We finally get some real movement on the Ortegas trauma that was set up earlier in the season and the solution, forced exposure therapy, is pretty wild. Ortegas managed to overcome it fairly well, which does back up the “she passed her psych eval” stated in an earlier episode. Not only does she overcome a personal problem, but she actually manages some form of diplomacy across multiple alien species. Way to go.
My biggrumble with this episode is the ending. I saw it coming a mile away, there’s no practical way to end it other than finding some excuse to write out the good!gorn. I think the episode did not even need the aliens running things behind the scenes, it would have been perfectly fine to just have the spatial anomaly and a crash landing as the setup.
I hope that Ortegas remembers that La’an killed the Gorn, that will make for some nice drama later. I also hope that Ortegas remembers enough that she could try to advocate for the Gorn. While this episode wasn’t quite “Darmok”, Ortegas shows a lot of aptitude for cross-species communication, and that needs to be used alongside her piloting.
The Uhura-Pike drama was a bit less enjoyable. At the end of the episode pike basically says he would have stayed anyway, which undermines the whole B-Plot of the episode. If anything it should have been a Pike-Una debate. And with a more pressing need than “These people need a vaccine absolutely right now but also they can wait a couple days if need be”.
the episode did not even need the aliens running things behind the scenes, it would have been perfectly fine to just have the spatial anomaly and a crash landing as the setup.
I think having the Metron running things behind the scenes helped a bit. I did a huge eye roll when there just happened to be a recently-occupied tent within walking distance from the crash site on a desolate moon, given the vastness of space this is so ridiculous (not that it stopped Star Trek or other sci-fi before).
I kinda appreciate how the Metrons orchestrating things can explain details that seem extremely contrived or impossible otherwise:
a human and a gorn being stuck in the same spot in the first place
a traversable wormhole that they didn’t detect, and that is unlike anything on record
a moon with an orbit that passes through a gas giant thermosphere, that somehow hasn’t had its orbit decay long ago, and that somehow retains a breathable atmosphere
Ortegas and the gorn surviving burning the atmosphere - you see a blue glow around them when that happens
I really enjoyed this one.
We finally get some real movement on the Ortegas trauma that was set up earlier in the season and the solution, forced exposure therapy, is pretty wild. Ortegas managed to overcome it fairly well, which does back up the “she passed her psych eval” stated in an earlier episode. Not only does she overcome a personal problem, but she actually manages some form of diplomacy across multiple alien species. Way to go.
My biggrumble with this episode is the ending. I saw it coming a mile away, there’s no practical way to end it other than finding some excuse to write out the good!gorn. I think the episode did not even need the aliens running things behind the scenes, it would have been perfectly fine to just have the spatial anomaly and a crash landing as the setup.
I hope that Ortegas remembers that La’an killed the Gorn, that will make for some nice drama later. I also hope that Ortegas remembers enough that she could try to advocate for the Gorn. While this episode wasn’t quite “Darmok”, Ortegas shows a lot of aptitude for cross-species communication, and that needs to be used alongside her piloting.
The Uhura-Pike drama was a bit less enjoyable. At the end of the episode pike basically says he would have stayed anyway, which undermines the whole B-Plot of the episode. If anything it should have been a Pike-Una debate. And with a more pressing need than “These people need a vaccine absolutely right now but also they can wait a couple days if need be”.
I think having the Metron running things behind the scenes helped a bit. I did a huge eye roll when there just happened to be a recently-occupied tent within walking distance from the crash site on a desolate moon, given the vastness of space this is so ridiculous (not that it stopped Star Trek or other sci-fi before).
I kinda appreciate how the Metrons orchestrating things can explain details that seem extremely contrived or impossible otherwise: