It was good, it was back to the crew encountering strange new life and coming together to solve problems.
I will say though...
Spoiler!
I'm sad about Ensign Gamble, I was really liking him, but the actor killed it in this episode! Unfortunately, they gotta lay off Spock and let Chapel ride off into the sunset or something, her character just hasn't been with it this season.
__________________ The Beatings Shall Continue Until Morale Improves!
This Post Has Been Distilled for the Eradication of Seemingly Incurable Sadness.
The World Ends when you're dead. Until then, you've got more punishment in store. - Flames Fans
If you thought this season would have a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention.
It was good, it was back to the crew encountering strange new life and coming together to solve problems.
I will say though...
Spoiler!
I'm sad about Ensign Gamble, I was really liking him, but the actor killed it in this episode! Unfortunately, they gotta lay off Spock and let Chapel ride off into the sunset or something, her character just hasn't been with it this season.
Spoiler!
I agree, Ensign Gamble had more character development in a minor role over a few episodes than most of Discovery's bridge crew had over the full run of the show, and the actor really did a good job bringing a supporting character to life.
As soon as Dr. M'Benga told the ensign he was on the away mission, I turned to my wife and said sadly "That guy is dead".
This was an absolutely classic Trek episode. Archaeology, alien mind control, someone almost got Geordied...
Spoiler!
The ruins were definitely Iconian, right? I got strong Iconian vibes. I really like this ancient connection between Gorn and other races they are building. They are really building some great lore into the Gorn as bad guys. But, here's the problem with prequels, they are making it hard to believe that the Gorn wouldn't be more active later in star trek canon.
Maybe we'll get some good Tholian stuff too.
My only complaint is that there is too much love. I'm ok with 1 or maybe 2 crew relationships taking some of the screen time, but that episode had 4 couples (5 if you count M'benga and the ensign's father son dynamic.) I think it worked out and the episode was still very good, but I am suspect about that level of romance focus long term.
Also this love triangle forming between Spock-Kirk- and (Khan) is a total fan fiction lol.
Last edited by Monahammer; 08-08-2025 at 09:47 AM.
I agree, Ensign Gamble had more character development in a minor role over a few episodes than most of Discovery's bridge crew had over the full run of the show, and the actor really did a good job bringing a supporting character to life.
Spoiler!
Yeah! He was just like "Holy ####! I'm on the Enterprise!! He brought excitement and that sense of gravitas of "you're on the Flagship now." And the chemistry between he and M'Benga was great! I guess I was kind of looking forward to that for a while longer.
Meanwhile Chapel has just become annoying. I didnt realize how much Ortegas was doing the heavy lifting in that character duo.
And I do like the interchange between Uhura and Ortegas' brother. He's a good comedic foil and manages to peel Uhura out of her shell. Its fun!
__________________ The Beatings Shall Continue Until Morale Improves!
This Post Has Been Distilled for the Eradication of Seemingly Incurable Sadness.
The World Ends when you're dead. Until then, you've got more punishment in store. - Flames Fans
If you thought this season would have a happy ending, you haven't been paying attention.
I didn't like the episode. It felt too much like Discovery for me.
I'm sorry, I'm going negative here - I didn't want to but it's been stuck in my craw.
Spoiler!
Everyone is now in love. Like... everyone. The captain, the other captain, the science officer, the comms officer, the nurse, the security officer...etc. It's not Love Island. It's supposed to be a ship of exploration. These relationships wouldn't be appropriate in a mid tier corporate office let alone Star Fleet where death is on the line. In TNG and DS9 these things were handled with subtlety and maturity (think Picard and Crusher where it was just tension for years) and it was way more fun.
Ensign Expendable doesn't behave like a Star Fleet officer. He acts just like the Discovery bridge crew. He was given an order and replied with something like "yeah man, I'm all over it". WTF is that? Give me some tempered enthusiasm from young officers - think Nog from DS9. Grabs the glowy orb holds it up to his face... for reasons? An idiot I won't miss.
Gamble's eyes visibly blown out, blood all over his uniform shown in close up multiple times. This level of gore adds nothing for me personally in Star Trek. It DOES remind me a lot of "shock factor!" attempts in Picard and Discovery (like where Icheb was vivisected on camera). Snapping necks, dead bodies everywhere. This is not why I watch this show.
It also particularly sucks because it means I can't watch the show with my kid or my wife.
Why did Scotty happen to have that orb to catch the demon in? Where did that come from? Bugged me in the moment.
Anyway - an irritating miss for me on a show that I very genuinely want to (and most often do) love.
I agree with some of that Sutter Brother, I just put it aside and allowed the really great parts of this episode to shine. But I too worry about some of the direction and choices.
another example you didn't mention is Pelia's character. I dislike every minute of her screen time. This episode was particularly egregious. Though they did make fun of her overdramaticization too.
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I agree with some of that Sutter Brother, I just put it aside and allowed the really great parts of this episode to shine. But I too worry about some of the direction and choices.
another example you didn't mention is Pelia's character. I dislike every minute of her screen time. This episode was particularly egregious. Though they did make fun of her overdramaticization too.
I chuckled at that last scene to be honest. In the wake of the horror show of that episode to have her say that last line hit just right.
I'm also distracted by how attractive the actress playing Chapel is. Like... I can't pay attention to the scene sometimes.
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Exp:
Quote:
Originally Posted by SutterBrother
I didn't like the episode. It felt too much like Discovery for me.
I'm sorry, I'm going negative here - I didn't want to but it's been stuck in my craw.
Spoiler!
Everyone is now in love. Like... everyone. The captain, the other captain, the science officer, the comms officer, the nurse, the security officer...etc. It's not Love Island. It's supposed to be a ship of exploration. These relationships wouldn't be appropriate in a mid tier corporate office let alone Star Fleet where death is on the line. In TNG and DS9 these things were handled with subtlety and maturity (think Picard and Crusher where it was just tension for years) and it was way more fun.
Ensign Expendable doesn't behave like a Star Fleet officer. He acts just like the Discovery bridge crew. He was given an order and replied with something like "yeah man, I'm all over it". WTF is that? Give me some tempered enthusiasm from young officers - think Nog from DS9. Grabs the glowy orb holds it up to his face... for reasons? An idiot I won't miss.
Gamble's eyes visibly blown out, blood all over his uniform shown in close up multiple times. This level of gore adds nothing for me personally in Star Trek. It DOES remind me a lot of "shock factor!" attempts in Picard and Discovery (like where Icheb was vivisected on camera). Snapping necks, dead bodies everywhere. This is not why I watch this show.
It also particularly sucks because it means I can't watch the show with my kid or my wife.
Why did Scotty happen to have that orb to catch the demon in? Where did that come from? Bugged me in the moment.
Anyway - an irritating miss for me on a show that I very genuinely want to (and most often do) love.
I thought it was an okay episode. Not great, but certainly not Discovery bad. At least they had everyone pitching in to solve the mystery rather than just having Michal Burnam snap her fingers and solve the problem.
My only beef was when they were arguing about whether they should leave or carry on.
Spock: Starfleet regulations state we should leave
Chapel (with the help of the blue guy): It's important that we figure this out for Bluey over here
Like, okay, yeah, it is important.
Why TF can't you just come back tomorrow? We don't need to figure this all out today!
A small nitpick, but they could have thrown in a reason why they had a ticking clock and it was today or never (say there was a planetary alignment or something).
Otherwise, I thought it was okay.
As to your question about Scotty having the orb, they did say that they brought it back and were analyzing it to see what happened, so it was already established that it was on the ship/in Engineering.
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I agree, Ensign Gamble had more character development in a minor role over a few episodes than most of Discovery's bridge crew had over the full run of the show, and the actor really did a good job bringing a supporting character to life.
Spoiler!
It was amusing when M'Benga talked about now that Nurse Chapel is back he's kinda surplus, and then the problem worked itself out.
Ya,the love stuff is junk. Chapel also seems to have an oversized roll on the ship considering her position. And the Captain just sorta hangs out taking stuff in. Maybe that was just this episode, but it seemed like he was just kinda there to take info in.
I did like the concept of the episode, it was all great. Is this is one of those cases where they rotate writers, and some of them just have their own thing they gotta force on the series?
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