Sickbay: "Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum" (Episode 53)

In this episode, Ashley is not enjoying the Klingons. (Could it be because she hasn’t met WORF?) Also, does not enjoying the Klingons mean you aren’t enjoying Star Trek? M. Foss continues her Saru Apology Tour, and wonders when—or if—Ashley will come to appreciate him. He might win her over if he promises to never run on camera again.

Here's the SNL sketch about the Papyrus font in Avatar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVhlJNJopOQ&t=3s

And here's an article about it: https://designforhackers.com/blog/papyrus-font/

Have you ever seen John Carpenter's The Thing? If not, M. Foss recommends watching the whole film (if you're into the scary stuff). If you don't have time to watch the whole film, you can get the point by watching this iconic scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2o2FRwn_hg

And finally, here's the TikTok about how the Star Wars films are incorrectly named: https://www.tiktok.com/@fake.disney.facts/video/6855402195291032837?embed_source=121374463%2C121451205%2C121439635%2C121433650%2C121404359%2C121351166%2C121331973%2C120811592%2C120810756%3Bnull%3Bembed_masking&refer=embed&referer_url=movieweb.com%2Fstar-wars-movies-wrong-titles%2F&referer_video_id=6855402195291032837

Enjoy!

Transcript

Cold Open: 

MF: You hear that clock. 

AJ: What is that? 

MF: It's a clock. 

AJ: How have I never heard it before? Isn't life strange? 

MF: I'm wearing headphones and I hear it now. All of a…like, when I saw you look, I was like, “Oh, I hear it.” 

AJ: Life is so strange. 

MF: It's a clock. Yeah. 

AJ: Sorry. 

MF: That's okay. I'm gonna have to take it out of here. I'm gonna have to just take it out. Okay. Pause for the cause. 

AJ: Did it just turn on? 

MF: No. 

AJ: There's no way that's been playing the whole time. 

MF: It has. 

AJ: No, absolutely not. The number of times I've been here. How all of a sudden is it like… 

MF: And that's the most gentle, calm little sound. But also, nope. Also, nope. And it's not like I need it for keeping time. It says that it's 2 o'clock. Is it 2 o'clock? No. It's 1:27. 

AJ: I thought something was rattling so I was gonna, like, touch it, you know? And so, I was like, “What is that?”

MF: Are we having an earthquake? Like, what's going on? That's hilarious.

Welcome:

Hello there, my loves. Welcome back to The TV Doctor, a podcast where I prescribe for you exactly what television you should be watching to treat the socio-emotional ailments that might be bothering you. I’m M. Foss, and I’m not a doctor on TV, but I play one in real life.

Here in Season 5 of the podcast, my Special Guest Star, Second Opinion, Cha’Dich, Co-Pilot, and Co-Host Ashley and I have our tricorders open and we are ready to seek out the healing properties embedded in Star Trek: Discovery. We know there are parts of the show that require an even closer look, parts that could possibly do harm as well as good, and we’ll be brave and cover those parts in our examination as well. Together, we are a rookie and a veteran attempting a mind meld, if you will, inviting you to join us as we do our best to boldly go.

If you don’t think of yourself as a quote-unquote “Star Trek person,” fear not. Ashley is your patron saint. She’s proof that even those of you who aren’t quite ready to sign up for Starfleet Academy can find wonder and resolution in these tales from the stars. Feel free to watch (or re-watch) Discovery along with us. We’re at the half-way point in the season, but these first eight episodes are a quick binge if you’re just getting started! Our journey is still long, and there is still a comfy seat just for you in our shuttle. Consider this message your sign that it’s time to see what all the fuss is about, and I’ll consider this message my sign that it’s time to beam y’all directly to…Sickbay.

Second Opinion:

MF: Welcome back. We are here with Season 1, Episode 8, and this episode is entitled…I'm going to give it my best shot. 

AJ: Give it your all. 

MF: Here it comes: “Si Vis Pacem Para Bellum” 

AJ: Mm hmm. Probably. Probably. 

MF: To the best of my internet education, that is the correct pronunciation of that Latin term. Loosely translated, it means, “If you want peace, prepare for war.” Okay. So, would you do the honor of gracing us with a recap of what happens in this episode? 

AJ: I would be happy to, but first let me just say it is with delight that I join you today among the bioluminescent flora on the harmonious—literally harmonious—planet of Pahvo. In Beta quadrant. Quadrant? Quadrant. 

MF: Quadrant. 

AJ: In Beta. I don't know. I'm trying to get very, like, where are we? We're in a quadrant. 

MF: So, I would say “the”…”the” Beta Quadrant. 

AJ: Okay, so, we are on the planet of Pahvo. 

MF: Yes. 

AJ: In the Beta Quadrant. Not in Beta Quadrant. Nope. Can't say it. Cannot. Si va vi para bellum. Si en la escuela. Para dormir. En la escuela. Para mi. 

MF: Para ti. 

AJ: Para ti. 

MF: I don't know if you care about this right now, but I feel like I'm going with it anyway. 

AJ: I'm with it. 

MF: All right, so, the Milky Way galaxy is divided into four quadrants. So… 

AJ: As far as we know… 

MF: As far… 

AJ: …or just… 

MF: …as in…well, I don't know if that is based on actual science. Why not? 

AJ: I don't know. 

MF: I haven't bothered to look that up. 

AJ: I mean, what is actual science? That's for a different pod. 

MF: What even is that? Right. Exactly. That's a question for another day. But in Star Trek terms, the universe is broken up into four quadrants: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta. Earth exists in the Alpha Quadrant. The Beta Quadrant is further out in, terms of distance from Earth. So, different part of the galaxy than our backyard, essentially. At this point in Star Trek history, we have not been to the Gamma nor the Delta Quadrant. The part of the galaxy that we know about at this point in the story is Alpha and also Beta.  

AJ: Well, that is…that is where we are. And that's where I am happy to join you. 

MF: Okay, great. Thank you. 

AJ: It's far from Earth. That's all that matters. 

MF: It is far from Earth. Yeah. Right. Yeah. 

AJ: So, okay, in a little mix of “previously on Sickbay” and what happened in this episode, Starfleet is losing the war, actually, which is… 

MF: It's not going great.

AJ: It's tough. It is tough. Lieutenant Tyler, just as a reminder, Chief of Security now, Burnham is the Science Officer. Discovery can jump, but we're using Stamets and the spore drive. 

MF: Well, she's a specialist. 

AJ: Science specialist. 

MF: Yes. 

AJ: So, she's not an officer. 

MF: Right. 

AJ: Oh. 

MF: Because she was an officer, but she was stripped of her rank. So, she's basically… 

AJ: An employee. 

MF: Correct. 

AJ: Hmm. Okay. So, how would you refer to her? You would refer to Specialist Burnham. 

MF: Correct. 

AJ: Okay. Science Specialist, not Officer Burnham. 

MF: Because here's what…here's why I'm making a stink about that, When you are the Science Officer, that means like head of science.

AJ: Right. 

MF: Yeah. 

AJ: And she's not. 

MF: She is not that. 

AJ: She doesn't even have rank on Pahvo. She gets outranked a couple times. 

MF: Yes, that's right. 

AJ: So, Mr. Saru, Burnham, and Lieutenant Tyler are on a mission to Pahvo. In the ship's log, she says they're gonna modify the frequency of the silver thing that goes into the sky (she may have used different wording) as a sonar to detect the invisible cloaking system that the Klingons have because the Klingons have revived the Ship of the Dead. 

MF: The Ship of the Dead. 

AJ: Okay. So, Stamets is experiencing episodes of jumbled time on the ship. He's calling Cadet Tilly “Captain,” so, he's like super disoriented. Saru is influenced by Pahvo's peaceful, harmonious resonance. 

MF: Quote/unquote “influenced.” 

AJ: Yeah. Lashes out at Burnham and Tyler. He becomes a bad guy, which I would argue he's always been the bad guy. 

MF: Yes, you would argue that.

AJ: This just allowed him to be his truer self. Burnham and Tyler kissed. Then they realize they don't have a future. Maybe Tyler doesn't realize it, but Burnham does. We can get there later. The Pahvans send a signal inviting the Feds and the Klingons to their planet, in the name of harmony. Stuff is about to go down. Speaking of going down, it's going down on the ship with L'Rell, who's beefing with Kol, who has wiped out her entire clique. 

MF: Yeah. 

AJ: And so, she's trying to defect to Admiral Kitty Kat Cornwell. 

MF: Not Kitty Cat. 

AJ: Yes. 

MF: Something about that woman gives you Kitty Kat? 

AJ: Because her and Lorca, I'm still not over it. When he called her Kat, I was thinking it's Kitty Kat. 

MF: Yeah, you're like, “In my mind…” 

AJ: She looks like one of those people where I wanted to give her a Goog. She feels like someone who I've seen in a number of different things, but I couldn't quite place her. But she's good. 

MF: She's good. 

AJ: So, what are your high-level takeaways as a rewatch?

MF: Okay, this feels like a clear Avatar ripoff for me. And so, I expected them to use the Papyrus font.

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: Please tell me you've seen that SNL sketch where they, where they talk…we'll link it in the show notes. But the fact that James Cameron, maybe this wasn't his call, but like as the director, it's kind of… 

AJ: Kind of your decision. 

MF: It's…it's kind of your decision. If you were like, “No, that…is that Papyrus? Like, choose something else.” Avatar, the highest grossing film of all time, used Papyrus. Literally, like in the four or five fonts that they give you on Microsoft Word, Papyrus is the most, I would argue, on par ridiculous with Comic Sans. The fact that you could have come up with your own Avatar font, but no, instead you basically used Comic Sans for your title and all your subtitles, by the way. So, anyway, the Avatar ripoff here was distracting for me and I couldn't get past the ridiculous nature of this world.

AJ: Yeah. This was a tough hang for me as well. 

MF: The Saru part? 

AJ: No, that tracked. He was horrible. It was… 

MF: Let's talk about Saru. 

AJ: Yeah, let's talk about…I mean, you talk about Saru. 

MF: I'm going to. 

AJ: Because maybe he's under the influence of something, but he's under the influence of peace and harmony and this is what… 

MF: And this is what he does.

AJ: …and this is what he turns into. 

MF: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. 

AJ: Violent. Manipulative. Lies. There's gotta be a general order against just lying. There's no context for kings in just saying, “Oh, spoke to the captain. We don't need these comms anymore.” 

MF: Yeah. 

AJ: But yeah, no, you go ahead and talk about…tell us about Saru, your plant. 

MF: Yeah. A couple of things. And granted, I would like to just say that my plant was named after, like, Season 3 Saru. There's a…there's an arc. There's a character arc. Okay. 

AJ: I am looking forward to it. 

MF: As many arcs, it ends. It begins low and then gets higher. 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: You're…you're still waiting for that. 

AJ: It's like a chart of my weight loss journey. It's like up and down, up and down…

MF: He’s a bar graph.

AJ: Up and down. Yeah. This is just up and down. This is further down than when we started with him. 

MF: Has he ever been up for you so far? 

AJ: No. He did offer her some blueberries. That was nice of him. 

MF: That was an up? That was like a… 

AJ: That's as high up as he's been so far for me. 

MF: Okay, fair enough. So, here's the thing. They beam down to Pandora and Michael starts off with the disrespect. They are immediately back to the bickering siblings that they were on the Shenzhou. Michael is like, “Oh, and did you know this about Kelpians? And they can do this, and they can do that.” And Saru is right there. 

AJ: She was bragging about him. 

MF: No, I don't think that was a brag. She was talking about him like he was a safari animal. And she was the safari guide. 

AJ: If it walks like a Kelpian. 

MF: Wow. So, Saru is right there. And I was glad that he actually called her on it and said, “Listen, you're talking about,” you know? She was like, “They do this.” 

AJ: We are coming at this from completely…I did not hear that at all. 

MF: Are you serious? 

AJ: She was smiling. She was like telling Tyler like, “Oh yeah, they could…did you know they can run this fast?” 

MF: But also he was right there.

AJ: And then later we see him running that fast. What… 

MF: I'm gonna come back to him running, by the way. I have to. 

AJ: Are we supposed to pretend like he isn't there when you're talking about something that's very cool? Because he was like… 

MF: She could have been like, “Saru, tell Ash about the running thing.” Like, she didn't have to be like, “Kelpians can do this and this and that,” like he's a specimen in a zoo or something. So, then he was like, “Yes, and we also enjoyed being talked about in the third person while present.” And I was like, “You better stand up for yourself, Saru.” I do have in my notes that he had it coming because he started it by saying, “Well, yeah, you know, if it weren't for you humans, I could make it there in 15 minutes.” 

AJ: Well, then how can you continue to defend him? 

MF: I am not defending him in this moment. I'm just saying that Michael was also being shady. 

AJ: All right.

MF: In that moment. 

AJ: Disagree to agree, because I'm not going to agree to anything on this. 

MF: She came with shade. And she knew it, which is why she apologized. So, their relationship, their little bickering back and forth with each other I think is restarting which, that feels like progress in their particular relationship. So then later in the episode, though, he shows us that he is fast. And…

AJ: I was crying laughing. 

MF: I also was crying. 

AJ: Screaming.

MF: I don't think I clocked it the first time through. But on the rewatch, I was like, “Oh, no.” 

AJ: He is booking. 

MF: This is…this is not good. 

AJ: It's tough. 

MF: So, we should have known that we were going to get an example of Speedy Saru in action. The fact that they were having that conversation, we should have known we were going to get to see it. And I will say that there are only two people, probably in the world, who could even stand a chance of pulling that off. And one of them is Andy Serkis, whom many of us know from being Gollum, being like the motion capture actor who's responsible for all of that very fun motion. And then the other is Doug Jones. And so, it is Doug Jones and he gave it his best, but still I was just like, “Oh, that's not good.” But it was as good as it was going to be. 

AJ: Like, I think it was Woody in Toy Story where he's sort of like flailing about, sort of trying to run somewhere. And it's just…it's like…I cannot take this guy seriously.

MF: I think we could have done without seeing Kelpien speed.  You know how in horror movies, the monster is way scarier in your mind sometimes? And then when you see the actual monster, you're like, “That's actually not so scary.” I felt the same way about his run. Like, if I didn't have to see him running, that would have been so much better, like, just imagining how fast Kelpiens can run, than actually seeing. 

AJ: Yeah, I mean, if he had just walked like Jason, just walked, I would have been more freaked out than watching him sprint haphazardly. 

MF: Like Phoebe Buffay in Friends. Waving up the appendages. 

AJ: Not good for podcasting, but we were both waving our hands in the air. 

MF: I mean, shout out to Doug Jones, though. He did his best. Anyway. 

AJ: He was willing to be violent to maintain his peace. And it's not that that isn't relatable to some degree.  I mean, you tell me what…what your interpretation was, but I couldn't tell if we were supposed to believe that he became under the influence of something because he had that moment where he looked up at the sky and there was the light that was sort of shooting out of him. Or if he was genuinely like, “I can finally just breathe and just hear nothing. I don't feel fear in this moment. And so, I would do anything, including murder somebody, maybe, so that I can stay here and feel that.” Yeah. I wasn't sure what we were supposed to think that was. 

MF: I think it was a combination of both, quite honestly. Okay, so there are a few things that the show has underlined for us multiple times. One of the things is that Michael Burnham is Starfleet's first convicted mutineer. They refuse to let us forget that.

AJ: Mm-Hmm. . 

MF: One of the other things that they really, really want to drive home, which…I get it. This is your pilot season; there are some things that you wanna do later that depend on these points. So, one of those other points is that Kelpians, their one kind of defining feature as a species is their ability to sense danger and death. And so, I think what we are seeing with Saru is he's lived an entire lifetime where that sensing of danger and that experience of fear has been his defining characteristic for his personality. For his whole species, really. That's what evolution has brought them to. The reason why he's helpful on board is because he can sense when danger is coming. It's kind of like having a Betazoid on board, which…that means nothing to you just yet. But when you have a Betazoid on board, that means that when you're interacting with all of these different species out in the world, you have this Betazoid person who can be like, “Yep, they're not telling the truth. I can tell you right now. We can't trust them.” So, I almost feel like having a Kelpien on board, they are using him in that same way. Like, yeah. “Should we, should we be worried about this?” 

AJ: Right. Yeah. 

MF: He knows what he is and he knows what they need and want from him. 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: So, I feel like in this situation, yes, he is absolutely under the influence. It's just like you got the pure, uncut stuff your very first time. Oh no. So, he took, like, a full blast of whatever those Pahvo drugs were. He got a full hit of it and just…he went, full Zendaya in Euphoria. He was, like, all out there. Also, though, towards the end of the episode, there was a scene where he's debriefing it with Michael. And she's like, you know, “It's cool. I understand that, you know, you were acting that way. You weren't fully in control.” And he was like, “No.” 

AJ: Yeah, that's where I… 

MF: “I knew what I was doing.”

AJ: Yes. 

MF: “It's just, I was feeling it.” He was free for the first time in any Kelpian’s life. Maybe. 

AJ: It still feels shady. 

MF: He wasn't burdened. It was shady. But, but, but, but…

AJ: Because he was like, “Yeah, no. I said what I said.” 

MF: I know. But here's why I love that for him. This is a real turning point for Saru because he's like, “Oh shit,” right? Like, “I didn't realize that unchecked, unburdened by this stuff, that's the kind of person that I am.” When he's saying to Michael, like, “No, that was me,” he was admitting to her that he didn't like what he saw. He didn't like what he was. 

AJ: I didn’t see that.

MF: Really? 

AJ: No. 

MF: No, I think he is owning it, but not proud of it. 

AJ: Hmm. 

MF: To me, it felt like, “Yo, for us to move forward, it's important for you to know that I know that that shit was ugly and I'm trying not to repeat that. I'm trying not to be that again, but that's who I was.” I don't know. Like, I… 

AJ: Okay. 

MF: And…and again, it's me having been through this story once and knowing who he is now, right, in the present, going back and being like, “Yeah, he was hella shady. He was violent. He was the villain in this episode.” 

AJ: Yes. 

MF: He tried to ruin everything. 

AJ: He was screaming and moaning and groaning and, “You take everything from me.” And that was just… 

MF: Because that was the first time he had ever felt that, so he was like a child. I'm also a Saru apologist, just so we're clear, but… 

AJ: I would love to get there. It's just…it's tough. 

MF: He felt to me—and this is the last thing I'll say about it—Saru in this episode reminded me so much of people who do decision making based on vibes. 

AJ: Oof. 

MF: He was making choices not as a result of his years and years and years of Starfleet training and experience under the best captains Starfleet has ever had, but on, like, “Yeah, that's groovy. Let's do it.”

AJ: It's almost irrelevant what his vibes are or if this is the first time that he's felt a certain kind of way. 

MF: Correct. 

AJ: It isn't practical that we stay here when there is in fact a war raging. 

MF: And you are the first officer. 

AJ: You're the number one.

MF: Yeah, this was not a shining moment for him. I'm fully willing to admit that, but I do think it was a turning point in the evolution of his character. 

AJ: Okay. I hope so. 

MF: Can we talk about Stamets? 

AJ: Yes. 

MF: Let's talk about Paul Stamets, your fave. He begins this episode very clearly letting us know that he is tired of this shit. He is not feeling it. He is letting us know sustainable it is not. 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: He already said he didn't want to do this, but did for the good of the ship, for the good of Starfleet, for the good of the whole Federation. He was like, “Sure, I'll…I'll have my white matter messed with,” right? “You can totally re-scramble my DNA. That's fine.” 

AJ: I think he did that to himself. 

MF: He did. That's what I'm saying. He like volunteered. He was like, “Yeah, I'm going to do this.” But the fact that he volunteered with no real sense… 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: …of what this could mean… 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: You saw it turned your bestie into, like, soup. 

AJ: Who?

MF: Your boy on the Glenn. I don't remember his name now. 

AJ: Oh. 

MF: He turned into John Carpenter's The Thing. 

AJ: Oh, I thought he was killed by the tardigrade. 

MF: No, he was killed by the accident that happened with the spore drive… 

AJ: Oh, 

MF: …where it scrambled everybody. Like, your arm is coming out of your forehead and, like, you've got two jaws and… 

AJ: Oof. 

MF: Anyway, he wasn't on that away team, thank goodness, because he didn't need to see what his project did to his best friend and their entire ship. But he's here and he's still doing this. It's very clear to all of us that he is on the verge of becoming the next tardigrade, dehydrated and balled up like a roly poly in the corner, right? He is…he is tired. He's almost done with all of this, with all of you all. And yet, they keep going back to him. They're setting up what's coming and really letting us know that he is not going to be our tardigrade. He can't do it. Like, this is not a sustainable thing.

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: And something else is going to happen. What else do we have? 

AJ: There's a lot of Klingons in this episode, but I don't have a lot of notes about them because it just…it feels like a convoluted part of the plot to me. I'm lost in the thread of the inner Klingon war. 

MF: Yeah. What is life like for the other side? 

AJ: And who is the other side? 

MF: Yeah. So, here's what's so interesting about Discovery's treatment of the Klingons is that before I think in almost every example, Klingons are largely presented as monolithic, as one note. And so, I think we come in knowing, okay, (we meaning Trekkies), right, we come to this knowing this is what Klingons are like. And so, we're like, “Yeah, of course, you're like power hungry. You want to kill everybody that's not with you, total domination, your first option is always fighting, diplomacy is stupid when we can just fight because we know we're better than you at that.” So L'Rell, and to a certain extent, Voq, we are not clear on where in that typical Klingon picture you stand. I love L'Rell's interaction with Cornwell, because on the one hand, we're like, “No, she totally has something up her sleeve. She's making this alliance and trying to defect and become Cornwell's prisoner for some kind of other reason.” Like she's got something up her sleeve. But the things that don't go together, as far as we know, those things are Klingons and, like, subterfuge. That's not the way that they work. They don't, like, pretend, for the most part. And so, if L'Rell says, “I'm trying to defect,” we're kind of trained to take her at her word, but also, we don't know. That's uncharted territory for us in dealing with this species that maybe she is trying to be an operative. Maybe she does have some other reason why she wants to go with Cornwell. 

AJ: I hope so, because right now it just feels like a character that's a little, yeah, one note, a little flat and then I think we were supposed to maybe feel something for her when we came across her friends and/or family and/or clique or whoever that were slaughtered as she's saying their names and I just feel nothing and then it…maybe we're supposed to feel happy for her that she's like, “I want to defect” in the way if we're watching another show and there's someone over here and they're meeting with someone and then they sneak off and say wanted to, you know, defect to America, we're like, “Oh, look at this is exciting.” I didn't feel anything. So, I hope there's something more to it. 

MF: Yeah. 

AJ: Because I don't know where Voq went. We didn't see him die on screen. 

MF: Nope. 

AJ: So, we'll see. But yeah, the Klingons…they're a tough hang for me. I end up wanting to sort of like pick up my phone and do something while I'm watching, which you can't do. 

MF: During the Klingons.

AJ: Yeah, because sometimes they're speaking English, like the translated, but sometimes it's still you know, something you have to watch. So, I'm a little disappointed in the Klingon storyline. 

MF: Okay. I'm intrigued by L'Rell and I think I kind of have been for this whole time, but the only Klingon that I'm sort of disappointed in is Kol just because he feels, to me, so close to that monolith. He's the only one that is giving us the same ol’ same ol’ when it comes to Klingons. L'Rell is a different kind of Klingon that we're not used to. And Voq was a different kind of Klingon than we're used to. 

AJ: I mean, you can't put this in the pod, but she just, every time I see her, she looks like a tampon. 

MF: Oh my gawwwwd. Oh my gawd.

AJ: She's just wearing all white with like this blood…the whole top is just like the blood and then it's white and it's just giving like… 

MF: I'm keeping that.

AJ: I can't. 

MF: I’m keeping that.

AJ: I can't take her seriously. I want her to be as compelling as a white Walker, but she is not that. I want her to be compelling as, I don't know, maybe the woman who like sort of saved the man that she loved, but where did he go? Maybe she killed him off screen, maybe she didn't, but now she wants to defect. But why? I don't know, I just…here's, where the awkward part could be. 

MF: Sure. 

AJ: For the podcast. Okay, the beginning of Disco, wonderful. But maybe it's not even just assuming like, are you a Trekkie or will you become a Trekkie? It's like, will I actually like Star Trek? Because if Klingons are a central part of what makes Star Trek Star Trek and I'm not into it…

MF: Yeah.

AJ: …then I mean, I don't know. We'll have to see. 

MF: Yeah. You know what? 

AJ: If I was like, “This is super cool,” but maybe I don't actually like it at some point. Or maybe this is just a lull. Who knows, but I'm not…I don't…I'm not into them. 

MF: So, that is a really chewy nugget, but I think the engine, the media property that is Star Trek, Star Trek without italics. 

AJ: Mm hmm. 

MF: I think they combat that by throwing so many different species at you that they know something's gonna stick. “Yeah, you're not into the Klingons.” And so, if it's a Klingon-forward episode, “Mmm, yeah,” you know, but it's not like there's a whole series that is just the Klingons.

AJ: Okay. 

MF: Now, is there a storyline that they might explore where it's about that conflict? Sure. Maybe it's a whole season, but even as we are navigating this experience with the Klingons, we're also dealing with the Vulcans. We're also dealing with different kinds of species on board Discovery that we don't know a whole lot about just yet. Kelpians, for example, weren't a part of the Star Trek universe until Discovery, right? We didn't know about Kelpians. It's like Netflix, “Did you like this? No? Okay, maybe you're more into the Vulcans or maybe you're more into Romulans.” I will tell you that I'm not concerned that your lack of interest in the Klingons is going to have catastrophic results for your overall love for the franchise, which I still believe will happen.

AJ: Okay. 

MF: Okay. Can we talk about the name of the episode? Si vis pacem para bellum. 

AJ: Sounds right. 

MF: “If you want peace, prepare for war” is what that means. But what does that mean in this episode? If you want peace, prepare for war. While you ponder, have you seen…there's like a TikTok or a reel or something where the person is saying how all of the Star Wars movies are named incorrectly? 

AJ: I've seen. Yes. 

MF: So, it's like… 

AJ: I saw that somewhere. 

MF: Episode One should be… 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: …you know, A New Hope and… 

AJ: Yes. 

MF: Episode Two should be like The Phantom Menace or whatever.

AJ: Yes 

MF: I had that thought when I learned what that phrase meant. I was like, “This is the wrong episode to bear that name: if you want peace prepare for war.” 

AJ: Why is that? 

MF: I think I might have to talk about that in a future episode. 

AJ: Ah, okay.

MF: Because I think there's one that we haven't gotten to yet that would be more aptly named “if you want peace, prepare for war,” but I'm wondering what it could have meant here and I'm thinking it might have something to do with the fact that they have encountered a planet that could essentially become collateral damage in the war between the Federation and the Klingons. But I don't know. I'm curious what you thought. 

AJ: Maybe I was thinking about it too literally or too one-for-one, but I was thinking that it's sort of a message for Saru. He felt at peace when he was there and Burnham was saying, “I would love to have a second, a millisecond of peace, but we can't have that until we finish this war. We can't have that until we finish the conflict.” And It's tough because he almost, Saru, had this feeling in grasp, you know? It was almost there, but it's actually…maybe that's just a taste of what this could be. If you want peace, even for Stamets, it's like, “Okay, you don't want to keep doing this and we'll get there, but if you want peace, we got to prepare to do this other thing really quick.”

MF: Yeah, that's right. 

AJ: And Michael is sort of saying, “We need to stay the course. And I am sorry. I know that you feel harmony here and you don't feel in pain here. But there is a whole war that's being waged, and we have the potential to end it, to resolve it. So, if you want that peace, like, hang tight, buddy. But first, we got to do this one other thing. We got to go to war.” I don't know if it works for the Klingons, because I'm not sure if peace is the plan. I don't think war is the vessel to get to peace. War is the vessel to get power.  

MF: Okay, this is gonna come out messy, because it's literally still forming in my brain. I think this may be your road back to Klingons because that's part of the reason why I think the war started the way that it did. That may be Starfleet's essential problem, is that they show up with the peace rhetoric. Starfleet comes in saying, “We just want to explore and make besties across the universe. That's all we're here for.” But you don't have all that military structure, you don't come with ships that are packing for bear when all you want is peace. What you want is control. So, there is an element of power, of control. And the Klingons are deeply resistant to that and I think the fact that there hadn't been war with the Klingons for that long is because the Klingons were like, “Leave us the hell alone. Like, y'all stay over there. You don't have to mess with us. We're good.” 

AJ: Is that what you think? The Klingons are like, “We're cool”? 

MF: They're like, “If you leave us alone, we're cool. We'll just be over here.” Listen, I'm not trying to speak for the whole species, right? But, I literally think they would have been completely happy just over in their home world, in their part of the universe. And as long as Starfleet doesn't come and try to like, have democracy, like, “Don't bring us that. And we're not interested in your diplomacy. We don't want to trade with you. We don't want that. We're good. We are not out here trying to, like, take over the Federation. We're actually just wanting to be over here, fightin’ and happy.” 

AJ: It's interesting because I don't see that. I have not seen that Starfleet. The Starfleet that I've seen, I mean, they talk about it when they're on the planet. But the whole idea of like spreading democracy or even being colonizers is the antithesis of General Order One, sort of, so they're restricted from revealing themselves to sentient beings who aren't warp capable. 

MF: That's right. 

AJ: So, they aren't really trying to go in and say, like, “We're gonna establish something here.” They're not even trying to be seen, so I don't see how… 

MF: But we're past that point with the Klingons. We know the Klingons. They know us. We are past that point. So, once we made first contact with the Klingons…and that's actually a backstory that I would love to know. How did that happen? Right? What is the backstory? And I'm sure somebody has done that. It may be in a movie or a show that I've missed. Admittedly, I'm not well versed in Star Trek: Enterprise, which is the earliest, chronologically, of all of these shows. And that's the show, probably, that I know the least. But I don't know how our first interaction with the Klingons actually went. I do know that there were members of the Federation (which was not the Federation at the time), but there are Federation member species that had interacted with the Klingons long before humans even entered the picture. I mean, we're literally America. Like, these countries have existed for a long time, and then here we came, acting like we own everything, and we control everything, and we're the best thing since anything. So, humanity is a late entry into the game. 

AJ: This is going to be a path where we diverge quite distinctly, because there's a whole lot that came with that, of time spent with the characters and with the IP and with all of it. Okay. 

MF: Yeah. 

AJ: I don't know any of that. In fact, they do mention first contact protocol here. Burnham says, “We can't alter or borrow property without them understanding and agreeing to our objective.”

MF: Yeah. 

AJ: So that goes against…it's not that I don't believe you. It's just that that's not the Starfleet I know. The Starfleet I know is, “We're going to come onto this planet and we're going to…we're…you know, do no harm, leave no footprint unless we have to. We're going to see if we can use this, but only if they agree.” I don't have any of that like spreading democracy or any of those little things.

MF: So, why do you think the Klingons don't trust Starfleet? 

AJ: I don't think the Klingons trust anyone. They seem to be pro-Klingon. So, I would think that anything is in antithesis to them, even neutrality. 

MF: So, you think if Michael hadn't showed up, and the Shenzhou hadn't messed with the Ship of the Dead, they eventually were going to bring that war to Earth's doorstep?

AJ: So, I thought it was a trap. 

MF: Oh! 

AJ: That wasn't a trap? 

MF: That's not how I read it. 

AJ: I read it as a trap. 

MF: I did not. That's fascinating. Were they setting a trap you think for Starfleet? 

AJ: Yeah, I thought the show was signaling that to us. I need to look back at my notes. 

MF: I know. I'm like, “Do I need to watch this a third time?” 

AJ: I need to go back because I thought… 

MF: Yeah, I'm going to watch it again because my reading of it is that they were just doing their own thing. And here's why I think that's the case: because they were worried about internal stuff. They weren't trying to go external and fight Starfleet. They were dealing with what's going on internally. Voq was like, “This is how we should be running things.” And Kol was like, “No, we're running things like this.” And they had all of these different factions, but Voq was out there like a revolutionary, like, “This is how we should be living.” They were happy to be fighting each other. 

AJ: I missed that. 

MF: Yeah. Which is why it's wild. And it's not that you missed it. It's that that may just be our difference in interpretation. Yeah, because. I remember them mentioning that there are all of these different houses, right? 

AJ: Yeah, factions. 

MF: All of these different factions, and Voq was attempting to bring them all together. 

AJ: Unite them.

MF: So, maybe that was part of the plan. 

AJ: I thought he was doing it by starting this war. But I need to go back because I just came out with a completely different understanding. 

MF: Well, and not for nothing, if that's what it meant to you, that's what it meant. And if that's what it meant to me, that's what it meant. Yeah. 

AJ: No, there is a right and wrong answer for this. 

MF: There absolutely is not. No way. No way. No way. No way. No. It can't be a right or wrong because it exists. And so, it's possible that I saw it or heard it. I experienced it and ignored parts of the text that were very clearly there because they weren't consistent with my view of how the universe works. But it is really interesting to me that it would be my reading of Starfleet that is the more suspicious. 

AJ: That's why I'm so confused… 

MF: I am also. Yeah. 

AJ: …why you talk about them like they are these galaxy-wide colonialists when I'm just hearing them say, you know, “Let's pretend like we weren't here” or “We don't want to reveal ourselves. We don't want to do anything if we don't have permission.” I don't know the Starfleet that you know. I mean, the Starfleet I know, the Admiral is telling L'Rell what happens if you're taken as a prisoner of war. It's like, “We don't have the death penalty. No, you'll come, we will interrogate you, but we'll do it humanely, and then we'll release you when this thing is over.” I mean, I don't know the Starfleet that you know. 

MF: You've crystallized it right there. You don't know the Starfleet that I know. 

Both: Oh!

MF: I know and I almost feel like that's my dirty little secret. Like, I don't want you to know. I still want you to believe in Starfleet the way that you do. But there's so much of it. And we even talked about this, I think, in the first episode that for me, Starfleet, as an organization, is great at talking the talk, but not so much with the walking of the walk. 

AJ: To be determined.

MF: And part of that is, yeah, part of that is what I see here. And I think the lion's share of it is what I know just coming in. Whoo! Okay, that's exciting. That's an exciting result. 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: Okay. So, shall we go to the quiz? 

AJ: Yes. 

MF: Yeah, and we've decided that we want to do things a little differently… 

AJ: We do.

MF: …with the quiz because what was so attractive about the quiz to me in the first place was…and, you know, I'm going to be honest. This is possibly a time loop confession for me. The thrill of, “I know something you don't know.” If I'm being honest, like, that's the whole point of trivia, isn't it? That there are people who know the answer and then there are people who don't know the answer. So, for that, I apologize. That was not very Starfleet of me. 

AJ: Or maybe it was. Or the Starfleet that you know, but not the Starfleet that I know.

MF: So, we're going to change up the quiz a little bit and it's, I think, going to be less of a quiz and more of a “Let's go through the little trivia related gems… 

AJ: Yes. 

MF: …that were revealed to us in this episode.” But it'll still serve, I think, the same purpose of, “Did you know that this was more than maybe what you initially picked up on?” Yeah, okay. But I still want my first question to be “Are you a Trekkie?” 

AJ: No. I don't even like this episode of Star Trek. 

MF: Okay. 

AJ: Sort of. 

MF: All right. That's fine. The first question, which we've already talked about, so let's just get it out of the way and get it on paper. What is General Order One? 

AJ: One may not reveal oneself to sentient beings who are not warp capable. 

MF: That's right. So General Order One essentially morphs into what we call the Prime Directive. So, if you ever hear them talking about the Prime Directive, the Prime Directive is that we, as Starfleet, may not interfere with the normal development of any alien society, right? So, the way that that manifests in Star Trek is that if we come across a population and they are not warp capable, then we are not allowed to reveal ourselves, “Hey, guess what? Aliens exist. There are planets other than your own where life forms similar to you have developed and we have the ability to visit other planets and stuff like that.” We're not really allowed to do that. That gets broken. All the time. Literally all the time… 

AJ: I'm sure. 

MF: …which is a little bit of a… 

AJ: Laws are for lackeys. Yeah. Context is for kings. 

MF: …context is for kings, right? Sometimes you accidentally break the Prime Directive or General Order Number One. It's in the justification of those violations. Yeah, it's the context, right? It is in what you do next that really tells the tale of a captain, a commander, whoever it might be. Yeah, you broke what Starfleet considers its first commandment, basically. 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: It is like number one. Yeah, and it just gets trashed all the time. 

AJ: Which Saru kind of did. 

MF: He did. 

AJ: Well, even in his introduction, he said, “I'm Commander Saru…” 

MF: “Of.” 

AJ: I don't know if he said “of Discovery,” but I think he did say…oh, he's a first contact specialist.

MF: Yes. Which means that he is the person that they send in when…so, okay. When humans developed warp capability, the very first time that we sent a vessel and achieved warp, the Vulcans were basically the ones who welcomed us to the interstellar community. They were like, “Good job.” 

AJ: “Look at you.” 

MF: “Look at you.” 

AJ: Rolling up to the party, “Hi.”

MF: Children.

AJ:  “Welcome.” 

MF: Drunk. Right. 

AJ: “Glad to finally see you.” 

MF: We were like high schoolers at a drunk high school party. Yeah. So, they did first contact with us and they were instrumental in bringing us into that community. They were our prophytes. So, Saru is the person who knows how to do that protocol. The problem is, it wasn't like Discovery was hanging out and watching the Pahvans do some kind of warp-capable thing. They were on the planet. They didn't know, remember, that there were sentient beings there.

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: So, when he realized that there were sentient beings, boom. He had to kick into first contact protocol, which is, “Oh shit. We didn't realize but now we have to, like…” 

AJ: “Sorry, we thought it was empty here, but we did hear music.” 

MF: “Yeah, we did. We definitely heard your music. Thought it was the plants. That's weird. Sorry.” Yeah, so that is General Order One. Or the Prime Directive. That's a kind of an important thing, to your point and mine, that that would be their guiding principle, and also how they break it all the damn time. Yeah. Okay let's see. Here's a fun one. Early in this episode, Lorca says to Airiam, probably, as he's walking off, he says, “You have the conn.” 

AJ: Oh my god, I wrote this down as a question I had for the episode. 

MF: Great. 

AJ: I wrote down, “’You have the conn.’ What is that?” 

MF: Yes. 

AJ: Because first I thought it was comm. So, for a while, I think I assumed he was saying “You have, like, the computer.” And then I was hearing “conn,” like “You have the controller.” And then he was like, “You have the conn.” And I wrote down the question: “But what is…what do I have?” 

MF: “What is that?” Excellent. 

AJ: I don't know. 

MF: Great. 

AJ: Is it the computers? The controller? What is the conn? 

MF: Okay. Full transparency, I don't know what the…what conn stands for. I don't know what that means, but I can tell you what it means in the grander scheme. So, here in our kinder, gentler, more humane version of this quiz, I will just tell you that when he says that, that basically means that she is now the most senior officer on the bridge. 

AJ: On the bridge. 

MF: Not an elevator. On the bridge. So, if, for example, they were to be under a surprise attack, Airiam would be the one sitting in the captain's chair. It's her call, whatever happens. 

AJ: Got it. 

MF: So, her first action would probably be, “Captain to the bridge.” Right? “Get your…get your ass back here so you can make these decisions. But while you're off duty or for the moment, I'm the one in control.” So, it probably means control, but I..I actually don't know about that. But it's the conn. C O N N. You have the conn. 

AJ: You have the conn. 

MF: He's basically saying, “It's your ship while I'm out of the room” or whatever. All right. This one is going to be an audio clue.

AJ: Ooh. 

MF: Can you identify…(tribble squeaks)…can you identify the creature that makes that sound? 

AJ: No. 

MF: Okay. If I showed you a picture of that creature… 

AJ: Is that the little thing that's on his desk, on Lorca's desk? 

MF: It is. When we first meet Lorca, he has two very interesting things sitting on his desk. One of those things is a bowl of fortune cookies. The second is that creature, and that creature is called a tribble. A tribble is so Star Trek, made first famous in the Original Series episode, “The Trouble with Tribbles,” revisited in a later series in an episode called “Trials and Tribble-ations.” 

AJ: Wow. Okay. 

MF: The fact that they would come back to the tribble well is really kind of cool. And the fact that they didn't make a whole thing about it in that episode, but it was enough of a thing that they put it on his desk and like, wanted people to see and hear that there was a tribble. 

AJ: I didn't see it or hear it. 

MF: Right, because they just slipped it in there. 

AJ: That's so funny.

MF: But when I watched it again, I was like, “Oh my god, how did I not bring up the tribble?” Yeah. So, here's a fun side story that we absolutely don't have time for. I used to have a tribble and it was battery operated… 

AJ: Wow. 

MF: …so that when you touched it, it would make that little, subtle tribble voice, but that by itself is not that fun. Here comes the fun part. So, when the batteries started dying and you would touch it, it would be like, it would sound like the demonic version of a tribble. Anyway, I don't know where that is now. I think I put it somewhere to keep it safe and now I don't know where that is. 

AJ: It's still there. 

MF: It is still in that safe place. 

AJ: Yeah. 

MF: Okay. So, last question. True or false: a ship under cloak can fire. 

AJ: False. 

MF: That is correct. The whole thing about cloaking is really interesting in this episode because they are talking about it. They're not even always calling it cloaking. They're calling it, like, “invisibility screen” and stuff like that. So, cloaking is a huge part of the Trek universe. Who does and does not have cloaking technology is a big deal. So, it is a little bit outside of conventional and canonical wisdom that Starfleet at this point is learning so much about the cloak because what I know of cloaking technology is two things. Number one, it's something that the Klingons and the Romulans, again, you don't know them yet, but the Klingons and the Romulans have that technology, but the humans don't know how to do it. But two, by the time we get to Next Generation, Starfleet has a treaty with the Klingons and the Romulans, or maybe just the Romulans, but we have entered into a treaty where we have agreed not to develop cloaking technology. We're not supposed to have cloaking. 

AJ: Okay. 

MF: We've basically said, “Okay, we probably could figure it out, especially based on…” 

AJ: “…the information we have.” 

MF: “We figured out how to do this spore drive situation so we could figure out cloaking.” Right. But by the time we get to Next Generation, we've agreed not to. And then in another series, we revisit that idea of cloaking again. 

AJ: I think it's interesting, especially because when you think about are the Klingons supposed to be a superior race, are they supposed to be inferior, and yet they have this stealth tech. And they're using that as a tool to build their coalition, their army, if you will. 

MF: Yes. 

AJ: Okay. I have some trivia. 

MF: Oh, okay. 

AJ: Sort of. 

MF: Oh, this is fun. Like, do I know? 

AJ: Well, maybe. 

MF: Okay. 

AJ: So, I'm trying to keep track of whenever they mention names of other ships.

MF: I love that. 

AJ: Because you've said that's very important. 

MF: It is important. 

AJ: So, not that I expect you to have, like, remembered from this episode, but in the first scene, we're like engaging in battle. It's like, “USS Discovery is here to help save the day.” Spoiler, they were not in fact there… 

MF: It does not work out.

AJ: …to help save the day. Didn't work out like that. 

MF: And the way they were like, “Well…” 

AJ: “Whoops.” 

MF: “We tried. Whatever. We tried.”

AJ: So, there was a ship that did not make it out of that scene. And then there were two more ships that were mentioned when Captain Lorca was talking to the Vulcan Starfleet member, the Black guy with the ears, the Admiral, and when he was saying, “Oh, these other ships…” 

MF: “…came to…” 

AJ: “…yes, and also didn't make it.” So, we had three names of other ships. 

MF: Yes. 

AJ: Did you catch any of them? 

MF: Did. Thank you for bringing that up. So, I think the first one, the one that we swooped in to save and we were actually talking to them before… 

AJ: Yeah, it was tough. It was so tough. 

MF: Just a little too late.

AJ: “Did we get that second warhead? Did we? Did we? No.” 

MF: And then… 

AJ: “Didn't.” 

MF: “I guess it's not gonna matter.” But the way that Lorca was like, “Well, let's pack it up and get out of here.” 

AJ: I think his words were, “There will be time to grieve. This is not that time.” 

MF: That's right. That's right. He was like, “We need to get the hell out. Not that time.” I want to say that that ship was the Gagarin.

AJ: Yes. 

MF: Yes. Okay. And so, I think that might've been named…I'm going to want to fact check this, but I think the first Russian cosmonaut was Yuri Gagarin. 

AJ: Oh, okay. 

MF: So, I think that is a reference to Earth space history. 

AJ: Okay. 

MF: But now I want to…I want… 

AJ: You gotta look it up. 

MF: I have to look. I have to do a Goog.

AJ: Give it a Goog. 

MF: Yuri Gagarin was a Soviet pilot and cosmonaut who became the first human to travel into outer space on April 12th, 1961. 

AJ: Look at that. The USS Gagarin. Gagarin. 

MF: Gagarin. 

AJ: May it rest. 

MF: Yes. She went out in a blaze of glory, that's for sure. Yeah. What were the other ones?

AJ: Hoover? 

MF: It can't possibly be Herbert, right? 

AJ: This is ironically like the American history corner. No, because we had a Russian in there. This is global history. This is a history corner. 

MF: Yes, yes. 

AJ: Well, the second one was Muroc, M-U-R-O-C. So, USS Hoover and Muroc both didn't make it out of the…

MF: Oh, okay, wait a minute. Oh, I might be onto something here. Either way, I don't know the answer to these two. But now it's like a little breadcrumbs trail that I want to follow. So, what is currently Edwards Air Force Base was established in the 1930s as Muroc Field. The facility was renamed Muroc Army Airfield and then Muroc Air Force Base before its final renaming in 1950 for World War II Air Force veteran and test pilot Captain Glenn Edwards. So, I think Edwards Air Force Base is where the space shuttles would come back in. So, we know they take off from Cape Canaveral, right? I think Edwards is where they would come back.

AJ: Oh, I thought they just landed in the ocean. 

MF: The shuttles did not. The shuttles landed like planes. Huh. 

AJ: Oh. 

MF: Yeah. There we go. So, notable occurrences at Edwards include Chuck Yeager's flight that broke the sound barrier. The first landings of the space shuttle and the 1986 around the world flight of the Rutan Voyager. 

AJ: Oh, Voyager. Very nice touch. 

MF: So, this is a deep cut if that is in fact the origin of that one. That's a deep cut, but that's fun. 

AJ: Sounds right to me. Okay, that's the end of my little running trivia now. 

MF: Okay, I love that. That feels like a very fun feature. I want you to do that every time. 

AJ: Yes. 

MF: I like it. All right, we are over time. 

AJ: We are way over time. 

MF: Like, embarrassingly. So, on that, see you next time. 

AJ: Bye!

Urgent Care (the Prescription):

Welcome back. Because Ashley and I apparently had lots to say this time, I’m going to keep the line for your prescription pick up short and sweet, but before I do that, I would like to say sorry to this man Yuri Gagarin for pronouncing his name with a random extra R, like Gragarin. Not sure what I was trying to do there, but he was an important human who probably deserves to have his name pronounced correctly. I would also like to say sorry to this man Herbert Hoover, NOT the former president of the United States, but the other Herb Hoover, the first civilian and the second person to break the sound barrier. So, I’m gonna take a wild stab and say that the USS Hoover, may she rest, was probably named to recognize Herb’s contributions to the history of human flight and our pathway to the stars. 

All right. Let’s talk about this prescription. So, my dude Saru was controversial in this episode, wasn’t he? His behavior on Pahvo was not a good look. Now, I’ve already mentioned that I’m a Saru apologist, but he did not make it easy for me here. I knew the prescription would be based on him, though, for sure, because even as he was just absolutely being his worst possible self, he was doing so in a way that was highly relatable, and even Ashley recognized it as such. On a regular day, Saru serves what I recognize as big Virgo energy. He cares about the rules, and always tries to follow them to the letter, and he’s here to make sure everyone around him follows those rules as well. He pays attention to the details, all the fine print. He’s a policy expert. He’s got more than a splash of introversion. Um, if you feel like he’s judging you, you’re right. He is. He believes we can all do better, and he is the self-appointed champion and monarch of the Do Better society. But as high a standard as he’s holding for you, he’s holding himself to an even higher bar. And on behalf of Saru and all my fellow Virgos, may I say, we are exhausted. Being in a state of perpetual clench for self and others takes its toll. 

So, when Saru had an opportunity to unclench and not be THAT GUY for a minute, especially having never encountered such an opportunity before, baby he UNCLENCHED, okay? He was Team Wavy Gravy. Rules? Out the window. Responsibility? Gross. Who cares? Policy? (blows raspberry) Someone else’s problem, right? Policies are for lackeys, and context is for kings, and Party Saru was in his messy, troubled, child king era on Planet Pahvo. He was not himself.

Now, Saru is not even close to being the first Star Trek character to not be himself in an episode or two. It’s almost a Star Trek trope: a member of the crew falls under some alien influence and they behave in a way that strikes the audience as unfamiliar or inconsistent. I can’t even count the times Star Trek has done this exact gag with the otherwise unimpeachable Jean-Luc Picard, maybe most notably by turning him into Locutus of Borg, right? You take a character who is THE most buttoned-up, by-the-rules, setter of the standards and then you spin him off into a near or actual total disaster where he does all the things we know he would just never do (hashtag Wolf 359, hashtag never forget). 

Typically, by the end of such an episode or story arc, the character is either like, “I did WHAT now? Whoa, I don’t remember that at all. That’s so weird,” or they’re like Picard, breaking down to the ship’s counselor, like, “I was aware of what was going on and I gave the fight my all, and I’m deeply ashamed of not having enough dog in me to stop the chaos,” or whatever. But what we DON’T typically see in these scenarios is a character being like, “Yep, that’s me. You’re probably wondering how I got here” with the opening bars of “Teenage Wasteland” playing in the background. 

It would have been so easy for Discovery to take the “I don’t remember that” road or the “I tried to fight it” path with Saru. They could have very easily created an escape hatch for him and excused his behavior as a result of him being infected with or intoxicated by whatever the hippies on Pahvo were peddling. Making Saru even a little bit aware of what he was doing, giving him the burden of owning his behavior…that was a bold move, a complex one, and I love it and it’s what pushed this episode into a zone of prescription-worthiness for me. Saru became a reckless, flailing, criminal manifestation of the maxim, “A drunk mind speaks a sober heart.” Even if he WAS under the influence, he showed out because he wanted to. He cut all the way loose, but the consequences ended up being so much more than he was prepared to handle. 

If, like me, you’re revisiting the show, doing a rewatch, I would be interested in knowing if you agree with me that this episode is special (and prescribe-able) because it marks a real turning point for Saru. He absolutely was the clenched, rigid, and yes, shady character Ashley knows him to be so far, but after this moment where his ugliest inner self rears its head, he begins the uncomfortable process of looking right at that ugly reflection and coming to terms with it. We watch this episode to remind ourselves that we can’t outrun our demons (not even if we run like Kelpiens), but as long as we know they’re there, maybe we can stay a few paces ahead of them and let our best selves be the ones who cross the finish line.   

That’s gonna do it for this episode. Star Trek: Discovery Season 1 Episode 8, “Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum” (maybe) was directed by John S. Scott. The writers for the episode included Bryan Fuller and Alex Kurtzman as creators of the show, and Gene Roddenberry, of course, for creating the Star Trek universe. We also have Kirsten Beyer as a writer on this episode. Bowie Kim and Erika Lippoldt are our executive story editors, and Kirsten Beyer and Sean Cochran are staff writers. 

We have now reached the part of our appointment where it’s time for me to give you some instructions for what to do when we part ways just in case you don’t remember what we’ve discussed. If you’ve enjoyed what you’ve heard here, please check out all the previous TV Doctor episodes. We would love to see you give us your highest ratings and reviews. Yes, we do read them, and yes, we do care. If you think we’re doing some good work here, let the powers that be know that you’re picking up what we’re putting down, and you can do that in the following ways: give us a five-star rating, leave us a glowing review, follow and subscribe to our show on your favorite podcast platform, follow our Instagram accounts at tee vee phd and sickbaypod (s-i-c-k-b-a-y-p-o-d), leave us hearts, leave us comments, share our content, and buy our merch by visiting teepublic.com/user/the-tv-doctor. And finally, the BEST thing that you can do for us is to tell a friend about our show. Surely you have a friend who loves podcasts as much as you do. Tell that person to join you for your next visit to Sickbay. We’ll be sure to take the very best care of both of you, I promise.

So, on behalf of my number one and I, we are so grateful to have not messed up first contact with you, and we’d like to remind you not to forget to schedule your next appointment on your way out. See you next time!