Far From Home

As much as I loved the third season premiere of Star Trek: Discovery, and as much as that had a lot to do with it being a showcase for the considerable talent of Sonequa Martin-Green, I didn't at all mind that the newest episode barely included her at all -- because the rest of the great cast of characters was back in full.

Discovery arrives in the future, much worse for wear. It crash-lands (on a planet that wasn't where they thought they were heading), and needs urgent repairs before night falls and a parasitic ice consumes the ship. Saru and Tilly set out to barter for help from a local settlement, only to find its people under the thumb of a self-appointed despot.

Part of me recognizes that the overall plot momentum this week stalled a bit; this episode essentially replayed all the story beats of the first, just from the point of view of different characters. You could even see this episode as a self-contained "crisis of the week" kind of affair with no significant connection to any ongoing narrative. But I don't at all mind Discovery relaxing its hyper-serialized narrative a little. And I'm absolutely thrilled to see the rest of the characters back.

It's been a year-and-a-half since we've seen Saru, Stamets, Tilly, Georgiou, Culber, Reno, Detmer, Owo, and the rest. Long enough to maybe forget that after just two seasons, this batch of characters is already more sharply drawn than many from Star Trek series that ran seven years. And this episode seemed specifically crafted to let them all be their purest selves.

A more confident and assertive Saru really got to take charge and be the captain in all but official rank, and Doug Jones got to show there's more to his performance than just a carefully constructed means of movement. Tilly got to be her patented mix of bubbly/babbly/fiery, and Mary Wiseman gave us a number of great moments. (My favorite: Tilly being moved to tears by a compliment from Saru.) Georgiou got to ooze and vamp all over the place, and Michelle Yeoh got to be the center of another epic hand-to-hand combat sequence. Stamets and Culber were finally back to being a happy, natural couple, and Anthony Rapp and Wilson Cruz got plenty of opportunity to show their great chemistry. Jet Reno was drier, crankier, and more sarcastic than ever, with Tig Notaro serving as delightful comic relief in every scene.

Yeah, there were a few moments that don't hold up to much scrutiny. Why exactly did Stamets need Reno's direction to complete a basic repair? And why call Culber for help to just have him stand there cheering like he's on the Amazing Race and his teammate is performing a Road Block? We're not really implying Detmer is infected by Control, are we? Did we really come 900 years into the future just to immediately start up the same story line again?

But I was much more caught up in the fun of it all. We've seen many a ship crash in Star Trek over the years (including one in Lower Decks, just a couple of weeks ago), but great visuals and stunt work made this one feel more exciting and dangerous than we've seen before. The "saloon" that Saru and Tilly found seemed straight out of Firefly... but that's an homage I can live with, and the earnest hopefulness of Kal quickly won me over. Plus, we got more of those fantastic visuals from location filming in Iceland.

I'd give "Far From Home" a B+. Now that the whole crew is reunited, I'm eager to see what they'll do next.