Badges of Dishonor: Star Trek: Section 31 Fires Phasers at the Franchise Rulebook
Michelle Yeoh swaggers back into the final frontier with a black‑ops caper that’s equal parts swagger, shrapnel, and moral shadiness. But is this Paramount+ “movie event” a bold new vector or just a classified detour?
If the utopian sheen of Star Trek sometimes makes you crave a little grime under your tricorder, Section 31 shows up like a Romulan ale after curfew. Billed as the first non‑theatrical Trek feature and the 14th film in the franchise, the Paramount+ original lands Michelle Yeoh’s Philippa Georgiou—mirror‑verse tyrant turned complicated antihero—in her very own spy‑thriller playground. Directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi and written by Craig Sweeny, it premiered January 24, 2025, straight to streaming, a first for a Trek film.
Here’s the clean, spoiler‑lite lay of the land: set in the franchise’s “lost era,” somewhere between the original‑cast films and The Next Generation, Georgiou is recruited by Starfleet’s shadowy intelligence wing to clean up a mess that has her fingerprints all over it. The hook is pure Trek melodrama with a spy‑movie heartbeat: to protect the Federation, she has to face the sins of her not‑so‑distant past.
Georgiou’s cover is as proprietor of The Baraam, a nightclub outside Federation space—a very Georgiou flex, equal parts velvet rope and veiled threats.
The team she falls in with is a rogue’s gallery that would make Spock raise an eyebrow. There’s Alok Sahar (the “mastermind”), Quasi (a shapeshifting Chameloid—yep, the species from The Undiscovered Country), Zeph (a human who lives in an exoskeleton), Melle (a Deltan who never took the famous celibacy oath), and Fuzz (a microscopic Nanokin piloting a Vulcan‑shaped mech suit). It’s an ensemble built for misbehavior, and the official character breakdowns are a hoot. If you’ve ever wondered what a Mission: Impossible crew would look like after a transporter accident with a Trek encyclopedia, here’s your answer.
Michelle Yeoh remains the gravitational center. Her Georgiou is still sharp enough to cut a hull plate, but Yeoh layers in just enough world‑weary curiosity to keep the character from calcifying into pure camp. She’s also simply fun to watch, whether she’s gliding through The Baraam like a velvet‑gloved hammer or delivering a withering aside that lands like a photon torpedo. The film knows this and lets her swagger lead, and more often than not, the moments that sing are the ones that let Yeoh be Yeoh.
Osunsanmi and Sweeny steer the vibe toward “capers in the neutral zone,” leaning into what The Verge aptly clocked as a lighter, quippier tone—think Guardians of the Galaxy‑meets‑Suicide Squad by way of San Francisco Fleet Yards. Depending on your tolerance for banter with your black‑ops, you’ll either grin or groan at the shift. For us, the tonal reboot is welcome; Trek can absolutely sustain a heist‑and‑hijinks entry so long as it doesn’t forget the ethical engine under the hood.
It helps that the supporting cast plugs neatly into the “shady Starfleet” premise. Omari Hardwick gives Alok just enough steel‑trap menace to keep you guessing; Sam Richardson’s Quasi steals scenes with deadpan alien detachment; Robert Kazinsky’s Zeph is a bruiser with surprising warmth; and Humberly González’s Melle brings irresistible magnetism (literally and figuratively) to a species Trek usually plays as ascetic. And then there’s Kacey Rohl as a young Rachel Garrett—yes, that Rachel Garrett—whose presence tees up some delicious Enterprise‑C lore without drowning the movie in continuity glue.
Craft‑wise, Section 31 is a sleek 95‑minute glide, with Glen Keenan’s photography keeping the action legible and the interiors glossy‑menacing. Jeff Russo’s score nudges the usual Federation fanfares into spy‑thriller territory, sneaking in slinky motifs that still resolve into that familiar Trekian swell when the idealism peeks through. It’s a smart, modern genre blend: the brass never quite forgets it’s carrying Gene Roddenberry’s hymn, even while the percussion is casing the joint.
The film’s best stretch arrives in its middle act, when the team’s mission collides head‑on with Georgiou’s mirror‑universe history. Section 31 doesn’t pretend its black‑ops bureau is anything but an ethical hazard; if anything, the movie is most Trek when it interrogates the price of safety secured in the shadows. Georgiou is asked to make decisions that Prime‑timeline captains famously avoid, and Yeoh plays the push‑pull between ruthless efficiency and acquired empathy with tightrope precision. The character’s arc (going back to Discovery) remains one of the franchise’s strangest and most intriguing experiments; here, it gets a bite‑size, morally chewy showcase.
Where the film wobbles is in the rush. You can feel the bones of the original plan—a full series—under the movie’s skin. At feature length (and on a streaming budget), relationships that deserved a two‑or‑three‑episode simmer instead get two‑scene sprints. Quasi and Melle, both brimming with franchise‑remixing potential, don’t get quite enough runway. A late‑game betrayal hinges on dynamics that could’ve used one more loop around the sun. Even the MacGuffin at the story’s center, dangerous enough to keep Admiralty awake, can feel like it beamed in from “Any Big Sci‑Fi Movie, 2010‑Present.” Section 31 is fun, but you may wish it had the room to be risky. (Worth remembering: this really was conceived as a spinoff series before it was refit into a film.)
Tone, too, is a phaser with two settings. The quips snap, the pace zips, and the heist‑movie energy gives Trek’s 60‑year‑old chassis a welcome jolt. But every now and then, a joke lands at right angles to the stakes, and the tension bleeds out of the room. That push‑pull won’t bother viewers who loved Strange New Worlds’ tonal agility; purists who prefer their Federation ethics served with solemn strings may start composing strongly worded subspace messages.
A quick, clearly marked spoiler detour: the movie caps itself with a wink that’s hard not to enjoy. Jamie Lee Curtis pops in late as “Control,” the ever‑mysterious hand behind Section 31’s curtain, teeing up more covert adventures and the kind of cross‑quadrant cameo that feels less like fan service than savvy casting alchemy. It’s brief, but it lands. (And yes, you can thank Yeoh for helping make it happen.)
How is it playing? Critically, it’s been a tug‑of‑war. The Verge saluted the new direction and the Georgiou‑driven antihero energy; elsewhere, some outlets and critics called it the franchise’s nadir, with Spain’s El País labeling it “perhaps the worst Star Trek movie ever.” Rotten Tomatoes’ editorial roundup likewise notes it as the worst‑reviewed of the 14 films—though as always with Trek, fan sentiment is messier and more enduring than a score. Even Nielsen’s early streaming estimates (roughly 170 million minutes in week one) suggest that, controversy in tow, plenty of viewers showed up to see what Yeoh was cooking.
So… is Star Trek: Section 31 a hidden gem or just something flashy in the limelight? For our money at Hidden Gems & Limelight, it’s a messy, lively, frequently entertaining detour—an experiment worth doing, even if it doesn’t always stick the landing. It lets Trek play in a morally gray sandbox without turning its back on the franchise’s fundamental question: who are we when no one’s watching? When Georgiou gets her answer right, it feels like a daring riff on the Federation’s favorite melody. When she gets it wrong—or when the film gets too cute—well, that’s the risk you run when you ask a mirror‑universe empress to babysit your soul.
Newcomers can jump in and have a good time; the setup is clean, the mission is legible, and Yeoh is the kind of movie star who does the onboarding for you. Long‑time fans will clock the deep‑cut sprinkles (Chameloids! Deltans! A certain future captain with a very specific date with destiny!) and may feel the runtime squeezing what could have been a richer slow burn. But even when the seams show, the sheer novelty of this tonal lane—black‑ops intrigue in a Federation wrapper—makes the movie an intriguing puzzle piece in modern Trek.
If Paramount+ greenlights another classified outing, there’s fertile ground to till: give the team more time to bicker and bond, let the ethics debate breathe, lean into Russo’s espionage‑laced orchestration, and let Osunsanmi’s set‑pieces cook with fewer quip‑interrupts. The door is very plainly left open (Control would like a word), and there’s a version of this franchise branch that could grow into a thorny, delectable rose.
Final verdict: Section 31 is more funhouse mirror than star chart—reflective, warped, and sometimes thrilling. It won’t convert the skeptics who want their Trek optimistic and unclouded, but it gives Michelle Yeoh a scheming playground and proves there’s room in this galaxy for the occasional morally dubious romp. Consider this a classified file worth opening—just don’t expect Starfleet to approve the methods.
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Credits & context: Directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi; written by Craig Sweeny; score by Jeff Russo; cinematography by Glen Keenan; stars Michelle Yeoh with Omari Hardwick, Sam Richardson, Robert Kazinsky, Kacey Rohl, Sven Ruygrok, Humberly González, and James Hiroyuki Liao. Premiered Jan. 24, 2025 on Paramount+.
