TL;DR – I think this episode shows the potential best and also the possible worst for the series moving forward.

Disclosure – I paid for the Paramount+ service that airs this series.

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy – Beta Test Review

Apparently, it is tradition in the year of the Lord 2026, when you drop a weekly series order, you need to drop two episodes, which usually feel like they could have been one movie-length episode, but weren’t because of weird Hollywood economy reasons. Star Trek: Starfleet Academy is no stranger to this phenomenon, but to give it its credit, this did feel like a whole new episode in its own right.  

So, to set the scene, Caleb Mir (Sandro Rosta) is trying to acclimatise to a world defined by rules, order, and, strangely for him, safety. Meanwhile, Captain Nahla Ake (Holly Hunter) is championing student learning wherever she can. One opportunity is being given to Admiral Charles Vance (Oded Fehr) because, for the first time since The Burn, the Betazed delegation is coming out of their psionic barrier that was put up around their territory. This could be a big win for the Federation to get Betazed to return to the fold, but it was the Federation that abandoned them during The Burn, and memories can be long. Now, from here, we will be looking at the episode as a whole, so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead.

Potential Best

What this second episode does well is show the potential of this new series, and I think they have set themselves up well in that regard. The first strength comes from the cast, because Holly Hunter is a fascinating choice to anchor your show around. Her character is meant to cut through all the rubbish that has built up over the hundred-plus years of isolation, and on that front, it works really well. The setup of a university that is both generally stationary but also flexible has excellent potential to allow guest characters from the greater Star Trek world to pop in as guest stars, as we got with Jett Reno (Tig Notaro) this week. This gives you the space to build a show’s core cast but with the reinforcing strength of your guest cast, much like Lower Decks did in its first season.  

This week’s episode also found itself smack-damn in the middle of a classic Star Trek conceit: how do you find a new way forward with a people that you have wronged in the past? The Betazed delegation was coming with demands that would never be accepted, and the Federation were showing that they had not learned as much from their past as they should have. How they resolved that crisis showed that the writers understand what drives a series like Star Trek, and it is indeed one of the best indicators that the show is probably in good hands.    

Possible Worst

However, while watching this episode, I could see where those cracks could be and where the dangers lie ahead for the show. It has been famously said that Gene Roddenberry didn’t want any interpersonal conflict between the crew in The Next Generation, and the first couple of seasons were hampered by this, and Deep Space Nine showed how you could use it for real impact, see It’s Only a Paper Moon. However, I do think that Gene’s warning was coming from a place that understood how dangerous interpersonal conflict can be for a show when it does not come from a genuine place.

Growing up in the 2000s, my life, music, movies, and television were full of angsty teens rebelling against it all. For every OC or Dawson’s Creek, there were a dozen shows that burned bright and messy for half a season before vanishing into the cultural ether.. When conflict feels forced, or it is not coming from a genuine place, it can be a death knell for a show. This week, we witnessed that happening on two different occasions. The first was the confrontation in the underwater observatory, and the second when Caleb and Tarima Sadal (Zoë Steiner) have a fight over seemingly nowhere about Goja V. Both were narrative shorthand to get the show where it needed to be as the credits rolled, and not genuine conflicts. They come out of nowhere like a surprise slap, but have no impact because their foundations are flimsy. I am concerned about whether this is the direction we are going in.

Recommendation

In the end, do we recommend Star Trek: Starfleet Academy – Beta Test? While there was much to give me pause this week, there was also a lot that showed just what potential this show has if it can find its feet. I mean, if nothing else, it didn’t hurt to see another Brikar in all its glory and a miffed Exocomp to boot. Have you watched Star Trek: Starfleet Academy – Beta Test? Let us know what you thought of the new series in the comments below.

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Bluesky at @Tldrmovrev, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

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Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Star Trek: Starfleet Academy
Directed by – Alex Kurtzman
Written by – Noga Landau & Jane Maggs
Created by – Gaia Violo
Based On – Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry
Production/Distribution Companies – Secret Hideout, Warm Blood Sunday, Roddenberry Entertainment, CBS Studios & Paramount+
Starring – Holly Hunter, Sandro Rosta, Karim Diané, Kerrice Brooks, George Hawkins, Bella Shepard, Zoë Steiner, Oded Fehr, Gina Yashere, Brit Marling, Stephen Colbert, Tig Notaro & Robert Picardo
With – Raoul Bhaneja, Anthony Natale, Jamie Groote & Romeo Carere
And – Cecilia Lee, Scott Yamamura, Piotr Michael, Kether Donohue, Joseph Messina & Graham Knox