From Janeway, Picard and Sisko to modern Star Trek: what happened to the ethical future we were once asked to imagine?
I have been watching Picard, and I am genuinely surprised by how much the ethical structure of Star Trek has changed.
I am not talking about nostalgia, and I am not saying that characters should remain exactly the same for thirty years.
I am talking about something much more fundamental.
TNG, DS9 and Voyager were built around an ethical premise that, for me, was one of the strongest elements of Star Trek:
THE END DOES NOT JUSTIFY THE MEANS.
This principle appeared again and again.
Characters could make mistakes. They could become angry, afraid, traumatised or confused. They could even cross ethical lines.
But the line existed.
And when they crossed it, Star Trek stopped and examined what that meant.
That was the difference.
The characters did not simply ask:
Can we do this?
They asked:
Do we have the right to do this? What will this choice make us? What responsibility comes with the power we have?
Voyager is probably the clearest example.
They were trying to cross an impossible distance to return home. They could have justified almost anything through survival.
But they did not.
Again and again they accepted a longer journey, greater risk and personal sacrifice because reaching home could not justify destroying another civilisation, exploiting another species or abandoning the principles they represented.
That was not weakness.
That was the entire point.
Humanity had evolved technologically, but Star Trek proposed that perhaps we could also evolve ethically.
And this is where I struggle enormously with Picard.
Picard himself feels fundamentally different.
The Picard I knew could certainly be wrong, but his reasoning had extraordinary internal coherence. He questioned himself. He debated. He understood that being captain was not simply having authority — it was carrying responsibility for how that authority was used.
The new Picard often feels reactive, impulsive and strangely ineffective.
For me, that is not simply “an older and more vulnerable Picard”.
It changes the architecture of the character.
And Seven of Nine is even more difficult for me.
Seven was one of the characters I identified with most.
Her journey in Voyager was not simply about becoming emotional or “more human”.
It was about learning how to be human while maintaining discipline, logic and integrity.
She struggled with identity, belonging and emotion, but what made her extraordinary was precisely her effort not to become governed by impulse.
She could be wrong. She could be severe. She could misunderstand human behaviour.
But revenge was never the foundation of the character.
Her relationship with the Doctor was particularly important because both of them were learning what humanity meant almost from the outside. Their logic often exposed the inconsistencies of ordinary human behaviour.
Now I find Seven driven by anger, punishment and revenge.
At times she feels closer to a Klingon archetype than to Seven of Nine.
For me, this is not character development.
It is a different character.
And the change goes beyond Picard and Seven.
The entire universe feels different.
The older Star Trek made an extraordinary effort to maintain coherence.
Character coherence.
Ethical coherence.
Political coherence.
And even scientific coherence, as far as science fiction could reasonably achieve it.
Of course there were mistakes across hundreds of episodes, but you could feel that the writers cared about the rules of the universe they were creating.
A decision made years earlier could still matter.
A species had a culture and internal logic.
Technology had rules.
Characters carried the consequences of what they had experienced.
And most importantly, Star Trek was never simply fantasy in space.
It was asking something.
What could humanity become if we improved?
Not if we became perfect.
If we improved.
What would happen if curiosity became stronger than conquest?
If responsibility became stronger than ego?
If knowledge created an obligation rather than simply power?
If we learned that having the ability to do something did not automatically give us the moral right to do it?
That was what made Star Trek different from ordinary science fiction.
It was not the Enterprise.
It was not warp drive.
It was not aliens.
It was the idea that the future could contain people who had learned something that we still struggle to understand today.
I started watching Star Trek when I was around 18, and this philosophy genuinely influenced the way I grew up.
I saw many things I already believed in expressed in a more evolved society, and it made those principles feel possible rather than naïve.
Responsibility mattered.
Integrity mattered.
The method mattered as much as the result.
The end did not justify the means.
DS9 challenged this perhaps more
- JANEWAY — Caretaker THE COST OF DOING WHAT IS RIGHT
“I’m not willing to trade the lives of the Ocampa for our convenience.”
JANEWAY — CARETAKER 70,000 light-years from home. The easier way home would cost someone else their future. She refuses.
- PICARD — I, Borg POWER DOES NOT CREATE THE RIGHT TO USE IT
Caption:
PICARD — I, BORG He could destroy the enemy that once destroyed him. Having the power does not give him the right.
- SISKO — In the Pale Moonlight WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE END DOES JUSTIFY THE MEANS?
Caption:
SISKO — IN THE PALE MOONLIGHT He crosses the line — and he wins. The episode is about the moral price of that victory.
JANEWAY I will sacrifice our advantage rather than sacrifice them.
PICARD I will not become my enemy in order to defeat him.
SISKO I crossed the line to save millions — now I have to live with what I became.
When did Star Trek stop making the moral cost the story — and start treating moral compromise simply as character development?
The conflict should not come from within the ship and starfleet should feel professional. Corruption should not be a part of future utopia. Less swearing and tantrums pls. A modern show should feel more utopian, with humanity ever closer to replacing the q.
Star Trek Picard is just a bad show for memberies to please Patrick Stewart.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdLHKdn0JTY (sorry for the 4h video, but it’s very good)
Old trek felt more competent, trusting of each other, asking should we do this? Will it harm others? It was inspirational, a future where we could talk and try to help each other and learn and grow.
Current trek feele more anti human, more drama, more attacking each other, more shit going on.
Old trek they actively had a problem and trusted each other and told each other and listened. New trek doesn’t understand that concept and nobody seems to trust anybody anymore.
I believe the reason is always comes down to capitalism. They want more views more money and giving people a vision of the future without it is anti capitalism, they don’t want that.
I just enjoyed the old shows better because they where compet, trusting, caring and more loving and understanding of others and there differences.
Now it’s just drama and subtle or overtly anti Difference, mainly because the giga corp making it wants us to fight each other instead of making a better world.
This is just my thoughts and feelings of the shows. And don’t be a dick and say “oh what about this one episode!”. I’m talking it as a whole, not a single shit episode I the whole series
You talk a lot about trust, and I think that’s an important factor. Sure, you can argue that the shows’ utopianism changed entirely because the powers-that-be warped the messaging. That’s probably true too, certainly now with the Ellisons at the top. But that’s pretty recent.
I think there’s also an aspect of how much viewers would be able to suspend their disbelief if they were served '60s or even '90s era scripts today. Especially TNG was very diplomacy focused and based in mutual respect. My guess is there has been an erosion of trust in Western society in the meantime. Again, ultimately because Capitalism, I’m sure — but in a broader sense than I interpret from your comment?
I dunno, I don’t have a neatly wrapped theory about this. Sorry if I go completely off on a tangent based on your comment.
I think the first season of Discovery tried to earnestly grapple with real world politics through the whole Klingon war/Mirror Universe arcs. All of Picard seemed to be about conspiracies and shadow governments, which certainly also speaks to its time of production… while dulling the shine on the utopian vision for the future.
And it’s not just badmirals and Section 31 that have been at issue. We’ve seen plenty of disgruntled pirates (read: regular-Joe capitalists) turned terrorists in the eyes of the Federation. Our main casts have visited enough dystopian “slum” planets in the past ten years, where criminals organise and prosper, that the idealism of Star Trek is depicted as precarious.
Way out in the 32nd century, as Osyraa bites into a Federation-produced apple, admiral Vance comments that “it’s made from our shit, you know”. Way to sell post-scarcity, buddy. Nobody wants to know how the sausage is made. I think the past decade of Trek has done a good job of postulating soft values, standing up for minorities and diversity. It’s been pretty shit (to stay in the vocabulary) at representing the very foundation of that sort of tolerance, though.
Trek should be a means to imagining the end of Capitalism, even if only as a background note for all kinds of weekly weird encounters and philosophical twists. But that is not just hard to depict in the 21st century — it’s actively being played as downright unsexy in the shows.
I wonder how much of it is habit. DS9 thoughtfully examined the idea, and then Voyager did so much more loosely given the desperation level. Then Enterprise often had them fall short on this, because it’s the beginning of Starfleet- they’re the reason the rules are being written, that’s the point. Then Disco S1 was both wartime, although by now that was more of an excuse than the point like it was in DS9, and also you had the mirror captain. By the time Picard rolled around, it had accidentially just become habitual and reflexive. The idiom of Trek became looking at the line over your shoulder
Thank you for the well written, though out post.
I remember in TNG when their stance on Palestine and then violent resistance changed. Was kind of cool seeing the process of the writers coming around on a political stance
You’re absolutely right, it’s not the same. I refuse to watch the new franchise because I find it depresses me. It’s so far off from the shows I know and love.
I think it’s hard to blame one person for its divergence, so I blame them all. Cast, creators, producers, and writers equally.
What I like to say is that Star Trek: Picard (STP) is so bad it tries to retroactively drag Star Trek: The Next Generation (TNG) down with it. If you take STP as canon, it means the Federation and one of its best Captains were lying all along about having principles. Red Letter Media did an excellent analysis of how terrible it was, and it depressed the hell out of them. Alex Kurtzman is so much of a hack he didn’t even bother asking why Star Trek is great, he just went straight for generic action sci-fi with interpersonal conflicts
On a slightly unrelated note:
What’s up with double-spacing every sentence?
It’s really
annoying to read
if you ask me.
I think you are partially trapped in nostalgia. Star Trek has never been this philosophically pure. Picard broke the Prime Directive in S1 by having contact with the Edo. And then regrettably prevented them from executing Wesley for trespassing a flower bed. Either should’ve cost him his command.
When Data has an inappropriate chat with a girl on a dying planet, JLP jokes with Riker about the level the shit is up to for them. And there are no palpable consequences for any of this behaviour.
Picard doesn’t feel like he should plant the Borg bug in Hugh. Admiral Valarian Canapés wholeheartedly disagrees. And while I like Picard’s reasoning, from a ten thousand foot perspective I agree with her. With the benefit of hindsight, it would have prevented the best TNG movie from existing but perhaps we would have also been spared Picard S2-3.
Late TNG and early DS9 with the introduction of Starfleet Al Qaeda, i.e. the Marquis, is a turning point for me. We get more stories that are more grey. Star Trek went from Kirk coming to a planet, telling the inhabitants their culture was stupid, to more contemporarily thoughtful treatments of ethical and moral conundrums in a utopian world, to seeing where utopia rubs up against the rest of the galaxy that isn’t there yet. Starfleet and the Federation are no longer exclusively the good guys. Sisko poisons an atmosphere just to catch one traitor and gets away with it. WTF?
Janeway gets a pass from me for most of her bad decisions because she tried and had to figure stuff out by herself. Tuvix be damned!
Enterprise also exists.
Third wave Trek is more grey than Marquis era Trek. It’s more CGI and action oriented because they can. That saves a couple of pages of dialogue otherwise spent on ethics. It’s different just like TNG was different from TOS. But it isn’t a radical change if you ask me.
Early TNG isn’t great until they stabilised the writers room. And then there is a continuation of development through DS9 and even into ENT. (Unfortunately including grade A assholes.) “Chaos on the bridge” is the default for Disco and Picard. And that’s why they often tell weird stories that don’t match up with what came before. They try to do Trek in the now passé golden age of television. And failed a lot imo.
Of all the third wave Trek, I’m most fond of Lower Decks. Because it doesn’t take itself too seriously and is littered with easter eggs. Disco S2 is good. Most of SNW S1-3. Picard had moments in it but that’s it. My heart’s not in it any more. I watch it because I see we are entering another content drought. I even enjoy SNW S4, not because I think it’s good Star Trek but because it’s a middle finger to Paramount for no longer financing any new projects.
I think there’s more to Lower Decks.
Lower Decks shows a crew that’s certainly not as professional and dignified as the TNG-era ones but also one that still feels like the crews we saw back then. They might have issues but they’re also dedicated professionals and they’re all interested in becoming better versions of themselves. Even Mariner, who has a whole menagerie of deep-seated issues, manages to work through them with the help of her fellow lower deckers (and sometimes even the bridge crew).
“Cerritos strong” may be a particularly blunt implementation of the Starfleet ethos but it is one. The idea that they’re all in this together and they’re all working towards a better future for everyone underpins everything the characters do, even when they get drunk off contraband hooch. Ultimately, Lower Decks shows that flawed individuals can come together and achieve great things and that you don’t have to be Jean-Luc Picard to do the right thing.
The show highlights the silliness of the Star Trek universe but it also takes a firm stance on the side of idealism at a time when the writing room seems to be staffed by 1990s comic writers.
I don’t think nostalgia is the issue.
I’m not saying old Star Trek was morally pure. DS9 in particular had characters crossing serious ethical lines. My point is that the line mattered: when someone crossed it, the story examined the moral cost.
What feels different in Picard is not that it is darker. It is the loss of ethical and character coherence. Too often the characters seem to react as the plot requires, rather than from the moral architecture built around them over decades.
Seven is the clearest example for me. Of course she should change after twenty years. But moving from discipline, logic, self-control and the struggle to build an ethical individual identity toward revenge and punishment needs a convincing bridge. I don’t see enough of that bridge.
Old Trek repeatedly asked:
We can do this — but should we?
Sometimes the characters answered badly. But the consequences of that answer were part of the story.
That is what I miss. Not the 1990s. Not old sets. The coherence and the ethics.
I hear you. You think crossing the line mattered in 80s+ Trek but it doesn’t now. I don’t think that’s true. Sisko poisoning a planet is one of the examples where it clearly didn’t. But should have. So nostalgia is the only thing I could come up with to explain why you like the older and dislike the new stuff.
I don’t want to be in a position where I have to defend Picard, the show. Half of S1 is okay and then it goes off the rails. There are moments in it that are good. Overall, it’s a mess. One aspect that they did well is that they show a hero aging. Kurt Corbain will always be an icon because he ended his life early. So we were spared his ideas on COVID, Q Anon, or pick another hot button issue later in life or albums continually deteriorating in quality. With Picard they wanted to show consequences and chisel away at the icon a bit. The trauma of being borgified. His being sidelined for his unwillingness to bend to his superiors’ will. Why they had to bring his parents into it will be the writers’ secret. But they show consequences of lines being crossed. One of them is him standing rightly on his professional principles. It sounds to me this is exactly the stuff you’re missing and they built the whole S1 premise on it.
Burnham getting to be captain is about as realistic as chubby Kirk being demoted back to Captain.
There is such a thing as too many paragraphs.
Sadly, not everyone is familiar with markdown.
J.J. Abrams killed it and it’s been Marvelized since then.
Or maybe it was dead before that, maybe Malcolm McDowell did it
Enterprise and Nemesis killed it, he revived interest.
Shut up.
My guess? In short? The people, who first made up that future and that quest for humanity are now called woke antifa sympathisers or worse. Todays filmmaker have other dreams, where the end does justify the means and so on.
It’s not the filmmakers that changed, it’s the centralization of power of studios. Today’s woke antifa supporter filmmakers are making youtube videos or podcasts, or trying to scrounge together crowdfunding.
I found Picard to be the most poorly written of the modern Trek series, with some great ideas wasted by haphazard and shoddy execution, but:
Season one ends with Picard convincing Soji that the safety and freedom of synthetic life is not worth welcoming entities that would destroy organic life. Instead she’s working towards peace and understanding in season 2.
Season two charts a redemption arc for no less than the Borg Collective, very much following up on the themes of I, Borg.
Season three shows the result of Section 31’s “ends justify the means” thinking during the Dominion War: enduring hatred leading to the infiltration of Starfleet and near destruction of the Federation.
It’s not well executed, and there is certainly plenty I disagree with, but I think for the most part Picard aligns with the principles you’re talking about.
There is a season 3 of Picard???!!!
I stopped watching somewhere midway season 1 coz it was so stupid… But, they made 3 seasons! Dafuk.
I watched the first season and I loved it! The story, the characters…
Wait, no. That was Mass Effect.
Do you have any particular examples of the “the ends justify the means” attitude you seem to think is so prevalent now?
Yes sure a lot and a lot… but Seven is the clearest example for me.
In Voyager, she repeatedly learns to restrain impulse, revenge and Borg-style utilitarian logic in favour of individual rights and ethical judgement. In Picard, she becomes a vigilante and ultimately kills Bjayzl out of revenge even after Picard explicitly challenges that choice. … she changed is nto mroe seven of nibe and all the character behind…
More broadly, Picard normalises extrajudicial violence, revenge and “necessary” moral compromise much more than TNG/Voyager did. My point is not that older Trek never crossed those lines . DS9 absolutely did. The difference is that older Trek usually made crossing the line itself the ethical problem of the story.
That distinction matters to me: not “nobody ever does wrong”, but the narrative still knows that the means require moral scrutiny.
Enterprise got pretty rough in seasons 2-3. But that was a reaction to 9/11 and yeah a lot of people kinda had their minds broken by that.
Which I think alludes to the crux of the issue: Star Trek does not REALLY take place in the 23rd century: it takes place on a series of soundstages in Los Angeles in the twentieth and twenty-first century.
Each show is an examination of the values of the moment as we want to believe ourselves. Earlier Trek was filmed in a more optimistic age; later Trek was filmed in a more jaded, bitter, cynical age. And it shows.
This is one of the reasons I love Lower Decks so much, btw: aside from the jokes, it embraces the corny wholesomeness of the Berman & Braga era. I think Strange New Worlds might. I’m curious how it feels. I haven’t watched it much.
That’s the best part of science fiction. On the one hand, it’s a mirror. “See, even with all their technology, they’re still people. They’re still us. Look at what we are” But on the other hand it’s a place to play with and practice ideas. “Look at what we can become.”
The best of Star Trek, I think, is the “look at what we can become.” But if things are rough out there, it turns into “look at what we are.” And it’s rough out there.
Exactly. For me, Star Trek was never just science fiction. It was always a human question: what could we become if we genuinely chose to become better?
Even TOS, rough as it was, was already pushing boundaries — putting Uhura, a not only white skin and woman, on the command and imagining a future where that was simply normal. The same principle continued through the franchise: different planets and species were rarely just “aliens”; they reflected real cultures, conflicts, prejudices and political or social problems from our own world, but displaced far enough to let us examine them differently.
Even the science was treated with unusual discipline. Much of it was speculative, of course, but it was usually extrapolated from real scientific ideas rather than used as random fantasy. The strength of Star Trek was coherence — scientific, cultural, ethical and psychological.
That is why “look at what we can become” matters so much more to me than “look at what we are.”
If the future simply reproduces our present cynicism, ego, revenge and moral shortcuts with better technology, then we have advanced technologically, but not as human beings.
And Star Trek’s most radical idea was always that perhaps we could do both.
That’s very well put.
And even then…they got there in the end. It was rather the point of the arc.
Some of what you are saying is explained in the show, the universe they are in changed. Picard kept trying to do the right thing whilst others just reacted or took the easy way out and it kinda broke him a bit.
Seven saw a different side of the universe in the nigh on lawless frontiers and on top of that saw friends hunted for who they are and logically decided that she would be shit to people that didn’t deserve her time or empathy.
The knee-jerk reactions to the androids (anything synthetic in the end) and the Romulan crisis pushed the characters to their limits, way out of their comfort zones and part of the show is them trying to get back some of what they lost or thought they’d lost.
Maybe I’m being generous in my interpretation but the fact it’s open for discussion is a good thing.
Look I’m foursquare against dumbing things down just to satisfy folks that don’t like to read, so take this with that in mind.
That was the proverbial wall of text I couldn’t make myself finish. Too damn many paragraph breaks. Some are welcome, as I deal with dyslexia and separation can help with that. But the single line paragraphs was just intolerable. Again, I’m long winded and totally get the need for extended writing to carry a point. But you gotta learn how to format better
