Arguably they were still figuring out the tone, and how to revive a 20 year old franchise while not retreading the past. Not claiming there aren’t some duds, but later 90s Trek benefited from TNG cracking the “formula” and sticking to it.
Compare a modern spiritual successor to TNG like The Orville, which, despite a rocky premiere, just crushed it within 5-6 episodes, and kept crushing it, because they didn’t have to put so much legwork into defining the tone of the show.
The Orville… Still the best Trek of the modern era.
Arguably they were still figuring out the tone, and how to revive a 20 year old franchise while not retreading the past. Not claiming there aren’t some duds, but later 90s Trek benefited from TNG cracking the “formula” and sticking to it.
Compare a modern spiritual successor to TNG like The Orville, which, despite a rocky premiere, just crushed it within 5-6 episodes, and kept crushing it, because they didn’t have to put so much legwork into defining the tone of the show.
The Orville… Still the best Trek of the modern era.
The Orville also had the advantage of being Not Star Trek™ in that they didn’t have to adhere to sixty years of per-established lore.
Discovery could have avoided the vast majority of that burden by being set in the far future. (And they painfully, eventually realized that.)