10 Star Trek Twists You Never Saw Coming

It turned out that cause of the utterly devastating, galactic event of the 31st century, 'The Burn,' which wiped out every ship with an active warp core, killed whatever the collective noun is for that many people, and pretty much saw the collapse of the Federation, was ONE angry Kelpien with a bizarre connection to dilithium. If you saw that one coming, please use your powers for good. And, to quote the TrekCulture podcast on the matter, "is that it?" What’s Kelpien for 'Are you taking the piss?'

We were teased about 'The Burn' nearly all season-flippin’-three long of Star Trek: Discovery. Michael BURN-ham was pretty much obsessed from the moment Booker told her about it, and the audience was rather intrigued too. As is fun for fans, multiple theories as to its cause started to emerge including a link to Omega, an accident caused by Burnham’s suit, a tie-in with The Next Generation episode Force of Nature, extradimensional manipulations via the mysterious music, the return of Lazarus from The Original Series, the Borg, the temporal cold war and so on. As far out as some might have been, all bar none were far better than the actual explanation.

Plot twists like this are impossible to predict for all the wrong reasons: the baffling and maddening anti-climax. The shock comes from the natural desire to avoid one’s own disappointment.