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Spoilers Star Trek: Discovery 3x07 - "Unification III"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
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You're welcome?
If memory serves correctly, on original broadcast, "Unification" parts I and II described events that were yet to be seen in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, which would be released later on.
I've been going over "Unification III" to see foreshadowing of future Trek developments. None so far...
Although, The Undiscovered Country could be shortened to The Un-Discovery in light of recent events. A redacted ship suddenly revealed and re-integrated.
I've been going over "Unification III" to see foreshadowing of future Trek developments. None so far...
Although, The Undiscovered Country could be shortened to The Un-Discovery in light of recent events. A redacted ship suddenly revealed and re-integrated.
Not bad. The refit and the jump scene look very good. It's also a relief Burnham and her mother are apparently not connected with "the burn".
Despite being just a plot device, the SB-19 is an interesting concept.
I don't know what to think of the Ni'Var thing. Was it necessary to change the name of the planet?
Nice to see the Vulcans and the Romulans finally achieved unification. That said, it was curious how Burnham in one episode almost ruined Spock's life work.
Tilly as first officer doesn't make sense. It seems there's no chain of command on Discovery.
Too much emotions and crying in the ep. I hope they tone that down a bit.
8/10
Despite being just a plot device, the SB-19 is an interesting concept.
I don't know what to think of the Ni'Var thing. Was it necessary to change the name of the planet?
Nice to see the Vulcans and the Romulans finally achieved unification. That said, it was curious how Burnham in one episode almost ruined Spock's life work.
Tilly as first officer doesn't make sense. It seems there's no chain of command on Discovery.
Too much emotions and crying in the ep. I hope they tone that down a bit.
8/10
Sure there is. That's why they need a new First Officer. Though putting Tilly in that spot is odd.
Keeping the name Vulcan might not sit well with the Romulans and push them away.
As much as the over-importance of Burnham is absurd within Discovery, Burnham isn't responsible for getting Vulcans and Romulans angry at each other. They were basically at each other's throats long before she got there. Burnham's forum just gave them an excuse to bring the feud out into the open. She didn't ruin any of Spock's life work that wasn't already at at risk and barely hanging together as it was.
Other than Saru, Burnham, and Tilly, who else went through the command officers training program?
Ohh, can we see Tilly take the Kobayashi Maru?
Because the answer was cake all along.
One might assume that anyone wearing gold is required to take command training.
Ha! It does to. Completely unintentional i assure you.
I watched the episode first thing in the morning, but thanksgiving stuff got in the way of writing a response until now. And since I wanted to write more of a mini-essay than anything, I really didn't want to respond on my phone.
Regardless...
Better than last week, but similar to last week (and the week before) a mixture of good elements and awful ones.
As is normal, I'll start with the good:
Regardless...
Better than last week, but similar to last week (and the week before) a mixture of good elements and awful ones.
As is normal, I'll start with the good:
- I give this episode props for having coherent character arcs, particularly for Michael. She starts the episode conflicted and doubtful regarding her place on Discovery, but has her "faith" restored by the end.
- I really appreciated that we another action-less episode of Discovery (lacking even a 30-second fight scene like Forget Me Not). It's been a long time since we had a courtroom drama episode in Trek (Lower Decks excepted) so this was a welcome change of pace.
- Some of the individual character moments were great. I liked Michael's scenes with Book, and enjoyed seeing Mama Burnham actually act a bit like a mother this season, and not just an exposition fairy.
- I appreciated that a bit of worldbuilding went into imagining future Vulcan/Romulan society, although I do wish we actually go to go to Vulcan. I understand that not every episode can have a true away mission.
- Was it just me, or were Saru and the Vulcan President flirting a bit at the end of the episode?
- Tilly being promoted to "acting" XO is just dumb. Tilly is unprepared/unsuited for command, Oddly, the writers seem to understand this, given Tilly herself raises all of the issues, and Saru just waves them away. This is all being pretty transparently driven by Mary Wiseman being a main cast member, while all the likely candidates who outrank her are still only slightly jumped-up extras. Tilly made sense in the original conception early in Section 1 - as Michael's roomie to show how much she is really starting from the bottom. But ever since the "lower decks' conceit was dropped, I feel like the writers have struggled to find a way to make her relevant from week to week. This is just sort of the culmination of this - kicking her upwards to finally get rid of the issue of how a "lowly" ensign is always at the center of things. To be honest, I'd have no issue with this happening...eventually. But this is another case of something being unearned. Sure, she has played integral roles in solving various problems onboard the ship, but so have others such as Stamets. She should have had an arc where her leadership skills were put to the test, and she was shown to have grown before getting this promotion. If I viewed things from a within-show perspective, the decision here would really make me lose confidence in Saru's captaincy, but of course I can see the stitch-up job the writer's room did, so I won't blame him directly.
- Secondary to this, the ending of the arc - the big group hug - was all wrong. I'm not in the "Starfleet is the military" camp, but it's a very military-like situation. Lieutenants and Lieutenant Commanders have every reason to be resentful of an ensign jumping to the front of the line. A group hug just seems wildly inappropriate. Now that she's XO, she's their fricking supervisor. Indeed, the job of the XO is typically to be more of a hardass with the crew than the captain himself. It's totally ruining her sense of authority to seem this vulnerable and unsure in front of everyone, and it's also really weird to see literally everyone beaming and saying "no really Tilly, I'm so happy you got this instead of me!"
- The initial premise was really contrived, insofar as Admiral Vance pivots from his hostility to Burnham in the last episode to "we need you" at the drop of a hat. I honestly moved past this pretty quickly, but again, the show was showing its stitching.
- They were so close to ending Michael's character arc in this episode in a smart way, and then they totally blew it. When Michael actually stepped back from her monomania regarding The Burn and said "you know what, I don't think it's worth it to cause a civil war in order to get the data, you keep it" I thought it was a tremendous step forward for her. Probably the most concrete one I have seen yet, because she seemed to finally realize just because she wants something to happen doesn't mean it's actually the best course of action, and that her duty to the Federation outweighed her messiah complex. Then the writers had to ruin it with the Vulcan President passing the data along to Mama Burnham anyway. This basically negates the character arc, because it means that Michael sacrificed absolutely nothing and got everything she wanted regardless.
Other than not liking the character or disagreeing with the writers decision to do it, can anybody come up with a reason based on what we've been shown so far in DISCOVERY's episodes, why Tilly should not be given a chance to prove herself as being capable of filling the FIrst Officer spot?
And it has to jive with the fact that we have seen the entire bridge crew welcome Saru's decision.
Nothing we've seen so far indicates to me that she should not be given a chance to try.
And it has to jive with the fact that we have seen the entire bridge crew welcome Saru's decision.
Nothing we've seen so far indicates to me that she should not be given a chance to try.
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Can I just say that I appreciate that Vance isn't a dysfunctional and/or evil badmiral? Because I really do. It's a nice change of pace.
As for the episode itself.... I'm conflicted, because there was a part of me that loved it and a part that was profoundly disappointed that the episode didn't go deeper into what Ni'Var is actually like.
As for the episode itself.... I'm conflicted, because there was a part of me that loved it and a part that was profoundly disappointed that the episode didn't go deeper into what Ni'Var is actually like.
Considering Tilly's entry into the program as an ensign was a major exception, it's very likely that other officers were still looking forward to it. Indeed, a scientist like Stamets probably had no leadership preparation outside of his department.
I like Tilly, but an Ensign who only recently was a cadet, wouldn't he high on the list of candidates. She would need to prove her self at lower levels first. Like Harry Kim, who was cutting his teeth by taking the con on third shift.
You do realize that it's been almost four years since she was in the Academy right?
(notwithstanding the jump in time)
I know, right? I definitely got that vibe.
The issue is that Tilly's worthiness can't be viewed in isolation. The rest of the crew exists, even if they are not played by main cast members. Tilly has experience, but most of them outrank her and have more experience than she does.
Tilly is not just being offered a promotion, she's being jumped over the rest of the crew, and being made their direct supervisor.
Can I just say that I appreciate that Vance isn't a dysfunctional and/or evil badmiral? Because I really do. It's a nice change of pace.
As for the episode itself.... I'm conflicted, because there was a part of me that loved it and a part that was profoundly disappointed that the episode didn't go deeper into what Ni'Var is actually like.
I didn't say this in my episode review, but I am in some ways a bit let down that the N'Var President didn't have a bit more of a in-depth critique of the Federation other than the awkward Peak Oil analogy.
I mean, I'm happy they haven't gone with "evil Federation" but at the same time, I find it kind of naïve that the Discovery crew trusts implicitly that the Federation holds the exact same ideals they do after 930 years of cultural evolution.
Which as far as we've been shown, has been completely addressed by that entire conversation in the spore room between her and the bridge crew.
I think folks who object really need to take into account the fact that this has been described by the characters themselves as being her "audition" toward her stated goal of eventually being a Starship Captain.
I think too that one needs to take into account the circumstances the Discovery Crew find themselves in.
It's not like she can now follow the normal process that would have likely been in place before they jumped to the future.
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