Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 3x07 - "Unification III"

Remember that Spock mind-melded with Jean-Luc at the end of Unification II. Since he is now in an ageless android shell, we will find out that he completed Spock's work over hundreds of years, and the 31st century Romulans and Vulcans are now devout followers of "The Picard".

 

I've always wondered how unification between Vulcan and Romulus would work, especially considering that Vulcan and Romulus are so distant and Vulcan is part of the Federation. Would the Romulans join the Federation? Would Vulcan split from the Federation and join the Romulan Empire (unlikely)? Or would unification simply mean a normalization of relationships between the two with free trade, free trade, free cultural exchanges etc...? Did the Burn maybe serve as a catalyst for unification? Perhaps, with the fall of the Federation, Vulcan was independent again and decided to actually join Romulus?

 

I have no such expectations. Expectations are the thief of joy.


Best to keep them realistic and in-check.

 

Distant philosophically, perhaps - but there's little evidence that Romulus would be far away from Vulcan in terms of lightyears.

In the original Unification episodes, the trip from Romulus to Vulcan in a fleet of old tubs actually takes very little time. For all we know, it's a shorter hop from Vulcan to the Romulan Neutral Zone than it is from Earth to Vulcan, and Romulus might lurk right behind the Zone.

Granted that the Romulans probably would want to put distance between themselves and the planet they abandoned in disgust or fear. But perhaps they weren't able to travel far. Or perhaps they never really "left", and the relatively proximal Vulcan colony named Romulus simply stopped answering Vulcan vidiphone calls, and started shooting down visiting Vulcan ships?

I rather think the latter is the more likely scenario. What do the Vulcans need the Federation for? It was convenient back when there was this big war with Romulus. But the Vulcans have been dealing with, say, Klingons just fine all on their own, as per "The Vulcan Hello".

So perhaps Romulans agree to worship Surak, and Vulcan agrees to join the New Star Empire? But Vulcans might also give up their silly attempt at suppressing emotion, and the Romulans would join... What exactly? They'd probably see little value in the Federation being run by Admiral Vance. If Burnham is to sell them futures, she better give the speech of her life.

Timo Saloniemi

 

Burnham: Whatever became of the Zhat Vash and the great android hunt I read so much about?

Praetor Saruk: That's a very interesting story Commander Burnham. After--

(zap)

Linus: Sorry, transporter malfunction again. Hmm, I must have accidentally beamed down here and mistakenly beamed the Praetor up to Discovery in my place. Hope he wasn't in the middle of doing anything important.

 

goddammit @LastRideOut you can't vote before you see the episode

 

I just had an inspired idea. I'll watch "Unification" I and II before this.

 

I am not sure that we can trust travel times in the show since we know episodes can fudge times for dramatical purposes.

Based on this map, Vulcan and Romulus seem pretty far apart. I drew a line between them for comparison.

 

Same! If I'm honest, they aren't my favorite two-parter, so I haven't revisited them in a while. This seems like a great time to do so.

I wonder if there will be a "Previously on..." similar to last season?

 

Unification I aired eight months before I was born. I guess I've been waiting for Unification III my entire life.

 

I watched them last week, and realized again how great they were

 

That would make a for a very entertaining Star Trek show.

 

Kinda curious about this one. Wonder just how deep the connection to the original two-parter there'll be. Was never really a huge fan of Unification to be honest. As far as antagonists go Sela was just the worst, and the story kind of loses focus towards the end, but I always loved this exchange.

Data: As you examine your life, do you find you have missed your humanity?

Spock: I have no regrets.

Data: "No regrets". That is a human expression.

Spock: Yes... fascinating.​

 

It wasn't about Sela. Spock's interactions with Picard and Data were great, Picard negotiating a BoP from the junior officer played by Erick Avari was great, the Qualor II lady and her songs were fun, Picard trying to sleep with Data looking at nothing was hilarious, and the end was epic with Spock connecting with his dead dad for the first time after decades of fighting.

 

Yes. Sela is a bit of a weak point in the episode but everything else is great. There are a lot of great moments in the episode. I love the scene with Picard and Sarek. I also love the scenes between Spock and Data. And the B plot with Riker and the enterprise investigating what happened to the TPau is also really good. We really get to see Riker's command style. And the B plot ties in nicely with the A plot.

 

I also rewatched "Face of the Enemy" since it followed up on the reunification storyline a bit.

 

I would add that the scenes between Spock and Picard are great. Not surprising. Any time you put actors like Leonard Nimoy and Patrick Stewart playing characters like Spock and Picard together, it's going to be great.

 

Good point, I'll watch that one today!

 

Oh, God. I'm reminded of how much red tape there was that the Enterprise-D normally went through.

Admiral goes to Picard, Picard goes to Vulcan, talks to Perrin, talks to Sarek, goes back to the Enterprise, has Worf try to reach Gowron, Gowron won't answer so Picard has Worf try to reach someone else, then they finally get in touch with a Junior Adjutant. Meanwhile Data looks up information about Senator Pardek, goes into his Senate Record, mentions where he might be found outside of the Senate Floor...

This is like me IRL, having to do paperwork, reaching out to someone, and getting sent from place to place to get a signature for something.

I don't understand what made Spock want to become a politician. This applies to TUC as well. I get trying to promote good causes in the galaxy, but becoming a politician is basically becoming a professional liar.

 

I am hoping for Spock being mentioned prominently. And also a "previously on Star Trek" part with clips from first 2 unification episodes. If the fat Ferengi is mentioned or seen then that would a bonus.