Borrowing story ideas is nothing new, whether you're in the 23rd, 24th, 25th, or 32nd centuries!
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00:00With nearly 60 years of history behind it, it's inevitable that there's going to be some reusing
00:04of ideas and episode plots in Star Trek. That's fine. We're looking at the episodes that have
00:11been released since the return of Star Trek, as in the premiere of Discovery in 2017. When you
00:18start to see reusing of plots in a smaller amount of time, that's when they start to stand out a
00:23little bit more. I'm Sean Ferrick for Trek Culture and here are 10 modern Star Trek plots that are the
00:30same. Number 10. Sam Rutherford vs Red, Data vs Lore. In Lower Decks' third season episode Reflections,
00:37Ensign Rutherford finds himself at odds with himself, or at least he's battling a variation of himself,
00:43a holdover from a time before his implant was grafted to his skull. This version of himself, Red,
00:49is far less agreeable and far less of a people pleaser. The two sides of this personality must
00:54battle each other for control of the one Rutherford body. In Picard's third season episode Surrender,
01:00Data and Lore are revealed to now be sharing the same golem body. Without total control it seems
01:05as though the Titan A will fall to the Changeling forces under Vadik. There follows a beautiful
01:10exchange between the brothers, as Data hands items from his memory to his evil twin. Though neither
01:15outcome was unexpected, there is a catharsis in seeing both Sam Rutherford and Data gain complete
01:21control over themselves again. It is certainly a similar plot point between the two shows,
01:26with some lovely easter eggs in Picard and some crucial information in Lower Decks. Commander,
01:32Buen Amigo? Here, it simply boils down to taking a good idea and applying it across the board.
01:37Number 9. End of the Universe. Oh no, control will wipe out everything! How can we stop it? Oh no,
01:43the Burn destroyed all warp capable ships! How can we fix it? Oh no, the DMA is destroying planets at
01:49random! How can we avoid it? Does the crew of the USS Discovery ever get a week off? Do they get a bit
01:54of downtime where they can just have shore leave, catch up with friends, maybe go to the bar for a
01:57drink or some food? No? It seems as though every few minutes a new devastating calamity is waiting to
02:03swallow them up and spit them back out again. It certainly makes perfect sense that the Discovery,
02:07equipped with its spore drive, would be the first ship called on in most situations. What gets a bit
02:12repetitive is when, despite all of the advancements made, it's still the only ship. Star Trek has more
02:18often than not focused on a single ship, so that isn't the issue. The issue is the dialogue in which
02:22the ship is often referred to in almost messianic terms, not far away from, well if Discovery can't do
02:28it we're doomed! Doomed! Seriously, build a better fleet, or maybe make friends with some Q or something!
02:35Number 8. Pellia Guinan. Picard's second season sees Picard meeting Guinan in the past,
02:41specifically the 21st century, down in LA where she is tending bar. Though they have of course already
02:46met several times, this being the second time from Guinan's point of view after San Francisco,
02:51there are many rules around time travel that must be observed. Almost concurrently, La'Anne Noonien
02:56Singh and James T. Kirk are traipsing from Toronto to Vermont to see Pellia, a similarly long-lived
03:02being, building her huge collection of antiques, hoping for her help. The Strange New Worlds episode
03:07Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow depicts these two officers, both from different futures, being
03:12flung back into their common past in 2023. The fact that there are two alien women on planet Earth at
03:18the same time is hardly the shocker here. It's the fact that these two alien women, both of whom will
03:22still be alive in the 23rd and 24th centuries, are the sole means of help for our standard time
03:27travellers. It's a little too similar not to notice, no matter how much fun it is to see them in the past.
03:32Number 7. Texas Class. Star Trek Lower Decks' third season concludes with the revolt of the Texas
03:38Class ships, fully automated, attacking starships and starbases alike. There is, in fact, a fairly
03:43harrowing scene depicting the starbase taking an absolute pasting from these vessels, with several
03:48people very clearly killed as a result. The sequence is very similar to the assault on Space Dock depicted
03:53in Star Trek Picard's final two episodes, Vox and The Last Generation. This again is a harrowing
03:58sequence depicting a fully automated Starfleet armada training all of their weapons against the
04:02most recognisable of landmarks. This series does go one step further, Space Dock actually does fall
04:07to the barrage. While the Texas Class ships do considerable damage to their Space Dock, Picard
04:11manages to depict a station that's fighting back. Though the end result is negative, it's a significant
04:16difference between these two stories, despite the premise being almost identical. At least one
04:21similarity between the episodes end up saving a lot of lives. There are only three Texas Class ships to
04:27contend with, and though the armada in Picard is called the entire fleet a number of times, it's
04:32clearly only a portion of what Starfleet has to offer. If either show had shown anything close to
04:37Starfleet's full potential, it's entirely possible that the only thing appearing post-2401 will be
04:43floating debris in space. Number 6, Living Construct. And here we go again, automation threatening Starfleet.
04:50This time it comes in the form of the Living Construct, a devastating AI weapon that's placed on board the USS
04:55as Protostar, turning the finest of Starfleet ships into a ticking time bomb, ready to cripple any
05:01Federation ships that get too close. There are just enough subtle differences in this plot that it's
05:05not exactly the same as either Lower Decks Texas Class or Picard's Assimilated Armada, but in essence
05:10we have another fleet that's being controlled from a central evil source, ready to infect every Starfleet
05:16ship that it comes into contact with. There's no arguing that the sequence showing the Living Construct
05:20going live is almost as chilling as Skynet's inevitable rise, and the visuals remain as gorgeous as the
05:25first time we saw them. But it all simply begs the question, between this, the Texas Class which
05:30would have come before, and the Borg infected fleet, has Starfleet got any firewalls in place on its ships?
05:36Number 5, Frontier Day. Let's put aside the notion of gathering the entire fleet in one spot for a
05:42moment and concentrate on, yes you've guessed it, another fully automated fleet being hijacked. In this
05:48scenario Starfleet sets itself up for demise by creating Fleet Formation, a system that will allow other
05:54ships to join in on the fun, should one become incapacitated. On paper, there is perhaps a bit
05:59of merit to this idea, however this is set in 2401, after the awful experiences with both the Texas
06:05Class ships and the Living Construct aboard the Protostar. The kinks clearly haven't been worked
06:10out of the system, shown when not only are the Borg able to infiltrate the ships, but then both the Titan
06:15A and the Excelsior are able to overcome it for however short a time. The truth of the matter is that,
06:22though the storyline is problematic in its own way, the fact that all three of these shows take
06:27place so close together in terms of airing, it's very hard not to immediately lump them together.
06:33One has to struggle to stop oneself from shouting at the screen, HAVE YOU LEARNED NOTHING?
06:39Number 4, It's the Borg. There. Are. Other. Villains. So, the first season of Picard saw the return,
06:47in a manner of speaking, of the Borg. Starfleet's greatest enemy of all time. They arrived with a
06:51twist. This impressive Borg cube was in fact crewed by XBs, drones who had been liberated from
06:57the Collective. They shared their space with Romulan refugees, and were eventually betrayed by them.
07:01The second season of Picard saw the return, in a manner of speaking, of the Borg. This time,
07:05they had a new ship and a new version of the Queen. After a season of time travel hijinks,
07:10the Queen was revealed to be an assimilated Agnes Jurati, and the Borg were, in fact, friendly. The third season
07:16of Picard saw the return, in a manner of... Ok, you get the point. While the final version of the Borg,
07:21seeing the return of the Borg Queen, voiced once more by Alice Krieg, was certainly the most
07:25intimidating, there was no escaping the fact that they had become a little old hat at this point.
07:30The franchise's over-reliance on them as a primary antagonist dulls the impact of their arrival,
07:35so that the reveal of the Borg cube behind the red door in Jack Crusher's mind was a bit like...
07:41Ok then. That's not to say the following episodes weren't impressive, but please,
07:45for now at least, let the Borg die.
07:50Number 3. Evil Starfleet. Starfleet is evil! Now that sounds like a heck of a statement,
07:55but when evil Starfleet storylines get pitched again, and again, and again,
07:59it seems as though this once glorious organisation is, in fact, one of the most devastating empires
08:04in history. Star Trek Picard depicted a Starfleet that was bruised and broken, ok, not evil,
08:09but refused flat out to help the Romulans after the incident on Mars. Billions died as a result.
08:14Star Trek Discovery depicts a Starfleet that would happily commit genocide in the Klingon homeworld,
08:19or created a programme that could wipe out all life in the galaxy. Star Trek Lower Decks depicted
08:24yet another evil Admiral in the form of Buen Amigo. Once again, this is an example of the writers in
08:28the franchise not collaborating on their efforts. This theme of an evil or darker version of Starfleet,
08:34while not new to Star Trek, having so many examples of darker Starfleet so close together,
08:40seems like several good ideas tripping up over each other. Number 2. Time travel from an alternate
08:46future. Let's travel back in time so we can fix the future that's broken! Star Trek Picard's second
08:50season spends the bulk of its running time in the past, or our present to be more exact. With Q
08:55having interfered to teach Jean-Luc a lesson, the future is now controlled by the evil Confederation,
09:00Picard as a brutal warlord, and Seven as President of Earth. Seems a bit sus really. The heroes travel back
09:06in time via the trusty slingshot around the sun technique before working on setting things to
09:10right. Thankfully Q sends them home again. In the Strange New Worlds episode Tomorrow and Tomorrow
09:15and Tomorrow, which has already appeared on this list, L'Anne and Kirk are flung back to the 21st
09:19century. In this case, it's Kirk who has travelled from the darker future, one where Starfleet and the
09:24Vulcans are not allies, and both are facing crushing losses to the Romulans. Thankfully their actions in
09:29the past ensure the restoration of a brighter, more hopeful future. Both stories have their ups and downs,
09:34but the time travel gimmick tends to get a little old quite quickly.
09:38Number 1 Genetically Engineered Pariah Strange New Worlds, Prodigy and, to a lesser extent,
09:44Picard, have all gone in with storylines about genetic engineering. If we look at Trek of Old,
09:49certainly Disgust, Space Seed, The Masterpiece Society, and Statistical Probabilities all dealt
09:53with it head on. In Picard, Coray is hidden away from the world due to her father, Adam Sung,
09:58his inability to create the perfect genome for her. Though this is cured by Q,
10:03it leads to Adam reaching out for a folder titled Project Khan. This may only be a small nod to the
10:09history of Star Trek and the Eugenics Wars, but Prodigy and Strange New Worlds both take on the
10:13subject much more overtly, and arguably in a very similar fashion. Una Chin Riley and Dal's
10:18experiences with Starfleet, including their initial rejection due to their genetically engineered status,
10:24neither of which they were responsible for, is incredibly similar. Both of them face discrimination
10:28for their status, and both are eventually welcomed into, or back into, service. Whether it's Advocate
10:34Neera's passionate plea to accept Una's asylum, or Admiral Janeway's direct influence to make Dal
10:39a warrant officer, both examples depict Starfleet of the future upholding the centuries-long ban on
10:44genetic engineering, effectively barring both individuals from service for something entirely
10:49beyond their control. That's everything for our list. What do you think folks? Do you think that
10:54there's a few more plots between the various modern Star Trek shows that share more than a few
10:58similarities? If you do, let us know in the comments below. Thank you very much as always for following
11:03along. Now please remember you can go and follow us on Twitter at TrekCulture, same as Blue Sky at
11:07TrekCulture and Instagram at TrekCultureYT. You can find myself at Sean Ferrick on Twitter as well,
11:13I'm also on Instagram and Blue Sky. Thank you so much to our wonderful editor Martin for making this
11:18thing look as good as it did. Everyone, until I see you again, make sure that you look after yourselves,
11:23make sure that you look after your nearest and dearest, lead with kindness, and above all else,
11:28live long and prosper. Thank you very much.