Huh. After a season of Strange New Worlds that’s mostly focused on action, comedy, romance, and horror, I’ve been craving something more intellectual from the series, one of those classic Trek episodes that really makes you think rather than just providing easy good guys and bad guys. And, at first, “What Is Starfleet?” seems to have all the hallmarks of such an episode: a complex war; a giant, scientifically exploited space creature; an outsider’s perspective courtesy of Ortegas’ little brother Beto and his probing documentary.
The first half of the episode lays out the pieces for what could be a complicated morality play like Deep Space Nine’s “In The Pale Moonlight” or at least last season’s “Ad Astra Per Aspera.” Only then it just…ends—to the point where I checked my screener to make sure I hadn’t accidentally missed a scene. Instead of starting simple and growing more complex, “What Is Starfleet?” starts with a bunch of complicated, thorny ideas only to winnow them down to a celebration of how great Starfleet is. And that makes it an odd watch, even if it’s relatively engaging on a scene-to-scene basis.
That starts with another patented Strange New Worlds high-concept premise: This entire episode is framed as Beto’s documentary, complete with talking head interviews, declassified security footage, and artistically composed shots from a budding filmmaker. It’s another example of Strange New Worlds’ tendency to conflate episodic TV with high-concept gimmicks, although in this case I don’t mind the switch-up. We’re used to seeing our Enterprise crew from one “objective” point of view, so it’s interesting to look at them from a different lens for once.
It turns out Beto’s aim isn’t just to document Starfleet procedure, but to raise questions about whether the Federation’s space exploration/defense arm might actually be an imperial power in disguise. As he puts it, “Both colonize. Both impose their laws and doctrines on others. Are they explorers as they claim or soldiers as they appear? They call their vessels starships. What distinguishes them from warships?”
It’s all a bit melodramatic (intentionally so, I think). But the idea of an episode all about morality and values rather than interpersonal drama is an exciting addition to the season. Beto particularly zeroes in on how much combat and violence are part of the Starfleet experience. This week, for instance, the Enterprise is called in to help with a brutal war between Lutani VII and its sister planet Kasar. The Kasar’s goal is to lay claim to the Lutani system and its resources. So far there have been nine million Lutani war casualties and only 119,000 on the Kasar side.
My initial thought upon seeing those numbers was that Strange New Worlds was about to weigh in on the current war in Gaza, which would’ve been both a bold choice and perfectly in keeping with Star Trek’s original ethos of timely socio-political commentary. But the episode soon pivots to a different conflict instead. The Enterprise has been tasked with transporting classified cargo to Lutani VII. And part of that cargo is a giant space moth called a Jikaru, which the Lutani claim they’re going to use in their rebuilding efforts but which they’ve actually modified to be a massive weapon.
It’s a thorny dilemma: The Lutani are a non-Federation world who have attacked Starfleet in the past. (Ortegas suggests they’re aligned with the Klingons.) But they’re now being decimated by the Kasar on a horrifying scale. And their only hope of winning the war is to subjugate a giant sentient being. How will the Enterprise deal with that impossible moral dilemma? By ignoring half of it, of course!
In the end, “What Is Starfleet?” winds up glossing over the war to become an episode about whether it’s okay to mistreat a giant, beautiful, sympathetic space creature. And while it’s sweet to watch Uhura advocate for communicating with the Jikaru to see what it wants, that shift in focus feels like such a cop-out. Instead of an episode about the morality of global interventionism, we get one about how animals have feelings too. And the fact that the Jikaru was modified by Lutani scientists rather than Federation ones means we don’t even really get any kind of critique of Starfleet in the end, either. For an episode about how hard it is to follow orders, none of the orders our crew have to follow this week seem particularly tough.
That’s because the arc of “What Is Starfleet?” doesn’t actually belong to any of our central heroes. Instead, it belongs to Beto, who comes to realize he entered this project with a bias against Starfleet. Apparently, he’s been harboring resentment towards the organization ever since it took his sister away and especially after Ortegas’ recent Gorn injury. It takes Uhura to help him see that. But it’s hard to care about her warm advice that he can still mend things with his sister when I had no idea until that scene that there was anything between them that needed mending. As far as I can remember, the only tension between Ortegas and Beto during his intro in “Wedding Bell Blues” is that she didn’t want her lovable kid brother flirting with her co-worker.
That speaks to an overall structural weirdness with this season of Strange New Worlds. When the series began, it made the clever choice to deliver old-fashioned episodic television with serialized character arcs. But this season has really dropped the ball on the second half of that equation. The reason to introduce Beto so early in the season would be to establish an emotional arc that gets paid off here. But as with Ortegas’ PTSD, Gamble’s death, the La’An/Spock relationship, the Pike/M’Benga friendship, and Marie’s Gorn treatment, the big emotional drivers of the season are totally stop-and-go depending on what each individual episode calls for.
I think that’s a big part of what’s making the show’s third season feel kind of listless, even though there have been moments I’ve enjoyed in every episode so far. If anything, I’m probably underselling how much “What Is Starfleet?” works on a scene-to-scene basis. Its strongest moments are the talking head interviews about violence. M’Benga contrasting his role as a doctor with his history in the Klingon War is a compelling use of Babs Olusanmokun’s quiet intensity. Uhura learning on-camera that her Starfleet Academy roommate died on the Cayuga is haunting. And I liked the frustration Anson Mount channels as Pike pushes back on how flippantly Beto asks about death.
There’s just a disconnect between the small-scale stuff that’s working and the big-picture ideas that are floundering. There’s poignancy to the way the Jikaru asks Pike to protect her children as she flies into a sun to sacrifice herself. But why make the Lutani death toll so extreme if the episode doesn’t want to grapple with that? Why make the Kasars a colonizing force if the episode doesn’t want to tie that into Beto’s critique of Federation imperialism? Why end this episode with such an upbeat montage about how Starfleet is the best rather than at least allowing some shades of grey to remain? Shouldn’t Starfleet policing how a non-Federation people fight back against their oppressors aid Beto’s critique, not refute it?
This episode really only works if you don’t think about it too hard and let its vibes wash over you. But then why use the probing format of a documentary to tell this particular story? It’s a genre about digging in and thinking deeply. And that makes it an odd fit for an episode that wants to end with a feel-good montage about how Starfleet has given Ortegas a family, Uhura a purpose, and Spock a place to explore his human half—sweet as those ideas may be.
So far, the most memorable episodes of the season have either been the ones where the gimmick is strong enough to make up for the weaker writing (“A Space Adventure Hour”) or where the writing is strong enough to make up for a weaker gimmick (“The Sehlat Who Ate Its Tail”). But, ideally, form and function should be working as one. For a while, it feels like they are in “What Is Starfleet?” But a tacked-on happy ending winds up undercutting too much of what came before.
Stray observations
- • I really appreciate this show’s commitment to giving Uhura the coolest nails and eyeshadow.
- • I first came across this idea in a critique of the Doctor Who episode “Kill The Moon,” but it’s funny when a sci-fi series makes a creature more sympathetic by making it bigger. Like, if the Lutani could turn the tides of war by transforming a bug-sized sentient moth into a weapon, would the Federation care?
- • It’s almost jarring to see Marie pop up as “general civilian girlfriend” at the end of this episode. Remember when she was about to accept a new captain position? Is she just totally fine with losing her career and becoming Pike’s live-in girlfriend due to her Gorn infection?
- • Ortegas reveals that she joined Starfleet as a way to feel in control again while her mom was dying. So, hey, at least we know one more detail about her other than the fact that she flies the ship!
- • I’m not sure if we’re supposed to think of this as a completed documentary that actually got released in-universe, but if so, it really feels like Starfleet funding its own propaganda, right?
