Why Star Trek Discovery is Crap

 Star Trek began in the 1960’s as a “Wagon Train to the Stars”. It is of course no secret that in the middle of the Cold War and the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement, that Star Trek depicted a future of  a united Earth and a society where racism, at least in theory, only existed in historical records.

 Of course Trek creator Gene Roddenberry was always pushing the envelope with trying to get his progressive beliefs past the network censors. One of the more interesting episodes was Errand of Mercy, where Kirk and Spock fought to save a primitive culture from an invading Klingon force, only to find the “primitives” were actually an advanced non-corporeal life form, that put the smack down on both the Klingons and the Federation.

 Star Trek: The Next Generation continued Rodenberry’s Progressive themes with The Host and The Outcast,  not exactly the best TNG had to offer, but at least the LGBT community were getting some attention, as much as the network would allow anyway.

 Next is my favorite Trek, Deep Space Nine. It would be hard to pick a favorite character. Avery Brooks was awesome as Cmdr. Ben Sisko. Not only was he a good leader, he could sing too. I am sure a real Jadzia Dax would have had plenty to say about being a woman, and a man.

 The honor of being the first female starship captain did not go to Kate Mulgrew on ST: Voyager. Madge Sinclair  was  the captain of the Saratoga on Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home as well as another captain, and Gerodi La Forge’s mother, on a Next Gen episode.

  Discovery pretty much craps on every virtue of Star Trek. I know, moralizing is boring, but people willing to stand the high ground seem to be in short supply these days. Section 31 and the episode of Enterprise where Enterprise attacked a ship to steal its engine core made me cringe. So Jonathan Archer became the Evil Leaper?

 Although I have only seen episode 1 (thank you CBS), I do have enough information on 2 and 3 to take a guess on where the series is going. There are no likable characters, except perhaps someone I refer to as Tosk. (If you are a DS9 fan you will know why) There is a complaint that this is sort of a SJW version of the future because of the number of non-white and female actors. I will not  offer an opinion on this one way or another, but I will tell you this is not the unification of the races that the original Trek was.

Forget the things which made us enjoy the previous Treks. I heard that episode 3 has something called “Black Alert”. I don’t know what it is, but  I am guessing it isn’t a notification for an after Thanksgiving sale.

There are some people who like the darker gritter themes and the idea of a series based on Section 31 and I have no doubt they will enjoy Discovery. However, I am thinking that this is one time the Star Trek label shouldn't be applied. It is clearly not Gene Roddenberry's Trek, or any sort of future I would wish to be a part of.