What are your controversial Star Trek opinions?

But it's not the primary or secondary reasons I see most frequently. So, it may be out there, but it's in the noise.

 

Deleted.

 

Okay.

 

Yeah, I kinda hated DSC so I stopped watching. Man, I liked PIC S2, the first two eps. Then — as we say up here in da yoop (Upper Peninsula of MI) — Holy wuh! But I don’t frequent their forums, or even really think about ‘em till somebody thinks em up

So, I’m pretty sure I want things to succeed, then see how they do.

Oh, and PRO might now be my second fave Trek show evah.

 

I am keen for a Section 31 based show. I really am and I like spy stuff in general so I'm down with that.

 

The only Section 31 material I'd like to see...is its destruction.

Those who want a Trek spy show, let it be Starfleet Intelligence. They're the only legitimate "spy" organization Starfleet has.

If Starfleet Intelligence can't get it done, it doesn't deserve to get done.

 

I don't think the idea that the ST fanbase is large enough to pour a lot of resources and advertising into a streaming revival is fundamentally verifiable if there is no ST09 or if ST09 bombs. I think you're understating just how small the fanbase had gotten by 2005 and how long it had been shrinking and shrinking and shrinking. If ST09 and its sequels aren't there to prove there's still an audience for ST, I think it's just as likely Paramount looks at streaming and says, "We'll try making our own, but let's hedge our bets and not pour too much into it."

 

Ok. Hopefully the show shows it's being undone. This isn't about deserved. It's about intrigue and interest and the line of moral grayness. That's what intrigues me more that the strict black and white.

I'm keen to see this gray area of Star Trek, and perhaps a little more out on the frontier.

 

I'm in for a Star Trek spy show only if it stars Bashir and Garak

 

Whereas I'm very jaded and find it comforting in a twisted way that Starfleet and the Federation aren't anywhere near as high minded as they pretend to be. Real life doesn't work like that and neither does Star Trek's.

 

I don't know how much of it has to do with how dark a place I was in for the last several years, but "NuTrek" optimism has been a literal lifeline for me. I've seen stories of overcoming, of redemption, of making one's own way against the odds. DSC, PIC, PRO, SNW, and even LD have reminded me why I loved Star Trek in the first place and have gradually rebuilt my hope that humanity will survive and that we deserve to. They've helped me come back from a place of cynicism to where I'm willing to have hope again. And yes, inspire me to work towards that future.

My $0.02.

 

I have been on both sides of this. I don't think Trek got more cynical or less optimistic but that it became more honest about the realities of conflict and that humanity was not just going to "evolve" in the 24th century, even with newer tech. We have seen that newer tech is a double edged sword that it alloys for easier connectivity but struggles with personal care, or feeling more overwhelmed with data. Human behavior, to quote ENT, is pretty stubborn and not going to change over night.

And that for me is the more positive aspect. It isn't that Trek gives me optimism. It reminds me of the resiliency of the human race.

 

Pop culture representation is not wokeness.

PRO might be aimed at a younger audience, but it is pure Trek.

That's all anyone has to do if they don't like something.
That's all anyone gets to do if they don't like something.

It's probably like killing a hydra.

As a team? Or as... something else?

 

I mean, you could do a show about Starfleet Intelligence doing shady things instead of a show about Section 31, and at least then the show would not actively be idolizing the idea of a spy agency that's above the law, does whatever it wants, and answers to no one. I'd much rather see a show that examines the morally ambiguous side of espionage but which at least always depicts that agency as answerable to the democratic state. Idolizing Section 31 is an implicit attack against democracy itself.

Thank you for sharing. A living refutation against the idea that modern Star Trek lacks for hope and optimism.

 

Perhaps. But you've got to try.

 

Utopia is not a location to arrive at, but rather an ideal to constantly strive for.

 

Captain Kirk couldn't have said it better!

 

Controversial opinion-setting up a rogue agency as the protagonists does not make them idealized. Nothing about Section 31, even with how Discovery treats it, makes it appealing as far as how it goes about business. I don't see a show about that same organization being an idealization of the agency, any more than shows like the Sopranos idealized mob life. It might skirt closer to "Pirates of the Carribean" which definitely presents pirates in a more positive manner than I would prefer. Just because a show is about an idea does not make it an "attack on democracy itself."

 

Finally, a probably-controversial opinion:

There’s a tendency to picture Section 31 as always, in every single action it ever takes, to be evil and to the detriment of the Federation. There’s an opposite tendency, mostly in certain quarters of fandom, to portray it as the secret unsung heroes who are actually saving the Federation all day and probably having great 007 adventures doing it. Both of these takes are silly.

A government arm — and however off the books and disavowed it is by the 24th century, it is a government arm — isn’t going to last for over 200 years if it never gets anything right and always proves to be against its own side’s values. On the other hand, where there’s smoke, there’s fire. S31 does awful stuff—whatever else it may also do, that we never get to hear about.

It seems more than likely to me that Section 31 runs all sorts of operations all the time, ugly and beneficial, the only connection being that they’re all deep, deep black No Eyes Only actions. Starfleet Intelligence is the public, accountable intelligence service. S31 is (by the 24th century) the disavowed Impossible Missions Force — and also, yes, the KGB. Starfleet proper doesn’t like S31, but at the highest echelons, it absolutely retains it as a resource.

If this sounds like a defense of Section 31, it’s not; genocide is genocide, and unaccountable power run amok is unaccountable power run amok. I just don’t buy that Section 31 is only, ever bad (or good).