I love Star Trek. I grew up eating Kraft Macaroni & Cheese and watching Star Trek: The Next Generation every Saturday at 6PM. It was a family event, and one of those “core memories” everyone talks about. I loved it, even if most of the episodes went over my young head. I can still smell cut grass and taste the boxed pasta when I hear clips from old episodes and remember feeling wonder and hope and pride. I internalized all the good things Picard insisted humanity was capable of.
When I married Mr. Trent, he was not a Star Trek fan. He’d frequently wonder what I was quoting. Netflix and I fixed that. After we put our babies to bed, we’d watch an episode or four. It was my first rewatch, and it was a good one.
Fast forward ten years later, and we started our second rewatch: this time skipping the original series and going straight to NexGen. Our kiddos were old enough to watch, and Star Trek is a much needed dose of hope in a world that has been dominated by dystopian narratives. Watching Star Trek as a fully grown adult and parent of the next generation, gave me a deeper appreciation for this franchise. Star Trek is complex, entertaining, intelligent, funny, thoughtful, and prescient. I cannot believe the themes Star Trek was exploring 20 years ago regarding Artificial Intelligence/Life. Star Trek is introspective. It asks questions of our past, our literary traditions, our biases. It quotes Shakespeare. It reinvents literary villains. Temple Grandin has said, “The world needs all types of minds,” and Star Trek has shown all of us for generations what the embodiment of that quote could look like.
Favorite Quotes
Star Trek is incredibly quotable. Why? Great writing, absolutely. But I think the delivery by all those fantastic actors who did years of Shakespeare before they captained starships has something to do with it.
I really like Picard, and Janeway, and Kirk, and Sisko, and Pike, and and and.
Best Alien Races
The Vulcans, obviously. It’s not a contest. Except the Borg just keep getting cooler. I love how their story evolved in Season 2 of Star Trek: Picard. But even so, the Vulcans win the best aliens category. The Tamarians, however, win for being my favorite aliens.
Apart from a relatively recent episode on Lower Decks, the Tamarians appear in only one episode in Star Trek: The Next Generation. “Darmok” (Season 5, episode 2) is a smart, beautifully crafted episode. Stellar acting. Great pacing. And so cool. An alien race that speaks entirely in metaphors, and the exploration of some of our oldest literature helps Piccard save the day? What’s not to love?
Iconic Tech
Of course the best tech in Star Trek is the holodeck.
It’s also the best metaphor I’ve got for what it feels like to draft a novel. Drafting is me on a holodeck, and it is so much fun. From a storyteller’s standpoint, the holodeck is up there with Harry Potter’s cloak of invisibility in terms of ingenious story telling devices. How can the reader hear conversations that Harry is not privy to given the books are written in third limited POV with precious few exceptions? How can the crew of the Enterprise engage with the past or with literature or with other settings when they’re working on a starship?
Most Iconic Episodes
Picard: “Watcher” Season 2, Episode 4. Guinan has some outstanding lines in this episode. My favorite: “This place is a pressure cooker. You know they’re actually killing the planet? Truth is whatever you want it to be. Facts aren’t even facts anymore. A few folks have enough resources to fix all the problems for the rest, but they won’t. Because their greatest fear is having less. They got one tiny ball in the entire galaxy, and all this species wants to do is fight.”
And then Picard says, “It’s not too late.” Hope feels so good. I’m next in line for a hug, Jean-Luc.
Strange New Worlds: I am a sucker for star-crossed lovers, so the episode with Kirk and Noonien-Singh time travel and fall for each other is my favorite. “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow” Season 2, Episode 3.
Next Generation: I was little when I first watched NextGen, so a lot of moments stick out more than episodes. Data is for sure my favorite character.
An android who loves his cat and decides he wants to be a single dad in his free time. Heart melting. If I had to pick a favorite episode it would be “The Offspring” Season 3, Episode 16,. It’s the one where Data becomes a dad only to lose Lal. The episode has great quotes, my favorite being:
Voyager: “Blood Fever”, Season 3, Episode 16. It’s a hot take, but I love this smutty episode with B’Elanna Torres and Tom Paris. I like the exploration of consent. I like the chemistry between the characters, and the reveal at the end that the Borg are in the Delta Quadrant was a total game changer for the series. Plus, Kes is barely in the episode.
Deep Space Nine: “The Quickening”, Season 4, Episode 24. There are so many good episodes in Deep Space Nine. There are so many good characters, but this episode is my favorite. Dr. Julian Bashir is charismatic and heroic, and he wins but not on his terms. Deep Space Nine came on right after NextGen growing up and I remember when this episode aired and it being a paradigm shift for my young mind. What if victories couldn’t be complete and glorious? What if they were hard earned and came with losses? What if there were problems even the Dr. Bashirs of the world couldn’t quite solve?
The Original Series: So I approach TOG very differently, and rank episodes by best kisses. While there certainly are a lot of them, it isn’t a contest. Kirk and Uhura’s kiss in “Plato Stepchildren”, Season 3, Episode 10 wins. But if you’re doing a series rewatch, there are a lot of episodes to get through before that iconic moment. “Dagger of the Mind” Season 1, Episode 9 is a bright spot in the journey. Helen Noel has some backstory with Captain Kirk, but the good stuff comes after they go off on an away-mission and Kirk is brainwashed. Insta love with some back story? Yes, please. Also, what the what? The Enterprise had a Christmas party?
Enterprise: “Similitude”, Season 3, Episode 10. It’s the one where Trip Tucker’s clone saves the day and has a “needs of the many” moment. Completely solid episode with great directing by LeVar Burton. But honestly, whenever I think of the series Enterprise, I want to just talk about Connor Trinneer’s work on Stargate: Atlantis, specifically the episode “Michael” from S2.E18.
Lower Decks: Meh, I can’t get into it. I think the show’s greatest contribution was creating an alternate timeline where Dr. Bashir and Elim Garak got married.
Discovery: “Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad” Season 1, Episode 7. I love the Groundhog Day conceit. I also love this series because we watched the first season in Rome over Thanksgiving one year. Gotta love Airbnbs with a Netflix account.
Best Movie
I enjoy almost every Start Trek movie, but my favorite is a tie between Stark Trek IV: The Voyage Home and Star Trek: First Contact.
Incidentally, I think I quote this film more than any other. However, whenever my cat learns a new skill, like how to open kitchen cupboards this scene from First Contact springs to mind:
So many iconic scenes in this movie, and I find it particularly touching that discussing literature helps Captain Picard overcome his dark night of the soul moment. It is all around a very quotable, fun movie.
Cultural Impact
A 2013 article from the Guardian says, “[Star Trek] has never been cool, but then it’s never been cynical or pessimistic.”
I like folklore, fairy tales especially. And one of the reasons I value them is because they end happily-ever-after. While being jaded might be considered cool, I do not find the practice very helpful. Especially as a parent of young people who are carrying the weight of our world on their shoulders. I have to reassure them that humanity is at its core a species of problem solvers. That we have a thirst for knowledge that is worth celebrating. Mama can’t draw from an empty well. I also need the reassurance and comfort that things will end okay. The reason I write stories is to realize for myself and for my readers that happy endings are possible.
Life happens. Sometimes I feel bombard by the pain and suffering that is all around us. Empathy is an amazing tool, but sometimes it gets dialed up to the point where it paralyzes me. I wonder how it can ever be okay? How can any of the wrongs that are so abundant in our lives ever turn out right? I don’t know, but I write stories to try and find out. I read stories looking for answers. I watch shows like Star Trek to dream of what could be. Our environments influence us. Star Trek is an environment that I want to be in. When Benjamin Sisko says you look out the window of Star Fleet academy and see paradise, I want to realize that future. I want to bring some of that optimism into my present moment.
Solarpunk. Utopia. Optimistic Sci-fi. Believing the hallmarks of humanity are friendship, ingenuity, curiosity, and courage and celebrating them…
That’s the impact Star Trek has had on me and viewers like me. That’s the legacy its left on our culture.
There are other notable impacts. We don’t model or teach how to deal with maladaptive thoughts or indeed mental health in American Culture. But isn’t it remarkable that Mr. Spock repeatedly demonstrates a cognitive diffusion techniques which apart from cognitive reframe is the way to handle unhelpful thoughts?
I mentioned Temple Grandin’s quote at the top of this post. There are those among us who are treated as less than human because our minds, looks, or ideas are different. Star Trek shows how valuable all of us our to humanity’s common mission.
This should probably be a different blog post, but I love folklore so I’ll put it here for now. In Star Trek there are characters who throughout the course of their series work to establish and assert their humanity. Is Spock human? Is Data human? Is The Doctor human? I would emphatically state that yes, they are, and they are incredibly vulnerable humans. I’ve noticed that folklore motifs that are often associated with princesses are woven into these character’s narratives. For example, Data does not feel emotion, and yet Q causes Data to laugh for the first time in episode “Deja Q” Season 3, Episode 13. There are quite a few princesses in folklore/fairy tales who never laugh( The Golden Goose, The Good Bargain, etc.) and then do in the story to the delight of their father, the king. I believe that weaving in motifs like these highlighted to the audience that these were special, valuable, vulnerable members of the crew/kingdom without jeopardizing the masculinity of these characters. Other instances where Data’s character flirts with princess motifs: he’s buried underground/deactivated–like a sleeping beauty– for centuries. He becomes a parent in an unusual way. His complexion definitely makes him the fairest of them all, and he has a wicked half (step?) brother.
I’ll spare you my assessment of how Spock and The Doctor show up as princesses, but I see the strategic use of fairy tale motifs as a way of communicating the value and vulnerability of these humans and all humans who are marginalized.
Star Trek is awesome, and I am so happy to be on the Star Trek Panel for LTUE this year. Worried that I might get nervous and tongue tied, I decided to put all my thoughts down her just in case. Thanks for indulging me!
