Star Trek: Discovery 3x13 “That Hope Is You, Part 2” Review

rating: ****

the story: The season finale, in which the Burn is resolved.

review: There’s a ton happening here, mostly resolving the Emerald Chain’s takeover of the ship but also Saru’s arc with the Kelpian responsible for the Burn.

Reclaiming the ship involves some truly cinematic action revolving around the turbolifts (staged like the action in Nemesis), which gives the episode a bigger feel than either of the previous finales in the series. It’s the best action of the series, period.

Some of the storytelling (as has been true throughout the series) is transparently convenient, hitting beats just to set things up, like using Adira to assist Saru mostly so Gray can be seen again (both figuratively and literally). I’m not overly complaining, I like the results, but clearly it was done without being overly concerned if the mechanics made much sense. The same with Saru, but it’s nice, what results, anyway.

It’s better when Book turns out to be capable of using the spore drive. It was dramatic, Burnham ejecting Stamets. Curiously, there was so much that needed to be done, and some of it gets very little time, mostly because so much suspense was deemed necessary, so that the backend of the episode feels rushed, even though we get a great moment or two of it. We even get a last minute glimpse of Reno, who was otherwise absent the last few episodes, in fact more or less replaced by Adira, mostly to get her to the point she and Gray need (you see what I mean) to happen.

But these are quibbles. The end result concludes a season that has better executed its arc than the previous two seasons, all its parts flowing together nicely. For some of my previous reservations on how rapidly the season progressed to rediscovering the Federation, it worked out wonderfully, and even the broad strokes of the Emerald Chain ended up strong enough to handle this standoff. 

And the ending...! Burnham is finally captain! Some fans have drawn parallels between this and Sisko getting that last pip in the finale of his third season. I can dig it. I love that Vance finally upholds the Kirk tradition of acknowledging the unorthodox is sometimes necessary (Burnham emphasizes the comparison by refusing to believe in a no-win scenario), that this is what Burnham has been doing since the beginning of the series. In a lot of ways, this is kind of the completion of the initial thesis of the series. I don’t know how many more episodes or seasons we get out of Discovery, but I think it has settled its legacy at this point.

criteria analysis:

>franchise - We haven’t had a movie since 2016. In a lot of ways this episode is as close as we’ve gotten since then.

>series - It’s a great season finale and a statement that resonates back to the beginning.

>character - Michael Burnham is finally recognized as the hero she is. And promoted to captain!

>essential - Sure it is! A worthy summation of the season at the very least, and a great season at that.

notable guest-stars:

Oded Fehr (Vance)

David Cronenberg

Kenneth Mitchell

Tig Notaro

Star Trek: Discovery 3x12 “There is a Tide...” Review

rating: ****

the story: The ship has been taken over, and now the Emerald Chain wants to negotiate with Starfleet...!

review: There’s a lot that happens in this episode in terms of the first part of that brief synopsis, involving the crew working to regain control (but not Control!), including a return of first season Klingon actor Kenneth Mitchell as the lone good guy among the bad guys, but none of it’s nearly as interesting as the second part of that synopsis.

Osyraa is not a great screen presence for most of her appearances. But she’s great when she needs to be, and her encounter with Admiral Vance is exactly what the season needed to nail down the era. The idea of the Burn transforming interspecies relations, making everything more dangerous, and diminishing the role of the Federation, but not its moral clarity, is something Vance makes clear.

Too often fans reduce what Star Trek is to a format or even a given set of characters, but at heart it’s really about ideals, ones we are still working toward embodying, in some ways being far away from, in others we’re hopefully closer. Vance refuses to sanction the Emerald Chain’s worse attributes, and forces Osyraa to finally admit for all the good she’s willing to commit to, she also has to admit that bad she’s done. Which she is not willing to. And thus makes impossible Vance agreeing to what otherwise seems like a great deal.

Discovery tends to work small details well. It gets another big hit in that regard with Eli the truth detector hologram. He’s a big part of how well this sequence works, emphasizing the narrow ledge between Osyraa’s good and bad intentions.

criteria analysis:

>franchise - Casual fans ought to cheer the Federation ideals.

>series - Discovery fans ought to cheer this moment, too.

>character - It’s Vance’s best moment of the season, justifying his recurring role. He was essentially the Lorca/Pike spot.

>essential - Absolutely. A moment that represents Star Trek’s whole message.

notable guest-stars:

Oded Fehr (Vance)

Kenneth Mitchell

Star Trek Arcs I: Pike

One of the great underappreciated legacies of Star Trek is the idea of the story arc. On the surface this seems to be a simple riddle to unfold, as Star Trek began, as with all TV programming of its era, as episodic storytelling. Yet, somehow, arcs have been a part of the franchise from the very beginning.

The first pilot of the original series, “The Cage,” featured Captain Pike and a completely different crew, aside from Spock, aboard the Enterprise. In the episode, Pike discovers a planet populated by beings who are capable of casting powerful illusions. 

NBC passed on the pilot but opted to let Gene Roddenberry take another swing, which with “Where No Man Has Gone Before” turned out to be worth three seasons.

Now, towards the middle of the first season, of course, “The Cage” was repurposed as flashback material for the two-part “The Menagerie,” in which we learn that Pike has been horribly mutilated and confined to a mobile chair. Spock has agreed to bring him back to Talos IV, the planet of the powerful illusions, so that he might continue some semblance of a normal life. The episodes themselves carry the framework of a trial Starfleet is prosecuting against Spock, as we watch footage from “The Cage” as evidence.

The idea of this being an arc is kind of a matter of hindsight. In 1966 audiences would really only have known of “The Cage” as part of “The Menagerie.” It’s later fans who get to enjoy the full scope of the story. Pike himself would later resurface in the Kelvin films, as well as Discovery, in which  material relevant to the arc is inserted during “Through the Valley of Shadows,” where he is given a glimpse into his fate and even the chance to avoid it.

The next franchise arc would prove to be more deliberate, not to mention dramatic. And cinematic!