Anika and Liz go for a nice walk in the forest and discuss Star Trek: Discovery‘s “Si Vic Pacem, Para Bellum”, and ask ourselves: which Discovery characters are most likely to massacre a bunch of Tusken Raiders?
You may have noticed some audio issues lately, and this recording was particularly challenging, so Liz resorted to Descript’s “studio sound” filter. This made everything more or less audible, but also weirdly muffled, like we were recording from inside a pillowfort. Alas!
- Is it possible to tell a new Star Trek story?
- If Dave Filoni wrote a Star Trek, it would be this episode
- Did Admiral Cornwell hold Starfleet Command’s only brain cell?
- We are going to say something nice about the pacing on Star Trek: Discovery
- Liz knows very little about chess and it shows
Transcript
(Please note this transcript was generated automatically by Apple Podcasts, and though it was edited by a human, some errors may remain.)
Liz: Welcome to Antimatter Pod, a Star Trek podcast where we discuss fashion, feminism, subtext and subspace hosted by Anika and Liz. Today we’re discussing a Star Trek: Discovery Season 1, Episode 8, “Si Vi Pacem Para Bellum”. What was the meaning? To create peace, prepare for war?
Anika: Correct.
Liz: I did do Latin at university, I just did very badly at it.
Anika: I mean, so, it’s one of those things where they put it in Latin, so that people who cared to look it up would look it up, but it just sounds like a thing, you know. Even the translation to me sounds very, we just made this up.
Liz: Original.
Anika: We’re using this on purpose. We’re not like saying anything with this, we’re just trying to confuse you. That’s my personal take on it.
Liz: I mean, that’s Latin.
Anika: Yeah. Anyone can make it make sense. It’s like astrology.
Liz: Yeah.
Anika: It has just enough in it to make you like, oh yeah, that’s exactly how I am. So yes, I don’t think the title is particularly meaningful.
Liz: No. But, you know, they put some effort in and after all those seasons of Star Trek: Voyager having episodes with one-word titles that start with R, I do appreciate a bit of effort. I feel respected.
Anika: Yeah, I do. I like that they were like, we’re going to have fancy titles, and we actually don’t care if it’s meaningful, which is very TOS of them and I approve of them.
Liz: So TOS.
I thought that I liked this episode, but I think really I just like the Kat scenes. I’m sorry.
Anika: No, fully agree. I think that there are elements of this episode that are … okay. So the Kat scream is great and there are elements of the episode that are very interesting, but overall, I struggle to pay attention. Yeah.
Liz: And I kind of feel this is like the mushroom party episode last week. This is kind of one of those ones that was received by fandom as, oh yeah, we’re doing proper Star Trek. We’re on a strange new world. There’s the war stuff and we get one of the few big space battles of this season, which ironically doesn’t have a lot of that. But mostly it’s about the planet and the mission and making first contact with a new species. Real classic Star Trek stuff.
And I just kind of feel maybe there has been so much Star Trek and this story has been told so often. Maybe there’s just not a lot of room to do anything new with it. And I don’t think this is a Discovery problem. I think this was an issue going back to Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise.
Anika: I don’t think this is a Discovery problem, because we’ve discussed how… So the 10C, that was in season four, right, of Star Trek: Discovery? Which isn’t even… I don’t even love season four. I have a lot of problems with season four of Star Trek: Discovery. However, the 10C stuff is really interesting to me, because it was finally sort of doing something different.
Liz: Yeah.
Anika: With Star Trek and with the aliens. And it was a big swing. And I appreciated that more that this legitimately felt like a Star Trek: Voyager episode. I think you can tell a story that we already know the beats to in a new and interesting way. I just don’t think that this actually accomplished that.
Liz: My question for this sort of story is like, okay, well, we’ve seen this basic science fictional idea before, but what is it saying about the characters?
And in that sense, it does great work with the characters. It’s a really important episode for Saru and all of that. Whereas Star Trek: Strange New Worlds will do this sort of Star Trek, we’ve seen it before, and it’s about Star Trek. It doesn’t really tell us anything about the characters that we don’t already know, generally not something good.
With season four of Star Trek: Discovery, like the stuff with the 10C, it was a familiar story, but we had never spent so much time exploring it. I think that’s really the great opportunity of streaming era Star Trek to really dig deep and spend a lot of time with these stories that would have been told in 45 minutes in the 90s.
Anika: I think that’s exactly it, that this episode felt more like one of those episodic one-off stories, even though it goes into the next episode, so we’re not done with Pahvo, but-
Liz: No, it’s not totally self-contained.
Anika: Spoiler alert for the next episode, it’s not like they do anything new or interesting then either.
Liz: No.
Anika: They don’t spend enough time here to do anything. And also, yeah, you’re right that there is a lot of great character stuff for Saru, and I think that I don’t connect with it because I still have issues with Saru. And again, that’s a personal preference thing. That’s not a ding necessarily on the series or on Saru as a character or on Doug Jones, certainly. But I was interested in how it changed him. I wasn’t necessarily interested in his reactions. I can’t express it exactly.
And also the characters that I do care about, Michael and Ash, I actually feel like Ash is playing different parts in this episode. At the beginning of the episode, he’s such a bro. And as much as I loved his bro energy last week, I’m not into his bro energy in this particular sense.
Liz: There’s a time and a place.
Anika: I’m not into him, I’m just like, no. And then he is leaning into his secret Klingon-ness to distract Saru. And that’s interesting, but it’s not actually what the story is about, or what that scene was about, or – like, I only know that because I know what’s coming. So it’s like retroactively interesting, but it’s not interesting in the moment.
Liz: Yeah, yeah. I am going to be meaner about the Saru side of the story. And look, when I criticize Saru as a character, I do not mean Doug Jones. I love Doug Jones. I think he gives a great performance. I love his work. I think it’s still a writing problem that Saru in this story is still incredibly defined by his biology.
Anika: Yes.
Liz: And so part of the problem is that his behaviour is driven by his biology and not his training as a Starfleet officer.
Anika: I think that’s the thing, is that he is, it would be interesting if it was like Saru was, and you were right to say this is what happened since season two. Like it would be interesting if Saru was like, wait, everything that I believed about myself and my biology and my culture might not be true. If he was interrogating it in any way, but he is still stuck in the – like, what he’s been taught is reality belief system.
Liz: I don’t want to fault him for that, but at no point is he trying to use his intellect to think around what the Pahvans have done to him and how that’s affecting his behavior.
Anika: Right.
Liz: And I understand it’s a stressful situation. There’s a lot going on, but Michael would intellectualize it if this was her. Michael would think her way through.
Anika: So I think I can explain everything I need to about my issues with Saru with my comments here that Saru is a Jedi. And I was struggling. So Ash, I can go into this more in depth when we get there, but Ash and Michael are very Anakin and Padme in this particular episode, there is a real thread of Anakin, Padme in the meadow. They have one scene where they disagree. And I was like, that is almost-
Liz: That is the meme.
Anika: I could definitely make the meme. This conversation, I know, would barely have to change any of the dialogue. That’s how much it maps on to it. And then Saru, I was like, okay, so does that make Saru Obi-Wan? And I was like, not really, because in Attack of the Clones, Obi-Wan is sort of a different – Obi-Wan in general, he’s not indicative necessarily of the Jedi. And then I was like-
Liz: He is also an outlier.
Anika: Saru is Yoda, but he’s not–
Liz: That’s what I was going to say!
Anika: Yeah, I mean, Saru is like, what if– And then I was like, that’s too mean. Because we all know that I hate Yoda. And then I also– I hate Yoda for the same reasons that I hate Saru in certain ways. And it is his unwillingness to adapt.
But I eventually decided that was unfair to Saru as well, because Saru is young in his- Like, it’s not just that he’s not 900 years old, that they– Legitimately, he has not gone through his puberty, like his final puberty or whatever. You know what I mean? So it’s not fair to call him out as that. So it’s almost like Saru is another version of Anakin. It’s like the anti-Anakin.
Liz: And it’s sort of the same problem as with Odo, where you have this character who is chronologically very young and very much still learning to how to be a person, how young a person is, but played by a middle-aged man.
Anika: Exactly.
Liz: And so there’s this disconnect between…
Anika: And Neelix.
Liz: Stop casting middle-aged men as these characters.
Anika: But I mean, like straight up, he was almost verbatim talking about the living force at times in this episode. You know what I mean? It was just like, wow, as someone who sees Star Wars everywhere, there’s a lot of Star Wars in this episode. But that’s also, it’s because they are non-corporeal light beings. And there’s a freaking tree made of crystals. I’m not crazy to be looking at that tree and saying, okay, so Khyber crystals. They literally run on energy.
Liz: It’s not quite that episode of The Clone Wars where they go to planet Mortis, but it’s not that episode.
Anika: Exactly. That’s how I was feeling. So that’s why, and Saru is on the side of the people that I disagree with. In all of those Clone Wars and Attack of the Clones and all the prequels and just Jedi in general arguments, Saru is on the side of Yoda and I am not.
Liz: Yeah. I think saying that Saru comes across as a bit of a Jedi, you think that’s mean, but I was going to say that if Saru was around today, he would be gender critical.
Anika: That’s even worse. Yeah, you’re right. That is worse. Because also, many people out there in the ether would say that me calling Saru a Jedi would be a positive. They would think that was a compliment. And then me calling Ash Anakin – is particularly in Attack of the Clones is a negative, whereas I’m like, and that’s why I love him.
Liz: I mean, Ash would absolutely go berserk and kill a bunch of Tusken Raiders if his programming told him to.
Anika: He basically says that’s what he wants to do in this episode. Like it’s, again, it is not subtext. It is like texturally. Ash says that he wants to go on a killing spree of all the Klingons. And obviously we know that it’s not actually the Klingons that he necessarily wants to kill.
Liz: But there’s a lot happening in his little head.
Anika: Exactly. And also, of course, Voq, who is an outsider, is someone who has been mistreated by his peers, the same way that Anakin was in terms of within the Jedi. Of course, Voq would harbor negative feelings towards the people. L’Rell does. In this episode, L’Rell textually says that she wants to murder all of the people who have gone against her. And they’re still Klingons. You know, so of course, Voq would be on L’Rell’s side.
Liz: These crazy mixed up kids are heavily radicalized, just kind of unique in their political opinions.
Anika: Right. And they don’t know any better. Because, oh my gosh, L’Rell in this episode is again, so young. She’s such a baby in this episode, and I just want to wrap her up in a warm light and take her away from it all.
Liz: Protect these children at all costs, but also keep them away from Tusken Raiders.
Anika: Exactly. It’s wrong to murder the Tusken Raiders. But they didn’t necessarily know it was wrong. And that’s on us. That’s on the adults.
Liz: I’m just going to float that I do think that Anakin knew that it was wrong to kill the Tusken Raiders.
Anika: Well, yeah, I mean, because he admits, okay, but this is not a Star Wars podcast. But I have many correct opinions about Attack of the Clones. And if anyone ever wants to hear them, hit me up, because I can go on for hours. And it is that they’re all, every single person in that movie is extremely flawed.
Liz: Oh, yeah.
Anika: And it’s great. It’s honestly great.
Liz: It’s actually my favorite of the prequel movies.
Anika: And it’s beautiful. It’s beautiful to watch. And it’s incredibly deep.
Liz: Yeah. But also, we are not a Star Wars podcast.
Anika: I guess. If you say so. I’m not, okay, again, I’m not crazy to call this episode very Star Wars-coded. I’m sorry.
Liz: No, no. It feels like a slightly misplaced Clone Wars episode. If you told me that this script was ghostwritten by Dave Filoni, I would absolutely believe you.
Anika: Yes.
Liz: Both in the complimentary and the derogatory sense.
Anika: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. He’s only missing a cowboy showdown, and I feel like that’s in the next episode.
Liz: Yeah, we’re going to get there. I am actually seeing The Mandalorian and Grogu today, so this is really appropriate.
Just to go back to the battle at the opening scene, I do really like this sequence. It has my favorite Lorca line, “Mr. Rhys, can I trouble you to fire at something?” We see so little of this sort of thing, but Lorca is trying so hard to save the Gagarin and to save Captain-
Anika: Yes.
Liz: His name, Kavi? Anyway, I looked it up.
Anika: Someone dead.
Liz: It does feel like as much as he doesn’t support this universe, he really does want the Federation to get a win.
Anika: Yeah, I would say, well, of course he does because the Federation is soft and not what he like. But he’s like, I can whip these guys into shape. They’re better than the Klingons. He’s a xenophobe. I mean, that’s obvious.
I really like that battle too. I like that it begins with that battle and that it ends with sort of the tension that another battle is coming. The emotions that the bookends of this episode create are just very strong. And I think that that was smart. I could have just kept watching, right? Because I can binge at this point. It’s 10 years later.
Liz: Yeah.
Anika: But the feeling of anticipation for the next episode was actually like … even though I knew exactly what was going to happen, and I’ve seen it more than once. And I know everything that happens for the next five years of the story. I was still like, oh yeah, I was excited. And I just think that is strong storytelling.
Liz: Obviously, later in this season, we’re going to have a lot to say about the pacing of season one of Star Trek: Discovery. But I think just this couple of episodes, they do a really good job of telling self-contained stories that are connected. The end of this episode feels like the end of a chapter.
Anika: Yes, exactly. It’s a well-done cliffhanger. Yeah.
Liz: So kudos to them, and I’m not sorry for all the mean things I’m going to say in coming weeks, or honestly in a few months, now, about pacing on Star Trek: Discovery. Really, the mean things about pacing that I’m going to say for years to come and have said already.
Anika: So do we have anything more to say about Pahvo or the action that happens on Pahvo?
Liz: I think this is a really great Michael episode, but a lot of that comes down to shipping. But I find it very interesting that she is a xenoanthropologist and Saru is a first-contact specialist. It feels like maybe they’re doubling up skills to a point, but also it makes sense that Saru would be a first-contact specialist because first contact with his species was made with him.
But maybe another source of tension on the Shenzhou was that they have similar skill sets but diverging focuses, and there’s just enough overlap that they have strong opinions, but they don’t know about the other and how the other works professionally.
Anika: Yeah, that makes sense.
Liz: It’s interesting.
Anika: It is interesting.
Liz: I also feel it’s a situation that Captain Georgiou created and could have managed.
Anika: Right. I was just going to say, I feel it wasn’t necessarily as much of a problem on the Shenzhou. I feel like Lorca doesn’t respect Saru at all, and he only respects Michael to the extent that he respects anyone who’s not himself. He respects her as an appendage of his own.
Liz: He sees her as an extension of himself and his ambitions. And he’s still quite certain that he can groom her to be his consort or whatever.
Anika: Which brings us to, in that way of, I guess she’s his extension, it sort of almost makes sense for her to be on this away team. If I was just going to take everything at face value, it feels out of character for Lorca to send Michael on this mission. And it also feels out of character for the person that they made up a position for because she’s really supposed to be in jail to be on this mission. It just feels kind of ridiculous for Michael to be on this mission.
I think that the only way I can understand that is if Lorca was like, I need someone who is representing my point of view on the planet to be there. And so he just slots her in as an extension of himself. That’s the only way that I can understand it because as we’ve seen, Lorca has been so intent on making sure that Michael is protected. And yes, so it seems weird to be like, I’m going to drop her on this planet. Maybe he threatened Ash again, and we just, that’s off screen, but it’s implied.
Liz: To me, it makes some sense because a xenoanthropologist would be useful for this. But also, I think he thinks, you know, how dangerous can this be, really?
Anika: I mean, but it just seems, it’s just overall, it’s like, why would she be on this?
Liz: The plot requires Michael to be on this trip.
Anika: Yeah, the plot requires Michael to be there. And so I’m just saying, from a storytelling standpoint, it’s a little bit of a, okay, I will accept it. But I do have to come up with reasons. It’s not something that just makes sense on its own, in my opinion.
Liz: I mean, it’s also like, why does every away mission require the senior staff of the USS Enterprise? You know, it’s just one of those stupid Star Trek rules, because they’re the protagonists.
Anika: I know, but they’re at least, they have a position on the ship. Michael and Ash, like Ash was promoted, so he’s the chief of security.
Liz: But he’s the guy who knows how to use guns.
Anika: But Kat pointed out, collecting misfits. And I love that. I love that as an Anika, Anika loves that. But as a…
Liz: Extremely Janeway-coded of you.
Anika: Exactly. It’s like I’m super into it, but it just feels a little bit convenient again. And I will let it slide, but I can’t just say that it’s okay, because it does bump me.
Liz: After all these years, I have a brand new prime Lorca headcanon. Do you think he’s a guy who’s always adopting lost puppies and lost kittens?
Anika: Like, actual animals? That’s adorable. I did write that cat fic.
Liz: Like, the less evil.
Anika: I wrote the fic where he had a cat, and Kat had to take care of his cat.
Liz: No, you did.
Anika: And then Kirk had to take care of his cat.
Liz: Oh, I forgot about that, yes. Man, I miss the Kirk that existed in my head before Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. They should make a TV series where that guy is the captain of the Enterprise.
Anika: Woof. Okay. So, should we move on to the Kat and L’Rell plot line?
Liz: Yes, I needed to do that second because otherwise it looks like I only paid attention to one half of the episode. I actually remember this episode was the first to drop after you created the Discord. So it was the first one where we were watching and chatting live. And only just now occurred to me that I could have gone back many years through our archives to see what we said about it back at the time. But I didn’t think of that, so let’s just go.
Anika: Well, what I can say is that I posted a screencap of Kat screaming, or perhaps a gif, I’m not sure. But basically Kat screaming in L’Rell’s face after she’s told to scream. And I captioned it, I would die for her.
And I have to explain that that’s a catchphrase, right? It’s a tagline for characters that you love. I would die for them. I literally had never used it before, even for Anakin or Padme or Alice or anyone. No other character got this tagline because I have a real — and this is related to my Murder Is Bad thing — I don’t like the concept of using death as a flippant descriptor of strong emotion. I feel like death is actually a thing that shouldn’t be trifled with.
Which again, no, I’m not judging any of you. I just want to be very clear that I’m not judging anyone because I know how words work and I know how phrases work and I know that whole thing. I understand memes, I promise. I personally struggled with it because I have a specific relationship with death.
Liz: That makes perfect sense to me because, you know the bit in Brooklyn Nine-Nine where Rosa has her dog and she’s like, I’ve only had this dog for a day, but if anything happens to it, I’ll kill myself and everyone else in the room. I say that in real life a lot with people I know, but I rarely use an unedited version of that online because if I say it, I always include the gif so there’s some context so people don’t think that I’m just threatening mass murder and suicide.
Anika: Exactly. There has to be the context. You have to understand the reference. And sometimes I worry. And so I just don’t do it because it’s just a personal thing. But I used it and I didn’t even think about it. I was just like, this is so meaningful to me. This is so thrilling.
Liz: You think about this so carefully, but not in this specific case.
Anika: That I just had to express this feeling. And using this meme phrase is the only way I can express this feeling so that everyone on Tumblr will understand. You know, it was like, this is the first time that this has ever happened to me, that I’ve had this level of emotion.
Liz: Man, I have that level of emotion like every Tuesday.
Anika: I have very strong feelings about my characters, but again, because of my personal history, I struggle with the concept of death used casually. I sound like a crazy person. I apologize to our listeners.
Liz: I think you contextualized your feelings well.
Anika: So I’ve only gone to Star Trek Las Vegas once, and it was because Jayne Brook was going, and it was 2018. I’d never gotten any celebrity’s autograph before signing up to go to Star Trek Las Vegas in 2018. That’s the level of — I became a different type of fan because of Jayne Brook’s performance as Katrina Cornwell. And it was that scream that really solidified it.
Liz: I mean, it’s a really shocking moment because we know Admiral Cornwell by now, and we know how restrained she is. And I think in this scene and in general, she was very good at depicting the fear, the very real fear that Kat feels as she sees L’Rell.
And L’Rell has brought her own instruments. She’s bringing her own little torture kit. It’s actually quite sweet, I guess.
Anika: Yeah. And for the L’Rell stuff, in this particular watching, I was struck by how young L’Rell is, to be in that scene. They’re absolutely equals in that scene, even though one is a prisoner and one is a captor, and there’s also the huge age difference. One is fully herself and L’Rell is still forming herself.
And so there’s just so many layers to that scene — you don’t know what L’Rell is planning and you don’t know what Kat is planning. You can guess on both sides, but we’re not actually in their heads. We don’t hear their captain’s log, you know? So it’s really interesting to me. And I just think that’s amazing.
Liz: I think what’s interesting as well is that it wasn’t until I rewatched it the other night that I really appreciated how much Kat does not for a minute believe that L’Rell wants to defect.
She’s looking at L’Rell like, I don’t believe you, but I need to get out of here. So I’m just going to, you know, we’re going to escape and then I’m going to drop you off for whatever humane interrogation process is in order. And then I’m going to have a spa day and get Captain Lorca removed from command. It’s going to be great.
Anika: Yeah.
Liz: She deserves that spa day. She doesn’t get it, but she deserves it.
Anika: I mean, she deserves it. There are so many things that would be saved. But I just — everyone, let’s have a stress relief day. Let’s all just go to the hot spring. Just saying, let’s try it out.
And it’s funny that I just said that because it’s a little bit like what the Pahvans do at the end of this.
Liz: “Hey guys, come hang out with us.”
Anika: I did not mean to, but I kind of just went full Organian slash Pahvan right there.
Liz: I will say that usually when we see this sort of disembodied non-corporeal alien in Star Trek, they’re usually super wise, really good people. And they just want everyone to get along. And the Pahvans just want everyone to get along because they’re naive — they don’t understand. And I do think that’s doing something new, and the tropes are well done.
Anika: Yeah, I’m going to say something crazy, everybody. I almost would like to spend more time with Saru and the Pahvans, figuring out what exactly was happening there.
Liz: That would have been interesting.
Anika: Yeah, that’s what’s interesting about the Pahvans — their effect on Saru and how it changes him, and the misunderstandings on both of their sides. Because Saru also doesn’t understand humans or war, you know? It’s funny to me that the Pahvans are like, we’re going to possess this guy and then we’re going to understand everything about this culture. And it’s like, no, that guy also doesn’t understand the culture. That’s the interesting part of this episode. And I feel we don’t really get to explore any of it.
Liz: Yeah, that is true. And it’s kind of the same mistake L’Rell make,s because she also doesn’t really understand Kat. She doesn’t really understand humans, and they have a longer conversation about it later in the season. But she also doesn’t really understand Kol, and she underestimates him because he’s — Kol is also a jock. He is a bro.
Anika: He’s such a bro. Sorry. There is a modern AU with Kol’s gym and Ash infiltrating it. He’s definitely giving everyone steroids.
Liz: I’m sorry.
Anika: My mind just went crazy with the idea of Kol’s version of a bro versus Ash’s version of a bro.
Liz: And because of this, L’Rell really underestimates him and she thinks that she can just lie to his face and get away with it. And Kol is much smarter than that and he sees through her. And you have this note here in Anika’s Wonderland corner — L’Rell levels up as Kat is toppled, but I don’t think L’Rell has leveled up. I think she’s been maneuvered into — I know she’s just a pawn, but she’s been maneuvered into checkmate. Kol thinks he’s taken her off the board.
Anika: Yeah, but she hasn’t been. So when I say level up, I don’t mean that she’s gotten to Queen. I mean that she is now controlling herself on the board. And yeah, what happens is she makes a move and she’s immediately captured by Kol. But it’s check, not checkmate, just saying.
Liz: I’m sorry, I have anticipated your Wonderland corner and also, I’m really bad at chess.
Anika: I think that L’Rell doesn’t make it across the board to be queen until the end of this season, when she’s literally made queen. Spoilers, but that’s actually what happens. But what’s interesting about this is that she made her first move outside of — she made her first move as a pawn controlling herself in previous episodes, when she set up the whole Voq thing, right? She and Voq were like, we’re going to do this, right? That was definitely the beginning of it.
But what’s interesting here is that she has this plan, and she executes it. It is not a particularly well thought out plan. It is not a plan that works. However, she does execute a plan in this episode and she doesn’t die. So that’s what I mean by it’s check and not checkmate. Because she’s not toppled, she’s not taken off the board. She is captured in the sense that she can’t move without being taken off the board, but she can wait for her captors to move themselves away so that she can escape.
Liz: Yeah, I getcha. I just think also this is a great episode for both Kat and L’Rell, because up until now, all their stories have been about their interactions with men — mainly Voq and Lorca — and he’s been creepy to both of them, which, my dude. And now they’re interacting with each other.
Anika: Exactly.
Liz: And it adds so much to both of their characters and to both of their stories, and I just think it’s nice.
Anika: It is nice, and it’s important because this is not their last interaction. They continue to move the plot and move across the board in tandem, almost. So they’re linked by this interaction, and they continue it. And so it’s important to understand that Kat is a queen, but she is a queen who has been captured. She was captured last week, right? Or two weeks ago, I guess. But anyway, you know what I mean? So there is —
Liz: I just assumed you were repressing the mushroom party.
Anika: Well, I like to.
So, you know, she’s handicapped. She can’t move as freely as she normally can as a queen. And L’Rell is on the other side. She’s a pawn from the other side. So she’s trying to contain her, but she’s also trying to take power for herself, which is taking power away from her own side. You know what I mean? So she’s sort of playing both sides. Not to really beat this chess metaphor to death.
But I think that there is a lot going on here in terms of what everybody is doing. Kat is absolutely trying to play L’Rell just to escape, right? And L’Rell is trying to play Kat and Kol, and not succeeding in either way, really. Whereas Kat appears to be dead at the end of this episode, right? However, it’s not like L’Rell is better off because of that. So L’Rell hasn’t won because Kat is dead. You know what I mean? So it’s not like she’s gaining power from either side. She’s trying to play both sides and not gaining power for either of them, but she is still playing on her own terms.
Liz: Yeah. Yeah. No. It’s really interesting when you think about the future of their relationship, where by season two, yes, L’Rell is a queen, but Kat is basically treating her as a puppet chancellor for the Federation and has installed Georgiou and Section 31 to keep an eye on her and manipulate her.
Anika: Right. Because Kat still thinks of herself as a real queen who was born queen, whereas L’Rell is a pawn who became queen, and that’s different.
Liz: There’s an interesting subtext of Federation exceptionalism in there that I really like.
Anika: Yes.
Liz: I love to problematize the Federation.
Anika: But while we are in the Kat and L’Rell section, I want to talk about the fake death.
Liz: Which caused no end of trauma in our Discord.
Anika: Yeah. So, I mean, I will say straight up that there were two parts of Anika during that week. There was the Anika who firmly did not believe it. I was like, they’re tricking us and she’s not dead. Because it legitimately did not make sense as a plot point for her to be dead. I didn’t understand the story.
Liz: But also, remember Jayne went on the after show and said something that implied she wasn’t really dead. And then startrek.com had to put out a last minute interview with her where she was like, oh yeah, I’ve never been murdered by a Klingon before, ha ha ha.
Anika: Is that true? Because I remember it as — I never actually watched the after show. I watched the first one with her but not this one, because I heard they were discussing her death. And I was like, she’s dead. But yeah, I do remember the startrek.com article about her being dead that I was — again, I was like, that’s fake news.
Liz: And it was so blatantly damage control because they were so intent on having twists and secrets, which I do appreciate. That was very stressful at the time.
Anika: I felt like — so I like the twists and turns in the story. I like the, is Lorca a good guy or a bad guy? Is Ash a good guy or a bad guy? Is Kat dead or not dead in the story? I straight up am like, I object strenuously to startrek.com having an article trying to trick me into believing that she’s really dead. That is just — okay, it’s not on par.
Liz: No one wants to be gaslit by startrek.com.
Anika: I don’t like that at all. Honestly, I do not approve of the Javad Iqbal fake Voq actor thing. I’m sorry. I like that it was his dad’s name. I just want Shazad to get credit for that. And I feel it muddled it. And as you said, I hate being gaslit by anything. Gaslighting is always wrong. Sorry. Again, this is another terrible opinion of Anika’s. Murder is always wrong and also gaslighting is always wrong.
Liz: I feel like that’s a pretty popular opinion, to be honest. I don’t think you need to apologize for that. I think it’s pretty mainstream, or should be.
Anika: I hate when they cross the line into actual media, separate from the show. The story can gaslight me as part of the story and I will accept it. I do not want the production team to be gaslighting me. I think that is a bridge too far that I will never approve of.
Liz: I mean, sometimes I enjoy it, like I enjoyed the Javad Iqbal thing very much. But you get to some stuff like — what was it called? — that terrible Doctor Who spin off? Torchwood! When Torchwood presents an actor as a regular and then kills her off in the first episode, I don’t like that. I’m actually still pretty mad about it. So yeah, I completely see where you’re coming from. And I think your opinion is reasonable.
Anika: Thank you. And I still maintain that I do not actually understand the L’Rell subplot from this episode through to the end of season one. I don’t understand what is happening with the L’Rell subplot because it would make more sense to me — And again, this is just my personal opinion — It would make more sense to me if L’Rell had actually had a plan, and the plan was to fake Kat’s death and then escape together. I think that makes more sense than everything that actually happens.
Liz: God bless her, but she’s still figuring this whole thing out. What I want to know, I’m also thinking about this plan, but from the writing side. We know that Kat’s death in “Lethe” was originally planned — she was meant to be killed in “Lethe,” and then at the last minute, they saved her. What was the original plan for getting L’Rell onto Star Trek: Discovery? Is this why they decided not to kill her? Because they realized they needed someone for that step?
Anika: I mean, I don’t know. I feel it’s related because I feel like the decision to create this amazing Kat and L’Rell relationship was incredible. I love their relationship, and I love what happens with it. So it’s actually super amazing that this happens. But I think that in creating that, they bumped up against things — you know, we have to move things around so that this makes sense. And I’m not sure it quite actually made it to sense.
Liz: No, I completely understand that, but also it’s been 10 years and I’m only just now thinking about it. So I’m not mad.
Anika: No, it’s fine. I just remember fully believing that Kat was not dead. L’Rell knew Kat was not dead. And that her plan was to trick Kol and then escape. Okay, she was surprised by the dead bodies. That felt believable to me — L’Rell found all the dead bodies and freaked out and was like, okay, plan B or whatever.
But her plan was still — I have this living admiral who is a way into the Federation, you know what I mean? She wasn’t going to collaborate with the Federation. She was going to use that to take over control of the Klingon Empire, in my head. I think — again, she’s super young and she hasn’t necessarily thought all of this through — I believe that her motivations were to use Kat and the Federation to gain control of the Klingon Empire, and she didn’t think all of that through.
Liz: I thought she was trying to get to Kat to get to Discovery to activate Voq, and then they would have a sleeper agent — or rather, she would wake up the sleeper agent. I’m sick of saying sleeper agent.
Anika: Yeah, yeah, you’re right. To get to Voq. And I think that L’Rell was planning to put Voq in control of the Klingon Empire, but she would be the power behind the man. I feel like that was the plan. And so she was going to use Kat and use the Federation and use Voq to do this whole thing. It was her grand plan, pie in the sky and ridiculously overcomplicated to begin with.
What doesn’t make sense to me is that she is surprised Kat is alive. That doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t understand why she’s surprised Kat is alive. I can totally believe her having this unconscious admiral, being surprised by the dead bodies, dropping the admiral there and not thinking — I have to think on my feet and do things differently or whatever. But it’s weird to me that she ever thought Kat was dead. That’s what’s weird to me.
Liz: I don’t know. I think you make a lot of good points.
Anika: Yeah, it doesn’t take away from my enjoyment of everything that’s happening. It’s one of those things where a friend of mine pointed out that I am the type of person that sits in the middle of a story and points out where it doesn’t make sense.
Liz: I mean, that is such a useful skill.
Anika: So I’m always noticing these things that are not necessarily plot holes. They’re just interesting. So it’s fine. I legitimately didn’t believe she was dead. I have — again, I have the time, I was curled up on my kitchen floor crying about the idea that she could be dead. But at the same time, I really didn’t believe it. The reason I was so upset was that it didn’t make sense for the universe to go that way.
Liz: And it offended your sense of narrative.
Anika: Exactly. Which is very different from in season two — in the finale of season two, where she like, I was about to say, goes down to fix this torpedo thing. And Una joins her. And I was like, oh, she’s dead immediately.
Liz: Yeah.
Anika: I knew what was happening. And I turned off emotionally and had the exact opposite reaction where I knew that it was true that she was going to die and I had no emotional reaction whatsoever.
Liz: Whereas I am still having a very strong emotional reaction. And I think because in that case, that real death just didn’t make narrative sense to me. It made sense in terms of hitting all the right story beats, but in terms of character, I couldn’t make sense of it and I still can’t.
Anika: No, I agree.
Liz: And I’m still trying to this day.
Anika: It absolutely is not true to her character or Pike’s character. Kat’s death does not make sense to either of their characters or their character arcs. I will go down forever believing that. I’m sorry. You can’t convince me otherwise.
Liz: Obviously, I have a strong Pike bias here, but I do think that’s where Pike turned from the well-written character of Star Trek: Discovery to the less well-written character of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.
Anika: Do you want to talk about Stamets?
Liz: I was just going to say, I don’t really have much to say about Stamets. This is sort of building the mycelial universe jump storyline, the Mirror Universe and all of that. But I do enjoy that Tilly is so consistent from Season 1 of Star Trek: Discovery to her presence in Star Trek: Starfleet Academy, her emotional intelligence and willingness to push at difficult conversations is really amazing. And here, she’s not a lieutenant, she’s not dealing with cadets, she is managing up. She’s managing her boss and she’s very good at it.
Anika: She is very good at it. And she says, Oh, actually, I’m usually good at that. And I was just like, wow, I love that confidence. I love it.
Liz: Yeah. Nothing but respect.
Anika: The only thing I have to say about the Stamets subplot is that the way he describes how he’s feeling is — I wrote down here in Anika’s Wonderland corner — that it sounds like Stamets is the one in Wonderland. Because the way he describes how he’s feeling and what is happening to him, I was like, oh, so Wonderland, okay.
And that is — not to put too much of a scholarly take on it — but Wonderland is a good representation of mental illness in certain ways. And whenever you’re interrogating your interior self, that’s going to be part of a mental health journey, right? And the play of Wonderland is like, when do you recognize something that is off balance? How far off balance do you need to go before it’s too much? Can you reel it in? Do you have control over it or does it have control over you? Those kinds of questions.
And I feel like that’s what Stamets is grappling with. I’m proud of him for actually opening up to Tilly. And I really appreciate the way that he is keeping it from Hugh. I don’t necessarily agree with him, but the way that he is thinking about how it would affect Hugh is —
Liz: Yeah, yeah. He should be bringing it to a different doctor.
Anika: Exactly. But we’re not there yet. But I really liked that he not only trusted her with how he was feeling, but trusted her with why he wasn’t bringing it to Hugh. And I think he was really opening up to her and trusting her in a way that is notable.
Liz: Yeah. Tilly is a good person to confide in.
Anika: Absolutely. And she knows it. And she seeks people out, to sort of prompt them and say, I’m listening if you need someone to listen. The only other thing I wanted to say before we get to shipping news is that I really appreciated the contrast between Pahvo and the Ship of the Dead.
Liz: Yes.
Anika: Pahvo was wide open. All of its colors were cool — blues and purples and greens — and it had a lot of light and twinkling, and everything was about being lit up and bright and in movement.
And then the Ship of the Dead was so cramped. All of its colors were warm — yellows and reds. And instead of light, it was very shadowed, about the negative space. There was the heaviness of bodies and death and blood, and all of that. It felt very torturous. Everything felt very weighed down. Whereas Pahvo was out in this — even their interior quote-unquote scenes were in these tents that were still open to the outside.
Liz: Yeah, yeah. And they looked warm and comfortable, but the tones of the lights used were very intentional. They looked like glamping tents set up for Instagram. It was really appealing. I really liked how on Pahvo — obviously they were just filming in a Toronto forest somewhere outside of the city. But the way colour grading was used to make it look like an alien landscape was very effective and I really liked it.
It was just nice to get outside because there’s honestly not a lot of location shooting on modern Star Trek. And so it’s always nice when they get to go outside and see Canadian wilderness or the Icelandic wilderness, as we’ll get in season three.
Anika: Yeah, it’s good. I even appreciated that Discovery also looked different. It looked antiseptic compared to Pahvo, but comforting compared to the Ship of the Dead. It was really well done — how Pahvo just felt very alive, and the Ship of the Dead felt very dead, and Discovery was somewhere in between.
Liz: I think it’s very interesting how in this first season, Discovery is lit in very cool tones, and as you say, it’s very antiseptic. And then in later seasons, and particularly once Michael takes command, it’s in warmer colors, it’s in reds, we have the bar set with a little fireplace. It’s the same locations, but they’re lit so differently that they feel like new places.
Anika: Yeah, it’s really — the production design, even the special effects towards the end, and the crystal tree and that stuff, I was like, this is kind of silly, but even that sort of almost silly CGI, I appreciated. The sets were very well done, and I just need to shout that out.
Liz: Okay, shipping news. And this for me is where the Michael story comes in, because Ash is going, what if you matter? What if you’re important? What if your importance to the universe is greater than the worst thing you’ve ever done?
Anika: Oh my God. I remember the first time I watched it, and I was like, Ash, stop being such a bro, stop being such a jock. But then he turns it because he trusts Michael’s plan, and he fully sells it to Saru, and there’s just this — I don’t know — he’s just all in with Michael, which is not necessarily un-jock of him. It’s pretty jock of him to be all in on Michael. But I don’t know. I was almost mad at him and then I stopped.
Liz: It’s also very consistent with his life as Voq. In both personalities, he finds a very intelligent woman and is like, I am going to support you so hard. You have no idea.
Anika: It’s very high school. It is not a deep, meaningful, permanent soulmate relationship. It’s just not. And that’s okay. Neither of them need that. And I don’t need that right now. I’m like, this is lovely. It’s really lovely. It’s just sort of comforting again.
Liz: It really reminds me of Caleb and Tarima, where it is that youthful, you’re the first person I’ve ever really liked and liked romantically and trusted, and I trust you absolutely. I’ve come to agree with you that I think Genesis is the endgame for Caleb. But I think that Caleb and Tarima will have a better ending than Michael and Ash. Because Tarima — well, neither of them are secretly Klingons.
Anika: Thank goodness. I mean, we haven’t seen Zuzu too. You never know. I’m pretty sure. They’re not secretly Klingons.
Liz: We know Tarima’s terrible secret and Caleb isn’t scared of it. Whereas Ash’s terrible secret is that he actually secretly really wants to murder Michael. That’s not really a good foundation for a relationship.
Anika: Not great. It’s not great.
Liz: In his defense, it’s also a secret from him.
Anika: Oh, my poor baby boy. I think even when I was watching, I was like, they’re not endgame. This is Michael’s first starter relationship. And it turns out it’s actually also Ash’s, even though it wouldn’t have been if he was really just Ash.
Liz: Whoever the real Ash Tyler was, I’m sure that he has an ex-girlfriend out there or an ex-boyfriend.
Anika: He’s got game.
Liz: Yeah. He says he’s alive, but why hasn’t he called?
Anika: Again, once again, the humanness of normal guy Ash Tyler is just so precious. He just wants her to like the food that he likes and to go on a cute little vacation. It’s just very sweet.
Liz: But also he’s like, you do not have to be punished for the rest of your life for your crime.
Anika: I know.
Liz: You’re making restitution.
Anika: Sing it out loud, Ash Tyler. So the only other ship I would say is in this episode is Kat and L’Rell, and I don’t ship this at all. I feel like L’Rell is a baby. She’s very young and Kat is not. And I just think that throughout this series, one or the other of them would be playing the other. The imbalances in power are too strong. They’re not unbalanced in the way I like it.
Liz: Yeah.
Anika: They’re the wrong kind.
Liz: If instead of being blown up, Kat is accidentally catapulted 30 years into the future, then absolutely fine. Politically, it’s kind of iffy, but I’m into that. At this point, yeah, I think the gap between them is so big — the age gap and the experience and everything else.
Anika: Yes.
Liz: L’Rell doesn’t need that.
Anika: L’Rell doesn’t need that. It’s a no from me, but do these scenes lend themselves to shipping? Absolutely.
Liz: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And lots of people do ship them and more power to them.
Anika: Exactly.
Liz: Also, and I feel kind of terrible saying this, I’m not really into the whole alien sex side of Star Trek. I like my sexy aliens to be a little more human-like.
And I realize that completely misses the point of the horny science fiction franchise. But I have a hard enough time being attracted to actual humans, and you start adding latex in there and all the bits and pieces and the horns and it’s too much.
Anika: And it is okay. So this is our first viewing of L’Rell having been scarred. And that is interesting. It is something that I have not actually put too much thought into — as to how her scarring relates to her arc, and how it changes her, or provides her more or less power. I think there is something there, but I haven’t thought about it too much to really go into it now. But I did find myself really thinking about it — oh yeah, her scars are so visible, the difference in her eyes. It really does change her physically.
Liz: And she carries herself differently too.
Anika: She carries herself differently. It does affect her. And I’m going to try to pay more attention to that going forward.
Liz: Thinking about L’Rell’s scar for me, I keep thinking about how in season two, she’s prettied up and made to look more like a traditional Klingon and they give her hair. But they also really soften the scar. And that really bugs me because it is so at odds with Klingon culture and everything we know about Klingons.
Anika: I completely agree that she would never. This is someone who — if we are going to flash forward to Chancellor L’Rell — she would be wearing it as a badge of honor.
Liz: Yeah, like General Chang and the eye patch that he’s literally bolted to his face.
Anika: Yeah, exactly. General Chang and Martok — there are so many disfigured Klingons who wear them as a badge of honor, as proof of their warrior heart. And I just think she should lean into it. And I feel she sort of is here. She isn’t hiding it in any way. In the scene with Kat or in the scene with Kol, she’s playing it up. And so it’s weird to me that — other than showrunner, production design sexism, not sexism in Klingon society —
Liz: Yes, which we have discussed at length elsewhere.
Anika: Yeah. Anyway.
Liz: Yeah.
Anika: Do you have anything else to say?
Liz: I just want to say, looking forward to Star Trek: Strange New Worlds and the Klingon defector that we see in “Under the Cloak of War” — maybe Kat is the only person in Starfleet who actually looks at a Klingon who says they want to defect and thinks, do you really?
Anika: Starfleet lost a lot when they lost her.
Liz: I think she may have been holding the only brain cell.
Anika: Legitimately, many poor decisions have happened since.
Liz: And we keep hearing what a great leader Admiral April is, but again, really, no.
Anika: Haven’t seen it. I mean, he’s very pretty. Yeah, sure. But no.
Thank you for listening to Antimatter Pod. You can find our show notes at antimatterpod.com, including links to our social media, credits for our theme music and transcripts of our episodes, which we will be working on. You can follow us on Facebook, Tumblr, TikTok, Instagram, and Bluesky, all at antimatterpod, and on Mastodon at antimatterpod@tenforward.social.
If you like us, leave a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you consume your podcasts. The more reviews, the easier it is for listeners to find us, and tell your friends. Join us next week when we will be discussing the next episode of Star Trek: Discovery Season 1, “Into the Forest I Go.”