Discovery - Short Treks 2x3 "Ask Not"

rating: ***

the story: A cadet faces an awful test when faced with an impossible decision.

review: Finally, a Short Trek that isn't mediocre or great, just comfortably somewhere in the middle.  This is the seventh one now; the format itself has been tested and its creators generally know what's possible.  This is the third one, of the past three, to give the Discovery Enterprise a little more breathing room, and the first to feature Pike directly.  As he was throughout his appearances in Discovery's second season, Pike remains eminently watchable, so "Ask Not" has at least that going for it.  But there's more.

Ever since Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, and Wesley Crusher's early experiences in The Next Generation, fans have been given glimpses at the sorts of things Starfleet recruits might expect in their initial training.  The 2009 Star Trek movie was built around the idea, too, but for the purposes of this Short Trek, I'll dwell mostly around Wes.

"Ask Not" feels like an attempt to give us something far better than what Wes got to experience.  It doesn't give us strong character work so much a great grasp of the scenario.  We get some fun details, including an unexpected callback to The Motion Picture's hilarious "reserve activation clause" that Kirk used to bring McCoy back, another sign that Discovery's creators have been far closer attention to franchise lore than some fans have been willing to admit.  (The longer a franchise goes, the more old fans like to claim that the new stuff "just isn't the same."  But Star Trek fans have been making that claim since at least the first season of Next Generation.  And really, since The Motion Picture.)

This is the sort of experience that's fun just to watch play out.  Like a lot early Next Generation, Wes's experiences feel fairly primitive.  "Ask Not" is vivid, as Discovery tends to be, without being needlessly flashy (these productions are always by definition minimalist, operating on budgets befitting their brief running times; this one's the shortest of the Shorts so far).

It's another real treat.

criteria analysis:

• franchise - Good use of Starfleet lore, in familiar yet fresh ways.
• series - If it doesn't give us fresh insight into Pike necessarily, it does give us a welcome return visit with this version of him.
• character - With such a brief run-time, it's a welcome relief that this Short Trek didn't try to hamfist character development, as some of the earlier ones did.
• essential - For its kind of story, yes!

notable guest-stars:

Anson Mount (Pike)

Ethan Peck (Spock)

Rebecca Romijn (Number One)

Discovery - Short Treks 2x1 "Q & A"

rating: ****

the story: Spock boards the Enterprise for the first time and meets Number One.

review: Seems more an ode to Number One than Spock, though it can function both ways, and I'm not at all complaining either way.  This may be the best Number One spotlight (and the closest to learning her name?) we ever get.

I've already seen quibbling over whether or not they screwed up the costuming for this one, given that it's technically a flashback to a period with different costumes than we remember.  I suppose that can't possibly matter in the grand scheme, unless you really want it to, and I don't.

Written by acclaimed novelist Michael Chabon, "Q & A" sets the the second batch of Short Treks on sure footing.  Number One didn't get a lot of scenes in Discovery's second season, so it was nice for her to get this spotlight at all, much less it turning out to be such a good one.  A character famously portrayed by Majel Barrett Roddenberry in the original pilot of the original series ("The Cage"), and never seen again, until Discovery, Number One occupies a unique place in franchise lore.  Here we discover that she's an intellectual equal to Spock, and it doesn't feel like a cheap development.  We even see how she helps guide Spock's subsequent deportment, reconciling the smiling Spock glimpsed in that pilot with the famously stoic one better known in virtually every other appearance.

It does help connect the Spock previously featured in Discovery with his other portrayals, too.  When we caught up with him in the series, he was already past the point where we'd seen him with Pike's crew originally.  We not only learned of his relationship with Michael Burnham, but another period of doubt in a life filled with such moments.  Here it's nice to be able to enjoy unfiltered Spock, with someone who accepts him as he is, not merely as a friend or colleague, but his basic character.

criteria analysis:

• franchise - Wonderful look at Spock regardless of where you're coming from.
• series - A welcome return to the Discovery version of Pike's Enterprise.
• character - At long last, a Number One spotlight!
• essential - It's possibly the best one we'll ever have!

notable guest-stars:

Anson Mount (Pike)

Rebecca Romijn (Number One)

Ethan Peck (Spock)

Discovery 2x14 "Such Sweet Sorrow, Part 2"

rating: ****

the story: Burnham makes her leap into history.

review: This is kind of instantly the high water mark for epic Star Trek TV storytelling in a single episode (though it obviously continues and contains elements from previous episodes).  It's a bombastic sendoff for the Discovery crew in its original timeframe, and a nifty packaging for why we don't hear about any of this in later (earlier) incarnations of the franchise.

Okay, so that last part might be a point of debate for some fans, who will naturally feel dismissive for any number of reasons.  What a cheap way to explain it! they'll say.  But forget them.  This has been a series that has consistently enmeshed itself in familiar lore while carving a separate destiny.  Now it seems it's reached the point where the unknown will truly be embraced, and all we have to do is wait for next season.  This is how season finales are done, folks.  This is one of the best I've ever seen.

So of course there's lots to appreciate.  We get flashes of that brilliance Discovery has so enjoyed celebrating about Starfleet officers.  We get callbacks to all the signals the crew followed throughout the season (and how the whole of it feels so satisfying in summary).  We get Burnham and Spock in a bittersweet farewell.  We get Stamets and Culber finally reconciling.  We get Tilly's queen friend saving the day.  We get Control being defeated.  We get Georgiou being truly heroic.  We get repair droids! 

Just a lot of good stuff.  The episode ends with Pike, Number One, and Spock (shaved! in uniform!) on the bridge of the Enterprise (and the credits featuring the original theme!), nudging us to what Star Trek was when it began, and it feels right.  So often fans have struggled to identify Discovery with the original series, so it seems appropriate that a season that spent so much time with familiar elements concludes on such a note. This might be the kind of experience Enterprise tried to capture in its final episode, with a holodeck simulation aboard Picard's ship of Archer's crew.  Then again, it might be equally controversial.  But then, again, forget the fans who will view the results that way.

criteria analysis:

• franchise - A rewarding way to bridge the Enterprise with the Discovery.
• series - Setting the Discovery definitively along its own destiny.
• character - Burnham becomes the symbol of what Spock later finds in Kirk & Bones.
• essential - An affirmation of Discovery's place in the franchise.

notable guest-stars:
Ethan Peck (Spock)
Michelle Yeoh (Georgiou)
Tig Notaro (Reno)
Rebecca Romijn (Number One)
Shazad Latif (Tyler)
Wilson Cruz (Culber)

Discovery 2x13 "Such Sweet Sorrow"

rating: ****

the story: Deciding on a final course of action to thwart Control.

review: "Such Sweet Sorrow" is an excellent follow-up to "Through the Valley of Shadows," and an even better way to smooth over the rough patch of discovering the identity of the Red Angel while also building on it, and as the second season has been doing so well, emphasizing the strengths of its characters and how they embody the franchise tradition of utilizing brilliant minds in concert.

And blowing up a ship?  Almost!  And saying dramatic goodbyes?  Yep!

My biggest criticism of the season is that it began to overplay the dramatic moments.  Once Saru nearly died, it was hard to top.  What "Such Sweet Sorrow" does so brilliantly is not play things the same way, but rather circle back to the tradition of optimism in the franchise, crews supporting each other, defying fate (lookin' at you, Pike!) and the odds.  Once the solution to the Control problem becomes, once and for all, time travel, Burnham volunteers to carry it out, even though it becomes equally clear that she can expect to be lost in the future as a result.  But just as she decides to walk this course alone, everyone rallies around her, at least to help her reach the point where she'll get to make the jump. 

Two notable exceptions: Pike, of course, who the season has made clear has a specific destiny, and nothing done here is going to change that, and Tyler.  Burnham and Tyler have been on a rollercoaster ride across Discovery's two seasons.  One might expect Tyler, of all people, to finally commit to Burnham.  No doubt we'll learn more of what follows for him, and for them, later (I have to chuckle at my early season efforts at prognostication, believing Tyler and Section 31 to have a limited role in it), whether in the season finale (next episode) or at some point in the future.

This is a series that keeps its cards close to the vest, and yet sometimes it allows a wink or two to escape.  "Such Sweet Sorrow" gives us a literal wink, perhaps, when Georgiou finally tells Pike who she really is, and he winks back to her.  Does that mean we'll see more about that later?

Anyway, the episode also features a lot of great visuals, and even a redemption of the seemingly vapid Tilly Short Trek.  Plenty to enjoy.

criteria analysis:

• franchise - Our first look at the Discovery version of the classic Enterprise bridge!
• series - A dramatic setup to the season finale.
• character - Burnham's arc reaches a satisfying climax.
• essential - Where does she goes from here?  I think the question itself is raised eloquently.

notable guest-stars:
Ethan Peck (Spock)
Michelle Yeoh (Georgiou)
Rebecca Romijn (Number One)
Tig Notaro (Reno)
Shazad Latif (Tyler)
James Frain (Sarek)
Mia Kirshner (Amanda)
Wilson Cruz (Culber)

Discovery 2x4 "An Obol for Charon"

rating: ****

the story: A mystery sphere cripples the ship.

review: Well, this just might be the best episode of Discovery to date.  That's how good "An Obol for Charon" (a title that refers to Greek mythology, Charon being the ferryman bringing new souls to Hades) is.  No exaggeration.

It's the most confident Discovery has ever been.  It's the most Discovery that Discovery has ever been.  The characters assert themselves (which is saying something, as Discovery features perhaps already the most assertive characters in franchise history) to their fullest in a classic crisis episode (most comparable to Deep Space Nine's similarly masterful "Civil Defense") that also features at its core an equally classic "mystery space object," which itself seems to be a metaphor about the big mystery of the season itself, something Enterprise attempted in its third season Xindi arc multiple times.

But really, at times it's just plain masterful, just plain fun.  The early scenes concerning the Universal Translator not always performing adequately, to the Translator being sabotaged by the mystery space object and everyone speaking in foreign languages (it's an episode that builds and builds until it reaches a true crescendo), those are just the icing that somehow must compete with Saru's dramatic arc, which itself leads Burnham to realize she has to keep fighting for her brother (y'know, Spock)...

Some of the things that come up in "Obol" will undoubtedly be much debated in years to come, and I'm sure it'll make it hard for fans to fully embrace the episode.  At one point assisted suicide seems to be considered a viable option (Next Generation had a whole episode, "Ethics," in which Riker was disgusted at the very thought).  But this kind of bold storytelling is exactly what Star Trek ought to be, and what it invariably is at its best.  Whether or not you agree with the ideas is beside the point, but the very fact that it brings them up, that's always been at the heart of the franchise.

Toss in comparably small fish like the first appearance of Discovery's version of Number One (a classic one-off character who appears in the first Star Trek pilot, "The Cage," and its repackaging in "The Menagerie") and wonderful appearances from supporting characters, and yeah, more of Tilly's predicament, which like the Spock arc continues to develop, but this time in a most compelling fashion, and the whole thing is a sheer delight.

criteria analysis:

• franchise - Echoes of familiar storytelling that's frequently at the heart of Star Trek.
• series - Yet strongly resonant within Discovery itself.
• character - While Discovery is often at its best introducing characters, this is an instant of fully embracing their potential.
• essential - Discovery in bloom.

notable guest-stars:
Rebecca Romijn (Number One)
Tig Notaro (Reno)