In Its Third Season, Star Trek: Discovery Finds Its Identity

Back in 2017, Star Trek: Discovery had a lot riding on it. Not only was it the first Trek series to grace the small screen since Star Trek: Enterprise left the airwaves back in 2005, but it was set to also be the first series in franchise history to embrace a more modern storytelling style while also bucking traditional network TV constraints. The show’s first season certainly had some great moments but ended up dividing fans with some overcomplicated plot threads, some unnecessarily grim imagery, and conflicting tones—most likely due to the unexpected shift in showrunners before its completion. On the other hand, season 2 proved to be much more consistent in both tone and theme and marked the point when the series began to hit its stride. But in the third season, which wrapped up in early January, Star Trek: Discovery seems to have found its identity.

Spoilers ahead.

Sonequa Martin-Green as Burnham and Blu del Barrio as Adira. Michael Gibson/CBS © 2020 CBS Interactive, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

The season’s opening moments bring us headfirst into the immediate aftermath of the previous season’s explosive finale. Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) finds herself literally thrown over 900 years into her future—deliberately further than anything else we’ve seen in Star Trek canon prior to this. Coming to the realization that life still exists in this future and her mission at the end of season 2 was a success, Burnham lets out the most jubilant cry of both joy and triumph that perfectly sets the tone for a season that makes a point to showcase a renewed sense of wonder, excitement, and optimism.

In the first several episodes, we see the crew acclimating to life after leaving everything they knew behind in the past as well as trying to explore this new and unfamiliar frontier they’ve found themselves in. This, in a sense, reflects the season’s thematic through line of healing after trauma—both personal and collective—and the challenges of moving on. In exploring these shared experiences and shared trauma, we also see a continued emphasis placed on found family and how these bonds come to be formed.

Oded Fehr as Admiral Vance, Doug Jones as Saru, and Vanessa Jackson as Lt. Willa. Michael Gibson/CBS ©2020 CBS Interactive, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

We’re also presented with a galaxy suffering from the effects of “the Burn,” a cataclysmic event that saw the destruction of nearly all of the known stores of dilithium—the primary component in a starship’s ability to travel at warp speeds—and a Federation exhausting all resources just trying to keep up with the basic needs of its remaining member worlds. Rather than focusing on a single “big bad” or stopping some massive threat, this season instead chooses to craft its narrative arc by mirroring the characters’ journeys through trauma and healing and seeing not just the Federation but the entire galaxy ask, “What happens next, and how do we recover?”

That’s not to say there is no villain, however. This season introduces us to the Emerald Chain, a scrappy yet aggressively capitalist syndicate born from an alliance between the Orions and Andorians, and one of its leaders, an Orion named Osyraa (Janet Kidder). Throughout the season, the Emerald Chain comes off as a dark mirror of what the Federation could have allowed itself to become had it abandoned its principles in the wake of the Burn. While the threat serves as more of a season-long B-plot to the show’s primary mystery, it’s this plot thread that allows Discovery to really reaffirm some of Star Trek’s long-held core values. Through an extended dialogue between Osyraa and the head of Starfleet, Admiral Vance (Oded Fehr), the admiral firmly makes the case that compromise for the sake of unity cannot come at the expense of justice and accountability—something that feels all too relevant to us today.

Blu del Barrio as Adira and Ian Alexander as Gray. Michael Gibson/CBS ©2020 CBS Interactive, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Many other aspects of this season worked to add to Star Trek’s legacy of pushing boundaries, digging into socially relevant topics, and making bolder statements. This season made franchise history with the inclusion of the first trans and nonbinary characters (Ian Alexander and Blu del Barrio, respectively), and its running theme of forging connection through abrupt isolation felt almost too poignant and familiar. And aside from the primary season-long arcs and themes, a general shift toward a bit more of an episodic approach to the season allowed the writers to play around with more small-scale stories with some classic Trek–esque morality plays.

Of course, as with nearly any season of television, it is not perfect. A complaint many had about the previous two seasons was the pacing; the feeling of rushing from plot point to plot point left us little time to really sit with and get to know some of the characters. Much has been done to rectify that this season, but I still found myself wanting the show to slow down from time to time. There was a truly delightful plot centering around finding ways for the crew to bond (which concluded in a shipwide watch party of a Buster Keaton film) and a fun sequence surrounding Saru (Doug Jones) trying to figure out his captain’s catchphrase (i.e., “engage”), but these moments still felt secondary to the often breathless pacing of the action and plot progression. I don’t think I’m alone in wanting to learn more about the bridge crew and some of the background characters who are always present, yet not as regularly featured.

The crew gathers for a dinner party. Michael Gibson/CBS ©2020 CBS Interactive, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Despite this, the show does have a tendency to develop its core characters quite well, and this season did a great job furthering that. The transformation of Dr. Culber (Wilson Cruz) into the ship’s de facto counselor (and, in effect, more of a main character as well) was a particular highlight for me. New characters—such as the aforementioned Osyraa and Admiral Vance along with David Ajala‘s charismatic space courier, Book; a new Andorian character named Ryn (Noah Averbach-Katz); the enigmatic Dr. Kovich, played by David Cronenberg (yes, the David Cronenberg); and, of course, Grudge the cat—were all welcome additions to the show and brought in some fun and fresh new dynamics.

Raven Dauda as Dr. Pollard, David Ajala as Book, and Grudge. Michael Gibson/CBS ©2020 CBS Interactive, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Ultimately, Star Trek: Discovery‘s third season is solid television and a great addition to Trek canon. From a technical standpoint, it continues to be an absolutely beautiful series—the visuals are top tier, the ship and set designs are rich and textured, and the creature and alien effects are just all around cool. From a storytelling standpoint, Discovery is becoming the show that Trek fans had wanted it to be when it was first announced. I’ll admit that I felt a twinge of disappointment at first hearing that the show was going to be another prequel rather than moving the the timeline forward. And while I and many fans grew to love it for what it was, this leap into truly uncharted territory feels like the series is now discovering what it really wants to be. I, for one, cannot wait to see where it takes us next.

Star Trek: Discovery is currently available to stream on CBS All Access.