I have a lot of thoughts about tng and ds9 being like opposite ends of the same spectrum and then voy being like a return to tos. like it starts with the idea that political/social commentary in media exists either to ask questions or to answer them and both of those things are good in different situations
like tng chooses to answer questions that have yes or no answers ie is torture ever morally acceptable? (chain of command) or should we give up individual rights in the name of government security? (the drumhead) and the answers there are clearly no and no
ds9 on the other hand asks questions that there aren’t good answers to- like to what extent is a desk jockey to blame for the horrors of the bajoran occupation? (duet) there just isn’t a good answer there
in a lot of ways tng and ds9 balance each other out and succeed in places the other can’t and then voyager comes along and is just as political but more metaphorically so and goes back to the the feel of tos in a lot of ways bc they’re on their own. tng and ds9 are deeply tied into the politics of the federation. tos and voy are much more about what you do as an individual in a situation that may be inherently political and raise moral and ethical questions but isn’t political on the surface the same way that talking to an ambassador is.
I don’t know exactly why the distinction matters to me so much but I think it’s about the way that star trek takes so many different approaches to political/social commentary bc I like the way that it says that different situations and different ppl need different approaches.
