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Star Trek Discovery Discussion: The Red Angel
52 Plays1 year ago
Some technical difficulties on this one, watch at your own peril, we talk about the episode, The Red Angel!
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Transcript
Introduction and Overview
00:00:03
Speaker
And we're back on another exciting episode of Star Trek and informal conversation about Trek. And today we're focused on Star Trek Discovery's 10th episode, The Red Angel. And I'm joined by Fatherie. Hello. Howdy. Howdy there. All the way from Texas.
00:00:26
Speaker
Yep. Actually, it's not too far from where I am. The future of your site is Zindy Gash. There's going to be a lot of destruction in Florida. Oh, yeah. You're going to get blown up in the 22nd century.
Florida's Fate in Star Trek
00:00:45
Speaker
I love that the enterprise writers were trying to decide where should they blow up on Earth. And someone finally was like, they should blow up Florida.
00:00:57
Speaker
terrible terrible have you seen the florida man meme that's been going around so yes yes and i put my uh i put my birth in and it was florida man florida man apprehended uh naked with a gun in an airport florida man sexually assaulted washing machine at laundromat
00:01:26
Speaker
The hell are y'all doing in Florida? Oh, Florida Man. Florida Man's been a joke long before the meme, like with you. But I'm really happy the meme came out. That's pretty exciting.
Episode Summary Challenge
00:01:41
Speaker
So yeah, we're here to talk about the episode Red Angel. I offer you the chance to do the summary if you would like to. You did a job for six minutes. Last, if you're prepared, you can do it. Otherwise, I'll give it a crack. I just summarized it for my podcast.
00:01:56
Speaker
So you do the same. We could do one of those audience pause this video, go listen to the summary and then come back. But I think we should give at least like a two minute. Okay. Let me see if I can do it in two minutes. I normally have like the warp speed summary where I get it done in six minutes. This will be like a transport.
00:02:16
Speaker
Oh, I love it. Not quite like split stream, but still faster than warp speed. So we started the episode off with Ariam's funeral. Everyone's sad that she died in the last week's episode.
00:02:32
Speaker
But Tilly has discovered the bio neural readings of the red angel and some of the data she's been going through. It appears to be a perfect match for Michael Burnham.
The Red Angel's Identity
00:02:43
Speaker
They believe Michael Burnham is the red angel and they decided the best place to get answers is to find the red angel.
00:02:50
Speaker
Giorgio and Leyland of Section 31 show up and they offer even more explanation. It turns out that the Red Angel is part of a Section 31 project called Project Daedalus. It was an attempt to create a time-traveling angel suit
00:03:07
Speaker
that you wear and can travel through time in micro wormholes. This was actually something that surprise, surprise Michael Burnham's parents worked on. They were secretly Section 31 operative researchers. And the Klingons who killed them were actually trying to get their time crystal that they needed to make the Daedalus suit work.
00:03:30
Speaker
So we find out that's why Leyland felt responsible for the deaths of Burnham's parents. Burnham is relieved. She's also angry at him and punches them around a little bit. Her and Spock have a heart-to-heart conversation after it though and it seems like they're finally going to get past their
00:03:51
Speaker
frustrations with each other and come back together as a healthy brother-sister relationship. They decide to capture the Red Angel. They need to put Burnham's life in danger. They think that if they're going to kill Burnham, her future self will be forced to come back in time and prevent that. That's why sometimes the Red Angel shows up whenever Burnham is present or in danger.
Burnham's Dangerous Plan
00:04:13
Speaker
They go to one of the Red Angel, or one of the Project Datalis testing sites, ESO4, a planet with a toxic atmosphere. They can use a plasma reactor there to power their phase discriminators that they need to capture the Red Angel. They put Burnham on like a torture chair in the middle of this facility and expose her to this toxic environment.
00:04:36
Speaker
And she's like gasping for air and getting like burnt by acid rain and seemingly dies. Her heartbeat flatlines. I think she actually dies. Yeah. The red angel appears, revives her with some type of energy beam and they use their phase discriminators like capture the red angel with like Ghostbusters beams that like shoot up and like wrap around her and, and container. They put up a containment field around her.
00:05:04
Speaker
Um, while that's going on, it looks like on the section 31 ship, something stabs Lakeland in the eye and we don't know if it kills them. We don't know if it like replaces him. What is going on there? But it looks like the control AI might still be active. Cut back down to the planet. The red angel is unmasked and what the hell? The red angel is not a future Michael Burnham. It is her mother.
Red Angel Revelation
00:05:27
Speaker
And that's the end.
00:05:29
Speaker
That's it. That's very good. That was like awesome. And you did it in two minutes. It was very good. It shows that it can be done. Was it? Okay, fine. There's not a lot going on.
00:05:45
Speaker
Yeah, I feel like you're making this show a little more efficient. I really appreciate it. So yeah, let's get right into it. I have a question. I don't know if you feel the same, but I kind of wonder, like, now that they know it's a time travel suit, like why everyone keeps calling it the Red Angel, because it's like, I feel like, you know, scientifically, after Section 31, I can't
00:06:11
Speaker
I can't imagine they called it Project Daedalus. They didn't call it the Red Angel. So for them, it would have been the Daedalus, right? So like, why aren't we? If they call it like the Exosuit, that's not as dramatic as the Red Angel. I know, but Daedalus suit, or they could just call the person the time traveler now.
00:06:30
Speaker
If you've been calling something the Red Angel for, we don't know how long season two's been going on. But let's assume that it has been like, I don't know, a month and a half. I think is what I concluded last time I was trying to figure this out. If you've been calling something like for the last six or seven weeks, the Red Angel, that's kind of a hard habit to break at that point. It's just been christened as the Red Angel.
00:06:57
Speaker
That's fair, but I still think that it would have been cool if someone, maybe that's what Ariam would have done and now she's dead. So someone would have just mentioned like, we shouldn't call it the red angel anymore. Especially in the era of social media when you want maybe hashtag red angel to be a thing. I was going around for a little bit, hashtag who's the red angel.
00:07:21
Speaker
Who's the Red Angel? I think I did that. I would say of that too, yeah. But now we know. I think I did what is the Red Angel. So I got that for a second. I like that it was the mom because the grandfather paradox idea I
Time Paradoxes and Crossovers
00:07:36
Speaker
was a little upset about because it doesn't really work. Because if you do kill Michael Burnham, it erases the future self. So the future self can't really come back and save you. So I didn't understand that part.
00:07:48
Speaker
Yeah, but they do play fast and loose with time travel and Star Trek sometimes. It's true, but still like you wouldn't work better like the only way.
00:07:59
Speaker
grandfather paradox works only if you're in the past, right? Because then you exist, future self goes back to the past, kills your grandfather, but you stay alive because you were still born, but now you're out of time, right? But it can't work. And if the Red Angels from the future, which is what we think, because it has to know that Michael died, wouldn't have been able to
00:08:22
Speaker
So I think it's good that it's my mom because I would have been really upset. I would be like, that doesn't make sense. Like, how can Michael Burnham save herself from the future if, you know, I mean, she wouldn't exist to begin with. So it makes sense. I mean, sometimes you need Peter Capaldi to explain it while playing Nate Coven on his guitar. But that was the doctor who reference for you.
00:08:45
Speaker
That was a very good reference. Well, this whole season deals with time travel, so I feel like that's all we need to complete. It would be a cameo from the doctor and it would be like just just deliciously great. He's the one who actually sets things right and puts a time travel ban. He's like, sorry, Time Lord say you can't do this. Which one which one would be the the one to show up and do that?
00:09:14
Speaker
I think that would be a classic doctor. Probably the 11th doctor would be the one who would do that. But I would want it to be Matt Smith reviving his role as the 11th doctor on Cameo. Did you read the next generation 11th doctor crossover comic? Yes, I actually did and I loved it. It was great.
00:09:38
Speaker
Yeah, if anyone listening to us likes Doctor Who as well as Star Trek, and you haven't checked out that comic book, you totally should. You should. That's a shout-out surprise. It's called Assimilation Squared, and it has beautiful painted artwork by JK Woodward. It was pretty cool. I've met him on Star Trek. Cool guy. Wait, on the Star Trek, we'll...
00:10:02
Speaker
On the Star Trek cruise that I went on, not this year, but I forgot you went on the Star Trek cruise. Yeah, I went on the second one they did. Oh, how was it? Would you go again? Yeah, I actually wanted to go to the one coming up in January, but they've already booked up the entire thing. So I guess I'm going in 2021. Oh, yeah, it was the best vacation me or my girlfriend, either one of us had ever been on.
00:10:33
Speaker
How long is the cruise? Like a week. Oh, wow. Yeah. OK, I better start saving my pennies. Yeah, they depart from Miami. So it'd be good for you. Oh, that's the reason. I wouldn't have to take a flight. Yeah. Yeah. Drive down to Miami and you're good to go. I mean, yeah, drive up to Miami from where I am. But yeah, it's really very easy. I thought Miami was like the southern. Miami.
00:11:00
Speaker
uh close it's like it's definitely in the south the southern part of it but the uh i'm closer to the tip okay where i live uh which is called homestead florida and then that's the con like the continental of the u.s but then we have the islands called these which i guess it's still considered part of the continental u.s key west is the southernmost point in the united states of america officially there's other south and
00:11:30
Speaker
That's correct. There's a gigantic marker that says southern most point of the United States of America. But I think Hawaii is just a little bit north and it makes sense because it looks on a map, it looks like it's a little further north than we are. But we digress. Yeah, enough about the geography. We got a red angel to talk about.
00:11:56
Speaker
Well, I guess what's like the most compelling thing that you learned from this episode and what are you kind of satisfied you feel with like the reveal, et cetera? I loved the reveal. In fact, I wasn't really digging this episode. I was pretty frustrated while watching it. But the reveal at the end did make me feel a lot better about things just
00:12:22
Speaker
everything with Michael being the red angel, I hated that.
Focus on Michael Burnham
00:12:27
Speaker
And I'm so glad that that turned out to be a red herring. I thought that was like, that would be the easiest, most predictable thing they could have done. So I'm glad they pulled the rug out from under us. And there were some like, I have some problems with this episode that we'll get into if you want. But
00:12:47
Speaker
I liked a lot of the character moments. I liked the Dr. Culber stuff. It was good that we got to see Ariam's funeral. And I liked everything Seneca Martin Green was doing when she learns that Leyland is responsible for killing her parents, her conversation with Spock.
00:13:12
Speaker
her agony when she's being tortured, even though I thought that was way over the top and melodramatic. I loved her performance of it. And some of the stuff with her and Ash Tyler I thought was really good. So she was definitely the standout actor of the episode. But yeah, those are the things that I found compelling that I liked. Are you still there?
00:13:49
Speaker
Um, word. I don't know. I don't know if anyone watching this is going to have me on screen or Starfleet boy, or what's going on here, or if he can hear me, or maybe no one can hear either.
00:15:09
Speaker
duh duh duh duh duh duh
00:15:55
Speaker
So it sounds like Starfleet boy has lost his internet connection and is temporarily down. Uh, I'm not sure what will, uh, what will be the case with this video if he's going to still use any of, Oh, look, I think he's back. So, um, Hello, can you hear me?
00:16:24
Speaker
I think he might have been. Yeah, I can hear you. What's up? Are you there? Hello. Yes, I'm here.
00:16:42
Speaker
Oh my God, that was the weirdest section. 31 does not want us to talk about this. So they're like causing interference for a long time there when I was waiting on you to come back, I was just like silent. So I didn't have anyone to talk to. That's okay. It happens. Well, if you want to use that, you can just like, um, I guess you can put up like a little link to like skip ahead. Oh, that's a good idea.
00:17:09
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Or just download the whole thing and edit that. And cut out. Yeah, it's probably what else. So it totally cut out when you were talking about how initially you were bored and kind of disappointed with this episode. But and then that's all I heard. You didn't hear me all the good stuff I said.
00:17:31
Speaker
No, the good thing about the audio audience will have it all because you are recording your audio separately. So that's good. The podcast audience will have the best of that. But for the YouTube audience, I have no idea if you're stayed on or if I have no idea what the outcome may be. Mine stayed on, I think. So I think we should just risk it probably being there.
00:17:53
Speaker
Like, so hot, hot take real quick to not repeat yourself fully, but why I guess the question I have is why, why was, why were you kind of hating the idea that Burnham was the ready and the big question? Because they already make her the most prominent character in a lot of ways and they focus on her a lot, which I don't mind. I get the, that's kind of the point of the show. She's the main character. However,
00:18:21
Speaker
there were so many cool possibilities with the Red Angel. And to just make it be a future version of her, I thought that was one of the most commonly predicted things. So it was like super easy to guess at the way that they presented it with Tilly, just walking into a meeting in the ready room and just say, Oh, by the way, Michael is the Red Angel. I thought that was not very dramatic and not very satisfying.
00:18:48
Speaker
It also was kind of weird because they were so certain the biosignature was hers, but apparently, I guess, could your, is that right? Like, can your mom's biosignature be that like so indistinguishable from yours? There's a couple of things. There's a couple of ways they can get around that. They could
00:19:06
Speaker
Maybe at some point Michael Burnham does put on the suit and that's the maybe they just true. That's a good point. Maybe they just hand wave it as well. There is some tacky on radiation interfering with the readings. And because of that, the computer couldn't distinguish
00:19:23
Speaker
the Red Angels bioneural readings from those of Michael Burnham. So it came up with a false match.
Character Relationships
00:19:30
Speaker
Fair enough. So you were saying that you didn't like the episode. Did you like the Culber kind of revelation? Yeah, it was one of the things I said that I really liked was a lot of the character stuff. Like I loved what they were doing with Culber. Also, I loved the Saniqua Martin Green's performances. I loved seeing her when she learns that Leyland killed her parents when
00:19:52
Speaker
when she has that conversation with Spock, all the stuff with her and Ash Tyler, I liked all of that. But yeah, the Dr. Culber stuff, I really dug and I'm hoping that they're setting the stage for him and Stamets to reunite. Do you think that's what's gonna happen?
00:20:11
Speaker
I think so. I do agree with Kowalski a little bit that it's a little bit too CW right now because like Stamets was definitely like pining to get back with Culbert and was like very conscious and like trying to make give him a space but then now finally Culbert starts reaching out and then he's like this is not the time okay fair but then he's like it may never be the time like man like does he?
00:20:36
Speaker
He does. He goes, it may never be the time. He says it to him. And it's like heartbreaking because it's like, you know, it's it's a little heartbreaking and it's a little melodramatic, which don't get me wrong. I mean, that's like it gets you going. Right. But at the same time, I was like, no, come on. Like I don't think they crossed the line yet where they've where they've drawn it out.
00:20:56
Speaker
too long. I agree. Enjoying it for sure. I don't want it to become a will they won't they it one of the things I brought up in my podcast at some point, they did actually compare it to I use the CW show the flash as an example.
00:21:11
Speaker
Right. If anyone watches that with Barry and Iris and oh, that went on for like, what, three seasons? I don't know. Yeah, I. It's still going on. Only watched the first three years of that show. But yeah, like they got together and they broke up and they got engaged and they got unengaged. And then I think they maybe got married. I don't know. It's true. It gets a little a little a little tiresome after a while. But no, I don't think you made a right drug.
00:21:41
Speaker
It's true. Yeah, I mean, it's like, yeah, but on the most the most recent text direct podcast available today available now. Nice. Our guest Anna, who had joined us one time previously, her interpretation is she doesn't think that they are going to get back together and that
00:22:03
Speaker
Colbert kind of seemed uninterested when he was talking to Admiral Cornwell. I didn't read it that way, but she has a different opinion on it that if you check out our podcast, you can see what she has to say about that. And maybe people will agree with me, maybe they'll agree with her. Maybe we're both wrong, I don't know.
00:22:23
Speaker
Who knows, we'll find out. I did like that Admiral Colberg, they kind of reminded us of her background as a psychiatrist. Yeah, and I liked on Twitter that Marina Sirtis tweeted that if Admiral, darn, I just said her name. Admiral Cornwell.
00:22:52
Speaker
Thank you, Admiral Cornwell. It's advice from a counselor that she'd be happy to give it. And then Jane Brooks responded with like, oh my gosh, that's awesome, or something like that. So that was a cool real life tie in.
00:23:08
Speaker
There was also, I guess another point for me is, are you buying Emperor George's sincerity here? Do you think that she is interested in Michael? And then if so, I don't think the show's really kind of answered what is her interest in Michael. What do you think is going on there? Yeah, I'm still suspicious of her
00:23:36
Speaker
concern and affection for Michael Burnham. Me personally, I don't want to see this character easily forgiven after she was a racist, xenophobic, fascist, dictator, emperor who brags still in these recent episodes, still brags about genociding entire planets, you know, killing all the Talosians,
Redemption of Georgiou
00:24:08
Speaker
I kind of don't want to see this character forgiven at all, but if they do try to do any type of redemption with her, it's gonna be very difficult to pull off.
00:24:17
Speaker
And I don't know, I kind of would need them to kill her off in the end, like Darth Vader's style. And maybe only then, forgive her. You mean at the end of the Section 31 show? Because we're going in that direction. Which basically, actually, the season Section 31 show, because they've been in the season. And I wanted to ask you about that, too. So there's definitely this whole between before they kiss and make out
00:24:55
Speaker
I don't see how section I just don't understand where they're.
00:25:02
Speaker
It's okay to me that Section 31 is not what we expected in the sense that it's not like a buried underground operation. That's fine with me because I think that it's fine. I think that Section 31 can evolve certainly into what it's going to be and everything. But what I don't understand is why there's so much
00:25:26
Speaker
of a battle between Section 31 and Starfleet constantly. I don't actually see Section 31 being at fault for the things that are going on. You're not to get too political.
00:25:43
Speaker
But you and I are both in a country where our traditional military has been supplying like one group of fighters in Syria. And then our section 31 type CIA has been actually building up another group of fighters. And so like our tax lawyers are going to basically have two different groups fight each other in another country.
00:26:12
Speaker
I don't see it as that unusual that there's a conflict between your CIA type group and then your traditional military type group. I think stuff like that happens in the Pentagon in real life.
00:26:31
Speaker
I do think that the conflict we are experiencing between them will eventually explain why Section 31 retreats back into the shadows and becomes what we are familiar with from DS9 and Enterprise and all the rest of their depictions.
00:26:49
Speaker
Going further into that, so another big reveal is that Burnham's parents were not what they... So, actually section 31 operatives. How do you feel about that and what do you... That reminded me of the Spider-Man comics when they revealed that Peter Parker's birth parents were actually agents of SHIELD.
00:27:12
Speaker
right it does actually it's like it's like the exact exact thing yeah it's true um it was kind of cool that how do you feel about it do you think it's cool that her mom was an astrophysicist and her dad was a what is it xeno anthropologist anthropologist which is what she is which is what i think burning is right um so the the way that he said that they had
00:27:37
Speaker
I've seen examples of technological leaps and thought that that was a sign of time travel. I was like, oh, yeah, like a Zeno anthropologist would be the person who might notice stuff like that. And if he's married to an astrophysicist, she might be the one who is trying to build their time machine and the temporal cold war with temporal arms race with the Klingons, not temporal cold war that was enterprise.
00:28:03
Speaker
But they do call it a temporal arms race, which is interesting. It could be tied to that. Yeah. Because we know that the Sulabon were messing around with the Klingons also. So the Klingons might have been like, oh, look, there's time travel technology. We need to build up our empire with time travel tech.
00:28:24
Speaker
I was really hoping Captain Archer was going to be. Yeah, you know, I had my theory. I don't know if you saw it on Twitter, but I thought that if the Red Angel was Archer, he needed to like take off the helmet and reveal it was Helm and just say, it's been a long road.
00:28:47
Speaker
Or oh boy, right? Either one. I was hoping to be born or Neelix, one or the other. Or some people were hoping that it was Admiral Archer's dog. Yeah, the one from the Kelvin universe after after Kelvin, Scotty, beam Scotty, dog and who knows where.
00:29:11
Speaker
I like the initial time travel event took place during the tack and supernova. So I hope we get a flashback to what actually happened on Dutari. Was it... Dr. Tori Alpha. Oh, Dr. Tori Alpha. Thank you. It's an actual star, I believe.
00:29:31
Speaker
so it sounds like the um the guns came to get their time crystal back and like some you know something's gonna happen you know obviously like burnham's hidden in the and she doesn't know what's going on so it sounds like the mom decides well i need to like get the heck out of here so she takes the suit and actually
Section 31 Connections
00:29:50
Speaker
Um and actually uses it to go into the future at some point. So it'll be interesting and i'm sure we'll get that Explanation and I hope we get a cool flashback. But what do you think uh speculations on bernum's dad did he Uh think he made time for her to escape and died or do you think uh, there's something yet to be revealed about the dad as well?
00:30:11
Speaker
You know, I hadn't actually speculated on that too much. Yeah, so that could have been the thing is like the dad was like, you know, I'll fight the Klingons off for a little bit so you can get away, but you would think he'd be like, but you should take our daughter with you who's hiding in this closet over here.
00:30:32
Speaker
Maybe the plan was to, maybe the people as she would travel back and warn them, but then it went wrong. Like she actually ended way in the future. You know what I mean? Like maybe the plan was just to go back maybe like 10 hours, you know, or something like that. And it failed. The suit didn't work properly or something like that. And she got launched into the future. The way that they explain the time travel is kind of like a yo-yo,
00:30:58
Speaker
or it has like a rubber band that pulls you back. So you can like, you can leap to a point in time and space, but then you have to be like snapped back to where you were. So that's true. It makes me wonder, well, where is she? Yeah, back in the past, is she even further in the future?
00:31:18
Speaker
Well, I think she has to be in the future only because she wouldn't have learned about Michael's death in that chamber unless she was in the future. Yeah. Or the, you know, Spock mind melded with her. And that's how he learned about the destruction of the galaxy. So that stuff has to have been in the future. Um, so maybe she still dies on Drury Alpha. Maybe, maybe at the end of all her time traveling, she has to go back and die. Wow.
00:31:48
Speaker
That kind of got me right there.
00:31:58
Speaker
Or the other thing is that maybe the Red Angel plot doesn't get resolved fully this season, like maybe she escapes and the whole end of the show could be like Burnham having her parents back and then the timeline being reset, so to speak. The timeline's already set. This is the timeline of the original series, the next generation, everything else.
00:32:22
Speaker
Well, it changes then. And then you have a Burnham who grows up with actual parents. I don't need an explanation for why the Klingons look different or why they were using holograms as much as they were. I don't want them to mess with the timeline to explain that stuff.
00:32:40
Speaker
come up with a reason like in the story to explain why things look different. We'll see what happens. I'm already messing with time travel that the explanation's already there. It's like, you know, to me it's very like, you know, Star Trek Discovery. I think that you can have both. You can have your cake and eat it too, is what I guess I'm trying to say. You can still have a valid show that takes place in a time bubble.
00:33:08
Speaker
I don't think it does. I think it's less devaluing. It's less devaluing than what happened to Enterprise.
00:33:24
Speaker
But we'll see. We'll see. We'll see what happens. I don't know. I don't know what will happen. It's an interesting thing because to me there's a lot of things like necessarily the visuals are important per se. Like I don't mind the updated look and feel or even the holograms. Like I like I kind of can see, you know, many reasons why Starfleet would move away from holograms or like just
00:33:47
Speaker
in that technology or you know some other reasons like they've already like dropped the hint about the security flaw or whatever you know and like we have this whole AI thing coming through which could also explain yet like we regress kind of like maybe they're like okay we need to like
00:34:04
Speaker
much like the Battlestar Galactica, it survived this Holocaust because the ship was self-contained and didn't have a network connection to the mainframe, right? So it couldn't be infected by the Cylon virus that disabled all the other defenses. So I could totally see, like next, I totally already see Discovery, some really cool possible explanations for why TOS
00:34:31
Speaker
feels different you know and so I'm I already see that Laurie's on that path I'm saying I'm open to any possibility but like but like I just think it'd be tragic to like the Burnham the main thing that the reason why I think there's going to be some kind of explanation or Burnham's going to get her other life back so to speak is that the whole fact that
00:34:59
Speaker
this was not like Burnham's existence is kind of like one of those things in the Sarak family is kind of like one of those things where you're like she wasn't just an exchange student you know that like for a little while that Spock could easily forget like there's a like there's a validity in the question why doesn't Spock ever mention her even more than Cybok because at least with Cybok like we know he like
00:35:26
Speaker
the family and went off and maybe right but and like maybe like that so that kind of like you know he wasn't like a part of Spock's life but Burnham was clearly a big part of Spock's life and it also continues to be now and they're reunited and they're like reconciling and so like it just doesn't make sense that you know Spock would just forget about his sister. Why do you think he forgets about her though?
00:35:51
Speaker
So that's my thing is that like, if for some, like to me, like if I were Spock, if I were Spock. Let me rephrase that. Like, why do you think that Spock has forgotten his sister? Like what indicates to you that the Spock we see in the original series and the movies and the next generation going back in time and Star Trek 09, like what makes you think that guy does not remember Michael Burnham being his sister?
00:36:22
Speaker
I mean, actually nothing. An episode of the original... Let me throw this out there real quick. There's an episode of the original series Operation Annihilate with the fried eggs that are attacking people on the colony. And Captain Kirk's brother was there and his family was there. George Kirk, right? Yeah. And so his brother and his nephew and everything,
00:36:51
Speaker
And they're not mentioned after that episode. So let's say that episode was like deleted from the Star Trek canon. Let's say like never existed. Sorry, let's say that episode never existed to begin with. And then someone went back and did that story as a prequel.
00:37:08
Speaker
You'd have people who are like, well, why does Captain Kirk have a brother? He never had a brother before. He never mentions a brother and all this stuff. That doesn't work. You're breaking the timeline. That's a very fair point. It's fine. No one ever asks Spock, hey, did you ever have a sister? So I don't really see it breaking continuity. Cisco had a sister that they never talked about until they did talk about her.
00:37:33
Speaker
That's true. I guess that's a fair point. That's a really fair point. I have to just let go of my expectations here. Like I have to kind of like pair. And I would be frustrated if they did something like to erase her from his mind or something because the producers have hinted at like this will explain why why Spock doesn't mention her later. And I'm like, I don't need that explain.
00:37:57
Speaker
Yeah, it's fair. Actually, it's a fair point. It's almost the opposite of... The explanation almost would be like, you're right. I never thought of it that way. Huh. Good.
Dramatic Tension in Capture
00:38:12
Speaker
Moving on.
00:38:17
Speaker
The plan and the whole thing about, so on the third watching, it came to, you know, the whole scene where Burnham's dying is like, it's beautifully active, first of all, it's horrifying. It's like, you really feel like the pain and stuff like that. And Sanico Martin-Green's really good at like doing that, like when she does that crazy scream in the, you know, in the episode where she gets stabbed, like it was brother, it was the first episode, right?
00:38:46
Speaker
the first episode of season one when she's fighting Voke on the Klingon ship. That's right. Beautiful acting. But let me ask you, couldn't they have just done like a lethal injection, like actually killed her? I get why they wanted to be dramatic, but this is too extra. Like it was melodramatic in a bad way.
00:39:12
Speaker
It was like, you know, like her skin looks like they were like, um, like going to torture her to death. Like it was like, like, he's like a status. She's like, she's a total status and they're all, and they're all watching this from like, like everyone's watching. He's like fascinated. She's like, watch, like she forgets herself. And also you would think that, you know, if they were assuming that Michael was in fact the red angel,
00:39:42
Speaker
Like, won't she remember this experience? Like, how's, how's it going? I know it's like, it's such a like, traumatic experience. Like, wouldn't she remember that like, he set herself up to die and like, come back sooner before the torture and like, just stop herself, you know, I don't know. It's like, like maybe try to thwart the plan instead or break the equipment, you know, like, I came up with a better,
00:40:08
Speaker
What I would consider to be a better story, where they could have done like the same stuff, but just like a better way to go about it. But I won't go into the details of that here. But if anyone wants to check that out, just check out the- Is it on your- Yeah, the most recent Text Trek podcast, which I described. Oh, awesome. So it'd be Text Trek number 62, where we talk all about this episode of the Red Angel. Got it. Quick overview though, like the gist of it.
00:40:34
Speaker
Um, it's better than what they, the writers actually did here. That's okay. Now, I haven't heard it, but audience, you can pause here, go and listen, come back. And, uh, well, we can't talk about it because I haven't heard it yet. So I'm dying to see this. So I will also pause and go look at, listen to and come back.
00:40:58
Speaker
Hey, wow, what a great idea for that. I really do think that like, yeah, when I was thinking about it, I actually thought about TNG and I thought about like, you know, in TNG, if this was Aria, they would have totally lethal injection.
00:41:23
Speaker
I would accomplish the same except without the dramatic skin burning and the really painful death. But the show always try to go in the most dramatic direction possible. And sometimes it works very well and sometimes it falls flat. And to me here, it fell a little flat.
00:41:46
Speaker
The last thing we need to talk about other than minor old moments here and there is what's up with the Section 31 ship at the end when Leland's trying to override the buffers and what's going on there parallel, I think.
Control AI's Threat
00:42:02
Speaker
Yeah, I'm thinking of that as the control AI resurfacing, like they said that it might.
00:42:10
Speaker
Um, it's hard to tell exactly what happened to the Leyland after he falls to the floor after getting his eye stabbed in that viewfinder. He, his eye, it looks like it kind of like rebuild, rebuilds itself. I like, yeah. Yeah. So like maybe the, maybe the, the AI can infect human minds as well, which is pretty creepy. Like, you know, technology now. Oh yeah. Ah, what do that?
00:42:42
Speaker
What else stabs you and then assimilates you into its matrix? Fascinating. I don't think that the origins of the Borg are going to be somehow explained, but it could be the Borg actually doing this. Do you think that's plausible? It is possible. I don't know if I'd say plausible.
00:43:09
Speaker
But maybe I'm splitting the hair there. But Milno, maybe more on the realm of possibility because it could. It could what? So apparently Starfleet boy, I think he had his eye too close to the camera and it just like a little needle.
00:43:34
Speaker
Did I go away? Yeah, I think I was just infected like Leyland I was I want the three dots to appear whenever No, I guess what I was saying is like I don't think it's like you're right I don't think it's likely it's it's possible but not plausible because the future scenes don't look anything like the like what we consider the board right cubes or spheres
00:44:02
Speaker
Um, not even spheres. They were like these, uh, you know, things, phallic working. The doomsday machine.
00:44:15
Speaker
series. Exactly. I don't want to see the Borg and I don't think they would do that. I kind of want Discovery to be kind of hands off from the Borg and they don't often bring things in from other shows except TOS occasionally with
00:44:33
Speaker
Pike, Spock, number one. Other than that, though, they don't really, they might like have like a little nod to, oh, like Captain Archer went to Chronos one time, or like, oh, here's like a TNG-style combat that you, you know, tap on, and every, every now and then they will kind of have like a little tip of the hat at other Trek shows, but they don't really borrow big important things other than the TOS characters they've used.
00:45:06
Speaker
We'll probably find out a lot about the time traveler next episode, who is Burnham's mom. We'll probably get some really interesting reveals. It looks like Burnham is like blow the whole goddamn place. So maybe something we find out is not sitting right with Burnham regarding her parents, who they really were, you know, we'll find out.
00:45:33
Speaker
Yeah, the next episode we're going to get a lot of details on her parents. I think just the fact that her mom is there and is going to be talking to them that we should get like a whole lot of backstory stuff.
00:45:47
Speaker
a whole lot of Red Angel explanation. You know, why is she doing this stuff? Why did we see her on Kaminar and with like this World War III church and all this stuff? I think we're gonna get answers on that. We're gonna get like some big emotional payoffs with Michael reconnecting with her human mother that she has not seen since childhood. Interesting. And now she's a time refugee. She can't go back to where she was from.
00:46:16
Speaker
Yeah, they're holding her hostage. They're holding her hostage. So it's going to be interesting to see how that affects the master plan she had to stop, if that was her first place, was to stop the AI from gaining a good hold and evolving faster than it might have. Cool. The only other thing I have in my notes is that it was cool to see Arium 1.0. Oh, yeah.
00:46:46
Speaker
Yeah. Who played Ariam in season one, oddly enough. And now she's back on the bridge. Yeah. What are the names of the actresses he had? Is it Heather Cheeseman was the one? Hannah Cheeseman. Hannah. Yeah. Hannah Cheeseman. Right. And then who's the other one? I knew her name, but I can't remember it at this moment. So you'll have to look it up. But Lieutenant Nielsen. Oh, gosh.
00:47:16
Speaker
Do you have it, do you have it, Father? I'll have it momentarily. Lieutenant Nelson is played by, I should know, because I follow her on Twitter, played by Sarah Mitch. Sarah Mitch, that's right. Yeah, she's a Croatian, Croatian Canadian, who goes to the country music bars in the Toronto area. I know those.
00:47:43
Speaker
fascinating. I keep telling Sean that he needs to move to Toronto because it seems like that's where all the action, if he wants to get on Star Trek, that's the action. He told me that he has to live in Quebec because his wife wants to live somewhere where they speak French. That's true. So it's fine. But I mean, go to the west coast to Vancouver. The weather is a lot nicer. Quebec has a filly as well, though. So who knows?
00:48:14
Speaker
there could be a future seasons where, especially if they want to film in Paris, I hear Quebec is a good, sorry, Montreal is a good substitute for Paris, apparently. So they often use it. The Highlander TV series was filmed in Montreal. It took place in France. Yeah, like flashbacks and stuff to like old France. Yeah. Old France. And that was all Montreal. Yep. Interesting.
00:48:43
Speaker
Duncan McCloud, another show, another time. We could do a Highlander retrospective on Starfleet Boy. Today we covered Highlander, we covered Spider-Man comics. I know, we're all over the place.
00:49:04
Speaker
Well done. The only thing, it would be cool if Star Trek is zeissed in one of its, like, the planet zeissed is, like, somewhere in Federation space. That would be pretty cool reference to Highlander 2. You know that, right? Have you seen Highlander 2? Yeah. I've completely forgotten that was a thing. Yeah, we're Highlander super sci-fi for a moment there. All right, so...
00:49:34
Speaker
I think it's time to give our ratings. I'll go first. I think that overall this episode for me was very good. It was entertaining. There were a lot of, you know, especially I Like You was really kind of surprised and also pleased with Mother Burna. We joked about this on Starfleet Boy earlier. We were thinking that like,
00:49:57
Speaker
Burnham herself and come back like Michael herself would come back but that she would be known as mother Burnham like Like you're the mother of the of the galaxy, but actually another on so Right. It's true. So it actually ended up being true But but in the literal sense that it is Burnham's mother. So it is mother burn. I like mama mama Yeah
00:50:21
Speaker
I like mama burners here. That's much more cozy, it's true.
00:50:28
Speaker
So I like that I did like I really enjoyed a lot of the exposition in this episode. I don't know something I didn't talk about there. There are moments that I definitely disagree. I don't think like I think Burnham should be past clocking people being people or like fucking people out like I think she should be past this kind of violence and like I know it was satisfying. If someone is like oh yeah like it's my fault your mom's dead like you wouldn't want to hit them in the face.
00:50:58
Speaker
You know, like hitting someone in the nose, you could actually kill them. That is like one of the most appropriate times to hit someone in the face is if they're like responsible for the death of a loved one.
00:51:12
Speaker
I guess it's true. I don't know. What's like a more infuriating thing you can do to someone? That's true. I'm not saying that it wasn't appropriate. I'm just saying I wish Burnham could have had a different reaction because she's always getting herself in trouble. Like I'm tired of Burnham being in trouble all the time. You're able to behave this season.
00:51:36
Speaker
i mean yeah like she ran from section 31 but like the whole the whole discovery was on her side so that's true i agree no i i and and don't get me wrong i love bernum i just i just was like oh don't please don't put bernum in the brig come on keep her safe although she she was the reason they you know they couldn't do anything they needed her i get it so but but like i like that i we didn't talk
00:52:05
Speaker
We didn't talk what? Lost you there. He's getting stabbed in the eye. But I really like the scene that there were other moments like in secret when they're, oh, hello? Yeah, you said we didn't talk about what?
00:52:19
Speaker
Oh, we didn't really talk about that scene in detail, but the scene between Spock and Burnham was nice. Like, I really liked the exposition in that scene. Yes. And I love everything about Ethan Peck Spock. I think he is so awesome as this character. And I would love to see more of them after the season if there's any possible way they can do that or if they make like the Pike Enterprise show that some some fans have theorized.
00:52:46
Speaker
Like, you can get more of this guy a Spock. And I thought I wouldn't like it that much. I was glad they took a while to build up to him, because I'm like, I'm not in a hurry to see Spock. I don't want them to do anything too weird with the most iconic Star Trek character ever. Then when I actually see him, I'm like, oh my god, he's so good.
00:53:05
Speaker
He is so good. In fact, he inspired my new, my look here today. Like I got the Spock beard going on. You can't see my Vulcan ears cause they're covered by the phone. So that was good.
Pacing and Exposition Critique
00:53:22
Speaker
And in general, even though if you guys go and check out Kit Wolski's video, I do find myself thinking about a lot of the points that he makes in it. And he definitely didn't seem to enjoy this episode at all, and I think his video shows that. But at the same time, I do see his points, and I think audiences should go check it out too. But I didn't
00:53:54
Speaker
but in general I like that he's kind of like normalizing and I do like that you know the way kind of sometimes just like a simple piece of advice can actually change your whole perspective and I think when
00:54:09
Speaker
When Admiral Cornwell says basically that like it's a choice love is a choice every single day You know and that kind of like gets him thinking and gets him to come around. I like that I do hope that they don't play this thing out too long I hope that they do reconcile like maybe next episode And then you know move forward again as the the couple that we we've come to enjoy so we're all actually
00:54:35
Speaker
Overall, though, I have to say that even though the ending was so exciting and everything, this is like my lowest rated episode of Star Trek Discovery. I'm going to give it an eight point five this season. I don't know if I gave any love for you. Yeah, that's super low because it's been hitting tens and nine. So eight point five.
00:54:59
Speaker
Yeah, it's my rating. So is that all you got? Yeah, that's all I got. So I had a lot of problems with this episode too. And I feel like we spent a lot of time talking about like the good things. So I was real quickly list off some of the problems I had. And a lot of that was just
00:55:17
Speaker
A problem I have with the show in general is that it doesn't take time to breathe. It's always too eager to move along with this high energy, fast pace, just boom, boom, boom. Never take the time between the big moments to hash things out. Have conversations around a table in the conference room, next generation style, and talk about
00:55:45
Speaker
How did we learn the Red Angel, or how did we learn that the control AI is from the future? Why do we want to capture the Red Angel? Oh, so we need to go to this planet and do this, but okay, there's a danger of that. They don't have those conversations where you have conflicting
00:56:04
Speaker
ideas where Worf thinks this is a good idea, but Jordy is like, oh no, the technology needs to be like this. And then Riker is like, well, I think it'd be good if we did this. They don't really have those slower moments. The show doesn't stop to breathe. And I think it was super apparent in this episode, they could have benefited from some of that type of stuff. They don't even tell us how they learned that the control AI is from the future. And when they decide that
00:56:34
Speaker
Oh, this bioneural scan shows that the Red Angel is Michael Burnham. Immediately after that, Giorgio and Leyland happen to show up and give more explanation. And it just doesn't feel natural and organic. It feels like writers trying to connect plot point to plot point to plot point. And you get really contrived things sometimes that don't work.
00:57:02
Speaker
I loved what they did with the reveal at the end. I love the character moments, Spock and Michael, Michael and Tyler, Colber and the Admiral, Colber and Stamets. But they're super cringy scene that I had.
00:57:19
Speaker
that's going to like keep me from giving this any higher of a rating than what I'm giving it is when Giorgio was flirting with Culver and Stamets. Oh my God. I forgot about it.
Awkward Character Interactions
00:57:28
Speaker
I didn't even remember. That was a little clunky and unnatural. It was a little extra. It's true. That's true. I even blocked it out. Thanks for reminding me. Are we supposed to think that like everyone in the mirror universe is a pansexual? A pansexual. Yeah.
00:57:45
Speaker
Apparently pansexuality is really evil. It's like the evil universe. That's what everyone does.
00:57:53
Speaker
to me i'm curious if you have an opinion on this would just just to me i do i think in that i think the way tng and even tos kind of handles it where it's just not even talked to it's a non-issue like we it's clear that riker is pansexual but he doesn't is he like does he when does he like boys well that's the thing is like that this is just in your head canon
00:58:18
Speaker
Yeah, it is. He, but he has that gender neutral planet and like, I know she, like the, that, that they, and identifying as female. And that's why like that attraction was strong. So I'm just joking. But I'm saying like, what, I guess what I'm trying to say is like Star Trek always depicted like an advanced notion of sexuality, but that it would also like, like, it would also like take into account that like, you know, most people are going to be to our home.
00:58:47
Speaker
or in sexual period, right? And that there would be a few people that are homosexual, just like it is now. Like it's not gonna change. Like not everyone's gonna be homosexual in the future or pansexual or bisexual. It's just not gonna happen, you know? So I feel like, yeah, you're right. It's in an odd way that discovery kind of wears its sexuality on the sleeve. And I do think that's great. One pointed out that trick discovery is the entry point
00:59:17
Speaker
seen every Star Trek series are like, well, Star Trek already dealt with this, right? But I do think it is important to reiterate these things for new fans because it is an important thing about Star Trek. But that scene was just awkward. It was just like a weird scene. I think it's cool that we finally have gay men in Star Trek because that had never been a thing.
00:59:37
Speaker
And then it's weird to me to tell the gay boys that in like, oh no, like the other universe, like you still like girls. So it's like, you can't, to me it feels like you can't even look like the gay men be gay men.
00:59:51
Speaker
Right. No, it's true. And, well, I like that. I mean, I do kind of like that, uh, Stamets says, uh, as far as I can tell here and in any other universe, I'm gay. Do you find that relatable? Is that how, is that how you feel? Yeah, I, I actually, uh, I get the question, you know, you know, when they're close to people, they like start asking you questions about your sexuality.
01:00:16
Speaker
just a natural thing and I often like how gay are you like is there any exception like to your to your data like a skeleton yeah and I get that like I think especially for someone who is meeting or like interacting with a gay person for the first time it's kind of hard to like establish that but I also think it's a fair question because um uh Kinsey showed that like you know it's more of a scale right like it's like scale so I always am 500% gay so if you want to
01:00:46
Speaker
like if you want to like maybe uh maybe like 11 out of 10 but like no like you're like as if you are interested in me you'd have to chip away at four at 500 just to get me at 100 and then you'd have to chip away at that to get me to like
01:01:05
Speaker
be a little bit straight free. So no, I apologize, ladies who might be interested, but I am 500% gay. So that means here and in any other universe, I'm probably also gay. But yeah, so keeping that terrible scene in mind,
01:01:27
Speaker
I give this episode a 5 out of 5. It's not totally bad, but it's not particularly good either. It's probably my least favorite episode of this season and possibly of all of Discovery.
01:01:51
Speaker
It's a tough one because it has like a really good moment at the end, right? Like it's a pretty powerful moment, but I do think, well, like, but as an exposition episode, like, do you think it's its job well? And that's why I gave it an eight and probably why you gave it a five. Like it does its job, but it doesn't really go, like it could have gone.
01:02:07
Speaker
Somewhere else and it would have been more I think impactful I like the idea that I would have loved the idea because there is a conference room we'll seen in this episode, but it like lit 30 seconds and You know like it could have been a lot or and stuff like that. I do want to mention that I know that the Show is filmed in Toronto, but it looked like the conference table had this like rough wood like thing Did you notice that I was like kind of broken wood? I
01:02:38
Speaker
Yeah, I noticed that a few episodes ago. I wonder, because there's an artist in that, and I'm like, oh my God, is it that artist? I would love to know if anyone from CBS who's involved with the production is listening, where did you get that cool conference because it looked like something I've seen in Sure. Yeah, I would be curious to learn more about it. So what do we have in a 5?
01:03:07
Speaker
Yes. What does that average out to? I'd say it's fair to say seven. Six point five. Six point five. Six point. Yeah, I think six point. Yeah, let's fair. Seven's fair. That's not bad. Star Trek Discovery overall is still holding its high rate higher than last season ratings for this season. And I am looking forward to the next episode. How many do we have left for?
01:03:36
Speaker
Yes, yeah, this was episode 10 of 14, so four to go.
01:03:49
Speaker
I know that it's been proven beyond a shadow
Final Thoughts and Future Speculations
01:03:55
Speaker
of a doubt that the enterprise will not appear again, but I'm really hoping that the enterprise does come in at the last minute. Yeah, I believe that. It's just too good, right? It's just too good. All right, Father, I think we'll spare the audience any further discussion.
01:04:14
Speaker
and end the show right here. Thank you for joining us, audience. If you want to check out Fatherie's content, please go to his YouTube channel, Textrek, and also check out the audio-only podcast that is up today. It's live now, and I also published this episode, so if you're watching this, do that.
01:04:33
Speaker
which is what I'm going to go listen to next while I have a cup of tea because I've been under the weather. And I look forward to seeing you hopefully next week and everyone live long and prosper and we'll see you next time. Bye.