Star Trek Keeps Trying To Give Backstory To The One Character Who Doesn’t Need It 

Written by Chris Snellgrove | Published 43 seconds ago

Even after that terrible ending to Season 3, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds It was an overall solid show that explored what life was like on the Enterprise before James T. Kirk took command. The show leaned into its prequel setting by giving a lot of backstory to characters like Kirk, Spock, Uhura, and more.

However, the series is about to spend its fourth season providing backstory to the one character that arguably doesn’t need it at all: Montgomery Scott (known as Scotty), the ship’s future chief engineer.

Give it his all, Captain!

We know this thanks to actor Scotty Martin Quinn’s interview with Collider, where he said that SNW Season 4 will have “more of Scotty’s kind of backstory,” something the actor “really enjoys.” He summed things up somewhat vaguely by saying, “This kind of takes shape and Scotty’s world-building takes shape, and becomes more and more alive.” Considering how negligent the show has been with Scotty’s lore so far, Quinn’s comments give me a bad feeling for next season.

When Scotty was first brought aboard the Enterprise V Strange new worldsHe showed his artistic skills by helping Captain Pike defeat Jorn. Later, he was called to work aboard the ship, where he worked with Chief Engineer Belia, his old teacher at Starfleet Academy. So far, everything had made perfect sense: Scotty was a technically brilliant young man who was going to learn the ropes from his old mentor before becoming chief engineer (not to mention chief miracle worker) to Captain Kirk in The original series.

The backstory that no one asked for

However, cracks began to form when the show insisted on giving Scotty some unnecessary backstory. For example, in Space Adventure Hour, he had to learn a lesson directly from an after-school special: that he doesn’t have to try to do everything on his own. Sure, this was related to an unnecessary bit of painful backstory, but the lesson itself rang true strange Traditions of a famous character The original series To come up with brilliant engineering solutions for technology on his own.

Perhaps the most poignant moment was at the end of “Wedding Bell Blues,” when Kirk held a glass of Scotch to his bruised head. Scotty suggests a trip to sick bay, but Kirk sarcastically tells the other man that he “prefers scotch.” Scotty replies that he “could get used to that,” which seems to establish the character’s famous love of the drink. The original series.

Are we? truly Need a special origin story on why a Scottish gentleman loves to drink Scotch? While giving Scotty superfluous lessons in teamwork was stupid, giving a legalistic explanation for his favorite drink seemed downright insulting. Because of terrible writing like this, I actually To the fullest extent Concerned about what kind of additional backstory for Scottie Martin Quinn is hinting at for his character Strange new worlds Season 4.

Scotty is about to get the Spock treatment

Ultimately, Scotty is arguably the simplest character in Star Trek, someone who’s only really known for two things: fixing things and drinking scotch, usually in that order. Honestly, the show has really explored both sides of his personality, first by giving him a brilliant engineering mentor and then (remarkably) explaining his penchant for his favorite alcohol. There’s really nothing else to explore, and anything the show adds to its lore beyond that will threaten to change the Scottie we know and love, just like… Strange new worlds He changed Spock by turning the logical Vulcan into a ladies’ man with endless feelings.

In short, Scotty is about to fall prey to the same character assassination that Spock did, all in the name of fleshing out his backstory. Martin Quinn is a talented actor, and I’m sure he’s excited to get a bigger role in it Strange new worlds Season four. But at this point, it would take an entire writing team of miracle workers to do everything they could to make this character interesting without completely destroying her in the process.