Eric’s Blog

I just finished watching all 3 episodes of Star Trek: Prodigy. I recommend you give it a try. I thought the first episode, which was a two-parter, was a bit difficult to follow because there wasn’t much ado about the Federation. In fact, my wife came into the room while I was watching the first episode and asked if I was watching Star Wars or Star Trek.

The first episode definitely reminded me of Wars instead of Trek. Child slaves in a mine were forced to search for a crystal called chimerium. No one can understand one another because no one has universal translators with them. In fact, translators have been banned by the owner/supervisor of the mine. One child dreams of escaping and going back to the stars and tries several unsuccessful attempts before being caught and forced to track down another escaped slave named Zero.

During his search, this alien uncovers a Federation ship called the USS Protostar. He and another alien activate the universal translator onboard and are finally able to understand one another. Together, they go on a search for an engineer and recruit him to join them so the ship can fly again and they can all escape. It’s unclear how the Protostar wound up buried inside this asteroid inside the Delta quadrant. It appears to have been there for quite a few years since it needs repairs before it can take off. The ship has two warp cores and a mysterious component situated in-between the two cores that we don’t know much about yet. The engineer makes a comment that one warp core would be enough to either take the ship to warp nine or fly them into pieces. Could the second warp core and mysterious technology be an updated transwarp drive or just a backup in case the first core fails or needs to be ejected? The USS Protostar has the prefix NX on its hull denoting it as an experimental prototype class of ship. There was no sign of the previous crew other than a comm badge laying on the bridge when first entered. What happened to the crew? How did the Protostar wind up in the Delta quadrant? What does the villain know about the ship and why is he after it?

During their escape together, they activate the ECH (Emergency Command Hologram) which has been programmed to resemble Captain Katherine Janeway from Star Trek: Voyager. This was a nice call-back to the episode of Voyager where the EMH (Emergency Medical Hologram), played by Robert Picardo, dreamt of becoming an emergency command hologram and wound up saving the ship in many of his daydreams. Hologram Janeway tells the “crew” that she’s there to train the crew and help them learn about their ship. It’s clear to the viewers at this point, but not the crew, that Janeway knows more than she’s letting on. She’s obviously a leadership development program as well as an ad hoc mother for the junior crew in addition to teaching them all about starship functions, warp mechanics, tactics, information technology, and shipboard repairs. The crew escapes the prison asteroid and begins their training, their cohesion as a crew, and their flight from the show’s villain.

There are a few more surprises for fans of Trek. The shuttle bay doesn’t have any shuttlecraft in it, but it does have a 3D printer/replicator that can fabricate (out of thin air no less) any vehicle that the crew needs. The ship doesn’t have any transporters that we’ve seen as of yet, but the Protostar has another function similar to that of Voyager, it can land on a planet. The ship lands on a class-M planet in the third episode as one of the functions of Starfleet crews (as Janeway puts it) is to explore strange new worlds.

I already love the show, the characters, the ship, the story, and everything else to do with Star Trek. It will be interesting to see how long the show stays on streaming services. Star Treks seems to be going through another heyday like when I was growing up (TNG, DS9, VOY, ENT). Now we have Discovery, Picard, and Lower Decks. Eugene Roddenberry, son of Star Trek’s creator, Gene Rodenberry, is listed as an executive producer for the show. Michael Giacchino is back as the composer of the opening theme, he wrote the opening theme for the latest Star Trek movies (Kelvin reboot). Even the opening credits are a nod to the latest versions of Trek with multiple close-up shots of the characters’ “eyes” as the Protostar flys around introducing every one of them. This is akin to Discovery and Picard’s opening credits. I hope the show stays online, but only time will tell. Animation doesn’t seem to get as much love as live-action shows, but with the success of Lower Decks, I’m remaining optimistic. Much like every version of Star Trek that exists; there is hope in every episode.