1) A note on the title before we go. "Unification I" and "II" was an awesome two-parter in TNG that saw Picard and Data travel to the Romulan homeworld to find Spock. That a series as poor as this one is has chosen to reference that work troubles me. Hey ho. Deep breath...
2) No-one can possibly care enough about this to need it recapping, surely?
3) It took until Season 3, but this show has
finally embraced crew logs as exposition devices. I'd say 'better late than never', but frankly the writers don't deserve to be let off that easily.
4) Pity SMG is delivering this one with all the charm and warmth of a Siberian winter.
5) Pausing for a second. Is it really just me? Does everyone else ever actually find themselves caring at all about Burnham? Does anyone think that she's particularly well-written or even well-acted?
6) If this is no longer your home love, then please - airlock's to the left.
7) Sexy times with Book (*hums Careless Whisper to himself*).
8) Post-coital witless dialogue.
9) Spock getting referenced. You'd assume he would be, given the episode title.
10) Book noting Burnham's "Messianic complex". Brother, that ain't the half of it...
11) And now she's gone to see Tilly.
12) Who is delivering some home truths.
13) SMG gone back to whispering for, I dunno, emphasis I guess?
14) Still wanging on about how she doesn't fit in. Airlock is still to the left.
15) Anton Yelchin's name immortalised as...a starship that blew up. Given that Yelchin died far too young, I'm not quite sure how to take that!
16) I'm already bored of the mystery surrounding the Burn. Which doesn't bode well for when it turns out to be something incredibly mundane later this season because these guys can't write for ****.
17) Burnham seizing on them having positional data only to be shot down by Tilly due to the distances involved. Amusing.
18) Exposition.
19) Armour-piercing question from Tilly, and scores a direct hit right to Burnham's self-centredness. Gonna leave a mark.
20) But, swept away as the computer confirms another datapoint proving that the Burn was indeed not absolutely instantaneous galaxy-wide.
21) Briefing the Admiral. Cool overhead shot of them walking as the walkway forms out of the programmable matter. You'd
really not want that to fail. Hope that there's some kind of fast-reacting transporter lock-on tech, otherwise the Health and Safety people would have a fit of the screaming meemies.
22) She's still doing that whispering/rasping thing. Wish she'd pack it in.
23) "It's Ni'Var. You'd know it by its former name, Vulcan." Got to pause there.
Ni'Var is a term that was coined waaaaaaaaaay back. It was created by
writer and linguist Dorothy Jones Heydt, for a series of Trek short stories that she wrote for a fanzine in the late '60s/early '70s. She was one of the first people to have a stab at creating a Vulcan language (other authors had created Vulcan words before, but she went a few steps further). The word means 'two form' - it relates to Vulcan art that has dual aspects, or an art piece that examines a subject from two different points of view. So, guess we can safely say that the Vulcans have indeed reunified with their Romulan cousins by this point. (***edit*** ENT also referenced the word apparently, naming a Vulcan starship Ni'Var in an episode).
Props for once to Kirsten Beyer, or at least someone in the writers room, for having a spot of knowledge about early Trek fandom. Or for at least reading Memory Alpha.
24) Called it, Vulcans and Romulans do indeed live on their mutual ancestral homeworld.
25) Hooray for continuity! The Federation of the 2250s was unaware of the link between the Vulcans and Romulans, and remained unaware until 2266 and the original series episode "Balance of Terror". All Saru and Burnham know of the Romulans is the Earth-Romulan war from the 2160s, during which there was no face-to-face communication.
26) Ni'Var seceded from the Federation a long time ago. One wonders at this point who's left, with Earth and Vulcan/Ni'Var (two of the founding members) out.
27) Hammering the crap out of the 'skip intro' button.
28) I still really don't get the whole 'disconnected nacelles' deal. I also don't get why they even have nacelles if they're not using the warp drive.
29) Burnham droning on about...something.
30) Tee hee. Another moment where she makes a pronouncement and gets shot down in flames. The Vulcans wanted out of the Federation, the Romulans were happy to stay in.
31) Exposition.
32) SB-19 was an attempt at replicating something that functioned in a similar manner to the spore drive. They had reservations, the Federation forced them to keep working on it, the Burn happened, Vulcans put two and two together and got some beans.
33) This is one of those moments where if this was a real thing, if Starfleet was an actual deal with it's quasi-military/naval nature, then Burnham would be getting yelled at to shut up and let Captain Saru do the talking. Instead, it's a TV show that's desperate to push the Burnham character front-and-centre so we have to put up with wide-eyed SMG doing a righteous indignation bit.
34) Yes, yes, well done writers. She's Spock's (adopted) sister so she gets to go save the day
35) Bored.
36) So bored in fact that I'm getting drunk in order to make it through the episode.
37) Spock
Proper Spock, as well. Got the stardate from "Unification II" wrong, mind
38) Just going to bask in Leonard Nimoy's Spock voice a minute.
39) It was a good speech, that one. But then, Michael Piller could write. This lot can't, at least not reliably.
40) I would really like this dialogue between Burnham and Book to stop. Please.
41) Saru and Tilly meeting. Tilly getting advanced to acting XO (!). Can't wait for the hatred to erupt from fandumb for
that one
42) I remarked last week that the chain of command seemed weird on this ship. So what's one more bit of weirdness?
43) Another armour-piercing question from Tilly - is she being advanced because she's the right candidate, or because she won't be any trouble? Reassuring answer from Saru.
44) Wonder what the crew reaction will be? Don't suppose the bridge bunnies will mind, but Stamets' reaction might be amusing
45) Off to Ni'Var we go.
46) Rousing speech from Saru.
47) Stamets getting to use the new spore drive interface. Looks as though he likes it a whole lot better than the old one.
48) Seems a bit close to the planet for a Lagrange point, but okay.
49) Trying to be the MCU again, with the holographic interface and the swiping and the Tony Stark-ness of it all.
50) 'Special passenger'. Don't make me retch
51) *all the strangled screaming*
52) *all the strangled screaming, plus a bit extra for good measure*
53) Burnham invoking the "T'kal-in-ket", a sort-of philosophical challenge designed to get to deeply buried truths. And STD showrunners, that was the moment that the Vulcan lady should have raised her eyebrow to put the button on the scene. But, you blew that one.
54) Saru noting that - yet again - Burnham has charged in and given someone that they were trying to make peace with no choice but to respond to her actions. You get a sense of just how weary this trait of Burnham has made Saru as he asks her about the protocol. Very nice from Doug Jones there.
55) Ni'Var party beams up, and there be Romulans here. Romulans with northern ancestry, because they have the brow ridges.
56) President T'Rina in no mood for pleasantries. Another fine piece of diplomatic work by Burnham there
57) Qowat Milat from PIC getting a mention. Only their members can serve as advocates during these inquiries because [reasons].
58) Exposition.
59) Stakes ramped up. If Burnham screws this up, she shames Spock's memory.
60) Again with the whispering! Quit it!
61) Okay, so the QM advocate is going to be Gabrielle Burnham isn't it? Because what other female character would hold any interest for Burnham?
62) T'Rina grabbing hold of Burnham's arm. It was long established in Trek that Vulcans weren't mega-fond of physical contact with anyone other than fellow Vulcans, due to being touch telepaths. So...Yet Another Inconsistency™?
63) Yep, it's Momma Burnham
64) God damn it all.
65) Saru and T'Rina talking. So at least that puts off the Michael-and-mother scenes a little while longer.
66) Man, it's nice to watch Doug Jones here. At least he can act.
67) Over all too soon. Back to Burnham family crapola.
68) *beats head against desk*
69) Too dispirited to even make a 69 joke.
70) Bored. Bored. Bored. Bored.
71) Bored.
72) Back to Saru and T'Rina, who is getting Saru caught up.
73) "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." Except, as Kirk pointed out, sometimes the needs of the one outweigh the needs of the many. Even if it results
in your ship getting Blowed Up But Good™ and you
spending time in exile before getting reduced in rank.
74) Saru attempting to plant seeds.
75) Here we go for the T'kal-in-ket then, and this week's instalment of "STD Writers Depicting Burnham As The One True Light".
76) Quorum member V'Kir straight in on the attack.
77) And after some back-and-forth, we see that V'Kir is more than willing to attack fellow Quorum members to make his point. At this rate, Burnham is going to set reunification efforts back a few hundred years.
78) Tee hee. V'Kir accusing Burnham of invoking Spock's memory as an emotional appeal. It's a pity that the story is going to make her the hero again by the end of the episode, because that (intellectual) punch landed hard.
79) Shira questioning Burnham's motives. I think everyone is at this point.
80) Even Gabrielle getting in on the act.
81) Meanwhile, down in Engineering. I do believe we're about to see Stamets' reaction to Tilly as XO.
82) I think the reaction can be summed up as "absolute puzzlement".
83) Owosekun breaking up the moment.
84) Witless dialogue between Michael and Gabrielle.
85) I really need this scene to end before I start throwing things.
86) It seems to me like this T'kal-in-ket was an idea that the writers had because they needed to show Burnham get attacked intellectually in order to rise up as the hero of the piece, either by winning everyone over or by losing gracefully.
87) "That is a big ask." Since when did Romulans start using Human expressions like that???
88) Gabrielle attacking Michael again.
89) And in a better-written piece it might have some emotional impact.
90) I am so bored of this.
91) Michael wanging on about how awesome she and the Discoball crew are.
92) So all this somehow counts as the absolute candor the Quorum were seeking. Really not sure how.
93) Aaaaaaaand there goes the unification of Vulcans and Romulans.
94) Just in time for the awesomeness of Michael Burnham, Galactic Messiah™ to fix it
95) Back to 86), and she's gone with 'losing gracefully'. Or at least whatever passes for 'gracefully' with anything this character does.
96) So they give her the data anyway, right? They must do. There's no way that they're ending this episode without it being a complete win for her.
97) Gabrielle gone to see Michael in her quarters, so back to witless dialogue.
98) Called it at 96).
99) **** this show
100) You're wrong Gabrielle, she is absolutely a lost cause...
101) Stamets has gotten the senior bridge crew together in Main Engineering, presumably to give Tilly a pep talk.
102) Yep.
103) Cute.
104) Cuteness ruined by the arrival of Burnham.
105) T'Rina complimenting Saru. His reaction is pretty adorable.
106) I choose to believe that any willingness Ni'Var might have for re-establishing relations with the Federation is down to Saru and not Burnham.
107) LLAP moment.
108) Grudge!
109) Who is the only good part of that whole scene.
110) "Next time..." I can barely contain my indifference.
