The Post-Burn Galaxy thread or "Post-Apocalypse or Slightly Used?"

[Charles Phipps]

"I am not a hater but I have criticisms."
-My epitaph as a fan of Star Trek

One of the biggest controversies of Starfleet Academy is an inherited one (and I mean among actual fans of Star Trek versus the hate money machine). Specifically, the show inherited the Post-Burn era as its premise and all the assumptions that it brings. In a very strange way, it is much easier to do a sequel to the heavy continuity of the DS9/TNG/VOY era than it is to DISCO because you have, "the future is so bright, I've gotta wear shades." While the Post-Burn era is, "The future was really bright and now it's gone to hell."

I'm pretty okay with this but I feel like DISCO didn't give the Burn-Era the due to needed (and I assumed it would be a season-long time travel journey anyway and not a ditching of the 23rd century premise). After season 3, it seemed like much of the post-apocalypse galaxy storytelling was abandoned. This despite the fact we saw a Trill where there's more symbiotes than people, a Earth that was so isolationist it was at war with fellow humans in the system without knowing it, and no subspace communication system among the Alpha Quadrant so the Discovery couldn't even be certain the Federation existed.

Then kind of just acts like it's fine the next two seasons.

One thing I've been looking forward to with this show has been whether they'd lean into the Season 3 of it all and show a galaxy that had been shattered as well as give more information how it got that way or if they'd continue pretending the Burn was just a thing that didn't have lasting consequences. Thankfully, it seems to be doing the former not the latter. "Beta Test" is my favorite of the three episodes because it gives some badly needed context and at least alludes to the fact that a lot of the students come from victimized worlds.

Still, it's very much set on a paradisical world and the tone can be very...goofy.

Basically, this is a thread for discussing the Burn-Galaxy in Starfleet Academy and how well you think they can address the issue or even if they should. The post-apocalypse or whatever happened being possibly irreconciable with the upbeat wacky hijinks of Starfleet.

 

[Starflight]

I assumed part of the reason to set it in the distant future would be to just be able to make their own thing with its own tone, like Enterprise tried to do by going to the past.

The show so far doesn't seem to have any interest whatsoever in its own setting but that's not necessarily a problem if it's just intended to be an excuse to have a clean-ish slate.

Admittedly this is scuttled somewhat by the fact that every other building is named after some TOS/TNG shit like "The Helen Noel Auditorium" or "Dave Bailey Gardens" or w/e.

 

[Charles Phipps]

The show so far doesn't seem to have any interest whatsoever in its own setting but that's not necessarily a problem if it's just intended to be an excuse to have a clean-ish slate.

Really?

Because the show has shown significantly more interest than DISCO, I'd argue. After all, Caleb's origin is directly due to the Burn making starvation a thing that humans and other people in the galaxy suffer. The whole reestablishing of the Academy is due to some nebulous "Starfleet losing its way." Also, the big enemies are a giant pirate fleet that can defeat a nation state.

Beta Test is all about following up on the Burn.

 

[Michael]

The show so far doesn't seem to have any interest whatsoever in its own setting but that's not necessarily a problem if it's just intended to be an excuse to have a clean-ish slate.

Hm, I’m not sure I see it that way. Each of the only three episodes so far has at least one element that’s a result of the fact that the known galaxy is in disarray because of the Burn. Sure, they would have been able to tell Caleb’s backstory without the Burn as well, but it does make more dramatic sense in this century than it does during the relative peace of the late 24th and early 25th century. Same for the story of episode two, trying to get Betazed to rejoin the Federation, or the fact that there’s a more militarized version of Starfleet in the War College. Nothing of that would have been totally impossible to tell at earlier points in the history of the Trek universe, but to claim that the show didn’t demonstrate an interest in doing something with the post-Burn setting is IMHO overstating it. Let’s not forget that we’re only three episodes in.

Reportedly episode four will finally answer what happened with the Klingons after the Burn. So I’m sure there will be more world building in that regard going forward.

 

[Starflight]

I dunno, right now it feels very Enterprise-esque, which is to say the setting feels more like flavour rather than something that's acting as a storytelling engine

The Betazed plot ultimately just plays out as "tense negotiations where our hero falls in love with one of the delegates", which is a typical Star Trek story.

This isn't a bad thing - I actually think I'm more interested in the episodic lighthearted comedy the show seems to be promising than I would be in something that was making a more earnest attempt to investigate the setting and the nature of the recent apocalypse - but I'm definitely not currently feeling like I'm watching a group of people who grew up in nightmarish conditions rallying together to form a fledgling Starfleet that's still uncertain about its future.