Jinaal

I enjoyed this episode as it's fairly traditional in its Star Trek themes of connection and understanding of others.

The Trill plot is reminiscent of many Trek stories beforehand where characters learn about an apparently hostile species and it unfolds in an interesting way. The body swap aspect with Wilson Cruz playing a different character works well. Michael and Book service the plot, but the interest lies more with the themes and obtaining the next part of the mcguffin. How it finishes promises intrigue for the next episode but it feels a bit random with no foundation laid for what it showed.

Rayner's first day on Discovery was entertaining and the conflict between him and Tilly feels like Riker/Jellico for the modern Trek audience. As much as I enjoyed seeing this type of personality onboard Discovery, you get a bad feeling it's going to end up with him sadly admitting his no-nonsense approach is all wrong.

Saru and T'Rina reminded me (slightly) of that early misstep in the Sisko/Casssidy Yates engagement, just slightly less dramatic. You feel Saru should be too smart to initially fail to see what T'Rina explains to him near the end. If that was the case though, there would be no story.

For me it's a 6.5/10, but I round upwards.

The final season of Star Trek: Discovery should be going out with all thrusters blazing.

It is a shame that after a promising opening two episodes. This is a safe listless episode with the A, B and a C plot.

It was a bit of a snoozefest. T'Rina and Saru's bump in their relationship before officially announcing their engagement. The president marrying a non Vulcan or Romulan might cause waves. It seems T'Rina and Saru never discussed the implications of their cross species relationship.

The new First Officer Rayner wanting to spend 20 seconds to get to know his new crew. He was essentially being a Captain Jellico lite.

Even Burnham's and Book's quest in the planet of the Trill's only livened up when they got chased by the Itronoks.

A glacial pace but the biggest problem. It wanted to be like a Star Trek: TNG episode of the late 1980s. Discovery should be following its own course.

The unholy tradition of "shipper"-fan faction has.finally become the official Star Trek-policy.

The USS Discovery doesn't need a ship's counselor. Everybody treats everyone with corny.psychobabble, pretentious pep talk.and.pushy empathy signalling. The dialogue and the acting is almost unbearable to watch.

This misery is only interrupted by a paper-thin plot and the empty promise of suspense. The so-called writers have learned absolutely nothing from the mistakes of the previous seasons.and they are obviously fiercely determined.to carry on this.uninspired tearjerking ham to the bitter end of the show.

This episode is a masterpiece of boredom. One certainly has to have a lot of practice and creativity as an author to write a 55 minute episode in which absolutely nothing happens and then even receive money to stage this non-action on film. In the end, as a viewer, you wonder if you shouldn't have spent those 55 minutes for ANYTHING other than wasting them on this episode.

When Adira announced Trill as the location for the next clue in the last episode, I feared the worst: Gray. And of course you're not spared the infantile conversation between Adira and Gray, where after a while you don't know whether you should either look away from the screen in disbelief or click fast forward a few times. You ask yourself whether you're actually watching science fiction and Star Trek, or whether you've accidentally opened a teenager's diary and just happened to come across the page about heartbreak and first love.

The entire episode, from start to finish, is a collection of relationship problems and emotional hysteria (especially from Tilly). It starts with bickering between Burnham and Booker, then Adira and Gray realize that a long-distance relationship doesn't work for them, Saru acts like a wimp again and is unsure whether his engagement was the right move... and of course Tilly, whose idea of professionalism as an officer on a spaceship is to fraternize with the crew and have a few cocktails at the bar. Because everything that has anything to do with a mission is carried out by Burnham and Booker alone anyway. And since the board computer does the rest of the work, the crew has nothing to do except gossip and talk about relationship problems. During the scene where Burnham introduces her bridge crew to Rayner, I thought to myself, "Who are all these people who have never been noticed before?" DIS is the only Star Trek series in which the entire bridge crew consists of extras who are just decoration so that the bridge doesn't look so empty.

The fifth season could have been a cross between Indiana Jones and National Treasure. In space. With sophisticated puzzles, peppered with all sorts of traps and futuristic technology. Instead, we get to witness a kind of slow-motion couples therapy that somehow managed to get a Star Trek stamp on it. I really wonder why a fifth season was even produced. This whole scavenger hunt has nothing to do with what has happened so far anyway. The fact that there is apparently even a spin-off in the works with Tilly as an instructor at the academy far exceeds my worst fears and imagination.

One star for Rayner, who at least initially put Tilly in her place. Tilly has always been a huge PITA, but this season she seems to have made it her mission to annoy all the show's "haters" (aka real Star Trek fans) even more.

Episode 2 was actually pretty good, but I had already feared that it might not last. I was right. This week's episode brings back all the worst tendencies the show has exhibited for years. Minimal advancement of the larger story, because the season arc again is (perhaps) not meaty enough to carry an entire season. Flashy effects set pieces for apparently no other reason than to change the otherwise dull pace. No significant interest in actual believable human drama, but instead melodramatic soap opera dynamics and shortcuts to deliver Hallmark-esque platitudes.

Chief example is their overuse of the word "connect". It always seems to come down to "connecting" and touchy-feely faux-emotional solutions. Where's the science? Reason? Logic? Or if not those: suspense, mystery, sense of wonder? All such things mark science fiction as a genre, and Star Trek in particular. Discovery keeps claiming that these things is what it's interested in, but really it's all about sentimentality.

Callum Keith Rennie and his character remain a bright spot in a mostly one-note ensemble (Rapp, Wiseman and del Barrio being the worst offenders) as a focused professional with an edge, but they set him up this way just so he can be lectured by a sanctimonious subordinate about how professionalism should take a backseat to being friends with everybody. I don't know why the writers think such representation will endear anyone to Tilly.