When Stamets determines that Tilly is still alive inside the mycelial network, Pike agrees to attempt a rescue with a dangerous spore drive jump that will leave Discovery half-in and half-out of the network for a prolonged period of time. But when Statmets and Burnham enter the network, they find more than they expected. Tilly has promised the entities inside the network that she'll help them with a "monster" ravaging their realm... and she is not the only person trapped inside the network.
I really don't see away to be coy about this one, so... SPOILERS! Not for a sentence or two, but basically, this entire post is (more than usual) a giant spoiler.
So, with that warning out of the way... let's talk about the "resurrection" of Culber. I think the writers are misguided if they think this somehow "undoes" the damage of killing the character in the first place. I mean, when you watch The Wrath of Khan today, you know full well that Spock comes back to life in the next movie. That doesn't rob his death of any of its emotion and power as Leonard Nimoy brilliantly plays the death scene, William Shatner chokes over Kirk's eulogy, and the camera glides over the pastoral resting place of Spock's coffin. It happened. I've gone on at length before about how terrible it was to kill off one half of Star Trek's first significant (and actual) gay relationship, so I won't rehash that now; suffice it to say, the damage was still done, even if they "buy back" that death now.
Now don't get me wrong, I am happy to have Culber back. I look forward to future episodes with him. But there are a lot of flaws here with the episode that brought him back. For starters, there were issues of timing. Just last episode, Discovery served up a bait-and-switch death centered on another character. I'm not suggesting that they should have actually killed off Saru. Indeed, they actually made taking him to the brink of death and saving him work fairly well. But to then essentially pull the same trick with Culber in the very next episode cheapened the story. It's a one-two punch of similar beats that may well leave the audience wondering if death actually even means anything on Discovery.
What I find especially bad about stacking these two episodes together like this is that there were plenty of other reasons to separate them. Saru just had a life-altering experience last episode. This episode, not only did we not get into the question of what a "Saru without fear" is like, we barely got any Saru at all. And it seems to me that Tilly could have remained lost in the network for an episode or two, heightening suspense and/or giving her a sort of "side quest" of self-discovery. There easily could have been another episode inserted here.
If the pacing of the overall season felt questionable, the pacing within this episode itself was even worse. I understand the desire to put a ticking clock on the rescue of Tilly. Having to get her back in an hour heightens the drama and the stakes, yada-yada-yada. But with the entire ship being eaten "alive" as it simultaneously slipped deeper into the network, the danger level was too high. It was so high that it made any attempt to do anything other than "escape the danger right the hell now!" feel like stupidity on the part of the characters.
The writers wanted to have their cake and eat it too. They wanted the poignant reunion of Stamets and Culber, dwelling on all the emotions inherent there. But with the ship falling apart around them, it simply made no sense to be doing that. Why are we wasting six minutes explaining how Culber is alive? That's 1/10th of the time we have to work with. Rescue now, explanations later.
Discovery pursues action-adventure more than past Star Treks, but would it have killed them to slow down here and have a contemplative episode that really wrestles with life and death? They could have even started with the ticking clock that wanted so much and then stopped it -- they wrote the justification right into the episode, possibly without realizing it. May was able to exert control over her fellow creatures in the network, stopping them from attacking Tilly. Could she not have also stopped them from attacking the ship? How great would it have looked for Tilly (and/or Burnham) if they'd been able to use diplomacy to convince May to do that? Classic Star Trek contact with aliens.
We got to a good end point, I suppose. And there were even some moments of the journey that were fun -- the Section 31 material involving Georgiou was pretty cool at times (and Michelle Yeoh's performance was delicious). But the bottom line for me: the pacing of this episode was terrible -- so rushed that it wasn't able to spend time on the moments that really needed it. And the writers knew how important it was to have gotten this one right -- they've been telegraphing this one for a year.
I do expect some good down the road will come from this disappointment. But it was a disappointment. I give it a C-.
1 comment:
I thought the reason they killed off Culber is that having "couples" in the bridge crew of Star Trek sucks. It makes both characters one-dimensional and locks out a ton of potential avenues. Miles and Keiko only worked because Keiko was never a major character. Paris and Torres was horrible. Worf and Dax was... sort of okay I guess but only because we had experienced about 10 seasons of Worf at that point and so he kind of needed another angle, but it certainly neutered Dax as a character. Other than that it is something they have really tried to avoid. I'm all for having a gay relationship - they did it, cool. But in a universe where nobody bats an eyelid at being gay, if they keep them both around it is just going to make both characters extremely stale very quick and Stamets is an interesting enough character to not deserve that.
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