I started with Star Trek after watching the Star Trek (2009) movie in college. After that I went wild watching everything I could since I was young with loads of time. I watched most of TOS, all of TNS, all of DS9, all of Voyager, all of Enterprise and all of the movies. I then stopped since I didn’t have the time and wasn’t ready to download a new app to watch Discovery.
I am interested in watching some of the new shows from Discovery onwards but don’t know where to start and what are worth watching. I no longer have hours to watch TV or movies anymore and want to prioritize series on an easy to find streaming service. What is worth watching and what is worth skipping? Is it worth while to watch them all the way chronically or just watch one series and then another one.
If you’re going to start a new Trek, I seriously recommend The Orville.
It’s a love letter to TNG, VOY, DS9 era Trek. Better in many ways.
It starts as a goofy comedy and the first few episodes are kind of… okay. But by the third episode they find their footing and it just gets better and better.
The third (and possibly final) season is up there with the best of Trek. No bad episodes, and a much more serious tone. The show even has actors from ST series like Penny Jerald (Kassidy Yates in DS9) as main cast, cameos from Robert Picardo (Doctor on VOY), Tim Russ (Tuvok), John Billingsley (Dr Phlox from ENT). Also Brannon Braga produces/writes on it and Jonathan Frakes directs some episodes.
If you want to continue with TNG/VOY/DS9 era - Lower Decks is my personal favorite new Star Trek property. It’s a cartoon geared to a more adult audience, very funny - and very well written.
Strange New Worlds is the best of the new live action series. It’s episodic ‘alien of the week’ kinda vibe. It’s a spin-off from Discovery. It’s a prequel to TOS.
Discovery is a different approach. It’s season-long story archs and follows one main protagonists’ journey. It does become more about the crew later on. It had a very weak first two episodes - way too much lens flare and shaky cam. It gets a little better after but Season 1 was fairly weak. Season 2 is a huge improvement (and is the precursor to Strange New Worlds). You could start there if you read up about the characters and plot points.
Season 3 is their best - and is practically a whole different show. They flip the entire setting and premise and introduce some new characters. You could also start here if you do some light reading. Season 4 is a continuation of Season 3 - not as strong, but still solid.
Picard is pretty much fan fiction.
Some of the new characters are fun (I like Rios a lot), but the writing doesn’t do any of them any justice. Season 1 and 2 are pretty bad. If you don’t have time to kill, skip it.
Season 3 is actually the show many fans wanted. It’s pretty much like a long-format TNG sequel mini series. It has some plot holes, but it’s a real joy to watch and puts a nice bow around the series. And around TNG.
I’m not a big fan of DIS S1 but I’d still watch it for context. Plus I absolutely loved the performances from both Michelle Yeoh and Jason Isaacs - Isaacs in particular makes S1 for me.