Star Trek: Discovery will return October 15th on CBS All Access for what will be its third season.
The reveal of this new date came in a video of Sonequa Martin-Green’s Michael Burnham planting a Federation flag on a very dry-looking planet. After the events of last season, the U.S.S. Discovery went through a wormhole that sent them to an unknown time and planet, where they would no longer have to be tied down by having to be a prequel series to one of the most iconic series of Star Trek.
The most important part of the trailer is that Michael no longer has awful hair, which … thank the gods, because that wig was a criminal offense.
Discovery has been a divisive series for a lot of reasons. While I enjoyed it and got sucked into it as my first Trek, after watching DS9, I understood why Disco, as it is known, was not really up to snuff yet. You really don’t feel the strong relationship between the members of the crew, with Tilly, Saru, and Michelle Yeoh’s Georgiou being some notable exceptions.
The relationship between Paul and Hugh was supposed to be this epic, big gay romance, but Hugh was murdered in the first season and brought back to life in the second. This might have been interesting, but we never really had a clear understanding of their relationship to properly understand what they’ve lost. So, all the tension about their relationship in season 2 ultimately never amounts to anything for me, as a viewer. All the connection I feel is because of the skill of the actors, not the story.
Martin-Green’s Michael Burnham has always been a standout, and I genuinely enjoy her character, but I also feel that tying her to Spock was a mistake—not because that dynamic isn’t interesting, but because it’s Spock! Not to invoke the dreaded term, but making your brilliant female lead character related to one of the most popular characters in the franchise, and their sibling tension built around who’s more special, is just very much in Mary Sue territory—which I don’t dislike, but it doesn’t endear audiences.
Burnham is interesting without those connections, and with only 13-episode seasons, I know they don’t have the “filler” to explore all the aspects of each member of the team, but the show would be stronger for trying.
Overall, I enjoy Disco. It is the first Trek series I fully watched, and regardless of its flaws, I think it is slowly getting to a place where it can finally figure out what it is. Plus, as the true Trekkies tell me, it takes every Star Trek series at least until season three to start getting good. Let’s see if Disco continues that tradition.
(via Deadline, image: Screenshot)
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