The first episode was stupendous. Definitely the best pilot of any star trek series.

The latest episode, "Lift us to where suffering cannot reach" (apart from being kind of a derivative premise) was as good an episode of Star Trek as we've had in any series. (I can't see it on the same level as, say, "The Inner Light", but I wouldn't find it weird if someone did.)

Every episode in between has been forgettable. I mean, literally: I remember almost nothing about these episodes. There was some dumb thing about Katras last week. I don't know how many Khan references there've been, because I make a point of ignoring every Khan reference they throw at us. That security officer and I are not gonna get along. But none of that means they can't have great stories when they have great ideas.

The refocusing on episodic storytelling is the best thing that's happened to star trek in years. When a whole season is built on a single story, then that story is all we get. And if that story isn't good enough to fill ten hours of TV (nothing this side of Breaking Bad or Twin Peaks is), then the whole thing starts to feel uneven. I've adored both seasons of Picard so far, but I can't pretend the writing didn't get lazy and sloppy, especially in the later half of season 2.

DS9 was "my" Star Trek series, and I remember how exciting it was when they built those long story arcs. Sometimes they worked, sometimes they didn't. And Voyager (for all is flaws) also kept a good balance of long arcs and self-contained stories. But nowadays I don't rewatch either series, largely because I can't muster any excitement over another minor story about Bajoran politics or the Borg queen.

Enterprise (the most underrated star trek show) tried to return to episodic storytelling but switched back when they were losing ground in ratings and buzz to Battlestar Galactica. (Supposedly Ron Moore's vision of what Voyager was supposed to be -- but I definitely don't care to watch BSG again...)

Nowadays almost no major drama series use an episodic format. But star trek gets monotonous if there's just one story. I hope the writers on Discovery take notice. Somehow, even though I consider two thirds of the episodes so far to have been duds, I'm still looking forward to every episode. It's kinda like the first seasons of the great Star Trek series.