Star Trek: Discovery 3x10 “Terra Firma, Part 2” Review

rating: ****

the story: Georgiou’s fate revealed.

review: If the first part was all setup, the second is all delivery. If there’s any disappointment it’s that it doesn’t take up the whole episode.

So this is Mirror Georgiou’s moral reckoning. The delicious part is that you might expect her to succeed in turning the Mirror Universe around, but she doesn’t, and the biggest swerve is that just as when we see her die for her efforts, we end up back on the other side of...

The Guardian of Forever!

Yeah! That’s who Carl was all along! It’s a great bit of franchise continuity going all the way back to one of the first classics episodes, “City on the Edge of Forever,” and finally reclaiming the idea as a continuing piece of Star Trek lore. All the talk about temporal accords this season are of course also acknowledged. And the whole thing feels like classic material itself, how Carl’s presented, how he’s used, and what he allows Georgiou, and viewers, to experience.

The episode does allow us to spend more time just experiencing the Mirror Universe, reveling in the chaos the dastardly Lorca created in his wake, getting to see a few old faces (some in surprising ways!) along the way. We see the relationship between Mirror Georgiou and Mirror Burnham play out in ways that please and disappoint them both. A central relationship of the series thus receives closure, a number of ways.

If I have one quibble, the farewell Georgiou is given doesn’t address how different Georgiou must have seemed to anyone who didn’t know this one came from the Mirror Universe, which unless I’m forgetting something should have been...everyone, basically, except key personnel like Burnham and Culber. 

But if you’re going to have Michelle Yeoh in a TV series, eventually you give her her due, which is what all of this was about. And, I guess, giving her a way to get back to the possibility of that long-gestating Section 31 series, talked of since the end of the first season, but now at least two series fallen behind. And probably three, since we have seen far more rapid progress even toward Pike’s spin-off. Anyway.

criteria analysis:

>franchise - Mirror Universe fans should easily be able to eat this up. As well as fans of the Guardian of Forever!

>series - A kind of series wrap for the character(s) of Georgiou.

>character - A fine final series statement on Georgiou.

>essential - Absolutely. This was classic material.

notable guest-stars:

Michelle Yeoh

Paul Guilfoyle 

Rekha Sherma

Oded Fehr

Star Trek: Discovery 3x9 “Terra Firma, Part 1”

rating: ****

the story: Turns out Georgiou needs to return to the Mirror Universe.

review: Basically another of those stories the series essentially had to do, like finally concluding the mycelial network business (still had to look that up in order to spell it correctly) last season, which is to say, finally determining if Mirror Georgiou (y’know, the one we ended up spending the most time with) was actually worth spending all that time with.

To find out, she has to go back home, and be forced to decide whether she learned anything spending all that time in the prime universe or faced with a second chance if she would make different decisions.

And so basically “Terra Firma, Part 1” (and its concluding chapter) brings the Mirror Universe full circle, forcing someone from that side to decide to become a better person. Deep Space Nine, in its many visits, made strides in that direction, though it was mainly concerned with the long road of humans reclaiming a sense of self-determination. Enterprise, in its two trips, reveled in the atmosphere. Discovery was initially content to do much the same.

And “Terra Firma, Part 1” is much the same, though it hints at what follows. Instead it’s the setup, and as such allows us to see the Nirror Universe, once more, in its classic context, to see things like Captain Killy being Captain Killy (perhaps all the more interesting since Tilly meanwhile is finding her own command path). 

We also meet an intriguing figure who gets Georgiou there in the first place, memorable in this appearance alone, before we learn anything else (but that’s a good development from the second part, too).

criteria analysis:

>franchise - Any return to the Mirror Universe ought to at least provoke some interest, let alone one with some ambition.

>series - A story thread from the first season reaching its culmination...!

>character - At last Georgiou fully in the spotlight!

>essential - While the second part has big things to accomplish, and nails them, this one feels bigger, and is.

notable guest-stars:

Michelle Yeoh

Paul Guilfoyle

Rekha Sharma

Odes Fehr 

David Cronenberg 

Discovery 1x13 "What's Past is Prologue"

rating: **

the story: Burnham confronts Mirror Georgiou and Lorca.

what it's all about: Well, it had to end.  My enthusiasm for Discovery had been riding pretty high.  It would have been truly remarkable if that had been maintained through the end of the season.  Turns out it didn't.  The very serialized storytelling that's been working so well is actually what did it.  "What's Past is Prologue," to my mind, once again indicates there are limits to this style.

Even though Deep Space Nine in part reached its greatness thanks to its pioneering use of the style, and Enterprise received its only acclaim from employing it, serialized storytelling itself is not automatically good.  Storytelling is still storytelling, and must be judged on its own merits, not the way it's presented.  Today it's called "binge" storytelling, and there are a lot of people who seem to like it for the mere fact of its addictiveness. 

Which is to say, each episode still has to stand on its own, and must be able to justify what adds or doesn't add to the overall storytelling arc.  "Prologue" attempts to once again twist the knife of constant twists in this series.  For me it doesn't work.  And it works, as presented, about as poorly as anything has in Discovery (read: "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum").

As with a lot of Discovery material, the viewer is expected to carry previous events in mind, and judge the new material based on these previous memories.  This is the third episode in thirteen in which there's a big action sequence with Burnham being asked to confront the villain.  And this time, inarguably, the villain, for the first time, is someone we should reasonably be expected to care about.  With the two times it's happened with Klingons, we've known both times that it didn't matter, because we still had the Torchbearer, we still had (and as of this episode, have) L'Rell.  In a manner of speaking, that dynamic remains, because we still have Georgiou.  Well, Mirror Georgiou, anyway.  But that only makes things unnecessarily complicated.

Because the villain this time is Lorca.  We've just discovered that a character we've known throughout the season has been someone else all along (and hardly the only character like that), that he was from the Mirror Universe.  "Prologue" not only confirms this, but confirms that he's as bad as anyone has ever been in the Mirror Universe.  This feels like a development that can't be judged, entirely, on one episode, that it might be counterbalanced, once we see where Tyler/Torchbearer settles.  We can't use Burnham as the control element, because she's the only character in this series being allowed to operate on more than one level at a time.  Which turns out to be unfair, and part of what's slipping off the scales of what keeps Discovery feel like traditional Star Trek, despite everything else.

Because the episode ends with her believing she has a chance at redeeming Mirror Georgiou.  And not because Mirror Georgiou is redeemable, but because Burnham feels guilt about what happened with her Georgiou at the start of the series.  The series wants us to believe we care about what happens to Georgiou, any Georgiou, more than what happens with Lorca, and yet this is not really a Star Trek question at all.  If all we care about is Burnham, and whether or not those wacky people around her stop stumbling into dramatic situations, sort of tangential to her adventures but constantly defining them (Stamets and the spore drive has basically been confirmed to be a Maguffin)...

Sorry, I don't want to be flippant or negative.  My point is, "Prologue," even in that title, desperately wants to be evocative and climactic.  If you accept it to be a dramatic conclusion to Lorca's story, and that alone, it probably works the way it wants to.  If you wish Mirror Georgiou's arc concluded here, too, as I do, then it probably doesn't.  To my mind, it doesn't work because it weakens Burnham, and it strains the credibility of the storytelling.  Burnham's guilt doesn't outweigh Mirror Georgiou's character.  We don't need another episode to decide this.  Suggesting we do is a slap in the face of "Prologue" itself, which is all about reconciling the facts and what we want to believe.  Except in the matter where it really matters.  That's not good serialized storytelling.  It's deliberately prolonged storytelling, and not because it produces good storytelling.  Far too much serialized storytelling is like that.  Until now Discovery had avoided that trap.

Well, hopefully the rest of the season can make up for this.

criteria analysis:

• franchise - Reflects poorly on Star Trek ideals.
• series - Regardless of its merit, this is relevant Discovery material.
• character - And relevant to Burnham and certainly to Lorca.
• essential - The death of a major character has rarely been this disappointing.

notable guest-stars:
Michelle Yeoh (Mirror Georgiou)
Rekha Sharma (Mirror Landry)

Discovery 1x4 "The Butcher's Knife Cares Not for the Lamb's Cry"

rating: ***

the story: Burnham solves Lorca's biggest immediate problem in true Star Trek fashion.

what it's all about: I've mentioned before that it's still too early to know just how serialized Discovery is.  It's possible that the whole season will feature one continuing story, so that every episode is linked.  This has become increasingly standard since Star Trek last had a TV series (Enterprise).  For now, I'll continue to treat episodes in their immediate context, and consider "The Butcher's Knife" as a kind of second half of the "second pilot" that was "Context Is for Kings," much as "Battle at the Binary Stars" was a continuation of the first episode, "The Vulcan Hello."

In that sense, we get some clear resolution in this episode, seeing where Burnham settles in among Lorca's crew, and even see her at her unabashed best, which was probably kind of necessary after seeing her Starfleet career literally self-destruct previously.  We see her perform a classic compassionate solution to a vexing problem, another alien life-form needing to be understood (see: "The Devil in the Dark").  If you don't want to see this as merely a continuation of previous episodes, that act itself is as close as Discovery has gotten to Star Trek's episodic roots.

In the process, we get the show's second shocking death of a character who seemed like they would otherwise have been in it for the long haul.  Previously it was Captain Georgiou (a lot of fans are saying it was obvious she was going to die, when they saw Michelle Yeoh listed as a guest-star; it could just as easily have meant Burnham merely being transferred to another ship, which is to say, Burnham's fate at the end of "Binary Stars" itself couldn't have been predicted, either, except in hindsight).  This time it's Landry.  Matter-of-fact Landry in a lot of ways represented the darkest fears of Lorca himself, his apparent rogue captain status.  And yet, once Burnham figures out the truth behind the alien life-form, Lorca isn't there demanding everyone ignore it.  One has the sense that Landry wouldn't have been so malleable.  And yet, she's a compelling element of the episode all the same, and it's a shame to see her go.

criteria analysis:

• franchise - A classic Star Trek narrative.
• series - Burnham finds her place in the new crew.
• character - Finding redemption in the process.
• essential - It's a little disappointing that she is so straightforwardly heroic this time.\

notable guest-stars:
Rekha Sharma (Landry)
Michelle Yeoh (Georgiou)

Discovery 1x3 "Context Is for Kings"

rating: ****

the story: Burnham is conscripted by Captain Lorca following her discharge from Starfleet.

what it's all about: For all intents and purposes, "Context is for Kings" is what the pilot of Discovery would be if it were like every other Star Trek series to date.  It sets up the ongoing continuity of the series, whereas the first two episodes explained the backstory.  And it's another winner.

Burnham is now a convict, being transported with other convicts, until fate intercepts her with Lorca and the Discovery.  Lorca seems to be akin to the kind of rogue captain Kirk kept running into in the original series.  Since he isn't the lead character (and unlike every other series in franchise history there is a clear lead character, and it isn't by default), there's no automatic assumption that he's the good guy or right in his decisions, and there's no reboot at the end of the episode where everyone learns from their mistakes, that sort of thing, regardless of whether or not he's another rogue. Our allegiance necessarily falls to Burnham, who tries to understand what a science vessel being run by a war-hungry commanding officer can possibly have for someone like her.  Like Picard thought of Riker in Next Generation, perhaps it's merely her willingness to defy expectations.

At any rate, it's the introductions that carry the episode.  Where Saru made a strong impression in previous episodes, it was really Burnham carrying the bulk of the material.  That changes in "Context."  Lorca certainly makes a huge impact.  So too does science officer Stamets, whose differences in philosophy with Lorca recall Wrath of Khan, where Carol Marcus and her son David were equally aghast of domineering Starfleet methods.  Also noteworthy is Tilly, Burnham's bunkmate who's struggling with anxieties of one kind or another, not the least of which is realizing that Burnham is one and the same mutineer she'd just been babbling about to Burnham herself...!  Plus, there's the awkward reunion between Burnham and Saru.  These are all strong, and strongly-defined, characters, right from the (re)start.  There's also Landry...but more on her next episode.

There's been a number of complaints among fans that Burnham can't really be classified as a mutineer based on how circumstances played out in the first two episodes.  "Mutineer" is the word on everyone's lips around her in "Context."  And it is appropriate.  Her confrontation with Georgiou is off the bridge in "Battle at the Binary Stars," and yet she's the only one, initially, of the two on the bridge when she changes the ship's orders.  The crew complies with her orders with little protest despite the radical departure she's introduced.  In effect, she fakes a mutiny; the crew remains blameless but was also complicit.  Had Georgiou not turned up so quickly, no one would've known differently, but she did, and so the situation devolved into chaos.  Chaos is the result of conflicted motivations, which is to say, there had been a de facto mutiny under Burnham's brief leadership.  The crew believed Burnham's lie, and that's really just about enough.  If this had been a pirate ship, these "conspirators" would be dead. 

criteria analysis:

• franchise - Meeting the main characters of any series is always pretty important.
• series - Effectively a pilot episode.
• character - Aside from the new faces we meet, we also follow Burnham as she finds herself in unexpected new context.
• essential - This continues to be bold new Star Trek storytelling.

notable guest-stars:
Rekha Sharma (Landry)