Tag Archives: Enterprise

Sep 27 2026

Too Much Kirk & Gimmicks Marred The Fourth Season Of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds started off strong when it began streaming years ago and had a competent second season that continued with its episodic nature that reminded many Trek fans of the old days of Star Trek shows that didn’t bother with complicated season-long storylines. However, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds began to falter in its third season with lackluster episodes and it was hoped that with its just-concluded fourth season that the show would course correct itself. Unfortunately that was not to be. The fourth season is a lot better than the third one, but two glaring issues have marred the season for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds–an overreliance on gimmick stories and too many appearances by James T. Kirk.

This is regrettable because the fourth season has many merits such as the acting, the production values (Star Trek has never looked better on the TV screens), and some episodes were true standouts. In fact, its premiere episode “Valles Marineris” was not only the best episode of the season but one of the best Star Trek episodes ever with a time travel yarn that reveals how pivotal the Enterprise and its crew were to our history. So imagine how disappointing it is to then be inundated with a bunch of gimmick episodes like the one where the Enterprise crew, except Spock, are turned into puppets (“Level-Five Transporter Incident”) or the crew end up in a reality that resembles a soap opera (“Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass”). Even the better received episodes can be seen as gimmick episodes. For example, “Valles Marineris” is seen as a knock-off of Jurassic Park, while “Orders of Magnitude” was a thinly veiled remake of Crimson Tide. But those are just surface-level similarities. Also keep in mind that the series will end with a short fifth season of just six episodes. It just makes one wonder why are the producers and scriptwriters wasting time with these gimmick episodes?

Defenders of these gimmick episodes will point out that Star Trek has done such episodes before, even in the original series (TOS) had them like “A Piece of the Action” or “Patterns of Force”, but the difference is that TOS and other older Star Trek TV shows had longer episode runs in their seasons, and their gimmick episodes were spread out and didn’t overtake the regular, more serious episodes. Nowadays, Star Trek TV shows only have about ten-episode runs per season. That is not a lot of episodes and given the precious few episodes and long waits between seasons, the producers should only allow one to two gimmick or comedic episodes per season. In the fourth season, instead of exploring new planets or meeting new alien races, the Enterprise crew were turned into puppets or ran around intoxicated in a pleasure planet (“Human Best Friend”) which ended being a pedestrian attempt at comedy, or acted out fantasy roles without even bothering to scientifically explain the presence of magic (“Once La’An A Time”). What made these gimmicks so frustrating was that there were attempts to tell compelling character studies. For instance, the puppet episode supposedly explains why Spock became more logical by the time TOS came along, while the soap opera episode revealed that Captain Pike is undergoing severe grief and has to confront it. The problem is that these interesting sub plots are shoehorned into the main story and were not fully developed.

Speaking of Captain Pike, the premise of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds was to showcase his time as the captain of the Enterprise, as well as the crew during that time period. At the end of the first season James T. Kirk was introduced in the episode “A Quality of Mercy” in an alternate reality and played by Paul Wesley, and he has appeared in subsequent seasons, but by the fourth season, he has supplanted Pike as the main character. Strange New Worlds is supposed to focus on Pike and his crew as an ensemble piece like most Star Trek shows, but it seems like in every other episode of the fourth season, some reason is concocted to have Kirk on the Enterprise. Sometimes the appearances were organic other times they did not make sense. For instance, in one episode Kirk goes to the ship to get a medical exam. Really? His own ship doesn’t have medical facilities? Or in one episode, he just happens to be on the same pleasure planet that the Enterprise crew visit. That’s too convenient. All in all, Kirk appeared in five episodes this season, which is half of the season. That is way too many episodes to devote to him and what is worst is that those appearances were not necessary. Take “Orders of Magnitude” a rogue Starfleet admiral commandeers the Enterprise and assigned Kirk to be the first officer who is forced to confront the admiral when the superior officer orders the crew to decimate a planet’s population. Why did this have to be Kirk? Pike could have easily filled in this role and could have fed into a narrative that he was becoming disillusioned with his career or the incident could have been why he was promoted later on.

What makes the many appearances of James Kirk so problematic has to do with the casting of Wesley. Sadly, he is not William Shatner. True, trying to fill in the shoes of the original actor to play the iconic Kirk is very difficult, but Shatner’s Kirk had a sense of bravado and charm that is not evident with Wesley’s version of Kirk. Sure, at this point in time, Wesley’s Kirk has not grown into the role yet and there have been instances where he showed hints of becoming Shatner’s Kirk, but he just lacks the sense of authority and charisma that the original Kirk had. On the other hand, Wesley’s portrayal of Kirk is more faithful and authentic than Chris Pine’s in the rebooted Star Trek films; at least he does not come off as a spoiled frat boy which is how Pine’s Kirk seems. Still, he appeared too many times and took away any desire to see more of him in the failed series proposal of Star Trek: Year One. Perhaps it is for the best. Given the way continuity has been shredded with the recent Star Treks, one can only imagine how a series set around the time of TOS would be received. The best we will get were the glimpses of Kirk’s command in the season finale “Tomorrow’s Enterprise”, an episode that could have been a great time travel episode but was undone by poor writing. At least in this instance Kirk’s appearance makes sense and Wesley’s performance is not why the episode failed.

The core issue with the fourth season of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is not just the abundance of gimmick episodes and James T. Kirk. It is with the scripts. The overreliance on gimmick scripts is a symptom of lackluster writing. It seems as if the writers grew bored with the basic premise of Star Trek and decided to write in so-called tributes to other genres. This is unforgiveable given that the show is coming to a conclusion and tepid efforts were made to wrap up character arcs, and the fact there are precious few episodes left. One should be hopeful that in the fifth and final season the writers would step up and give us some truly memorable Trek episodes and go out on a high. But that is doubtful.

Sep 7 2026

Star Trek Turns 60

“Damn it Jim, what the hell is the matter with you? Other people have birthdays, why are we treating yours like a funeral?”

-Dr. McCoy, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

This week marks the 60th anniversary of one of the most renowned and beloved sci-fi franchises, Star Trek, which aired its first episode “The Man Trap” 60 years ago on September 8, 1966. That is quite an accomplishment and it’s wonderful that 60 years later the TV show is still relevant and launched a universe that was so rich and full of imagination which spawned more TV shows, films, books and other medium. Also, let’s not forget the endless merchandise that helped fans relive their favorite moments from the TV shows and films which are still sought out and created.

These are the Voyages…

original Star Trek cast

For anyone who has been in cryosleep for the past 30 years, Star Trek, chronicled the adventures of space-faring explorers onboard the starship Enterprise led by Captain James T. Kirk (portrayed with a roguish relish by William Shatner) and his command crew which included the half-alien First Officer Spock (Leonard Nimoy), who was coldly logical and the ship’s Chief Medical Officer Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy (DeForest Kelley), the emotional opposite of Spock. Each week the Enterprise crew explored Earth-like planets and encountered human-like aliens (give thanks to the show’s budget and available effects technology in the 1960s) and dealt with the pitfalls of their explorations. Given its now-quaint production values and presentation, Star Trek may come off as dated to modern audiences, but the essence of the scripts with their timely messages still resonate with us.

Throughout the decades, long after the original TV show was canceled, Star Trek grew as a franchise through syndicated reruns, merchandise, fan conventions, and later reunion films and finally TV spinoffs that focused on new crews in different time periods in the future. These shows, such as Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager and StarTrek: Enterprise, eventually became as beloved, if not more than, the original Star Trek as they introduced rich characters and stories that captivated fans over and over again.

Trepidations

While this is an occasion to celebrate, especially for fans of the TV series and its numerous spinoffs, there is a general feeling of trepidation with Star Trek and its future. Why is that? Well, it is because of the dismal reception to the most recent Star Trek TV shows and the lack of clear plans for the future aside from yet another film in development. This seems odd given that in the past nine years we have gotten numerous TV shows but for the most part they failed to capture fandom’s imaginations or received the reverance the older TV shows had. Meanwhile on the film front, the last Star Trek film, Star Trek Beyond, was released ten years ago and was a box office disappointment, and led to an unintentional film hiatus. There have been endless pitches from writers and directors, even acclaimed director Quentin Tarantino proposed his own Star Trek film. But unfortunately none of the proposed films made it out of development hell as the franchise shifted its focus on TV productions.

There are many reasons why the modern Trek did not resonate with fans who themselves have splintered into various camps that automatically condemned anything new as “woke” or were convinced that modern Trek was too preachy thanks to scripts that failed to capture the magic of the older series. To be fair, a lot of the criticisms were valid but there were genuinely great Star Trek moments in the modern era, the best being the third season of Star Trek: Picard, followed by Star Trek: Prodigy, Star Trek: Lower Decks and on occasion Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.

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Sep 21 2025

Should The Next Star Trek TV Show Be About Kirk?

The powers that be that are in charge of the Star Trek franchise are busy planning a new Star Trek TV show that will feature a young James T. Kirk in his early days as captain of the U.S.S. Enterprise starship. This version of Kirk would be portrayed by Paul Wesley, who appeared frequently in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and the proposed show would be a sequel to Strange New Worlds called Star Trek: Year One. It’s a great idea since Kirk is still one of the most popular characters in Trek. But should there be another TV show based on Kirk?

Let’s put aside the acting chops of Wesley or the idea of Kirk being recast, which has always been a challenge that producers had to deal with since William Shatner, the original actor to play the role, is ingrained with many fans who have a hard time accepting someone else playing Kirk. Just look at the trouble the production team behind the 2009 Star Trek film went through to cast Chris Pine as Kirk. People have to accept that Shatner will never play the role again, especially since Shatner is in his 90s and the budget to digitally de-age him would be prohibitive for an ongoing TV show.

In Wesley’s defense, he does a good job playing a young Kirk without resorting to Shatner’s unique method of acting that gave lots of fodder for comedians. To get an idea of how Wesley would have aped Shatner, take a look at the season three Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode “A Space Adventure Hour”. It was one of those by-now obligatory holodeck malfunctioning episodes where Wesley as Kirk played a parody of Shatner’s Kirk. The point is if any actor tried to act like Shatner, he would not be taken seriously, which would doom the show.

Getting back to the idea of a young Kirk TV show. On paper it seems like a natural, do a TV show about a young Kirk settling into his command, making mistakes and learning from them, and seeing how he formed his bond with the famous Enterprise crew. It would be fairly easy to create the show since it would be a sequel to Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and the standing sets and design are already done, so that would save money and time. Plus, many of the actors from Strange New Worlds like Ethan Peck would just transition over to Star Trek: Year One since Peck would be playing Spock, who became first officer of the Enterprise during Kirk’s command. The proposed Star Trek: Year One could also remake some of the more famous first season episodes like “Space Seed” (which would give us a recast of Khan) or “City on the Edge of Forever” but with better production and effects. This is very tantalizing.

The problem is that we saw Kirk’s early adventures in the original TV show. When Star Trek first aired, it featured Kirk when he first commanded the starship Enterprise. The implication with the first season of Star Trek was that the first season took place during the beginning of the ship’s five-year mission. On the other hand, there are signs that there was a time gap during the very first episodes and the later episodes. “Where No Man Has Gone Before” and “The Corbomite Maneuver” had the crew wearing slightly different uniforms than what was shown soon after. In fact, Doctor McCoy was not even around in the pilot episode “Where No Man Has Gone Before”. More importantly, there are implications in the early episodes that the crew of the Enterprise had been on their mission for some time. So, this leaves room for a Star Trek: Year One.

Kirk v Gorn in Arena

There is a headache that the writers of the proposed TV show would have to deal with and that is with continuity. This has plague all the Star Trek TV shows and films as they had to make sure the continuity established in the original Star Trek and later shows and films remained intact. Unfortunately, this did not work out many times and the recent Trek shows received a lot of flack from angry fans, such as with the look of the Klingons, the Gorn and with the early history of Star Trek. For example, Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds established that there was a Klingon War which was never implicitly mentioned in the original Star Trek, yet it happened close to the era of the original Trek. In the Star Trek episode “Arena” the Gorn looked radically different than the species shown in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, and in the original show, the Enterprise crew acted as if they never heard of the Gorn, who were an ongoing threat in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. This is an issue that long-running TV shows and films have to grapple with and Star Trek is not unique to this situation. As long as the basic history is adhered to, then fans should be willing to give the writers a pass.

One way out of this would be to do what the 2009 Star Trek film did and establish that the recent Star Trek shows are set in another reality. The trouble is that it has been shown already that the recent Trek shows are set in the so-called Prime Timeline.

The most pressing problem for a so-called Star Trek: Year One has to do with whether or not there is any demand for it. Not everyone is thrilled with Wesley’s performance or the fact that the character has hijacked Star Trek: Strange New Worlds by appearing in practically every other episode. This was supposed to be a show about Christopher Pike not Kirk and we already have an idea of how the early years of Kirk went. Do we need to see it play out? Why not create a new Star Trek adventure with new characters? There are many time periods that have never been covered that are ripe for presenting like the time period between the original Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation. In fact, a TV show about a young Picard sounds more interesting. Ever since Star Trek: Picard concluded, fans have been begging for a Star Trek: Legacies show featuring the crew of the Enterprise-G with Picard’s son, but it seems like the powers that be are hellbent on ignoring fans and plowing ahead with a young Kirk show. This is a sign that the current showrunners do not truly understand Star Trek. Over the decades, the franchise has proven repeatedly that it was rich enough to provide new characters and situations set in the franchise. It allowed Trek to reinvent itself and not rely on Kirk and his crew to generate interest.

To date it’s not known if Star Trek: Year One will get the green light. A lot depends on studio politics and budgets since modern Trek shows are very expensive. If the show goes through, we’ll have to give it the benefit of the doubt that it will be a worthy addition to the legacy of Star Trek.

Sep 8 2025

Star Trek As It Approaches Its 60th Anniversary

As Star Trek celebrate Star Trek Day and commemorate the 59th anniversary of the famous sci-fi TV show, it is important to reflect on the state of the Star Trek franchise and where it is going as it soon approaches its 60th anniversary.

Star Trek has had its highs and lows throughout the decades in terms of popularity, cultural relevance and quality with its glory years arguably being during the 1990s. After the franchise took a forced hiatus in the mid 2000s, a comeback was attempted with the reboot film Star Trek (2009). The film did well and was popular but a significant number of fans did not appreciate director J.J. Abrams attempt to turn the franchise about space explorers, noted for its thought-provoking plots, into a more simplistic shoot-em-up space adventure that emphasized action and explosions over nifty plots and character developments.

The reboot film franchise came to an end nine years ago with Star Trek Beyond, which did not perform well in theaters, though its tone was more of a throwback to the original TV shows and films. Since then, there have been many failed attempts to produce a fourth film featuring the cast of the reboot films, but none have succeeded and that franchise is now essentially dead. Or is it?

Meanwhile, Star Trek returned to its TV roots in 2017 with the debut of Star Trek: Discovery, a prequel series to the original show that streamed on the app CBS All Access (later renamed Paramount+). Now, while the TV show ran a respectable five seasons and spawned another prequel spinoff, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, as well as additional Star Trek TV shows, Star Trek: Discovery wound up being divisive among fans. Many complained about the storylines and the characters, with more conservative fans being outright hostile to the show’s featuring of non-heterosexual characters. It did not matter. In this day and age of toxic fandom where cynical content creators are more interested in clicks and views, any iteration of Star Trek would have received scorn.

Right now, Star Trek is at a bit of a crossroads. Its parent company, Paramount Pictures, is undergoing a merger and the fate of the franchise is unknown with many rumors flying around as to its final fate. But there are many reports that the bigwigs at Paramount are bullish on Star Trek and want to continue with the franchise. The question remains is how will it continue? As of now, the only currently streaming Star Trek TV show (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds) will come to a conclusion after its fifth season (the fourth season is currently filming while the third season will complete streaming new episodes this week). After that, a new TV show Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will stream in early 2026, while a sitcom set in the world of Star Trek is in development. Who knows if that comedy will ever see the light of day or even generate any laughs if it comes to fruition.

There are other pitches for Star Trek TV shows, including a prequel series based on a young James T. Kirk, which will be a sequel to Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and would star Paul Wesley reprising the role of Kirk. The show has been tentatively titled Star Trek: Year One and would be about Kirk’s early days as the starship Enterprise captain. Meanwhile, Scott Bakula, the star of Star Trek: Enterprise is involved in a pitch for a show that would take place years after Bakula’s show and feature his character as the president of the United Federation of Planets. Unlike other Star Trek shows, this one would not be a show about exploring worlds but have a political slant more akin to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Then there is the fan-favorite idea of Star Trek: Legacy, which would be a sequel to Star Trek: Picard, specifically its popular third season and be about the adventures of the crew of the Enterprise-G. It has been pitched in the past, but so far, Paramount has not shown interest in pursuing Star Trek: Legacy.

Regarding films, there are still plans to produce a fourth film set in the Abrams reboot universe with directors and writers coming and leaving the project. Then Paramount recently announced another film will be produced that will feature all-new characters and situations. That actually sounds interesting but as of now, we have no definite information.

Given all that, there are not any concrete plans for Star Trek TV shows or films aside from the Academy show, which is a bit concerning given that the 60th anniversary is under a year away. You would think Paramount would have something concrete in production. Some of the ideas noted above are interesting and even if they don’t end up as TV shows they can at least become limited series or TV films, just better executed than the hot garbage Star Trek: Section 31. One thing to consider is that 2026 will be a celebration of the original Star Trek, not its sequels and films, and there are three remaining cast members from the original show. Aside from a standard documentary/retrospective, maybe Paramount can find some way to involve William Shatner, George Takei and Walter Koenig in some kind of new Star Trek production. The only limits are time, money and more importantly, imagination. Here’s to boldy going 59 years strong.

Mar 31 2023

The Return Of James T. Kirk?

Sure, this title seems like your typical Aprl Fool’s Joke on Trekkers, but the possibility in official Star Trek canon was raised last week with the recent Star Trek: Picard episode, “The Bounty”. Spoiler warning for anyone who has not seen the episode.

During the episode Worf, Riker and Raffi raid the clandestine Daystrom Station. Unlike the noble, scientific think tanks named after Daystom shown and mentioned in other Star Treks, this orbital facility was the 25th century version of Area 51. The station stored many of Starfleet Intelligence’s top secret technology, weapons and alien contraband. The Daystrom Station was littered with many Star Trek Easter eggs and call backs, but the one that raised the most eyebrows among fans was the revelation that the station had the remains of Captain James T. Kirk.

The last time Kirk was seen onscreen, as played by William Shatner, was in the 1994 film Star Trek Generations. The late, great captain of the starship Enterprise met his end anticlimatically when he fell off a bridge while aiding Captain Jean-Luc Picard. To many fans this was an unsatisfying way to kill off the beloved Enterprise captain as they felt he warranted a more heroic death. Of course, this was not the last fans saw of James Kirk as he was portrayed by other actors, notably Chris Pine and Paul Wesley. But Shatner’s version of Kirk remains the definitive Kirk that is beloved by fans and many hoped that the actor would someday reprise the role. The closest we got to that was in Star Trek: Enterprise where there were plans for Shatner to reprise the Mirror Universe version of Kirk, and Shatner was slated to cameo in the Star Trek reboot film, but these plans never came to be.

Shatner himself expressed his dissatofaction with the way his character died on screen and went as far as to co-author a series of books with Garfield and Judith Reeves-Stevens where Kirk was resurrected. The first of these post-Star Trek Generations books was The Return and its plot revolved around Kirk being revived by Romulans using Borg technology to use him against the United Federation of Planets. Kirk with the aid of many Star Trek heroes overcame this plot and went on to live a full life in the 24th century. The books, called the Shatnerverse, are considered an alternate reality for obvious reasons, Still, they were popular with Kirk fans.

Getting back to Star Trek: Picard, which is official Star Trek canon, when Raffi passed by a containment unit in the Daystrom Station, a holographic display showed an image of a skeleton with the signage “James T. Kirk”. This image also had some biographical data and what was interesting was that the display revealed that Kirk was “critically injured” in the events of Star Trek: Generations. It does not say that he died in the film even though Picard was clearly seen standing over Kirk’s grave. So what gives?

Technology will be much more advanced in the far future, especially when it comes to medicine. For all we know a critical injury like falling off a bridge and being clinically dead as we know it today may not be the actual end of a person’s life. It can be possible to revive a person hours after death in the future and it’s possible this could be top-secret technology in the Federation that is reserved for very important people. Or perhaps Kirk remained dead but Starfleet Intelligence and its black-ops offshoot Section 31 may be trying to clone James T. Kirk for their own reasons. This is not far fetched since the Romulans cloned Picard in the film Star Trek Nemesis.

Most likely nothing will come of this, but this Easter egg is fertile ground for future screenwriters. It is also unlikely that Shatner, who is in his early nineties, will reprise his role one last time. However, this tantalizing Easter egg gives fans of the legendary James T. Kirk some hope that he can somehow return someday for one last, great adventure, at least in their imaginations. After all, legends never die.