Star Trek: Strange New Worlds should focus on expanding on The Orions next

The Orions are arguably one of the more difficult aliens in the Star Trek canon to get a handle on. Originally they were depicted in line with other alien races of the era across sci-fi. A group of aliens who used members of their own race to entice others. In the original series, they became known as the "Orion slave girls".

In Star Trek: Enterprise, it was shown that the Orion women were far more capable and not always the victims. In Star Trek 2009, and Star Trek: Lower Decks, we know some Orions were part of Starfleet. In fact, they further expanded on the aliens and further explored more of their history.

Namely that they were pirates who did awful things to people, including, but not limited to slave trading. Enterprise really tried to flip the script on the race and Lower Decks added some much-needed levity to them. Yet of all the original series aliens, the Orions are arguably the one group that has the most on the bone still for us to dive deep into.

In some ways, the Orions are the most confusing race of aliens in Star Trek due to this. Every show that has come out since the original series has tried to rewrite the race, as many fans saw the depiction of the Orion women to be problematic. So Enterprise and Lower Decks worked hard to rewrite the script on them.

Instead of the women being slaves, the men are. The women disguise themselves as slaves to lure people into their traps. It's a concept that isn't better, it's just more socially accepted. It's caused some fans to brush off the changes. Making what Lower Decks did, galvanizing the society as matriarchial seem tacked on and lacking a strong foundation outside of some dialogue.

STrangeg New Worlds could actually fortify the new ideas and maybe explore further into the mythos that make up the Orions. Maybe you could have dueling factions who both use the other gender as slaves. Maybe no one is a slave and the Orions are just perpetual liars, which would make sense as Lower Decks' D'Erika Tendi once said Orions don't engage in pirate behavior anymore, only for that to be proven false.

Strange New Worlds did wonders with streamlining and highlighting the Gorn, and maybe they could do the same for the Orions. After all, they've really become Star Trek's version of Hawkman from DC Comics. In the comics, Hawkman's backstory has been retconned and reworked so many times that they even created a special storyline designed to resolve the complexities of the character's backstory.

Granted it didn't work, but Star Trek could still try to do the same thing with the Orions and give us a clear narrative and backstory as to who they are.