The marooned Protostar has been repaired... but without critical fuel, it cannot reach space. The deuterium that the ship needs can be harvested from the intense storms on the planet, but this means Chakotay and the cadets must sail into the heart of the storm. Quite literally, in fact, as the Protostar sails along the planet's clouds like a boat on the ocean.
This is a really fun episode, with a clever premise that somehow hasn't been done before on Star Trek. Despite countless references to "old sailing vessels" throughout multiple Star Trek series, this is the first time we're seeing a starship used as one. And I'm glad the idea was left for Prodigy to present, as animation seems like the perfect medium for it. From the colorful backgrounds of the "calm seas" to the dangerous swirling maelstrom of the climax, every part of the voyage looks beautiful.
Not all the animation in the episode is top-notch, though. Prodigy has generally been good about capturing the likeness of the established Star Trek characters brought onto the show. Another such character makes a cameo appearance here... but Beverly Crusher looked so unlike Gates McFadden (at any age) that it undermined the moment. It seemed so "not right" to me that it even made me question the voice; I wound up checking the end credits to confirm that it was indeed McFadden voicing the character.
Which is a shame, because the content of the scene was wonderful. Having Crusher speak as a mother to give advice to Janeway was a brilliant way of connecting the characters. And the writers also wove a great connection to the final season of Star Trek: Picard, with Crusher hinting at the growing distance between her and Jean-Luc at this point in time. It's kind of wild how McFadden played this character for 7 seasons of Star Trek: The Next Generation, but only now in the 2020s is she getting her best-ever material to play. (It surely helps to have more women in the writers' room.)
I was also pleasantly surprised by the scenes between Chakotay and Dal. I really do find Dal to be the most annoying character on the show (though I think that's intentional), and so I'm often wary when a story focuses more on him. But Chakotay's mentorship of Dal is a good story for both characters, and I love that the lesson here was essentially that one can be valuable without necessarily being the "leader." (That's something Dal could really take to heart.)
Part II of this story was as good as part I -- and taken together, the real high point of the season so far. I give "Last Flight of the Protostar, Part II" a B+.
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