Star Trek: Discovery Season 4 Premiere [Review]

It has been almost a full year since we have seen our time-and-space-displaced crew in Star Trek: Discovery. This season 4 premiere holds up and sets the bar high for what’s to come over the next story arc, with an extended episode!

It’s her time to FLY!

The newly commissioned Captain Burnam is now in charge of Discovery and her crew. Together they embark on a new mission to help rebuild the Federation and Starfleet. Their first diplomatic mission to the Aushane, Captain, along with Book, has an action-packed yet hilarious misunderstanding with their hosts. All because of a Grudge (the cat), because telling an insectoid/human species that you treat your cat like a queen, remember hive mentality, is going to take you places.

Even under the direst of phaser fire, Micheal keeps an open com with the ship and they figure out the problem with the Butterfly Peoples’ issue with not being able to fly properly. Seems their satellite system that circles the planet hasn’t had any maintenance in years, thus leading to gravitational shift and the butterflies not having that sense of where they are going. They restart the satellites make a hasty retreat and still leave Dilithuium. The Emperor hales the ship and Captain says again they will be there, no strings attached.

The Plans of Presidents

Book heads home to Kwejian for his nephew’s coming of age ceremony. Meanwhile, Michael and the crew head back to Federation HQ to induct the first Starfleet class in over a 125-year break. Michael is skeptical because the new Federation President is going to use the occasion as her introduction to the galaxy.

The New President, Lara Rillick, A Human/Cardassian/Bajoran, thanks the Discovery crew. She reminds the new cadets to embrace the mission of exploration. Showing off the new ARCHER Spacedock, named after the First Starfleet Captain of the Flagship Enterprise.

The Admiral and President along with Captain get a distress beacon from a Science outpost. The President insists on joining and shows herself on to the ship. Michael, apprehensive of this, jumps to black alert and pops over to the coordinates of the station.

Spinning Out of Control

The Station has been knocked off course, and the antigrav is all sorts of messed up. Systems are offline, the usual life and death kind of stuff. The crew eventually figure out a way to save the station’s crew. But the Captain goes head to head with Madame President in regards to doing a spacewalk herself. Eventually, she saves the crew, but the lead scientist dies.

Back in the Captain’s ready room Michael and the President have a talk about the mission. How this was an unwinnable scenario a Kobayashi Maru. The President goes on to say that Michael WAS in line for one of the newer ships and systems, like retrofitting Voyager-J, but she has a flaw that she will always take the unnecessary risk to save lives, thus making her not ready for the next command.

This always makes her highly volatile because she makes huge swings of a pendulum that could one day turn into a wrecking ball.

Saru: Between 2 Worlds

Saru, after taking time to save Su’kal, the dilithium enhanced being that caused THE BURN, is back on Kaminar. And delighted at the fact that all these centuries later, the Kelpians and the Ba’ul live together in peace and hope to bring the planet into the Federation. He shows a great analogy that we are not alone.

Later Su’kal speaks with his friend and father figure, saying it’s obvious that Saru needs to be back out there in the ocean of the stars. And how he will always be an outsider on Kaminar, but he now has some friends that will be his new home, while Saru is out amongst the stars.

Booker and the Birds

While Book was back on Kwejian for his nephew’s ceremony, the birds started acting strangely. He went back to his ship to get an overhead look, only to find that the birds were falling from the sky. Seems the “distortion” that affected the Space Station also hit Book’s home planet, thousand of kilometers away. He barely made it off-planet and back to Discovery in one piece. When the ship reaches the coordinates of the planet, it’s gone. The entire planet is floating dust in space ripped apart.

Discovery S4: SYSTEMS ANALYSIS

Wow! What an epic setup for the season. Let’s talk about all the nods to the Star Trek legacy.

• Archer Space Dock even had a musical cue to Enterprise‘s closing theme
• Random Tribble still all those years in the future
• Mentioning the retrofit on Voyager

We got new, and very bold uniforms! Last season we saw a single-colored stripe on the right side of the uniforms. This season there has been the command decision from on high that we will have BOLD blouses. Yes in the US military your top shirt is referred to as your blouse. I’m still not a fan of the collar piece but I digress.

52 minutes is a long time for a single episode of Star Trek. But not a single second was wasted. We caught up with the crew, got an idea of how long it’s been since last season’s finale, and set a great base to build off of. We see Staments worry about his adopted child during their first away mission. TIlly struggle with still being out of time and dealing with the weight of becoming a Lieutenant. So far the rest of the Bridge crew is back in the flow of things. As for Booker, his story is just beginning.

What did you think of this season premiere? Did we miss any Easter eggs or nods to previous shows? Let us know in the comments below. While you’re at it head on over to our That Hashtag Show Facebook page.

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