Star Trek: Discovery — ‘The Sanctuary’ [3x8] ★★★☆☆
By: Dan Owen
Tags: Culture, Television, Star Trek, TV, Review

As mid-season episodes go, “The Sanctuary” wasn’t hugely revelatory and there was no raising of the stakes. It was a functional instalment with a few good moments and a great action sequence (more for the thrilling sound design than anything), that nudged a few important plot threads along. It’s just that, once season 3’s mysteries are answered, there’s not much here to lure viewers back for a rewatch in terms of its ‘mission of the week’.

The USS Discovery is granted permission by Admiral Vance (Oded Fehr) to travel to Book’s (David Ajala) home planet of Kwejian. His people have traded tranceworms with the Emerald Chain, led by Osyraa (Janet Kidder), for centuries, in order to procure an invaluable pesticide to handle locusts. One complication is the bad blood between Book and his adopted “brother”, Kyheem (Ache Hernandez), who became the planet’s Steward after they disagreed about how to deal with the Chain. And it seems Kyheem is luring Book back to his homeworld because Discovery has given asylum to the Andorian Ryn (Noah Averbach-Kaz), who Osyraa wants back in captivity because — spoiler! — he knows even the mighty Chain are running low on dilithium.

As the majority of the episode revolved around this story, it was unfortunately a rather mediocre tale. Book meeting his ne’er-do-well sibling wasn’t as dramatic or interesting as it needed to be, although there was some intrigue in seeing more of Book’s home and what his species are all about. It feels like their Discovery’s more interesting take on Betazoids, essentially. I didn’t expect the show to return to the Emerald Chain, who had featured in “Scavengers” only a few weeks ago, but can’t say the villainous Osryaa was worth the bother.

In other subplots, the most interesting was seeing Georgiou (Michelle Yeoh) grudgingly undergo a medical examination by Dr Culber (Wilson Cruz), who wants to find the cause of her recent odd behaviour. The mystery didn’t move forward to any great extent, with Georgiou experiencing another flashback to a traumatic moment she can’t otherwise remember, although Culber’s “atomic scan” does reveal she’s dying from whatever the ailment is.

One mystery that did advance, only slightly, was that of The Burn, as Stamets (Anthony Rapp) and Adira (Blu del Barrio) found the source of this inexplicable event: the Verubin Nebula. The source seems to be a Federation distress call that is also the ear-worm sequence of tones that people across the galaxy have subconsciously remembered — particularly Adira, who is now able to play the music having inherited that skill from a previous host. In related news, Adira gave Stamets a quick how-to guide on addressing her as a non-binary person — it’s “they” and “them”, not “she” and “her”. A little moment that worked well and is especially of-the-moment in a week where Elliot Page revealed his transgender status.

“The Sanctuary” was an assortment of stories that, individually, didn’t amount to much. The downside of Trek being more serialised nowadays is that the subplots are teasing mysteries that won’t have much repeat value (try watching season 2 with all the “Red Angel” intrigue, now we know what it all meant). It’s a shame because timeless stories were once the franchise’s bread-and-butter, but what’s in vogue has to be adhered to in order for Discovery to become a hot topic of conversation amongst geeks. Well, at least it’s airing weekly and fans still have a chance to theorise about things and build up some anticipation.

One thing I did like about the episode is how it made Book realise just how special the USS Discovery’s crew is, so he’s starting to realise this ship could become his new home and he’s exploring the idea of becoming a part of Starfleet. I’m guess it won’t be long until Ensign Book becomes a thing, if the writers want this character to stick around for a lot longer. And at least the chances of promotion are good, as Tilly’s (Mary Wiseman) now First Officer. This silly idea just about worked for this hour, although Tilly’s most memorable input was getting Captain Saru (Doug Jones) to consider his own take on Picard’s “engage” or Pike’s “hit it”.

However, “The Sanctuary” is more evidence that season 3’s found a better balance of the shoot ’em up action that characterised the previous seasons and more traditional Trek storytelling. There was some attempt here to deepen a few characters (especially Book) and give some of the Bridge characters more interesting things to be doing — like Detmer (Emily Coutts) using her piloting skills in Book’s ship with Ryn as co-pilot. The story being told here just didn’t grab me, but it wasn’t a chore to sit through.

Cast & Crew

writers: Kenneth Lin & Brandon Schultz.

director: Jonathan Frakes.

guest starring: David Ajala, Oded Fehr, Noah Averbach-Katz, Ache Hernandez, Janet Kidder & Ian Lake.