It’s 2018, Star Trek: Discovery is back for another half-season, and it feels like a completely different show. Again. In a universe already filled with temporal and spatial anomalies, Discovery is an anomaly of its own. It can’t decide what it wants to be. The rest of the Star Trek series basically know what they are: a starship and its crew exploring space (or a space station at the crossroads of the galaxy). When Discovery launched, it promised a different kind of storytelling: a serialized arc about a disgraced Starfleet officer aboard a ship at war. After several major shifts in that arc, including diversions into standalone time-travel shenanigans (which I liked, mind you), the series has jerked us in yet another new direction. One of my favorite things about Star Trek is how many different tones and types of storytelling it can encompass: drama, comedy, action/adventure, horror, etc. But in previous series, all these shifts in tone were contained within the steady framework of the series’ premise. Discovery has felt so messy because its premise keeps shifting, and its transitions between tones are more jarring.
So what about that new story arc?
Mirror, Mirror… Again?
I confess: as soon as I figured out we were in the Mirror Universe, I groaned. Haven’t we gone to this well enough times? Look, I think “Mirror, Mirror” is easily one of the best episodes of the Original Series. Deep Space Nine expanded on the Mirror Universe in interesting ways, but it had already started to wear out its welcome by the series’ end. Enterprise found an original angle by setting its story entirely in the Mirror Universe. But now? What is so interesting about the Mirror Universe that we have to keep returning there? Seeing evil versions of our characters (or in this case, our normal characters acting evil)? In a series that has mostly avoided the nostalgia crutch, the decision to use the Mirror Universe again feels like a tired throwback.
However, even though I was frustrated with the concept, what’s here is solid and well-executed. Some moments are even great. Tilly’s attempts to impersonate her evil self are laugh-out-loud funny, and her gold power suit is badass. The episode nicely sidesteps the trope of making the female Mirror Universe costumes just skimpier versions of the regular uniforms. And in one particularly good expository scene, the episode ties the Terran Empire into the season’s larger themes. “Their entire society is built on fear and rejection of the Other,” Burnham explains. Just like the Klingon and Vulcan movements for cultural and racial purity, the Terran Empire is explicitly rooted in xenophobia. In our current political moment, it does feel like “decency is weakness.” It remains to be seen how the season will tie together these alien / Terran alt-right movements, but it does seem to be building toward some kind of grand statement.
Tyler Terror
Meanwhile, Tyler’s story is getting more compelling all the time. “Despite Yourself” continues the effective technique established in “Into the Forest I Go,” with quick, jarring flashbacks of Tyler’s torture. An intense scene between him and L’Rell raises some interesting questions. She snaps him into a fugue state with a code phrase, but he doesn’t finish the sequence by stating his Klingon name, indicating that his brainwashing (or whatever it is) isn’t complete. L’Rell’s alarmed expression tells us that it isn’t part of her plan (whatever that is). Shazad Latif turns in his best performance to date, showing us Tyler’s slowly building sense of panic, like he’s trapped inside his own body. Dr. Culber even raises the terrifying possibility that the Tyler we see, and that he experiences, isn’t even the real Tyler. And then, in a truly shocking moment, Tyler snaps Culber’s neck: tragically, while Stamets is right there, in a spore-induced delirium. Though I continue to find the Burnham / Tyler romance “meh” (it hasn’t been quite as interesting as it was in the playful, romantic “Magic to Make the Sanest Man Go Mad”), the question of what Tyler is and whether he can control himself makes for more than enough intrigue.
As Burnham takes control of the ISS Shenzhou, walking a razor’s edge between acting evil and remaining good, Discovery heads into the unknown, with a solid start to its latest storyline. I’ve given up at trying to guess what this season will look like. How much time will we spend in the Mirror Universe? Will it tie into the larger story arc of the Klingon war or feel like a distraction? Only time will tell. At least we’re not in the agony booth like poor Lorca. I’ve always wondered just how much those things hurt.
Miscellaneous Notes:
- What the hell is L’Rell’s plan anyway? What can she hope to achieve with Tyler at this point, with the Discovery in a completely different universe? Does she merely hope to escape, or use Tyler for a greater purpose?
- Stamets is out of commission for this episode, still lost in whatever realm the spores catapulted him into. But it will be heartbreaking when he comes back to reality and realizes Culber is dead. I’d really begun to care about their relationship.
- The episode’s only true WTF moment: when Lorca bangs his head against the wall to draw blood. I repeat the question from an earlier review: what is this guy’s deal?
- On a pure action / badassness level, the episode’s best moment is when Burnham arrives on the bridge with the corpse of Connors and the crew begins a slow clap for her. The fight scene in the turbolift is very well choreographed. And it’s a nice twist of the knife (pun intended) for Burnham, having to kill the alternate version of a colleague she already blames herself for killing.
- The episode is directed by Jonathan Frakes, William T. Riker himself, who also directed two Trek movies and 14 episodes of TNG, DS9, and Voyager. The direction is good, except for an early scene where the camera spins around a table like a merry-go-round. There’s disorienting, and then there’s nauseating.
Previous episode: “Into the Forest I Go”
Next episode: “The Wolf Inside”