decks, and may even get a Western-themed episode in the future. Is there any other show around that likes to boldly go crazy like this?
The Series Is Effortlessly Inclusive, a Staple of the Star Trek Franchise
One of the defining traits of Star Trek is its optimistic view of the world we live in. Sometimes we may feel like we’ve lost faith in humanity, but Star Trek will never. No matter the medium, one of the premises of the franchise is to show us how good we can have it if only we moved past differences and joined to overcome our common struggles. It started with The Original Series, which put a Russian officer on the bridge of the Enterprise at the height of the Cold War with Pavel Chekov (Walter Koenig) and dared to show the first interracial kiss on TV between Kirk and Uhura (Nichelle Nichols), and still continues.
So it could be no different with Strange New Worlds. The series embraces diversity in a subtle way, without making a point of pointing it out, just showing it normally. Instead, the idea of respect and diversity is relayed to character stories like Una Chin-Riley and La’an Noonien-Singh (Christina Chong) — portrayed by white and Asian actresses, respectively -— who have stories that explain why they are different, but also worthy of respect. Racial and sexual diversity is simply not an issue because, in the universe of the series, society has moved past prejudice and bigotry. No one questions why the chief medical officer of the Enterprise is Black or the ship’s ace pilot is Latina because that’s absolutely normal, as it should be.
Although the series is not in any danger of being discontinued (thankfully, really), it’s a shame that Strange New Worlds doesn’t have a much bigger audience than it currently does, because it deserves to. There is no other series on TV right now that takes chances and sets a positive example as it does. It boldly goes where no other TV series goes nowadays, and it should get more credit for that.
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Khushi Patel is a science fiction author who lives in Austin, Texas. She has published three novels, and her work has been praised for its originality and imagination. Khushi is a graduate of Rice University, and she has worked as a software engineer. She is a member of the Science Fiction Writers of America, and her books have been nominated for several awards.
