Big changes arrive in Star Trek: Discovery’s fifth outing for season two, “Saints Of Imperfection.” Ensign Sylvia Tilly breaks on through to the other side, Section 31 joins the game permanently, and a character from way back in Season 1 seems to have returned from the dead. “Saints” is another fast-moving tumult, the usual non-stop train of twisty plot that is absolutely the signature element of this version of Star Trek. To corrupt Forrest Gump, “Discovery is as Discovery does.” And it definitely did this week. We leave no one behind.

We first want to say a few words for the passing of the spore drive, may it rest in peace.

Through the course of the last few episodes, the reasoning as to why the spore drive doesn’t seem to exist throughout Starfleet or in any other Trek series is starting to come together. The mycelial incarnation of May Ahearn, who is tangled up in the Tilly storyline, lets us know that the spore jumps Discovery has been performing are damaging her home in the mycelial network. From there, we can extrapolate that Starfleet will abandon the Spore Drive experiment. It is a situation which will be paralleled in TNG’s “Force Of Nature,” where it is revealed in the 24th century that warp drive technology is eroding the fabric of space.

Will the spore drive be used again for more jumps in Season 2? Perhaps. But, the writing is on the wall with this technology; as if there was any other way it could end for the Discovery’s sojourn into the mycelial network. We knew that some way or another, using the network like this was a dead-end. And if “Saints Of Imperfection” is the last time we get snarled up on the great mushroom highway, then we’ve gone out on a bang.

The USS Discovery is half in the normal universe & half in the mycelial network.

This episode has the crew of Discovery park the ship half inside the normal universe and half inside the mycelial network. This is done because the crew is attempting to rescue Tilly, who was kidnapped by mycelial May and taken to the network. While there, however, Tilly is asked to help May and her fellow mycelial beings — the jahSepp. You see, there is a monster roaming around, set loose on the jahSepp due to Discovery’s reckless spore jumps.

The monster is none other than Dr. Hugh Culber, the love interest of Paul Stamets who died at the hands of AshVoq back in Season 1. Culber has been trapped in the network since his “death,” transported there through some convoluted technobabble. Wilson Cruz, who plays Dr. Culber, gives us his most memorable Discovery performance to date. With the reluctant assistance of mycelial May, the crew is able to save Tilly and recreate a physical version of Dr. Culber in the normal universe. Culber, like Spock before him, has managed to come back from the dead, a move that will undoubtedly affect Stamets, and possibly start a religion in the future, too.

Dr. Hugh Culber is alive & well. Sort of.

During this week’s adventures in the mycelial network, it is revealed that Tilly and May share a unique bond. We wanted to stop here for a moment and ask…what bond? The pace of the plot has been so rapid and twisty that we didn’t realize that there was a bond between these two characters until they were already acting on it. Typically, that isn’t the sort of thing that should have been a surprise. As far as the audience knew, Tilly had been kidnapped and was still upset about that, understandably. Technically, the groundwork for this was there. Tilly’s expressed regret over how she did not befriend the real May Ahearn in school. And Tilly reluctantly agreed to help Mycelial May clear the Network of the monster because it was the right thing to do. But, we’d argue that the audience didn’t have time to emotionally register these clues. In order to sell the moment, the audience had to be told what to feel — that seems to be the modus operandi for Discovery throughout the entire life of the series so far.

We don’t actually have a lot of time to figure out how we feel about something before that something has passed. The crew of Discovery could, like crews past, use a nice, quiet poker game or a relaxing evening at Quark’s Bar in order to process the events of the day. And we’d argue that the audience needs this, too; space in the narrative to process and to figure out how we feel about the events on screen. Not everything has to be a Marvel movie.

Tilly arrives in the mycelial netowrk.

But, no one was left behind, which is nice and important. Except we left the Red Angels storyline behind, which was put on pause for “Saints Of Imperfection” in order to fully deal with mycelial shenanigans. Speaking of those Red Angels and their conniving ways…let’s speculate for a moment. The Red Angels have been conspiring events so that Discovery can come to the rescue. In “Brother,” Discovery follows a Red Angel signal to an rogue asteroid where the USS Hiawatha was found to be in need of saving. In “New Eden,” while chasing another Red Angel signal, Discovery finds that the humans on Terralysium need a rescue, and they use an asteroid fragment from “Brother” to do it.

If we extrapolate out, we can see the trap the writers have laid out for us. The Red Angel or Angels have some kind of ability to tug at the throughlines that affect the galaxy, adjusting the Discovery for action and deed like a chess piece. So, what’s to stop us from seeing the hand of the Red Angels in everything Discovery touches? Did they arrange for the jahSepp to be rescued by Discovery, meaning they had something to do with trapping Dr. Culber in the Mycelial Network? Did they push Spock over the edge in order to bring Discovery to a certain point in time and space? Everything that is happening can now be viewed skeptically. Is the hand of a god involved here, or here, or even there? It is a neat trick that might make the audience sympathetic to Captain PIke’s theological leanings. We will get to that in a moment. Let’s stick with the Red Angel questions for now.

Admiral Cornwell is back!

Aboard the Section 31 Admiral Cornwell indicates that they detected “tachyon radiation” at the site of the first Red Angel signal Discovery investigated. This could have a time travel component. If so, then Discovery could be moving to connect with the “Calypso” Short Trek that was released earlier in 2018, which took place a thousand years in a future past the 23rd century. Could the Red Angels be organizing aid to that time period? Are they in need of aid themselves? Did Spock travel to the future? Time travel in Star Trek has always been a mixed bag. But, in this case, we hope to see a furthering of the context of “Calypso”, arguably the best of the Short Treks so far.

Speaking of Section 31, we get to see former emperor Georgiou again, as well as AshVoq, Leland, and the motley crew of the Section 31 ship. It appears that this clandestine organization will have a permanent place in the story this season, assigned to aid Discovery in the investigation of the Red Angels. This comes with layers of drama, as the former emperor and AshVoq both have histories with Michael Burnham. Watching Georgiou move through this universe as if she owns it is all the drama we may need. Did you see her litter, leaving behind some half-eaten fruit in one of Discovery’s corridors as if some servant was going to come along and clean it up? She’s adjusting well, wouldn’t you say?

Former Emperor Georgiou arrives back on Discovery.

Georgiou seems to still retain a soft spot for Michael Burnham. Perhaps she is a little lonely over here in the Prime Universe? Or, maybe she intends to exact some revenge against Burnham for stranding her here.

One other item of note in the business of Section 31 is just how well-known the organization is in the 23rd century. Everyone seems to have heard of it, even though no one seems to know what they do, exactly. This fits in with our own perspective on the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States — an organization for which being involved in shady activity is a matter of state.

Contrast this to how well known Section 31 is in the late 24th century, which is to say not well known at all. So, something must happen to the organization and its reputation between the 2250s and the 2380s to push it further beneath the radar of Federation society. And it is something that will likely be explored in the upcoming Section 31 spin-off. Perhaps that something involves the Klingons, who have a particularly nasty history with Section 31 (see: The Augment Crisis).

We can almost hear the eyes of fans rolling in their sockets! Section 31 again? In Roddenberry’s universe? Well, yes. You can blame Deep Space Nine for introducing this part of the canon. Indeed, Section 31 fit in nicely with the the Dominion War arc. But perhaps Discovery and the upcoming Section 31 spin-off will take a moment to explain how the existence of such a clandestine organization is actually the result of a Federation insecurity. Yea, you read that right.

Leland, the captain of the Section 31 ship, is an old friend of Pike’s.

You see, the Federation is an ambitious experiment and quite young, too; by the time of the USS Discovery, the Federation is barely even a century old. Like any democracy, it probably has uncertainty built into its system of governance where sometimes member worlds agree or don’t agree on the issues of the day. It has the Romulan Empire, the Gorn Hegemony, and the Klingon Empire, among other interstellar states, threatening at its growing borders. The Federation was born out of a hot war with the Romulans that turned to a centuries-long cold war, and recent vicious fighting with the Klingons probably unnerved the whole alliance. No wonder Section 31 is invested in keeping Federation-friendly Chancellor L’Rell in power.

All this to say that there is a fertile ground to mine for Section 31 stories. Discovery’s second season is already striking the earth with its pickaxe.

Again in this episode as with previous episodes, Captain Pike makes a religious or theological reference. This time, he mentions that his sister once went to church. Clearly Pike has strong theological leanings, and that is relatively new ground for Star Trek. If and when another question over the theological nature of the Red Angel issue comes up, we know exactly which side Pike will stand on. That low-level religious perspective doesn’t inhibit Captain Pike from performing his job. He is still a tall glass of action-packed Starfleet captain. In this episode alone, he proves himself to be a very capable leader. Overall, the franchise has a decidedly non-religious perspective to it. Perhaps writing Pike in as a man who may have sympathies toward the religious is another test for adherents to the Federation’s cultural inclusivity policy. Can Starfleeters work with someone who, potentially, would take a theological explanation over a science-based one? Is that even possible? A theme like this can be a good source of storytelling fuel. And, indeed, in a multiverse where god-like beings exist, it is odd that we don’t see more attitudes like Pike’s among Starfleet personnel.

Captain Pike might be a religious character.

Finally, the episode closes as it opened — with an almost-random monologue given by Michael Burnham. This one component of the episode did not gel together with the other ingredients — it felt very much out of place. Primarily because it was the sort of overly dramatic setup that signals a season finale or another big turn in story. And we weren’t in a season finale. So, what gives? This is an ironic perspective on these kinds of voiceovers, since a great deal of Star Trek is littered with captain’s logs. Nevertheless, it did not work here.

Some stray observations:

The planet Cestus III is mentioned, a place famous as a contested borderland between the Federation and the Gorn Hegemony. Later, in the 24th century, Cestus III hosts a Federation colony and a baseball team, the Cestus Comets.

We got to see a 24th century-style Starfleet communicator badge, where a tap of the badge opens a channel. It appears the technology incubated first in Section 31 in the 23rd century before going Starfleet-wide.

That’s it. We are looking forward to next week’s episode, “The Sounds Of Thunder.”If they don’t bring up Imagine Dragons, we will be disappointed. In the meantime, we will leave you with our favorite quote from this week, from Ensign Tilly as she escorts Mycelial May through the Mushroom-dipped Discovery: “I have a Type III Phaser Rifle, which is bigger than a Type 1 or Type II, which is probably why they call it a Type III”.

Written by Kyle Sullivan & Katie Boyer.

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