Star Trek Strange New Worlds: What is Starfleet?

"Someone once said, space is dark and cold and full of death. Our job is to bring light, bring warmth, bring life to wherever we go. That's our mission."

I didn't think I was into this episode. But then it crept up on me.

Erica's little brother Beto has been visiting the Enterprise for the past couple of episodes and making a documentary. Starfleet is such a "shining example of duty, honor, peacekeeping" that it never occurred to me that Beto was doing a hit piece. Realizing that the purpose of Enterprise's mission to war-ravaged Lutani VII was a secret made Beto think he had hit the mark, too, and that there was something awful to reveal.

Beto secretly eavesdropped on Pike and Una talking about the difficulty they were having with their orders, all the while interviewing crew members and (wink wink nudge nudge) trying to get them to admit that Starfleet was all about death and colonization, about soldiers on warships, not explorers on starships. His crew interviews were all very good with enjoyable bits about all of our characters. But the standouts were Spock, who talked about running away to the Plain of Blood and trying to cut off his human half after he was rejected by a childhood friend, and Uhura, who learned during that very interview that her Starfleet Academy roommate Elena Cho had recently died in action on the Cayuga.

Beto's questions got progressively more leading and even nasty. Like asking M'Benga if he'd ever been ordered to kill by Starfleet, asking La'an what it felt like to kill someone, or Pike what it was like to watch someone die. And asking Uhura how Starfleet could bring a weapon of war to a distant planet, which was what finally clued Uhura in to what Beto was up to.

And that's when we learned that there was indeed a truth waiting to be revealed. The Lutani had spent years deliberately turning a Jikaru, an enormous flying creature from the Tychus-B moon, into a weapon, creating a shock collar of sorts to contain it. I think this is when I started getting upset because I could feel the end coming.

Spock, Chapel and Uhura endangered their own lives to communicate with the Jikaru and discovered the horrible thing that had been done to her, and that the only way for her to find peace was to die. Pike promised the Jikaru that the same thing would not happen to her children and family, to others like her. The Enterprise crew gathered on the bridge and in Port Galley to honor her and acknowledge her sacrifice as the Jikaru voluntarily flew into the sun.

And this is what Star Trek is all about. In the 1960s, people became fans of a television series that was about the best that we could be, about seeking out new life and acknowledging its value – all of it, even flying space dragons. Starfleet and the Federation will be there to defend the Jikaru. They will not succumb to the Lutani threats. Like Uhura's roommate Elena Cho, they have found what they need in Starfleet and are willing to die for what they believe in.

Bits:

— Stardate 2191.4. The Enterprise was taking "cargo" to Lutani VII, a planet at war with their sister planet Kasar. The "cargo," an altered Jikaru, was native to the moon Tychus-B.

— This episode didn't look like other SNW episodes since it was all Beto's footage, sometimes concealed, or console and stationary cameras at odd angles. That lent to the feel of the episode, that it was supposed to be an exposé.

— The childhood story Spock shared with Beto was truly upsetting. No wonder exploring his human half is extremely important to him.

— Beto hated Starfleet because he lost Erica to it, and then Erica got seriously hurt. I liked how Uhura forgave Beto, and showed compassion toward him. Like the crew of the Enterprise showed the Jikaru.

— I liked that Erica works on engines in her cabin. Makes sense.

— The shuttlecraft that Spock, Chapel and Uhura took to interact with the Jikaru was the Galileo.

— If I were going to assign original series homework, it would be "The Devil in the Dark," a beautiful episode about an ugly, frightening creature and about new life and new civilizations.

— No credit sequence until the end. The episode began with: "In accordance with the United Federation of Planets 'Freedom of Information act,' this documentary includes security footage that has been declassified by Starfleet Command in the spirit of transparency."

— I loved how they showed the bridge crew as a family having a meal together. It said what it needed to say.

Quotes:

Ortegas: "Anyone else gonna have nightmares about space dragons?"

Spock: (sensing the Jikaru) "...something so sublime..."

Pike: "You're right. People do die. Have you ever seen somebody die? I don't recommend it. And if it ever does happen to you, I don't think you would enjoy being questioned about it."

M'Benga: "She's tired of being a weapon."
Uhura: "She wants to die. It's the only way she can find peace."

Uhura: "If not us, then who?"

Uhura: "What is Starfleet? It's the people. All of us. We make Starfleet what it is. Not the other way around."

This episode packed a genuine emotional punch. In fact, I had trouble writing about it because I kept thinking I was getting too maudlin. Of course, any episode that makes me cry gets four out of four dinners with the crew,

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

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