It begins in the Mirror Universe, where a young Georgiou passes the trials to become the new empress of the Terran Empire.  Jumping to our universe, agents of Section 31 are send to Baraam station, where Georgiou now rules after leaving the Discovery.  She is recruited into the team to track a weapons dealer.  When one of the team is killed, she recognises the weapon as the "Godsend", something she ordered to be developped in the Mirror Universe.

 

As she gets to know the team better, including the background that the leader Alok hails from the 20th century Eugenics Wars, they hunt the dealer Dada Noe and question him, learning he also comes from the Mirror Universe.  They learn the Godsend is to be used for the Terran Empire to invade and conquer the Prime universe.  It turns out one of their team is an infiltrator, and that San, a shadow from Georgiou's past in the Terran Empire, is the masked man that has been following them and causing obstructions to their mission.

 

During the confrontation, the Godsend is activated as Georgiou overcomes San, who dies in her arms, and the vessel containing the Godsend is send back through the wormhole into the Mirror Universe, ending the threat.  Weeks later the remaining survivors of the team are contacted for a new mission...

 

What a pile of rubbish, Suicide Squad style Star Trek just doesn't work, and the mystery surrounding Agent Sloan and his Section 31 pale to what they made of this.  Not to mention the age issue this movie creates for Rachel Garrett, the future captain of the Enterprise C, which would make her at the time of Yesterday's Enterprise almost 150 years old. 

 

 

 

The story takes off about a year after the events of the season 1 finale, as Admiral Janeway recruits our young heroes Dal, Rok Tahk, Jankom Pog, Murf and Zero to join her aboard her new ship, the Voyager A.  They work as cadets though, but soon discover there is a special mission about to happen with a ship called the Infinity to retrieve Janeway's best friend.  

 

On present day Solum, Gwyn struggles with a coup forged by Ascensia, and reunites with the Diviner's younger uncorrupted self and her father to be, Ilthuran.  Dal and his friends, together with a young vulcan called Maj'el, accidentally activate the Infinity and tossed to the future, locked away together with Chakotay.  Gwyn loses the challenge, while the cadets set Chaokotay free and manage to launch the Protostar into the future, hopefully restoring the timeline.  Murf in the meantime is contacted by a stranger...

 

As they take the Infinity through a Borg conduit, they set out to find whoever is being sending messages to both Murf and Gwyn, and start connecting dot's during various adventurous in the quadrant, like a mind control device and a new body for Zero on a Medusan refugee planet.  They arrive at a Time Ziggurat, hidden in a pocket dimension, where they are greeted by Wesley Crusher.  he was the mysterious person sending messages, as the timeline hasn't been restored and theirs is actually dying, slowly invaded by time parasites called The Loom who feast on closing timelines.

 

Wesley reveals the plan to find Chakotay and restore the timeline, sending them off before The Loom take the upperhand, and realises Maj'el is the seventh variable.  They come to a sandy planet, finding a stranded Protostar and Chakotay who apparently has been there for 10 years already since their previous meeting.  They manage to convince him to heal the paradox, and set out making the ship spaceworthy again.  They will need to build a new protocore to return to Voyager though, whom is 3000 light years away.

 

They manage this on a planet of genetically enhanced tribbles, and set off for the rendez-vous, and Zero gets a body looking like her old one, as the new one is breaking down, but improved with more senses.  Ascensia however is still bound on destroying the Federation, and her battleship Rev-1 engages the Protostar and Voyager A.  They are then ordered to Solum, where Wesley is being held captive by Ascensia to make a temporal weapon, the Incursor.  

 

The Protostar crew infiltrates, freeing Wesley and Ilthuran, and the people of Solum rise against Ascensia, triggering the civil war events, but Janeway decides to ignore the Prime Directive and aid the people against the tyrant.  As she launches her fleet against the Federation, as the wormhole is opened to send the Protostar back to where it all began and restoring the time paradox.  As everyone settles back into their normal life, and adding some nice details like Wesley visiting dr Crusher and meeting his infant brother Jack (nice Picard reference here), and the Mars Attack from Picard season 1 takes place, cementing the series in the timeline.  The cadets are field promoted to Ensigns, and Dal realises he is more of a first officer then a captain material, handing command of the ship they received for their training to Gwyn, the Protostar class USS Prodigy.

 

 

 

But, not everything is perfect, and that has to go for this season as well.  It starts very strong with the conclusion of season 2's cliffhanger, then has some weak episodes, only to pick up again halfway through to a strong finale.

 

After saving the colonists and his missing crew from the Gorn, captured in that season 2 finale, and being allowed to track them "off the record" by Starfleet, they stop a large invasion force, while putting the egg inside Captain Batel dormant.  The season then jumps three months forward, and everyone deals with their pains in their own way, including Spock and Chapel breaking up.  She returns onboard with her new boyfriend, Dr Korby (yep, the one from TOS), but reality seems to shift, only Korby and Spock eventually being aware of the events.

 

When Batel's egg seems to reactivate, they start looking for a cure, searching for the Chimera flower, located on a planet contested with Klingons.  here M'Benga faces the daughter of Dak'Rah, and he admits he killed him in the previous season to her.  Not long after, when a test for the new "holodeck" goes wrong, this technology is put on hold for further finetuning, as it nearly cost La'An her life as safety protocols fail.

 

The Enterprise accompanies dr Korby to a planet for the ruins of a civilization rumoured to have discovered immortality, only to have nurse Gamble infected by an alien consciousness.  This turns out to be the Vezda, an extraterrestial lifeform of pure evil.  Gamble tries to take over the ship, but is killed and the being trapped in the transporter buffer.  And then the weaker part ends, because the next episode is a classic, The Sehlat Who Ate It's tail brings James T. Kirk, whose vessel the Farragut is heavily damaged, in command of that ship, to go and save the Enterprise.  Enterprise has been captured by a huge scavenger ship, and Kirk still struggles with the pressure of command but is supported by Scotty,Spock and Chapel in overcoming his blocks and saves Enterprise, though he remains haunted by his first command decisions.  

 

Beto, Ortegas's brother, joins the Enterprise to make a documentary about Starfleet to show it is not a pure military organisation, and how they aid a space creature that is forced into being a weapon.  When later on Pike, Chapel, Uhura and La'An are stuck in being Vulcans from an away mission, Spock manages to return them to being human, as Batel is offered a high ranking promotion to the Judical Department.  But soon after, Ortegas is stranded on a planet with a Gorn, with whom she has an inherent trauma.  However, they bond, and when they manage to have themselves found the alien is killed by the landing party.  The Metrons reveal themselves, and erase Ortegas memory (and plugging the plothole that Kirk first meets the Gorn in person years later in TOW).

 

As Batel is ready to leave the Enterprise and take up her new role, they discover that the Vezda Gamble has escaped from the buffer.  He traps some of the crew, but when it is revealed Batel is the key in keeping them trapped (timeloop moment), she decides to live out a lifetime with Pike, who didn't get his accident in that alternate reality, before becoming the key on the lock to keep the Vezda in.

 

 

 

 

In the Delta Quadrant, on the prison colony of Tars Lamora, a young alien named Dal escapes together with a bunch of exotic aliens from The Diviner.  They do this when they find an abandoned Federation starship, the USS Protostar.  On board, they are greeted by the training hologram, looking like former USS Voyager captain Janeway.

 

She thinks the refugees are actually Starfleet cadets, and begins learning them to fly the Protostar and it's experimental drive, and the younglings dream of joining Starfleet after they learn more of the Federation.  Meantime, a girl named Gwyn, the daughter of the Diviner, is held captive in their brig.  Coming along an M-class planet they land the ship and set out to explore, but the planet is actually bound on devouring them, as Gwyn escapes and takes control of the ship.  They manage to escape the planet when The Diviner and his enforcer Drednok arrive, and as he would sacrifice Gwyn for his own goals, Dal saves her and she joins the crew as they find out about the "proto-warp feature", from which the vessel gained it's name.

 

The vessel made a 4000 light year jump into the Gamma quadrant thanks to this engine, and as Dal learns more about captaincy by running the Kobiyashi Maru scenario, they unlock a code in Janeway's databank, showing the original crew, led by captain Chakotay was boarded by an unknown enemy.  Meeting with the Ferengi that raised Dal, they are framed by her as they try to prevent breaching the Prime Directive.

 

 

When the vessel goes through a Tachyon storm, it is thrown into various timelines and Janeway must move between all of them to reverse the anomaly, causing them to learn how to work together.  A Drednok is discovered onboard, showing a message that all the prisoners of the colony will be freed should the Protostar be returned, and Dal agrees.  But they have created a rouse to prevent The Diviner getting his hands on the engine.  Gwyn learns her father was send back in time to save his people, as in the future the events following First Contact with the Federation leads to the destruction of their homeworld, and a computer virus has been planted inside the Protostar.

 

The real Janeway, now a vice-admiral, is tracking them though aboard the USS Dauntless, and when they reach a remote station in the Beta quadrant, the virus causes the statiosn weapons to turn on itself, destroying it.  Realising they can't go to Federation space,  even going as far as boarding a dormant Borg cube to try and destroy the device, as The Diviner, who lost his memories, is brought aboard the Dauntless.

 

 

As they try and find a way to reach the Federation by other means, they run into Janeway, and as they escape from the Dauntless Dal learns from a Dr Jago that he is fully genetically engineered and as such unique in his kind.  On the Dauntless, one of it's crew, ensign Asencia, reveals to the Diviner that she is also an agent, the Vindicator.  Together with Drednok they manage to bring his memories back.  Dal manages to warn the Dauntless of the virus, but they are met by a Federation armada.  The fleet fast starts attacking itself due to the virus, but other non-Starfleet vessels come to their aid.  Hologram Janeway decides to sacrifice herself to save the Federation and be hurdled into the future to hopefully find the crew where they may still be alive.  The Protostar crew joins Starfleet thanks to Vice-admiral Janeway, and asks them to join her on a mission to find Chakotay and the Protostar crew, as Gwyn goes to her homeworld to prevent it's destruction in the future.

 

 

 

The USS Discovery is assigned a top secret "Red Directive" mission by the mysterious Dr Kovich to find an 800 year old Romulan research vessel, but before they reach it, couriers Moll and L'ak take something from it.  Pursuing them together with the USS Antares of Cpt Rayner, who has experience hunting them, they learn it is a Romulan puzzle box holding a journal.  The USS Antares accidentally triggers an avalanche, allowing Moll and L'ak to escape.  Kovich reveals to them that the journal belonged to a team of 24th century scientists that holds the key to the Progenitor life creating technology.  Rayner is brought before the tribunal for his actions, and loses his chair, but Burnham offers him a new chance as her new first officer.  Saru is retiring from his post in order to become a Federation ambassador, to be closer to his fiancee T'Rina.  

Book contacts Moll, learning she is actually Malinne, the daughter of his namesake and mentor Cleveland Booker IV, as Burnham and Saru learn the next clue of the puzzle is located on Trill.  As Adira breaks up with Gray while there, they meet Jinaal, a conscience now residing in the host Bix.  Culber offers to temporarily host him, and takes them to the next clue.  Burnham and Book pass the test, but as they leave Moll plants a secret tracker on Adira's uniform.

 

 

This tracker, a time bug, is a left over from the Temporal Wars, causing the Discovery to jump through loops in time, with only Burnham, Rayner and Stamets unaffected.  Future Burnham manages to convince the crew from weeks after she had joined to vessel to help her break the cycle, but this gave Moll and L'ak a headstart on the location of the next clue.  This clue is hidden in an unstable wormhole, and there they find it is on the ISS Enterprise.  The Mirror universe version was brought into our universe to escape the Terran Empire, and they learn that one of the crew actually joined the 24th century scientist team, proving they made it out of the wormhole.  They learn the motivations of the two, but also that L'ak is actually a Breen (the first time we see them unhelmeted), and they look to sell the technology to live a peacefull life together on a colony in the Gamma quadrant.

 

Kovich identifies the five scientists who hid the map pieces, allowing Discovery to discover that the next piece is on Halem'no, hidden in a weather tower which holds off deadly sandstorms.  But in order to retrive it and save Tilly and a local girl named Ravah from being sacrificed, they are forced to break the Prime Directive (with no consequences oddly enough from Starfleet, seems the mission is more important them the ideal), as Moll and an injured L'ak are brought aboard Discovery after being caught.  Culber tries to threat L'ak but is unknown with Breen physiology.  It is revealed that L'ak is the direct descendant of the former Breen emperor, and a card to be played by all the factions vying to take control of the Breen empire now.  He manages to help Moll escape, but dies due to an overdose as a result, Ruhn declaring war on the Federation as a result and taking Moll, who revealed the mission, with him.

 

The next clue is located in the Eternal Gallery and Archive, located in the Badlands.  Burnham is subjected to the test, which forces her to come to terms with her own weaknesses like her fear of failure and loss.  This grants her the piece, but also a valuable insight on how to access the technology.  Discovery gives a copy of the map to Ruhn as negotiated to prevent destroying the archive, but as he plans to break his word, Moll stages a mutiny, killing him and taking control of his Breen faction.  Arriving at the location of the Progenitors technology, a Lagrange point between two black holes, the Breen snatch it away in front of them.  Inside the container is a portal, but Tahal, another Breen contender for the power, is on her way to take over Ruhn's forces.  Saru volunteers to stop her if possible, as Burnham and a team from Discovery secretly board the Breen dreadnought.

 

 

As Discovery is forced to heavily damage the Breen dreadnought, Moll and Burnham enter the portal before it is pulled in space.  It takes them to a higher dimension, and Burnham manages to access the technology, connecting with the consciousness of one of the Progenitors.  She learns it cannot return L'ak to life, but that she is free to use the technology as she sees fit, but decides no-one should have access to this sort of power, releasing the portal into one of the black holes.  Weeks later, at the wedding of Saru and T'rina, she reconfirms her love with Book, and as they accept a new mission from Kovich she learns he is actual Agent Daniels (from Enterprise), who also plans to offer Moll a job.  Years later, Book and Burnham have a son, Leto, who is also a Starfleet captain.  Burnham, now an admiral, takes Discovery for a last mission, restored to it's original 23rd century appearance.  It will travel to a specific location where Zora will have it wait for a long time as part of a new Red Directive mission.  Though how she manages to spore jump the vessel without Stamets, as there is not a single other crewmember aboard, is beyond me...

And so Discovery ends, and while I liked parts of the series as a whole, in the end it is one of the weakest in the Star Trek franchise.  Luckily a new season of Strange New Worlds is on the horizon for some real fix of Star Trek... and as I said at the beginning, the captain was for me the whole weakness of the series, being to omnipotent, the only other input coming from season 3 arrival Book, who wasn't even officially part of the crew.  I do admit, Rayner was a welcome addition to the season, and he actually felt more like a Starfleet captain then Burnham ever did over the 5 years of the series run.

Talking Kirk, he does appear in quite a few episodes, still a lieutenant aboard the Farragut, but to be honest he is like the only minor point for me, and a very minor, yet not per se bad point.  While his character is on point, being young and bold (especially in the time travel episode), the actor for me is a tat to willow-y in build, making him look a bit on the nerdy side instead of the lady swooner that William Shatner portrayed, as after more then half a century he seemingly gained the trait of empathy.  It just "feels" different from the captain I got to know over the decades of the franchise.

When undergoing upgrades, Spock, contacted by La'an, steals the Enterprise to prevent a plot to respark the Klingon - Federation War, and while clandestine this is hailed in thanks with the threat of the conflict with the Gorn Hegemony looming on the horizon.  In the meantime, Pike is recruiting a top lawyer to clear his first officer from the genetic modification charges, as she turns out to be the one that turned herself in.  During the process, she is cleared of charges and can resume duties, but this does mean her secret is out.

La'an, is tossed in the past, and must prevent the formation of an alternate timeline together with that realities Kirk, as they need to save Khan Nonien Sing from a Romulan plot to alter time.  While succesful, even though that timelines Kirk dies (and in this episode, we really see streaks of the Kirk we all got to know and love, I must say, cudos to Paul Wesley's portrayal here) to restore the timeline La'an came from instead of safeguarding his own.  

Talking captain', Pike has hiw own issues with captain Batel, his love intrest and captain of the USS Cayuga.  When he is assigned to investigate a planet where a previous mission failed, he finds one of his deemed killed in action crewmembers from that earlier mission has become a sort of local tyrant king with the help of a shield that prevents a memory whiping radiation.  Radiation is also of an issue when together with this timeline's Kirk, the first time we get to meet the actual character, comes aboard from the USS farragut to aid in the repair of a deuterium facility.

And then we get one of the funniest episodes this season, an actual crossover with... the Lower Decks animation series.  Mind you, the opening being drawn this episode was super.  Boimler, assigned by the USS Ceritos to investigate an ancient portal, falls through and ends on the Enterprise.  Starstruck, he tries to help out while not altering the timeline when an Orion pirate steals the portal.  When they get it back, instead of getting home Mariner comes through looking for him, and they need both their future knowledge on how to get the portal back up and running and return them home.  

While the episode with the Klingon ambassador is more serious in tone, looking back in the past of war of doctor M'Benga, the next episode is a musical.  Hilarious (and again, the thing they did with the opening was amazing), but then it all turns back to grim seriousness.  A colony is attacked by the Gorn, and the USS Cayuga who was there is destroyed.  The Enterprise intervenes, but a line is drawn across the planet, being claimed by the Gorn and making it a hard diplomatic tippytoe situation.  Pike finds Batel amongst the survivors, together with a young engineer called Montgomery Scott who had build a cloaking device to escape the Gorn in a shuttle when his own starship was destroyed.  By the way, Enterprise didn't get a new chief engineer this season after the death of Hemmer last season, so I think we all know who is going to fill the vacancy!

But during the rescue mission, which involves crashing the saucer section of the Cayuga on the planet to destroy a Gorn jammer, part of the crew is hijacked away from teleport by the Gorn, while captain Batel is infected with Gorn eggs.

 

It all starts when Picard receives a call for aid from the medical vessel SS Eleos, commanded by Beverly Crusher.  As she tells him not to involve Starfleet, he turns to his old friend Captain Riker, and together they arrange a suprise inspection of the USS Titan-A, the successor to Riker's old ship.  They try to convince her captain, Liam Shaw (god I love this character) to take them to her location, which he declines.  But his first officer, none other then Seven of Nine, changes the vessel's course, ignoring his orders.

 

In the meantime Rafi, now working for Starfleet Intelligence and a mysterious handler, is tracing a stolen weapon from the Daystrom Institute but arrives to late and sees a facility being destroyed right before her eyes.  Btw, she inherited the La Sirena from the first two seasons.

 

Picard and Riker board the Eleos through a shuttle, finding a severly injured doctor Crusher and her son, Jack Crusher.  But a large vessel, the Shrike commanded by the bounty hunter Vadic, appears and tries to teleport Jack of the bridge, only justly prevented by Picard.  The Titan intervenes when the Eleos is captured in a tractor beam, but it turns out Jack is a wanted criminal and captain Shaw considers turning him over to save his crew from the formidable opponent.  Rafi is told by her Handler to hold back, but she pushes on and meets with a Ferengi named Sneed, but as he almost kills her, her handler appears and dispatches the Ferengi, being none other then Mister Worf!

 

 

It is revealed Jack is Picard's son, something Riker had already noticed, and realizing he won't turn him over, Shaw orders the Titan deeper into the unstable nebula, Vadic giving chase.  When Shaw gets injured in the chase, he transfers command of the Titan to Riker, but as they try to escape the use of portal technology keeps them trapped.  Picard wants to lay a trap, while Riker opts to flee, as Seven and Jack discover that a gas leak is giving away their position.  This is revealed to be sabotage by none other then a Changeling, as Rafi and Worf discover their target is also a Changeling, part of a group that keeps opposing the Federation after the Dominion War and the attack with the portal weapon was just a distraction.

 

Riker lets Picard convince him to attack, but their weapons are reverted due to the portal weapon and with heavy damage the Titan sinks in the gravitational anomaly inside the nebula.  As they make up later, Shaw bitterly tells his experience at the Battle of Wolf 359 and why he dislikes Picard as such.  Vadic, also a Changeling, is ordered to pursue the Titan, as the crew makes a plan to use the energy pulses in the nebula to repower the Titan, and as they damage the Shrike on their escape the nebula gives birth to a new organism.  Picard realises that five years ago, Jack had sought him out and he had unknowingly turned him away, as Jack experiences strange visions.  Returning command to Shaw, the Titan is approached by the USS Intrepid, to arrest Picard and Riker.  But their security officer, none other then Ro Laren, warns them to escape as it is revealed the higher echelons of Starfleet have been infitrated by Changelings that found a way past the screening tests.

Ro sacrifices herself to give them a way to escape, as they are contacted by Worf he was also working against the infiltration with Ro.  Gathering together, they journey to the Daystrom institute together with LaForge.  They discover that the security system there is actually a synthetic lifeform (like Picard is now) containing the memories of Data, Lore and B-4.  In the meantime, Jack and LaForge's daughters take the old cloaking device of the HMS Bounty (the Bird-of-Prey from The Voyage Home) to install on the Titan.

As they start to reinitialize Data, they find out the Changelings have stole Picard's original body as Riker covers their escape from Daystrom, being captured by Vadic who also has Deanne in custody.  The crew summarises they want to create a perfect replica of Picard to target the celebrations of the 250th Frontier day anniversary, as Data and lore fight out an ideological battle inside the body, Data using honest trickery to finally ascertain himself as the dominant personality, albeit he comes with emotions now.  As Vadic boards the Titan, she is captured and reveals how she came to be, before taking control of the vessel.  But when a "very pissed off AI" comes into action, they regain control and Vadic is blown into space to her demise.  As Riker and Deanna are saved from the Shrike, they find out the true plan: a new Borg based technology allows all vessels in Starfleet to act as one, and due to a virus in the transporter buffer, all younger aged crewmen become assimilated into Borg as it has been programmed into their patterns.

The Borg Queen, that once created Locutus, wants revenge by assimilating Jack and him becoming her new beacon.  Her damaged cube hides in Jupiter, and as she has control now of every vessel in Starfleet, including the Titan, they need another, not connected ship to go there and stop her.  Enter the final crewmember of the Next Generation as I said above...

Restored by Geordi as a labour of love, they travel to the cube where Picard wants to give himself in exchange for Jack, but the Queen laughs it away, stating the Federation will end anyhow and she doesn't need him anymore.  But Picard gets through to Jack and disconnects him, as they destory the cube and the Queen finally with it, ending the Borg threat now completely.  The assimilated crew returns to normal, as the crew receives full pardon's for their actions.

One year later, the Titan is rechristened the Enterprise-G in honour of their exploits, with Seven of Nine in command, having inherited the ship from the late captain Shaw who gave his life for the others to escape during the Borg attack.  Jack is assigned to the vessel, but as the vessel sets out, he is visited by Q saying Picard's trial has ended, but his has just begun...

Okay, this was an awesome farewell to the Next Generation, with a lot of tie-ups of older story arcs.  It also leaves open the window for a spin-off series, but unfortunatly that is not on the table though, even if you play Star Trek Online, shards can be deducted of what came to pass afterwards.

 

 

Taking place before Kirk's famous mission, this follows the previous crew of Enterprise, under command of captain Pike.  It is set after the season he took command of Discovery, and as such he has the knowledge of what his ultimate fate will be.

This weighs heavily on him, and his crew, including younger iterations of both Spock, Chapel and Uhura, try to convince him that the future is not set in stone and he might not meet the accident in about 10 years time.  But of course, the mission comes first as well, and this leads to various first contact missions.

There is a funny moment as well in the second episode when an admiral tells them the no contact rule will be renamed the Prime Directive, with Pike retorting "those names never stick".  But the season also has some very strong, moral episodes as we get to know from Star Trek, like a planet's society resting on the shoulders of a child having to be sacrificed to power the "world engine".

With a rather diverse crew, including a blind engineer and even a Nonien-Singh as security officer, the season has a lot of various points of view to the episodes, and not Discovery's "the captain is the only one present and solving everything" feel to it, but an actual crew that contributes to the problems at hand.  Including the struggles of the Federation coming in touch with unbeknowst opponents, and how their always peaceful approach gets them into trouble at times.

There are also very tense episodes, like the one where they go out to retrieve the crashlanded USS Farragut, only to end up in an Alien like episode with one of the core cast required to make the ultimate sacrifice...

While he enjoys his life at his wine chateau, he struggles with his feelings for his Romulan friend Laris, trying to supress feelings of love.  In the meanwhile, Rios has become the captain of the brand new Stargazer, a vessel with a legacy for Picard.  When send out to investigate a spatial anomaly, Picard is called in as the anomaly wants to talk personally to him.

It turns out to be the Borg themselves, and a new queen starts taking over the fleet, forcing the Stargazer to self destruct.  But Picard suddenly finds himself back home, as Q intervened and rewrote time.  As a result, the galaxy became a Mirror universe like distopian nightmare, with the Confederacy conquering one after another civilisation.  Picard collects his companions also stuck here, and together with a Borg queen's assistance travel back to 2024 to try and set things right.

But they lose Elnor on the way there, as he is shot and dies after the slingshot effect.  In 2024, they have to search for the Watcher, and Picard finds Guinan to help him in this search, while Jurati tries to merge with the Borg Queen to get the location of the Watcher that way.

Rios, Seven and Rafi go into Los Angeles, but Rios gets injured upon arrival and finds himself arrested by immigration after being treated in a public clinic.  He is set for deportation, but his friends set out to rescue him.  Picard in the meantime finds the Watcher, looking a lot like Laris, and learns that the event Q is about to alter is actually the Europa space mission, and the involvement of Picard's ancestor, Renee Picard.

But Q itself also has some tricks up his sleeve, as he contacts doctor Soong, helping him out with illegal genetic procedures to try and cure his ailing daughter.

After a failed attempt at his ancestors life at the gala, Picard gets stuck in his memories, and Talinn goes in to free him.  Rafi and Seven discover in the meantime that the Queen has influenced Jurati, and taken over her body.  While she roams the city to build up power, Picard faces his past and seeks the help of Guinan to summon Q.  But instead, the FBI come in and arrest him as they saw him materialize.  During the interrogation, Q appears before Guinan, and she learns he is dying, and all Q are stuck in the past.

Soong is faced by his daughter, who learned she is nothing more then a genetical experiment.  He is recruited by the Borg Queen to try and take La Sirenna, and remove Picard, but as she is about to succeed Jurati manages to convince her to merge into something new and maybe manage to change the Borg in the future, as they take off in the ship.  But Soong wants to prevent the Europa mission, to create a future where he left behind a legacy, no matter how grim it might turn out to be.

They manage to prevent him stopping the launch, but at the cost of Talinn's life, leaving him behind a broken man while his daughter Corey is recruited to the Travellers by Wesley Crusher.  Q returns all of them bar Rios to the future, who stays behind with the love he found there.  They return moments before the self destruct, but deduct the Borg queen is actually Agnes, and she seeks them out to use the fleet and stop a quadrant destroying galactic event from happening.  With the event stopped, Picard returns to his Chateau, and gives in to his feelings for Laris.

And slowly that Federation is rebuilding, rebuilding it's memberships by contacting old allies and friends.  But suddenly, a distress call from a Deep Space station comes in, as it is hit by a strange gravitational phenomena.  When this phenomena arrives later at Booker's homeplanet of Kweijan, it destroys it utterly.

The Discovery is send out to gather data, but they only learn the anomaly can change direction, making it impossible to predict where it will go and what planets are on it's path, in danger of being destroyed.  As the crew tries to figure it out, Ni'Var (formerly Vulcan) rejoins the Federation, an important sign of the rebuilding efforts.

But they suffer loss as well, as Lieutenant Tilly leaves the Discovery to become a teacher at Starfleet Academy, reopened after 125 years.  They learn that the anomaly, dubbed the DMA, is an artificially created entity, made... outside of the known galaxy.  A scientist named Tarka suggests destroying the anomaly with a weapon he made, but the gathered council barely votes for a more peaceful effort, resulting in Tarka convincing the guiltridden Booker to take off with him and deploy the weapon themselves.

As the Discovery approaches the DMA, they face off with Booker.  A standstill is agreed on, but Tarka takes matters in his own hands, deploying the weapon and destroying the anomaly.  But soon after, a new one emerges and a first contact mission is undertaken.  But this DMA threatens Earth and Ni'var amongst others in the Alpha Quadrant, as Discovery (and a piggybacking Booker) cross the Galactic Barrier to search for the dubbed species Ten-C.  They find an old planet of them, learning upon their culture...

Tarka kidnaps reno, and she tells book that from seeing his calculations, he intends on destroying anyone, no matter the way things go, to use his teleporter.  He launches his attack, Discovery just in time to stop him, but Book's beam out signal gets lost.  As the delegates meet with the Ten-C after deciphering their language, they however return him to the crew, and stop the DMA as they didn't realise it caused so much damage.

So, season 4 huh, and the fourth captain on the chair.  For me, this was a bad move, as while the overarching story is good, Burnham has to much of a "God position" in the series.  Why does this captain needs a crew, she is barely flawless it seems, knowing everything, and apart from some Book related tears (usually very briefly) solves everything on her own.  Alien languages, technological issues, it's no problem for Miss Godlike Being.

The Discovery, after the finale events of season 2, finds herself stranded 900 years in the future.  The Federation is but a shell of itself, pushed back to a single hidden starbase and counting only 38 member planets, none of their originals included.  Vulcan (now Ni'Var) still finds it's pacing with the Unification that Spock had begun all the way back in The Next Generation, Earth has turned in herself and Andor is now in an alliance with the Orions, the Emerald Chain.

And so the crew starts to not only find their footing and rebuild what is possible of the Federation ideal, but they also investigate an event that transpired 125 years ago when all the dilithium in the universe suddenly exploded.  This event, called The Burn, is the reason the Federation fell apart as in a matter of moments, billions where lost and long distance travel became impossible.

This season as such also carries back to the ideal of Star Trek, exploring strange new worlds (or, in this case, often rediscover old, familiar worlds) and carrying the torch of co-operation.  But there where downsides for me as well this season, and I`m not talking the finale where the Discovery's interior is like a gazillion times to big in the turbolift sequence.

No, this is the first season I actually was annoyed with the "Michael Burnham does everything" syndrome, and even though she gets the chair flying into season 4, she was just to omnipresent for my liking.  Other mainstay character like Stammets really became glorified cameo's.  

The other thing I was a bit urgh about, is the actual cause and source of The Burn.  While it has been worked out very well for what is was, it was just, well, underwhelming for something that impacted the galaxy so hard.

But on the other side, the series DID bring the Abramsverse into the canonical fold, and in a pretty nifty way I must say.  And we met a very, very old face again...

All in all, it wasn`t a bad season, and the idea was really great in my opinion, but the main point above distracts a lot from it, so let's see how season 4 will handle this new dynamic before placing a final judgement.  Like every Trek series, this has been the season it became it's own storyline, and a 32nd, the Federation is not almighty, setting is very intresting for sure to explore!