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After two weeks of giving us a lighter version of Star Trek: Discovery, the third episode, ‘Point of Light’, takes us back to the darker aspects of Season 1. Particularly because of the reappearance of some ‘old friends’ from the first season. There were two main plotlines this week with one little side trip that was introduced last week.
First up, the show really dove back into some unfinished Season 1 business with the Klingons. L’Rell (now with luxurious hair!) seems to be struggling to hold the various Houses together with some of the leaders not really on board with her ‘human’ Ash Tyler as the Torchbearer. Even though he is the Klingon Voq, they just can’t get over his human appearance and continue to treat him as a human. And that is leading to some fractures within the Klingons, which could also put the truce with the Federation in jeopardy.
Ash knows that trouble is brewing and seeks some supportive words from Michael Burnham. It’s nice that even after all they went through last season, she’s still able to be a friend to him. But his actions of contacting the Federation make Kol-Sha even more suspicious of L’Rell and her ability to lead. It doesn’t help matters that even her uncle looks down upon Ash and he hopes to destroy whatever bond the two have by revealing a major secret to Ash — he’s a father. L’Rell learned she was pregnant during the process of changing Voq to Ash and she didn’t want to tell him about the baby at that point. Nor did she even carry the child! She’s never even met the boy, but when all is said and done, Ash actually understands her reasoning.
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What they don’t know is Kol-Sha had tricked Ash into trying to wipe the war paint from his face which embedded some tracking/eavesdropping material onto Ash’s skin, allowing Kol-Sha to know their every move … including the fact that there was now a baby involved. He kidnaps the child as a hostage in exchange for L’Rell ceding power to him. But before the deal can be completed, someone else from the past shows up — Philippa Georgiou who takes out Kol-Sha (poor Kenneth Mitchell can’t catch a break on this show having already died last season playing Kol). She knows that Ash, and now the baby, are not safe with L’Rell and L’Rell and her leadership are in jeopardy as long as Ash and the baby are there. Ash agrees to go with Georgiou, apparently to be part of her new crew working for Sector 31, leaving the baby at a Klingon monastery never to be seen again, while L’Rell puts on the act of having killed her child and beheaded Ash for the benefit of anyone who questions her authority. A fearsome display indeed to keep everyone in line.
Back on Discovery, a surprise guest arrives. Sarek’s shuttle has approached the ship but it’s Amanda who beams aboard, troubled about Spock’s disappearance. Knowing that he had checked himself into a psychiatric facility, she first went there but when she was forbidden to see her son or any of his records, she stole them and hoped that Michael would be able to open the file. Something definitely against Starfleet protocols, but presenting their case to Pike with some loopholes, and an odd communication from an officer at the facility, gives Pike reason enough to allow Burnhan to crack open the encrypted file.
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While she is downloading the records, several images flash on the screen, drawings of the Red Angel made by Spock. Michael reveals to Amanda that she too saw the Angel on the asteroid, and we can’t forget that Pike saw it in the video footage from the humans’ ancient video camera on New Eden. But the question remains — where is Spock?
The side story focused on Tilly as she continues her officer’s training program and trying to deal with being haunted by her old school mate May. Tilly attempts to ignore May but during the shadowing portion of the training where Tilly is suppoed to follow and observe Captain Pike, May becomes very aggressive, demanding to see the Captain. Not this Captain though, the shorter, blonder captain. I don’t know why Tilly couldn’t figure out it was Stamets this ghost of hers wanted to see, but the vision caused her to have a complete breakdown, yelling at May while everyone thought she was yelling at Pike.
Tilly finally checked herself into sick bay and they discovered she was infected with some kind of parasite, apparently from the piece of the asteroid that she was studying. Staments was able to draw the parasite out of her but she still doesn’t know why this thing was in her, why it was manifetsing itself as someone she barely knew from her childhood, or why it was demanding to see Stamets. And from the looks of things in the preview for next week, the thing is not happy to have been sucked out of Tilly.
While not as light-hearted as the previous two episodes, ‘Point of Light’ was still a good watch and the Ash/Georgiou storyline may have actually been a sort-of pilot for the now acknowledged Gerogiou spin-off series, so we can assume that will involve Section 31 and Ash will also be a part of that story. Cool!
New episodes of Star Trek: Discovery begin streaming Thursdays at 8:30 PM on CBS All Access.
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