The Examples

Now we are getting back to the traditional "Star Trek" episode recipe we all know and love. The past couple episodes have been borderline awful, but this one has climbed back up a few notches.

It was nice to see multiple story arcs going on at once, and it was also very refreshing to see Burnham wasn't the saving grace of all. Let's hope the rest of the season is more like this episode and not like episodes 4.3 and 4.4.

How does Star Trek get away with human characters constantly FORCING their values and beliefs on an alien species?

Burnham once again to the rescue.

Why?

Cause Burnham knows best................

Hi Hoi Burnham,,,,, Away.

I'm not a Trekkie so I'm not really bothered about what this show "should" be and I can see the value in a TV show that caters to people who want to have the characters psychoanalysed in response to their trauma using metaphors to mirror what's happening irl...

... But we weren't watching it for that. Changing the show to be something radically different after three seasons is a terrible idea. You won't somehow draw in a new audience who want to see that, they'd have to watch the first three seasons to make any sense of it, which they won't enjoy. If it's what your old audience had wanted to watch, they would have been watching something else to begin with.

It's not as though the emotions are any more realistic and relateable than befits pop-SF. Enough of the unearned, melodramatic, masturbatory speeches.

The Examples feels traditionally Trek in its themes and storytelling.

I can easily imagine the main two plot threads appearing in TNG. The situation Burnham is faced with is reminiscent of the type of problems you could imagine Captain Picard dealing with in his philosophical way. Sonequa Martin-Green portrays the appropriate strength and compassion in her scenes and I think it works well. David Ajala is also on good form.

Likewise the problem Saru, Stammets and Tarka deal with could easily be Riker and Geordie with some mad scientist guest character of the week. Although technobabble-heavy, these are solid moments of sci-fi exploration with a bit of command responsibility drama thrown in. It would have been perfect if this aspect of the plot ended with the reveal of information already dumped on us in the opening scene, but unfortunately it's not the case. That being said the final dialogue exchange between two characters makes me want to find out what is coming next.

Culiber's introspective scenes are more typical of the self-obsession usually depicted in Discovery characters. The reflections and associated dialogue is suitably insightful, but after 4 seasons I am exhausted at hearing the words "I" and "me" coming from so many troubled characters.

Oh no. The whole universe is about to end. Only Burnham can save us. But first we must whisper intently and discuss our feelings. What a load of excrement.

Thanks to this rubbish my son is no longer interested in Trek. That hurts and the creators of this should be ashamed.