Working with Dr. Korby, Enterprise is set to explore an underground alien complex that may house knowledge from an advanced, extinct race. Ensign Gamble is thrilled to be assigned to his first landing party, and Ortegas' brother Beto is also coming to gather footage for his documentary. But then a horrifying accident sends Gamble back to Sickbay, and soon the remaining team becomes trapped inside the complex, cut off from communications with the world outside. Can our heroes solve the mysteries that past explorers did not?
I'm often sad that Strange New Worlds gives us only 10 episodes a season, less than half of what the Trek series of the 80s and 90s delivered. But we're in a television age of quality over quantity, and this episode in particular benefits from the writers being able to map out an entire season before a frame of film is shot.
The Star Trek landscape is strewn with the bodies of hundreds of redshirts. (It happens to some poor security guard in this very episode.) Usually, these deaths don't really "matter" to the audience or even the main characters, doing little more than advancing the plot. But here, knowing what they had in store for poor, doomed Ensign Gamble, the writers were able to backfill him into earlier episodes, playing up his youthful exuberance in a way that makes his fate here hit harder for Dr. M'Benga.
It also serves a hell of a meal for guest star Chris Myers. He's been so goofy and bright as Gamble for several episodes now that when he switches to the persona of a merciless Vezda, it's creepy as hell. And the combined makeup and visual effects used to present his eyeless sockets amp up that horror. (But side note: ask LeVar Burton how hard it is to act without being able to use your eyes. Myers' switching between two characters -- or really, one character pretending to be another -- seems even more well-realized in that light.)
As Gamble is featuring in his final story, Beto Ortegas is figuring into one more chapter in his. Part of me found it odd that he basically had zero interactions with his sister in this episode. Regardless, I really appreciated the conceit of putting a total civilian (even more so than Korby) into a full-fledged Trek adventure. Almost every Trekker would imagine themselves to be a cool, collected Starfleet officer in such a situation; the reality is that most of us would be losing it just like Beto.
However... this maybe isn't so much a full-fledged Star Trek adventure as much as it is a high-tech escape room. An escape room borrowing heavily from Indiana Jones movies in particular. Watching our heroes solve an escalating series of puzzles wasn't dull, but it did feel more intellectual and clever than emotional and engaging. And Korby's presence on the mission wasn't nearly the liability or source of strife I might have expected. (I suppose the writers have him on a longer character arc than I'm imagining.)
A few burning embers of season three plot elements continue to get a bit of oxygen here: Batel is forced to acknowledge the "devil" inside her in a potent way, Beto and Uhura perhaps edge a bit closer to a relationship, and Korby's obsession with his research slowly builds. Still, this episode of Strange New Worlds feels more on the "stand-alone" side of the series' "stand-alone, but connected" format.
Once again, the series has served up a pretty good episode -- a B+ in my book. But now, halfway through the season, I'm surprised it hasn't yet given us an "all-time great" for the franchise, as I felt both of the first two seasons did more than once. But there's also something to be said for the remarkable consistency Strange New Worlds achieves each week.
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