“Orders of Magnitude”

Well if there was another tv show/movie this was riffing on, I’m not sure I’ve seen it before so others will have to enlighten me.

Uhura has disobeyed orders so many times on this show that to this episode’s credit, I thought she was actually betraying the crew for a minute until she surprised even me with her ruse. While this particular instance worked for me, it doesn’t excuse the absolutely comical Burnham-esque frequency the show has chosen to do this with her character.

It felt a little odd that everyone on the Enterprise besides Kirk was coming across as totally fine with the Admiral’s orders for most of the episode since they were obviously suspect at best. Would have liked to see more from Spock in particular.

Those complaints aside, the acting by Joe Morton sold it and gave most of the scenes a lot of tension. I liked the character story for Jim and Sam, think this was a good way to set up the door for our current Doctor to leave at the end of the show, and I like that we finally had our crew standing up to genocide/massacre instead of enabling it like this show did so poorly in the previous season. I also like that they didn’t axe a certain new crew member this season like last. Felt like they were unfortunately going that route this season just like with Gamble, and I don’t think that would have served the story and been lazy. I also like the parallel with Uhura’s previous arc about deciding whether or not to stay in Starfleet.

Will rewatch before I come to a conclusion on the rating I want to give it.

A lot of things I liked in this episode and yet it was kind of a mess wasn't it.

Did we really need the subplot of George Kirk being the Admiral's first officer? Was the motivation of the Admiral's family being killed on the planet not enough for him to be erratic, and his illegal orders alone enough reason for Jim to oppose him? Did this not just muddle things hopelessly?

Riga punished George Kirk for taking command during the battle by preventing him from taking family leave whenever he applied, leading him to spend less time with Jim and Sam when they were growing up? Wasn't the Klingon war like five years ago? Huh?

Unless that battle was during an earlier Klingon war? I'm pretty sure there were more than one according to canon. But I didn't get that sense from the dialogue, especially because M'Benga was there as CMO?

And why would Riga believe M'Benga drugged the Admiral's coffee to lower his inhibitions enough to expose his irrationality and give a demonstration of why he needed to be removed from command, when M'Benga already has the power to do that? Yes, M'Benga didn't do it, Jim did, and he's just covering for him. But the cover doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

. . .

And then there's the Uhura Of It All. It certainly appears she got promoted for not only disobeying orders but betraying her captain. I thought at first this was a classic Trek prisoners' play. Pike and Una had worked it out with her to pretend she was disobeying them so the captors would buy it that she was actually helping them, because they would never believe Pike would give up the codes and would take further steps for insurance (separating or injuring the other prisoners maybe) while whichever one of them who worked on the console was watched too closely while they did their thing to implement The Plan, which was maybe giving fake codes that were close enough to the real thing to pass inspection, or sending a distress call to Enterprise covertly (they didn't know it wasn't in orbit), or whatever.

And I guess that could still be what happened. But then Pike's plan was for Uhura, the Ensign, to set off a siren and face down an entire armed squad singlehandedly, eliminating them and freeing the rest of the landing party. And you know, I just don't think it was.

I think the show wants us to cheer that Uhura made lieutenant by disobeying Pike and taking the choice on how to deal with the situation out of his hands and into her own, simply because she had to face danger as a result of doing that and got an action hero moment out of it.

And you know what, I don't think I will.

That's initiative! That's bravery! Promote her!

No, that's fucking insubordination. And stupidity. You don't know best, Uhura. You're an ensign. Pike's the captain. Do as you're told and he would have gotten you out of the situation, almost definitely more safely and with a better resolution. This is above your pay grade. You don't know what you don't know.

Dumbass writers.

. . .

Actually.

Much has been said in past comment threads by certain posters about their belief that episodes are being written by AI and personally I haven't credited any of it. Those remarks, to me, were made by people who aren't actually very familiar with AI, who are basing them off of what they think AI is and what its output is like vs. what it is actually like. This episode, however . . . this IS what AI output is like.

Do with that as you will, but I truthfully would not be surprised to learn that AI was involved in the process of writing this episode at some point.

. . .

There's so much more to point out to. But hell with it, I'm going to bed.

*To point out too.

I'm tired.

Jeffrey's Tube, reading your comments, I recalled the episode "I, Mudd" where Uhura pretended to go along with the androids, to get an android body, as a ruse to help the other senior officers in their plans to defeat Harry Mudd and disable the androids.

This episode paints the bridge and medical crew of the Constitution in an ugly light, for this plan to work they had to be complicit in the deceit and they had to actively alter or delete the internal surveillance systems of the bridge and sickbay so as to make it look that Reeger was in command. This adds another layer, unfortunately, to the events seen in "Court Martial". It shouldn't have been a surprise that the video footage of the bridge could be altered. (The last episode helped to explain how Ben Finney could have hidden himself when the ion pod was jettisoned.)

I have long ago accepted that the maps show locations which shouldn't be known until a later time, like the planet Miri whose location was labeled on the star chart map seen in this episode. However, I do take umbrage to them placing a wormhole near Cardassia Prime. The only wormhole I know of near this place is the Bajoran Wormhole. Its discovery was a key event in DS9.

About the Klingon War, there was only one by 2262. For a man who had a wife and children, Reeger seems to like keeping George Kirk from his family. It was telegraphed early in the episode that Reeger and James Kirk were heading to a confrontation.

@Jeffrey's Tube

"I truthfully would not be surprised to learn that AI was involved in the process of writing this episode at some point."

I struggled with this episode, things felt 'off' with the script and characters, even the acting seemed odd to me. Perhaps you've hit the nail on the head!

By the standards of this season, a great episode - honestly the best episode of the season yet, though not without some minor flaws.

The biggest structural issue I have with the episode is that to a certain extent it's not an episode of SNW. This is an episode which is Kirk vs. the Admiral Reeger. The backstory of George Kirk is integral to the story, and Sam Kirk gets a larger role than most of the main cast. The regular characters here are largely either set dressing or mostly exist as sounding boards for Jim Kirk.

That said, what a fantastic A-plot. Joe Morton is great as Reeger, perhaps the best "evil admiral" in all of Star Trek. He begins the episode appearing affable, with cracks in the facade slowly developing as he is more and more overtaken by his anger. Wesley also puts in his best performance to date as Kirk. I can finally see why here the showrunners have such a hard on for the Year One concept, because they obviously are more interested into diving into Kirk's psyche than doing anything with Pike any longer. The episode also has a level of ambiguity which has been missing in a lot of modern Trek, examining conflicts between the chain of command and following a moral code. I especially loved the final scene with M'Benga and Kirk. Yes, M'Benga is taking the fall to align canon and allow for his demotion, but what Joseph said still rang true. It also means that Kirk eventually does him a solid by allowing him to come back into service. Great all around.

That said, I'm a little confused by the timeline this episode suggests. I wasn't following the details of the admiral's war experience closely, but I presumed the win he (falsely) took credit for over George Kirk was during the Klingon War, which canonically took place 5 to 6 years ago in universe. And yet, there's all this discussion of how the elder Kirk's career went nowhere due to his conflict with the admiral, with the last scene implying that Jim and Sam were still kids for much of this? Yet M'Benga served with the admiral, and he's clearly not an old man. The more I squint, the less this whole backstory makes sense.

I also don't understand how the episode ends with Reeger still an admiral. It seemed strongly implied, due to how he commandeered the Enterprise and refused to contact Starfleet, that he had "gone rogue" and was sending the ship on a private mission. Am I to believe it's just normal course of duty to let admirals to dictate actions independent of Starfleet command without consequence? Sure, he didn't get his way on the mission, but it's implied he still has enough pull left to destroy Joseph's career which is...odd, considering his actions over the course of the episode.

The B-plot in the cave with the Andorian criminals is pretty transparently there just to keep Pike/Una off the ship to allow for the A-plot to take place. Nothing here really matters other than Uhura's, arc, which leads to her promotion. It was a bit ambiguous whether she was taking initiative or faking betraying the crew on Pike's orders, but I suppose it worked out in the end. Didn't buy that she could defeat that Andorian dude in hand-to-hand combat, but TV show logic, I guess. Perhaps they should've made the lead Andorian who was ex-Starfleet someone who served under Reeger - would've reeked of small universe, but provided some thematic connection to two otherwise disconnected subplots.

While I'm glad they didn't kill As'ha, this was kind of a damp squib to her presence on the show. I hope that although she announced her intention to leave Starfleet here, we get a little bit more with her in the final two episodes before she leaves the ship, because the farewell in sickbay seemed truncated.

So yeah, some minor quibbles, but man, if the season was stuffed with these, instead of mediocre genre homages, I'd complain about little overall. Let's hope Episode 10 is of a similar caliber.

One question: The "Previously On" showed Pike lecturing Kirk on the responsibilities of a captain, but I don't remember that scene. Anyone know which episode it came from?

I liked this very much, thought the suspense was good in both plots. Sure, I would rather have had a non-Kirk episode, and IMHO the George Kirk story was completely unnecessary. And Uhura disobeys orders AGAIN yet gets promoted for it. But still, this was several quality levels above most of the other episodes this season, and I wouldn't mind rewatching it. I especially appreciated seeing more of Andorians and hearing Hemmer's name (I still miss him).

@The Queen

The episode was “The Sehlat Who Ate It’s Tail”.

Funnily enough, that episode felt like SNW’s answer to the 09 movie. This episode now that I think about it felt like their answer to Into Darkness. Both episodes of which I enjoyed significantly more than either film respectively.

Well comparing to most of this season's episode this was much better.

It still had its issues. Mostly proving us how bad Pike is as a captain.
It seems his crew had absolutely no problem following Admiral-Ahab's order to destroy a whole planet, but they do not hesitate breaking the rules or even killing people under Pike's command.
It would be a great Star Trek episode if the whole the crew would disobey the orders and not wanting to kill thousands of people just to get the few bad ones. And that would be a mention to what is happening to a certain current conflict in our world today.
But I guess these people are not brave enough to dare and talk about current issues, they only care to talk about their crew's feelings.

Also, Uhura.. like Burnham can stop a bunch of Andorians all by herself.
Oh well, after all this season's stupidity this was much welcomed.
Nothing really special though, not among the episodes I would rewatch (basically so far this season I would only rewatch the 1st episode and part of the stoned planet one or maybe none of this).

This is basically Crimson Tide. Good stuff.

The idea that the entire crew would mutiny without Pike and/or Una there to take the first steps is really stretching it. It's hard to tell by looking at the main cast, but these folks are supposed to have spent years being trained to follow orders and give their superiors the benefit of the doubt because they have experience/knowledge. Look at Riker and the Pegasus incident - he knew his commanding officer was wrong, but still defended him because he was a young ensign who didn't know any better. Or how the DS9 crew didn't turn on Sisko as he was going off the deep end in his search for Eddington.

Finally a good episode

This is basically The Wounded from the POV of the crew on Maxwell's ship. Or Matt Decker taking control of the Enterprise while Kirk is away in The Doomsday Machine. There are more examples from other non-Trek media, but my memory is terrible. The premise of an authority figure taking command of a military unit and going on an irrational mission of vengeance isn't a new idea. I wouldn't say it's a trope, but if you are a fan of westerns, WW2 programs, or military sc-fi you have likely seen this story played out more than once. Having said that, I have no problem with them re-using it, honestly. It's a good premise.



Thoughts as I watch:

Good guest actor. Plays the part as a little off, but not enough to set off major alarm bells.

General Order 24. I am not a devoted SNW watcher, but I don't think this crew, of all Trek crews, would be the ones to go along with this. All it takes is a few compliments to get them to go along with mass murder? Come on. The Admiral is clearly nuts.

M'Benga says that the Admiral was possibly given his promotion because he was unfit for command of a ship. Yeah, I know the "badmiral" thing is a Trek cliche, but that makes no sense. Update: this gets a bit of an explanation at the end. It was for morale purposes during the war. Ok, it still makes Starfleet look shady, and more importantly, the war has been over for years, right? Maybe it's time to put Captain Crazy out to pasture? I'm sorry - Admiral Crazy.

No idea why M'Benga couldn't relieve the Admiral of duty. He just tells Kirk to be careful and wanders off. Kirk just told him that the admiral was about to nuke a planet, and that's his reaction?

The Admiral chastised Kirk for not being on the bridge when the ship is at red alert, but the ship wasn't on alert, was it? There were no alarm sounds or lights.

Why is Scotty wearing a skirt? New canon: Scotty has been faking his accent all these years just so he can have an excuse to slip into a kilt on occasion.


We've reached the point where I'm ready to stop watching.



IT"S FILLER TIME!

The B plot is just: KEEP PIKE OFF THE SHIP. Why devote so much time to this? I get so sick of every character having to be included in every episode. Jesus, I want this stupid Andorian to STFU. Only slightly less uninteresting is all the family drama between James and Porn 'Stache Kirk.


There's always a "You're damn right I ordered the Code Red!" scene for these types of stories , too.

Cordrazine?! Cordrazine?! What a copout. The guy was clearly a loon when he started the General Order 24 stuff.

And Pike does nothing. I hate this guy.

Boy, all that time devoted to the Vulcan girl really paid off big time, didn't it?

I really love Jim Kirk being the heroic protagonist of Pike era Enterprise.

Did You Know that "Uhura" is Swahilli for "Burnham"?


Final judgement:

The only way I could have enjoyed this episode is if I had never watched Star Trek and knew absolutely nothing about all of these SNW characters. If this was just some random new sci-fi show that I stumbled across the A plot would have been fine. The B plot would have still been nothing but filler.

RIP Tony Todd, the part of admiral Reeger was clearly written with you in mind.

Now this is more like it. This week, after soap opera, film noir and the Muppet Show, Strange New Worlds attempts to mimic classic Trek. The deranged admiral taking over the ship on a revenge driven mission is a Trek trope dating back to TOS' The Doomsday Machine.

Of course, as others have pointed out, it's far from perfect. Most of the senior staff now openly disobeys orders, Uhura even gets promoted for it. Pike gets sidelined once again, even in his own B-plot... And don't get me started on the lunacy of Reeger's decision to pick Kirk as his second in command.

We've seen Scotty in command in TOS when Kirk, Spock and McCoy were away. By that logic, shouldn't Pelia have been next in line? She's a full commander, after all. Where IS Pelia, anyway?

Oh, I just thought of something funny. This was a golden opportunity to rebut all the claims that Pike is a pushover. Imagine if he was the one in Kirk's role in this episode.

Instead we have Kirk being the hero of the day, Uhura making him look like a chump in the B plot (and being promoted for it), and then doing absolutely nothing when M'Benga confesses to poisoning an admiral.

@Norvo "don't get me started on the lunacy of Reeger's decision to pick Kirk as his second in command."

Early on in the episode, I would have disagreed with you. My reasoning being that Spock would be the last person you would want to try to bend to your will because he's, well, Spock; brilliant, logical, and has a relationship with the crew. Kirk would be difficult but doesn't have Spock's mind and familiarity with the crew. Add to that, he might have thought that he could undermine Kirk's confidence by tearing down his father.

But since all the stuff he was saying about George Kirk was untrue, my attempt at playing devil's advocate falls apart. He has no idea what George told Jim or Sam. He has no idea if M'Benga will spill the beans. He already knows Kirk through his profile so he should know that bringing false accusations against his father is a big mistake.

And was the Badmiral's original plan to browbeat Pike, Una, and Spock?



They should have sidelined all of the high ranking officers in this episode. Make it a Lower Decks style show but with the lower ranking officers we already know. That would make the Admiral's plan, and the overall plot, a lot more plausible.

Oh, also:

There have been many episodes that show La'an is above Spock in the chain of command on the Enterprise, yet in this episode Spock is suddenly above La'an.

Not messing this stuff up is what a "series bible" is for.

We can squint on this and say: Pike left Spock in charge of the Enterprise as La'an was off-shift at the start of the episode, and when La'an went to the bridge she elected not to relieve Spock of his watch and instead took her station. Then, later, the admiral has the ability to designate whom he wants as first officer (just as Riker could have picked Worf or Geordi as first officer over Data in Best of Both Worlds, though he picks Shelby), and he picks Spock after relieving Kirk because he wants the tactical officer to stay in her mission-critical role. We CAN square it; it just really isn't written this way.

Based on the roles the script wants everyone to play in the plot it's easy to understand why it's been written this way, but it's still sloppy and I don't even feel confident the showrunners caught the inconsistency and simply decided it didn't matter versus being completely oblivious to it.

Atoz, I generally don't care about the "what they should have done" comments, but yeah, your idea would have been a winner.

I even had one of those ideas myself about the Uhura issue. It would have needed just four words from Pike and two seconds of direction. When Uhura first objected to Pike, he could have said, "Uhura, remember your training" and given her an intense stare. She would have looked back and seen a message in his eyes. That would have made her comment at the end, "I remembered my training," resonate so that we clearly understood that she was somehow going to trick the pirates. It would have taken 30 seconds of screen time at most.

"Based on the roles the script wants everyone to play in the plot it's easy to understand why it's been written this way,"


Wouldn't it have worked better with La'an in charge though? Have her be starstruck by the admiral and be a little too gung-ho as a consequence of that. Her forceful personality and relationship with Spock would have been an asset to the admiral and the writers. That would leave Jim Kirk, as someone who isn't a member of the crew, to act independently to try to thwart the admiral.




Do you think that there will be a follow-up to the Vaardan massacre? Five million dead colonists seems like something big enough to circle back to.

@John
"It's hard to tell by looking at the main cast, but these folks are supposed to have spent years being trained to follow orders "

We have seen these folks repeatedly NOT to follow orders and been forgiven or covered by their captain. Even Uhura got awarded for saving the day by NOT following orders.
I guess these folks do not care about genocides and choose not to follow orders only about their own matters.
This could be a great episode if there was a crew mutiny against Admiral-Ahab and as I wrote earlier a great parallel for current world war crimes.
But I guess the spineless writers were too busy to do soap opera research...

It was a good episode for what it was, in my opinion, out of this season as a whole.
I liked that Uhura got promoted.
No obvious gimmick. At least it felt like a "Star Trek" episode to me.
There was a storyline, a plot. We see that we shouldnt follow orders just because we were just following orders and Kirk doing what is "right".

"Uhura got awarded for saving the day by NOT following orders."

Well, if she failed, Uhura would have been court-martialed. Or worse, maybe killed. I think what she did was a bit logical. It is not like they had any choice.

@thequeen "Uhura, remember your training"


Good idea. And like you said, it would have been so easy to do.



@theBgt: "a great parallel for current world war crimes."


Someone here asked the other day about modern day issues that we wish Trek would address and this would have been a good choice. Unfortunately topical and seemingly timeless.




I would love to hear what the writers think about Pike. What's their reasoning for persistently writing him the way they do. What role they think he fills in the show.

It's been reported that starting in Season 2, Mount asked the showrunners to give his character a "step back" in terms of screen presence so that he could spend time with his newborn child. He had a second daughter in 2025, so maybe he asked them to tone down his presence even more?

That doesn't explain why they choose to write him like a cool, but pushover camp counselor, though. I mean, Sisko had plenty of authority even in Ferengi comedy episodes where his only scene was glowering at his desk for five minutes.

I don't like this episode nearly as much as I should, but I think that's because this episode is very rote and uninteresting. It's hard to not fall into tropes and cliches when you're playing in a world with as much existing content as this one, but this episode felt particularly derivative.

You've got: Starfleet Badmiral, Dumb Orders, Stopping a War/Genocide, Quest for Revenge/Moby Dick Syndrome, and of course an extremely uninteresting and 'meh' side-plot.

Thing is, I've been watching a bit of The Original Series lately and I couldn't escape the feeling that this was sub-par fanfiction. It felt like Star Trek Continues, in a way: extremely good for what it is, but lacking because of what it can't be.

What is the 'arc' for Uhura in this episode? She learns to shoot people? Uh, okay?

But finally my biggest gripe returns once more: it's now the Commander Kirk Show, Featuring Captain Pike. Every single episode the excuses for shoving Mr. Kirk onto the Enterprise get lamer and lamer. We know that 11 years before TOS, he was on the Farragut, and that ended badly when the giant Gas Cloud of Doom wrecked his ship, resulting in the great 'Obsession' episode. But it's like that just isn't fast enough for these writers, who desperately want to have their Kirk and eat their Pike, too. Pike is just not a character in this show anymore. He occasionally gets about 10 minutes of really good writing a season. That's it.

Now is where I predict the season finale will cover the Farragut incident.

Where was I going with this? Oh yeah okay so. The incessant need to nod to previous installments (or future, if you like) is also getting old, a classic symptom of preqels. I really don't care for the introduction of Cordrazene as this new drug, and it's a Chekov's (McCoy's?) gun for almost any casual viewer of TOS who has seen City on the Edge of Forever. "OH YEAH, THE STUFF THAT MADE MCCOY CRAZY", then you see the Badmiral sweating into his armchair. The first time I watched it, I just figured he was sweating and freaking out because the character had reached that place from.... you know... the stuff we saw him going through? I don't see why they added the 'drugging' thing other than to write themselves and James out of the corner there were in by the end.

I should like this episode more than I do, but it's just so agressively... mid? And it's also too little, too late for this particular Star Trek. This is the kind of episode I expect in a Season 1 or 2, when it's still Playing the Old Hits to find its own voice. SNW has no voice because it, fundamentally, has nothing to say. It is a most pleasant and diverting way to spend an hour, occasionally. But that's all. Maybe that's fine but for me? I'm going back to my old DVD's.

Mount wouldn't be the first lead actor to ask for more time off. For Stargate fans, remember when Richard Dean Anderson started being absent for large chunks of episodes? Plus I'm pretty sure he gets paid the same regardless of screen time.

Speaking of which, Jack O'Neill morphed from a relatively serious former special ops officer who sometimes cracked a joke to someone who had a sarcastic quip ready at all times.

Something similar has happened to Pike, who has leaned completely into the Father to his Men role. The funny thing would be if he has actually stopped caring. He knows his fate is set and that he's not going to be booted out of Starfleet or anything, so he just rolls with it.

Mildly engaging, but this episode – unusually for SNW – suddenly shits the bed in the final third and tries to shoehorn in far too many things at the same time and starts spinning like a Catherine wheel.

The entire plotline with M’Benga is completely unnecessary, as is the irritating reminder that ‘Chapel’ is annoyed with him for some petulant, passive-aggressive reason; having NuKirk as the focus character turns the whole episode into a curious issue of family honour rather than command decisions; Uhura makes perhaps the least convincing action hero in Trek history and her attempted friendship with the Vulcan cadet isn’t much of an investment to get bothered about; La’an getting tricked, disarmed and stunned by NuKirk is laugh-out-loud ludicrously weak. Talk about Chekov’s wristwatch (!).

That said, Miles Dyson does a great job as the manipulative evil admiral of the day (which is undermined by the revelation that he’s been poisoned by M’Benga and/or NuKirk). It is however very questionable how long it takes the starstruck bridge crew to tell right from wrong.

A better episode than most this season, though.

The best episode this season but Pike is an extra in his own show. Paul was decent as Kirk though. That Enterprise Year One show might be good, after all! But then we thought that about SNW's.

Shame the Jessica Alba lookalike Vulcan is leaving.

The episode transcript is now online, and checking back through it, I'm even more fucking confused regarding the timeline here.

Everything within the narrative indicates that Reeger is a veteran of the Klingon War. He served as Captain of the Constitution, George Kirk was his XO, they battled four D7's, etc. This canonically is in the range of 5-7 years, given where SNW is now.

And yet, the episode also indicates that George Kirk was "never made a captain" due to Reeger's interference once he became an admiral. Okay, but it's like five years - doesn't seem a big deal. Except Sam and Jim also explicitly say the times he was absent during their childhood was due to Reeger arranging transfer every time he was up for personal leave. This should indicate the Kirk boys were small kids during the Klingon War, which would be at least 20 years in the past, not five.

I can't really square this away, unless people are using the term "Klingon War" to interchangeably talk about two different conflicts. Even in this case, M'Benga was certainly serving with Reeger/George Kirk, even as a junior officer. Since he's canonically 39 at the time of this episode, he'd have to be a Wesley-Crusher style wunderkid.

Good catch, Karl.

In addition to the current Enterprise crew going along with mass murder, you have Starfleet knowingly promoting someone unfit for command "to move him off the bridge of a ship, and M'Benga, George Kirk and presumably several other members of the Constitution conspiring to cover up for a captain who is lying through his teeth. Not exactly a good look for the good guys.

The war time morale rationale doesn't hold much water either. George heroically stepping into the breech to defeat 4 enemy ships and save 1,000 colonists makes for good propaganda, so why go along with this fairy tale concocted by Reeger? Especially when you take into account that he just suffered a traumatic brain injury. Unless he was on the phone to his publicist I don't see how his false narrative ever took root.

It's just a bit of a mess. They spent a lot of time on a B plot when there were a lot if wrinkles in the A plot that needed to be ironed out. All the stuff about George Kirk just seems superfluous.

So are we meant to assume that this mystery ship is a prototype cloaked Romulan warbird? The map in the background of the opening indicates we're near Romulan space, and it's left open as to who they actually were.

I liked the acting/characterization of the lead Andorian. I actually would have liked to learn more of his backstory with Starfleet.

I like this as a Kirk leadership story. I actually think it might have worked better as an Una leadership story, especially since her promotion to full commander was a plot point this season.

"So are we meant to assume that this mystery ship is a prototype cloaked Romulan warbird?"


I would imagine so. But that would raise the question of why, if they are close to the Neutral Zone, no one raises the possibility of Romulan involvement. The Federation knew that the Romulans had cloaking technology as far back as Archer's time. "Minefield."

I really enjoyed watching Star Trek: Crimson Tide. The minute the admiral demanded the codes from Kirk I knew for sure he would punch him (there is even a little of Gene Hackman’s character in the admiral to help sell this).

Derivative? Yes. Enjoyable? Absolutely.

There was a bit too much plot all around, and the b-plot could have dropped entirely but otherwise this was a stronger episode in what has been a season of gimmicks. Having something that was at least focussed on character and a moral dilemma gave this episode the weight that others missed.

Another random thought I had. Since we're diving so much into the prime version of George Kirk's life, it might have been interesting if this had been Admiral Robau and the event happened in the prime timeline for the USS Kelvin rather than the Constitution. Then we'd have a frame of reference for what this admiral was like before he went nutso.

There are probably legal/royalty reasons that it couldn't be that. Just something that occurred to me.

Picking up on my question about why no one was mentioning the possibility of Romulan involvement since they are so near the Neutral Zone. I've got two follow-up questions.

1) The recent death of 5,000,000 colonists seemed to be common knowledge among the crew. Pike had to know about it too, right? Pike, who lived through Quality of Mercy/Balance of Terror doesn't put it 2 and 2 together?

2) Why is Reeger flying around in a shuttle craft with a lone crewman? He's a legendary admiral who has just figured out a way to track a ship that massacred 5 million people and he has to resort to what amounts to commandeering someone else's ship. Why isn't he at the head of a fleet of ships hunting down the killers?

Joe Morton’s character was Admiral Simon Reeger. Judd Hirsch played Alex Rieger (spelled thus and usually pronounced “Reger” by the other characters) on the 1970s–1980s sitcom “Taxi,” where one of his fellow cast members was Carol Kane, a.k.a. SNW’s uber-annoying Pelia. Kane’s character was the wife of Andy Kaufman’s Latka Gravas, and both characters were from an unnamed eastern European country and spoke with an accent. Kane always pronounced Hirsch’s character’s surname as if it were spelled like Morton’s surname: “Ree-ger.”

I’d like to add that despite being an atheist, I want to say “thank God” for Pelia’s absence from this episode.

Contrast the ending of this episode with TNG's "The Wounded." At the end of "The Wounded" we find out that Ben Maxwell's suspicions about the Cardassians are correct. The moral of the story is that even if you are right about something it doesn't automatically mean you have the right to take action.

In “Orders of Magnitude” the ending seems to imply that Kirk may have been wrong because the cloaked ship escaped and could potentially slaughter millions of more people.


I don't know quite what to take from that, but I do find it interesting.

"Judd Hirsch played Alex Rieger... on the... sitcom “Taxi,” "



Ensign Ignatowski: What does a yellow alert mean?

Admiral Reeger: Slower

Ensign Ignatowski: What ....does... a... yellow... alert ....mean?


Admiral Reeger: /turns into a badmiral

I wouldn't be surprised if the A and B plots are related, and the Andorians are unknowingly aiding the Romulans.

I thought this was a pretty decent episode, and while Paul Wesley makes a perfectly believable Kirk, this really needed to be a Pike-centered episode, or, at least, a Number One episode.

I'm glad to see Sam again. The Kirk brothers, as such, have been sorely underutilized. That said, it's clear to me that Kurtzman never wanted to do anything other than a TOS reboot. He should have just done that.

SNW has not lived up to its potential, at all. And it makes me mad because Pike and Una are outstanding when they're given good material.

Paul Wesley doesn't make a perfectly believable Kirk at all.

Least problematic episode of the season, though. They tried to give Reegan some restraint and honor early in the script.

It's just all the same problems. The belabored dialogue, the awkward pacing, the odd acting choices (Morton's performance is a needlessly busy one), the obvious green screen, and the endless canon anachronisms when both this show and Discovery would have made so much more sense being set after Picard.

Excellent! 3 1/2 stars. Best of the season so far!

"Your father was captain of a Starship for 12 minutes. He saved 800 lives, including your mother's and yours. I dare you to do better."

- Admiral Pike, Star Trek 2009

The A plot knocked it out of the park. Wouldn't change a thing.

The B plot - Uhura, action hero - was a bit much, but she was always something of a baddie (especially in the movies), so why not.

Sad to see our hottie cadet go. Not as sad as Uhura, but, you know, sad.

Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in.

A battlefield promotion.. after the battle?

These writers are just posers

No puppets. No singing. No soap opera. I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm taking the win.

That was pretty good. Actually seemed like Star Trek. No pastiches, no homages, just the story with some good callbacks; cordrazine etc. I really liked the performance of the admiral also.

Not bad. But then again, I'm judging it against the last few abysmal episodes, so the bar was already quite low... I understand the show runners are trying to lay the groundwork for Kirk eventually taking command of Enterprise and getting all the other pieces in place (e.g. Lieutenant Uhura). The story just felt a bit chaotic, and rather forced in certain spots... Hopefully this can serve as a turnaround episode that sees a strong finish to the season. Fingers crossed.

Yet another episode with Kirk just "stopping by" the Enterprise. Does he spend any time ont he Farragut? Do military personnel jsut stop by another ship or base whenever they feel like in real life military? The writers don't even try to explain this.

And why do we need Kirk at all? Isn;t his supposed to be pike's enterprise? Why can't Pike take on the Badmiral? It would make a lot more sense than shoehornign Kirk into the Enterprise yet again. It's like the writers don't even want him pont he show and are trying to sabotage his character.

And didn't the Badmiral dismiss Kirk? Why was he back on the bridge aftert commercial break?

I felt like the "backstory" of Kirk Sr. taking over the ship and Mbenga covering for Kirk spiking the coffee was all needlessly contrived and complicated. Just have Pike stand up to the Badmiral. I mean Kirk.

Someone said how everyone was fine with committing genocide, even Spock. Didn't ring true for me either. I think that is yet another episode of shitty writing and how the writers don't know or care about their own characters.

Also, I think the gimmicks actually continue with this episode: Now the writers are doing Star Trek gimmicks; Here is a parody/homage the the Star Trek Insane Admiral(c.) Badmiral trope, like from Doomsay Machine, Too Short a Season, Pegasus, Drumhead, etc.

Also: More Starfleet cover ups, altering transcripts and duty logs, disobeying orders, Pike letting court martial behavior slide, both from the Badmiral and M'Benga. The writers do this so frequently and casually; that's both lazy writing and also showing a totally corrupt and morally compromised Starfleet where the ends justify the means. What happened to Star Trek's spirit of optimism and faith in human nature? Starfleet and the Federation are both rotten from the inside.

@Kyle
"What happened to Star Trek's spirit of optimism and faith in human nature?"

They are too busy working on their feelings and having fun in space with their pals!

The more I think about it, the more I dislike this episode.
The easiness of the bridge crew not hesitating committing genocide should be the heart of the episode, and not the Kirk's family honor or who spiked Admiral-Ahab's coffee.
Cause this is Star Trek and these kind of dilemmas are its core. La'an could not wait to press the button to obliterate a planet.
Ortega just raised her eyebrow, and Spock? What about Spock? Oh wait, Spock has reduced to romantically exploring his feelings.

And what the hell is wrong with La'an? No one is worrying about her recent rage/murderous issues? Ok, Pike is just busy contemplating about his lost imaginary life and the meal of the day. Una? M'Benga? Chapel? No one? Nobody? Nada? At one point I expected her to kill that planet before even Admiral-Ahab give the command, just because trigger happy.

I guess the fairies will help her in the next episode.

@Kyle
Why can't Pike take on the Admiral? Because the episode would have been over in 5 minutes. The crew wouldn't have hesitated to take his side. I think the same would have been true if Una had been in command.

Plus unlike Kirk, Pike has Admiral April to back him up along with the certainty of how his career will end.

Good points, John^

Also @theBgt, La’an said she had reservations about the orders being given and then also is the one who put the admiral on his ass at the end when push came to shove. Your reading of the character’s actions in the episode are flawed if you think she was excited to commit genocide.

@Pike’s Hair

At the end, when Kirk objected and Admiral was out of control they all did, but before that she was ready to go on with the orders. All were.

I think I’m at a 3 stars for this overall. I don’t think the episode needed the “drug the admiral” element at the with the crew standing around pandering to him at the end. It holds it back from being a great episode. But still definitely a good one, and certainly better than last years 4 and a half crap which occupied the respective 8 spot.

@theBgt

And Crusher was ready to follow Picard’s suicide level orders in first contact before Lily intervened and made him realize how much of an ass he was being. Just because a Starfleet officer is ordered to do something, and will do what they are told, doesn’t mean they have to be okay with it. Which La’an clearly states. Thats more than I can say for Spock, who in any other episode would have been more outright vocal about how unfit this guy was to be leading the charge on the mission.

Speaking of first contact though I think another thing holding this episode back is how the writing doesn’t treat everyone in this episode like rational people. In first contact, crusher does voice her disapproval despite going along with it, and there’s also the great moment with Worf standing up to Picard. It feels like only Kirk bros and La’an are expressing any sort of uncomfortable feelings about the orders being given. M’Benga doesn’t until the very end, Ortegas is basically in love with the guy, and like I said Spock from any other episode, even in this show, would have had enough 5 minutes in.

@Pike’s Hair
" Just because a Starfleet officer is ordered to do something, and will do what they are told, doesn’t mean they have to be okay with it."

There is a point where you stop following orders. "Not being ok with it" is not enough when you end up pulling the trigger. It makes no difference since you commit mass murder.
Nobody did anything to stop the Admiral except Kirk. They all seemed to have accepted his authority and move on with the given order. Raising an eyebrow or just presenting an alternative was not enough.
Plus, "following orders" is not an excuse when committing crimes. Nazi's (and not only) were put in trial and found guilty even with their defense of "I was just following orders".

@theBgt

“Plus, "following orders" is not an excuse when committing crimes. Nazi's (and not only) were put in trial and found guilty even with their defense of "I was just following orders".”

Congratulations you’ve arrived at the point this very episode was making.

And may I remind you that La’an DIDN’T blow up the planet, but she did shoot the Admiral giving her dubious orders.

Uhura has a history of disobeying Pike and not trusting him to make the right call. Is she doing that again here, or do you think she and Pike had an unspoken plan (Kirk seemed to have unspoken protocols with his crew in TOS)?

Question to everybody: After so many episodes in which the core characters have been (ab)used so liberally and arbitrarily to fit the plot, are you able to invest devotion in them once there is a story that feels true and genuine?
Reason why I'm asking: I felt really invested in Pike's fate or Number One's role in Starfleet and on the ship. But everything about them has been handled so at will that nothing has consequences. Characters can disobey and the get demoted or promoted whatever a plot calls for. Nothing seems to matter. That episode to episode approach makes me care less about characters overall. Am I wrong? Am I the only one seeing it like this?

@Kyle "Too Short a Season"

I'm embarrassed that I didn't think of this episode when I was trying to think of other shows that use this plot. I did think of an old episode of Combat from the early 60s that did it. And I think there's an episode of the show Sea Patrol from 2008 that also did a similar story.

@Q-less "After so many episodes in which the core characters have been (ab)used so liberally and arbitrarily to fit the plot, are you able to invest devotion in them once there is a story that feels true and genuine?"

It makes it hard to. To do it you have to have selective memory; weed out the "versions" of the character you don't like and only remember the one that best fits in with the episode you're currently watching. It's very similar to the issue of all the gimmick episodes. If you don't have a bedrock reality, then the special episodes are meaningless.

On the other hand, there are a lot of people out there who seem to totally live in the moment. If a scene is supposed to be sad, they cry. If it's supposed to be romantic, their heart melts. If a line sounds cool or clever, it is. It doesn't have to make sense in the context of the story; they respond to any stimulus. You could show some peop!e a picture of a frowny face and they would weep.

Q-Less: "Nothing seems to matter. That episode to episode approach makes me care less about characters overall. Am I wrong? Am I the only one seeing it like this?"

Live-action nuTrek is constantly resetting, retooling, and pivoting in new directions, so there's no consistency. Nothing feels real. Everything feels ad hoc.

Paradoxically, when it does try to plan in advance, these "serialized" things often feel overdetermined and phony. "Discovery" in particular has a very hermetic feel; nothing exists outside its little serialized mini arcs.

Pike's Hair: "Well if there was another tv show/movie this was riffing on, I’m not sure I’ve seen it before so others will have to enlighten me. "

"Crimson Tide". Kirk is Denzel Washington and Admiral Reeger is Captain Ramsey (Gene Hackman).

But at least they're ripping off the right genre, now.

One comment: Uhura did not disobey orders. She was ordered to do nothing to help the mercenaries; she pretended to, but she didn’t. This is pure “if we went by the book, hours would seem like days” sort of bluffing.

No gimmicks. A brief pause on the gimmick of the week concept that has more or less irredeemably ruined Season 4. Just a straight up Star Trek episode. What a new concept! Star Trek has such a rich history, such a vast universe of storytelling possibilities that telling ten episodes shouldn’t be a problem. This is only the third such episode this season (Valles Marineris, Off-Hour, and now Orders of Magnitude). What a shame.

The heart of this episode is simple enough. At what point do you just blindly follow orders and at what point do you deem such orders (regardless of the reputation of who may be giving such order) unlawful. Blowing up inhabited planets and issuing Order 24 may or may not fall within that category. Starfleet Admiral Simon Reeger (nicely played by Joe Morton) is the one giving such morally challenging orders. The crew is at first in awe of the reputation, the man. However as he quickly commandeers the Enterprise and the reality of what he is contemplating sets in, concerns are raised especially by his drafted First Officer James T Kirk.

At least they gave a reason (however flimsy it may be) for Kirk to be onboard the Enterprise this time when these events take place. Sure you’ve got to suspend your disbelief that he just happens to be here at the very moment Admiral Reeger happens to appear. Yet here he is aboard and maybe he’s quickly reaching a point where blindly following what may very well be the morally unlawful may not be an option for him. He does some digging and sure enough it becomes clear Reeger may not be all that objective as his family was killed in what is known as the Vardan Massacre by some sort of mysterious alien cloaked ship. To Admiral Reeger, the ship must be destroyed at all cost. Will the mysterious cloaked ship will millions more? Sure his family was killed but so were millions more. Thus the moral dilemma.

I would have preferred they would have left it like this but they put in a bunch of Kirk family history. George Kirk (father of James and Sam) served under Reeger. For those inclined to do the research, clearly none of this will probably match up to what was previously known about Kirk’s father. Also Dr. Joseph M'Benga (isn’t a little young for all this? and doesn’t he get around?) just happened to be around when Reeger and George Kirk were fighting Klingons. He also just happens to know all these secrets. Too many just happens for my taste.

Eventually it gets exposed that Reeger, through his own actions and Kirk family history, he’s not the hero he was made out to be, it was all a myth, a lie. Kirk does everything in his power to stop the obliteration of the planet & M'Benga stops him totally by spiking his coffee. I was a little confused in what was in the coffee but he clearly becomes mentally unhinged & starts to babble his inner most thoughts. He did make a valid point once this mysterious cloaked alien ship (are they Romulans?) escaped will it kill millions more? Blindly obliterated a planet and committing genocide clearly is not the answer.


The B plot with the landing party was nice with some rogue Andorians holding them hostage. Negotiations break down & Uhura starts kicking ass. Someone kicking ass in a landing party being held hostage is basic Trek. When I saw this it seems clear to me that this was planned between Pike & Uhura but others say it was clear insubordination. Just say I think it may not be clear but I’ll stick with my first instinct.

All in all very good episode despite a few minor flaws. Really enjoyed it. Best of the season for me.

You see? Star Trek is actually SO much better when it Star Treks, as opposed to all the other weird pastiches it's been doing this season.

Great review, Jammer! One minor correction - the script makes it clear that Reeger is a veteran of "The Klingon War" not a war with the Romulans.

There's a lot of circumstantial evidence here that it was a cloaked Romulan ship that killed everyone on the planet his wife/kids were on, but this seems to be a later, postwar development.

2.5 for me. For a minute there I thought this was a Kobayashi Maru test for Kirk. Because the situation was so conveniently set up for him.

M'Benga has a lot of secrets in his medical closet doesn't he.

It's nothing against Jammer's rating system, but in my own mind when reading film reviews (which I guess began years ago with Ebert's reviews), I generally think of 3-stars as being "solid quality." The system obviously breaks down the more closely you look at it, because after all how do you rate something which you really enjoyed but which has obviously glaring flaws? Do you have multiple ratings - one for thrills, one for structure, one for rewatchability, etc? It just ends up being too cumbersome, and for this reason and others I tend to avoid thinking in stars when personally watching media. As a reviewer Jammer of course has certain priorities which I, as a viewer, don't need to have.

I'm reminded of Ebert's famous review of Basic Instinct 2 -

SPOILERS (if you haven't read that review go read it now! And also watch the film if you dare)

- where he kept forcing himself to insist that the film was total trash, while repeatedly careening over to the other side in admiration of some of its surprisingly outstanding qualities. Trashy, but outstanding, as Olivander would say. He gave the film *1/2, as a "cold shower" to prevent himself giving it four stars. I'm very sympathetic to this type of dilemma. For example I would be really tempted to give TNG's Disaster four stars. It's not a four-star episode, but that doesn't matter because I enjoy it more than most three-star episodes, and even some better ones. I also enjoy Q-Pid more than I have any business doing. So what does that mean in terms of a rating? I don't know.

@Pikes Hair
"Congratulations you’ve arrived at the point this very episode was making."

What point? that Spock, La'an, Ortegas, Scotty can blindly follow orders committing genocide?

La'an didn't blow up the planet because of Kirk's interference, not because she refused to obey.

The only point this show made is that our heroes suffer in values, principals and ethics. They do not obey orders for their personal matters/convenience, but if it is not about them, even killing 5000 is an order they must execute.

While I think this is the best episode of SNW this season and it being a pretty good story with compelling character motivations etc. there are still some frustrating elements like how it feels that SNW is always relying on elements of various classic Trek episodes. I still can’t get past the feeling I have that AI has a lot to do with the writing.

There are also the usual plot points that are clearly made for TV and thus cheapen the integrity of a military situation. But the 2 guest characters for the admiral and the Andorian leader were excellent in their own ways and greatly helped the material.

I don’t know offhand what canon has on Kirk’s father but how he was a victim of subterfuge and the cover-up by the admiral — I think it works too easily that a mentally compromised admiral was able to get away with it for so long. And why was Kirk’s father so seemingly passive about it? And then what is up with M’Benga who seems to want to do anything in his power to get kicked out of Star Fleet? I would never want to be treated by this guy.

I would also take issue with this being a Kirk episode as Pike is largely sidelined. Pike’s not even the star of his subplot. Action hero Uhura is a bit farfetched — how she takes out several Andorians. And still the Vulcan cadet A’Sha decides to quit…

Admirals on Trek are rarely the good guys. You know with how much the admiral was getting praised that he was going to do something unhinged. Initially reminded me of Jellico but then he became more like Satie (“The Drumhead”) — although M’Benga spiked his coffee… So I don’t think the script should have called for M’Benga drugging the admiral. Let the admiral trip himself up (like Nicholson in “A Few Good Men”) and just have M’Benga certify him as a lunatic.

Now I also now wonder how Sisko was so easily able to get away with nuking an entire planet, driven by a personal vendetta…

3.5 stars for “Orders of Magnitude” — just barely, maybe this episode just looks so much better relative to what’s come before it in SNW S4. Given how abject SNW S4 has been, this is a welcome change for the much better. It’s far from perfect but there’s enough here to definitely not be boring or stupid. The material is elevated by the two main guest actors (the admiral and the Andorian lead mercenary) but Wesley still does not come across as Shatner’s Kirk; however, his acting is good enough to get the job done here — maybe it would be better if he was just somebody else. There’s overall very good tension and character work here.

just to correct something I wrote (twice) -- should be Kirk spiking the admiral's coffee, which I feel was unnecessary.

This was a solid episode, even if it heavily echoes episodes such as The Doomsday Machine and Chain of Command. At the very least, it isn't a gimmick but a serious story. I don't know if the full picture hears can handle much scrutiny but in the minute-to-minute it works. I'm not a big fan of the Kirk Family Saga in SNW, I would've preferred Kirk stays out of it and have Pike clash with Reeger, but the producers really want to make Kirk a big part of this show so Pike is again sidelined into the B plot where Uhura saves the day. Joe Morton is really good here and carries the episode. I do question LA'an's actions here. Was she really about the wipe out an entire planet without flinching? Was Kirk the only reasonable person on the ship? (later we would learn he had M'benga in his corner as well).
But still, it seemed like most had no issue with it. Spock raised an eyebrow or two but that's it.

I have a pet peeve with the writing here, and I've seen it in other episodes as well, where characters are spouting exposition. Some perfect examples here as characters explain to us what Reeger did, or what the invisible ship did, I mean, it's basically written in such a way where the characters are obviously talking to us. I think that's a lazy way of handling exposition.
Now I have to wonder if this "invisible ship" will ever return n the few episodes we got left, or if it was just a Mcguffin here.

Or maybe it's the Doomsday Machine itself?

P.S: Kirk distracting La'an with telling her he watch looks manly was either hilarious or bizarre, I'm not sure which yet.

I'm absolutely stunned.

Even though there were a couple other episodes this season I liked quite a bit, I didn't think they had this level in their toolkit. It's clearly the best of the season, probably the best of the series, definitely better than anything else from other nuTrek series, and maybe the best Star Trek of the past 30 years.

Here are my ratings, on Jammer's scale, of the eight episodes so far this season to illustrate what a wild ride we have been on:

3.5, 1.5, 0.5, 3.5, 2.5, 3.5, 2.5, 4

Honestly, I feel like the "Bad Admiral" episodes run a spectrum and the best ones are one where the opposition is presented as someone who absolutely has A to B logic in his actions but the morality of what they propose is against what the protagonists believe. "Inter Arma Enim Silent Legas", "The Pegasus", and "Too Short A Season" are all best for me because I understand what the admirals are trying to accomplish. They're not just generically evil with their highly illegal actions and in Deep Space Nine, Sisko does a few of those and there's the uncomfortable fact that they work.

"Orders of Magnitude" is about just a petty tyrant who ruined James T. Kirk and his brother's family life for no other reason than wounded pride, a fact that they should have gotten over and is made doubly ridiculous for the fact that Kirk gave him the credit. If I had more faith in the show, I'd say this was a critique of Captain Pike's philosophy of constantly covering for his crew under the assumption he's doing them a favor (versus Star Trek: Into Darkness where Spock correctly exposes Kirk's crimes of forgery when Kirk should have just said why he did it).

The irony is that the war crime of blowing up 5000 people to destroy the Romulan (?) vessel after it has killed millions has that A to B logic. Colonies in Star Trek are small because there's more M class planets than sand in the beach so the numbers don't bother me. However, the morality wouldn't change from 5 to 50. At what point does it become wrong? Still, as far as our heroes know, this is on a mission of extermination in the Federation and the Federation has no defense against it.

It's also a reminder that the Romulans include pointless massacres against humans, Klingons, and other races.

"It's clearly the best of the season, probably the best of the series, definitely better than anything else from other nuTrek series, and maybe the best Star Trek of the past 30 years."


Looks like someone's Cordrazine is kicking in.

Multiple people have mentioned Uhura's perceived insubordination while other people thought it was all a ruse. I'm on the second camp. To me it was obvious she acted on orders from Pike that were given off-camera. What's funny here is that Uhura WAS insubordinate in previous episodes and part of me wants to think the writers consciously played on that expectation, but that may be giving them too much credit.

@The Queen
"I even had one of those ideas myself about the Uhura issue. It would have needed just four words from Pike and two seconds of direction. When Uhura first objected to Pike, he could have said, "Uhura, remember your training" and given her an intense stare. She would have looked back and seen a message in his eyes. That would have made her comment at the end, "I remembered my training," resonate so that we clearly understood that she was somehow going to trick the pirates. It would have taken 30 seconds of screen time at most"

I think they just wanted it to be a twist, that's all. Wanted you to think she was going against Pike's wishes when actually she wasn't. But i'll be the first one to admit this was not handled very cleanly or clearly in the writing as evidenced by all the confusion.

Lynos: I mean, it's basically written in such a way where the characters are obviously talking to us. I think that's a lazy way of handling exposition.

Yeah, exposition is always tough. You would think that the "previously on" openings, Captain's logs, and briefing scenes would cover almost everything, but no. I think it's because they know a good chunk of the audience isn't paying attention.

@Assassins! Murderers! "Looks like someone's Cordrazine is kicking in."

LOL, de gustibus but I will say that was some sloppy math. There were some extremely stellar episodes of Voyager. But I don't know if there was anything on Enterprise as good. And certainly not anything since then. For my taste, anyway.

@ Jammer

Quick correction: it's the Klingon War that Reeger is supposed to be a hero of, not the Romulan War. Even though we can't reconcile the timeline around this with everything the episode tells us happened.

Did you have an opinion on whether the episode intended Uhura to be following orders or disobeying them? I was looking forward to your interpretation and commentary.

This episode's gimmick-of-the-week was to do a TOS Episode, it seems...

...And I'm gonna be honest with you, it kind of rocked 🍿

It is so exciting to get to watch an episode of Star Trek instead of "_________ in space." I'd give this 2.5 stars on a Star Trek as a whole curve but 3.5 stars on a SNW curve.

The writers decided to tell a Star Trek story using Star Trek tropes - what a novel idea! Badmirals, caves that cut off communications, moral ambiguity, bring it on! Joe Morton was excellent as Admiral Reeger. Currie Graham did a solid job as well.

WHY ARE YOU ALWAYS ON MY SHIP?!?!?!?! I have a lot of sympathy for Carol at this point. Not only is Kirk focused on his career as First Officer of the Farragut, it seems like any time he is able to get away, he runs off to the Enterprise instead of, you know, spending time with his son.

We would have had a better episode if Kirk wasn't on the ship, there was no B story in the cave, and Pike was the one in conflict with Reeger. The whole George Kirk plot line is one of the two big issues bringing down the episode. The other is the cave plot silliness. What is the Andorians' plan exactly? We're smuggling weapons under Starfleet's nose, let's bring a bunch of Starfleet officers to our secret lair and show them all the guns that we're smuggling!

The episode is stronger if Reeger really is a war hero and really is a tactical genius who is also personable and charismatic. I was so frustrated when Reeger started really going off the deep end. It was somewhat improved by the revelation that Kirk drugged Reeger to make him obviously unfit. If Reeger is unhinged there's an easy answer. If not, then the characters must struggle with questions: 1. Is Reeger wrong? 2. How sure am I? 3. Do I argue with him? Refuse a direct order and be relieved of duty? Actively seek to sabotage his orders or render him unable to continue?

Unfortunately, we didn't see anyone really wrestling with those questions. Kirk was sure from the beginning. No one else took any action until Reeger was completely out of his mind, and there's no indication that anyone was planning on saying no either. Not a great showing for the crew.

Still, a solid episode with a great borrowed landscape of the Trek universe.

@Atoz
"I think it's because they know a good chunk of the audience isn't paying attention"

Maybe. You think it's the Netflix effect?
just a couple of examples. La'an finds that Reeger is coming aboard, Spock notices her nervousness and asks what's up, she says:
"It’s just… this is the Admiral Simon Reeger. Captain of the Federation flagship Constitution during the Klingon War. The man is a living legend. "

To which Spock replies that yes, he's aware of who is is. Of course you are, Spock. This wasn't said to you, but to us :-)))

Later, when Reeger boards the ship, Ortegas says to him:
"You helmed the Palenque during the war, and I heard that your skills at Prospero saved a lot of lives".
Thanks, Ortegas. Wouldn't Reeger already know what he's done?

Reeger asks the officers if they heard about the Vaardan massacre. To which they reply with perfect staccato timing:
"An unprovoked attack on a Federation colony."
"Five million civilian casualties."
"Long-range scans showed the attack was carried out by one ship."

Of course in realistic situation they would just say "Yes, we know about it". But then WE wouldn't know about it, lol.

Anyway, SNW's writing is full of clunky exposition like that.

It's difficult to get my head around what I'm watching... the sense of whiplash from the last few episodes to this one, it's as if.. the kids were in charge for a few episodes and then the parents came home and started making Star Trek again... it's deeply stupid pacing for a season, with this episode feeling like it was from a different show, a show we haven't seen since S2.

As Jammer said, poor writing, lazy story beats, but more so I'm frustrated with this type of storytelling... ask yourself this... what is more interesting and entertaining... being confused why the Admiral starts to go even more crazy... or making it crystal clear Kirk poisoned him.... and then watching it unfold. For me.. it's the latter by a mile. I'm sick being so confused all of the time watching this show.

The same situation occurred a few episode a go when Chapel just randomly turned out to be a saboteur... I mean... it would have been much more interesting to know this prior to enjoy the reactions and interactions. In that episode La'an just comes across has having a mental breakdown because we the viewer have no idea what is going on... confused is not entertained... and being like... oh!!!!! right at the end of the episode, doesn't make up for it.

Say what you want about the Berman era.. but at least stories were comprehensible, and you didn't feel like you were watching a different show each week.

Nice to have a proper Star Trek episode... but there are not enough episodes left to make up for what has happened to this show. 1 serviceable episode a season is not a reason to watch a show. For me.. it was a 2.5/5 because it just wasn't well written.

@Lynos I believe that in your second example it was Reeger saying that he was aware of Ortegas helming the Palenque. I actually like this bit because it illustrates how Reeger is gaining the goodwill of the crew via flattery.

You're dead-on in your first and third examples though. The Admiral's legendary reputation could have been shown through the acting instead of exposition. Show us how the crew reacts to him coming onboard without telling us. Do you need the people in a king's court to explain the Divine Right of Kings or do you just need to see them bow and curtsy? If you want to use expository dialogue, you could have easily inserted the admiral's resume into M'Benga's warning to Kirk.


The Vaardan massacre dialogue was also poorly scripted. "Of course we all know about 5 million people being slaughtered!" Well then why aren't you doing something about it? Or even talking about this colossal tragedy? And where is Pike? Is he busy reading My Pet Goat or something?

The most effective way to have handled this is to have Reeger bring the news of the Vaardan massacre. Knock the characters back on their heels. There are multiple benefits to doing this. You deliver info and get a dramatic moment that allows your cast to ACT instead of just saying "yeah, we know." You also make your plot more plausible because this makes your cast acting slightly out of character more understandable. And finally, you get the audience's attention too. An unknown character is introduced, the crew obviously revere him, and now he's delivering news of a major catastrophe. That hooks an audience. "Here's a bio on the new guy and, by the way, 9/11 happened and nobody is very worked up about it" doesn't really have the same impact, does it?



This is a badly written show. It has been from day one. I don't understand why people have to be hit in the face with Muppets to notice that.

Your post makes me wonder how would tragedies such as this and all kinds of - for lack of a better word - "terrorist attacks", should be handled on an intergalactic scale. Would it be believable if Reeger came in and told them about the incident? It's seems like something too big to keep secret, but then again, ther galaxy is also pretty big. How quickly would you be aware of something happening on the other side of the galaxy? Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but we have not seen anything resembling a recognizable media outlets or news organization in Star Trek. How do news travel? There is also no visible internet-based global network delivering news. characters seem to be getting their information from personnel files and what looks like an inner network of information possibly connected to a Starfleet main computer.
I think the crew would be surprised about it only if it just happened now. This would also affect Reeger vengeful feelings because he would not have enough time to simmer in them and have him being consumed (even though, as the episode tells us, he was not really driven mad by vengeance, but merely poisoned, character development sacrificed for a twist).

I think it's simply that the intention here was to do a Kirk episode that revolves around his command style and decision-making, highlighting his maverick attitude (was 1960s' Kirk really that maverick as SNW wants us to think? I'm not sure) and tying all of it to the Kirk Family Drama. It's not about Reeger at all.

Also, I gotta say, I just realized this: if you consider SNW canon (and I'm not sure I do, personally) but if you do, then this episode is a very interesting mirror episode to Obsession, where Kirk essentially does something very similiar to what Reeger does here with the big difference that he's the actual captain and not an outsider, but still....

@Lynos I really love your observations and your questions. I've also wondered at the total lack of discussion of news.

Star Trek has always been highly inconsistent (with the exception of Voyager) with the extent to which the ships are isolated from Starfleet. They never wait for backup or call and ask for orders/guidance (unless it is to create dramatic tension because they are going to ignore orders). Yet Kirk and Reeger can both pop by in shuttles because they were in the neighborhood, M'Benga could have beamed over the medication, and there doesn't seem to be a problem for the crew calling their girlfriend/wife and kids. How regularly are ships in contact with Starfleet? Does anyone notice if the flagship of the Federation suddenly runs dark? Is the crew logging in at midnight Earth time eager for the next episode of their favorite series/holonovel to drop?

That was pretty good! Just like last year, we get an enjoyable Kirk origin story that my biggest complaint about is Paul Wesley. He's not bad, just *wrong*.

Otherwise my only real complaint is that the final bridge showdown between Kirk and the admiral went on a bit too long. The content about Kirk wanting to defend his dad's legacy is fine. It's just the placement that didn't work for me. It would have played better as a personal confrontation between them after he was relieved, rather than the public shouting match on the bridge which came across as a bit Scooby Doo.

I'll take ten more like this please. Oh wait, there's only eight episodes left in the whole show...

Lynos, the only news media I can recall in Trek are the gaggle of reporters at the beginning of Generations, and the Gannett character in Demons/Terra Prime.

In a few of the old Trek books from the early 80s the crew had access to what was basically the internet, I believe.

KIRK: Wait. Where you came from, did I know my father?
SPOCK PRIME: Yes. You often spoke of him as being your inspiration for joining Starfleet. He proudly lived to see you become Captain of the Enterprise.
KIRK: Captain?
SPOCK PRIME: A ship we must return you to as soon as possible.

@ Rahul - Paul Wesley "does not come across as Shatner's Kirk."
@ Tim C - "my biggest complaint about is Paul Wesley. He's not bad, just *wrong*."

For you two and others who feel this way - what is it exactly that feels off to you? I know some people just see Jim Carrey in his face and can't get that out of their minds (and if I did, I'd probably feel the same). But even if it's not that, what seems wrong to you? Is it his physical appearance? Command of the character or the screen? The way he speaks?

I'm pretty satisfied with him as Kirk myself, though I do think he's missing the underlying confidence and joy that Shatner had - the twinkle in the eye, as I call it. And he obviously doesn't have the same body type (I have a hard time imagining this Kirk running to, shall we say, chunkiness like Shatner in the movies). But to me, Wesley is doing a good job of capturing his essence. So I'm curious what other people are seeing as missing.

@RuthieB
Thanks for your kind words.

Yes, I agree, Star Trek in general has amazing world-building, some of the best in the genre - certainly in visual media - but it was always more concerned with alien cultures and the protocols of starships and the federation than with the mundane workings of the galaxy and how it operates on day-to-day basis. Maybe it's because it's primarily a TV show and not a book series, it comes of as a little bit shallow in that regard. But honestly, it rarely bothers me unless there's there's a story beat that makes it pop-out, like here.

@Atoz

Yeah, good call about Generations. One of the rare instances.... Would you say the documentary crew in What is Starfleet can be considered part of a news media?

While watching I wondered if perhaps there was still some residual Soap Opera radiation from the prior episode impacting everyone's behavior and warping its underlying logic, resulting in what would have otherwise been a good SNW episode. But the devil is in the details.

I am re-watching the best episodes of the series. The ones with actual Sci-fi plots. The gorn episodes are out of this world. The whole series is film quality.

When those aliens froze time in terrarium I literally cried.

So why are they doing all the gimmick of the week episodes? The writes are doing it on purpose probably because it’s easier to write gimmicks, let’s do a ground hog day episode next maybe?

Or could it be that the writers have got their pay check and they don’t care any more as the series is ending.

Or even more sinister, are they doing it on purpose as as they are disgruntled or to insult us?

Either way I feel disenfranchised.

In Crimson Tide, there is a scene between Denzel Washington’s Commander Hunter and a junior engineer. Hunter motivates the crewman by explaining that their dilemma is akin to any number of classic episodes of Trek where Kirk needs Scotty to once again fix the Enterprise in order to save themselves from Klingons. In this episode, Kirk plays out the same type of conflict we saw between Hunter and Captain Jack Ramsey (Gene Hackman) - a disagreement over whether to follow orders when countless lives are at stake. Crimson Tide deliberately made the situation ambiguous. Either Hunter or Ramsey could be right or wrong. There is no way to confirm the orders without risking the ship. A wrong decision to launch would start a nuclear war, costing millions of lives. A wrong decision not to launch would leave a gap in the American response to an attack that had already cost millions of lives. As I've said, there's nothing wrong with cribbing from a good source. "Orders of Magnitude" gets a lot right. There is a very good tension in both plots. The contrivances necessary to get Pike on the planet, Admiral Reeger in command, and James Kirk as First Officer can be overlooked. This is one of the first times that Paul Wesley has really felt like Kirk. In a longer season, the incident on the planet with Pike and Uhura would have been its own episode. Here, it cuts into the main story. The episode takes shortcuts in establishing Reeger as the bad guy. Something about him seems off from the beginning, but nobody comments. In fact, for an Admiral to show up, by shuttle, at this exact point is a bit much. Had Pike been present, he would have confirmed the change in command. Reeger's decisions to denigrate George Kirk in front of his son, his dangerous targeting of a civilian freighter, his constant undermining of James Kirk as XO, all cast his stability in question. Reeger's decision to invoke General Order 24 is another strike against him. Is Reeger even acting on behalf of Starfleet or is he pursuing his own agenda? If his character had been more subtle, the stakes of the conflict would have felt more real. That said, the episode had me on the edge of my seat. I haven't felt that way about SNW all season. Uhura deserves her promotion. And Cadet A'sha - don't let the door hit you on your way out. (I have a theory about her, but I'll reserve judgment till the end of the season).

@The Queen,

For me, Captain Kirk is one of the greatest fictional characters ever created. Maybe some others might be Superman or Sherlock Holmes etc. But for me, I've watched TOS so many times that Kirk is Shatner and Shatner is Kirk.

I have nothing against Wesley -- he's a good actor and I'm fine with him being a guest star on SNW (though how frequently he pops up and at the expense of Pike is a problem -- but that's a separate issue). The big thing is he just does not look enough like Shatner's Kirk, doesn't have the gravitas or the mannerisms even for a younger version of Kirk. And yes, I can't get Jim Carrey out of my mind when I see Wesley.

But the Kirk boots are much too big to fill for anyone. It's not Wesley's fault. I've said before that Vic Mignogna looks much more like Shatner and has done the best Kirk out of all the others who've tried.

I think if people watch TOS more and really watch Shatner's acting, they'll see enough of a discrepancy between Shatner's Kirk and Wesley's Kirk -- and for me that's an issue.

@The Queen - I have wondered this myself. Previously I've described Wesley as missing an "X factor", but that's a cheat. Maybe one of my issues is his age? Much like with Jack Crusher in Picard, the character is meant to be fresh-faced, talented, but raw. But by casting someone clearly approaching middle age, they've undermined it.

Part of the reason I usually find Celia Rose Gooding effective as Uhura just has to do with her own physical attributes. She *looks* like a young officer and that goes a long way towards selling the performance.

I shouldn't just ascribe it to looks, though. It's a cop-out, but "X-factor" really does describe it best for me. Wesley's performance doesn't make me yearn for a show where he's in the lead, as Anson Mount did when he was on Discovery.

@Tim Buckley
"In Crimson Tide, there is a scene between Denzel Washington’s Commander Hunter and a junior engineer. Hunter motivates the crewman by explaining that their dilemma is akin to any number of classic episodes of Trek where Kirk needs Scotty to once again fix the Enterprise in order to save themselves from Klingons".

I believe this line was written by Q tarantino who did some uncredited rewrites on the script. There's also a scene where crewmen discuss comic books and superheroes. Of course, famously, Tarantino was engaged briefly in possibly writing and directing his own Star Trek movie. It never came to pass.
I think one of the main differences between Orders of Magnitude and Crimson Tide is that we never really question who's side we should be on. The admiral we've never seen before (but everyone tells us he's great), or Jim Kirk, one of the most famous characters in pop culture? As I said previously, it's not really about the conflict between Kirk and Reeger because we're never supposed to question who's in the right, it's about character development for Kirk and just run-of-the-mill prequel fodder, like the scene where he's talking to Spock, saying: "Don’t worry, Spock. I’m sure, one day, you’ll get to aim that logical mind of yours at some lucky captain" and the viewer is supposed to be like,"hey, that's so cool! Because one day Kirk will be Spock's captain and I already know it and the characters don't!"

So you've got a baggage here that Crimson Tide doesn't have. It deflates the conflict to a degree but i think the episode is well-made enough to keep it engaging anyway.

@Rahul
I agree Vic Mignogna is the best non-Shatner Kirk, way better than Chris Pine and Wesley. they are far from bad, but Mignogna simply channels the 60's Kirk so well you actually never doubt it's the same character. Once again, for the record, I would LOOOVE it if Jammer reviews Star Trek Continues!

(side note: I find it amusing that we had Chris Pine and Kirk and Ethan Peck as Spock. If you combine both their names you sort-of get "Pike". I know, I'm reaching, but it's so close...)

I think SNW's (and the 2009 Trek to a degree) challenge is that their Kirk is supposed to be younger and inexperienced, while Mignogna's Kirk is based on the established character from TOS. How do you portray a young Kirk? Would he have exactly the same mannerisms as the older Kirk? On the other hand, the "older" Kirk is not much older, only a few years separate SNW's Kirk from TOS's Kirk. I dunno. I just think they should not bother with it, Kirk can be a guest in 1 or 2 episodes but this show should be about Pike, however, they keep gravitating towards Kirk, probably feeling it's more important to establish his character than to invest in any character development for Pike, a character that ultimately goes nowhere in the franchise and has a tragic, set ending. The show could be about that, but then it would be a bummer and we wouldn't have muppets and musicals.

Major Grin: SNW vs. Crimson Tide:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZsiX7TK6we0

“The only point this show made is that our heroes suffer in values, principals and ethics. They do not obey orders for their personal matters/convenience, but if it is not about them, even killing 5000 is an order they must execute.“

This take is so laughable, I feel the only way you could arrive at it is if you completely ignore character development in stories entirely to arrive at it.

Picard was going to genocide an entire species in I’Borg, guess he’s irrevocably a terrible person from that moment on since I can conveniently ignore the development of the story and characters within it.

I know this season only has two episodes left, and most of it has been spent on pastiche that we all pretty much agree has been unnecessary even in episodes that some of us liked more than others. I can’t help but feel like this season’s heart has been in the right place in spite of its absolute unevenness. S3 was more even and even less gimmicky, but I felt it was a lot more mean spirited and UNTrek like in its themes and what it was trying to convey. From bioessentialism, to shooting aliens on sight due to how they look, letting creatures commit suicide, letting everyone be racist to Spock, and the big bad being PURE EVIL with no nuance or depth… it felt like the core thesis is really where last season just didn’t get anything right.

This season on a superficial level is a lot worse, but on the deeper level of themes and ideas is a lot better in my estimation. Pike in the first episode doing his best to convince someone too far gone of the ideals of the federation was the best part of it. La’an headed back down the path of genes not making who you are as a person. We had a whole episode dedicated to our crew being competent professionals in Off-Hour, which isn’t something the show has done at all in quite some time. And this episode tackled a lot of trekkian moral dilemmas, taking a firm stance on what doing the right thing actually means. It’s a shame that “what stupid thing can we rip off” has overshadowed the bigger picture, and been a deliberate choice by the showrunners.

@Pike's Hair

"This take is so laughable, I feel the only way you could arrive at it is if you completely ignore character development in stories entirely to arrive at it."

What character development?
Apparently we disagree about the quality of writing.
For me it is horrible. You find qualities in the season even in a deeper level.
At least I do not find your views laughable, just different.

I admire your passion for a show that's been cancelled and will not be remembered kindly. I recall defending the character development of Baywatch's ensemble. So many people just had a blind spot there. You are a kindred spirit and I wish you smooth, unrepentant sailing.

I thoroughly enjoyed this episode and the characters had some great moments particulary the Kirk brothers.

I thought Kirk had drugged the Admiral and Mbenga decided to take the fall out of loyalty to George Kirk. Whe n James Kirk went into sickbay I thought he was trying to protest Mbengas lie. Kirk was under security so how would he drug the coffee.

Either way I'm glad he was drugged when he did his "A few good men" rant. Too often we see these confessions blurted out and its not how someone would act.

Also Mbenga needed some evidence of being unfit to command before relieving a commanding officer. This isn't the mirror universe.

I like how this show uses Uhura. She didn't disobey orders she pretended to help to get the Andorians to drop their guard. I don't think it was planned as Una told her she'd taken a big risk. But Uhura took the initiative.

@The Queen: "For you two and others who feel this way - what is it exactly that feels off to you? I know some people just see Jim Carrey in his face and can't get that out of their minds (and if I did, I'd probably feel the same). But even if it's not that, what seems wrong to you? Is it his physical appearance? Command of the character or the screen? The way he speaks?"

I would say the way he speaks. A lot of people especially on podcasts take it as a given that "of course he can't do a William Shatner impression"; to that I respond, why not? I don't mean an exaggerated parody of William Shatner, but how about just a subtle attempt to sound like William Shatner's Captain Kirk? People who play real life characters from recent history usually try to sound like them, so what's the difference?

@ The Queen

Presence. Shatner's Kirk is the center of attention in any room. Who he is as a person intrinsically commands it.

Wesley's Kirk does not have this. Younger or not, at this point in Kirk's story, he should. He achieved captain of the Enterprise at 32. Right now he's 30. There's supposed to be a reason he achieved this. By now, he should be a person that we believe would.

And I don't see it.

One of the things that impressed me most about ST Continues was how hard the lead actors - not just Mignona but all of them - tried to really inhabit their characters. The first few episodes I was, maybe not irritated, but itchy about the pitch of their voices. By the end it was noticeable that both Mignona and Haberkorn were using a lower pitch so they sounded more like Shatner and Nimoy. That's true dedication, done purely out of love and respect. Of course Mignona was a voice actor first, so maybe that gave him an edge.

I agree that a lot of James T. Kirk came from William Shatner the person. Paul Wesley is trying, and with better scripts he'd probably do better. I did like in this last episode that they had him bluffing.

While watching this episode, I kept thinking that Adm. Reeger set up the hostage situation on the planet to keep Pike and Una out of the way. The timing is too perfect, and frankly, his plan doesn't work if they're on the ship. First, Enterprise isn't even supposed to be at this planet. It is an uninhabited former mining facility. It's on a major trade route, but not somewhere that Enterprise would normally stop. They went there only because of the distress signal. Reeger shows up alone, in a shuttle, at the exact time that the landing party goes out of signal range. TOS era shuttles usually don't have long-range or high warp capacity. They're short and mid-range vessels. How did Reeger know Enterprise would be there? He would have needed to set out for the area days earlier and then find Enterprise in a fairly large assigned patrol area. And then he just happens to find Enterprise within minutes the landing party going into the mines. In this brief window, he can invoke the "senior officer" rule to assume command and shuffle the command structure. Oh, the landing party is held captive by a group of smugglers led by an ex-Starfleet officer? And Reeger orders Enterprise to leave orbit within a few minutes. (I kept yelling at Kirk to leave a message buoy for when the landing party came out. Otherwise, they would have found themselves stranded with no way to know what happened. I was relieved when Kirk made that suggestion.) But how would this have played out if Pike and Una had been on board? First, as Captain, Pike would have the right to see the orders either removing him from command or placing Reeger in temporary command. Since Reeger is not in Pike's direct line of command, someone else would have to sign off on that. (Random flag officers cannot simply commandeer any ship they want. Again, there's a chain of command for that.) Either Pike would remain in command of Enterprise and Reeger in command of the mission, or Reeger would take command of the ship with Pike as XO. Either way, the dynamic shifts. Pike would go along with the order to chase the mystery ship. But he would have been far less intimidated by Reeger's bullying and intimidation. And would he go along with Reeger's invocation of General Order 24? Somehow I doubt it, at least not without a better justification than "we can't let them get away!" When Kirk and Scotty invoked GO 24 in "A Taste of Armageddon," it was leverage. They announced their intention and gave the people of Emeniar time to consider their options. Here, Reeger simply plans to rain down destruction from above without warning. And he nearly got away with it because the crew didn't know Jim Kirk, and wouldn't trust his judgment over Reeger's. (Oddly, the only other person who seriously questions Reeger is M'Benga, who knows him from the Constitution and knows what really happened back then.) I would like to say that Reeger's actions suggest a larger game or ploy was in place. But given the writing this season, it seems they're relying more on coincidence than planning.

Tim Buckley said: "TOS era shuttles usually don't have long-range or high warp capacity. "

DISCO and SNW now treat this era as having warp-capable shuttles. I don't think the shuttles have warp in TOS. In TNG, the smaller shuttles have no warp, and the normal ones were "warp limited" (warp 1 and 2).

Correction, MemoryAlpha says TOS era shuttles have warp in "The Menagerie" and "Metamorphosis".

So it's TNG - sort of - which is a bit out of step. You'd expect shuttles in that era to be a bit better than depicted (Runabouts could go warp 5+, but the top TNG shuttle could only go warp 1ish).

TheRealTrent: In the Menagerie, Kirk and Mendez take off in a shuttle after Spock commandeers the Enterprise. While the shuttle has warp, it doesn't have the speed or the range to catch up. Enterprise ends up coming back for them once the shuttle passes the point of no return. In Metamorphosis, the shuttle also has warp capacity, but Scotty mentions its limited speed and range. (The Technical Manual indicates its top speed is Warp 3 or 4). It wouldn't surprise me if the SNW/DISCO writers simply forgot that. But even assuming Reeger has access to a higher-warp shuttle (for special missions), then how did he know where to find Enterprise? To quote Douglas Adams, "Space is Big. Really Big." It would be like taking a yacht out to find an aircraft carrier, when you only know the general area its is supposed to be.

I don't think there's any point in even mentioning things from the old shows when discussing modern Trek. The events, characterization, and the "science" of classic Trek have no bearing on SNW outside of providing the writers with a basic framework to build on and an occasional wink and a nod to the audience.

It's like taking a puzzle made from a picture of a bowl of apples and a puzzle made from a picture of a bowl of oranges and trying to fit all the pieces together as one cohesive whole. The writers aren't trying to do this, so why should we?

For those who would like to look at reviews from a different point of view, I just had a channel called Mr. Know It All come up on my feed. This is a guy who seems to have a background in TV production, so he talks a lot about lighting and other camera effects and what the producers were possibly thinking. He doesn't spend much time on nit-picking but is very knowledgeable about Trek history. The one review I watched was for episodes 7 and 8 together, and his comparison of them is very interesting. The language he uses was a little mysterious to me, maybe it's producer jargon? He rated the episodes a little higher than was done here and for different reasons (he was very impressed by Mount's acting in the Juliet scene of Chronitons).

I'm pretty sure that Wesley's Kirk is based more on Chris Pine's Kirk than Shatner's. Shatner's Kirk would probably be so politically incorrect these days modern writers would never dare to write him that way.

@The Queen
Tue, Sep 15, 2026, 9:17pm (UTC -5)
"For those who would like to look at reviews from a different point of view, I just had a channel called Mr. Know It All come up on my feed. This is a guy who seems to have a background in TV production, so he talks a lot about lighting and other camera effects and what the producers were possibly thinking. He doesn't spend much time on nit-picking but is very knowledgeable about Trek history. The one review I watched was for episodes 7 and 8 together, and his comparison of them is very interesting. The language he uses was a little mysterious to me, maybe it's producer jargon? He rated the episodes a little higher than was done here and for different reasons (he was very impressed by Mount's acting in the Juliet scene of Chronitons)."


Funny that you bring him up, I just started watching Mr. Know It All. He popped up when I was searching for info on the show, "Lanterns." His take on Lanterns is always entertaining. I didn't realize that he was also reviewing SNW. I'll have to check that out.

@Quincy:
'I'm pretty sure that Wesley's Kirk is based more on Chris Pine's Kirk than Shatner's.'

I think it's fair to say that SNW is written and produced more with the Abramsverse than TOS in mind, regardless of what memberberries they get AI to crib from Memory Alpha. You see it in everything from the sets to the effects to the casting to the dialogue to the meta references.

Two and a half stars. This features a great performance by the underrated actor Joe Morton, and the characterizations are decent, but it's too overstuffed with material and leans too much on the terrible Paul Wesley, whose resemblance to a young Jim Carrey (think Once Bitten) is so uncanny that you can never unsee it once you notice it. (Today I Googled it and was reassured to see many others making the same comparison with photographs.)

PROS:

-The acting by Joe Morton and others helps sell a rather tired retread of TOS "crazy admiral" tropes mixed with plagiarism of Balance of Terror's plot (invisible ship destroying outposts) and ST:Enterprise-style Andorians.

-I like seeing the Andorians again, even though they're rather superfluous as pirates here. They've always been the "fly in the ointment" of Federation utopianism that keeps things interesting with their volatile nature.

-The characterization of Kirk is well observed, despite the lousy actor playing it out, insofar as it nails his ability to think independently and take risks that pay off.

CONS:

-Paul Wesley as Captain James T. Carrey recalls the real Jim Carrey's Star Trek parody on In Living Color, minus the fun Shatner impersonation. His "don't tempt me with a good time" (rewind it!) sounds just like Jim Carrey cracking a joke in his Ace Ventura voice. I challenge anyone in this forum to give me a worse example of miscasting in the past 60 years of Star Trek. Gag me with a spoon every time he shows up with his flat acting. Kirk should be the essence of a charismatic extraverted figure, just as Bill Shatner and Chris Pine played him, but Paul Wesley is giving us a weak variation on his "introspective angst" character from "Vampire Diaries," and it just doesn't work for the character as Roddenberry saw him at all. No episode that focuses on this sorry version of Kirk can ever get 3 stars or more from me.

-The pacing in this episode sucks and only serves to remind us how perfect "The Doomsday Machine" (its clearest TOS inspiration) was. We get one too many inspirational speeches by Morton to the crew, too many polite Kirk conversations before he springs into action, and too much pointless Andorian B matter, which ends up diluting the episode's focus rather than complementing it.

-I'm glad the Vulcan cadet is leaving -- she was a pointless Saavik retread -- because she's another example off too much garbage stuffed into this episode.

--What happened to Dr. Boyce? He should be chief medical officer by the time of "The Cage," but he's vanished after one appearance this season where his priggish introduction was so brief that something feels like it was cut. This is starting to feel like DISCO's constantly shuffling if characters without any particular rhyme or reason, and only distracts viewers.

--Uhura as action hero was highly tedious and doesn't fit her established character from TOS. But the same was true of M'Benga as action hero. This seems strange to me and is a departure from Roddenberry's vision of spacefarers with highly specialized roles ala the Navy; there's no particular reason they should all be superheroes.

--Really hated the melodramatic shouting match between Kirk and the admiral with fisticuffs at the end; the doctor should have relieved the admiral of command as soon as he punched Kirk, but waited too long. Also it's a shame the screenwriters chose to make the admiral an example of stolen valor, because it makes him look like a real tool rather than a worthy adversary. His mental breakdown is too by the numbers.

Joe Morton still entertaining since his 90s days as Highlanders friend and 80s role in War of the World's TV show (also with Adrain Paul)

PS -- I think Joe Morton is underserved here by a wonky script that strips the character of all dignity and can't make up its mind about the sort of man he is. Rather than being a tragic figure who let revenge threaten to destroy his legacy, he's an actively bad person who steals credit for his greatest accomplishments, robbing his character of all complexity by making him a one dimensional poseur -- is he really motivated by revenge or his family or just by the chance to steal more valor by using the Enterprise crew? Yet he also delivers convincing heroic speeches that move the crew -- is he mpre of a calculated con artist than someone deeply moved by his family's death? Also, his mental breakdown at the end gets compromised by the revelation that M'Benga induced it medically -- is he crazy or not? The script doesn't even give him a chance to discuss or show his feelings about losing his family. Overall there's so much uncertainty in how the admiral is written and acted that it undermines a very good actor, making him fight against the script in the breakdown scene. It's not clear from the performance that even Morton understands who the admiral is. And that's a big problem. Add in the unnecessary Romulans (who are never named) just vanishing at the end without interacting with the Enterprise and it's just a stew of bad television that only reminds me of Trek's better days.

@Trek fan
Fri, Sep 18, 2026, 4:40pm (UTC -5)

"--Uhura as action hero was highly tedious and doesn't fit her established character from TOS. But the same was true of M'Benga as action hero."



Actually, I'd buy M'benga as action man far more than Uhura. 1) Star Trek is not known for its fantastic action. This is the same franchise that brought us Kirk's double hammer fist and double drop kick, as well as, Picard dodging phaser fire AFTER the phaser was fired. And 2) M'Benga had one of my favorite moments from TOS where Spock is trying to heal from an injury and asks Nurse Chapel to strike him to wake him up. Nurse Chapel does her best to accommodate Spock's odd request. Scotty runs in confused about what's going on and stops her. And then M'Benga runs into the room, instantly accesses the situation, and proceeds to repeatedly slap the crap out of Spock until Spock stops him. Spock gives M'Benga his thanks. That was a scene I would've expected to be reserved for Kirk or McCoy. But M'Benga was pretty good in that scene: https://youtu.be/zVnGFdx-MWY

@Quincy yes I love M'Benga in TOS. I don't think he's the same person in SNW -- nor is Uhura or anyone else quite in line with their established characters. That's my problem with prequels that recast beloved roles and change them fundamentally.

This was my favourite episode of the season and why wouldn't it be it plagiarized one of my favourite movies, not just the overall concept but lines and scenes taken right from Crimson Tide. The one thing they added was the drugging the admiral plot line which was so unnecessary. This isn't the first time the SNW writers (and their AI bot) have shown up to work and made an episode based on their favourite movies. But hey, if this is what it takes for them to write good trek then have at it. May I suggest Hunt For Red October next or A Few Good Men.

"one of my favourite movies...Crimson Tide."


I haven't watched that movie since it was in theaters. All I can remember about it is the Silver Surfer debate. The correct answer between Kirby vs Moebius is John Buscema. The cover of Silver Surfer #4 is one of my absolute favorites. No kid in 1968 could look at that cover and not buy it.


Connery, Hackman, and Nicholson - they just don't make movie stars like that anymore.