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Because Star Trek: Discovery focuses on the gender and sexuality of its central female character with the manly name, Michael, it returns to the themes of family, gender and sexuality in nearly every episode in a manner that overloads these themes until their essential structural flaws are revealed. As part of this overload is the fact that Michael has two biological parents, two adopted parents, a mothering-captain and a mothering-Emperor. Instead of being an independent woman who has attained a powerful position in the space military, she is constantly shown as being desperate for love from her various parents, and as a dependent who attained her position with help from their connections and guidance. These parental entanglements drive Michael to various unstable acts and mental states, and this psychological turmoil impacts viewers in constant waves of emotional trauma until no feelings are left and the fifth or sixth parental trauma becomes so repetitive it has the opposite effect of creating intense hatred for Michael's ceaseless complaining about her parental units.
The first two seasons of this show are somewhat split in structure as if two distinct writers created them. The opening season explores Michael's character while sending the U.S.S. Discovery on exploratory missions that are mostly engaging and curious as she is shown to break into a challenging job and then fights to keep it despite setbacks. In contrast, the second year's dominant creator chose to unduly recycle and repeat the formulaic family and relationship dynamics and their counterpart power-relationships; these are approached with formulas that are so common to science-fiction, they are nauseating to watch. According to the showrunners, Season 1 "is set roughly a decade before the events of the original Star Trek series, and follows the crew of the U.S.S. Discovery during the Federation-Klingon war..." Then, Season 2, "After answering a distress signal from the U.S.S. Enterprise, finds the crew of the U.S.S. Discovery joining forces with Captain Christopher Pike on a new mission to investigate seven mysterious red signals and the appearance of an unknown being called the Red Angel. While the crew must work together to unravel their meaning and origin, Michael Burnham is forced to face her past with the return of her estranged brother, Spock."
I was compelled...