I was reasonably entertained while watching the movie, but ultimately I can’t quite figure out what the show was trying to say.

Given that “Section 31” was originally conceived as a series, I think the influences of that are clear. For example, the introduction of a band of misfits that are clearly meant to keep on adverturing and the framing device of “transmissions” with individual titles.

The challenge is that the time we were allowed didn’t give us enough time to really know any of the new characters, which is a shame because they offered an interesting and rare opportunity to see what life is like in the ST universe outside of Starfleet. Those unique perspectives are one reason why DS9 continues to be so well-regarded and why I found season 1 of PIC actually quite compelling.

I think the shorter format would have been better served if it was a story exclusively about Georgiou finding a new place for herself after what she had learned from her DIS experiences, maybe leading up to a final confrontation with San which interrogated the idea of a “good dictator”. Indeed, I found the flashbacks and her interactions with San the most engaging parts of the movie. But because that comprised only a small part of the movie, we didn’t really learn much more about her than we already knew. And the actual bond/conflict between them was never particularly clear, with San’s motivations coming from left field.

The movie also suffered from what I call the “Inception effect” which is that it set up some potentially interesting mysteries but then solved them in the most boring manner. Having Fuzz be the mole was such an obvious choice, given that they had clearly established his ability to control electronics. As I was watching, I actually thought he was a red herring and that Melle was the mole all along, using her masked accomplice to fake her death at the beginning (a la “Gambit”). That would have at least turned Melle into an actual character, but I guess Deltans are cursed to die in the first third of any movie they’re in.

In fact, the script specified that it be pronounced “KAY-nar”: https://www.st-minutiae.com/resources/scripts/186.txt So that must have been forgotten/changed at some point, or maybe it is the auditory equivalent of “whisky” vs. “whiskey”.

Minor quibble (but then what other kind of quibble would it be):

In DS9: “The Adversary” the leader of the Breen Confederacy in the 24th Century is known as the “Autarch”.

Actually, “autarch” was the title of the Tzenkethi political leader, not that of the Breen. To my knowledge, the title of the head of state of the Breen Confederacy was never spoken (except perhaps in the form of Breen static).

Loved it.

Some amusing details:

• For Pike’s singing voice, he adopts a kind of Meatloaf/Russell-Crowe-in-Les-Miz style that is exactly the right mixture of masculine and adorable.
• The build up to the Klingon Boy Band: We know that Klingons love opera, heightened emotions, spontaneous group singing, and choreography (if you’re willing to consider martial arts a form of choreography). La’an even explicitly mentions singing old sea shanties which would seem to be an obvious way to translate the Klingons into musical form. So naturally, I was shocked that the Klingons would not immediately assimilate into their new musical reality. I even told my husband, “I can’t believe the Klingons would want this to stop!” And when it hit, everything made perfect sense.

David wasn’t aware that Kirk was his father

Technically, David did know that his father was an “overgrown boy scout” named Jim Kirk, but they had never met before and evidently knew little about one another aside from their mutual existence.

I take your point about wanting a more cohesive narrative, but I think there is a more important function served by the idea of shifting timelines. By allowing for the same essential historical events to occur just in different years, Star Trek can preserve what I think is one of its essential conceits: that it depicts our future.

I think the world of Star Trek was and is meant to be understood as a view into how we could develop, as a goal that we could achieve. Certainly, as a kid, that was why I found it so compelling. It showed me the great things that humanity could achieve if we decided to listen to and trust one another. It showed (admittedly not always very well!) that everyone has a place in the future, even people who are might currently feel hopeless, left out, or oppressed. While I can only speak for myself, I never felt that sense of purpose from other major sci-fi or fantasy stories. I may enjoy Star Wars or LotR, for example, but they don’t mean as much to me because I don’t feel like I or the humanity I know have a place in those worlds. They depict the dead past of a distant place rather than a living future that we could all have a hand in shaping.

I say that knowing that Star Trek is essentially fantasy, of course. My point is that, my maintaining the illusion that we are living in Star Trek’s actual past, it makes us feel connected and invested in a way that is different from how we might connect with other stories. I don’t know if that’s the reason for introducing the concept of shifting timelines, but I think it still makes it worthwhile just the same.

Just here to note two details I appreciated:

1. La’an still doesn’t know what a Romulan looks like after her adventure. The only one she met was surgically altered to look human, although Sera did drop a hint by complaining about the ears. Still, there’s plenty of aliens with non-human ears, so not really much to go on.
2. If she was paying attention, though, La’an did get another clue about Romulan physiology: When she shot Sera, the blood spray was green! Of course, Sera remembered her grandma’s old recipe for molecular solvent, so La’an may have thought that was the reason for the coloration.