(Why is this the real deal, where "Picard" and "Discovery" fall short? It took three tries to shake off abrams' toxic shadow? Regress klingons to "evil subhumyns", DSC? Violence porn of seven committing murder, PIC?? Perhaps it's because SNW is more story and issue-based. Certainly it's because this show found the humor that DSC and PIC misplaced.)
FOUR-STAR EPISODES: 0
AVERAGE EPISODE RATING: 2.9
-Strange New Worlds ***
After seeing a vision of his future mutilation/death (as portrayed in TOS and DSC), captain christopher pike reluctantly returns to service to save his first officer after a botched first contact. He must convince a warring world which accidentally acquired Federation technology, to not destroy themselves. We meet young spock, chapel, m'benga, and uhura, plus a descendant of khan, an aenar engineer, samuel kirk, and sparky helmsperson ortegas. Powerful and poignant, with great chemistry. Pike accepts a five-year voyage of exploration. The story feels like a metaphor for the humyn species...acquiring power beyond imagination, but lacking the evolved brainpower to control our obscene brilliance. Wrenching.
-Children of the Comet ***
Cadet uhura is thrust to the fore as Enterprise discovers an artificial comet on course to destroy a pre-warp world. Enterprise is imperiled by aliens who revere the comet as a god. Nyota discovers the comet's autopilot tech is based on a musical language. Aside from being a fine meditation on cultural relativity, predestination paradoxes are explored in a way that's surprisingly non-annoying.
-Ghost of Illyria ***
Researching a planet once populated by a genetically-engineered race, the ship fights an infection that renders people mindless slaves to light, while pike and spock are trapped on the surface during an ion storm. They discover the illyrians may have mutated into a benevolent plasma-based lifeform. To save the crew through antibodies in her blood, number one must reveal that she herself is illyrian - and that she lied about her heritage to get into Starfleet.
-Memento Mori ***
After finding survivors of an alien attack, security chief la'an noonien-singh identifies the attackers as gorn...after Enterprise falls into their trap. La'an was the sole survivor of a gorn attack as a child, and has never shaken survivor's guilt. A crippled Enterprise flies close to a brown dwarf, where all four ships become sensor-blind. Gripping.
-Spock Amok ***
During a visit from his fiance t'pring, spock switches bodies with her in a mindmeld ritual gone wrong. His presence is required in delicate diplomatic negotiations. It dances on the too-silly line...but doesn't fall over, just barely. Chapel has some great character-building, and pike a great diplomatic speech.
-Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach ***
Pike is reunited (and reignited) with an old flame on a non-Federation planet. He discovers a child-sacrifice element of their culture, and his cultural relativity/tolerance falls to pieces.
-The Serene Squall ***
Transporting a Starfleet counselor, Enterprise plunges deep into pirate territory in response to a distress call. After Enterprise is boarded and commandeered, the counselor is revealed as the pirate captain (who rather easily manipulates spock's emotions). She demands a prisoner exchange, to release her lover from vulcan captivity. T'pring, a security planet administrator, agrees...but spock and chapel pretend to have an affair, requiring spock to break off his engagement. It sounds corny, but it works, thanks to an understated guest performance by jesse james keitel (BIG SKY, QUEER AS FOLK).
-The Elysian Kingdom **
M'benga's daughter has a fatal disease, and is illegally kept in a sickbay transporter buffer while he searches for a cure. He materializes her occasionally, to read her favorite fairy tale. A non-corporeal nebula alien takes over the consciousnesses of the crew, casting them as characters in the fairy tale. M'benga sees through the ruse, and finally contacts the alien with the help of engineer hemmer (bruce horak - TRANSPLANT, IN THE DARK), whose telepathic abilities make him immune. The alien just wants to protect the child, whom it thinks is being abused. This one might have been three-star if the denouement were psychologically sound. To accept that m'benga would quickly give his beloved daughter to an unknown, VERY alien non-humyn, is too large a pill to swallow.
-All Those Who Wander ***
Enterprise responds to a distress call from USS Peregrine, which has crashed on an ice planet. An away team discovers the only survivors are two refugees, one of whom dies as four gorn hatchlings burst from his body. The team fights the terrifying hatchlings, who are also killing each other for alpha status. The best episode of the season, in part due to the sacrificial death of an infected hemmer.
-A Quality of Mercy ***
Pike meets a child whose life will one day be lost in the disaster that will leave pike mutilated and paralyzed. He decides to change those events, and is visited by a future version of himself, who shows him the catastrophes that will be unleashed by his actions, as he will still be in command of Enterprise during the events of TOS' "Balance of Terror". Those events play out, but war with the romulans is not averted, due to the differing command styles of kirk and pike. Kirk (paul wesley - THE VAMPIRE DIARIES, WOLF LAKE) appears, giving aid as captain of the Farragut. In this vision of the future, spock also dies. Back in the present, Starfleet arrests number one for concealing her illyrian identity.
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