Star Trek has always been “woke”, from the first interracial kiss, to the half-black, half-white guys who were enemies.
But, it also never lost track of the idea that it was basically a Western in space. The stories were about being on the frontier, where nobody had yet explored. The people on the ship came from a planet that thought it had everything all figured out, where people lived in peace with comfortable lives free from danger and with all their needs met. They were “civilized”. The people they encountered out on the frontier were not civilized, so there was always conflict between civilization and the great wilderness of space.
Like every western, there has to be a shootout. There has to be a chase. The civilized people display a code of honour even in a place where the laws no longer apply. Because the system of law has been left behind, it’s up to the heroes to be judge, jury and occasionally executioner. It’s not the kind of a show for a courtroom drama. And there’s no waiting for someone to come help you, if you get in trouble, you have to get out of it on your own.
These kinds of stories go back longer than westerns. Before westerns there were tales of the knights of the round table, or about ronin in Japanese culture. They’re about strong individuals from a moral society going out into the wilderness. The Arthurian legends are actually in some ways closer to Star Trek than westerns, because in that case you have knights encountering mystical creatures beyond their understanding, which is like the aliens / creatures that are encountered in deep space in Star Trek.
The point is, I think Star Trek got away from this core formula, and it suffered as a result. In TOS the Enterprise encounters a couple of aliens who are at war with each-other because one group has white on the right side and black on the left and the other has white on the left and black on the right, that’s pretty obviously about racism. But the episode isn’t characters talking about racism. There’s some of that, but mostly it’s an adventure. There are phasers being fired, self-destruct sequences activated, aliens chasing each-other through the corridors of the enterprise. Also, what’s key here is that the Federation has everything all figured out. They’re anti-racist, they see the problems with these “uncivilized” aliens and want to resolve them. But, the damn aliens won’t listen to reason. You can’t avoid the idea that the racism of the aliens is stupid, but they don’t have to spend a lot of time talking about it because it’s so obvious. So, it challenges modern racism while mostly being shootouts, chases, etc.
Modern Trek seems to be a lot of navel gazing and figuring out that the wonderful utopian world of the Federation doesn’t have everything all figured out. Earth and the Federation is no longer a utopia that can teach awful aliens how to treat each-other with dignity and respect. It’s shown to be a flawed place. It also seems like the action and adventure often takes a back seat to character development through dramatic soap-opera like scenes. I think they lose a lot when they forget it’s supposed to involve action and adventure. It’s fun to have stories where you know who the good guys are, and you know who the bad guys are. It can challenge modern culture and point out things like racism without there being racism within the federation.
I hope they abandon the whole “burn” universe, and start fresh with something where the federation is a happy utopia where everything is nearly perfect. Let it be the aliens who are flawed, and the federation is the beacon of civilization and goodness that tries to make things right out in the wilderness. If they want to explore a modern issue like religious fanaticism, that’s great. But, make it so it’s the aliens who are religious fanatics and it’s the federation that’s trying to help them, maybe drawing on their having overcome the problems with religious fanaticism back in the dark days.
Star Trek has always been “woke”, from the first interracial kiss, to the half-black, half-white guys who were enemies.
But, it also never lost track of the idea that it was basically a Western in space. The stories were about being on the frontier, where nobody had yet explored. The people on the ship came from a planet that thought it had everything all figured out, where people lived in peace with comfortable lives free from danger and with all their needs met. They were “civilized”. The people they encountered out on the frontier were not civilized, so there was always conflict between civilization and the great wilderness of space.
Like every western, there has to be a shootout. There has to be a chase. The civilized people display a code of honour even in a place where the laws no longer apply. Because the system of law has been left behind, it’s up to the heroes to be judge, jury and occasionally executioner. It’s not the kind of a show for a courtroom drama. And there’s no waiting for someone to come help you, if you get in trouble, you have to get out of it on your own.
These kinds of stories go back longer than westerns. Before westerns there were tales of the knights of the round table, or about ronin in Japanese culture. They’re about strong individuals from a moral society going out into the wilderness. The Arthurian legends are actually in some ways closer to Star Trek than westerns, because in that case you have knights encountering mystical creatures beyond their understanding, which is like the aliens / creatures that are encountered in deep space in Star Trek.
The point is, I think Star Trek got away from this core formula, and it suffered as a result. In TOS the Enterprise encounters a couple of aliens who are at war with each-other because one group has white on the right side and black on the left and the other has white on the left and black on the right, that’s pretty obviously about racism. But the episode isn’t characters talking about racism. There’s some of that, but mostly it’s an adventure. There are phasers being fired, self-destruct sequences activated, aliens chasing each-other through the corridors of the enterprise. Also, what’s key here is that the Federation has everything all figured out. They’re anti-racist, they see the problems with these “uncivilized” aliens and want to resolve them. But, the damn aliens won’t listen to reason. You can’t avoid the idea that the racism of the aliens is stupid, but they don’t have to spend a lot of time talking about it because it’s so obvious. So, it challenges modern racism while mostly being shootouts, chases, etc.
Modern Trek seems to be a lot of navel gazing and figuring out that the wonderful utopian world of the Federation doesn’t have everything all figured out. Earth and the Federation is no longer a utopia that can teach awful aliens how to treat each-other with dignity and respect. It’s shown to be a flawed place. It also seems like the action and adventure often takes a back seat to character development through dramatic soap-opera like scenes. I think they lose a lot when they forget it’s supposed to involve action and adventure. It’s fun to have stories where you know who the good guys are, and you know who the bad guys are. It can challenge modern culture and point out things like racism without there being racism within the federation.
I hope they abandon the whole “burn” universe, and start fresh with something where the federation is a happy utopia where everything is nearly perfect. Let it be the aliens who are flawed, and the federation is the beacon of civilization and goodness that tries to make things right out in the wilderness. If they want to explore a modern issue like religious fanaticism, that’s great. But, make it so it’s the aliens who are religious fanatics and it’s the federation that’s trying to help them, maybe drawing on their having overcome the problems with religious fanaticism back in the dark days.