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agoodwinsmithAlso Star Trek TOS S1 E 29, Operation - Annihilate!
SPOILERS
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I feel that Uhura's arc is very much like the arc of us as viewers: we've been so accustomed to trick episodes, that we aren't thinking about regular life in a regular space opera. We - meaning: I - forgot that Uhura went to Star Fleet Academy, and played those team games of scrabbling around in the dirt and taking stunner fire. I forgot that under that Cheerleader pep is the woman that also has it in her to become the alternate universe Uhura who plots and stabs. I forgot that she is the Uhura who, as a black woman, openly, to his face, expressed her exasperation with her white male boss in TOS S1 E 29, Operation Annihilate.[1] [2] So she is totally the woman who can concoct a spur of the moment plot to outwit and kill the blue pirate thieves.
This episode is more like the original TOS. Questionable ethical decisions. Information revealed, but we are aware of further secrets continuing in concealment. We seem to be further away from Kirk in the chair, but we are also seeing several people's comfort being disturbed, and how several characters could be eased off stage.
One of the general things that I think SNW does well are back of scene details. In this episode suddenly a senior officer, in this case the admiral, is being accompanied by a Yeoman. In the TOS episode, Kirk asks a Yeoman to provide a transcript of all events. It is as though Admiral Seeger's tampering with the past ship's digital record has been found out by the time of this timeline-later TOS episode, and a move to add an additional analogue record has occurred. Even in the TOS era episodes, they were relying on camera records for evidence, so it is not like analogue recording wouldn't have been a dated method[4].
Also in this episode we see Scotty in "a dress". It's the longer tunic that some of the women have occasionally worn. It makes sense that a kilt-wearing person might not feel that a longer tunic was wrongly coded for himself, but it is a nice dig at the Star Fleet Academy whiners who faint every time they see Jay-Den's shapely knee.
A flaw in the writing for me is the scene of all the senior officers of both adventures in the ready room, where the accusations of drugging occur. I was surprised to see the admiral standing upright, and still mostly in charge. I don't think La'An will escape shooting an admiral. I don't think Pike will dodge a direct order from an admiral. I think in his flailing, Admiral Seeger will cause Sam Kirk to choose his family on a remote station.
I am not sure what I think about Vulcan A'sha leaving. I mean, we knew she was going to because her initial reaction to shipboard life was "ew yuckie" - but logically, of course. I had high hope that Scotty expecting her to shift her butt and engage with the problem ('You're not helping." followed by an exasperated facial expression did seem to galvanize her.) might have hooked her. The thing that cheerleader Uhura never does is ask A'Sha to share her logic, so she could either see it or pick at it. Not engaging it at all is rather insulting. I liked the character, and I'm sorry she was just a foil for showing that Uhura's emotional impetus saved the day. Yay Emotional Human Beans. Also, A'Sha has been at risk of death three times in as few weeks, and things seemed to be escalating - normal people need to know when, as T'Pring said, not to argue with the laws of physics - or chance..
[1] - I don't think people remember how world normalizing Roddenberry's Uhura is/was. I was nine and ten and eleven. People my age and younger have never lived in a world where a black woman couldn't be on the bridge as an equal team member. Okay, she was still ickily *female* (ew) and our culture is still working on that, but shows had to begin to budge on black inclusion because that unconscious cultural thing (the narrative stuff I've been on and on about regarding Holy Green Luigi) was expecting a black presence somewhere equal-adjacent. We didn't and aren't doing it gracefully, but the limits continue to budge.
[2] - I watched TOS S1 E29 as a match for this episode because it is about Kirk's brother Sam. I was not shocked with Uhura's response to Kirk when I saw it at age ten - I thought she was right and he should have been sorry enough to say so.[3] In this recent viewing, I am boggled that it didn't raise big eyebrows at the time. Maybe it did, & I just didn't live where it did.
[3] - okay, this just proves I didn't understand military hierarchy either, and should have also been shocked that she back talked a ranking officer. Anyway.
[4] - however, in truth, in the 60's, we couldn't yet imagine a senior male not having a secretary, so bring on the Yeoman beings, with their clipboards and ink pens. So it was a failing of the era. Hubba hubba.
SPOILERS
~
~
~
~
~
I feel that Uhura's arc is very much like the arc of us as viewers: we've been so accustomed to trick episodes, that we aren't thinking about regular life in a regular space opera. We - meaning: I - forgot that Uhura went to Star Fleet Academy, and played those team games of scrabbling around in the dirt and taking stunner fire. I forgot that under that Cheerleader pep is the woman that also has it in her to become the alternate universe Uhura who plots and stabs. I forgot that she is the Uhura who, as a black woman, openly, to his face, expressed her exasperation with her white male boss in TOS S1 E 29, Operation Annihilate.[1] [2] So she is totally the woman who can concoct a spur of the moment plot to outwit and kill the blue pirate thieves.
This episode is more like the original TOS. Questionable ethical decisions. Information revealed, but we are aware of further secrets continuing in concealment. We seem to be further away from Kirk in the chair, but we are also seeing several people's comfort being disturbed, and how several characters could be eased off stage.
One of the general things that I think SNW does well are back of scene details. In this episode suddenly a senior officer, in this case the admiral, is being accompanied by a Yeoman. In the TOS episode, Kirk asks a Yeoman to provide a transcript of all events. It is as though Admiral Seeger's tampering with the past ship's digital record has been found out by the time of this timeline-later TOS episode, and a move to add an additional analogue record has occurred. Even in the TOS era episodes, they were relying on camera records for evidence, so it is not like analogue recording wouldn't have been a dated method[4].
Also in this episode we see Scotty in "a dress". It's the longer tunic that some of the women have occasionally worn. It makes sense that a kilt-wearing person might not feel that a longer tunic was wrongly coded for himself, but it is a nice dig at the Star Fleet Academy whiners who faint every time they see Jay-Den's shapely knee.
A flaw in the writing for me is the scene of all the senior officers of both adventures in the ready room, where the accusations of drugging occur. I was surprised to see the admiral standing upright, and still mostly in charge. I don't think La'An will escape shooting an admiral. I don't think Pike will dodge a direct order from an admiral. I think in his flailing, Admiral Seeger will cause Sam Kirk to choose his family on a remote station.
I am not sure what I think about Vulcan A'sha leaving. I mean, we knew she was going to because her initial reaction to shipboard life was "ew yuckie" - but logically, of course. I had high hope that Scotty expecting her to shift her butt and engage with the problem ('You're not helping." followed by an exasperated facial expression did seem to galvanize her.) might have hooked her. The thing that cheerleader Uhura never does is ask A'Sha to share her logic, so she could either see it or pick at it. Not engaging it at all is rather insulting. I liked the character, and I'm sorry she was just a foil for showing that Uhura's emotional impetus saved the day. Yay Emotional Human Beans. Also, A'Sha has been at risk of death three times in as few weeks, and things seemed to be escalating - normal people need to know when, as T'Pring said, not to argue with the laws of physics - or chance..
[1] - I don't think people remember how world normalizing Roddenberry's Uhura is/was. I was nine and ten and eleven. People my age and younger have never lived in a world where a black woman couldn't be on the bridge as an equal team member. Okay, she was still ickily *female* (ew) and our culture is still working on that, but shows had to begin to budge on black inclusion because that unconscious cultural thing (the narrative stuff I've been on and on about regarding Holy Green Luigi) was expecting a black presence somewhere equal-adjacent. We didn't and aren't doing it gracefully, but the limits continue to budge.
[2] - I watched TOS S1 E29 as a match for this episode because it is about Kirk's brother Sam. I was not shocked with Uhura's response to Kirk when I saw it at age ten - I thought she was right and he should have been sorry enough to say so.[3] In this recent viewing, I am boggled that it didn't raise big eyebrows at the time. Maybe it did, & I just didn't live where it did.
[3] - okay, this just proves I didn't understand military hierarchy either, and should have also been shocked that she back talked a ranking officer. Anyway.
[4] - however, in truth, in the 60's, we couldn't yet imagine a senior male not having a secretary, so bring on the Yeoman beings, with their clipboards and ink pens. So it was a failing of the era. Hubba hubba.
About Nyota Uhura's Further Future?
Date: 2026-09-13 01:19 pm (UTC)I further note that one of the data plaques accompanying the displayed portraits of Notable Starships at Starfleet Academy in Picard Season 2 described Uhura as eventually achieving a starship captaincy of her own, USS Leondegrance, where among the very junior officers of that ship at that time? Jean-Luc himself. Nyota's journey was far from done as of "Orders of Magnitude".
Re: About Nyota Uhura's Further Future?
Date: 2026-09-14 10:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2026-09-13 01:27 pm (UTC)Also I loathed Asha so good riddance lol. She did not demonstrate any logic and was just a sulky kid who did not belong in Starfleet.
I fully didn't catch Scotty's tunic! Cool.
But mainly I liked that there were Consequences and minimal to any comforting discussion for the audience's benefit reassuring us that the characters did the right thing. Of course we got that with Uhura, who objectively did the right thing, but they let the thornier issues stay thorny.
no subject
Date: 2026-09-14 10:59 pm (UTC)I have never, before now, been consciously aware, and, so able to articulate, that the whole impetus of TOS is: struggling against fossilized authority. There is always rank-pulling. There are always beings with irresistable power imposing their unreasonable will on people who are normally expected to serf up and pull their forelocks in submission and agreement that they belong in submission. TOS is about people saying, "hey, back off, that's not ethical." I mean, the language used is "that's not right", but it is morals that are under scrutiny.
Badmirals are always evidence of at least slight rot in the upper stories, in this case because his behaviour is rumoured to be known and managed. I think this is expecting us to remember S2 E8, Under The Cloak of War's Ambassador Dak'Rah and the Federation's support of a questionable figure. The Federation seems to support a "the end justifies the means" under-credo. And this leads to many of the major characters in the whole of Star Trek to hold their own ethics as their Northern Star, and to tell the Federation hierarchy as little as possible, while supporting the Federation's main goal whole-heartedly.
This is why we watch. We all belong to organizations whose ideals are our ideals, but whose ability to achieve those ideals are severely compromised by being implemented by human beans.