WARNING: Contains SPOILERS for Star Trek: Prodigy season 2!
Summary
I don’t think that theStar Trekuniverse has ever looked as beautiful as it does in Netflix’s animated series,Star Trek: Prodigy. It’s always irritated me that animatedStar Trekgets such a hard time from fans, whether it’s Gene Roddenberry’s petulant assertion thatStar Trek: The Animated Seriesisn’t canonor the sniffy assessment in some corners of fandom thatStar Trek: Prodigyis “just” a kid’s show. As the recent crossover betweenStar Trek: Strange New WorldsandStar Trek: Lower Decksproved, animation is just a different form of storytelling that can push the franchise in dazzling new directions.
By theend ofStar Trek: Prodigyseason 2, I felt that I’d just seen the most visually dazzling series ofStar Trekever made. Joining Admiral Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) on a highly-classified mission to rescue Captain Chakotay (Robert Beltran), Dal R’El (Brett Gray), Gwyndala (Ella Purnell) and their fellow Starfleet hopefuls visited an array of stunning alien vistas. Not only were the strange new worlds they visited utterly captivating, they were also populated by some of the most alien and terrifying creatures in theStar Trekuniverse.
Star Trek: Prodigy Season 3 - Everything We Know
Netflix has the option to order Star Trek: Prodigy season 3. Here’s what we know about the young Starfleet crew of the USS Protostar’s return.
Prodigy Season 2 Makes The Star Trek Universe Look Beautiful
From temporal wormholes to a vapor ocean and a cave full of giant Tribbles,Prodigyseason 2 is an eye-popping adventure through theStar Trekuniverse. For my money, art director Alessandro Taini has dreamed up the most vibrant and creative take on theStar Trekuniverse for decades. Unshackled from the budgetary limitations of having to realize these worlds through physical props and sets, Taini andProdigy’s storyboard artists and animators have pushed themselves to realize the limitless potential of exploring Federation space and beyond. The trailer forProdigyseason 2 alone portrayed the rare beauty that the show encapsulates:
Some of the alien planets inStar Trek: Prodigyseason 2 are the most beautiful that the franchise has ever seen. The dusky pink skies of the ruined Solum have a tragic beauty to them, while Icila is an astonishingly beautiful, and dangerous, world. It’s a criticism often leveled at animation, particularly computer generated 3D animation, that it’s somehow “soulless”, because it’s deemed to involve less work than hand-drawn 2D animation, whereas CGI’s hard work is “alldone by computers”.Prodigyproves just how ill-informed this lazy criticism is, as it provides beautiful alien worlds that can have more heart, and realism than their live-action counterparts.
For example, the lush verdant vista ofthe non-corporeal colony, Ovidia IVprovides some interesting parallels betweenStar Trek: Prodigyseason 2, episode 8, “Is There in Beauty No Truth?” andStar Trek: Discoveryseason 5, episode 6, “Whistlespeak”. Both episodes culminate in a ritualistic race across the alien landscape; inProdigy, this race feels like it’s taking place on an alien world; inDiscoveryit looked like a Sunday marathon in your local park.
Star Trek: Prodigyseason 2, episode 8, “Is There No Beauty In Truth?” was written by Keith Sweet II, and directed by Ruolin Li & Andrew Schmidt.
Animated Star Trek Is Perfect For Realizing Strange New Worlds
Obviously, animatedStar Trekseries have the opportunity to create their own alien landscapes, while live-action shows have to rely on real-world locations. For decades,Star Trekhas relied on places likeVasquez Rocks Natural Area Parkto realize its alien planets.More recent innovations like the AR Wall do allow live-actionStar Trekto interact with the same richly realized CGI landscapes as their animated counterparts, but as a backdrop, which breaks the immersion you get with a show likeStar Trek: Prodigy.
Star Trek’s AR Wall at Pinewood Toronto’s Star Trek Stage has been lovingly dubbed “the Holodeck”.
Unlike live-action shows using the AR Wall,Star Trek: Prodigydoesn’t have to worry about physical set design and props not matching the animated backdrop, because their hugely talented animation team is responsible for creating everything. This means that viewers are immersed in the strange new worlds visited by theProdigycrew. It also allows for some more out-there existential threats, like the plasma and gas storms experienced by Chakotay and his young rescuers onthe planet Icila, with its “vapor oceans”.
Prodigyseason 2 follows in the grand tradition ofStar Trek: The Animated SeriesandStar Trek: Lower Decks, proving that animatedStar Trekis the most dazzlingly creative wing of the franchise.
Animation also allowsStar TrekTV shows to create the new life and civilizations without worrying about dodgy rubber costumes or visible zips. The Loom inStar Trek: Prodigyare properly alien creations, an upgrade onStar Trek: Voyager’sSpecies 8472 alien villains, the franchise’s very-first CGI species. With its strange alien creatures and high-concept planets,Star Trek: Prodigyseason 2 follows in the grand tradition ofStar Trek: The Animated SeriesandStar Trek: Lower Decks, proving that animatedStar Trekis the most dazzlingly creative wing of the franchise.
Star Trek: Prodigy
Star Trek: Prodigy is the first TV series in the Star Trek franchise marketed toward children, and one of the few animated series in the franchise. The story follows a group of young aliens who find a stolen Starfleet ship and use it to escape from the Tars Lamora prison colony where they are all held captive. Working together with the help of a holographic Captain Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew), the new crew of the USS Protostar must find their way back to the Alpha Quadrant to warn the Federation of the deadly threat that is pursuing them.
Star Trek: Lower Decks
“Star Trek: Lower Decks” focuses on the support crew serving on one of Starfleet’s least important ships, the USS Cerritos, in 2380. Ensigns Mariner, Boimler, Rutherford and Tendi must keep up with their duties and their social lives, often while the ship is being rocked by a multitude of sci-fi anomalies. The ship’s bridge crew includes Captain Carol Freeman, Commander Jack Ransom, Lieutenant Shaxs and Doctor T’Ana. This is the second animated spin-off in the franchise after 1973-74’s “Star Trek: The Animated Series,” but has a decidedly more adult tone and humor.
Star Trek: The Animated Series
Star Trek: The Animated Series follows Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, and the crew of the Starship Enterprise as they embark on new adventures across the galaxy. This animated series, released in 1973, continues the iconic science fiction stories of exploration and discovery from the original Star Trek television series.
