I started with Star Trek after watching the Star Trek (2009) movie in college. After that I went wild watching everything I could since I was young with loads of time. I watched most of TOS, all of TNS, all of DS9, all of Voyager, all of Enterprise and all of the movies. I then stopped since I didn’t have the time and wasn’t ready to download a new app to watch Discovery.
I am interested in watching some of the new shows from Discovery onwards but don’t know where to start and what are worth watching. I no longer have hours to watch TV or movies anymore and want to prioritize series on an easy to find streaming service. What is worth watching and what is worth skipping? Is it worth while to watch them all the way chronically or just watch one series and then another one.
Strange New Worlds episodic nature makes it easy to just drop right in. Technically it starts in Discovery but I think you’ll be just fine without it.
If they dropped the SNW and just called it Star Trek, I’d be okay with that. It’s deserving of the name.
As a purist, I’d say watch them all and in release order, but if you really have to be choosy with your time, here’s a list of things you can skip (in my opinion):
- Star Trek Into Darkness
- Discovery (whole show)
- Picard S1 and S2
- Short Treks
I know suggesting skipping Discovery outright is going to be seen as… extreme, but I suggest doing so only if time is a crucial factor. It’s a dizzyingly uneven show with the lowest points of quality in all of Trek. However, it also has some incredible highs and some truly great characters, so if you find the time to watch it, you should. And I know I’m in the minority on this, but I found Short Treks to be unwatchable.
On the flip side, Lower Decks is incredible, and Strange New Worlds is good. The third season of Picard is excellent. Prodigy is a little weird but it’s got a lot of strength. Star Trek Beyond is also a surprisingly good movie.
It’s a dizzyingly uneven show with the lowest points of quality in all of Trek.
Dude I’ve seen TNG season 1 and Enterprise seasons 1-2. I know we both know it can get worse.
TOS also has some truly awful episodes, but it’s pretty easy to ignore them.
I think the low points of DSC and PIC stick out for two reasons:
- Recency bias. It’s been 15 years since I last watched Code of Honor, and I rarely even think about it except when it’s time to make memes about season 1.
- Serialization. You can watch TNG, skip bad episodes like Code of Honor or Sub Rosa, and not really lose out on anything. But if you watch DSC and skip a bad episode, you blow a giant gaping hole in the over-arching story.
