Review- Star Trek Discovery Season 2
We recently finished season 2 of Star Trek: Discovery. A spoiler-free overview is its better than season 1, had some good moments and sets up an exciting third season but still struggled with some things. It gave the broader crew some life but hasn’t quite made them full characters yet. The visuals were better, more of a Star Trek feel but the cinematography still has some traits I don’t like (spinny camera and lens flares mostly). Overall, it’s not the Star Trek of my youth but then, TNG wasn’t the Star Trek of my Dad’s youth and he ended up loving it. And I would rank Disco season 2 in a similar category to TNG season 2. Season 3 was where TNG, and DS9 too, really took off so here’s to Discovery doing the same.
As for more spoiler specific discussion, the season’s over-arching plot mostly works but more as potential set up for future seasons than anything else. In the early part of the season, it served as a framework that allowed for more episodic…err…episodes. Investigating these red signals allowed Discovery to tell what felt like more traditional Star Trek one-off stories while still giving the show a seasonal arc.
That these signals were all sent by Burnham, in the end, might have felt contrived and your typical self-fulfilling prophesy but I think it actually worked. At the time, that Discovery gets a signal to go to Saru’s planet, just after he learned the truth about how his people were being oppressed, felt very coincidental. That Burnham was the one who sent the signals cleared that up. I think it would have worked better if the Kelpiens didn’t show up at the end to help in the fight. Then it would have just been Burnham helping her friend.
The one-off stories each had their moments but still struggled to feel like Discovery was its own show. When they jump to Terrelysium (spelling?) and find that human colony tried to tell a story about faith vs science and a typical prime directive story. But they missed some elements in their rush. The colony never felt real because we didn’t get to know them very well. They also, finally, used the spore drive for something truly Star Trek, going someplace no other ship could go but none of the crew appeared to care about that.
Speaking of the crew, they gave the extended crew more things to do but didn’t quite pull them up to full characters. They became background characters with names and hints of personality rather than true background characters. The episode where Airiam died did a great job of making her a person. Since we had seen her for two seasons, had known something had happened to her for a few episodes before, her death felt impactful. However, the long funeral scene at the start of the next episode wasn’t earned. Though, that the actress who played her in season 1 took over her position on the bridge is kind of funny.
The final few episodes suffered from plot. By that I mean, they had a plot, and it was going to happen no matter what. The Spore-drive could take Discovery anywhere. Why did it have to go to the future? Plot, that’s why. Instead of jumping Discovery out into the middle of nowhere space, where it would take Control or anyone else using conventional warp, more than 900 hundred years to reach.
They could have done a better job explaining that. Stamets would have had to go so that’s a downside, whereas when they conceived the plan they thought Burnham would have been able to use the suit to come back. Maybe the spore-network is galaxy specific and you can’t jump to the middle of empty space between galaxies. Therefore, it would only take Control one to two hundred years to reach her at conventional warp, which is far less than 900. So Discovery must go to the future because Enterprise can’t destroy her in the time available. Okay.
Control started as a good idea, Starfleet becoming dependent on an AI threat assessment tool that runs amok has a lot of story potential. But it just went off the deep end. It seemed pretty self-aware and murdery already. How was getting the sphere data going to make it more self-aware and more into murder?
It would have worked far better if they were fighting flesh and blood people from Section-31 who were committed to a path that led to Control becoming self-aware and murdering everyone. The only way to stop that was to remove Discovery and the sphere data. That in turn leads to Section-31 overplaying their hand and outright attacking a Starfleet ship which allows Starfleet to shut them and Control down for good.
And before I wrap up complaining that everything happens at warp 9 was a major flaw of the show’s style. Nothing had time to breathe. They rarely slowed down to let story happen and for character growth outside of non-stop action. This flow problem was still present all the way until the final episode. Which, ironically, had an important time crunch but took its sweet time to get there. Also on the petty rant level, my god, the lens flares need to die in a fire. As well as the spinning camera.
The second season’s biggest success was also it’s biggest weakness. That of course-correcting from season 1. All throughout the season the show morphed the universe from whatever the hell season 1 was to one that looked far more like Star Trek. By the end we have the Enterprise with solid blue phaser beams in a fight with Klingon D-7 battlecruisers crewed by Klingons that look like Klingons. They did a good job on Enterprise and the D-7’s feeling like just updated versions of the originals.
Captain Pike could have gone terribly but turned into one of the highlights of the season. Anson Mount did a great job of portraying him. I’m onboard for the Pike led Enterprise show some of the internet wants to see. That would be a way of getting old school classic Trek feel without actually doing a TOS remake. Though, it would have its own set of problems. The Enterprise would never actually be in any danger. Spock couldn’t have any real character growth and we know Pike’s ultimate fate. They could set it around 2259/60, have Spock return to Vulcan for awhile for the PonFarr before the events of “Amok Time” so he’s a reoccurring character rather than a central one.
But that’s getting sidetracked. Pike worked well for the show. His personality allowed them to pull off some things that needed to happen. Such as introducing and naming the rest of the bridge crew, something the first season had utterly failed to do. That could have been so corny, and it was, but Pike made it work.
The one primary Klingon episode didn’t completely overcome the mess of the first season but did well given how much it had to do. It kept the focus on the Klingons struggling to become united, got Tyler off Qo’nos and kept the Klingons at arms length from the Federation. While also explaining why the Klingon ships from season 1 were so weird and why we never saw any D-7’s before now. That the Klingons showed up to help Discovery at the end kind of undermined that a little though. Again, would have been better if it had been Starfleet, led by Admiral Cornwall, who showed up to help after they finally realized Section-31 had gone bad.
The finale’s ending tried just a little too hard to wrap everything up in a nice bow. Discovery vanishes and the Enterprise crew claims she was destroyed. They pull some technicality about how due to time travel rules they can never speak of her again. Sure, okay, you’re trying at least. But that doesn’t explain why Starfleet doesn’t build another Spore drive. Did Stamets keep all the plans aboard and no one is able to replicate it but him?
Overall, Discovery season 2 is a step up from season 1. And I didn’t hate season 1. Despite most of this post feeling like a rant (I am a Star Trek fan on the internet, what did you expect?) it’s not the worst show. It’s not quite there yet but season 3 gives it an open door to be something unique.
Hell, they could even start a little Star Trek universe between each of the shows now that we’re out of the prequel chains. There’s a Section-31 show coming with Georghiu at the helm, who got transported to the future. And because we don’t see where Discovery ends up, they could miss the 900yr mark and land in Picard’s lap.
Anything’s possible now which will allow the show to take off. I look forward to season 3.
