There is no debate when it comes to the Klingons in Star Trek

Star Trek: Discovery is a divisive show. Even if you enjoy it, you can't deny that it changed parts of canon forever, and for no real reason. From the uniforms to the types of engines it uses and most egregious of all, the Klingons. It was a show that really went out of its way to make sure fans knew that the old era of Star Trek wasn't enough.

That thing you loved? It was broken, apparently. So Discovery fixed it! Or so they tried. The thing though is that nothing the show did to improve, fix, or in otherwise change what we understood Star Trek to be made things better. It felt like a lot of pandering to non-Star Trek fans in hopes of expanding the franchise.

Expanding the franchise is a good thing, as new fans must come on board to keep this ship sailing, yet exposing new fans to things that are decidedly not "Star Trek" doesn't help anyone. The changes didn't bring that many new fans in but sure turned a lot of old fans off.

It would take Strange New Worlds, Prodigy, and a strong third season of Picard to really change the course of franchise perception from what it was with Discovery to what it is now. That meant undoing some of the more egregious changes that Discovery made. Namely, the Klingons.

For some reason, Discovery decided to take an ax to the decades of canon and enjoyment that fans have had with the beloved alien race. They changed everything they could about them. Their look, their culture, their hierarchy, and their entire image. They didn't have the same swashbuckling, pirate-life-for-me atmosphere that millions of fans fell in love with during the Rick Berman era of Star Trek.

Instead, they were seen as more ethereal in a way. Almost like villains out of the 2020 Doom sequel, Eternal.

While those who performed on camera did a great job, the overall decision making was the issue at hand. The actors and actresses did a wonderful job, but the material they were given just wasn't up to par with what fans expected. So when outlets start making statements like Inverse recently did, where they argue there isn't much difference between the hated Discovery era Klingons and the beloved TNG era, we have to beg to differ.

Not only are they dramatically different, but they were so refiled that the Discovery-era Klingons weren't even just changed, but were deliberately forgotten about. So far there has been no real mention about that era of Klingons or why they changed so dramatically.

The argument that Inverse makes, that the Klingons can be whatever they want at this point, is a fallacy. If that were the case, we'd see more different-looking versions of the aliens. Instead, the powers that be realized how badly they stepped in it and returned the Klingons to their prior glory.

Admitting they were wrong by doing so. If anything, the change back to the classic era of Klingons proves that Klingons aren't some wide arrange of unique and varied aliens. Instead, Klingons are what they have always been and that, is in fact, a very good thing.