Hey, remember Lost? Pretty good show, right? Yeah, I have fond memories—and one of the things I remember most readily is how much the show liked putting in emotional beats whenever characters were reunited with each other. It didn’t matter if they’d been gone a year or just five minutes down the beach, if an episode could put in a montage with people hugging while the waves crashed benhin them, it would do so. Mostly it worked; the show was willing enough to kill off its characters that moments had weight behind them, even if it got a little predictable after a while. I don’t know if Lost was the first show to use this trick, but it’s become a gold standard for genre series since, and boy does Discovery love using it. At the end of last week’s episode, we learned that Michael had been waiting in the future (which is now the present) for Discovery’s arrival for a year. “People of Earth” begins with a quick catch up on what she’s been up to, and then, oh yes, we get the emotional reunions. Several of them. It’s a lot.
It’s a weird vibe. On the one hand, these characters have been through a lot together, and they care about each other (if you ever forget that, just wait five minutes and someone will remind you), and it makes sense that they’d be happy to see each other again. At the same time, while Michael’s been waiting a year to see Saru et al, to the Discovery crew, it’s been a separation of, what, a day? Maybe two? And for the audience, it’s been two episodes. So while it’s possible to intellectually appreciate that this is necessary, it’s difficult for me to empathize directly. The music swells (again, and again, and again), there’s hugging and tears, and it’s so clearly and obviously manipulative that it sets the rest of the hour off on a bad foot almost immediately.
I think this may be the biggest difference between people who really enjoy Discovery and skeptics like myself: how you respond to these constant victory laps, the need to underline and highlight and overscore every emotional beat. If that works for you, great, but if it doesn’t, it makes for exhausting, often infuriating television. There’s no trust here, no faith that the audience will connect with what’s happening unless it’s always on full blast, and while that sort maximalism can work, I don’t think it works here. Maybe if we’d had a little more time to get a handle on Michael and Discovery being separated. Maybe if it was more than just an episode.
Because the thing is, it looks like that separation is going to be a big part of Michael’s character arc this season, and that’s an interesting development. “People of Earth” starts with her return, but things don’t go entirely smoothly; we get a glimpse of the Michael we haven’t really seen since the series pilot, as she takes a crisis into her own hands late in the hour, exploiting the trust of her co-workers and friends because she’s convinced she’s doing the right thing. In this case, her plans work out perfectly, thanks in no small part to Saru’s faith in her. But questions remain about what will happen the next time she decides to go rogue, and it would be a relief for the character to have something to do beyond being really really intense about everything.
Stripped of its theatrics, the plot is decent enough. Discovery returns to Earth, following a ten year old message from a Starfleet admiral, only to find that Starfleet, and the Federation itself, is no longer around; the planet is now run by the United Earth Defense Force, and they are very skeptical around outsiders. Saru handles things well enough, but the situation gets more complicated when a group of raiders show up, determined to steal Discovery’s supply of dilithium crystals. There’s a stand-off, Michael (and Book, in Book’s ship) run a con with the dilithium to capture the head of the raiders (we don’t actually see how they do this, which is kind of annoying), and force the UEDF contact and the raiders to negotiate. It turns out the raiders are actually humans, which means the whole thing was just one big misunderstanding. Long life the Federation, etc.
Sarcasm aside, this does at least try and make a case for why the Federation matters—the future is a pretty cutthroat place, and Saru’s insistence on peaceful solutions whenever possible is something worth fighting for. It’s disappointing, and weirdly convenient, that the big turn happens when we learn that the raiders are from a human colony on Titan; isn’t the point of the Federation to be building relationships between species? But it does, at least, nod towards the problem created by the premiere, giving our heroes both a reason to continue their quest to find the remains of Starfleet (I apologize for using “Starfleet” and “the Federation” interchangeably here) and a justification as to why we should care beyond mild curiosity.
“People of Earth” also introduces a new recurring character: Adira (Blu del Barrio), a teenage genius. Adira was announced in press releases before the season began as the first official non-binary character on a Trek show; curiously, Adira is referred to as “she” and “her” by both her commanding officer and Saru. (del Barrio uses “they/them.”) Hopefully the character’s non-binary status is something that will be clarified in future episodes, as it would be pretty bizarre for the show to promote the distinction without actually using it in the context of the show itself. For now, I’ll use the “she/her” pronoun when referring to the character, and “they/them” when talking about the actor. I’m explaining this here not because I’m annoyed (well, I’ll be annoyed if the character was promoted as non-binary and the show never actually addresses it), but to acknowledge that these distinctions do matter, and I don’t want to misgender anyone, fictional or otherwise, if I can avoid it.
Adira herself is interesting; she seems like an irritant at first, but the switch from “arrogant twerp” to “vulnerable idealist” happens fairly quickly. The reveal that she’s a Trill joined with the symbiote of the admiral who sent the message Discovery followed to Earth means that she’ll be sticking around for a while; del Barrio makes a strong impression, and it’ll be good to have a Trill back in the franchise.
I think that’s about it for this week? “People” leans too hard on its victory laps and the score is exasperatingly overbearing, but there are some decent ideas here. It would be nice if Michael’s decision to break protocol hadn’t been rewarded by giving her a promotion; Saru isn’t over the moon about her behavior, but everyone still spends way too much time worshipping Michael, and that’s going to be a problem in trying to make her a complicated, flawed human being. I’m hoping that there will be a little more interpersonal conflict going forward, and maybe some struggle over what a reformed Federation might actually mean. Oh, and the Burn. I gotta know more about the Burn.
Stray observations
- Adira wasn’t the only new character promoted before the season began; we still haven’t seen Gray (Ian Alexander), a trans man with his own Trill symbiote. I only bring him up here because it’s a bit of a choice to make both the non-binary and the transgender character Trill.
- The Burn is a very cool mystery, and I like how the show keeps layering it in; feels like we’re going to get a flashback episode at some point, and I would not object to that. (Actually, given that these seasons are so short, we probably won’t get a flashback. Maybe a scene or two.)
- Another shirtless Book scene. Maybe that’s gonna be his thing? (He’s fun, and his banter with Michael is very Whedon-eseque and fun: “That was entirely monosyllabic, I love it when you do that.”)
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There are non-binary individuals who still use she/her pronouns so the character being referred to as such does not mean that they aren’t non-binary. Of course it may also be that Adira is female and the *Trill* is non-binary. I guess it depends which of the two del Barrio was referring to.
I was also surprised and a little disapointed by Adira being addressed at she/her pronouns. The reveal of the Trill symbiote and that Adira doesn’t have all the memories unlocked point to where they might be going with the character. A lot of trans-people identified with Dax precisely because the host’s switch from one gender to another but still have all the memories before and are just accepted. They will probably have Adira have access to all the memories but being human unable to parse it out like a trained Trill host. Then Adira would feel more comfortable with They/Them pronouns.
I’m guessing that was deliberate because it came from Tilly and hopefully will be addressed in the next ep. Frakes is a trans rights activist and wouldn’t have messed that up.
Word is that Adira will go by they/them pronouns later in the season. Information is moving fast on this point.
I’m guessing that was deliberate because it came from Tilly No, Adira’s superior officer referred to them using female pronouns.
Correct. Just saw the rewatch and saru used she as well. Let’s see what the producers do in future episodes.
There’s an interview with Blu del Barrio on SyFy. It turns out that Adira is referred to as “she” because at this point, Blu was not out as non-binary to her family. The actor and the character basically “come out” at the same time.
As an English speaker accustomed to “they/them” as plural (despite the many exceptions to that rule), using those pronouns for a Trill makes intuitive sense, as a being with more than one consciousness. Indeed, now I regret DS9 failing to treat Dax as a plural being, a community on two legs.
I’m making my way through DS9 for the first time, and my interpretation of Jadzia Dax is not as a plural being (7 personalities in one body), but as a unique blend with access to all of the symbiont’s hosts’ experiences. There are several times where she refers to past-tense Jadzia as being distinct from Jadzia Dax, and really no ambiguity regarding gender.Also, DS9 is incredibly horny. How come no one told me that before?
Also, DS9 is incredibly horny. How come no one told me that before?You weren’t ready yet.
Also, DS9 is incredibly horny. How come no one told me that before?I’m just now coming to grips with that myself. I’m finally realizing that the entire Bajoran occupation was based on just how horny the Cardassians were for Bajorans.
I never got the sense that the Trill symbionts cared about gender identity whatsoever. The gender identity for the joined Trill always seemed to come from the current host. It would therefore make sense if Adira was gender nonconforming prior to being joined.
So, I’ve been confused a bit as well, but it appears Adira is NOT Trill, but human… who was the only one available to put the Admiral in when they died. So this may make the they pronoun make more sense later, vs. an actual Trill who is used to symbiosis…
Yes, that seems to be what’s happening here: Adira is a human who was concealing that fact that they’re joined with a Trill symbiote, and is currently going by a binary pronoun to avoid even the implied plural of “them.” Now that the, um, cat is out of the bag, there will be no need for the deception.
Maybe Adira was going by those pronouns because Adira was clearly keeping the fact they were joined with the Trill symbiote on the down-low since Adira’s commanding officer didn’t know and assumed the Admiral was MIA or dead.
I’ve got to assume that joined Trill end up being pretty much pansexual, as well.
What’s the overall feelings for season 3 so far? I felt season 1 & 2 did a good job of setting up plots and settings I can really enjoy, only to stumble on overly cloying characters (some particular characters are godAWFUL) & dialogue that sounds like it was written post wisdom teeth removal. Is there more dynamic to the future’s politics & mystery, and less hand-holding & “SCIENCE AND FRIENDSHIP FUCKIN RULES!”?
we’re only 3 episodes so I’d find it hard to make such a judgement especially since season 1 and 2 overall were plotted our like they were a single TNG episode. So far season 3 has the benefit of no (tr)Ash Tyler. So with out him things seem overall better. Season 3 seems like a mystery plot coupled with a “rebuild/remind people of what the Federation is” I’m enjoying so far but the pace hasn’t jumped out like season 2 did.
TBH Ash Tyler was never my problem with the series, the worst aspects of the series has been the Discovery crew scenes. Stamets & Tilly in particular are the cloying aspects- their expository scenes are like if Aaron Sorkin did poppers & embodied motivational posters in the dialogue.
Oh, don’t you worry. Tilly is still there and still looking totally out of place like someone transplanted from an 80s comedy series.Dialogues are cringiest than ever.Cheers
She’s my least favourite aspect of the series, and I feel bad for saying that, cause it’s not the actor’s fault at all. If they didn’t devote only the most cloying character traits to Tilly, maybe she’d be a better character.
What’s the overall feelings for season 3 so far?
It’s too soon to say. We’ve in effect had a three-part season premiere.
Hence the “so far”- just about a quarter of the season has aired, that’s quite enough to get an initial impression of something. It’s not like I’m asking for the verdict on all of season 3.
Hence the “so far”- just about a quarter of the season has aired
Aired, yes. Happened, no. Like I said, we’ve essentially had a three-part premiere. Not much has happened yet. We have no real indication of where they’re going with this yet. All we really know is that the future is different (duh) and something went wrong with dilithium.
Like I said, I am not being absurd and asking for a “real indication of where they’re going with this”, what I asked was the direct opposite of that. It’s also an open invitation, so if you don’t have an impression, that’s nifty- CaptainJanewaysCoffee has said as more than you have without any weird gatekeeping sentiment over asking questions.
It’s also an open invitation, so if you don’t have an impression, that’s nifty- CaptainJanewaysCoffee has said as more than you have without any weird gatekeeping sentiment over asking questionsI don’t know how to say it any other way: nothing’s really happened yet. We’re three episodes in & all we know is that the Burn happened, nobody knows why & Starfleet is gone. And we knew all of that at the end of the first episode. Two more episodes & we didn’t learn anything else.The only thing I can say (you clearly haven’t figured this out yet) is that this season is slow, much slower than the last season. Hopefully something happens in the next episode, because we’re ¼ of the way the season & nothing’s happened yet. At the end of the third episode, we know just as much as we did after the first.
Thanks. I appreciate your perspective!
I’m enjoying it so far. I like the arrival in the future, I’m interested in the mystery, which is nice I wasn’t as interested in what the Red Angle was. I’m so happy Saru is finally not just Acting Captain but a for real 4 pip Captain. By Episode 5 I’ll have a better feel for how the season is flowing. But I’m also rarely critical of Discovery when it’s airing, as its always a fun ride for me.
How is Saru now a “for real 4 pip Captain”? He was a Commander and “acting Captain” in the season 2 finale. Michael does not have the authority to promote him. Although she calls him “Captain” here it’s not official. Although I guess there is no one around to actually promote him – is Saru the highest ranking Starfleet officer around now?
I’m enjoying season three more than I did seasons one and two, I think because the pacing is slower and we’re not (yet) staggering from one existential crisis to another every few minutes.Pulling Discovery out of time has limited the focus of the show to something more akin to the other series — Voyager alone in a new quadrant, DS9 the fulcrum between two quadrants, and TOS/TNG probing beyond the bounds of known space. It make the show more intimate and relatable in my book.There is time for them to mess things up, of course.
Very positive so far.I absolutely LOVE the growth that Michael’s character is getting, and that SMG is getting in what she’s given to play. While I liked her in the first two seasons, I thought her portrayal was perilously close to one note, so it’s gratifying to see that not be the case this season.While the first two seasons had warp drive and Klingons and everything, season three gave me the first moment where I could actually see the bones of trek underneath the familiar trappings (the aliens with cheap facial prosthetics being helped by Starfleet) and it was so unexpected I almost jumped out of my bed. You ever hang out with an old childhood friend who’s changed a lot from when you were kids, but then they do that one thing where they wipe their nose a certain way and you recognize them *viscerally* and your heart jumps? That was a nice moment for me.they’re pretty clearly setting up Georgiou and Saru as some kind of object examples of what the future could be, with Michael being expected to choose. It’s a little obvious, sure, but still better storytelling (and more germane to the franchise) than what came before. And I can’t see Georgiou hanging around Discovery too long when there’s a whole post-federation universe out there waiting to be dominated. She’s going to have lots of scenery to chew this season and I’m looking forward to it.I had so completely forgotten about not-Ariel that I thought they were introducing a new character very clumsily.
God i needed to see the disc team settle that feud like thinking adults now more than ever.
“There’s no trust here, no faith that the audience will connect with what’s happening unless it’s always on full blast…”
I like this show but I agree with this.
i agree as well, and also it is a very Frakes way of directing
Oh god, they’re totally going to make Adira a Wesley.
Getting more Ezri vibes from them.
Hahaha, that’s exactly what I was thinking.At least they haven’t made Adira as annoying as Wesley. YET.
Adira, while a genius like Wesley, feels flawed in ways that Wesley was seldom allowed to be. In her handful of scenes, she felt more like a real teenager than Wesley ever did.
I think the problem with Wesley was that TNG was not self-aware of how annoying a smug child prodigy is. Other than a memorable exception (“SHUT UP WESLEY”), he was sincerely put forward as a “chosen one” with whom younger viewers were meant to identify. It was TNG trying to be a family show.Discovery is immediately self-aware of how annoying the smug child prodigy is. Adira’s met with immediate irritation from everyone around her, who explicitly point out that she’s not special just because she’s smart (“we all are”). That is a stark contrast with TNG, in which the crew tended to inflate Wesley’s ego far more often then not (especially in his initial run as a series regular — when he came back later in the series as a guest star, there was an episode in which he Picard beat the smug out of him so thoroughly that he quit Starfleet).
The only people who call smug child prodigies “annoying” are those who weren’t smug child prodigies themselves. 😉
I was a smug child prodigy. I was annoying. Still annoying, according to my sister.
Every episode of Discovery is an emotional episode of Discovery.
So the colony is on Titan, the moon of Saturn, inside our solar system? Which you can see with telescopes that you can buy on Amazon today. And it takes light 40 minutes to get to from earth. But the colony lost communication with earth for years, because they lost long range communication equipment? Even though they still had ships that can travel from Titan to earth in minutes.
Isolationism is isolationism. I read 3189 Earth as being like North Korea, just without the extreme poverty and propaganda.
How does earth even lose contact with Titan? They’re basically neighbors. It takes an impulse ship a couple of hours to travel between them. Even with our level of technology, we had a probe orbiting Saturn for 20 years that we kept in contact with. It would be like of Los Angeles completely lost contact with San Francisco just because the internet went down.
You can have a phone, I can have a phone, but if nether side is really interested in talking then communication is lost. He says they sent a ship to Earth when their reactor, or whatever, blew. The EDF shot the ship down without hesitation. So it seems far more willful we don’t talk to people and we just shoot first attitude.
No, he said they sent a ship because they lost long range communication. That makes no sense because you don’t need long range communication to contact earth.It also makes no sense that earth wouldn’t be able to detect a ship originating from within the solar system. Heck, if earth is so afraid of invaders, why wouldn’t they place sensors around the solar system so they could detect incoming threats sooner? Their defenses are going to be useless against any real threat if they can only detect threats after they arrive at earth.Aso, earth still has dilithium and gets dilithium shipments. So none of the ships coming in ever detected the settlement on Titan or where the raiders were coming from? And no one on the colony tried to talk to ships making dilithium deliveries to earth?
I’m pretty sure you can’t get North Korea to fully open trade relations with South Korea with a 10 minute meeting.
Yeah, and what’s wrong with good old fusion reactors?
I know it’s nitpicky, but they could have avoided it by just making the not-raiders from a surviving colony on Alpha Centauri.
Well, the Mr. Nuclears are starting to wear out….
Why does the loss of dilithium cause long-range comms to stop?
There was a line from Wen about Titan being self-sufficient after the Burn until an explosion wiped out part of the settlement and that was when they lost communications.
cuz the comms travel faster than light and just like the ships one needs dilithium to warp
My guess is when the Titan colonists first requested assistance from United Earth, United Earth knew that they were humans and just didn’t give a shit. They hid that fact because turning your back on your own species is pretty crappy, and then by the truth of the matter never got passed down with the various leadership transitions.
Star Trek ain’t got no beltalowdas, sasa ke?
This show’s relationship with technology in general is dumb. The Burn, for example. You’re telling me, that 700 years later, there have been ZERO advances in warp technology and everyone is still using dilithium? That makes absolutely no sense at all. That would be like moving from sailing ships to steam power…and just sitting on that for 700 years. “Oh no, all the coal is gone, what do we do????”
people are trying to explain it away, but you know the real reason: the writers did not think about it that much
It’s because the hacks who write Discovery wanted to rip off The Expanse and failed. This kind of situation would make sense in The Expanse universe, but not in Star Trek one.
The cynicism and skepticism is borne out of the polarized times we live in. I, for one, am happy to see a show that shows that achieving peaceful coexistence starts with what can be one of the hardest things to do: finding empathy and sympathy for ones you might not think deserve it.Maybe it’s because I’m a vet, but military pomp and ceremony evokes a lot of fond emotions from me. Saru’s ascendancy to the captaincy with the support of his subordinates was heartwarming.
It’s the emotional manipulation and lack of faith in the audience’s ability to engage on their own that finally pushed me away (yet here I am still reading recaps…don’t ask). My breaking point was in the final ep of last season. Disco is surrounded, no starfleet ship can get there in time to help (or some shit), and Michael is going to make the Big Sacrifice. But somehow, Sarek and Amanda manage to fly their wee shuttle out there to say goodbye in person – slo-mo steady cam, sparks flying, music shoving itself down your throat via your ear canals. Tossing narrative logic for this overbearing emotional beat did me in. That was it, thanks.
Ok, bye!
this was a harsh turn for the worst. They go back to Earth like it’s no biggie. I thought the goal of them going through time and as far away as possible was to hide (with all the super secret data and the still top-secret spore drive no one should know about)? Now they just fly back in seconds, solve Earth’s biggest problems (because no one on Earth could.), they didn’t actually show how they caught the baddie. Michael promoted Saru to captain. Said Book was owed crystals. Saru said sure! Saru 5 minutes later questions Michael’s motives and promotes HER Number 1. The fascinating guy that spent his whole life waiting for Starfleet to return (and Michael made him part of Starfleet!) from episode 1 is abandoned? The whole fascinating place they all ended up is now abandoned too? I mean Michael is pretty much a saint that keeps ordaining folks Starfleet can just rebuild it herself instead of looking. I mean how powerful can starfleet be if no one even knows where they are? Also, Michael and Book had so many amazing adventures — so many scams, broken bones, amazing hair styles and so on — and it was just a short year. I feel they squandered two amazing episodes and now they’re back to simply figuring out where Starfleet is for the rest of the season.
“They go back to Earth like it’s no biggie.” Spore drive.“I thought the goal of them going through time and as far away as possible was to hide (with all the super secret data and the still top-secret spore drive no one should know about)?” Their goal was to get the sphere data away from Control, which they did. “solve Earth’s biggest problems (because no one on Earth could.)“ The problem required a Federation solution, but there is no Federation left on Earth. So it makes perfect sense a Federation crew from the past would be able to resolve this issue.“they didn’t actually show how they caught the baddie.” Michael and Book trick the raider into lowering his shields so they can transport their dilithium to the raider ship. It’s pretty obvious they used this opportunity to beam the raider captain onto Book’s ship. “Michael promoted Saru to captain.” This is obviously an honorary promotion – Saru is still technically a Commander. Michael was just saying that she didn’t want to be captain and Saru should be it. Michael (or anyone) does not have the authority to promote Saru to Captain.“Said Book was owed crystals. Saru said sure!” Michael said that Book helped her survive for the year she was alone here. Why shouldn’t Saru honor Michael’s promise to Book for some dilithium? “Saru 5 minutes later questions Michael’s motives and promotes HER Number 1.” Saru knows that Michael is the best pick to be his Number 1, even with her new attitude of doing things on her own. He also knows that he needs someone who is familiar with this new time. “The fascinating guy that spent his whole life waiting for Starfleet to return (and Michael made him part of Starfleet!) from episode 1 is abandoned? The whole fascinating place they all ended up is now abandoned too?” It would be very easy to go back to that place and that guy. It’s way too early to assume we’ll never see him or that place again. “Michael and Book had so many amazing adventures — so many scams, broken bones, amazing hair styles and so on — and it was just a short year.” I think it’s safe to assume that throughout this season we’ll get plenty of references to Michael and Book’s adventures in the past year.
“I feel they squandered two amazing episodes and now they’re back to simply figuring out where Starfleet is for the rest of the season.” Figuring out where Starfleet is was set up as the season-arc in both of the previous 2 episodes. This is not a new plot.
The music swells (again, and again, and again), there’s hugging and tears, and it’s so clearly and obviously manipulative that it sets the rest of the hour off on a bad foot almost immediately.So…if you reunited with loved ones a couple of days after some massive disaster or event uprooted your life and nearly killed you, you wouldn’t be ecstatic and weepy? I sure as hell would be.In that day or two they were separated the crew went through three separate, life-and-death scenarios in a row (the battle with Control, the wormhole trip, and surviving/escaping the parasitic ice and the courier dude).
Yes to that one the one hand, but on the other hand, speaking as an expat who only sees their family in person every few years, Michael’s ‘I’m so estranged after not seeing you for a year’ came across as somewhat hyperbolic.
Also consider how rough that year must have been for her. It’s her 2020. There’ll be people I haven’t seen since March of this year who, once I do get to see them, hopefully next spring(?), it will have felt like a decade.
So during the time you don’t see your family, do you go back to a place where you know absolutely no one, where you’re unable to contact your family in any way, where everything and everyone you’ve ever known is dead and gone, where you’re nearly killed multiple times? Where you know no one, and you have to do whatever it takes to survive in a world you know nothing about? Where the one person you thought you might see (in Michael’s case her mother) is not there, and no one has ever heard of her? And are you spending as much time as you can searching for your family, because the last time you saw them,they were headed to an uncertain fate, and you’ve thought for a year that maybe they were dead and maybe you’d never find them?I don’t think the situation in this episode is comparable to most people on Earth in the 21st century who don’t see their family in person for a couple years, assuming you still know they’re around, you can still communicate with them, and you still have a stable life with friends and coworkers wherever you are.
She didn’t merely “not see them”; she didn’t know if she would ever see them, or whether they survived. And during that time, she wasn’t just working abroad, she was adapting to essentially a post-apocalyptic landscape, from her point of view, in which everyone she knew had been dead for almost a millenium.
That’s not it. She’d given them up for dead. She grieved them and now they’re alive and they don’t know what she’s gone through and how she’s changed.
This is what I came to say. Even if it’s only been a day or two, if you have just been through SOME SHIT and got separated from a dearly beloved friend whom you very well may never see again (for all intents and purposes, dead), when you do see that they made it through, too, and are OK, you would be weepy huggy happy. Couple that with the heightened emotions that come with the fact that you have lost just about everyone else you have ever known and loved for certain, when you found that one person, you’d react as if you hadn’t seen them in a decade, too.
That said, as much as I WANTED the moment to work, I don’t think it fully did. Discovery didn’t manage to convey to me the weight of what they’d done – everything they’ve given up and lost. They talk about it, but they still didn’t manage to make me feel it.
Just me, but I agree with him. Regardless of what they’ve been through I personally find the overuse of what sounds like an off-cut from Titanic to be just too much.
I’ve been as open-minded as I possibly could but it’s too Burnham-centric, giving little time to develop any of the supporting cast and for a show that leans so heavily on emotional weight, very little of it feels earned.
Discovery is never not going to be Burnham centric. That’s just how they’ve chosen to write the show. Once I accepted this, I started enjoying the show more.
Except she’s always in a state of emotional extreme. She’s not enjoyable, just tiresome.
She was very enjoyable in the premiere, from realizing that there was life in the future, to meeting Book, to getting truth-serummed by the guards, to finding the Holy Grail knight at the Starfleet outpost.Unfortunately the show decided to make her experience separate from the rest of the crew – instead of being brand new in the future and learning everything, she has been here for a year and is already comfortable here. That separates her from the rest of the crew, who will all bond from their shared experience of figuring the future out.
it’s a bit of a choice to make both the non-binary and the transgender character Trill.Now, if they had been J’naii.
Does Adira not have spots?
Trill, the humanoids, have spots (except the ridged TNG variant). Adira is human with a Trill, the symbiont, joined with them. The joys of confusing nomenclature.
I assume the reasoning for not having a full Trill is that with Earth totally isolated it’s harder for some of the alien races to keep their populations going if there weren’t a lot of them on planet when the Burn happened, and so the Trill admiral had to settle for a human.It does put a pretty massive hole in Discovery’s cover story, they’re the descendants of the original crew from centuries ago but there’s exactly one member of every non-human species on board. A generation ship should also have some children and elderly, now that I think about it even more.
The review could have specified that, instead of just calling the character “a Trill” and leaving it there. I kind of guessed as I made my way through the comments, but the review itself could have been clearer about it (and I’m usually a Zach defender).
The episode clearly states that Adira is a human.Unfortunately this is not the first time Zach has missed/misunderstood something in this show that the episode clearly tells/shows.
Am I the only one thinking that it’s not just a coincidence that the enigmatic event named the “Burn” mirrors the main character’s surname? Surely they won’t make this more than a coincidence? Let’s hope not.
So while it’s possible to intellectually appreciate that this is necessary, it’s difficult for me to empathize directly.This has been my main problem with modern Trek: Unearned emotional beats. Raffi can suck up all the drugs she wants and I’ll only be mildly concerned about how this is going to play into the plot. Troi reacting to losing a kid and I’m blubbering because she’s my old friend too, dammit.But at least Picard put in some sort of effort to establish its crew. Discovery is still very Voyager/TOS-like in that everyone else is is just background dressing for the power trio of Michael, Tilly and Saru.Given seven years maybe I’ll become as attached to Raffi as I am to the Rikers. But Discovery is still refusing to give me a reason to love Owo. (They didn’t even tell us her name until halfway in.)
There’s a blonde woman hanging out with the other semi-important bridge officers and I genuinely can’t remember if she existed before season 3 or if it’s a Remember the New Guy situation.
It’s not-Ariel. I had forgotten her too.
The blonde woman (who’s name I admittedly don’t remember), stepped into place last season after Ariam was taken over by Control and subsequently killed. Pretty sure it’s actually the same actor too.
Ah, right, I remember that now. They switched the original Airiam (I looked up the spelling) over to the non-makeup role and had a new Airiam at the start of season 2.
Ah yes, Airiam, or “the most interesting Discovery character we inexplicably only got one episode about”
It’s not a problem unique to modern Trek. Voyager was full of this kind of stuff. Latent Image springs immediately to mind but there are plenty of them.And TNG had its share of one-episode guest stars whose purpose was to die and tell us we should feel something about it. An inherent problem of having an invincible main cast.
I love sentimental beats in science fiction, but Discovery is taking it a little too far. It almost feels like a parody at this point. Thank goodness for Georgiou, but I wish the series had more emotionally diverse, rough around the edge characters. I think one of the finest examples is Jadzia Dax, who managed to embody so many traits. I hope the new Trill character works out like that. While she’s snarky, she seems much more Ezri than Jadzia. In Ezri’s defense though, her murder mystery episode Field of Fire is one of my favorites.
Adira is much more comparable with Ezri, since they both were meant to be joined. Ezri didn’t go through any Trill preparation and had to join with Dax because of an accident on the ship going back to the Trill homeworld, and as this episode says, Adira is human but had to be joined with the symbiote because the Admiral unexpectedly died.
So, this was definitely a transition episode, but after going seven months without seeing my close friends I can understand Michael’s reaction—plus the rest of the crew were all thinking that she was dead. I’m enjoying what they are doing with Saru this season, and I’m also liking the new additions.
I guess one of the advantages of being a courier is that you know all the good planets to get braids on. I honestly love that this show had been a total hair journey for Michael, starting with her Vulcan cut.
While it has been “2 episodes” since Burnham was last with the crew, I had no trouble feeling the emotion of the reunion, because it’s been eighteen months in the real world since the season 2 finale aired. Eighteen months that have not exactly flown by. But even still, they could have been apart for ten minutes, SMG sells her character’s emotions so convincingly that I still would have bought it.
Adira isn’t Trill, she’s human but she has the symbiote inside of her. Since she is human, she isn’t mentally connected to that symbiote and cannot know what it knows. Ian Alexander’s character is going to be Trill, and was promoted as someone who has only ever wanted to be joined. So I believe he will come along to host the symbiote that Adira has and then they can get the information that it knows about what happened to the Federation.
“Hey, remember Lost?” I’m out.
Actually, Adira isn’t Trill. She’s a human with a Trill symbiont. While Trills look human they have a distinct mottled pattern of dots visible on the sides of their faces.
“… as it would be pretty bizarre for the show to promote the distinction without actually using it in the context of the show itself.”
Not when the show hires these actors for no other reason than to, perhaps, signal their own virtue.
Solid episode for me.I was really digging the 60’s alien vibe meets 2020 CGI on the raiders, and a nice twist.Also, how long had Discovery been in the future when Michael caught up with them? A few days? I’m not sure why they missed her so much compared to why I get why she missed them. I really like they’re giving Doug Jones space to breathe and show he can act, in or out of a costume. He and Serkis are really making the case for cgi/mo cap/full prosthetics people to be taken seriously as actors. He has to use body language, voice and nuance to do what people mostly do with facial expressions. And he’s killing it.And finally, yeah, I want to know what happened. They obviously have a plan for what the Burn was and why/how… Let’s see how slowly they tease that out for us.
“I’m not sure why they missed her so much compared to why I get why she missed them.”Michael and Discovery travelled to the future separately. They hoped they would arrive in the same place/time together, but they didn’t know for sure. Disco arrived on a different planet than planned, and Michael wasn’t there. They had no idea if Michael had already arrived (and could be literally anywhere) or if she wouldn’t arrive for years.So while it was only a couple of days that they were in the future before they heard from Michael, each moment made them more convinced that they might never see Michael again. That was probably a long 2 days for them.
There’s a big clarification that needs to be made: Adira is NOT a Trill.
Adira is a human with a symbiote, and the Admiral – her former friend – was the Trill. They glossed over it a touch, but they made a point of noting that Adira is human and has a symbiote – hence why she cannot access the memories of the Symbiote easily. It’s clear that as there were a lack of Trills around, she was given the symbiote and because it’s 900 years in the future we are to assume medical science has developed to the point where a symbiote can be put in a non-trill without risk of rejection.
Hey all, I don’t watch Discovery but I just wanted to pop in and say that every time I scroll past the screenshot at the top of this review, my initial thought is “Wow the PS5’s graphics are looking pretty good.” This comment doesn’t even merit the sarcastic “OK” that would naturally come as a response, but I had to share.
Okay.
This is a show with roughly 15 Executive Producers. I won’t go through the credits to recount. What do these people do besides add shitiness, and take money? This show is so fucking stupid. I can’t help but fantasize about what would happen if someone made an actual Star Trek show with this cast and production value. God the dialog was written by subpar fanfic writers. Saru just told the people to ‘stop making assumptions and start listening.’ How did he not vomit saying those words to adults? All the lines are so pedantic and obvious. There’s no nuance or intelligence to anything anyone says. God I hate this. I don’t want to watch. Star Trek fans deserve better than this.
THIS: “I think this may be the biggest difference between people who really enjoy Discovery and skeptics like myself: how you respond to these constant victory laps, the need to underline and highlight and overscore every emotional beat. If that works for you, great, but if it doesn’t, it makes for exhausting, often infuriating television.” I enjoy Star Trek, and ST: Discovery comes with so much good: snazzy special effects, compelling, diverse characters, high production value. But the constant barrage of sappy, operatic music and close-ups on tear-filled faces is annoying AF. It’s more soap opera than space opera. This season in particular keeps bringing all these emotional moments that don’t feel earned or authentic. The cast is acting their hearts out, but the problem is that, at a basic level, the writing fails them. The show moves at a breakneck pace, one plot point after the next, so we never get a chance to sit and live with these characters. A show that got this right was Farscape—we got to see the characters eat together, brush their teeth, sleep, argue. When problems arose, the best part was seeing the characters interact. With Discovery, it feels like the characters are the vehicle for the plot, rather than the other way around. It’s not a bad show, but a “B” is a fair grade—what makes me sad isn’t the sad music or the tearful glances, but the wasted potential.
I don’t know that people are going to agree with me on this, but this was the first episode of Star Trek that I have seen since TNG. It just got it. Yes everything is resolved too quickly and Tilly is like “I always knew I would see you again” for the five hours since she has seen her, but they have figured out how to position Michael between Saru and Georgiou. They did that and they added Book, who in one episode (and maybe they planned to use Aldous Hodge after that short trek but he became too damn famous) has fucking nailed it with the shipping and his fat cat. but…this was Trek. It really was, finally.And lord have mercy I have never been so attracted to Ms. Martin-Green as with that hair. Sweet god fan me.I just became so fucking optimistic about this show.
“this was the first episode of Star Trek that I have seen since TNG”If you are being literal here then I would like to introduce you to a little show called Deep Space Nine.
I know, and I was exaggerating, but I do a bit agree with Marina Sirtis’s side-eye about DS9 being just about a “hotel in space”
I’d take Sirtis’ comment with a grain of salt. At the time DS9 was filming and TNG was still on the air, there were lots of reports of the TNG cast wandering over to see the new show being made and being impressed with what they saw. I think Frakes was quoted at the time saying that he didn’t understand why the DS9 characters were allowed to have conflicts with each other because the TNG characters weren’t allowed to.
she said “hotel in space,” it’s about a hotel in space, where’s the salt needed
She said “being just about a ‘hotel in space’”. That comment is loaded with salt, and so reductive – DS9 is so much more than that.
being salty doesn’t mean it must be taken with yet another grain of salt, different salts! She clearly maintains her opinion
Her opinion is bad and she should feel bad!Calling DS9 “just a hotel in space” is obviously someone on a Trek show that was much more popular at the time looking down their nose at the new show. Very much a “cool kids in school mocking the nerds”.History has proved that DS9 is the superior show.
the waves crashed benhin them
Yo, A.V. Club? Last week I filled out a job application to work for you as a copy editor. Under the circumstances, I think you should just stop sitting on your hands and hire me, now!
I only bring him up here because it’s a bit of a choice to make both the non-binary and the transgender character Trill. It’s a bad choice. Trills are pretty much non-binary by design, and using “they” as a pronoun for two consciousnesses isn’t quite the same as using it for a non-binary individual. Venom has always used the pronoun “we” to designate both the host and the symbiote and this is no different.
Star Trek has often used alien races as stand ins for different social groups, but they did so in a context where society wasn’t really ready to tackle these issues head on, which isn’t the case here. Using the pronoun “they” to designate a Trill isn’t a whole lot of progress from Sisko calling Dax “old man” almost thirty years ago. Adira should have been only human.
As others have mentioned, Adira is human, not a Trill. This is clearly mentioned in the discussion between Saru and Michael at the end of the episode.This is not the first thing these reviews have gotten wrong or missed that were very clearly mentioned/shown in this show’s episodes.
“There’s a stand-off, Michael (and Book, in Book’s ship) run a con with the dilithium to capture the head of the raiders (we don’t actually see how they do this”We see Michael and Book offer to transport their dilithium to the raiders and ask the Raider Captain to drop his shields. The next we see of them M&B have captured the Raider Captain. It’s pretty obvious that as soon as the Raider Captain dropped his shields M&B transported him onto Book’s ship and took him captive. This should not have been that hard to figure out.
Since no one else is praising Georgiou’s wonderful sarcasm:Stamets: “That’s impossible. Nothing could affect all dilithium all at once.”
Georgiou: “Says the man who jumps a starship through mushroom space.”Book: “You’re not Detmer…or Tilly.”
Georgiou: “I’d rather kill myself.”She’s the best.
Always great to see Christopher Hyerdahl, such a great actor. He was looking a bit rough here, hope he’s well and it was just makeup.
“Hey! With this script I can barely film a 15 minutes short!”
“Nevermind! Fill it with hugs, long stares and pointless conversations in whispers!”
And that’s how we get this and any other episode of Discovery.
“Commander Burnham has never let us down,” Saru said. Really wishing they had cut to Detmer with “Except for that time she staged a mutiny, got our captain killed, started a war, and left me with this metal hairstyle.”