Star Trek Strange New Worlds: Human Best Friend

"I promise you this will be the best shore leave ever."

And it's Star Trek does The Hangover.

Let me just repeat that my biggest complaint last year was that the entire third season felt like it alternated between horror and comedy. Occasionally, yes, I get it, but that isn't Star Trek. Star Trek is optimistic science fiction. It's space opera. It's exploring strange new worlds and seeking out new life and new civilizations. Isn't it?

Although again, even though I was deeply disappointed that we got yet another comic episode, this one was pretty funny. I thought the idea of a planet where everyone was constantly stoned was a great idea. Except that it didn't seem that it could work. How could all those different races of beings get high on the same thing? "No tech" makes sense, leaving your cell phones at home, but what about emergencies? Plus there are safety issues. From the first, this episode featured knives in the walls and broken glass everywhere, and no one was being careful. And may I also mention that not everyone enjoys inebriation?

Billie will now stop complaining and talk about the story.

Which actually had a purpose — giving the antagonistic Ortegas and Scotty a chance to work together and become friends. Why were the two of them always at each other's throats, anyway? Okay, whatever, I said I would stop.

While on their stoned vacation, Ortegas and Scotty were forced down to earth, so to speak, in order to deliver an important handwritten message to Pike. As they meandered around the resort hotel asking their crewmates for help finding him, they experienced a lot of different challenges and situations.

The best of which was definitely the totally paranoid Spock, in his spotless guest room apologizing for the mess, playing board games and confiding his every possible secret in what he thought was a hallucination of James Kirk. This was just delightful. I adore Ethan Peck's Spock and his expressions were just so funny. So were Paul Wesley's.

So Ortegas and Scotty worked their way through Uhura stoned out of her mind at the door of her party room, Una singing Klingon power ballads in the lounge where M'Benga was channeling the movie Cocktail with yet more broken glass, to a tattoo parlor where Pike was getting a tatt on his face and you'd think that on a planet full of drunks making bad decisions, you wouldn't have something like a tattoo parlor, now would you?

The best bit in this episode was Spock mind melding with a house plant. And then seeing Ortegas and Scotty as a bush and a cactus. It could have been too silly, but as a sight gag, it was special.

For some reason, Ortegas' cast looks
like toilet paper with an eye glued to the top

After retrieving La'an, who was somehow leading a class in relaxation that involved fighting people with sticks, she became the leader of the gang that stole Enterprise's shuttlecraft, which was hiding behind a billboard... you know what? I'm just going to move on to what this episode was supposedly about.

James Kirk was real. He was also on Cesnar Grand having fun but preferred playing board games and having heart-to-heart talks with Spock, which says a lot about their future friendship becoming their present friendship. And Ortegas and Scotty realizing that their animosity at its core was envy that they couldn't do each other's jobs; working through their problem and stopping the bomb that was supposed to sabotage the Rodaxian peace talks brought them together and made them friends. Certainly a good enough reason for an episode.

Bits:

— Stardate 2011.7. Both Ortegas' log and Scotty's, which was appropriate since this episode was about the two of them bonding. The Enterprise was on the way to the Rodaxian system by way of Cesnar Grand.

— There was an original series episode called "Shore Leave." It was the first funny episode of the original series, and it sort of involved hallucinations, too.

— The commercial for Cesnar Grand included bits of Star Trek: The Animated Series. Did you know the Agents of Doux reviewed every episode of The Animated Series? Well, mostly we talked about it and recorded those discussions, but it counts.

— It seemed to me that a lot of the activities on Cesnar Grand were geared toward humans. Vulcans don't have bingo parlors, do they? There were also a lot of other Star Trek in jokes scattered throughout, like the mugato, and "It's green."

— Scotty has a tattoo in a still undisclosed location.

— I loved that Pike had crib notes for his diplomacy speech on his fingers. Was the writing on his face in Klingon? Maybe it was the lyrics to a Klingon power ballad.

Quotes, and because of the nature of this episode, there were lots of them:

Spock: "Do you see James Kirk in this room?"
Scotty: "No. Unless he's invisible. Cloaked?"
Spock: "I have been hallucinating a manifestation of James Kirk. We've been playing board games."

Spock: "You do not recall fighting a dragon?"
Ortegas: "Is that a joke?"
Spock: "I heard you shouting in the corridor that you 'got the dragon'."
Ortegas: "I'll add that to my list of things to figure out."

Kirk: "Should we order some fries?"

Uhura: "Bye! Bring back cookies."
Ortegas: "Her hands are so soft."

Ortegas: "Scotty, Scotty, Scotty! You can't go off on your own. Since apparently another task I have is babysitting a small grown man."
Scotty: "I am average-sized!"

Ortegas: "How are there so many Klingon power ballads?"

Pike: "Old school paper envelope. I like it. We should get these for the ship! Drive Uhura crazy!"

Spock: "My mind to your leaves. My thoughts to your root system."

Spock: "I would recommend bringing La'an as muscle. She has quite a bit of pent-up energy today."
Scotty: "So she's even scarier?"
Spock: "She is much, much scarier."

Ortegas: "So we'll go in, make some threats, get our shuttle back."
La'an: "He must be in charge. Stay here. I threaten best alone."

Scotty: "They stole my eyeballs!"
Ortegas: "We've got bags on our heads!"

Scotty: "It's because I grew up with six brothers."
Ortegas: "Bet your house smelled great."

Pike: "No matter what, this has to go well. We are Starfleet officers, and as of right now, we are back on duty. Even if the world is on fire, no interruptions. There's too much at stake. (pause) A steak sounds really good right now, doesn't it?"

Spock: "Using reverse human logic, I deduced that you may have been referring to a bomb on board. Or just bad avocados. Either way, I am here to help. I should warn you, however, you are still a plant."

Ortegas: "I think we would have been friends."
Scotty: "I think we already are."

Spock: "Are you going to hug me again?"
Kirk: "Do you want me to?"

Of course I didn't hate everything. I liked the basic premise that Scotty and Ortegas have been colliding because they're too much alike. Kirk and Spock playing board games was delightful. So was the continuing plant joke. But honestly, if the rest of the season is mostly horror alternating with comedy, I might just be done with this series.

I know from the stats that a good number of people read these reviews. Is it just me? Let me know what you're thinking,

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

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