What if...Burnham had refused Lorca’s invitation

[The Wormhole]

Regulations were on his side, he had the power to conscript her for the war effort, whether she liked it or not.

Actually, no, Admiral Cornwell said that Lorca was crossing a line when he recruited Michael.

Are we a 100% that all we've seen of Lorca is MU Lorca? Is that confirmed or is there a certain window were he could've been swapped?

It really has been Mirror Lorca all this time. Remember, what tipped Michael off was when she learned that photosensitivity is a thing among all the humans of the MU, since it's been a thing with Lorca going all the way back to his very first scene on the show.

 

[Feron]

That's always been my assumption. The whole affair was staged to get Burnham onto the Discovery. It'd be less convincing to the prisoners if the pilot was with them when they landed (since there wouldn't be much reason for Landry to be messing with them if they were in someone else's custody), but it'd also be a pretty tough sell to get a pilot to both fly into a hazardous area of space and then cut her own line without a rescue plan just for a ruse.

Another possibility is this:

People are assuming (and it certainly is not an unreasonable assumption) that Lorca staged things to bring Burnham to the Discovery.

What if he was telling the truth when he stated that destiny brings them together? As many have noted, the likelihood that alternate versions of people exist in a mirror universe (with a very different history in key points) and they not only exist but also have relationships with pretty much the same groups of people is pretty darn slim, to say the least.

What if the reason a mirror universe can even exist is because some unseen force really does manipulate events so that mirror versions of prime people really do get brought together so that the basic relationships between the universes remains relatively the same?

After all, the trigger event on the prison shuttle was the weird energy eating bugs. Yeah, maybe an extremely tricky Lorca might be able to make something like that happen, but what if he didn't? What if that itself was a manifestation for what Lorca describes as "destiny"?

 

[Succubint]

Nope, he was able to recite the exact regulation which allowed him to conscript her in time of war due to necessity, even if she was a convict. I think he quotes it, or it's mentioned at least twice.

Of course, it was still dependent on Starfleet okaying his actions. Which they did. Until Cornwell had the shag-of-doom and realized he needed to be deposed.

Mirror Lorca seems to have crossed over at the time of the destruction of the Buran. So 7 months or so?

 

[David cgc]

After all, the trigger event on the prison shuttle was the weird energy eating bugs. Yeah, maybe an extremely tricky Lorca might be able to make something like that happen, but what if he didn't? What if that itself was a manifestation for what Lorca describes as "destiny"?

Burnham argued the triggering event was Burnham (and her new friends) being suddenly transferred to a different prison without the standard waiting periods and whatnot, and then the shuttle diverting to a new course halfway through the trip (probably so it could smash into the bug swarm). The ties that bind the mirror universe to the regular one are one thing, but we've never heard of such random events occurring to synch things back up (well, maybe Sisko's birth, if Mirror-Sisko's parents had a less wildly implausible romance). Either Lorca set her up to be rescued by the Discovery, or someone else did (well, I suppose someone else could've been trying to kill her and make it look like an accident, and it was, in fact, destiny that the Discovery was there).

I think the sufficient invocation of destiny was Burnham throwing her career away at a moment that made no difference to the larger universe. If she'd kept her pinchy fingers to herself, the war still would've happened, the Buran would've been destroyed and Lorca-Prime (presumably) killed, but she'd be captain or first officer on another ship, where Lorca couldn't get to her.

 

[Agony_Boothb]

What I want to know is how did Mudd know about Lorca and the Buran? Did MU lorca know MU Mudd? Did Lorca get help from PU Mudd when he first arrived?

 

[Donker]

Before all this Mirror Universe crap, Lorca makes way more sense as S31. I would bet $500 that was the original plan for him before this show underwent it's production problems (and obvious massive rewrites) and Discovery is in fact a Starfleet Intelligence ship being helmed by a S31 agent. (Black badges, 1031)

The "Mirror Universe peoples eyes are worse" doesn't even really make sense in the context of Discovery because we literally see Lorcas eyes get damaged.

My guess is when the show hit massive production troubles, Issacs saw the way the wind was blowing and decided to jump ship and this Mirror Universe arc is how they try to write him out.

 

[Beyerstein]

I'm wondering if MirrorLorca somehow engineered the whole war being started. what if that wasn't the real sarek who told her the Vulcans fired first? would the Vulcans really do that?

 

[Succubint]

The "Mirror Universe peoples eyes are worse" doesn't even really make sense in the context of Discovery because we literally see Lorcas eyes get damaged.

My guess is when the show hit massive production troubles, Issacs saw the way the wind was blowing and decided to jump ship and this Mirror Universe arc is how they try to write him out.

When did this damage happen on screen? We have seen him treat his 'damaged' eyes with injections and eye drops. He's reacted to the increased light levels but no, we haven't literally seen them get damaged.

Sorry, but your guess would most likely be wrong. That's not how contracts with actors tend to work in the film and TV industry. He most likely signed on for a limited number of seasons, one or two at most, with the proviso that he can renegotiate when the terms run out and there's a possibility of renewal. The fee and duration of the contract are usually sorted out well before filming even starts.

 

[Donker]

When did this damage happen on screen? We have seen him treat his 'damaged' eyes with injections and eye drops. He's reacted to the increased light levels but no, we haven't literally seen them get damaged.

In the scene where you see the Buran get destroyed. Also it's obvious that the Mirror Universe arc was not originally planned to be part of the series. The original plan for this series revolved around the Klingon War, but for whatever reason, they rewote that and added the Mirror Universe crap in. It's why so much stuff from the first 3-4 episodes of Discovery has been quietly dropped and the Klingon War happened entirely off screen with the Klingons not being explored at all. That Klingon Set they had must be insanely expensive, probably the single most expensive set of the show, think they planned on only using it for a few minutes of screentime? Voq/Tyler was a giant road to nothing, we saw none of the Klingon Houses they built extremely expensive sets for, the Torchbearer armour which is probably the most expensive costume of the show was shown literally for 10 seconds.

The Mirror Universe is a cheap way to pad out the season since you can just reuse all the sets and just change up some of the costumes and since I'm going to say, 110% Lorca was not originally planned to be Mirror Universe but S31, it was obviously done to write him out of the show.

Sorry, but your guess would most likely be wrong. That's not how contracts with actors tend to work in the film and TV industry. He most likely signed on for a limited number of seasons, one or two at most, with the proviso that he can renegotiate when the terms run out and there's a possibility of renewal.

I meant that he saw the way the wind was blowing and told them he would not be returning after S1. It would line up with the rumours that several of the actors basically told CBS they were bailing at the end of S1 due to production issues with the show.

 

[Timo]

There is no "scene where the Buran gets destroyed".

So there most certainly is no evidence for a different rationale for Lorca's eyes at his first appearance, and every reason to think he was always intended to be light-sensitive by birth and lying about it.

As for Mudd knowing about the Buran incident, it sort of directly follows from the premise. Lorca would make a big deal of it, this being his cover story for many things including his eyes, his curious bouts of amnesia, and his changed personality.

It's also an artifact of this being a Phoney War. Basically nothing happens in that war until Kol distributes cloaks to his faction: 8000 people die in the first day, in the first battle, and then only 2000 more before "Magic to Make". So the Buran would be major news, just like the Graf Spee was major news in early WWII.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Hythlodeus]

Voq/Tyler was a giant road to nothing

so, you've seen the last three episodes already? good to know. any hints how the ship comes back to the PU?

 

[Captain Killy]

The "Mirror Universe peoples eyes are worse" doesn't even really make sense in the context of Discovery because we literally see Lorcas eyes get damaged.

No we don’t.

 

[The Wormhole]

In the scene where you see the Buran get destroyed.

What kind of alternate Discovery are you watching?

 

[SJGardner]

No we don’t.

I think the only thing we see is L'Rell torturing him with a floodlight, but she outright states she's just exploiting the fact his eyes are painfully sensitive to light.

 

[Agony_Boothb]

In the scene where you see the Buran get destroyed.

We never see the Buran being destroyed.

Have you actually watched Discovery?

 

[Tuskin38]

What I want to know is how did Mudd know about Lorca and the Buran?

There was a Prime Universe Buran as well.

My current theory is either Mirror!Lorca destroyed the USS Buran (either by his own hand or tipped the Klingons off), or he took advantage of its destruction to replace Prime!Lorca.

Pretending he survived the destruction of the ship.

S31 agent. (Black badges, 1031)

Section 31 doesn't work like that

In the scene where you see the Buran get destroyed.

We never saw the Buran's destruction.

 

[Ar-Pharazon]

What I want to know is how did Mudd know about Lorca and the Buran? Did MU lorca know MU Mudd? Did Lorca get help from PU Mudd when he first arrived?

Of course! MU Mudd! That's why he's so much more menacing.