War or Peace

Story: ...But to Connect
Written By: Terri Hughes Burton & Carlos Cisco
Series: Star Trek: Discovery 
Year: 2021

Stamets and Adira are analyzing the data with Zora, hoping that Zora can find coordinates for the source of the DMA.  Zora does find the coordinates but refuses to hand them over, as she fears for the crew's safety.  The emotional element of Zora's systems is now, officially, out of control.  Refusing orders, withholding information based on emotions rather than logic is fairly disturbing in a ship's computer. As a result, Kovich arrives on board to evaluate the situation.  An important meeting with Kovich, Saru, Stamets, and Culber is ongoing to determine the best path forward. Oh and Adira and Gray just barge in with no consequences. Anyhow, it is a decent sci-fi concept, and in the end Kovich determines that Zora is not a sentient AI, which is prohibited from being installed on Federation ships so they can't go all HAL9000 on them, but is actually a new lifeform all herself.  The solution in the end is that Zora will be commissioned as a Starfleet Specialist, and as such must follow the chain of command.  And the get the coordinates. 

Meanwhile, a high profile assembly of Federation members, as well as allies (many of which the President hopes will someday join or rejoin the Federation), is ongoing at headquarters.  The must decide whether to attempt to find the source and try to solve the problem with diplomacy or to blow up the DMA.  War or peace...that's the basic debate.  Burnham is highly in favor of diplomacy, and hopes that can be achieved, especially as not knowing the source from another galaxy...an attack could have heavy consequences...maybe it's a peaceful species that doesn't know it is doing this and the attack could kill them.  Maybe they are genuinely evil and the DMA is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of their power.

But Book is firmly on the side of Tarka, as Tarka has invented a dangerous weapon of his own that can wipe the DMA out.  It could also make warp capabilities null in that sector.  It's a seriously intense weapon.  Tarka has an ulterior motive.  While he was a prisoner of the Emerald Chain he and a fellow scientist made a pact to escape to a happier universe in the multiverse...and Tarka needs a power source big enough to get there, and believe the source at the center of the DMA will do it.  Also Tarka is like a dick anyway.  But Book wants revenge.  The last episode was very much about Book looking beyond revenge because he disagreed with his hallucinatory father's words and was acting as if love was the better option. But that was an entirely different script and time's have changed over the last week. Now he wants blood!

Both Book and Burnham give their impassioned speeches. The assembly votes, and Tarka and Book's hopes are dashed, as diplomacy wins the vote.  Tarka steals the prototype updated spore drive from the lab and installs it into Book's ship, and the two escape to blow some stuff up.

This was another solid episode in a season that I admit I am so far enjoying. There was some decent sci-fi here, some good philosophical debate, and a bit of that Trek-lore idealism I like.  Book disagrees with it (today, who knows where he stands next week), but the idealism was there and most of the alien species agreed with it, and I liked that.  Plus the Zora story was alright. I felt Adira and Gray's presence seemed useless, and I thought it ridiculous that a meeting that was clearly for top brass just let an ensign and a non-crewmember barge in with no one saying "um, get out...what the hell?" But oh well...at least Gray decided it was time to go to Trill and left the ship.  They were about as useless a character as you can get, so they might as well be on another planet from now on.  

NEXT TIME: Book's Black Market Connections