Well, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds has ended its third season. Despite its first two seasons being fun and entertaining, this season has felt like a slog from beginning to end. It has a couple of bright spots, but apart from those, it is a season of boring horror and boring comedy. Perhaps aptly, then, the season 3 finale strives to be emotionally touching but instead feels dull and rushed.
“New Life and New Civilizations” continues the Vezda storyline from “Through the Lens of Time” and reveals that Captain Marie Batel, Captain Pike’s girlfriend, is destined to become an eternal statue being, to keep the Vezda locked in their interdimensional prison for all eternity. This is the result of the genetic modifications she received following her run-in with the Gorn.
Part of the episode is spent getting Captain Batel where she needs to be to assume this guardian role, which includes Spock and Kirk mind-melding so that they can fire the phasers of the Enterprise and the Farragut in perfect sync. This is not a significant part of the plot, but it is the most interesting part of the episode, so I am noting it.
Upon entering the Vezda prison, Captain Batel, accompanied by Captain Pike, takes them through an entire life together in an instant, giving echoes of the Nexus from Star Trek Generations or the probe from TNG’s “The Inner Light.” Then, the action resumes and Batel recaptures the escaping Vezda and turns into the guardian statue.
The end of the episode is then meant to be self-reflective, as Pike copes with his grief while noting that life and love move on aboard the Enterprise. A twiddly acoustic guitar song plays, and then the crew sets course for their next adventure.
Up until this episode, it was not clear to me what the longer “arc” would be for this season. There were some hints in retrospect, but that anticipation wasn’t there, so it feels abrupt. It also feels extremely sentimental without actually being emotionally touching. (I am pretty quick to get choked up in a story, so the indifference I felt watching this episode is notable.)
The biggest problem with “New Life and New Civilizations” is that it tries to cram so much into its brief runtime that it ends up feeling boring and emotionally distant. There could be many reasons for this, but my guess is that it is rooted in an interplay between the episodic format of Strange New Worlds and its limit to only 10 episodes in a season.
If we look at shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, we find that each season primarily consists of standalone episodes that gradually build longer arcs, which become the focus of the last two or three episodes of a given season. The emotional payoff of the longer arcs is often intense and satisfying, but the standalone episodes are also rewarding to watch.
Of course, Buffy has 22 episodes per season. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is trying to follow that same sort of narrative structure while compressing it into only 10 episodes. Other modern series, like The Mandalorian or Stranger Things tend to have their handful of episodes much more closely linked narratively, so the story is constantly building until it reaches a satisfying climax in the finale.
I love Star Trek and always hope that new episodes will bring excitement and joy, but season 3 of Strange New Worlds has proven to be a chore for me to watch. Sadly, this finale does not bring it all together. Instead, I am left feeling the apathetic indifference that Captain Pike displays in the final scene of the episode, where he doesn’t even really care where they go next. Neither do I.