Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Season 4 Will Make One Major Change From Season 3

"Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" is one of the most fun TV shows on the air, and part of an emerging new golden age for sci-fi in the streaming era of television. As someone who never fully got into "Star Trek" due to how big the franchise is, "Strange New Worlds" is a perfect gateway into this wonderful world. The show feels like it is fulfilling the promise of the original "Star Trek" series, showing the endless possibilities of an exploration journey through the stars, seeking out new life and new civilizations by exploring strange new worlds. 

Every week, an episode can and does tell a bold new story in an entirely different tone and even genre. In season 3 alone we went from an alien zombie episode to a murder mystery episode to an "Indiana Jones" style tomb-raiding adventure back-to-back-to-back, and it was phenomenal. Anything and everything can happen in this show, and you never know what will happen next, which is part of the fun.

But come season 4, there will be one major change from this season. Co-showrunner Henry Alonso Myers talked to Cinema Blend and said, "I think that we're probably a little more serious in 4, but, you know, we like to work in various genres."

Unfortunately for fans of funny "Star Trek," it seems "Strange New Worlds" is course-correcting. In that same interview, co-showrunner Akiva Goldsman talked about the challenges of making season 3 due to the strikes, which led to certain actors and characters becoming less prominent as they were unavailable. "Season 4, I think, is our best work," Goldsman said. "We were always chasing a little bit on [season] 3. [Season] 4 felt, in the best possible way, quite deliberate and fun."

Now, everyone is entitled to having an opinion, including at least one of the writers here at /Film who argued that "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" went a bit overboard with the comedy in season 3. But the comedy is arguably a big part of what makes "Strange New Worlds" so special as a sci-fi show, and as a big-budget show in the post-Prestige TV era. The past 15 years or so saw the rise of TV dramas that were overly dark and grim: shows with dramatic antagonists and bleak storylines, where anything could happen as long as it was something bad. We got some incredible, all-time great shows out of that era, but it also became quite tiresome to have even escapist television be an accurate reflection of our dark reality.

"Strange New Worlds," however, is more than that. Sure, the show is very much capable of delivering dramatic hours of television with plenty of ethos, poignant commentary, and even heartbreaking dream sequences. And yet, it is in the comedic episodes, in the wacky high concept episodes, that the show becomes something that is missing from television. The ability to tackle different tones and genres week by week is a big part of the appeal of the original "Star Trek." It's what made the best superhero show ever made, "DC's Legends of Tomorrow," so good.

Granted, there is something to be said about the fact that "Strange New Worlds" runs on 10 episodes a season rather than 22, making a slightly heavy reliance on comedy capable of overwhelming the tone of the show. These comedy episodes are special because they feel rare, not because they are expected. There has to be a right balance where a dramatic and a comedic episode both feel special rather than just expected. It will just have to happen after the already-confirmed puppet episode in season 4.