I assume it will be on his record file for Kirk to read about. Whether this is the deciding factor in Kirk passing M'Benga over for CMO in favor of Piper and then McCoy may never be clear.
Spoilers Star Trek: Strange New Worlds 2x08 - "Under the Cloak of War"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
- Start date
Yeah, he didn’t do that when facing other kinds of stress.
You’re probably right, and I think that emphasizes the naïveté of the federation. Here’s a dude that killed hundreds if not thousands of your own citizens, but you consider him forgiven and allow him to represent you for foreign worlds and governments. Plus you expect everyone else to forgive him for his sins. It’s a very ideal message, but the reality is that could never happen. That like saying that instead of taking out Bin Laden, he turned himself over to us and we made him our UN ambassador.
Not anymore.
I'm talking about the ownership of the knife - nobody knows it was in the box. The assumption is that it's was the Ambassador's knife.
She knew it was his knife as that is how she knows he is going on his mission - it's strapped to his side when he leaves and they make sure that both we and chapel see it.
What does that say abut the federation when you have someone responsible for the deaths of thousands, and you make him your equal with no repercussions. That tells me that the deaths mean little to the federation and that life is so cheap that those at the top don’t really care how many ensigns and civilians get killed, as long as they at the top get the results the want.
I'm surprised Pike didn't follow up with, "Well, they say revenge doesn't solve anything. Did his death make you feel better? It did alleviate your pain?" Then walks off.
And M'Benga could give a cold look when alone and answer, "Yes"
I liked this episode - a lot. It was really attempting to channel some of the deeper, messier character studies from DS9 (it ultimately played kind of like a speedrun of Duet inverted). That said, the episode wasn't without flaws.
Starting with the positives, Babs hit it out of the park again with his performance as M'Benga. I wasn't a fan of the retcon of his character as being a PTSD-affected veteran at the start of the series, but here it does pay off in some interesting ways. Unlike some, I loved the darker turn that the episode took in the final act. I don't think we're supposed to explicitly agree with M'Benga's decision to murder Dak'Rah (let's be clear, that's what happened, even if Dak'Rah started grappling with him first). Still, it's understandable from a character perspective. I liked the ambiguity of Dak'Rah up through the end - we're not sure if he's genuinely sorry for what he did, or he just decided that being a cold-blooded killer didn't work any longer, so he moved on. And that final scene between M'Benga and Pike, with the simmering tension, is great, as it begins to show fractures in their friendship and potentially (should M'Benga be discovered) the reasons for his demotion.
All of that said, my God, this is a contrived plot scenario to put one of our main characters into the situation of murdering a dude in cold blood while still being sympathetic.
While I don't mind revisiting the Klingon War per se - Discovery really fucked up, never showing the actual human toll of the war - these scenes just reminded me how little the chronology of the war made sense. The war was from May 2256 to some unknown point in 2257. So the war lasted - not particularly long, to be honest. Yet a lot of the framing of the past scenes - like M'Benga having a past in special forces that he "put behind him" to focus on medicine - really seemed to infer the Klingon War was going on for quite a while. Obviously, even a short conflict can transform a nation (Ukraine has only been at war with Russia for less than a year and a half), yet it just reminded me of the sloppy worldbuilding that Discovery had done.
Also, nothing about the setup made sense to me. First, they had to create a scenario where the (hidden) crimes of Dak'Rah were as bad as Gul Darhe'el. There was an awful logic behind the Nazi analogs in Duet, but here, I just don't see it. There's arguably sometimes a twisted military strategy behind killing civilians, but the episode made it clear he was killing Klingon children as well. For what reason? To make him unforgivably evil, I guess? Also, while it's true the Federation believes in second chances; I found it completely unbelievable that a former Klingon general who was known to command a group that engaged in war crimes and claimed to have killed his own officers would just be waved into the diplomatic corps within...two years it seems like?
Also, a minor quibble, but once again we have Ortegas-bait, as the trailers/preview clips suggested we would dig deeper into her own psyche as a veteran, only for it to be another M'Benga/Chapel episode. Ortegas's reasons for not liking Dak'Rah are also pretty shallow - she just comes across as being a racist; M'Benga (and, to a lesser extent, Chapel) had a reason for personal animus.
Still, it was an interesting episode and a good character study. The lack of suitable setup/worldbuilding just means it's inferior to the DS9 episodes it's clearly meant to harken back to.
Starting with the positives, Babs hit it out of the park again with his performance as M'Benga. I wasn't a fan of the retcon of his character as being a PTSD-affected veteran at the start of the series, but here it does pay off in some interesting ways. Unlike some, I loved the darker turn that the episode took in the final act. I don't think we're supposed to explicitly agree with M'Benga's decision to murder Dak'Rah (let's be clear, that's what happened, even if Dak'Rah started grappling with him first). Still, it's understandable from a character perspective. I liked the ambiguity of Dak'Rah up through the end - we're not sure if he's genuinely sorry for what he did, or he just decided that being a cold-blooded killer didn't work any longer, so he moved on. And that final scene between M'Benga and Pike, with the simmering tension, is great, as it begins to show fractures in their friendship and potentially (should M'Benga be discovered) the reasons for his demotion.
All of that said, my God, this is a contrived plot scenario to put one of our main characters into the situation of murdering a dude in cold blood while still being sympathetic.
While I don't mind revisiting the Klingon War per se - Discovery really fucked up, never showing the actual human toll of the war - these scenes just reminded me how little the chronology of the war made sense. The war was from May 2256 to some unknown point in 2257. So the war lasted - not particularly long, to be honest. Yet a lot of the framing of the past scenes - like M'Benga having a past in special forces that he "put behind him" to focus on medicine - really seemed to infer the Klingon War was going on for quite a while. Obviously, even a short conflict can transform a nation (Ukraine has only been at war with Russia for less than a year and a half), yet it just reminded me of the sloppy worldbuilding that Discovery had done.
Also, nothing about the setup made sense to me. First, they had to create a scenario where the (hidden) crimes of Dak'Rah were as bad as Gul Darhe'el. There was an awful logic behind the Nazi analogs in Duet, but here, I just don't see it. There's arguably sometimes a twisted military strategy behind killing civilians, but the episode made it clear he was killing Klingon children as well. For what reason? To make him unforgivably evil, I guess? Also, while it's true the Federation believes in second chances; I found it completely unbelievable that a former Klingon general who was known to command a group that engaged in war crimes and claimed to have killed his own officers would just be waved into the diplomatic corps within...two years it seems like?
Also, a minor quibble, but once again we have Ortegas-bait, as the trailers/preview clips suggested we would dig deeper into her own psyche as a veteran, only for it to be another M'Benga/Chapel episode. Ortegas's reasons for not liking Dak'Rah are also pretty shallow - she just comes across as being a racist; M'Benga (and, to a lesser extent, Chapel) had a reason for personal animus.
Still, it was an interesting episode and a good character study. The lack of suitable setup/worldbuilding just means it's inferior to the DS9 episodes it's clearly meant to harken back to.
I just assumed he wasn’t the CMO for Kirk’s ship because he just wasn’t a very good Doctor.
He probably moved on to do other things and Kirk requested McCoy, who he is friends with to take his place.
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I don't need to know everything about the character's backstory and history and childhood booboos when I start watching a goddamned show. Part of the pleasure is watching things unfold. It feels like you're the type who has to know what happens at the end before you can start reading the book. I want this show to go on and on and part of what that means is that questions are asked that we hope will be answered later. I want to be told a story. I trust these storytellers so far.
It's further compounded by the fact that we don't see M'Benga scream for help as one would expect if Dak'rah suddenly attacked him, nor do we see any immediate attempts (considering they're literally in the middle of a cutting edge medical facility) to revive Dak'rah after the fight.
Ortegas' speciesm was already foreshadowed in 'A Quality of Mercy' and how quickly she turns on Spock. Whether this will actually be followed up on or whether it's just sloppy writing that coincidentally implies a darker future for the character is unclear.
What I didn't understand was that poor young ensign had a Red Vest while Va'Al Trask had a pure black suit for a night-operation.
Why on earth do you want to make your poor ensign stand out like a Red Coat?
Basic Camouflage for your uniform is essential, given that they're running night operations, wearing a mostly "Black Uniform" makes perfect sense for the situation.
But wearing that Red Chest during a Night Operation is STUPID from a basic tactics perspective.
It was literally painting a bulls-eye on the Young Ensign.
Why didn't everybody have a all black uniform for Night-Ops?
And Seriously, why aren't their StarFleet Insignia's "Black-ed Out" for Camouflage purposes on their Combat Uniform?
That shiny emblem is a giant "Shoot Me Right Here" signal to the enemy.
All good points. I think the short answer is "production values." The red armor did remind me of the security armor seen during the original TOS movies.
I would also like to think that by the 23rd Century, instead of just wearing black, they might have some Pred-tech style light-bending camo. Not necessarily a 100% effective cloak, but something that would make you near-invisible if you weren't moving.
They'd have to. They can make it now technically (though not field tested). But probably by the time it's common in that future there's also tech that can read it and/or target it.
There's a lot of weight being put on that assumption. Either Dak'Rah brought his own knife with him when he defected, in which case it's somewhere that isn't Captain Pike's Conference Table Forensic Scanner, or he didn't have a knife on him, and somebody probably wrote that down at the time. Also, given that the knife belonged to some random Klingon the Andorian officer killed, it probably has somebody else's name on it.
I just keep thinking about the scene in Twelve Angry Men where the jurors are talking about how the prosecution insists that the knife taken as evidence was one-of-a-kind and there was no possibility for a mix-up, and then Henry Fonda takes out an identical knife and slams it down right next to the "unique" one.
I can't picture M'Benga screaming for help. He's former special forces.
I think the lack of medical response was clear, both M'Benga and Chapel had no remorse over his death. Justice was served. Finally.
Great episode. Yes, it was very dark, and there was no comic relief. But it told a great story and it was well done.
The green stuff has a name. Protocol 12. So now we know about Chapel and M'Benga using it before and it helps explain the overly drawn out fight scenes in The Broken Circle episode.
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This episode was absolutely fantastic. We get more backstory on M'Benga and Chapel's experiences in the Klingon war, explanations on the serum and that M'Benga created it, and the episode itself touches on past sins, forgiveness, and trauma. It is very well done. This is top tier Star Trek, as far as I'm concerned.
Wernher von Braun was a Nazi scientist, designing and testing new rockets for the Nazi campaign. Von Braun used slave laborers from concentration camps to build his rockets. After surrendering to the United States, the US picked him up for its own space program. He is now celebrated as the father of modern rocket science.
When Germany surrendered, one of the key generals placed in charge of West Germany was Adolf Heusinger, Hitler's former Chief of Staff. Then, too, in 1961, he was picked to be the Chairman of the NATO military committee.
There are a lot more examples in history, but those are the two that came immediately to mind for me.
This has happened in history.
Wernher von Braun was a Nazi scientist, designing and testing new rockets for the Nazi campaign. Von Braun used slave laborers from concentration camps to build his rockets. After surrendering to the United States, the US picked him up for its own space program. He is now celebrated as the father of modern rocket science.
When Germany surrendered, one of the key generals placed in charge of West Germany was Adolf Heusinger, Hitler's former Chief of Staff. Then, too, in 1961, he was picked to be the Chairman of the NATO military committee.
There are a lot more examples in history, but those are the two that came immediately to mind for me.
I clearly haven’t been keeping up with the news; I had to go look that up.
Defecting to NK is like defecting to a poorly supplied prison camp.
Yep. Definitely not a rational decision, and apparently this soldier has many issues. A definite problem child based solely on his disciplinary record.
She saw him with the knife when he was kitted out to go Klingon hunting, although there is no way to say for sure that she knew or suspected it was the exact same knife.
Horrible example.
Look up the term "In medias res". We find out the nature of M'Benga and Pike's relation through dialog by the characters. There doesn't have to be fifty episodes about it to make it "earned".'
