Ask Not

 ***(3 head bags out of 5)

Ooh, is that an extreme close-up and the sweet ringing of a concussion in my ears? It's time for another short Trek. 

Black bag ops and prisoner mutinies are... normal? I guess? In Starfleet, I guess? Amidst explosions, Starbase Cadet Sidhu is told to guard that mutinous sexy dog Captain Pike because... the security guards are busy... something something. Congratulations, no more boring inventory- You're the Brig now, Cadet!

Keep that phaser trained on Pike no matter what lies he tells- like he's the hero in all this, or join me and together we can rule the galaxy as father and son...

Or Tholians have seized the Bouman, where Sidhu's husband serves. That's especially crummy luck because Tholians killed everyone but the two of them a few years ago on planet Berillium, vital source of Galaxy Quest's berillium spheres. Won't somebody brave set Pike free from his unjust imprisonment to run off and blast nasty old Tholians into gorgeous glittering peachy particles?

Under a barrage of torpedoes, Pike and Sidhu exchange a barrage of rules to see who is right and who should wear kinky tesseract masks and handcuffs. Charmingly, many of these rules are previously established as "real" and seem to actually ground this story in Star Trek's dimension or near enough for me. 

Sidhu passed the test by standing her ground and will serve on Enterprise. As I should be expecting by now and is still not to my taste, the engineering department is a dazzling circuitry temple chamber I don't see anywhere on my old timey Enterprise blueprints. Ask Not what your effects department can do for you, ask what you can do to keep the effects from making sense in context.

Well performed minisode, unfortunate that I've been waiting so long for Pike to return. But soon we will be rewarded.

Brother

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Enjoy a Season One recap: “Bleak times... we cannot forget”. (Unless someday we’re ordered to.) Then Michael flashes even further back. “I expect you to be friends” her new dad Sarek urges Kid Spock. “Now say The Vulcan Hello to your surprise sister! We’ll try our best to shuffle her out of our richly appointed but terribly repressed lives as quickly as we shuffled out Sybok.”

Young Spock casts spell of water dragon? His computer’s operating on the level of Dumbledore’s Penseive? You know what a computer was in this time period, right? It was a grey cardboard box with a few colourful toggles that screeched “Working” at the beginning of every sentence.

“Damn, she’s a beauty,” Detmer gushes, back in the present, but glimpses of this new version of Enterprise are very much in the robot eye of the beholder.

Meet Nhan, a Barzan security guard, and Connolly, who got his BSc in making a bad first impression. Also, meet Captain Pike. “Sometimes it's wise to keep our expectations low.” says Pike, sagely, but that won’t be necessary in Pike’s case!

Saurian Crewman Orville… uh, Linus, is under the weather, but in a capitalist future there’s no such thing as time off, so he’s shuffling into a crowded turbolift. Lizard Man turning to sneeze directly into other people’s mouths is HI-larious! Screw that primitive 21st Century “elbow crook” hassle.

Grieving Stamets is teetering, talking about Kaseelian singers who kill themselves once they’ve sung one perfect note. This sounds dangerously unsustainable and I’m enraged that someone dreamt up a culture with this histrionic mental disorder. It makes me tear all my hair out when people get overly dramatic!!!

Sarek wanted Spock to learn human empathy from his foster sister Michael, because in this traumatized timeline he wasn’t learning it from his mother. I’m with you, Spock, I don’t want any empathy either if it means feeling like you’re on fire with a concussion all the time.

Sweet Merciful Introduction Scene! A welcome Bridge Crew roll call at last?! Pike’s so bloody charming. I think we all want to be on his landing party rescue! But not by way of a tedious old shuttle- by whirligigs from some Battlestar launch tube straight into an asteroid field- never tell me the odds. Lt. Belligerent Cynicism NOOOOO!!!! He was a dick with every word out of his mouth. He won’t be missed, not for a second. Empathy-shmempathy.

Tilly’s “Crying like a baby tribble in the kill zone” Is... what? What? Is that suddenly a common expression? When did Tilly meet a tribble in the 2250s? What does that phrase even mean? Is she talking about a video game? 

No time for our sorrows! Pop on your voice-activated Iron Man helmets. If only once it finished clicking around like a Michael Bay Autobot it became the spangly silver suit from “The Tholian Web”. I swear from a lifelong Star Wars guy this sounds unhinged, but I’d honestly rather have more story and less spectacle with my Star Trek. In the words of marooned engineer Jett, on screen all too briefly, while improvising heroic levels of chilling wartime medical experiments: “We’ve been rockin’ and rollin’ for hours- can someone tell me what’s going on?”

Oh, lordy, Pike, don’t take off your uniform, you had the best one!

Incomprehensible exploding blockbuster VFX padding and establishing a season-long scavenger hunt and then, out of nowhere… real genuine moments between people that I believed in (Stamets & Tilly, Detmer & Okosekun). But I still don’t grok this version of Sarek. Sarek never struck me as a father who was trying to help Spock become MORE human. Tig Notaro as Jett Backpack is very lively, an utter delight. And Pike is cool! Instantly one of my top 4 Captain Pikes. Years later I’m still excited this guy is gonna be our Strange New Worlds Big Fish.

Just, calm down sometimes and let me take a damn breath, Discovery. I’m crying like a baby tribble in the kill zone over here.