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Star Trek: Discovery has wasted no time this season getting the thousand-year-old crew from the season’s first episode ‘where are we?’ storyline to this week’s ‘we’re home!’ I really expected their quest to find Starfleet and the Federation to take up the entire season, leaving us with a cliffhanger when they finally set eyes on the place. But no, with the help of Adira/Senna Tal, they had those coordinates and off they went. And with the spore drive, the journey took less time than a blink of an eye … which is why, unless the spore drive was offline, these things don’t take full seasons.
Approaching the location of Starfleet, Discovery encounters some kind of weird distortion in the middle of space where Starfleet should be. No worries, it’s just a way to keep prying eyes from seeing what’s going on inside. As Discovery is expected, they are allowed to pass through and see many wonders, from a tenth generation Voyager to organic connections between the ships and the core of Starfleet that keeps the distortion powered. Yes, things have changed in 930 years, including the ability of Starfleet to scan everyone on the ship, right down to Adira’s symbiont Tal. Of course, Michael and some others are baffled as to why Starfleet isn’t welcoming them with open arms, but Captain Saru is keeping a more level head, assuring them everything is in accordance with Starfleet guidelines. Every seems to have forgotten that as far as Starfleet knows, Discovery was destroyed 930 years earlier so they have to exercise caution.
Beaming Saru, Michael and Adira to Starfleet, they aren’t exactly welcomed with open arms. Saru maintains the demeanor of an officer, but Michael is a bit like her old self, very quick to overstep her bounds. Adira, relaying a message from Senna, is also dressed down by the commander who reminds her that while he and Senna were familiar, he and Adira are not. Whether it was on purpose or not, Oded Fehr and others playing Starfleet officers were giving off a vibe of ‘something here just ain’t right’ … something the show has been doing all season where Michael Burnham is concerned. And that feeling was only heightened when Saru was told that everyone on the ship was going to be debriefed and the entire ship was going to be scanned with a fine-toothed comb, making Michael suspicious of these Starfleet people while they are suspicious of the Discovery crew.
Among the advancements in technology, Starfleet now has holograms that resemble humans but can ‘read’ the person they are questioning. They also have holographic AI that act as a super advanced Tricorder, able to detect the smallest changes in a person’s physiology, warning Michael that she cannot lie when answering a question. The best moment of the debriefing came between Georgiou and the two AI interrogating her. Interestingly, there was also another man with them observing. Georgiou was quite aware of what was happening, annoying the AI by directing her attention to the man (played by director David Cronenberg) instead of them. But she also knew how to disrupt the system by blinking quickly at the AI. It was funny, but it worked. Her quick series of blinks somehow disrupted the technology and shut down the holograms (she was quite satisfied with herself and told the observer they really should update their protocols). But this finally gave them a chance to speak person-to-person. Georgiou offered to answer his questions if he answered hers. He knew she would not play along that way, and she admitted as much, but he said he could learn what he needed from the questions she asked him.
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The first question on everyone’s mind was The Burn. What is it, what happened, how did it happen? Even more than 100 years later, there are still no definitive answers, so we can assume this will be a major plot point moving forward the rest of the season. The commander said he was not at liberty to address this to Saru and Michael, and Georgiou’s interrogator basically said the same thing, offering up that there are many ideas of who caused it but no concrete proof. What shocked Georgiou the most, however, was learning that her Terran Empire collapsed centuries earlier and … she’s completely alone, perhaps the last of her kind. No one has crossed over from her universe in more than 100 years. The man also suspected that the only reason she stayed with Discovery was because there is someone on the ship she cares about. Almost more than the feeling of being alone, the idea that she cares about someone other than herself seems to have jolted her. Even back on Discovery later when Michael came across Georgiou in a corridor, she was just standing there frozen, lost in thought apparently, finally coming out of it after Michael asked if she was okay. Her response was why would she ask a thing like that? But Georgiou is obviously not okay after discovering she actually has feelings for someone.
To get on Starfleet’s good side after being told the ship was going to be requisitioned and the crew disbanded, they found a way to be helpful and prove their worth as a crew with a unique ship — a group of aliens were in Starfleet’s sick bay, hours away from dying but no one could figure out why. Starfleet had already contact traced their ship’s movements, but Michael insisted they could find an answer. But no one was giving up any logs to them until Michael made an impassioned plea to let them help Starfleet save those lives. It was learned that one planet the aliens had visited had centuries ago been contaminated with some type of radiation so if they were there, they would have gathered things and eaten whatever they could find. Basically they had radiation sickness that could only be cured by finding an uncontaminated plant — impossible since everything on the planet was contaminated.
But … Starfleet still has a ship that houses seeds for every form of plant life in in the known galaxy. But that ship is five months away. Burnham impresses upon Starfleet that now is their chance to prove Discovery and its crew can work together as a single organism, use the spore drive to get to the ship and back in time to save the aliens. The commander reluctantly allows them to go with two of his own officers, and Saru offers to stay behind as a sign of good faith. And off they go, the spore drive jump a little overwhelming for the Starfleet officers. But they were impressed … not so much, however, by the dysfunctional working relationship between Stamets, Tilly and Reno, calling them unprofessional. But the trio showed the officer that they work best within their dysfunction.
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On the ship, they learn the current caretakers are a Barzan family, the same race as Commander Nahn. This would be the first Barzan’s she’s encountered since she joined Starfleet. She’s also surprised and pleased to learn Barzan did join Starfleet. She, Michael and Dr. Culber beam to the ship and find it overgrown with vegetation. They find the family, but all they are is a projection. What they don’t see is some kind of displacement following them. Nahn tries to find out what happened to the family and Michael tries to get the seeds she needs but the vault is voice activated and she needs the Barzan caretaker. Nahn finds a recording that shows the man almost folding in on himself, and Michael actually encounters this phantom in the vault, one minute solid, the next minute gone. Michael realized that the man was somehow out of phase, and that’s when Tilly, Stamets and Reno kicked it into gear, discovering a nearby star ejected material into space which engulfed the ship while the man was in the middle of transporting himself into the vault. The radiation from the burst interfered with the transmission, leaving him in a state of constant phasing. But it also killed his family, something he apparently was not willing to accept and that’s why all the vegetation was growing inside the ship — he was looking for a cure.
Once they figured out how to stop the man’s phasing, Michael had to tell the man that his family as dead, there was nothing to help them, but she needed his help to save others. Nahn tried to talk to the man but it was just too personal for her. He finally agreed to unlock the vault and give them what they needed, and Hugh went back to Discovery to synthesize and antidote. But now the issue facing Michael was leaving the man behind, something Starfleet never does. If they take him, against his will no less, Starfleet loses centuries of hard work preserving these seeds. But as the man is Barzan, Nahn says she will stay with him. Everything she’s done since coming aboard Discovery has been done to honor Aryam, who selflessly gave her life to save Discovery. There was no better way for Nahn to honor her sacrifice than to give up her own Starfleet career and help her fellow Barzan get home. And she finally gets to see her home again. Michael doesn’t want to say goodbye but she knows this is the right decision, so now we all must say goodbye to Commander Nahn.
Returning to Starfleet, the aliens are saved and the commander is willing to allow the Discovery and its crew to remain intact. But … there are no more five year missions. Discovery will go only to where Starfleet directs them. There are only 38 known members of the Federation remaining out of more than 300, and they must protect them at all costs. Where Discovery and its crew goes from here is unknown, but there are a few dangling threads to address: The Burn, Georgiou’s odd behavior, and Detmer’s mental state (she nearly flubbed drawing the seed ship out of an ion cloud with Discovery’s tractor beam, and her condition has not gone unnoticed by the AIs at Starfleet).
New episodes of Star Trek: Discovery stream every Thursday on CBS All Access.
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