I’m not too dissimilar from you, but expected cameos. Even Kirk in the S1 finale worked for me, because it was mostly about Pike but also a bit meta about the differences between him and Kirk. Continuity is great after all.

My point is that there’s a line beyond which the show leans prequel, and S2 has crossed that line IMO.

Which is fine, if that’s what people want, which I suspect is the case. I also suspect a TOS reboot would go down well and the execs are fully aware of this. But, is this really good for Trek or even good Trek? When was the last time we had new trek that wasn’t a prequel or driven by nostalgia? Lower Decks? I’m not a Discovery fan, but it surely tried, as did Picard S1 I’d say. Otherwise you might have to go all the way back to DS9. Thing is we’re as far from DS9 now as it was from TOS. SNW was something fresh, a true example of Trek being back on track by retaining the core but doing something new. The more it leans prequel, for me, the more I begin to feel all of nu-Trek is a missed opportunity and not worthy of celebration, which honestly saddens me (apart from lower decks, now my definitely fav new Trek!)

I would have it run until Kirk takes over as captain. Then jump forward to just after The Motion Picture.

This not only gives them about a decade of time before TWOK that’s barely been touched by the screen canon, they can do a design revamp to freshen the series up using TMP as a starting point, and they handle the fact that with a series per year the actors are going to quickly age ahead of their characters.