Star Trek: Prodigy

“Ascension, Part II”

Review pending

Air date: 7/1/2024
Written by Alex Hanson
Directed by Sean Bishop

Review Text

Pending my review, the comments section is open.

Previous episode: Ascension, Part I
Next episode: Brink

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4 comments on this post

    I'm continuing my binge watching and making a pit-stop at the end of The Ascent (aka Ascension).

    This kid's show does a really great job tugging at my heartstrings. And the story is well-written this season. Fan service wasn't brought in for the sake of it; everything seems to have a purpose and the writing is tight. The story's for kids but dynamic and complex enough for adults to enjoy. Even secondary characters (or characters that have been kinda sidelined) have their strong moments. Watching it feels like an extended animated film. Everything seems like Quality.

    I hope you all agree by the time you get here. I'd had to be alone in that assertion. 😆

    Nitpicks that don't really bother me:

    [1] The adults always seem to be walking with the hands clasped behind their back. I guess it's the show's way of demonstrating that they're the adults.

    [2] With the exception of a couple episodes, is Chakotay still... wooden?

    [3] I'd like The Doctor to dial back on his latest-employed catchphrase.

    It's a great episode that offers a good payoff to the setup from the first half. Zero's sacrifice, in particular, was a palpable moment, giving up something that meant so much to him. Dal's fancy flying tips helping to save the day and win the respect of Red Squad was also an important moment (even if it was Maj'el who really helped land the final blow).

    I'd like to take a point to note how incredibly fanwanky this season is, even moreso than the last. So much of the season is dedicated to a Voyager reprisal, with Janeway, Chakotay, and the Doctor playing such key roles. Involving Wesley Crusher (and thus, by extension, a lot of the stuff established about his character in Season 2 of Picard). Yet all of it works pretty well, because the focus is seldom on the legacy characters, but on the kids.

    @Karl Zimmerman

    It's insane to me me that this kids show has become a de facto sequel to Voyager, of all things, but as someone who was a kid when Voyager was on the air, I'm loving it. It's lovely to hear Mulgrew and Beltran again.

    There are a lot of callbacks in this episode, but they are done really well. Unlike in Picard, they're not just there for the sake of being there. And they're not static: for instance, when the torpedo got stuck in the hull, not only did it exude a toxic gas or aura or whatever, but they figured out how to reverse it out and then attack the other ship with it. That's the way you do it if you're a really good writer.

    The same with Zero's rescue of the trapped crewmember. I really thought he (or is it supposed to be they?) was going to echo the Pike sacrifice, or maybe Troi's unpleasant answer to her test, but no, they both lived. I suppose that was the child-friendly aspect of this, but I still appreciated it.

    I'd been wondering what would become of Zero, and enhancing the original suit seemed like an excellent solution. Putting Z in yet a third body would have been a little much even if this wasn't aimed at kids.

    So far this season, though not every episode has been thrilling and inventive, has been very high quality. I've been watching about 4 episodes a day and have a hard time not binging on through for hours.

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