What is Starfleet, Trusted Sources, and Lower Decks vs Strange New Worlds (long post)
From before the season even started I felt like SNW was not equipped to answer the question of What is Starfleet. After this finished I rewatched Lower Decks Trusted Sources, a similar episode about a format bender being used to have a conversation with what Starfleet is.
In Trusted Sources, we engage with the fact that the show often comes into an area, greatly affects them, and then leaves without any follow up. It is a real critisism that shows that, while Picard's decision helped out the Ornarans, the scars are there and they dont want anything to do with Starfleet anymore. Meanwhile, the Brekkans have been completely lost as a species and them not following up allowed for the Breen to invade unimpeded. It also uses the format to play around with the idea of how we present ourselves in front of the camera. Carol uses the episode to try and put her best foot forward, even if it is against the reality of what her ship is like. The contrast of how she presents off camera as opposed to on camera ends up justifying the impression the reporter has of her and the ship, and while it isnt revealed until later, Buenamigo did the same thing, using the presence of the cameras to show off his personal project in a positive light, despite the dark intentions he had behind the scenes. In both cases their need to get their personal projects to have Starfleet support superseded their mission as representatives of Starfleet. A good episode having critisisms of both Starfleet and media coverage, without fully undermining either, and tying into the character conflicts as well. Mariner's speech about how the people on the ship are like a family mirrors the end of this episode, but feel more substantial.
In contrast, What is Starfleet seems to point to interesting things at the start, but has absolutely nothing to say about them later. It starts out being a very pointed discussion about if Starfleet is colonialist and militarist, and drops them into a conflict where again, we have two planets at conflict, but (we have to assume, given the lack of context) that the power dynamics are completely off. That has led to them turning this animal into a weapon. The whole episode, the crew is visibly against what they're doing but at every chance they get to try and find an alternate and more ethical solution, they reject it, deciding to just follow orders. Uhura specifically says they could try and communicate with it and they still fire the torpedos first. The creature says that it wishes for death and they dont spend a millisecond trying to save it, and that's on top of being willing to deliver it as a weapon of war in the first place, framing this as them making the hard decisions and doing the right thing "eventually." But even then, why is the episode that framed this incredibly asymmetrical conflict as the central point of the story focusing entirely on the extremely desperate losing party with literal millions more in casualties? Why are they who the "You dont want to be an enemy of the Federation." is directed at? So the Federation is portrayed badly. And then it's this framing in which Uhura gives her speech that we're all a family, and ends the episode with them all having dinner and saying yeah it's all good.
And that's just half of it, because the other half is the documentary style is completely wasted. Ortegas is a terrible reporter, gives leading questions, records people without their consent, and is portrayed as overall bad and biased....except it's all in service of undermining his questions at the start, which make no sense because the episode portrays Starfleet badly! Uhura does the kicker and tells him that this journalist trying to find out about if the Federation may be messier than it likes to think is only doing it out of spite because he misses his sister, and needs to chill out and go eat some food. Yeah, the institutions dont need to be questioned, and those doing so have ulterior motives. And the episode seems to agree, and doesnt engage with its questions at all anymore.
At least the space creature looked nice.
