By Chris Snellgrove | Published
Paul Giamatti’s Nus Braka is Star Trek’s latest Big Bad, and he’s done an amazing job of terrorizing students and teachers alike. Starfleet Academy. In the previous episode, he pretended to help Chancellor Ake to carry out his real plan: destroy the star and hack the base of the star that was protecting it. The latest episode, “300th Night,” revealed what he stole: the Omega-47 particle, which can be used to destroy the underground and make warp travel impossible.
He wasted no time sending Omega-47 mines across the Federation, essentially trapping everyone within their designated borders. The show portrays this as the act of a supervillain, which our cadets must figure out how to stop in order to save the galaxy. However, given that the Federation has been researching a powerful weapon to help them replicate the worst disaster they’ve ever seen, Nus Braka sees himself as the hero who saves everyone from a terrifyingly powerful situation.
From villain to hero
The special weapon stolen by Nus Braka has been known to the Federation for the better part of a millennium. Of Voyager episode “The Omega Directive,” Janeway reveals that all Starfleet captains are required to destroy any traces of Omega particles they find throughout the galaxy. The reason is simple: when these particles explode, they destroy the ground, making warp and even long distance communication impossible. Despite its raw destructive power, 24th century Starfleet wanted to destroy the Omega on sight because it represented an inherent danger to interstellar travel.
However, i Starfleet Academy The episode “300th Night” revealed that 32nd century Starfleet was secretly learning how to use this particle weapon. They succeeded in creating Omega-47, a synthetic version of this destructive molecule. It is very easy to arm the Omega-47, which our heroes found the hard way when Nus Braka created landmines and planted them all over the Federation, trapping all his enemies in one place without firing.
The Omega Level Threat
Nus Braka’s plan is bold and effective: in just one move, he managed to threaten the entire Federation. Better yet, he did so using illegal weapons technology they were secretly developing. All of this is meant to set up the season finale where our heroes save the day, but as we’ve seen so far, I can’t escape one shocking conclusion: Nus Braka is the one. the original hero here, and Starfleet has always been the villain.
You can tell Starfleet is the bad guy of this story mostly because of the hypocrisy of the organization. Long ago, captains were responsible for destroying the Omega particle when they saw it because it represented a threat to interstellar travel. Destroying these particles meant that ships could continue exploring strange new worlds. It also meant that alien planets would not be effectively cut off from the rest of the galaxy by particles when their detonation would destroy the subsurface, making it impossible to enter or leave the space or even communicate with the people inside.
Starfleet’s Heel Turn, Revealed
Now, the Starfleet of the future has decided for them search having the ability to threaten the entire galaxy. Remember that there are no known good uses for Omega particles; they cannot be used as an energy source, which may at least make sense when dilithium becomes scarce. Omega-47’s sole function is to give Starfleet the ability to threaten most of Earth, and that threat comes in the form of a repeat of the 32nd century’s greatest disaster: the Burn.
In Adoptionwe learn about an event known as a Burn that simply makes most of the dilithium in the galaxy inactive. This quickly destroyed any ships with an active warp core (if dilithium gets inside, it can no longer keep matter and antimatter separate) while making interstellar travel very difficult. This event ended the Federation and made the 32nd century hell for many people. Young actors in the Starfleet Academy they are rough around the edges for the most part because of the Burn: with no utility lines and no power, characters like Caleb grew up eating out of garbage cans, something that would have seemed impossible.
The Future Is Very Bad, Thanks to Starfleet
I say this to emphasize that the Burn was the worst thing that happened to almost everyone in the 32nd century. It destroyed lives and led to the rise of evil powers like the Emerald Chain, and all because it was now insanely difficult to travel anywhere at warp speed. Now, we find out that Starfleet has been secretly developing a powerful weapon that can replicate the effects of the Burn on a smaller, more targeted scale, allowing the Federation to cut off any of its enemies in the known universe.
That brings us back to my simple thesis: although this was not the intention of the authors, Starfleet Academy recently introduced Nus Braka as a hero by using Omega-47 against the Federation. Our protagonists are supposed to be good guys, but it turns out that Starfleet was secretly developing technology that could help them threaten or destroy every planet in the galaxy. Now, the main villain of the show has just used the Omega-47 mines to contain the Federation in its place, ensuring that no other ships can enter or leave while the minefield is still active.
The Federation Is Now A Corrupt State
In the real world, other countries do not look favorably on rogue nations developing nuclear technology for two simple reasons: 1) they have threatened and harmed other nations before, and 2) they are trying to build a weapon more dangerous than any they have had before. If the entire galaxy learned about Omega-47, they would view the Federation as a strong nation that just broke all of its higher ideals in order to build a super weapon. A weapon that would do what the various leaders and managers wanted to do since the Burn, which was to make the Federation the greatest power in the known universe.
It’s not even the first time something like this has happened; remember, the Genesis Device could be used to destroy all life on Earth, making it the 23rd century Star Trek equivalent of the Death Star. Simply put, Starfleet and the Federation used about a a thousand years to build weapons that can threaten the entire galaxy, and Omega-47 is the latest. By using this weapon against the Federation, Nus Braka may be a villain to our characters, but he is a hero to the world because he did what no one has been able to do before: save them from Starfleet!
This is not your writers Starfleet Academy they intended, but they just made Nus Braka the secret hero of the series. Just as Michael Burnham had to stop Starfleet from blowing up the Klingon homeworld, a person he had to stop them from fighting the biggest threat the Federation had ever faced. If the writers really want us to root for the cadets at Starfleet Academy, they need to do something simple: stop portraying Starfleet as an amoral control group bent on threatening the entire galaxy!
