Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 2x10 - "The Red Angel"

[Timelord79 (he/him)]

Who later became a future guy depending on what you believe and then retired to New Orleans to be a Federal Agent in Earth's past with his memory wiped.

Equipped with time travel technology he then then started to jump through time to right what once went wrong, never to return?

 

[jespah]

Spoiler: about ... stuff

Michael's Mom is either named Zora or a feminized version of one of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Archangels

 

[The Leewit]

What an extraordinary episode! The drama and the feels are all there: a heartfelt funeral send-off for Ariam; Saru's elegant singing courtesy of Doug Jones' actual vocal gift; introducing Lt. Nilssom, the original actress who has played Airiam; the awkward confrontation between Georgiou, Stamets, Culber, and Tilly; the pep talk that therapist Admiral Cornwell gives Culber; Michael righteously punching Leland for her parent's demise; the satisfying sibling bonding between Michael and Spock; the emotional reconnection between Georgiou and her "surrogate daughter" Michael; the troubling witnessing of Michael's tortured dying; Leland's gruesome eyeful reward; finally Mom with wings...yes that mom.

 

[Agony_Boothb]

No, it's pretty similar. They are both characters who were revealed later to be instrumental in the pot of the series.

So what is your issue, exactly?

 

[XCV330]

Spoiler: about ... stuff

Michael's Mom is either named Zora or a feminized version of one of these: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Archangels

Yes! There's still a way to victory in this!

 

[Photoman15]

It seems like Discovery is all about Michael. The Klingon War was about her. And now we learn that all the major plot points of Season 2 from Section 31 to the Red Angel was also connected to her as well. Isn't she special?

Everyone seems to forget the lowly Starfleet Commander who "happened" to be stationed at an outpost by Bajor whose mother "happened" to be one of Bajor's Prophets who live in a wormhole with no temporal boundaries.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Everyone seems to forget the lowly Starfleet Commander who "happened" to be stationed at an outpost by Bajor whose mother "happened" to be one of Bajor's Prophets who live in a wormhole with no temporal boundaries.

I wonder if you get CBS in a wormhole don't mind me I'm just being silly.

 

[Agony_Boothb]

Everyone seems to forget the lowly Starfleet Commander who "happened" to be stationed at an outpost by Bajor whose mother "happened" to be one of Bajor's Prophets who live in a wormhole with no temporal boundaries.

No, I mentioned him. No one can forget the Sisko.

Wow how odd that the main plot points of season 2 might be about the series MAIN CHARACTER

By the way, not sure if you remember a guy called Sisko, he was basically Jesus in Spaaaaaaace, caused a war with Klingons, caused a war with the Dominion, was integral to stopping both and ultimately was responsible for saving the entire universe from being the playground for the Pah Wraiths.

But hey, thats totally different right?

 

[The Leewit]

It seems like Discovery is all about Michael. The Klingon War was about her. And now we learn that all the major plot points of Season 2 from Section 31 to the Red Angel was also connected to her as well. Isn't she special?

The showrunners have said that Discovery is all about Michael...the unfolding story is told from her perspective, much like Picard and Georgiou will have their respective show told from their perspective.

 

[Michael]

Well, that didn't click with me for some reason. It wasn't all bad – as usual I loved the Spock/Burnham scenes, the little moment with Nhan and Burnham in the corridor was nice, and I like that the reveal of who the Red Angel is was actually surprising to me – but the logic of what they were trying to do didn't work for me at all. Why would Burnham-Angel appear if Culber was standing by to resuscitate her? And I didn't follow the logic at all that it had to be Burnham who was the angel, since not all of the Red Angel appearances were linked to her.

Having said all that, I'm still interested to see where the story goes from here. And to be honest I'm still not convinced the Preservers don't somehow figure into all of it, because the obelisk design just can't be a coincidence. Well, we'll see.

I think I can very safely say no one saw that coming. I'm glad the arrogant don't have something they can congratulate themselves with.

No one? There sure weren't many, but there were some here who guessed exactly that. The way they kept mentioning Burnham's parents in a couple of the latest episodes laid the groundwork for this reveal, I think.

A clever way to bring back the original Airiam!

Cool scene with Sara Mitich entering the bridge to take Airiam's old station.

Yup, I thought so, too. Will be interesting to see if they'll ignore her character as well or only let us learn more about here once they decide to kill her off.

I didn't realize it was her until the credits. She was great in The Wire.

Ah, that's where I know that face from, thank you! I remember liking her on The Wire and think she got the chops to pull off a great performance.

I think I finally got a good enough look at the Discovery this week to determine that they seemingly have shortened the warp nacalles.

Kind of bummed, as I really liked them ridiculously long.

Really, what shot made you think that? That one?

Looks to me as they are about the same length as they were in season one:

Another little niggling issue from the first half of the episode (which I didn't like): they just casually mention they destroyed the Section 31 station off camera. Why the hell didn't they do that onscreen? I can understand not doing it last episode, because it would have ruined the ending, but they could have worked it into the opening act this episode, right before the funeral scene started.

Yup, would have been nice to actually see them destroy the station. That was a story thread that was kinda left hanging from last week. Sometimes it's weird what they decide to show and what not to show. The gazillionth CGI camera pan through the ship windows, for example. Although I must admit that I liked this one, because it's so seldom that we see shots from inside the saucer gap:

Although, is it my imagination or are we seeing a naked person through one of the windows?

Does every redshirt death get a full-crew funeral?

I thought it to be a weird choice to have the full crew (!) attend the funeral with the ship on auto-pilot.

So what is your issue, exactly?

That they don't like that plot contrivance in either instance?

 

[Lord Garth]

When Spock insists that everyone stick to the plan that Burnham die for the Red Angel appear, even when everyone doubts it, it made me think back to "Spectre of the Gun". At the end of that episode, everyone else was also not 100% sure but Spock didn't waver and said they couldn't have the smallest doubt.

 

[Lord Garth]

No one? There sure weren't many, but there were some here who guessed exactly that. The way they kept mentioning Burnham's parents in a couple of the latest episodes laid the groundwork for this reveal, I think.

Two others, in fact. eschaton and IMC Headquarters. But I posted that before I checked any other thread. I don't remember everything everyone says offhand. I figured there was no point in editing what I said earlier because now it's there for other people to call me out on. Like now.

 

[The Leewit]

When Spock insists that everyone stick to the plan that Burnham die for the Red Angel appear, even when everyone doubts it, it made me think back "Spectre of the Gun". At the end of that episode, everyone else was also not 100% but Spock didn't waver and said they couldn't have the smallest doubt.

He truly did have her back...brother dearest. Another great moment from this episode.

 

[Takeru]

They are obviously starting to turn Georgiou a bit more soft in preparation for her own series and/or her continued role on Discovery which I don't mind, I expected that but it still surprised me that she was the first one jumping to Michael's rescue.

 

[Amaris]

They are obviously starting to turn Georgiou a bit more soft in preparation for her own series and/or her continued role on Discovery which I don't mind, I expected that but it still surprised me that she was the first one jumping to Michael's rescue.

She must still love Michael, at least her Michael, which she has transferred those feelings to our Michael. I rather liked that scene where they were talking before the experiment.

 

[Michael]

Two others, in fact. eschaton and IMC Headquarters. But I posted that before I checked any other thread. I don't remember everything everyone says offhand. I figured there was no point in editing what I said earlier because now it's there for other people to call me out on. Like now.

At least three people.

And you didn't have to check any other thread. People in this very thread here were congratulating those who guessed correctly before your post.

 

[Michael]

Just realized that I theorized it was one of her parents as well a couple of days ago. Completely forgot about that.

 

[eschaton]

Third, many of the emotional beats didn't ring true. In particular, Burnham's shockingly immature reaction to Leland's admission to her (which wasn't actually even the kind of plot-relevant information she was asking for, but never mind that) managed the impressive task of making me actually sympathize with Leland. The whole story isn't remotely the most reprehensible thing he's done; indeed it sounds like his motives at the time were good and the risk was unintentional, and yet this is the thing she goes off on him about? Hell, she should be grateful to know she's been blaming herself needlessly.

I had the same issue. That was the point I was like "man, this episode is a bunch of melodramatic crap." Though it did right itself later on.

I mean, in a broad sense I suppose you could say Leland was "responsible" for their deaths. But it was clearly a mistake, and everyone involved worked for Section 31. It's like if your parents are in the military, are killed in combat, and you eventually meet their commanding officer who planned the mission 20 years later. Yes, if it wasn't for that call, they would be alive. But to err is human. And it happened when she was a small child. And Leland was obviously wracked by guilt about it for decades. I can understand being confused, saddened - but filled with rage as if he was the murderer?

I wonder if we as viewers were supposed to identify with Michael here, or see her in the wrong. Georgiou earlier in the season telegraphed something like this would happen. On the other hand, there's a symmetry between Leland's "responsibility" for Burnham's parents and Burnham indirectly causing the death of Georgiou is painfully obvious - meaning Burnham should have been able to identify with Leland.

Fourth—and this is the biggest and most multifaceted problem—the whole plot just made no damn sense. It makes no sense that the suit is a Federation time-travel experiment from nearly 20 years past; indeed, weren't we told in a recent episode that it was future tech? (And of course it has quite a lot of abilities beyond time travel — including instant healing, as seen in this very episode.) It also doubles down on the annoying Plot Devicium of "time crystals" from last season, making them something that's apparently been known and available for decades... which (logically) should have huge implications well beyond this story, and (in terms of continuity) completely undermines the new-ness of the Enterprise's pioneering time-travel discoveries in TOS.

We know Section 31 has access to tech that Starfleet thinks is "futuristic" in general. Also, it's entirely possible that Mama Burnham upgraded the suit in the future.

Having the Angel then actually turn out to be Burnham's mother is piling nonsense on top of nonsense, just for the sake of a Shocking Twist (which has no impact for viewers, as we've never met the character before). Never mind the mystery of how she isn't dead... the reveal completely undermines information from earlier in the same episode about the "bio-neural match," which supposedly proved beyond any doubt that it was Michael in the suit. Mother and daughter would not be identical on that level.

As I said, the bionural match thing may be accurate. Just because it was Mama Burnham in the suit this time doesn't mean it's always been her. Some of the earlier intervention into the timeline may have been future Michael. For example, Burnham would have a reason to save Saru and the Kepiens, but her mother wouldn't give a crap.

 

[Mr Awe]

Excellent episode. At first I thought the time logic was bad but it occurred to me that, whether Michael knows about the plan or not, the fact remains that she would still have to protect her past self to ensure her future existence.

I thought about that angle too. While she would be forced to save herself, she could alter the approach to avoid the trap. She knows how they're trying to catch her and would be able to change her plan. Some tech to avoid the trap or alter the timing of her rescue--it is a time suit after all. In other words, rescue her before the trap is set.

So, I'm glad it wasn't her because that would cause many complications and defies logic. Based on the information they had, including Michael in their plans to catch Michael didn't make sense. Ultimately it worked because it wasn't Michael.

 

[Amaris]

I have no problem with Michael's reaction to Leland's admission. It was her parents. Considering everything connected with Burnham started with the deaths of her parents, her reaction is completely understandable. Was it right? No. Yet it was very human.