Star Trek: Discovery Makes TNG’s Counselor Troi More Important

Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Discovery Season 4, Episode 4 – “All Is Possible”.

With its stronger focus on mental health, Star Trek: Discovery season 4 is making the role Counselor Deanna Troi (Marina Sirtis) played on Star Trek: The Next Generation even more important. In Star Trek: Discovery season 4, Dr. Hugh Culber (Wilson Cruz) has double duty as the USS Discovery’s Ship’s Counselor as well as his original role of Chief Medical Officer. With the Discovery’s crew now facing a gravitational anomaly called the DMA (Dark Matter Anomaly) threatening the entire United Federation of Planets, Dr. Culber has his work cut out for him.

The position of Ship’s Counselor was a forward-thinking innovation by Gene Roddenberry when he created Star Trek: The Next Generation. The Starship Enterprise in Star Trek: The Original Series had no ship’s counselor but it could have used one, judging from the traumas and ordeals the crew endured during Captain James T. Kirk’s (William Shatner) original five-year mission. Dr. Leonard McCoy (DeForest Kelley) was the Enterprise’s Chief Medical Officer but, out of friendship, he played the role of psychiatrist (and bartender) for Captain Kirk and Mr. Spock (Leonard Nimoy). TNG‘s Counselor Troi was groundbreaking because Star Trek acknowledged the importance of mental health. The crew of the USS Enterprise-D spent years in deep space exploring strange new worlds and Counselor Troi was vital to helping everyone on the Enterprise, including Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart), cope with all manner of traumas. In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine season 7, Lt. Ezri Dax (Nicole de Boer) came aboard as the space station’s counselor, continuing the important role.

However, Star Trek: Discovery‘s Dr. Culber faces a greater challenge than Counselor Troi ever faced on TNG because the USS Discovery’s entire crew is traumatized. The hundred-plus souls aboard Discovery made a one-way trip 930 years into the future, only to find the Federation shattered by the Burn. Discovery’s crew was equally shocked to learn that Earth left the Federation and became an isolationist planet. Even though Discovery heroically solved the mystery of the Burn and restored warp travel to the Federation to bring the union of planets back together, the time-tossed crew only had weeks to rest on their laurels before unimaginable tragedy struck in the form of the Dark Matter Anomaly. Discovery’s crew remains emotionally damaged, to the point that Captain Burnham has mandated time off and counseling for everyone aboard, which means Dr. Culber is responsible for the mental health of every Discovery crew member.

The two people most in need of Dr. Culber’s counseling are Cleveland Booker (David Ajala) and Lt. Sylvia Tilly (Mary Wiseman). Book witnessed the destruction of his home planet of Kwejian by the DMA and he’s understandably broken by the loss of his family and his entire world. Meanwhile, Tilly is also coping with the fallout of her rapid promotion, and Sylvia decided she needed time away from the Discovery so she accepted a teaching position at Starfleet Academy. While Book’s tragedy is already a huge challenge for Dr. Culber’s counseling skills, the rest of the crew are also in need of help, including Lt. Paul Stamets (Anthony Rapp), who has become obsessed with figuring out how to stop the Dark Matter Anomaly.

On Star Trek: The Next Generation, Counselor Troi was responsible for over a thousand Enterprise-D crew members, and she had to help the senior staff cope with calamities such as Captain Picard regaining his humanity after he was assimilated by the Borg. Troi’s excellence as the Enterprise’s Counselor is, obviously, the prototype for Star Trek: Discovery‘s Dr. Culber (even if Hugh has never heard of the 24th century’s Deanna Troi). Star Trek is, at its core, a study and exploration of humanity, and there’s no better reflection of that than the role of Ship’s Counselor innovated by Deanna Troi on TNG. With Dr. Culber’s crucial role as Counselor, Star Trek: Discovery season 4 admirably renews the franchise’s focus on mental health, which is as important to the audience watching as it is to the USS Discovery’s crew.

Star Trek: Discovery streams Thursdays on Paramount+.

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