Entertainment
Starfleet Academy Just Made A Perfect Voyager Episode Even Better
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
How do you fix a controversial show that audience members keep complaining about? Simple: through blatant fan service!
Starfleet Academy has been under constant fire from Trekkies who think the brand is being worn by it like a skinsuit. In an effort to combat this, the new spinoff has been making more and more callbacks to classic shows, attempting to strengthen its ties to some of the franchise’s best episodes from Star Trek’s golden age.
The latest Starfleet Academy episode, “Life of the Stars,” takes fan service to the next level by serving as a direct sequel to a forgotten Voyager episode. In “Real Life,” the Doctor used Voyager’s holodeck to create a family for himself, but thanks to the realism of his simulation, his digital daughter died after a freak accident. While he never seemed all that bothered about it in subsequent episodes, Starfleet Academy just revealed that he has been carrying around the horrific trauma of her death for over 800 years.
The Real World
“Real Life” was an episode of Voyager’s third season in which the Doctor wanted to learn more about what it meant to be a human. Accordingly, he programmed a family in the holodeck, giving himself a wife and two children.
After Tom Paris and B’Elanna Torres (who visit for dinner) tell him everything is a little too perfect, the Doctor tweaks the program to make it more realistic. This results in more rambunctious teenage children: the son falls in with a bad crowd of local Klingons, while the daughter starts playing the dangerous fictional sport of Parisses Squares.
While it looks like the Doctor’s son is in the most danger (it isn’t very long before he wants to get involved in Klingon bloodletting rituals), things take a turn for the worse when his daughter receives a fatal injury while playing sports. The Doctor’s attempts at treating her fail, and he shuts the simulation down out of sheer pain; however, after Tom Paris reminds him that families must support each other through even the worst tragedies. The holographic healer resumes the program and stays by his daughter’s bedside until she dies.
An Unexpected Callback
Star Trek: Voyager was a very serialized show, so it never really followed up on how the Doctor felt after watching his daughter die. However, the Starfleet Academy episode “Life of the Stars” dropped the bombshell revelation that he has been carrying around the extreme trauma of that event for more than 800 years. This also provides a retroactive explanation for why the Doctor has been so weird about SAM, his fellow hologram: she has reminded him of his daughter since day one, and he shut down her attempts to reach out to him because spending time with her reopened old wounds that had never fully healed.
SAM is glitching out in this episode, and the Doctor helps her mysterious alien race diagnose the problem: namely, that she never had the benefit of growing up, so she lacked the emotional resilience to process the recent trauma (namely, the Doctor’s own rejection of her) that she has experienced. In order to help her do so, the Doctor makes the radical decision to raise SAM on her homeworld, giving her 17 years of life experience before she returns to Starfleet Academy. But thanks to some timey-wimey stuff with her home planet, what feels like 17 years to SAM and the Doctor only amounts to about two weeks back at the academy.
Fan Service Done Right
Some critics of Starfleet Academy have complained that previous fan service episodes (mostly “Series Acclimation Mil,” which focused extensively on Deep Space Nine) are just naked attempts to please the audience. That doesn’t make them bad, necessarily; for example, some DS9 fans were happy to finally learn more about what happened to the Sisko. But “Life of the Stars” arguably takes fan service to the next level by making a perfect (albeit obscure) Voyager episode even better nearly 30 years later.
“Real Life’ is an underappreciated gem of an episode that allowed Robert Picardo to do some of his best work as an actor. He channeled some major pathos back then to portray the grief of a man experiencing grief over losing a daughter he never realized he loved until she was gone. Starfleet Academy brings that pathos back, letting Picardo give a master class in acting while adding some much-needed depth and complexity to his character.
Even if you’re not a huge fan of the show (maybe you even outright hate it), Starfleet Academy just added serious rewatch value to one of Voyager’s best episodes. The show also did this while giving explicit callbacks to the golden age of the franchise. Now that the show is finally getting decent (even downright good on occasion), let’s hope that this new Star Trek spinoff can defeat the ultimate no-win scenario of them all: premature cancellation by Paramount.
Entertainment
LA public schools pass screen time limits for students in a first
Los Angeles public school students may be returning to the age of college-ruled notebooks and Scantrons, following a Tuesday school board vote that will limit the use of computers, laptops, and tablets in classrooms.
Titled “Using Technology with Intention,” the new resolution mandates the creation of grade-level and subject-specific screen time limits across Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) schools, including a complete ban on device usage for kindergarten and first grade. The use of one-to-one devices, like individual Chromebooks, will be discouraged for second through fifth grades, as well.
Revised guidelines will also address video-aided lesson plans, access to video streaming platforms like YouTube, and expanded restrictions on gaming and social media platforms.
District staff must present the revised tech use policy by June, which will go into effect for all LAUSD students beginning with the 2026-2027 school year. Guidelines will be reevaluated every year, and schools are tasked with tracking and sharing student screen time numbers with parents.
Mashable Light Speed
The resolution cites increasing concern about the effect of screen time on young minds and alleged screen addiction, including recent Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) studies that show a correlation between high screen time and adverse health effects. The board was unanimously in favor of the tech restrictions, with one recusal.
“We know that tech is not going away and can be a powerful tool in the classroom. This is not about going backwards. This is about rethinking school time and screen time in schools to ensure we are doing what actually helps students learn best,” board member Nick Melvoin said during Tuesday’s meeting.
“This is not about going backwards. This is about rethinking school time…”
Advocates, parents, and even students have spent the last year lobbying for greater tech restrictions following the passing of a 2025 bell-to-bell cellphone ban restricting the use of personal devices during school hours. Schools Beyond Screens, a national classroom tech safety coalition founded by LAUSD parents and teachers, helped craft the resolution in collaboration with board members and co-sponsors Melvoin, Karla Griego, Tanya Ortiz Franklin, Jerry Yang, Kelly Gonez, and Rocío Rivas.
“Now is the time for a safe and science-backed approach to classroom technology, one that is not guided by Big Tech talking points like screen value over screen time,” the organization wrote in a press release following the decision.
“There is much work to be done, and this is only the beginning, but today, we are proud, grateful, and – for the first time in a long time – hopeful. Our kids may yet have the kind of public education that they deserve — one that is proven effective and free of undue digital distraction, harmful content, and corporate exploitation.”
Topics
Social Good
Family & Parenting
Entertainment
The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Explore Bluetooth speaker is at the lowest price weve seen all year
SAVE $75: The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Explore Bluetooth speaker is on sale for $224 at Amazon, down from the standard price of $299. That’s a 25% discount.
$224
at Amazon
$299
Save $75
Packing up for an adventure means figuring out how to bring along a soundtrack. A trip to the cabin or a lakeside campground all deserve to be experienced with a great playlist. If you could use an upgrade before summer to get a waterproof Bluetooth speaker, check out this deal at Amazon.
As of April 22, the Bang & Olufsen Beosound Explore Bluetooth speaker is on sale for $224 at Amazon, marked down from the normal price of $299. That’s a 25% discount that takes $75 off the price. It’s also the lowest price we’ve seen at Amazon so far this year.
A compact speaker with a scratch-resistant aluminum shell is exactly what we should be packing on adventures. With an attached carabiner, the B&O Explore speaker is designed to clip onto your backpack when you hit the trail. Or you can utilize the rubber base to set it on a rock or even in the sand. It’s both waterproof and dustproof, adding to the durability.
Bang & Olufsen notes this model gets up to 27 hours of playtime before it needs to recharge. It weighs under 1.5 pounds, so it won’t add much bulk to your gear. It takes about two hours to recharge the Beosound Explore.
Mashable Deals
Before summer kicks into high gear, add the Bang & Olufsen Beosound Explore speaker to your pack. It’s ready for any adventure you have planned.
Entertainment
Get some new wrist candy with the CMF Watch Pro 2 at its lowest price ever
SAVE $39.01: As of April 22, get the CMF By Nothing Watch 2 Pro for $39.99 at Amazon, down from its usual price of $79. That’s a discount of 49% and the lowest price we’ve seen.
$39.99
at Amazon
$79
Save $39.01
There are tons of smartwatches on the market if you’re in need of one. But if you’re willing to look beyond the Apple Watches or Samsung devices out there, you’ll find an awesome alternative from the Nothing brand that’ll save you some serious cash. Not only is it more affordable than the competition, but it’s got everything you could want and then some. In fact, one of the models is on sale right now.
As of April 22, get the CMF By Nothing Watch 2 Pro for $39.99 at Amazon, down from its usual price of $79. That’s $39.01 off and a discount of 49%. It’s also the lowest price we’ve seen.
This affordable smartwatch not only comes in an attractive form factor, but it has just about everything you could ask for. It has your average comms tools like Bluetooth calling and gesture control, a built-in mic and speaker, contacts, message reminders, and music control. But from there, it offers a wide range of sensors and data to help you take control of your health.
It offers a portable blood oxygen saturation monitor, a heart rate monitor, sleep tracking, and so much more. All of this data, including workout information, steps, and much more, can be synced across all your favorite fitness apps, including Apple Health and Google Health Connect. There are 120 sports modes to choose from, GPS positioning, and even a 3D warm-up exercise guide to help get you on your feet each day.
Mashable Deals
With interchangeable watch straps and an attractive face, this extremely reasonable smartwatch is definitely one to rival Apple and Samsung. You’ll want to grab yours while it’s still down to the lowest price we’ve seen.
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