Gotcha. Thanks for clarifying!

The Final Reflection which, although rendered non-canon by events

I don't think it was ever "canon," though maybe in the early eighties the novels were viewed as canon by some before TNG? I was too young at that point to really be confident. Mainly mentioning it in case you meant something closer to "incompatible with canon."

Curious what "events" you're referring to in any case. Not familiar enough with the novel to say for sure.

the audience ends up being (I’ll allow myself this just once) men rather than women

I know Trek has a rep here for the fans all being guys—specifically guys who can't get a date—but I don't know if it holds up to much scrutiny. The campaigns to rescue TOS were spearheaded by Bjo Trimble and I believe the participants were a pretty mixed crowd, including a lot of women who appreciated good sci-fi in addition to those who thought that—in the immortal words of Isaac Asimov's daughter—"Mr. Spock is dreamy." I haven't been to a lot of cons, but the ones I've seen felt like pretty mixed crowds as well.

the average viewer is, well, just that—the average person in the country where it’s broadcast

Isn't the average in most countries a roughly equal split of men and women?

I have one. I want to say ThinkGeek used to sell them, but I definitely recognize that backing as being from the same device I have.

It's cool and fun to wear, but not amazing as a Bluetooth device. Microphone didn't pick up super-well, which isn't too surprising when it's clipped on your shirt. Magnet would sometimes slip off if the shirt bunched up or something too. (I haven't used it in a few years, so I'm a little hazy on some of this.)

A Bluetooth version of the TMP communicators might have better success, albeit at the cost of having to hold your arm up for the whole conversation.

Not sure your country of origin, but in the U.S. it has all 13 theatrical films + Section 31, as well as Woman in Motion and Building Star Trek.

https://www.paramountplus.com/...

Not only do you not need to catch up with Disco, but the end of season 2 of Disco doesn't dovetail to the beginning of Strange New Worlds super-well when you watch them back-to-back; if anything, they feel like they lightly contradict each other.

Though if I were to recommend a single episode it would be "Through the Valley of Shadows" from season 2, which is probably the only "important" episode as far as Strange New Worlds goes, though the key stuff gets recapped in SNW.

The Short Treks episode Q&A gets some references in the series too, though if you don't watch it you likely won't realize you missed anything.

Bat'leth-man.

Mostly strong-to-glowing reviews. Comic Book Club, Looper, Radio Times, and TV Guide are the most negative (or at least least positive). Comic Book Club and Original Cin (both which I'd never heard of before) are the only ones I've seen that seems to hate it. ComicBook.com, ScreenRant, and TV Line give middling reviews.

(NOTE: I made that note before adding a bunch of others. I've updated it a bit since then, but I'm more focused on updating the list below than the list of negative-to-middling reviews; Rotten Tomatoes can do that for you instead at this point.)

https://www.avclub.com/...

https://awardsbuzz.com/...

https://www.beaconjournal.com/...

https://bsky.app/... (Meteorologist Katie Nickolaou)

https://www.cbr.com/...

https://collider.com/...

https://comicbook.com/...

https://comicbookclublive.com/...

https://www.comicsbeat.com/...

https://www.empireonline.com/...

https://www.engadget.com/...

https://fandomwire.com/...

https://fenixnests.com/...

https://www.joblo.com/...

https://www.ksitetv.com/...

https://www.looper.com/...

https://lytrules.substack.com/...

https://www.moviefone.com/...

https://nerdspin.com/...

https://www.original-cin.ca/...

https://nerdist.com/...

https://www.newsday.com/...

https://www.polygon.com/...

https://popculturemaniacs.com/...

https://www.radiotimes.com/...

https://screenrant.com/...

https://www.sfchronicle.com/...

https://www.slashfilm.com/...

https://www.starburstmagazine.com/...

https://www.strangenewpod.com/...

https://www.thathashtagshow.com/...

https://www.thetvcave.com/...

https://www.thewrap.com/...

TrekCore's WeeklyTrek podcast, which has a review by Alex Perry distinct from the TrekCore review by Jenn Tifft posted by @ValueSubtracted@startrek.website https://blog.trekcore.com/...

TrekCulture YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7PzOd1GstI

TrekMovie’s podcast, which is distinct from their article review: https://trekmovie.com/...

https://treknews.net/...

https://www.tvguide.com/...

https://www.tvinsider.com/... (by former TV Guide writer Matt Roush)

https://www.tvline.com/...

https://www.whatsalanwatching.com/...

https://winteriscoming.net/...

https://www.wsj.com/... (paywalled)

Aggregators:

https://www.metacritic.com/...

https://www.rottentomatoes.com/...

I'd probably just start the PIC era in 2399. We only see the 2380's in a handful of flashbacks. Prodigy definitely has some PIC connections, but it's far more a continuation of Voyager, and it starts like a year after season 5 of Lower Decks.

Voyager referenced or included TOS and TNG characters in at least eight episodes of season 3.

• "Flashback" was the big Sulu/Rand/Kang 30th anniversary tribute
• "Death Wish" had Q and Riker
• In "Alliances" Tuvok talks about Spock and recaps the events of Undiscovered Country
• McCoy was mentioned in "Lifesigns"
• Data was mentioned in "Prototype"
• Sulu was mentioned in "Tattoo"
• Picard and Moriarty were mentioned in "Alter Ego"
• Picard was mentioned again in "Scorpion"

That's basically a third of the season, assuming I didn't forget any. And that's not even counting things like the mention of Wolf 359 in "Unity" or the koon-ut-kal-if-fee in "Blood Fever".

And that's from the show that went out of their way to make it hard to use existing concepts.

I like to think that the pepperoni pizza was a tribute to the 30th anniversary of "Threshold" on the same day, but the true tribute to "Threshold" was depicting parents stranding their offspring on a planet and then justifying that it was fine.

I've been doing a rewatch and making notes of things that are referenced later. Considering most classic Trek has a reputation for being episodic, you'd be surprised just how much gets referenced later, whether in a passing comment or an in-joke or something. The only episodes of TNG season 1 where I didn't spot at least a passing reference later was "Too Short a Season", "Home Soil", and "When the Bough Breaks". (The references to a few of the others are vague and/or arguable though, and admittedly "Knowing where that clip in 'Shades of Gray' is from" qualifies a few of them.)

So it kind of depends on how strictly you define "important." Most people could probably skip almost the entirety of TNG season 1 and not be that confused, but for example:

• "All Good Things..." loses a lot without "Encounter at Farpoint"
• "The Naked Now" is important to "The Measure of a Man"
• "Haven" introduces Lwaxana Troi, Mr. Homn, naked Betazoid weddings, and the running gag of data being too precise. "In the Cradle of Vexilon" loses something without it too.
• "Where No One Has Gone Before" is crucial in introducing the Traveler, and that plot continues into "Remember Me" and "Journey's End" and beyond.
• "The Last Outpost" has first contact with the Ferengi, though you could argue that future Ferengi episodes make more sense without it? Though it's important to the game Star Trek: Resurgence.
• "Justice" doesn't seem important, but if you skip it you won't know what Remmick's talking about in "Conspiracy".
• "The Battle" isn't referenced often, but "Bloodlines" depends on it. Remmick mentions this one too.
• "Hide and Q" introduces concepts like the Q Continuum, and the events of it lead to Q's status in "Q Who", which introduces the Borg.
• "The Big Goodbye" introduces Dixon Hill and explains holodeck matter. The Jarada are mentioned again later too.
• "Datalore" introduces Lore and the Crystalline Entity and explains Data's past, somewhat.
• "11001001" is important to understanding "Future Imperfect"... though that episode isn't really referenced again other than that it introduces a fictionalized version of Nurse Ogawa. So is it still important if you skip both of them?
• "Coming of Age" introduces a lot of the characters and concepts that will be in "Conspiracy". Fun fact: This is the first episode to name Murf's species from Prodigy.
• "Heart of Glory" introduces Khitomer and gives Worf's backstory and sort-of sets up "The Neutral Zone".
• "The Arsenal of Freedom" is the first mention of Crusher's grandmother from "Sub Rosa", but arguably more important for relationship-building between Crusher and Picard.
• "Symbiosis" becomes very relevant in Lower Decks in the episode "Trusted Sources".
• "Skin of Evil" features the death of Tasha Yar. Armus also returns in Lower Decks.
• Even though the cliffhanger isn't followed up on, "Conspiracy" becomes important again in "The Drumhead".
• "The Neutral Zone" pays off the hints that the Romulans were gone, though if you skipped "Heart of Glory" you didn't catch this in the first place, and "Angel One" arguably contradicted it. But this is the first hint of the Borg, as confirmed in "Q Who" and "The Best of Both Worlds".

I could add other subtler things, but those are some of the bigger ones just from that highly-episodic season.

If there's no new Trek, that means watching old Trek, right?

Trying to finish my full in-universe chronological franchise re-watch for the 60th anniversary, which means an average of maybe 75 minutes of watching Trek per day through September 8 if I want to get it to line up. I started back in April 2024, but there's a lot of Trek out there, and I'm already falling behind. (Ideally it would've been 58 minutes per day. This includes watching some episodes multiple times if they take place in multiple time periods.)

For what it's worth, we'll arguably get some new Trek soon whenever the "season finale" of Scouts comes out. 😂 Only one episode left if they don't get renewed.

She's definitely missed.

Incidentally, sounds like you might appreciate this podcast if you aren't into it already. I've heard it mentioned a few times, though to be honest I haven't given it a listen myself yet. (I'm behind on too many podcasts already to add another one at the moment.)

https://www.alltheasiansonstartrek.com/

Here's the transcript for those who prefer that over video:

https://collider.com/...

I really liked it.

The Switch version is arguably a step down from the PC version (not sure about other consoles), but both have their distinct charms. Well worth grabbing while you can.

Nice notes, as usual.

V’Ger is the antagonist in TMP

Also it's in the Lower Decks opening credit sequence this year.

the Cambodian word for “toilet” is bangkon, which is pronounced similarly.

Interesting catch. That didn't occur to me, ហើយខ្ញុំចេះភាសារខ្មែរ។

Nurse Westlake is named after Chris Westlake

He's also appeared as far back as the series premiere, though he's rarely spoken until now, and I don't think he's ever said more than a couple of lines.

Great notes, as always.

In addition to the already-cited references, the Beagle could additionally be a sly reference to Archer's pal Porthos.

Interestingly, Jolene Blalock is credited simply as "Jolene". EDIT: Mike McMahan says this was at her request. https://bsky.app/...

Our T'Pol also had some indirect experience with the concept of katra transference when Archer briefly carried Surak's katra.

It's the same dumb cycle that's happened with every new Trek show since TNG (and probably TAS). It's tiresome, but at least it's predicable, I guess? Just ignore the obligatory backlash and see how it turns out.

Did they just re-release the 50th Anniversary issue and change the cover? That would track content-wise.

Entertainment Weekly's "The Ultimate Guide to Star Trek" 60th anniversary issue is largely a reprint of their 50th and 55th anniversary issues if the copyright dates in the indicia are any indication, though they definitely made some updates to keep it current by including more recent shows.