(There are Star Trek spoilers here.)
My girlfriend and I have been watching Star Trek: The Next Generation in order, from the beginning. This morning we just got to “All Good Things”, the final episode of The Next Generation. I’ve spent the rest of the day thinking about why Star Trek used to be so popular as a TV series, and why it feels like it’s lost it’s way. And then I had a weird thought. Star Trek had certainly had it’s up and downs after Next Generation went off the air in 1994, but after the 90s ended, things went really badly. Star Trek Enterprise, the last TV series, was prematurely canceled. Plans for a fifth Next Generation movie fell through after the fourth, Star Trek Nemesis, was a commercial failure. And it wasn’t just that people were over Star Trek. Star Trek, with the same writers, and the same producers, had seriously declined in quality. So what happened? And then I had a totally crazy thought. Could it have been 9/11? I know, crazy. But after 2001, something about Star Trek got weird. Star Trek got unnaturally… dark.