It’s been fun seeing so much of Kirk this season, but does that mean he’s now a regular? I don’t see how he could take a position on the Enterprise for years yet, so would that imply he just keeps coincidentally visiting all the time? Starts to strain plausibility after a while.
Seems to be like a Starfleet mentoring program we just haven’t seen in action before. It makes sense to me that they’d want their rising stars to get some exposure to other established captains and develop relationships with other crews beyond their own. I like it.
It’s also something that happens in real navies and the coast guard.
Sending a candidate for captain or first officer to shadow on another ship before a command level promotion is regular practice. In some cases, they are expected to complete shadowing on as many as two or three ships other than the one they regularly serve on.
I like it when the new shows incorporate regular naval or military practice even though many fans, unfamiliar with military service, take unnecessary exception. (This goes for negative fan reactions to Ortegas behaving exactly like many combat pilots in real life.)
I can’t remember when but I’m pretty sure we’ve seen officers shadow others before
does lower decks count? that’s the one that’s immediately coming to mind