Strange New Worlds Brilliantly Reverses Star Trek’s Oldest Trope
WARNING: Spoilers ahead for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds episode 9
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds brilliantly subverts the franchise's classic red-shirt trope in «All Those Who Wander.» Star Trek's suspiciously high red-shirt death toll is among the most famous tropes in TV history. During Captain Kirk's 1960s Enterprise adventures, the main cast would often be accompanied on missions by a security officer wearing a red shirt, and this one-off makeweight regularly became fodder for whichever alien enemy Kirk's team encountered. «Red-shirts» quickly developed a reputation for their lack of longevity, and the term became enshrined into cultural vernacular, used to describe any supporting character whose sole purpose is to die during the same episode they're introduced.
Modern Star Trek doesn't typically go in for red-shirts, largely because 60 years of re-runs means the audience knows exactly what to expect. Strange New Worlds episode 9 revives the trope wholeheartedly, but flips those worn, predictable narrative clues. Viewers have no idea what's coming until blood has already been spilled.
Related: Strange New Worlds Makes A Big Vulcan Change To Spock
"All Those Who Wander" introduces two brand new faces to the Enterprise crew — Duke and Chia. The former a clumsy ensign recently promoted to lieutenant, the latter a cadet medical officer completing her Enterprise rotation alongside Uhura. Both are positively screaming «red-shirt.» Neither has featured previously in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, and each follows the tried-and-tested red-shirt formula. They receive a few lines early on — a tiny slither of character development to make audiences mildly invested — then they're unceremoniously killed off while the main cast
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