Season 3 is literally just fan service. They reused the V’Ger sound/theme for the enemy. They brought back a character from another show in the franchise. They brought back a character who appeared in two whole episodes of TNG. Large parts of the sound design were lifted from the TNG-era series. Seriously, almost as much fan service as Lower Decks.
To be fair, I haven’t watched the latest season of LD, but up to that point, it really was “get this reference? See? Giant Spock’s skeleton! Remember this energy being that escaped the Enterprise-D?” However, I went into LD knowing that that was what I was going to be getting, and while I won’t say it’s my favorite nu-Trek series, I do really enjoy it.
TrekMovie.com: Patrick Stewart Reveals New Star Trek Movie Script Featuring Jean-Luc Picard Is In The Works ( trekmovie.com )