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Why do they turn Federation into a dystopia? (feddit.org)

submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by Chemo@feddit.org to c/startrek@startrek.website

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I just don't get it. What is the freaking problem of those directors, trying to rewrite federation into some kind of dystopian tech fascism?

I was annoyed by the first Star Trek movie by JJ Abrams, with those police cops. I was alienated by those anti-android resentments in Picard. I stopped watching Discovery after the first episode, because the main protagonist was sent to some kind of labor prison for disobedience, where prisoners regularly die. I didn't think it could get any worse but just watching the first 10 minutes of Starfleet Academy makes me want to bury the whole franchise [edit: and stopped watching]. Some drumhead court-martial, lifelong prison sentence, violently separating a mother from her child and some goons beating up a prisoner. How in the hell is this the same federation of TNG, Voyager and DS9?

Star Trek is supposed to be the ONE fiction with a positive, utopian view on mankind and the future. I totally get the attraction of dystopian settings but for that I can read some Warhammer 40k novels. This really makes me furious.

Fortunately there is still Strange New Worlds.

Please spoiler me, when this bullshit in Starfleet Academy gets turned around in some twist, because otherwise I will just ignore the show.

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[-] ragingHungryPanda@piefed.keyboardvagabond.com 5 points 2 months ago

have you seen the animated Lower Decks series? I love it.

but yeah, a lot for newer star trek stuff I don't think was written by people intending to follow the series

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[-] scy@chaos.social 4 points 2 months ago

@Chemo To answer your question: 15 minutes into the show.

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[-] Snowclone@lemmy.world 4 points 2 months ago

they stared downgrading the federation in DS9 man.

[-] kboos1@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago

DISC did a lot of bad things to Trek just for shock value. But in a utopia there still has to be rules, Burnham committed probably the worst crime in the Trek universe, she disobeyed a direct order, started a mutiny and opened fire on an alien ship, which started a war killing millions. The only reason she got out of prison was because her boyfriend from an evil universe broke her out of prison under false pretenses hoping that since she started a war in this universe that she was just as evil as her counterpart. How messed up is that? Then her redeeming moment is she seized command of the ship and starts a civil war and threatens to blow up another species home world to end the war she started. That's some cowboy shit right there. All because he has unresolved child hood trauma. She deserved to got to federation vacation colony for life.

Kelvinverse would have been great as a big budget sci-fi franchise if it wasn't set in the Trek universe. You can pretty much ignore Kelvinverse movies and pretend that it was just a fun experiment.

SFA and SNW are just trying to undo the mistakes of DISC.

PIC got a lot of things wrong but shared trauma from an unprovoked attack by the Romulans hacking Androids and forcing them to attack people would trigger mass panic and fear that it could happen again, I don't think that's far fetched.

[-] Kirk@startrek.website 4 points 2 months ago

The "this specific person (who happens to be a woman and black but that has nothing to do with it I swear) must be punished for being a naughty bad girl" fantasies always make me super uncomfortable BUT it's nice to see someone not calling Burhnam an overly perfect Mary Sue for once.

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this post was submitted on 09 Feb 2026

168 points (90.0% liked)

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