That was excellent. Full marks. This episode had a gravitas appropriate to the circumstance, and was deeply respectful to the characters of Discovery and the franchise as a whole.
The Enterprise looked great. If someone could turn down the eye-level lights and do something about the mirrored floors it would be perfect. The visual clutter makes it hard to look at, but the actual design of the bridge and the turbolift was amazing. Definitely a fan of how they updated it, aside from the minor nitpicks.
I did laugh a bit at Sarek and Amanda showing up just to have a little heart-to-heart while a guy who desperately wants to acquire Discovery was chasing them and had a head-start. Space and time mean nothing to family!
The character moments and goodbyes were all excellent (save one). Everyone got a moment to show how important the situation is and where it's all leading (as far as they know). Only the Tyler/Burnham scene completely fell flat for me. They simply don't have the chemistry that the writing assumes they have; they fell in love during a time loop that was erased and the show has never managed to make up for that since then.
Po just seems shoehorned in, as there's no particular reason any of her skills were crucial to magicking up the solution any more than either Reno or Stamets could have, but she's an interesting character to have around. I just hope that if she does become a persistent member of the crew they give her some actual genius instead of just Informed-Attribute genius.
None of these little problems detracted from what made it great, thankfully. I've become desensitized to a lot of these little stupidities, I think...
This really felt like a second pilot, that somehow had an entire season to set it up. Now everything's teed up, we'll see if they can make the shot next week. A lot of how well this whole season lands depends on whether this finale (which I strongly suspect will be a monster cliff-hanger) resolves or utilizes the plots they've been dangling. I'm glad this episode gave them the time it needed to breathe and put everything in place without too much of the usual shell game.
My favorite line of the episodes
"I thought there were no bad ideas?" - Emperor Georgiou
And then Cornwell of all people says "that's a bad idea." I'm sorry, but after last season's finale, she isn't allowed to judge. But at least she's learned her lesson at taking strategy advice from a genocidal psychopathic dictator.
