I’m doing a chronological rewatch of the whole franchise and am at the episodes where DS9 and Voyager overlap. It is mind boggling how much better DS9 is. I find myself wanting to skip almost every Voyager episode so I can just get to the DS9 ones.

I’ve watched Picard and discovery twice now and can safely say they’re very pew pew. The third season of Picard rocks, regardless. I still consider discovery to be the worst of all Star Trek shows. At the end of the day, I love all trek, but those two are not the highlights of the franchise.

For one Star Trek isn’t fantasy in space which is honestly a lot more appealing to those of the nerdy persuasion.

Like, Star Wars has ships that can travel anywhere and basically instantly whereas there are actually in universe explanations for how that might work in Trek and you can’t just zoom home whenever you want - Star Trek Voyager is a whole show about a ship that can’t return home. There are also just way better characters in trek and enough variety that everyone has different favorites.

It’s also nice that many of the conflicts in trek are solved through logic, diplomacy, and smarts. Only in Star Trek Discovery and the Picard show does the franchise venture too far into “pew pew” territory.

At the end of the day Star Wars is like 10 movies and a handful of shows that don’t do much and Trek has that many movies plus like 700 episodes of content.

One last tidbit, most of trek actually flows really well into each other and I think is way more cohesive than Star Wars where each era of movies feels like a different universe.

I wear a TNG uniform to my local ren fair every year - it almost exclusively generates excitement and high fives.

It follows

Orange man bad

The secret is Jeffrey Combs

Because he’s fully functional.

Honestly one of my favorite things about Star Trek are all my favorite “that guy’s” that show up. Was rewatching DS9 the other night and was like ITS BEN HORNE FROM TWIN PEAKS! Leland being a crazy religious proto-Vulcan in TNG was also a fun appearance.

There are no laws that govern his crimes

I fully support this. Also the Hornblower movies.

Guinan shoulda replaced Troi. She’s 1000% better at helping you solve your problems.

This person definitely has faith of the heart.

I’d argue you shouldn’t watch those till you’re done with the franchise for them to be at their maximum entertainment potential. A lot of the reason Trek fans love those 2 properties is because we have years of familiarity with what’s being parodying and being paid homage.

If you’re new to Trek, start with season 3 of TNG to get your proper Trek indoctrination. Then proceed on to DS9 and Voyager and onward to the current generation of shows. If you love it after watching that then go back to the campy TOS stuff and move forward from there until you circle back on TNG season 3.

I know it sounds weird to start on season 3 of a show but if you follow this order you’ll understand why. Trek didn’t become what most fans love until Roddenberry stopped being directly involved. He was a great dude for starting the universe but he’s also responsible for some of the worst decisions and episodes of the franchise. Before people get mad about me saying this please think about all the awful skippable episodes of season 2 and 3 of TOS and the low quality TOS scripts that were recycled in seasons 1 and 2 of TNG.

Also a pro tip for someone new, ignore anyone that says Trek ended after Voyager. Thats the neckbeard/anti-woke section of the fan base that is small but loud.

Been loving this game. All the folks complaining about it being too similar to Stellaris or that there’s similar mods for some of the functionality in it aren’t being fair IMO. Judge the game on its own merits. Feels like a 7 or 8 outta 10 game in my 10 hours of play so far.

God damn this is hilarious.

Uncle Quarks Youth Casino, Mariner saying that Ferengenar looks like heaven if God were stupid, and the naked female Ferengi subtly hidden in the restaurant were all nice little touches. I also think the Cerritos is severely lacking in relationship representation so I hope Tendi and Rutherford actually get together, never been a fan of the will they, won’t they dynamic in any show - as Boimler said, its lowest common denominator entertainment.

Smol data is kinda cute.

I watched this episode today and when Lal kisses Riker and Data walks in on them and asks “what are your intentions with my daughter” is probably the funniest gag in the whole franchise. Literally laugh out loud funny.