Give prison a break

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

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I didn't think of this before, but I suppose when you narrow it down to "good guys" and "bad guys", the best way to telegraph "rebel" is to give your hero character a criminal record. What else could the writers do?

 

[Finn]

Like Tom Paris?

 

[Forbin]

Like Tom Paris?

Tell us you didn't click the link without telling us you didn't click the link.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

The original post:

The Prisoner Cliché


I have enjoyed the first 2 episodes of Starfleet Academy.....but.....this is now the fourth Star Trek series that has been introduced using a main character who is a prisoner of the federation for one reason or another:-
Voyager - In the first episode we are introduced to Tom Paris, who is as a prisoner.
Discovery - Burnham becomes a prisoner in the first episode after starting a war.
Prodigy - Most of the main characters are prisoners at the start.
Academy - with a main character who is a prisoner and a carbon copy of Dal (Prodigy).
Kurtzman needs to use an original way to introduce his new characters because it's getting boring now.

To which I added:

I'll give you a fifth one - Kelvinverse Kirk runs afoul of the law as a boy and is later described by Pike as "the only genius-level repeat offender in the midwest."

Essentially, it's been done (too) often.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Fun fact, in William Shatner's Star Trek Academy: Collision Course (originally pitched to CBS as a series back in the early noughties), Kirk has the option of Academy or prison after stealing a police car and going joyriding.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

The prison-to-Starfleet pipeline has always been a thing, then?

 

[Shawnster]

To be fair the prisoners on PRO were not criminals or rebels. They were kidnapped victims of human, ER, species trafficking.

 

[The Wormhole]

The prison-to-Starfleet pipeline has always been a thing, then?

Likely based on the fact that in the US, for certain offenses military service can be done as substitution for prison time.

 

[Laura Cynthia Chambers]

Given that in the future, penal systems have been reformed (more focus on rehab, new sentence techniques, etc.), I wonder how many people might prefer prison. There's still the varying degrees of stigma from being an ex-con, of course, depending on where you live/work/travel.

 

[the G-man]

Likely based on the fact that in the US, for certain offenses military service can be done as substitution for prison time.

Not so much (if at all) anymore but it was extremely common at one point.
I can't confirm or deny that is how my father ended up in the service in lieu of finishing high school.