Prodigy: The Devourer of All Things, Part II

The first half of Star Trek: Prodigy season two concluded with "The Devourer of All Things, Part II."

Voyager arrives at the same planet as the cadets... to find they must stage a rescue amid a dangerous fight for their lives. As the Loom erases crew members from existence, Ma'jel is part of an away team and learns that she has an important role to play in finding the Protostar.

This is an unusual episode of Prodigy, distinct even from part one, in that the main characters -- the Protostar cadets -- aren't actually in it very much. And when they are, they're not driving the action at all, but going along with (uh, spoilers incoming, folks!) Time Lord Wesley Crusher's hectic plan to save the universe.

Now usually, when a Star Trek episode becomes too much about the guest stars, I tend not to like it. But there are two things working in this episode's favor. One, of course, is that Janeway is also a main character on this show -- albeit one traditionally in a supporting role. Here, there's a lot of action set aboard Voyager, and Janeway is at the heart of it all, in her biggest episode of the season to this point.

Two is that, like Deep Space Nine before it, Prodigy has been steadily building up guest star characters over multiple episodes to make them feel like an integral part of the whole. Maj'el has already had an interesting character arc this season, starting as something of a nemesis for our heroes and now positioned to join their team in as "official" a capacity as she can. (Wesley says she has to be there -- so the writers have laid down a big marker.)

Meanwhile, the elements of part one that I found most interesting continued into this part two. The Loom continued to be a surprisingly scary and dangerous monster for this kids' show. We continued to get answers to the questions the season has been posing; by the time the episode ends, we don't just know where Chakotay is, our heroes have found him!

In short, the momentum of this two-part episode carried successfully through both installments. If anything, I thought things picked up a little. (Or maybe I just acclimated to any annoyance I felt over hyper-caffeinated Wesley Crusher.) I give "The Devourer of All Things, Part II" a B+.