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Kate Mulgrew

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Katherine Kiernan Maria "Kate" Mulgrew is an American actress, most noted for her roles on Star Trek: Voyager as Captain Kathryn Janeway and Ryan's Hope as Mary Ryan.

She portrays Galina "Red" Reznikov in Orange Is the New Black .

• 1 Early life
• 2.1 Star Trek: Voyager (1995–2001)
• 2.2 2001-present
• 3 Personal life

Early life [ ]

Mulgrew was born in 1955 in Dubuque, Iowa, into an Irish Catholic family, to Thomas James "T.J." Mulgrew II, a contractor, and Joan Virginia Mulgrew (née Kiernan), an artist and painter. She attended Wahlert High School in Dubuque.

Aged 17, she was accepted at the Stella Adler Conservatory of Acting in conjunction with New York University in New York City. Mulgrew left NYU after one year. During this time, to earn money while in New York, Mulgrew was employed as a waitress at Friar Tuck, a now defunct restaurant previously at 914 Third Avenue.

Her early career included portraying Mary Ryan for two years on the CBS soap Ryan's Hope (1975). She became a fan favorite and is still associated with the show long after its cancellation. Mulgrew remains friends with former co-star Ilene Kristen and presented a special Soap Opera Digest Award to Ryan's Hope creator Claire Labine in 1995. While in Ryan's Hope she also played the role of "Emily" in the American Shakespeare Theatre production of Our Town in Stratford, Connecticut. In 1979, she played Kate Columbo in Mrs. Columbo , a spin-off of the popular detective series, created specifically for her, which lasted 13 episodes.

In 1985 she appeared in Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins in the role of Major Fleming.

In 1986, she appeared on Cheers as Janet Eldridge. In 1992, Kate appeared on Murphy Brown as Hillary Wheaton, a Toronto-based anchorwoman brought in to replace Murphy Brown during her pregnancy, but who turned out to have the same problem with alcoholism as Brown had previously dealt with at the beginning of the series.

In 1993, Mulgrew separated from her husband, Robert H. Egan, to whom she had been married for 12 years. In 1995, the divorce became final, and she was on the verge of selling her house and moving into a less-expensive apartment in Westwood when she received a call to take the part of Captain Kathryn Janeway in Star Trek: Voyager . Mulgrew made history in the Star Trek franchise when she became the first female captain as a series regular in a leading role. Voyager was the first show broadcast on the new UPN channel, the only series renewed after the channel's first programming season, and its only show to run for seven seasons, making it the UPN's longest running. Mulgrew won the Saturn Award for "Best TV Actress" in 1998 for her performances as Janeway. Mulgrew also voiced the character of Janeway in the PS2 and PC game Star Trek: Voyager - Elite Force and Star Trek: Voyager - Elite Force 2 . In recent years, Mulgrew kept active in doing voice-over work for video games, most notably voicing the mysterious Flemeth in the Dragon Age video game series, a role she described as "delicious".

During Voyager she also played the role of Titania in the animated series, Gargoyles (along with other Star Trek alumni, Marina Sirtis and Jonathan Frakes) and Victoria Riddler in Riddler's Moon , a made for TV movie. Mulgrew provided the voice of Janeway for Star Trek: Captain's Chair , a virtual-reality tour of various Starfleet vessels, for home computers.

Star Trek: Voyager (1995–2001) [ ]

Mulgrew auditioned for the role of the captain, named Kathryn Janeway, when producers announced casting for Star Trek: Voyager . She initially submitted a videotaped audition, which she made in New York City in August 1994. However she was unhappy with this audition and auditioned in person a few weeks later. That day, film actress Geneviève Bujold was selected to play Janeway, but left the role after only two days of filming, due to the demanding production schedule required for a television show.

About her years on Voyager, Mulgrew said:

"I'm proud of it. It was difficult; it was hard work. I'm proud of the work because I think I made some little difference in women in science. I grew to really love Star Trek: Voyager, and out of a cast of nine, I've made three great friends, I managed to raise two children. I think, "It's good. I used myself well."

Speaking about the best and worst part about playing a Star Trek captain, she said:

"The best thing was simply the privilege and the challenge of being able to take a shot at the first female captain, transcending stereotypes that I was very familiar with. I was able to do that in front of millions of viewers. That was a remarkable experience—and it continues to resonate. The downside of that is also that it continues to resonate, and threatens to eclipse all else in one's long career if one does not up the ante and stay at it, in a way that may not ordinarily be necessary. I have to work at changing and constantly reinventing myself in a way that probably would not have happened had Star Trek not come along. I knew that going in, and I think that all of the perks attached to this journey have been really inexpressively great. So the negatives are small."

2001-present [ ]

After Voyager came to the end of the full seven seasons, Mulgrew returned to theater and starred in a one-woman play called Tea at Five , a monologue reminiscence based on Katharine Hepburn's memoir Me: Stories of My Life . Tea at Five was a critical success and Mulgrew received two awards, one from Carbonell (best actress) and the other from Broadway.com (Audience Award for Favorite Solo Performance). In 2006, Mulgrew performed in The Exonerated at the Riverside Studios located in London, England. In the spring of 2007, she appeared in the NBC television series The Black Donnellys as Helen Donnelly which lasted for one season. She also performed the lead role in an off-Broadway production called Our Leading Lady written by Charles Busch in which she earned a nomination from the Drama League for her performance.

In 2007, Mulgrew played Clytemnestra in New York for Charles L. Mee's Iphigenia 2.0 . She won the Obie Award for outstanding performance. In June 2008, Mulgrew appeared in Equus on Broadway, playing Hesther Saloman, a public official who is empathetic toward the play's central character. The play opened on September 5, 2008 for a strictly limited 22-week engagement through February 8, 2009.

Also in 2008, Mulgrew filmed the 30-minute courtroom drama The Response which is based on actual transcripts of the Guantanamo Bay tribunals. It was researched and fully vetted in conjunction with the University of Maryland School of Law and was shot in three days. Mulgrew portrays Colonel Sims and she, the other cast members and crew agreed to defer their salaries to cover the production costs. The film has been screened at a number of sites and is available on DVD.

In 2009, Mulgrew returned to television in the NBC medical series, Mercy playing the recurring role of Jeannie Flanagan (the mother of the show's lead, Veronica). Due for release in 2010 is the film The Best and the Brightest , a comedy based in the world of New York City's elite private kindergartens. Mulgrew will play The Player's wife. Also in development is the film The Incredible Story of Joyce McKinney and the Manacled Mormon .

In 2010, Kate Mulgrew starred as Cleopatra in William Shakepeare's Antony and Cleopatra at Hartford Stage. As of July 2011, she has appeared in the Adult Swim series NTSF:SD:SUV:: . Also in 2011, Mulgrew appeared in the feature length documentary The Captains . The film, written and directed by William Shatner, follows Shatner as he interviews each of the other actors who played a Starfleet captain within the Star Trek franchise. During that same year, she guest starred on the third season of the series Warehouse 13 . Her character, Jane Lattimer, is part of a story arc which has continued into the fourth season.

Mulgrew has appeared as a main cast member on Adult Swim's NTSF:SD:SUV:: since 2011 as Kove, the leader of the titular terrorism-fighting unit and ex-wife of series lead Paul Scheer's character.

In 2013 Mulgrew starred as Galina "Red" Reznikov in the Netflix original series Orange is the New Black.

In 2014 Mulgrew narrated documentary film The Principle which aims to promote the discredited idea of the geocentric model. Mulgrew said that she was misinformed as to the purpose of the documentary, going on to say "I am not a geocentrist, nor am I in any way a proponent of geocentrism... I do not subscribe to anything Robert Sungenis has written regarding science and history and, had I known of his involvement, would most certainly have avoided this documentary."

Personal life [ ]

Mulgrew married Robert H. Egan in 1982. They have two sons. The couple divorced in 1993.

In April 1999, Mulgrew married politician Tim Hagan, a former Ohio gubernatorial candidate and a former commissioner of Cuyahoga County, Ohio.

Mulgrew is a member of the National Advisory Committee of the Alzheimer's Association. Mulgrew's mother, Joan Mulgrew, died on July 27, 2006, after a long battle with the disease.

Mulgrew is an opponent of abortion and capital punishment. She received an award from Feminists for Life, a pro-life feminist group. She is quoted as saying "Execution as punishment is barbaric and unnecessary", "Life is sacred to me on all levels" and "Abortion does not compute with my philosophy."

Mulgrew is Catholic.

• 1 Dayanara Diaz
• 2 Piper Chapman
• 3 Lorna Morello Muccio

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Orange Is the New Black ’s Kate Mulgrew on Embracing Red’s Spiky Hair and Russian Accent

Trekkies know Kate Mulgrew as Captain Kathryn Janeway from Star Trek: Voyager . In the past month, though, she’s acquired an additional fanbase on Orange Is the New Black , in which she plays the Litchfield’s resident den mother, Red. From the moment Piper inadvertently blasts Red’s cooking skills in episode one, Mulgrew is commanding and often hilarious as the stern, two-strikes-you’re-out chef, who sits atop the prison’s social pecking order. We caught up with Mulgrew a week after she began shooting the show’s second season and talked about Red’s survival instincts, the character’s real-life counterpart, and subjecting her Montenegrin doormen to her accent.

Even before I started watching the show, I heard a lot of people talk about how unrecognizable you were. Did that surprise you, or do you agree? I agree. And I have to tell you that I myself am rather surprised, because I don’t look like that at all in life. And that leads me to believe only one thing, and that is that Red must reside within me. Otherwise, it wouldn’t work. The hair, the chef’s jacket, the red lipstick, the eyes, all of that. The character has to live within, and that’s what the transformation is all about. I think. I hope. I don’t think that my boyfriend thinks I look like that. [ Laughs ]

Do you like your short red hair? There was that momentary hesitation, which is merely the hesitation of vanity. I mean, I had long, light brown, lovely hair, and Jenji [Kohan] said you gotta cut that. I said okay. So I went with the hairdresser and we did it in increments, and every time I trudged back up the hill [on set to ask Kohan], she just gave me a thumbs down: shorter, shorter. So I finally said, “Just cut it, just spike it, let’s go magenta, let’s just go.”

Piper Kerman, whose memoir the series is based on, was on set while you guys were shooting. Did you get any feedback from her on your character? Was Red based on someone from Kerman’s own time in prison? She was based on [a woman from Kerman’s prison time]. The book was dedicated to her and to Larry [Kerman’s husband], and I think it’s very much based on Piper’s experience with Red, whose real name is Papadakis. That woman took her under her wing and helped her get through what had to have been an absolutely stunning fifteen, sixteen months in that girl’s life. And she shepherded her through it. She protected her, given the condition she would be loyal to [Papadakis].

What were some helpful notes you got from Piper or Jenji? You see that the Russian women, before she comes to prison, have shunned her completely. She’s an oddball, she’s a goofball, she’s not popular, she never was. And I think that has always directed her and been a part of her decisions and her terrific vulnerability, which is just under her strengths. Her idea of survival is to be as excellent as she can be under harrowing circumstances. So she tries to make the kitchen as superb as she can make it, and even though she’s notoriously sort of medium as a cook, she thinks she’s a great cook. I knock myself out making Thanksgiving dinner and I’ll do anything to get that chicken. Did you see “The Chickening” yet?

I did. [ In Red’s accent ] “I want that chicken, do you understand? I believe in that!” She believes in the soul of the chicken, and she is gonna eat it, and she’s going to absorb the power. She loves all that.

It must be a lot of fun to play with your Russian accent. It is fun. The whole idea of this character, you can imagine — I’m an actress of a certain age, right? I’m a middle-aged woman, and to find this kind of a role and encounter this kind of an opportunity at this stage in the game is both mysterious and magical. I’m happy. I’m really, deeply happy about it.

Did you try out real prison food to see what it actually tastes like? I’ve had prison food because I was in a prison before.

Oh, really? As a visitor, thank you very much. [ Laughs ] You jumped on that one pretty quickly. “Kate Mulgrew Incarcerated.”

What do you mean, as a visitor? Were you doing research? I did a movie and we shot at Rikers for a few days. That was a very stunning experience because that was maximum security, and I was young and pretty, and I had to walk through — and boy, oh boy, I’m telling you, it chills you to the bone. Once you know you’re locked up and you can’t get out, I think something happens. The people who manage to hold onto their soul, their spine, their mettle, are very unique, because prison is intended to strip you of your singularity. This is what Red will not allow to be taken from her. She would rather die than be other than who she truly is.

I read somewhere that they wanted Red to have a lighter Russian accent. Did they ever ask you to tone it down? In the audition, it said a light Russian accent. So I did some studying of the accent and it’s almost an oxymoron, a light Russian accent, because the accent itself is so deep in the throat. Anyway, it just emerged like this, and nobody said a thing. She’s [ in accent ] Russian and proud to be Russian. And maybe in prison it really helps her.

You really ease into it well. Do you find yourself speaking that way a lot? I do. When I get to work, that’s it. It’s very off-putting, I know. One woman from Netflix said to me at the premiere, “I didn’t approach you for six months because you were scaring me. I thought, ‘Is she really Russian? Kate Mulgrew? I’ve heard her, I know she was the captain on Star Trek , but she had a nice accent for that one!’” So when I get to work I turn it on, because I have to stay there.

Do you use it at home? Unwittingly I fall into it. The doormen in my building are Montenegrin, so now I come home and say [ in Red’s accent ], “How are you guys doing? What’s going on? What the fuck went on today?” They look at me like, What happened to you? She had a lobotomy! You went away and now you’re back and you think you’re this Russian bitch ! My doormen aren’t nice to me anymore. They stand up to attention when I walk in. “How are you doing?”

Are there any Trekkies on the show? I think a lot of them knew who I was and liked that work, but none that have come forward. That would be a little weird.

At one point Natasha Lyonne has a line, “I thought I was your Spock.” Yes, they threw that in. I’m sure they’ll do some more of that. I think that was intentional and very clever!

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Orange to Black to Red: Kate Mulgrew on ‘OITNB’, Trekkies, and Her Memoir

Kate mulgrew isn’t one to mince words..

Kate Mulgrew isn’t one to mince words. Maybe it’s the three hit television shows (ABC’s soap Ryan’s Hope, Star Trek: Voyager , and Orange is the New Black ), or her recently released memoir Born With Teeth. Perhaps it’s just her forty year career, her perpetual existence among a flurry of scripts—but no matter which way you look at it, you’ve got to admit: Kate’s got charisma.

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Or perhaps, it’s Red who has charisma. Red, Ms. Mulgrew’s vivacious Russian Orange is the New Black counterpart, exists as an extension of Ms. Mulgrew herself, rather than finding her beginning and end in Litchfield Penitentiary.

However, Ms. Mulgrew’s characters don’t always come as naturally. The actress describes how her roles evolved as, “Unpredictably. The parts that have formed and shaped my career were unexpected, and when I embraced them I was also mystified at the size of my passion for them.”

This holds true for Ms. Mulgrew’s turn as Captain Kathryn Janeway on Star Trek: Voyager , which ran for seven years beginning in 1995. Despite Ms. Mulgrew’s lack of “understanding of science fiction before I took that part,” she found herself “falling disarmingly in love with [Janeway].” (Of course, Ms. Mulgrew wasn’t the only one in love with Captian Janeway—the actress fondly describes fans of Star Trek: Voyager as “ferociously devoted.”)

However, “Red was an altogether different thing because she was far more immediate…it was one of those things of alchemy, sort of like kismet, she just flew into my imagination. She was residing inside me for many, many years, perhaps she is a unique part of me organically. It was just an instant fit. My feeling about Red is a deep one, a profound one, as if we’re doing something together. Does that sound insane to you?”

Of course, it’s not insane. It’s the mark of an actor well versed in her craft. Kate speaks of Red with a familiar, loving caress—she often refers to her character in first person, seamlessly slipping from “she’s” and “her’s” to “I’s” and “me’s” when discussing the intricacy of her Orange is the New Black identity.

And Red certainly is intricate. The beginning of season three introduces a new Red, one who’s spent over a decade in jail and finally sees her remaining two years as manageable, even vaguely hopeful. Orange is the New Black excels when exposing the grim realities of the American prison system; we saw Taystee’s release and, upon her inability to acclimate to life without the order of jail, her return. So how will Red—who’s grown, if not flourished in prison—reconcile her outside life as a submissive wife hopelessly entangled with the Russian mafia?

Ms. Mulgrew muses, “It could be it’s that very struggle that makes Red interesting. It’s conflict, it’s what burns inside of her…what defines her now? Prison? Or the experience she has before she went to prison? I don’t think she even knows anymore. But my longing to rise above it, I think, is always present.”

Again, we see Ms. Mulgrew and Red blended into one. But, as Ms. Mulgrew argues, “Everything about her is arguably parallel to everything about me at this point in my life. She is a woman of a certain age, she has lived boldly, she has used her wits and her intelligence and she has made mistakes…I understand all of these things. I understand them very well.”

She understands Red so well, in fact, that she managed to translate her Irish Catholic background into her portrayal of a staunchly Russian woman. Red’s background, Ms. Mulgrew assumes, “Is a Russian Orthodox [one], has formed every decision she makes, just as my Irish Catholic one did me. Once again, we meet on the same footing, we meet on the same bridge.”

But while Red grew up in the depths of Russia, Ms. Mulgrew herself hails from Iowa, born to an Irish couple. Like Red, however, her life was marked early and often by tragedy: among other things, she recounts in Born with Teeth the death of both of her sisters and her rape. However, Mulgrew focuses on her decision to give her infant daughter up for adoption while filming Ryan’s Hope .  Ms. Mulgrew and Danielle were eventually reunited while the actress worked on Star Trek: Voyager , and have enjoyed a close and supportive relationship since.

On her decision to share the story of her daughter, Danielle, Ms. Mulgrew explains, “The whole story of my daughter was hard to write, because I had kept it so close to myself for so many years. This is not a story you go singing through the streets with, it’s very, very hard to tell the story of what happens to women, and in this case, what happened to me, as a young girl, and shaped the rest of my life. Every person I loved from going forward would be influenced by this regret, this agony, and then when I found her, twenty years later, the extraordinary effect it had on my life, and my children’s lives.”

Ms. Mulgrew approaches her life’s challenges with the same way she approaches her roles: with a thoughtful, bright intensity and a dash of self–deprecating humor. When reflecting on her past difficulties, Ms. Mulgrew merely exclaims, with just a hint of Red’s candor, “What’s difficult is realizing that 42 years have passed! In a blink!” And then, a pause. A hint of contemplation. “I’m telling you, it’s difficult to understand the velocity of life.”

• SEE ALSO : ‘Under the Bridge’ Review: A Miniseries That Interrogates the True Crime Genre

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Orange Is the New Black Is the New Star Trek  

Photo illustration by Slate. Photos courtesy Netflix, by CBS Photo Archive via Getty Images.

It may be hard to imagine Kate Mulgrew as anyone other than Red, the tough-as-nails Russian cook on Orange Is the New Black . But for certain viewers—those who occupy the surprisingly crowded middle of a Venn diagram containing OITNB fans and Star Trek fans—she is both Red and Captain Kathryn Janeway of the USS Voyager . And in fact, the two shows have more in common than just Mulgrew. I’d go so far as to say that Orange Is the New Black is the new Star Trek.

Captain Janeway and Galina Reznikov do share a raft of traits: They are wry, competent, honorable, in charge. They are loyal to their devoted crews, smart and enterprising—whether problem-solving in space or masterminding the stream of contraband in and out of Litchfield—and flinty when necessary. (Janeway sometimes demonstrates her badassery by exploding things, whereas Red prefers to stow a tampon in the enemy’s sandwich.) Both are lifted out of their normal lives and deposited far from home—Janeway in the distant Delta Quadrant, Red in a low security women’s prison—where they must forge new, unconventional families.

But for all the echoes between the two characters, it’s really the shows themselves that are in dialogue. Star Trek and Orange Is the New Black both feature ensemble casts thrown into close quarters, where they wear uniforms, manage power hierarchies, and are bound by rules explicit and unspoken. The shows espouse a vision of ethnic diversity and social progressivism. They underscore the challenges and complications of coexistence—the tectonic shifts of alliance and betrayal, the negotiation of difference—and yet neither one is willing to give up on its overall inclusive goal.

Star Trek set out in the late ’60s to explore new worlds, applying the same spirit of humanistic discovery to vistas literal and metaphorical. Starfleet members illuminated dark corners of the universe, sure, but they also opened up a multicultural space where motley individuals could come together under a common purpose. In bringing viewers inside a women’s prison, OITNB similarly treads “where no man has gone before,” lifting the veil on an uncharted ecosystem, and approaching the unknown with openness and empathy rather than scorn.

I won’t deny that the shows diverge, at least superficially, in tone. The year 2015 is a lot more cynical than 1995, when Star Trek: Voyager launched and scientific wonder could be solemnly expressed outside of Christopher Nolan movies. The space travel franchise looks shiny and utopian, while OITNB takes disenchanted realism to the point of showers that spit sewage. Plus, the inmates themselves, fiercely segregated into white, black, and Hispanic factions, don’t seem especially tolerant or enlightened. (Red: “Black girls know about chicken, of course they’ll chase it.” Piper: “Why? Cause all black people like chicken?” Red: “Don’t be racist—it’s because they’re all on heroin.”)

But OITNB , qua show, pays an unprecedented amount of respectful attention to women at the margins, just as Star Trek was notable for its embrace of Russian, Japanese, and black American protagonists. (Also alien ones.) Star Trek gave Uhura—played by Nichelle Nichols, whose name totally inspired the character Nicky Nichols, right?—a textured realization at a time when most black actresses were cast as maids. Likewise, Orange Is the New Black spins intimate, nuanced narratives around, for starters, transpeople, butch lesbians, non-butch lesbians, older women, poor women, and overweight women. These characters are presented not as peripheral or supporting but as the heart of the matter—their stories are the story, end of story.

Compare Orange Is the New Black ’s clear-eyed, humanistic, often funny depiction of gay eros with Star Trek , which shocked audiences in 1968 by portraying one of television’s first interracial kisses . Or consider creator Gene Roddenberry’s intent to “make statements about sex, religion, Vietnam, politics, and intercontinental missiles” with his show, to use the interstellar adventures as morality tales, in light of OITNB’s clear agenda: prison reform (see the Fig corruption plot), a working social safety net, less discrimination and prejudice.

Indeed, it’s in the disavowal of stereotypes—the close, generous look at who characters really are—that Orange Is the New Black makes its subtlest contact with Star Trek . Roddenberry’s show ended up endorsing pluralistic rationalism : commitment to reason, regardless of one’s worldview. The Vulcan crewmember Spock in particular became the mouthpiece for dispassionate logic; he belonged to a peace-loving race whose philosophy was based in the acronym IDIC , for “infinite diversity in infinite combination.” When you get right down to it, isn’t Star Trek ’s appeal to reason and empiricism kind of the same as OITNB’ s rejection of preconceived notions? Or put more strongly: Isn’t Orange Is the New Black ’s insistence that we reconsider our biases tantamount to a Vulcan logical imperative?

Mulgrew’s Red happens to be an ambassador for logic in her own mordant way. “If you want to assassinate someone,” she points out, “vision is a basic requirement. It’s like, step one: Pick a person to kill. Step 2: Kill the right person.” That’s a sensible, Spock-like observation dressed up in modern-day irony, but the gist of Red’s arc in season 2 is that she’s no killer. She’s a leader, a fighter, and a caretaker rolled into one hardy package—in short, a fit captain for one of television’s most intriguing voyages yet.

Kate Mulgrew, Star Trek and Orange is the New Black star, releases revealing new memoir

Actress details her personal life and career in born with teeth.

Kate Mulgrew's 'unusually rich life'

Social sharing.

Kate Mulgrew is famous for playing Captain Kathryn Janeway on Star Trek: Voyager and Galina "Red" Reznikov on the hit Netflix series  Orange is the New Black .

But the accomplished stage and screen actress wants to reveal the drama of what she calls her "unusually rich life" in her new memoir Born With Teeth . 

• CBC RADIO q |  Kate Mulgrew: "We all carry our suffering too much inside"

"It needed to be shared," said the 60-year-old who writes of leaving small-town Iowa for New York at the age of 18. 

Mulgrew also describes the emotional reunion with her daughter 21 years later.

"I do write about Star Trek ," Mulgrew explains, "mostly of the underbelly of Star Trek. What it was like to raise my two sons during that time [and of] the rigours of that work."

Mulgrew admits that she wasn't always able to be present for her children during her seven years with the hugely popular television series.  But she says it was a worthwhile sacrifice because it allowed her to play the groundbreaking character, Kathryn Janeway, the first female captain in the history of the  Star Trek  franchise.

"I think the single most gratifying thing of my entire career has been the influence I had on women and science," Mulgrew said.

"Janeway opened the door for them ... Thousands and thousands of women have come to me and said, 'you've changed my life.'"

A new voyage

After Voyager ended, Mulgrew returned to the theatre for a time, before enjoying another hugely successful TV role as Galina "Red" Reznikov on Orange is the New Black.

A Russian immigrant, "Red" is a tough but maternal figure at Litchfield Penitentiary, a woman who commanded power as the prison kitchen's head chef.

• Netflix ,  Verizon  dispute goes public amid Orange is the New Black debut
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"This role is so glorious for me, so complex, so textured," Mulgrew said. "She's so unexpected, full of surprise, excellence, despair."

Mulgrew also savours the fact that the critically acclaimed drama is a Netflix exclusive.

"It's the Wild West," she says of the streaming service. "It's a new day. This is the golden age."

Kate Mulgrew shares more of her story in the video above.

Born With Teeth is on sale now. Orange is the New Black launches its third season on on June 12.  

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Kate Mulgrew

• Born April 29 , 1955 · Dubuque, Iowa, USA
• Birth name Katherine Kiernan Maria Mulgrew
• Height 5′ 5″ (1.65 m)
• Katherine Kiernan Mulgrew, or Kate Mulgrew, was born on April 29, 1955. She grew up in Dubuque, Iowa, the second oldest child (and oldest girl) in a large Irish Catholic family. When Kate expressed an interest in acting as a child, her mother, Joan, encouraged her to audition for local theater productions. Kate left Iowa for New York City at age 17 to pursue a career in acting. Kate was accepted into the Stella Adler Conservatory (part of New York University's acting program) and studied there for only a year, as she landed the lead role in the ABC soap opera Ryan's Hope in 1975, vaulting her to instant stardom. At the same time she was filming Ryan's Hope, Kate played the role of Emily in the American Shakespeare Theatre's production of "Our Town" in Stratford, Connecticut. At age 23, following her success on Ryan's Hope, Kate was offered the lead role of Kate Columbo in "Mrs. Columbo," playing the wife of one of television's most beloved detectives, Lt. Columbo, as made famous by actor Peter Falk. While critically successful, the series was canceled after two seasons. In 1981, Mulgrew co-starred with Richard Burton and Nicholas Clay in Lovespell, a film set in the era of Arthurian legend, as Irish princess Isolt, whose love story with Tristan is a classic tale of doomed love. That same year, Kate co-starred with Pierce Brosnan in the six-hour miniseries, The Manions of America, set in 19th century America just before the start of the Civil War. In 1985, she had a notable role in Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins as officer Major Fleming. In 1986, Kate appeared in a number of of Cheers episodes as congresswoman Janet Eldridge, a love interest for series lead Sam Malone (Ted Danson). In 1987, she appeared in Throw Momma from the Train as Margaret, Billy Crystal's ex-wife. In 1992, Kate appeared on several episodes of Murphy Brown as Hillary Wheaton, a Toronto-based anchorwoman brought in to replace Murphy Brown during her maternity leave, but who also struggled with alcoholism (just as Brown did at the beginning of the series). Also in 1992, she played a guest-starring role as a soap opera star who kills her husband and tries to cover it up, on Murder, She Wrote, episode #170, titled "Ever After". Kate also guest-starred in three episodes of Batman: The Animated Series as the terrorist Red Claw. Kate has gone on to do a great deal of voice work for animated series and video games. Shortly after, Kate married theater director Robert H. Egan in 1982. They have two sons, Ian Thomas and Alexander James. The two officially divorced in 1995. More notably in 1995, Kate received a call that a part for which she'd auditioned but another actress had been chosen for - Captain Kathryn Janeway, the first female Star Trek captain. The first actress quit within two days of beginning production, leading producers to call Kate back and offer her the role. Star Trek: Voyager, as the newly-created UPN's flagship network show, had found its captain. Kate portrayed Janeway for seven seasons, and also appeared briefly in Star Trek: Nemesis as Admiral Kathryn Janeway. Mulgrew played Katharine Hepburn in the one-woman play "Tea at Five", debuting in Hartford, Connecticut in 2002 and going on to tour across the U.S. after a stint on Broadway. For this role, Kate received a Lucille Lortel nomination for Outstanding Lead Actress, an Outer Critics Circle nomination for Outstanding Solo Performance, Broadway.com's Audience Award for Favorite Solo Performance, and won the award for Best Actress at the 29th Carbonell Awards for her portrayal of Katharine Hepburn, all in 2003. Kate married Tim Hagan, former Ohio gubernatorial candidate and former commissioner of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, in April 1999. The two divorced in 2014. From 2003 to 2013, Kate had many memorable television appearances, including stints on The Black Donnellys, Mercy, cult favorite Warehouse 13, and NTSF:SD:SUV. In 2013, Kate began work on Netflix breakout out Orange Is The New Black as the wildly popular prison chef Galina "Red" Reznikov. OITNB is set to conclude in the summer of 2019. Kate is also an author of two memoirs - 2016's Born With Teeth (Little Brown) and 2019's How To Forget: A Daughter's Memoir (Harper Collins). She is filming the newest season of Mr. Mercedes, a serial killer drama based on Stephen King's Bill Hodges trilogy. Mr. Mercedes airs on the AT&T Audience network and can be streamed on DirecTV. - IMDb Mini Biography By: Amy Imhoff for www.KateMulgrew.com
• Spouses Timothy F. Hagan (April 19, 1999 - 2014) (divorced) Robert H. Egan (July 31, 1982 - 1995) (divorced, 2 children)
• Children Eleanor Hagan Marie Hagan Ian Thomas Egan Alexander James Egan
• Parents Joan Mulgrew Thomas James "T.J." Mulgrew
• Relatives Tom Mulgrew (Sibling) Joe Mulgrew (Sibling) Jenny Mulgrew (Sibling) Laura Mulgrew (Sibling) Sam Mulgrew (Sibling)
• Often plays no-nonsense, professional women
• Husky resonant voice
• Was initially turned down for the role of Captain Janeway on Star Trek: Voyager (1995) , in favor of Geneviève Bujold . When Bujold backed out of the project two days into shooting, Mulgrew again auditioned for the role, and won it.
• Is an avid fighter against Alzheimer's disease.
• Gave up her first child (b. 1977) for adoption. They both met for the first time in 1999. Mulgrew's biological daughter is named Danielle Gaudette and works as a yoga instructor. Mulgrew and Gaudette have remained in contact ever since their first meeting.
• Fellow Star Trek: Voyager (1995) actors Ethan Phillips and Robert Picardo are among her closest friends. She remarked at a convention that they got her through Voyager's seven-year run.
• Husband Timothy Hagan proposed to her on the set of Star Trek: Voyager (1995) .
• The minute there's a nip in the air, the fire's lit and the brandy is poured.
• Life is sacred to me on all levels. Abortion does not compute with my philosophy.
• [When speaking of the death penalty] Execution as punishment is barbaric and unnecessary.
• A lot of her is me. I've had this broad under my belt for five years. I own her - and nobody can tell me that I don't own her. I love every single dimension and component of her being. Her nobility, her flawed character, her laughter, her love of the absurd, her love of the unknown, her love of science... I've loved her great heart, her formidable spirit, her guts. She has a much better mind than mine, and a gifted imagination as well, but she's a little prickly, and certainly not without ego. She has this profound sense of humanity: she can talk to anybody and they listen.
• I have a very rich and wonderful personal life, and at its core are my sons. I will tell you very frankly that I have missed them badly in these five years... But what we're talking about is a block of time I've missed now with them. Years when nurturing was crucial, I think to their self-esteem. The kind of nurturing that comes without conditions or contingencies. The kind of nurturing that is so simple and so basic to human nature, regarding this relationship between mother and son. We missed it.
• Star Trek: Voyager (1995) - $60,000 per episode

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Kate Mulgrew recalls emotional last day of Orange Is the New Black — and who she forgot to tell goodbye

Watch the full episode of Couch Surfing streaming now on PeopleTV.com , or download the PeopleTV app on your favorite device.

With the final season of Orange Is the New Black premiering this weekend on Netflix, actress Kate Mulgrew is looking back on her experience playing the Galina “Red” Reznikov with more clarity.

While watching a clip of herself as Red during an appearance on PeopleTV’s Couch Surfing, Mulgrew tells host Lola Ogunnaike that on her final day of filming the groundbreaking drama, she got on one of the cafeteria tables, “gave a little speech, blew a big kiss, and I was gone.” However, Mulgrew then took a second to appeal to her character as she watched the clip, saying to Reznikov, “Now I can say I didn’t say goodbye to you .”

RELATED VIDEO: Kate Mulgrew describes the sexism she faced from network execs on Star Trek: Voyager

Mulgrew explains, “I let it go because we think reflexively that we can handle all of this, but in fact, seven years is not only a significant time, but the changes that took place in the world during the seven years that Galina Reznikov was alive were extraordinary. So I look at it now and I think, Yes I should’ve taken my measure of time , and I didn’t.”

As the audience now says goodbye to Red, Mulgrew has spent her time after Orange Is the New Black writing a new memoir titled How to Forget, and will appear in the third season of Mr. Mercedes premiering in September.

Watch the clip above for more.

Related content:

• Orange Is the New Black launches fund to promote criminal justice reform
• Orange Is the New Black producers pick 13 episodes to watch before the final season
• See photos and behind-the-scenes video from Mr. Mercedes season 3

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Entertainment

Trekkies Already Know This 'OITNB' Star

When the highly anticipated second season of Netflix's popular prison dramedy Orange Is The New Black debuts this Friday, viewers will rejoice to see some beloved (and lovely) faces roaming the halls of Litchfield Penitentiary: Suzanne "Crazy Eyes" Warren. Tiffany "Pennsatucky" Doggett. Tasha "Taystee" Jefferson. Yoga Jones. Sophia Burset. And many, many more. But some faces may look more familiar than others. Sure, everyone knows that Laura Prepon (who plays Alex Vause) is from That 70's Show . And everybody knows Jason Biggs (who plays Larry Bloom) as Jim from American Pie . But what about the Litchfield's Master Chef, Galina "Red" Reznikov? Why does she look so dang familiar?

It's probably because Red's portrayer Kate Mulgrew is most famous for starring in the Star Trek series Voyager as Captain Kathryn Janeway. Voyager , which was a spin-off of Deep Space Nine that ran from 1995 through 2001, is still the only entry in the space franchise to feature a female lead . We almost didn't get to see Mulgrew's Janeway — originally, feature film actress Geneviève Bujold was cast as the intrepid captain, but dropped out on the second day of filming the pilot, feeling unprepared for the rigorous schedule of TV production. Mulgrew, who had previously auditioned for the role, was brought in to replace her. She requested that the character's name be changed from Nicole to Kathryn, and the rest is history.

Of course, Orange Is The New Black and Star Trek: Voyager aren't the only credits on Mulgrew's resume. The 59-year-old Iowa native (and NYU dropout) is, in fact, a Golden Globe-nominated actress. She was recognized all the way back in 1980 in the Best TV Actress - Drama category for her leading role in Mrs. Columbo . The show was a spin-off of the popular detective series Columbo created specifically as a vehicle for Mulgrew, and although it only lasted for 13 episodes, it put the budding star on the map.

More recently, Mulgrew has recurred on such television show's as NBC's The Black Donnellys , Syfy's Warehouse 13 , and NBC's medical drama Mercy (which coincidentally starred OITNB 's own Taylor Schilling). Mulgrew also has extensive experience on stage, appearing around the country with such prestigious companies as the American Shakespeare Theatre in Connecticut, Seattle Repertory Theatre, California's La Jolla Playhouse, and NYC's Roundabout Theatre Company. In 2002, she won acclaim for her performance as Katharine Hepburn in the one-woman play Tea At Five , which was written specifically with Mulgrew in mind.

She won an Obie Award for Outstanding Performance in 2008 for her role as Clytemnestra in the off-Broadway production of Iphegenia 2.0 at the Signature Theatre Company. Most recently, Mulgrew appeared on Broadway in the 2008 production of Equus starring Daniel Radcliffe. She co-starred as Hesther Saloman, a sympathetic court magistrate trying to help Radcliffe's troubled Alan Strang.

Mulgrew recently cultivated a certain amount of controversy after lending her voice as the narrator of the film The Principle , a strange little "documentary" that, five centuries after Copernicus, argues that the Earth is the center of the universe. Fans were worried — was Mulgrew a crazy geocentrist? Why was she supporting a project funded by a notorious anti-semite and Holocaust revisionist? Thankfully, since the news broke of her involvement, she (alongside scientist Lawrence Krauss, who appears in the film) has come forward to say that she was essentially "tricked" into participating in The Principle .

Thank goodness. We couldn't stand the thought of our beloved and heroic Captain Janeway being a proponent of such backwards thinking. Orange Is The New Black is one of the most excitingly progressive shows on television, and we can't wait to cleanse our brains of that geocentric nonsense by watching Red kick some ass and take some names in the new season.

Images: Netflix; UPN; NBC; The Shubert Organization

Kate Mulgrew is thrilled Netflix picked up Star Trek: Prodigy

Netflix was Kate Mulgrew's home for seven years when she portrayed Galina "Red" Reznikov on Orange is the New Black.

Now, Kate Mulgrew will be returning to the familiarity of the streaming channel when Netflix releases the first season of Star Trek: Prodigy on December 25. That release will be followed by the second season sometime in 2024.

Mulgrew announced on Twitter/X that was thrilled that Prodigy will hit Netflix on Christmas and thanked the channel for picking up the animated series.

We shouldn't have long to wait to see Kate Mulgrew on Star Trek: Prodigy in 2024.

According to an October 17th post from executive producer Aaron Waltke , season two is "looking and sounding fantastic," and the team would begin to work on the final mix for the last quarter of episodes soon. Being that was a month ago, the final mix may have already started.

Fortunately, the creative team for Prodigy, believing that the series would find another home, continued working on the series even after cancellation. The season two First Look trailer was dropped in September which only boosted fans' hopes.

And this season promises a whole lot more for Team Dal as we'll find out what has happened with Gwyn, who left her friends behind to return to Solum. The team will also meet The Doctor (Robert Picardo) from Voyager and be introduced to a new ship.

Admiral Janeway will still be on the trail of her friend and former colleague, Captain Chakotay, and Mulgrew mentioned earlier this year that fans of that relationship would be very pleased.

So a lot is in store for our crew, and I'm one of the many fans who is thrilled right along with Mulgrew. This series deserved to be saved!

Red Directive (episode)

• View history

Captain Burnham and the USS Discovery are sent to retrieve a mysterious 800-year-old Romulan vessel; until the artifact hidden inside is stolen, leading to an epic chase. Meanwhile, Saru is offered the position of a lifetime, and Tilly's efforts to help pull her into a tangled web of secrecy.

• 1.2 Act One
• 1.3 Act Two
• 1.4 Act Three
• 1.5 Act Four
• 2 Memorable quotes
• 3.2 Story and script
• 3.3 Production
• 3.4 Continuity
• 3.5 Reception
• 4.1 Starring
• 4.2 Guest starring
• 4.3 Co-starring
• 4.4 Uncredited co-stars
• 4.5 Stunt doubles
• 4.6.1 Star chart references
• 4.7 External links

Summary [ ]

On board a ship going at warp, Captain Michael Burnham is hanging on to the outside of the hull, excited by the turn of events. Saru contacts her on his status as she reassures her before telling him to focus on his team while she goes inside the ship to get back something that was taken from a vault. As she uses her phaser to cut her way in, the ship's warp bubble starts to fail, prompting Saru to try and rescue her. Burnham grumbles that this wasn't what she expected when the night started.

Burnham is gathered with Adira Tal , Paul Stamets , Hugh Culber , and Sylvia Tilly as Adira is finishing a joke. A waitress approaches them with Tonic 2161 and explains that this is to celebrate a millennium of the Federation being active, give or take a few decades due to The Burn . Stamets, however, is in a sour mood: Culber reveals that they're shuttering the spore drive program thanks to Ruon Tarka 's theft of the prototype device during the Dark Matter Anomaly crisis and its destruction along with Booker's ship . Adira tries to reassure their parents that it just means Discovery is now one-of-a-kind, but Stamets would rather be someone other than "Scientific Luminary". Burnham is rattled by the mention of Booker, but she shakes it off and reassures Stamets that he'll do something just as great. Thankfully, her awkwardness is stopped when she is asked to meet with some of the dignitaries around.

As she leaves, Stamets regrets mentioning Cleveland Booker as Tilly laments that Burnham hadn't talked to Booker in months. Culber thinks she's hiding something the way she's acting. Tilly goes to add something, but she spots someone in the distance and awkwardly apologizes as she leaves. With that, the Stamets-Culber family decide to go mingle. Elsewhere, Saru is dancing with T'Rina , who realizes that he has something on his mind. Saru reveals that President Laira Rillak has asked him to be Federation ambassador for a coalition of smaller planets, not wanting to make the mistakes of the past as the Federation continues to heal and expand. T'Rina agrees as the planets are close to the Tholian Republic and the Breen Imperium . However, this means that Saru needs to resign his commission from Starfleet, but deep down, he's worried about his relationship with T'Rina. Elsewhere, Burnham is confronted by Admiral Vance , who gives her an infinity-shaped device. " You're done shaking hands. "

Burnham and Vance are taken to a blank white room, the Infinity Room , where Kovich is waiting for them. Vance explains that an 800-year old science vessel has been discovered at the edge of the Beta Quadrant and they need Discovery to drop there and secure it. Burnham realizes that she's being deliberately told very little, forcing Kovich to reveal that this is a Red Directive , stopping Burnham's questioning and agree to assemble her crew.

On the Discovery , the crew is gathered and the ship is prepared for departure. Burnham arrives with Kovich and gives everyone the details of what's going on before jumping to the location of a Romulan science ship .

At the ship, two figures teleport inside and race towards their destination, blowing open the door to a science lab. After stealing a few items, they open their helmets, though Moll hates the smell. She sees that the USS Antares is on their way with L'ak pointing out that another ship (the Discovery ) is coming. He suggests they have about eight minutes before they arrive and Moll discovers the source of the backup power's path. To L'ak's shock, the new ship arrived super quickly. He suggests bailing, but Moll convinces him to keep going.

At Discovery , as they bring up the Romulan ship, Joann Owosekun notes there were two lifesigns that suddenly disappeared. Linus hopes that they just left, but Keyla Detmer thinks they actually cloaked. Burnham orders Gen Rhys and Owosekun with her, phasers on stun, but Kovich surprises them by saying that might not be enough. Burnham thinks that's excessive, but Kovich makes it quite clear that he wants the mission successful by any means necessary.

Act One [ ]

On the Romulan ship, Burnham, Rhys and Owosekun take the science lab with Rhys noting that their targets were there recently. Following their path, they reach another room, where they discover the corpse of a dead Romulan. Rhys finds a vault that had its cloaking device taken out. They open the vault to find it empty. Burnham realizes that Romulan tech takes a long time to decrypt, Rhys realizing they're still here. They quickly turn and open fire, forcing Moll and L'ak to drop their cloaks. They imprison Rhys and Owosekun in a strange bubble, forcing Burnham to chase them herself.

A firefight ensues, forcing Burnham to change her phaser pistol to a phaser rifle to force them to stop and try to talk. However, they approach Burnham with a strange device. L'ak tosses it at her, causing a small black hole to eat up the hull and launch Burnham out into space, saved by her suit changed to a spacesuit. She contacts Saru to tell him to rescue Rhys and Owosekun, but when she spots the thieves' ship, she flies off to it. As she activates the suit's magnetic clamps, the ship comes into view and warps out.

In the present, Burnham attempts to use her phaser to disable their engines when the ship is hit with a tractor beam. It's the Antares , captained by Rayner , who notes Burnham started without him. However, the ship's warp bubble is dropping rapidly; Rayner refuses to let the ship go and the Antares can't just stop it as it doesn't have pathway drive tech. Saru has Detmer bring Discovery in to save Burnham, but the ship is getting rattled and Kovich isn't happy. However, Burnham and Rayner are arguing as Burnham wants him to drop the tractor or they're all dead and Rayner refuses. Ultimately, he relents and drops the lock. As they drop out of warp, the other ship tosses out a number of probes before warping away as Burnham floats back towards Discovery , teleported back on the bridge and she drops into the captain's chair exhausted. Rayner contacts Burnham, letting her know that stunt now has 20 different warp signatures to try and figure out which one's the real one. Kovich sarcastically asks if she has a bright idea and she does.

As the Discovery spore jumps to another planet, Burnham arrives in the cargo bay, where she meets a familiar face – Booker.

Act Two [ ]

As Burnham and Book walk down the hallway, they discuss why they were there, though Burnham congratulates Book on the work he's done for the refugees of the DMA and he wants to make sure he does his best to make up for what happened.

At the security briefing, Rayner reveals Moll and L'ak's identities to them. The item they stole was a Romulan puzzle box that no one knows what's inside and Kovich refuses to reveal. When Kovich asks Book for his help, he easily picks out the right warp trail, leading to Q'mau or "Fred". Vance orders Burnham and Rayner to make their way to Q'mau, though it's quite easy to see that the idea of working with Burnham is not a thrilling one for Rayner. As they leave, Burnham tells Saru that the secrecy of this mission is so strange that even Vance is out of the loop. Saru decides the best thing to do is to ask someone outside of Discovery' s chain of command, which Burnham understands. She also tells him that she'll miss him if he takes the ambassadorial position. He understands, but there's still so much to consider. For now, Fred.

Elsewhere, a very obviously drunk-on- Andorian champagne Tilly is rambling to her male companion about various subjects as she arrives in her room, confusing the poor man. Whatever plans he had are stopped when she decides to send him out with a promise of more talking. As she plans to just sit back and nurse her hangover, Burnham calls asking for her help, but she suggests she says no. Tilly's in.

Down on the planet, Burnham and Book teleport down, causing Book to reminisce about their times as couriers. Rayner drops in soon after and teasingly needles them as he notices that they're having trouble. Elsewhere in the trading outpost, Moll and L'ak make their way to a home which uses a scanner to confirm their identities before they go in. Stripped of their weapons, they meet with Fred, a Soong-type android . They offer their various items, ending with the puzzle box, which surprises Fred. With ease, he solves the puzzle box and reveals its contents: a journal. He flips through it quickly, but stops and focuses on a set of pages with a mysterious design on it. He offers three bars of latinum , but Moll and L'ak refuse, realizing that he reacted to the pages. They want higher. He refuses, and also refuses to return the items, demanding they leave.

Instead, a fight breaks out. In the process, Fred is able to get a phaser pistol working and shoots Moll, prompting an enraged L'ak into blasting Fred. Moll is alright and finishes off the android. Meanwhile, Burnham, Booker and Rayner reach Fred's home to find the place in a shambles. After finding Fred's body, Burnham suggests they stick together as Book knows where things are but Rayner quickly runs out, suggesting splitting up. After requesting Saru beams up Fred's body, Booker and Burnham realize their next move: the sand runners .

In medbay, Stamets and Culber take notice of Fred and marvel at his engineering. Even his memory drive is made in honor of Altan Soong . However, the components are so old, it'll take time to get everything just to try and get it out, more or less trying to download his memory. However, Stamets is a packrat and rushes off to get what he needs.

On the planet, Rayner catches sight of Moll and L'ak and lets Burnham and Booker know. They arrive quickly, prompting Rayner to ask how they got there so fast. However, as they board their own Sand runner, Rayner races off ahead, infuriating Burnham before she and Booker give chase.

Act Three [ ]

In Tilly's room, Tilly is busy hacking into the Starfleet database when two security officers race in, demanding she stop. However, Vance enters, relieving the two and taking over. Vance realizes Burnham asked her to do this and Tilly responds that she didn't, but they do need to know what's so incredible about an eight hundred year old Romulan ship. Vance agrees and the two prepare to finish the job. They reveal a hologram of the dead Romulan, Vellek , revealing he found something very dangerous, the damaged message mentioning cryptic clues and that everything he wrote was in a journal and that whatever it was must not be placed in the wrong hands.

Back on the planet, Rayner, Booker and Burnham try to chase Moll and L'ak before they reach their ship. Realizing they were getting close, Rayner races ahead, but they are too late as their ship takes off and begins firing on them. Booker realizes they're planning on heading into the tunnels, which annoys Burnham as this was the first time he mentioned such a thing. They figure Discovery and the Antares can meet up and block them off. She asks Owosekun for scans, but she's already certain they know which one they're going to take as it has a charge set up. Saru says that Zora estimates the chances of an avalanche at 30%, which Rhys warns would destroy the outpost. Burnham wants to be teleported over to it so she can disarm it, but Rayner tells her it'll disintegrate her before she can even pull up her holograms. He orders the Antares to lock on and fire, but Burnham doesn't want this to happen as they are on a non-Federation planet on a secret mission.

The Antares fires and destroys the tunnel entrance, forcing the ship to pull up. Rayner cheers before Burnham tells him that they're arming photon torpedoes, confusing Rayner in surprise. The ship triggers an avalanche, forcing the three to turn back and race away. Zora contacts Burnham and lets her know how fast and how large the avalanche is; there's no way to save the outpost's people by transporting them in time. Trying to figure out plans, Adria suggests throwing Discovery down to block it. Stamets says it’s not enough, but the Antares is suggested to help out. They would have to arrive at the same time, but it could work. However, Antares refuses as Rayner's ordering them to stay the course. Burnham forces Rayner to consider the people rather than the couriers, forcing him to give Burnham control.

Act Four [ ]

As Burnham, Booker and Rayner race back to the city, Discovery and Antares arrive in the atmosphere. As they do, they discover two civilians in the way. They can't get a transporter lock with all the dust, so Burnham uses their exact coordinates to pick them up before she passes them. Raising shields, the two ships dive into the ground, blocking the avalanche with their hull and shields. The outpost is saved and the citizens cheer their victory. However, Moll and L'ak escape, infuriating Rayner as he teleports back to his ship. Alone, Burnham and Booker talk and they realize their time apart has changed them, suggesting they may not be an item anymore. However, Tilly contacts her and reveals that what she has learned is crazy.

Discovery returns to spacedock, mooring itself once arriving. Watching outside a window, T'Rina is joined by Saru, the former having learned what happened. Saru admits to T'Rina that the incident made him realize his mortality and his relationships. As much as Discovery is his home and family, T'Rina is that and so much more; he wants to accept the offer and to be with her. T'Rina wants to codify their relationship, which Saru realizes that she's asking him to marry her, which he accepts.

Arriving at medbay, an exhausted Burnham meets up with Stamets and Culber and wants to know what they found. It turns out they have had a good look at the journal. Burnham realizes one of the pages shows twin moons in the Vileen system . She knows something's up and decides to confront Kovich.

On a ravaged world, Burnham confronts Kovich, demanding to be brought into the know. He refuses, stating that the information is classified and has been for hundreds of years, that it's bigger than her. He reveals that he's planning to relieve her for his own specialized team. However, Burnham convinces him that doing so means that team is going to be hopping twin moon planets for hundreds of years. Chuckling, he agrees and reveals he knew Tilly was hacking into the database and was glad Vance failed to stop her. The planet is revealed to be a hologram and he begins to reveal the backstory of what's going on: Vellek was a Romulan scientist that was part of a group that included Captain Jean-Luc Picard that discovered a message from a race of ancient aliens known as the Progenitors , who seeded life in the galaxy. Vellek had discovered the machine that allowed this to happen and Moll and L'ak are on their way to get it.

Tossing her the infinity-shaped device, he tells Burnham that the greatest treasure in the universe is out there and what is she waiting for? She replies "Let's fly."

Memorable quotes [ ]

" Never a dull moment! " " Captain, are you all right? " " Surprisingly, I'm not dead yet! Focus on our team, I'll try to take out their engines. "

" It's good to see the Federation back, isn't it? And at peace. " " It really is. " " Yeah. "

" It's a new world, Paul, and you will find new purpose. We all will. "

" An 800-year-old science vessel was just found at the edge of the Beta Quadrant. Dr. Kovich needs Discovery to jump there immediately and secure it. " " What's on board? " " Something vital to the security of the Federation. " " That doesn't answer my question. " " I'm aware. " " Sir, I cannot… " " Captain, this is a Red Directive. "

" That cherry that they just dropped on our shit sundae left us with twenty warp signatures all charting different courses! "

" Shut up, champagne! Why did they wait till all the after-parties to give that to us? They should have been passing it out to the delegates before they left, you know? Just a little diplomacy. Is it warm in here? "

" In my youth, I struggled often with… love. How to embrace those who were destined to be taken from me in the cullings. Until I met you, I did not understand the degree to which that fear had constrained me. "

" If I may, I do believe it would be only logical, given this development, for us to codify our mutual commitment in a more official capacity. " " T'Rina, are you asking me to marry you? " " I believe that is the language some cultures use for it. "

Background information [ ]

• By 1 January 2024 , this episode's title was revealed by the Writers Guild of America West. [1] (X) [2]
• The title was officially confirmed on 14 February 2024 . [3] [4]

Story and script [ ]

• This episode's synopsis was revealed on 11 January 2024 . [5] [6]

Production [ ]

• This episode is the first to introduce a new Star Trek intro animation featuring the Discovery jumping onto the screen. [7]
• The science lab aboard the Romulan scout ship is a redress of the Discovery mess hall set.

Continuity [ ]

• Although referenced being at the Millennium Celebration, President Laira Rillak does not appear in the episode.

Reception [ ]

Links and references [ ], starring [ ].

• Sonequa Martin-Green as Michael Burnham
• Doug Jones as Saru
• Anthony Rapp as Paul Stamets
• Mary Wiseman as Sylvia Tilly
• Wilson Cruz as Hugh Culber
• Blu del Barrio as Adira Tal
• Callum Keith Rennie as Rayner
• David Ajala as Cleveland Booker

Guest starring [ ]

• Oded Fehr as Charles Vance
• David Cronenberg as Kovich
• Annabelle Wallis as Zora (voice)
• Tara Rosling as T'Rina
• Eve Harlow as Moll
• Elias Toufexis as L'ak

Co-starring [ ]

• Emily Coutts as Lt. Cmdr. Keyla Detmer
• Patrick Kwok-Choon as Lt. Cmdr. Gen Rhys
• Oyin Oladejo as Lt. Cmdr. Joann Owosekun
• Orville Cummings as Lt. Christopher
• David Benjamin Tomlinson as Lt. jg Linus
• Victoria Sawal as Lt. Naya
• Natalie Liconti as Lt. Gallo
• J. Adam Brown as Fred
• Gregory Calderone as Lt. Jax
• Mei Chung as UFP Presidental Aide
• Michael Copeman as Dr. Vellek
• Julianne Grossman as EV Suit Computer (voice)
• Addison Holley as Cadet Ross
• Nicole Nwokolo as FHQ Security officer

Uncredited co-stars [ ]

• Lena Banks as Romulan officer ( archive image )
• Salome Jens as ancient humanoid ( archive image )
• Simon Northwood as Fred's Guard #1
• Maurice Roëves as Romulan captain ( archive image )
• Leatrim Stang as Romulan officer ( archive image )
• Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard ( archive image )
• Unknown actor as Young Vellek ( archive image )

Stunt doubles [ ]

• Louis Paquette as stunt double for Elias Toufexis
• stunt double for David Ajala
• stunt double for J. Adam Brown
• stunt double for Eve Harlow
• stunt double for Sonequa Martin-Green
• stunt double for Callum Keith Rennie

References [ ]

24th century ; 26th century ; ambassador ; Antares , USS ; avalanche ; Beta Quadrant ; Booker's ship ; Breen Imperium ; cocktail ; dignitary ; driving ; Federation database ; Federation Headquarters ; gravitational well ; graveyard ; holodeck ; Infinity Room ; jumja stick ; Lurian ; Lyrek ; Milky Way Galaxy ; Millennium Celebration ; mind meld ; pathway drive ; peace ; probe ; Progenitors ; Q'mau ; Red Directive ; resignation ; Rigel V ; Romulan ; sand runner ; Scaptar ; sector ; Security Protocol Six Alpha ; Simulation Week ; Soong, Altan ; spice market ; spore drive ; Starfleet ; tan zhekran ; Tellarite ; term of endearment ; Tholian Republic ; Tonic 2161 ; tribble ; United Federation of Planets ; vault ; Vileen system ; Vintar IV ; warp bubble

Star chart references [ ]

15 Sagittae ; 31 Aquilae ; 39 Serpentis ; 53 Aquarii ; 58 Ophiuchi ; 99 Herculis ; Aaamazzara ( Therbia , Epsilon Serpentis ); Alshain ; Antos ( Kappa Delphini ); Arbazan ; Argus ; Ascella ( Zeta Sagittarii ); Baham ( Theta Pegasi ); Balancar ; Balosnee ; Berengaria ; Cebelrai ( Beta Ophiuchi ); Deep Space 3 ; Deep Space 5 ; Delta ; Delta Aquilae ; Delta Sculptoris ; Deneb El Okab ( Zeta Aquilae ); Dopteria ( Kappa Coronae Borealis ); Eta Coronae Borealis ; Eta Serpentis ; Ferenginar ; Fesarius ; Gamma Coronae Australis ; Gamma Coronae Borealis ; Gamma Ophiuchi ; Gamma Serpentis ; Gemma ( Alpha Coronae Borealis ); Hornish ; Hupyria ( Tau Coronae Borealis ); Izar ( Epsilon Boötis ); Kappa Ophiuchi ; Kaus Borealis ( Lambda Sagittarii ); Kholfa ; Kohlan ; Lambda Coronae Borealis ; Lappa ; Lytasia ; Ludugia ( Rho Coronae Borealis ); Neural ( Zeta Boötis ); Nusakan ( Beta Coronae Borealis ); Omega Sagitta ( Madena , Altec , Straleb ); Omega Sagittarii ; Prexnak ; Rasalhague ( Alpha Ophiuchi ); Rhaandar ( Alpha Indi ); Rho Capricorni ; Rotanev ( Beta Delphini ); Rymus ; Sabik ( Eta Ophiuchi ); Sarin ( Delta Herculis ); Sauria ( Psi Serpentis ); Sepia ; Sigma Coronae Borealis ; Sigma Serpentis ; Tarahong ; Tau Piscis Australis ; Thalos ; Uncharted System 1702 ; Unukalhai ( Alpha Serpentis ); Upsilon Aquarii ; Zaran ( Mu Capricorni ); Xi Ophiuchi ; Zeta Microscopii ; Zeta Serpentis

External links [ ]

• " Red Directive " at the Internet Movie Database
• " Red Directive " at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• 2 ISS Enterprise (NCC-1701)

• May 3, 2024 | Podcast: All Access Listens For “Whistlespeak” With Commentary From Mary Wiseman Of ‘Star Trek: Discovery’
• May 2, 2024 | Recap/Review: ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Goes On A Spiritual Journey In “Whistlespeak”
• May 1, 2024 | Toronto Stage Used For ‘Discovery’ Renamed “The Star Trek Stage” By Pinewood Studios
• May 1, 2024 | Star Trek Event Coming To ‘World Of Tanks’ Online Game – Watch Mission Preview
• April 30, 2024 | Star Trek Team Was Top Fundraiser For Pancreatic Cancer Action Network 2024 Charity Walk

Recap/Review: ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Reflects On Its Choices In “Mirrors”

| April 25, 2024 | By: Anthony Pascale 119 comments so far

Star Trek: Discovery Season 5, Episode 5 – Debuted Thursday, April 25, 2024 Written by Johanna Lee & Carlos Cisco Directed by Jen McGowan

A solid episode with plenty of lore and character development gets weighed down with a bit too much exposition.

No, I didn’t kiss you in the past last week, what makes you say that?

WARNING: Spoilers below!

“Maybe we’re not so different.”

As the crew regroups following the time bug incident that lost them 6 hours, they try to trace the trail of their main rivals in the search for the Progenitor tech. Book takes this time to reflect on the choices he has made in life and how it isn’t too late for Moll; perhaps he can redeem the daughter of his mentor and namesake Cleveland Booker. Stamets and Tilly figure out the trail didn’t disappear into nowhere: Moll and L’ak went through a wormhole. The aperture isn’t big enough for the Disco, so the captain assigns herself to shuttle duty—over the objections of her new XO, who is still struggling a bit. After a little bonding over old Kellerun poetry, she leaves him with “I know you can lead this crew” and heads off with her ex. Returning to their old banter, including some teasing about what happened during her time tour last episode, Book and Michael head through the wormhole. Things get really choppy as they fly through exotic matter “deaf and blind,” losing comms with the Disco, and dodging debris. Skilled piloting and good ol’ Starfleet engineering saves them, but things aren’t so hot for Moll and L’ak, whose ship is spotted cut in half. Their only hope for survival is another relatively intact ship that looks familiar. A 24 th -century scientist hiding a clue in this pocket dimension on a shipwreck from another universe makes as much sense as anything.  It’s the ISS Enterprise—and that’s no typo. If the “Mirrors” title wasn’t clue enough, the ISS does it: Things are about to get Terran, again.

After docking, Michael and Book make their way through the mess of a ship to the bridge with more playful banter. The warp drive has been bricked and all shuttles and escape pods are gone, very out of character for ruthless Terrans. They track three quantum signatures in sickbay, but start with a trace in the transporter room, which looks more like a makeshift refugee camp. A chronicle reveals the crew mutinied after the Terran High Chancellor (aka Mirror Spock) was killed for making reforms. A certain Kelpien rebel leader (aka Mirror Action Saru) led refugees to the Prime Universe, where they abandoned ship. While Book expositions, Michael puts a piece of her badge (and its important Prime Universe quantum signature) in a locket she finds. Pay attention BTW, or you will be confused later. In sickbay, they find Moll and L’ak, Moll and L’ak, and Moll and L’ak—until they take out the holo-emitters so the four former couriers can face off for real. Book tries the “I knew your father” gambit and is immediately rebuffed by Moll’s serious daddy issues. The baddies figure they have the clue so they have all the leverage, but Michael uses that locket as a bluff, claiming she has the real clue. Still, no deal with the Federation is good enough because they need the Progenitor tech to get rid of an Erigah… a Breen blood bounty. That’s right, L’ak is Breen. Holy refrigeration helmet , Batman.

Mirror McCoy was a bit of an evil pack rat.

“You both still have choices .”

Cut to a series of Burn-era flashbacks when Moll was delivering dilithium to the Breen Imperium. The “bucket heads”  are not amused by the wisecracking courier who gets into a fight with one of them, but she turns the tables, revealing she knows he’s a disgraced member of the royal family—and she even knows his name. It’s L’ak, of course. He is intrigued by her plan to skim more latinum, getting payback for being humiliated for this cargo duty demotion. Soon enough, this unlikely pair is hooking up between cargo containers and he even takes off his helmet to show her his face, as well as his “other face.” It turns out the Breen have two: the one we have been seeing with L’ak and a glowing eyed translucent one.  Later, the star-crossed romance is threatened when Moll is drawn to the lure of even more latinum by delivering to the Emerald Chain. Before they can sort out if he should join her, Uncle A-hole shows up, not happy about his nephew’s little interspecies exchange program. He’s also not cool with L’ak using that old face and not the “evolved” glowy face. L’ak is given one chance at redemption: Kill Moll. He picks door number 2, killing some guards but sparing Primarch Ruhn, who declares the Erigah. L’ak knows this means they will never stop hunting him, but Moll is all-in on being a fugitive, so they escape together. Ah, true love.

Back on Mirror Enterprise, the standoff devolves into another quick firefight as the Breen/Human duo chooses not to take the offered off-ramp before going too far down the bad guy road. Moll and Book end up outside force fields that pop up around sickbay, so she reluctantly agrees to a ceasefire. The current Cleveland Booker tries again to connect, but Moll only has bad memories of a brutal childhood of abandonment after her Cleveland left her on her own at age 14. L’ak is all she has. L’ak feels the same about Moll, telling Michael that he would die before being separated, but seems open to the idea of them sharing a cell in the Federation pen. On the bridge, Book pivots to use his relationship with Michael to connect, but Moll’s need to get back to L’ak means no waiting for computer hacking, so she starts yanking out wires. The resulting short does lower the forcefield, but now the ship is out of control. Their shuttle is flung off with the jolt and there’s only eight minutes until the Big E is squished in the little wormhole. Book takes his final shot, handing over his phaser and telling Moll she is the only family he has left. She finally relents and they head to sickbay, where Michael and L’ak have resumed fighting. The captain gets the upper hand and ends up with the clue L’ak was holding and the Breen is left with a knife in his side, but impressed by the locket bluff. Moll arrives and is super pissed, so the Disco duo makes a quick exit before things escalate into yet another phaser fight. This former courier couple’s double date is over.

Uh, can you go back to the other face now?

“Maybe we can shape our own futures too.”

As Moll tries to patch up her boyfriend, Michael and Book work through the problem on the bridge, deciding that the tractor beam as their only hope. Over on the Disco, they detect an oscillating pattern, 3-4-1-4, which means something to Rayner. He now wants the nerds to figure out how to open the wormhole aperture big enough for a ship, offering kegs of Kellerun booze for the best idea. Adira sparks a team effort and Rayner rallies around the crowdsourced solution involving a hexagon of photon torpedoes. “We are only going to get one shot at this. I trust you will all make it count, red alert.” That’s the stuff. With what may be the last seconds of her life, Michael lets Book know she shared a “happy” moment with his past self during the whole time bug incident. Discovery fires the torpedoes and the crew is surprised to see the ISS Enterprise emerge at the last minute from the permanently collapsing wormhole. Everyone releases their tension as the captain informs her crew they saved her… but why is the Enterprise about to fire? A warp pod is launched! It’s Moll and L’ak. Before you can say “plot armor,” they escape to another episode. The captain returns to the Disco to tell Rayner she’s impressed with how he handled the crew during her time away, and he tells her how impressed he was with her subtle “3-4-1-4” message using the Kellerun “Ballad of Krull.” Alien poetry FTW!

In the background of the episode, Tilly has been noticing that Dr. Culber seems out of sorts. Everyone else leans on him, so she offers to be a friendly ear. As things wrap, Hugh takes her up on her offer over drinks at Red’s, admitting that ever since he was possessed by a Trill a few episodes back, he has been feeling a bit off, and he’s beening having some trouble coming to grips with the quest they are on with questions “so big and impossible to grasp.” He is not sure his matter-of-fact husband will understand what Tilly points out is a sort of spiritual awakening. This thread is left unresolved, unlike Adira’s mini-crisis of confidence: They were losing their science mojo due to guilt over the time bug, but got it back through Rayner’s tough love and being the one to come up with the hexagon of torpedoes solution. Things wrap up with Michael and Book looking over their prize, the latest piece of the map and a mysterious vial of liquid hidden inside, ready to set up the next episode once Stamets unlocks its secret. Burnham is starting to see a pattern with these clues and how the scientists who left them were trying to teach lessons along the way to the successful questers. The clue hidden in the ISS Enterprise came from Dr. Cho, a former Terran junior officer who later became a Starfleet Admiral. This happy ending for her and the others from Saru’s band of Mirror refugees fills them with hope as they can’t wait to find out what they will learn when they put the map together. There are just 2 more map pieces and 5 more episodes to go.

I think I have a thing for being possessed—no judgment.

Love stories

This halfway point episode is a bit of a mixed bag. Strong performances were a highlight, bringing extra life to welcome character development for both heroes and villains. But valiant attempts to expand upon franchise lore got weighed down in overly complicated exposition. And for an episode with a strong (and yes, often repeated) theme about choices, some of the directorial choices just didn’t work, potentially leaving some audience members confused or requiring a second viewing to follow the narrative. On the other hand, the episode carried on the season’s reflection on Discovery’s own lore and the evolution of its characters. David Ajala stands out as the episode MVP as he shows Book’s struggle to navigate the emotional complexities of his own choices and those of Moll while desperately trying to forge a new family connection. While some of the action scenes in this episode felt a bit perfunctory, the show is still getting better (for the most part) in finding moments for those character sidebars to talk about their emotional journeys and relationships. That was especially important in this episode, which took a closer look at how the events of the season are impacting some of the key romantic pairings of Book and Michael, Paul and Hugh, and Moll and L’ak.

Eve Harlow—and especially Elias Toufexis—stepped up to add layers and nuance to Moll and L’ak, with Discovery finally embracing how fleshing out adversaries and their motivations goes a long way towards making your plot hold together. The nicely drawn-out reflection of their love story with the rekindling one between Michael and Book adds another layer to the more obvious meaning behind the episode title “Mirrors.” Moll’s single-minded anger and L’ak’s desire for safety now all make sense, as does their unshakable bond. The episode also did a good job weaving in a handful of substories, including Rayner’s growing connection with the crew, with a nice sprinkling of Kellerun lore-building — adding some color to his character. Callum Keith Rennie continues to be a stand-out addition for the season, although Doug Jones is sorely missed, presumably not appearing in two episodes in a row for some scheduling reasons. Culber’s spiritual journey also gets just enough time, as it and these other substories all feel like they are heading somewhere without distracting or spinning their wheels, something that often weighed down mid-season Discovery episodes in past seasons.

Okay, let’s just agree we both have daddy issues.

Under the mask

The reveal that L’ak is a Breen was a surprise, but also nicely teased through the previous episodes. Fans of Deep Space Nine should relish finally getting some answers about this enigmatic race and finally having a first look under those helmets. “Mirrors” picked up on many elements from DS9, including the Breen language, refrigeration suits, neural truncheons, and the position of Thot , while adding lots to the lore, including some worldbuilding behind this new Breen Imperium and its “faction wars.”

Setting the Breen up as what appears to be the real big bads for the season involved a lot of data dump exposition here, surely keeping the editors of Memory Alpha busy for the next week. The notion that Breen have two forms with their signature suits and helmets allowing them to hold the more “evolved” form and face makes sense. If one were to get nitpicky, the Breen aren’t supposed to bleed, but perhaps that was a function of his suit; fill in your own headcanon. L’ak’s desire to hold the other, less evolved form making him a pariah in Breen society has echoes of allegorical episodes such as TNG’s “The Outcast.” That being said, the nuances are still not entirely clear, and fans who like the lore shouldn’t have to rewatch scenes to pick up the details. It feels like some details were cut, perhaps because this episode was already trying to cram in too much exposition with the Breen, Kelleruns (they boil cakes?), and the Mirror Universe.

Like the previous time travel adventure, this was a mid-season bottle show, this time using the conveniently located Strange New Worlds sets. Bringing back the ISS Enterprise was clever and fun, with the twist of how this time the Mirror Universe came to us. If you follow closely, “Mirrors” did a nice job of filling in some lore gaps and tying together the MU storylines from the first visit in “Mirror, Mirror” to follow-ups in Deep Space Nine , Enterprise , and Discovery . There is now a nice throughline from Emperor Georgiou saving Mirror Saru through to Mirror Spock, killed for the reforms he instituted after being inspired by Kirk. However, the redress of the Enterprise sets was not very inspired, with only a smattering of Terran wall sconces and some repainting, instead of demonstrating the brutality of the Empire with elements like agony booths. But what was even more missed was the promise of any character crossovers. There was a lot of talk about Mirror characters like Spock, Saru, Dr. Cho, and others, but we don’t get to see any, one of the many examples of how this episode broke the golden rule to show not tell. There were plenty of opportunities for a flashback or holo recording. Burnham longingly gazing at her brother’s science station is no substitute for Ethan Peck with a goatee.

We’re back!

Final thoughts

“Mirrors” is a decent episode, but it could have been much better with a few tweaks here and there. While not falling into the pointless plate-spinning trap of past mid-season Disco outings, it still dragged a bit for something so jam-packed with lore and revelations. Still, it provided a nice hour of entertainment, and possibly more with rewatches to catch up on the little details. The episode also continues the season’s welcome trend of weaving in the show’s own past, which makes it work better as a final season, even if they didn’t know that when they crafted it. Season 5 hits the halfway mark, and it’s still the best season yet, and hopefully the second half of the season will nail the landing.

Wait, we’re in this episode too? Anyone remember their lines?

• Like the previous episode, “Mirrors” began with a warning for flashing images.
• The episode is dedicated “to the loving memory of our friend Allan ‘Red’ Marceta ,” the lead set dresser who died in a motorcycle accident in 2022.  Presumably the USS Discovery bar “Red’s” was named in his honor.
• This is the first episode where Book’s personal log starts it off.
• Stardate: 866280.9
• Booker examined wanted notices for Moll from the Federation, Orion/Emerald Chain (who have a new logo), and the Andorian Empire.
• Tilly was able to reveal the wormhole by compensating for the “Lorentzian Coefficient,” referencing the real Lorentz Factor used in special relativity equations.
• A new ensign on the Discovery keeps a Cardassian vole as a pet.
• The ISS Enterprise was built at Tartarus Base, possibly referencing Tartarus Prime , from the TOS novel The Rings of Time .
• Moll refers to Breens as “bucketheads” (just as Reno did to Emerald Chain Regulators last episode). This could be a nod to the use of “ bucketheads ” in Star Wars as a derogatory term for stormtroopers.
• Moll’s mother died on Callor V in a mine for Rubindium , a substance first mentioned in TOS “Patterns of Force.”
• Linus can play the piano.
• Breen Primarchs may be a nod to the genetically engineered Primarchs from Warhammer 40,000 .
• How does Book know that Pike’s catchphrase is “Hit it”?
• This is the third (of five) season 5 episodes in which Oyin Oladejo and Emily Coutts do not appear, but their characters, Detmer and Owosekun, are mentioned when they get the honor of escorting the ISS Enterprise back to Starfleet HQ.
• Even though we didn’t see it warp away, presumably the missing intermix chamber was replaced, otherwise Owo and Detmer’s trip is going to take a very long time.
• Tilly says her long day makes her feel like she has been through a Gormangander’s digestive tract.

Remember when Mudd hid inside a Gormagander? Gross.

More to come

Every Friday, the TrekMovie.com All Access Star Trek Podcast  covers the latest news in the Star Trek Universe and discusses the latest episode. The podcast is available on Apple Podcasts ,  Spotify ,  Pocket Casts ,  Stitcher and is part of the TrekMovie Podcast Network.

The fifth and final season of  Discovery debuted with two episodes on Thursday, April 4 exclusively on Paramount+  in the U.S., the UK, Switzerland, South Korea, Latin America, Germany, France, Italy, Australia, and Austria.  Discovery  will also premiere on April 4 on Paramount+ in Canada and will be broadcast on Bell Media’s CTV Sci-Fi Channel in Canada. The rest of the 10-episode final season will be available to stream weekly on Thursdays. Season 5 debuts on SkyShowtime in select European countries on April 5.

Keep up with news about the  Star Trek Universe at TrekMovie.com .

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waste of ISS Enterprise

While I enjoyed the episode overall, the ISS Enterprise was a huge letdown and not even worth being an easter egg with what little they did with it. They should have just made it a generic constitution class ship from the mirror universe.

It felt like it was nothing more than a budget saver. Use existing sets from the other show. Which is weird because one of the arguments in favor of mini seasons is it allows more money to be spent.

That’s exactly what it felt like. Along with the missing, yet again, Detmer and Owosekun.

There must have been some deep budget cuts for the season.

Detmer and Owosekun were replaced by other characters so I don’t think they are missing for budget reasons. It’s more likely that the actresses were unavailable.

I get the budget issues considering what’s going on with the studio. But the end result was it showed that there isn’t much difference at all in the 900 years between the SNW Enterprise and the aesthetic of Star Trek Discovery. They both look as if they were set in the exact same era.

And there really shouldn’t be much. Discovery is from the same era, as the Enterprise. While the ship gets a technological upgrade, why would it get an interior design makeover?

Since it was deemed important (Stamets certainly makes since) that the crew stay on the Discovery, I would certainly think that psychologically having its design aesthetics stay similar to what it was would help give the crew a little bit of their past to hold on to, versus having all physical interactions be with a timeline that they aren’t native to.

Now where we should see it is in native places in this time. And we have seen some differences in design from standard Starfleet settings, versus Starfleet settings on this time (I actually wish we got more).

I did wish for a little more of self reflection from Burnham’s point of view as the ISS Enterprise should of course remind her of Spock (the Enterprise tie in), but also Georgiou (the ISS tie in). We get a small brief nod to Spock, but nothing to Georgiou (and while I still question the use of the character, there is no question that Burnham did have a connection with her, even if its primarily transference from her former Captain, not the mirror Universe Empress.

It’s not just the ship. It’s everything. Everything else looks like it matches the ship’s aesthetic. As if 900 year old retro is the current fad in design.

That’s always been my issue with Discovery.

To me that is part of the downfall of going so very far into the future. What aesthetic you make should be radically different. Not just shinier.

This is a VERY common trope in Trek, historically. Using redressed older sets, even ones from distant eras, to save money. It’s just downright foolish to think that a big budget series with fewer episodes to get better production value would simply have no limits at all. Discovery is one of the most expensive-looking sci-fi shows out there for a reason: a lot of money is being spent. On sets, effects, and even the cast. Oded Feherer, Callum Kieth Rennie, Michelle Yeoh, Jason Isaacs, Sonequa, David Cronenberg, Tig Notaro, and plenty of others during its run — its cast is broad and extremely strong, with well-known, talented actors, not to mention some of the best TV directors, set decorators, costumers, etc in the business.

Now, sure I think it’s fair to be let down by a budget-saving measure, particularly because of how much money IS being spent, so I get the logic here, but it’s sorely misplaced. The fact is, Trek has done this for decades, and often not nearly as well. Let it go — just try to enjoy the show and not worry about that kind of thing. But that’s the thing I struggle with, with you on this board: you seem to be looking for reasons NOT to like this show because you find more enjoyment in watching and hating it than anything else. Go watch a show you actually like, it’s been five years and it’s ending now. It’s time to let it go, my good friend.

Agreed. The last two episodes just felt very budgeted and basically bottle episodes. And this just felt like a twofer, a way to use an existing set and add a little fan service but that’s all it was. I thought the Enterprise itself was going to be a viral part of not just the episode but the story overall.

Instead it was just a backdrop. And yeah it’s obvious they cut the budget for this season but all the live action shows have felt this way starting with Picard season 3 and SNW season 2. That all felt pretty bare a lot of the times. I guess this was all during Paramount+ belt tightening and probably not a shock why the show was cancelled.

And maybe the I.S.S. Enterprise should have been the refit or maybe the Phase II Enterprise? That would have been a lot of fun but combine a lack of vision with a reduced budget and this is what you get.

Looking back on “In a Mirror: Darkly”, season 4 of Enterprise was dealing with a reduced budget but managed to recreate sets from TOS, introduced a few new set pieces and did a lot of great effects work.

This was a missed opportunity.

Which was added by stretching that story over two episodes, so that they had the budget to recreate the sets they used. Having half the episode count, doesn’t really help avail yourself to planning out a two parter for a way to save costs.

If Picard could pull off recreating the bridge of the Enterprise D for three days of shooting with barely half the budget of Discovery season 5, they could have done something equally as fun for Discovery on the cheap without actually having to building anything new and using the Enterprise as a crutch. They could have come across Deep Space Station K-7, where the exterior would have been immediately familiar and with interiors served by redressed sets from virtually anything available from Discovery or SNW.

I thought Discovery is basically the PII Enterprise?

The Phase II Enterprise looks like a slickly modified version of the Enterprise from TOS, falling squarely between the Enterprise from TOS and the refit. The “Star Trek: Phase II” fan series did a great job bringing it to screen.

No, Discovery resembles the Enterprise concept for the Planet of the Titans movie.

I don’t get that. I never assumed that the Enterprise (or its mIrror Universe history) was going to feature in significant manner (certainly the producers and promotional department didn’t make a significant deal about it). Perhaps it’s the time difference. But I literally assumed it would be as significant as the Defiant going in and out of phase like TOS “Tholian Web” the time difference. And that was primarily set dressing. That’s not a bad thing. I mean Tholian Web is considered one of the better third season episodes.

And the only reason I assumed it was the Enterprise versus another Connie, is simple to give Burnham a moment to reflect on Spock. Now I do freely admit that I wish this was a slightly larger moment. But I never expected it to be anything but a small moment. Roughly my preconceived notion would be something like Spock’s Mind Meld scene with La’an in SNW where she is able to get a peak into Spock thinking about his sister and the emotion that comes with it. It’s a very brief scene, but I thought SNW did a good job in conveying the emotional aspect, especially from a half Vulcan/ Half Human.

Ok fair enough. This is probably more my hang up and to be fair since they never really promoted the the Enterprise being back then clearly they weren’t trying to make it that big of a deal.

But same time a lot of people do feel there could’ve been more done. The main problem is it just feels like a ridiculous stretch this ship itself is even there. It’s a ship from 900 years ago from a DIFFERENT UNIVERSE that conveniently happens to be the ship that gives them their next clue. I know it’s Star Trek so whatever lol. But when you go through the effort to present it I think it would’ve nice to build a bigger story around it. It could’ve just been any ship.

Exactly! The ship could have been any ship. The fact that with such an enormous universe(s) they would happen to find the next clue on a Mirror Universe ship and the ISS Enterprise no less–it’s such “Small Universe Syndrome”.

When you feel like the Mirror Universe has been nothing but a let down after the initial TOS episode, It’s really not a surprise. There’s really nowhere to go with it, but I did find that the fulfilling of the promise that Prime Kirk spoke to Mirror Spock about from the original TOS episode quite satisfying. The ship’s inhabitants embraced the benevolence of the prime universe, and I thought that was great.

I felt the idea that the MU people just easily adapted was pretty ridiculous. But then, they admitted SNW was an alternate timeline. It’s not a stretch that alternate extends to all the Secret Hideout productions.

I’m not sure I would feel the same about Picard given it depicts the Prime events of ST:2009. The others tho yeah I think of it that way too. Although The Chase does make that harder to swallow about DISCO

I liked the MU in DS9. It was fun to revisit and a great reminder of the Prime Directive. But… after that it got tiresome.

It was pretty benign there, but the problem with it, is finding it plausible. It was a fun idea in the 1960’s, and it had a good message. After that, it an indulgence. The notion that that the same people would even exist in the same fundamental places, and that the same ships would exist with virtually the same crew just seems like too much of a stretch even for modern Star Trek.

That’s my only complaint about this episode. Seeing the tantalus field show up would have been really cool. When Michael talked about how she was sure that Mirror Spock was a savage just like the other Terrans, I was sure that we would see a recording or something of Ethan Peck in a goatee to prove her wrong. Or flashbacks with Ethan Peck and Paul Wesley as their mirror counterparts would have also been cool.

All the stuff with the Breen and Mol and Lak was really cool though.

“ waste of ISS Enterprise” should be the official episode description.

waste of series

They ate Mirror Saru in season one…

Was that Saru or another Kelpian? It’s been a while since I watched Season 1, but I recall Mirror Saru saving Burnham from Tyler just as Voq’s personality re-emerged. I know Mirror Georgiou served Burnham some Kelpian, I just didn’t remember it being Mirror Saru.

Mirror Saru saved Michael from Tyler in The Wolf Inside, which was the episode that preceded the one in which they ate the food made from a Kelpien (Vaulting Ambition).

Looking at Memory Alpha now, it says that the chosen Kelpien ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVQSipQlJR8 ) was played by someone other than Doug Jones, but they look so much alike that I thought for sure she had chosen Mirror Saru.

As per Memory Alpha, we never saw him again after The Wolf Inside until season three, but that was in the alternate timeline Carl sent Georgiu to, so it wasn’t the same Mirror Saru.

Nope, that was another Kelpien.

“They ate Mirror Saru in season one…”

They didn’t.

Wasn’t Mirror Saru established as having survived in Season 3 (can’t remember the episode name).

A s per Memory Alpha, we never saw Mirror Saru again after The Wolf Inside until season three, but that was in the alternate timeline Carl sent Georgiu to, so it wasn’t the same Mirror Saru.

Loved this episode. I liked seeing the I.S.S Enterprise though i would of loved to of seen maybe a video log of Mirror Spock.

As a big fan of DS9 I’m glad we finally get to see what a breen looks like and the 32nd century breen outfits look great.

I enjoyed seeing Book/Burnham trying to get through to Moll/L’ak and i hope they can eventually get through to them. With this season about connections and 2nd chances i can see Book and Burnham talking both of them down before they do something that they can’t come back from.

The shot of the I.S.S Enterprise coming out of the ‘wormhole’ is probably one of my favorite CGI scene in all of Trek.

I’m glad they didn’t. I think the conceit of using the I.S.S. Enterprise was not much more than a budgetary decision to be able to use the sets. Could have made it a different constitution class, but then they don’t get to tell the story of the crew’s transformation into our society. Just don’t think about it too much.. because that universe is just pushing out its own doppelgängers into our universe.. which seems problematic. lol.

As a big fan of DS9 I’m glad we finally get to see what a breen looks like and the 32nd century breen outfits look great.

Any kind of big reveal was bound to be disappointing, I suppose. Still, the idea that they were just another latex alien was a letdown. I had always hoped that the Breen were gaseous or plasma creatures.

Ethan Peck with a goatee would have been EPIC

“This is the way.” 😉

But seriously that was a pretty good episode. I’d like to see a 31st century restored Terran empire that never went through “the burn.”

“ The reveal that L’ak is a Breen was a surprise ”

It really wasn’t, though. That was many viewers’ guess since the beginning of the season, and it’s been a common discussion on many websites. The surprise would have been if he HADN’T been a Breen.

I am on a lot of other sites and I haven’t heard anyone thinking he was Breen. And I don’t believe anyone voiced that in Trekmovie either.

LOL. It’s been a common theory.

Obviously not THAT common. LOL

I’ve seen the theory mentioned in the comments here on TrekMovie.

Yes, quite common from what I’ve been reading. I just commented on this very site a couple weeks back that I liked the idea, when somebody else theorized it (forget who it was)!

I guess it’s just where you go for these discussions but yeah the first YouTube review of episode one I saw theorized Lak was a Breen in the first scene he was in when he took off his helmet. And this was obviously before the species was mentioned on the show.

So yeah some people caught on the first episode the way others theorized Tyler was Voq the first time he showed up. Others needed more convincing.

I never saw it but I certainly don’t read the majority of comments. And almost never watch video reviews. Now Voq, was something I remember seeing in many places. Though in fairness, the amount of conjecture done about any Trek series for its Pilot and early couple episodes has been in my experience far more than what you see for most regular episodes. So that shouldn’t;t surprise me.

It was a surprise to me.

The Breen being so ordinary looking was a bit of a surprise.

Well, one of their forms are. It explains the frozen wasteland/tropical paradise. Their “evovled” form needs cryo suits, their “normal form” doesn’t

Was a surprise to me. Then again, I don’t run around the internet and over analyze the show.

This season started out so well. What happened? It’s falling apart.

I hate to a agree. But its once again a long slow burn (pardon the bun) that I fear is going to lead to another whimper of a conclusion. I feel like the season could have been a movie instead. Where is Chapel?!

Wrong show. Chapel is on SNW. The ending was rewritten and new scenes were shot to make it a series finale. They had already started shooting when they got the word that it was ending after season 5.

presumably on Her show, SNW?

“pardon the bun” …🍔⁉️

What’d that poor bun do for it to be in need of a pardon? 😋

This is what happens in every single season of Discovery. Two lovers who want to destroy the galaxy so they can get to paradise was the plot of season four, and now they are recycling the exact same plot for this season.

Did you watch the show. In no seasons has two lovers wanted to destroy the galaxy….Period. L’ak and Moll want to pay off their bounty. Nothing about what they are doing is about wanting to destroy the galaxy.

Outside of the destruction caused by the aliens referred to as 10-C, did any character want to destroy the galaxy let alone a couple. The only couple we had, was one person wanting peaceful means of communication to prevent destruction, while the other wanted to use force to ensure the destruction doesn’t occur. In no case does that equal people wanting to destroy a galaxy.

I can understand not liking the show, but to have such a misconstrued concept of the plot of the seasons shows a shocking lack of basic understanding of what the plot and motivations of the characters are.

I mean the show has plenty that one can find legitimate issues with. Thats not one of them.

They want to pay their bounty by giving a weapon of potential mass destruction to the Breen, thus destroying the galaxy, as seen in the time jumps last episode. They want to do that so they can escape to the Gamma Quadrant while the Breen take apart the Alpha Quadrant.

Last season the scientist wanted to let the 10-C species bulldoze the Alpha Quadrant so he could get across the galactic barrier to meet his lover in paradise, without caring what happened to trillions of other lives.

It is the same basic plot point. Your analysis is incorrect, Wood.

I think you’re overreacting a little. As always.

This episode was disappointing and fell flat. The return of the ISS Enterprise from the mirror universe was of no interest. I had hoped to possibility see a video log from Kirk, Spock, or another familiar character. Why not explore other Constitution Class Starships like the ISS Lexington, Hood, or Potemkin? Enterprise, Enterprise, Enterprise. (Sigh)

Maybe cause the enterprise is the trek ship pretty much everyone knows even if they are a new trek fan or a casual trek fan or not even a trek fan it is so engrained and intertwined with the name Star Trek that is why they chose to make it the iss enterprise instead of one of the others you mentioned

Because exploring a random ship isn’t the plot of the episode. It’s basically set dressing. Having it be the Enterprise versus a different Connie, gives it a tie to the lead character and part of her family she left behind. That it sorry wise. Another ship wouldn’t have any emotion aspect to the characters. Now production wise its to save a ton of money, as creating a random ship with multiple settings to take use of takes money (if your trying to give it the same level of production that you see for the primary ship). Now of course they could have just created a redress of an existing set to be random alien ship of the week. Those usually aren’t done to the same level of using the existing bridge set of another show. So it serves a small story purpose (ie a setting), it serves a small character purpose *reflection for Burnham, and it serves a production purpose (having high quality set pieces without having to build or do a serious redress and thus saving some money).

Seems rather obvious, to me.

I’m annoyed by what they seem to be doing with Owosekun and Detmer this season. I assume that the actors are absent because Paramount wanted to pay them less, and that’s poor treatment for characters who have been around since practically the beginning of the series.

“ I’m annoyed by what they seem to be doing with Owosekun and Detmer this season. ”

…as opposed to the previous four seasons, when all they did was sit in chairs and look meaningfully at each other?

Which is all Sulu and Chekov do in the average TOS episode. So yes, it’s aggravating for them to be replaced by other actors who are doing the same thing.

I doubt they are paid exorbitantly as recurring guests. It could be similar to what happened in season 4 and Bryce Ronnie Rowe Jr’s absences – he had another gig.

I have a theory that before it was decided that Disco would be cancelled, they were going to replace some of the characters. I think Owosekun and Detmer were going to be replaced, and also that Rayner would become captain and Burnham would go away to do something else. But then that didn’t work out, and so to us it just makes no sense why those two main characters are suddenly missing.

You might be right — I hadn’t considered that revamps due to cancellation might be involved.

Well… It is what it is . This was easily the worst episode of the 5. Tropes galore and really bad plot contrivances.

It feels like the reshoots for when they got the cancelation news are getting dropped in throughout the season. A lot of scenes appear grossly out of place. It feels like they just aren’t even trying anymore to be honest. As flawed as the show has been one thing that never came across among the other problems was a lack of trying.

I am loving the addition of Rayner and the professional Starfleet officer energy he is bringing to the ship. I also liked when he told Burnham the mission was too dangerous for the captain to go on. He is turning out to be a nice counterbalance to the unusual way Discovery has been run as a Starfleet ship after season 2.

I hope he doesn’t get killed off.

Sorry but this was another big fat ‘meh’ for me. This was very very disappointing. Nothing of consequence happened. We learn Mol and Lak backstory basically and it is cool we learn that Lak is a Breen which has been the leading theory since he showed up but it just felt sooo bare overall. Like another Discovery infamous spinning wheel episode where they do the bare minimum to move the plot along but just through a lot of action scenes and inconsequential dialogue to feel like we were getting any real development.

And the biggest elephant in the room (or dimensional wormhole) was the ISS Enterprise. Such a let down. It almost felt like a gimmick or just shoehorned fan service. There was no real reason it needed to be there other than HEY THE ENTERPRISE IS BACK!

Again one of the problems with this show, no real development just there for another connection. Think about what they did with In a Mirror Darkly on Enterprise. They brought in the Defiant as obvious fan service from TOS but the ship had a very vital part to the story. It helped changed the dynamics of the MU. It wasn’t there just for show like this was. And Anthony made a great point the redress felt like a joke. It just felt like an excuse to use the set but little else.

Here it was nothing more than just a backdrop and a really forced one at that. And the whole Saru thing just felt very contrived.

I did like all the Breen stuff though and hopefully they will be the big bad the rest of the season. I still think they should’ve used the Breen as the main villain for SNW instead of the Gorn but I digress.

But yeah this is probably the weakest one for me which is disappointing since last week is my favorite so far. I’m getting a little nervous now. It’s usually the second half of the season this show begins to falls apart but still open minded. Still enjoying it overall but please don’t end up a tedious bore like last season felt once it got to its mid season.

You have one last chance Discovery, make it count!

I never considered the Breen in SNW before, but that’s a cool idea. Yeah, I would’ve liked that much more than the Gorn.

For me it was literally the first Gorn episode I thought the Breen would’ve been a better idea. You get the same type of stories and it doesn’t feel like it’s breaking any canon like the Gorn obviously does. I ranted enough about it but nothing about their appearance on SNW feels remotely canon anymore.

But the Breen could’ve been a great substitute if they wanted a known species not named Klingons and zero canon issues.

Agreed. I always enjoyed the mysterious quality of the Breen. Seems ripe for exploration.

This season is largely working for me. Not as good as last week, but the chase is enjoyable. I have a little trouble buying that Mol and L’ak fell in love so fast. I would have liked to have seen that handled better.. but the slow burn of the plot works because of what they do to sustain individual episodes. Only episode I thought was kind of wasteful was the one on Trill.

That is a big part of the problem, yes. The characters have little chemistry.

The flashbacks took [place over an extended period of time, it wasnt THAT fast

They both felt like outcasts in their family/society, fusing them together like lightning. I had no problem with that as it gave me a Bonnie & Clyde-vibe which is historical.

It’s fine, but the romance piece just isn’t clicking for me.

Tarka was a similar situation last season with the reveal of his motivation not really moving me, but I’m also not the biggest fan of waiting several episodes to fill in a lot of backstory in a flashback. It’s not easy to pull off, and Discovery hasn’t really perfected it.

It’s a wonder I stuck with Lost as long as I did, now that I think about it.

“ it’s still the best season yet ”

Well, it was for the first two episodes, but the three since then have been a downward spiral. Seasons one and two were much better than this week’s episode and last week’s.

I’ve enjoyed it all except for the Trill episode. I think it’s been fun with a faster pace.. which has helped with a lot of issues that haven’t gone away. Raynor has been a very welcome addition to the cast.

Overall, very entertaining!

For complaints: any other constitution ship would be cool – but I also feel like we don’t know what happens next – there could be some Prime Mirror Universe people out there. & the “hit it!” joke felt like Dad was in the writer’s room.

Otherwise, I the pairings felt very TOS. Rayner is a little bit Serious Scotty when performing a captain’s role. And he took pride in rescuing her – which is feels good.

For me, this season has been 5/5.

Personal Log. Stardate: Today.

Week 4 of not-watching Discovery continues without incident. Opinions gleaned from critics on the latest episode seem to confirm that ‘mid-season malaise’ has been reached right on schedule.

Based on the collective opinion of commentators, there have been a grand total of one episode out of five that qualifies as “actually good”.

In conclusion, it appears the decision to not-watch until the penultimate episode has been vindicated. The plot points I am privy to following the one episode I watched are:

– There is a chase (or ‘The Chase 2.0’) for the Holy Grail / the technological marvel Salmone Jens left behind.

– The Cylon is now the First Officer.

– The Trill and the Robot are no longer together.

All in all, I remain confident that the recap at the beginning of the penultimate episode should be sufficient to fill in all the key points required.

Again, my thanks go out to the resolute souls who manage to endure what I could not.

these threads are for people to talk about the episodes they have seen. CLOSED.

Am I wrong or did the DS9 episode Through the Looking Glass make a reference to the Mirror Spock being on Romulus? Also given all the DS9 cross overs with the Mirror Universe you would think Burnham would have known something more about her brother’s counterpart.

Spock was not mentioned in Through the Looking Glass. We know between Crossover and the new dedication plaque of the ISS Enterprise that he reformed the Terran Empire and was killed for it. Burnham has clearly boned up on a lot of info since coming to this century, but easy to assume the future history of the mirror universe wasn’t part of that. Also, that info could have been lost or been classified.

Wow! The Breen. From CGI to burn victim.

Does anybody think the Commander Rainer is gonna become the Commandant of Starfleet Academy?

Everything involving Book is incredibly tedious. They brought back the ISS Enterprise as a way to resurrect the OG Enterprise in continuity. Perhaps it ends up as the Enterprise Q or whatever, if Saru is in command then ok. Burnham insisting on going on the away mission is diametrically opposed to how TNG dealt with this – e.g., when Riker as captain insisted on boarding the Borg cube in Best of Both Worlds, and his senior officers reminded him his place was on the bridge. I guess everyone got much dumber in the 32nd century, but “dumber” is Discovery’s whole concept.

This post missed an important Easter egg towards the end: Morn was at the bar “Red’s” just like he did on Quark’s on DS9.

We don’t call out or find every little egg, but when the bar was introduced last season we noted the Lurian (Morn’s species), who has been there ever since. We don’t usually do repeated easter egg bits for each episode

Yay! Good seeing the Breen again and their evolved design in the 32nd Century is great.

Boo! Pretty much everything else except Rayner who is the best character in the show.

Imagine they used the Star Trek: Tour set in Trekonderoga for the ISS Enterprise? What a cool surprise that would have been. But nope, we got the generic canon-breaking Discoprise. Not surprised.

I swear if they make the new Enterprise in the 3190s a refitted Constitution, I will facepalm. Just a stupid idea, when you have far superior tech and designs in the future time period. Please don’t, Disco-writers. Bad enough they did it with the Ent-G (one of my few criticisms of the great PIC S3).

here are 6 points for a reply to each of your issues with snw and dsc as a whole and this episode in particular

1.there is already a constitution class in the 32nd century it’s design was also used pre burn in the late 31st century so i dought they would refit iss enterprise like they did with the discovery plus they did say the ship was being taken to a federation storage facility

2.as for why they used the snw sets and cg assets well two reasons for one location/budget convenience as snw is shot in toronto at the same studio as dsc is and two they have said from the start they visually updated the 23rd century to fit visually better between ent era and tmp era mainly star trek 5/6

3.and there is nothing canon breaking about any of the new shows as they give explanations that tie back to enteprise and first contact since enterprise tied into that movie for the reasons of in unverse changes to the prime timeline universe and that is time travel to fix the past either on it’s own or part of the temporal cold war

4.and the temporal Cold War which later turned into the temporal wars is the reason the discovery was refited and givin the -A at the end of the registry is to hide the fact the ship and crew time traveled and broke the law agaisnt any form of time travel that was put into place after the temporal wars and a smaller part to protect starfleets butt

5.and if you have to don’t look at seasons 1 and 2 of dsc and snw as prequels to tos but as sequels to ent and then veiw ent as a sequal to first contact as i hear it makes it easier for some tos fans to enjoy these trek shows

6.or use the in universe reasons for the changes mentioned above in point 3 to be able to enjoy watching new trek shows mentioned above in point 5

Would it have been too much if Dr. Cho was instead Marlena Moreau? Just saying. Kind of like Dax in Jinaal… I feel like they are making all of these deep cuts, why not make them count a bit more to the overall lore, instead of just throwing the ISS Enterprise in with no good reason. Making these deep cuts actually count towards the overall lore might make the obvious (potential) budget cuts, set reuses, etc. be a bit more forgiving. Giving loved characters some finality that affect the course of this in our face galactic scale quest… might make it hit harder? Maybe I’m wrong, I’m sure someone here will think so lol

Overall the episode was okay. I do understand using the ISS Enterprise since this is supposed to be the final season of Discovery it was a nostalgia play and kind of wrap up the history of that ship in regards to the series. But overall it just seems kind of mashed together. Have to see how it ties in with the rest of the season.

I would say this episode along with the one before it were definitely the weakest of the season. They started out with a bang on the first few, and while I know that they tend to slow down in the middle of the season before ramping up the action for the final few, this episode dragged. There were also a few things with the Breen and the Enterprise that seemed a bit confusing:

– The Breen have 2 faces…great! Awesome twist to the species and fantastic to finally be able to see them after all the mystery around them in DS9. If the second face is supposed to be the more evolved one though, why do they need the masks and the suits? Can the more evolved face not breathe in a standard atmosphere? When L’ak and his uncle opened up their masks, they seemed fine, so there’s still quite a bit we don’t know about why they use that whole setup, especially when they’re around their own people

– Does the more evolved form extend past the face?

ISS Enterprise

– The stardate on the commemorative plaque is 32336.6. Popping that number into a couple of online stardate calculators puts that around mid-2355, which would be a few years before the prime universe Enterprise-D was commissioned in 2363. They mentioned that Dr. Cho came back to the Enterprise to hide the clue, so the assumption is that she also placed the plaque there at the same time. The timing doesn’t quite add up though because The Chase took place in 2369. Nobody would have known about The Progenitors or their technology before that, so they were at least 14 years off with the plaque

– If this Enterprise has been caught in extradimensional space since at least 2355, that means it’s been there for over 800 years by the time it’s discovered. How does it still have power?

– It’s been discussed by the Disco production team that the Discovery-era Enterprise was designed so that it could eventually be refit into the TOS Enterprise. The ISS Enterprise was contemporary with Kirk’s version and was seen on screen in TOS in that configuration. Why is the version in this episode the Discovery one? I know the real-world explanation is that it was easier to just re-use that model to align with the sets, but we saw a TOS-era Constitution class USS New Jersey at the Fleet Museum in Picard, so they had that model available to use. Just a bit sloppy

– How did Stamets immediately know that the ship exiting the wormhole was the ISS Enterprise and not a different prime Constitution class ship?

Photon Torpedo

– The solution to hold the wormhole open for the Enterprise to escape was to remove the payload from the torpedoes and replace them with antimatter. Photon torpedoes are matter/antimatter weapons, so this is a little confusing. Are they taking out the matter and just loading them with more antimatter?

I don’t know that it’s been there for 855 years.. not sure if it’s kind of like the Nexus or the black hole in Trek 09, where time does things differently. My guess is, that’s how the people on board were able to integrate into society. Their doppelgängers were long deceased.

Here’s the other thing… if the idea of revolution started with Mirror Spock, and the crew of the Enterprise more or less went along with him.. this is a way of explaining how they didn’t spread the idea to teh rest of the Empire.. they were lost in space and didn’t have much, if any, influence off of their own ship.

But they did spread the idea enough to weaken the empire to the point where it could be conquered.

Yeah I was wondering that also. It’s possible since it was extradimensional space that it didn’t put them in exactly the same time that they left. Also odd that they said Dr. Cho went BACK to the Enterprise to hide the clue. That’s a pretty risky trip unless the wormhole was more stable back in the 24th century.

It is strongly implied, if not explicitly stated, that the wormhole’s instability was caused by the Burn. So, it had to be more stable in the 24th century.

they never said that the ship would be refited into the tos version as they said those 60’s sets and ship model design would not look good or belivable as from our future with modern filming cameras they said from the start they visually updated the mid 23rd century to fit better visually between ent era designs and tmp era designs mainly using Star Trek 5/6 as the basis for the tmp era side of the designs

as for the new jersey that was just a pandering memberberry easter egg for the fans that hate the visual updates and even blass has said he objected to using the 60’s design for the ship and pointed out that it should have used the snw model for it and that it was all on terry who was more interested in filling episodes with those easter eggs and memberberries like all the stuff on daystrom station and for having data come back instead of having a brand new soong type android that was exactly as alton soong designed it to be a amalgamation of data lore lal and himself

I feel like I’m seeing the same episode over and over, what a waste this series is became.

Great episode! This season has really been fantastic so far. The writing has been consistent, the acting of the principals is fantastic, and the pacing has been great.

I really loved the scenes with Rayner in command. That worked so well!

Loved getting the backstory about Moll and L’ak – it really did add layers to their characters and their story. And the reveal that L’ak was a Breen! I never saw that coming! Was great to know more about the most underdeveloped and mysterious alien race in Trek history.

Seeing the ISS Entreprise was a treat! I am guessing it was lost quite some time after mirror Spock took over from mirror Kirk. Nice Easter Egg… better than having some unknown ship in there.

Looking forward to the remaining episodes.

Did anyone else see “Morn” (or one of his species) sitting at the bar in Red’s?

Yes, I did catch that. It was a fun detail.

Seriously, an episode doesn’t go by without at least one eye roll over the touchy feely huggy share my feeling vibe that is shoe-horned into worst places. I wonder what this series would be like if Bryan Fuller had stayed on…

It would had been .. a Star Trek show, not this happy sad feeling sharing at all costs every single time somebody speaks.

I have a question because I’m really confused:

So discovery originally was set less than a decade before ToS. (And then they ended up far in the future)

The ISS enterprise is a reference to the ToS episode about the mirror universe. So that means the ISS enterprise is a contemporary with ToS and the USS enterprise, which means Dr Cho (who was expressly stated to be Terran) was about back in Kirk’s day.

However the progenitor technology and science in general was only discovered in TNG under Picard and i think it was expressly stated that the scientists that hid this research were originally asked to research it after the discovery by Picard in the first place.

TNG is set in the 24th century but ToS is set in the 23rd century – theirs about a hundred years between them.

So I’m trying to understand the timeline here because at the moment, from what I understand, it’s a human from the 23rd century somehow became a scientist on a study in the late 24th century and then stole the research and helped hide it with her 4 pals.

No the iss enterprise entered that anomaly in the mid 24th century sometime after 2355 going by the stardate on that plaque and the ship got unstuck in time via the anomaly and the refugees and survivors of mirror Saru’s revolt ended up in the late 31st century prime verse timeline sometime prior to the burn happening and then doctor Cho who was one of those survivors returned later to the ship to hide the clue there before leaving again and never returning and wiping all references to the ship from records so that it would not easily be found

I thought for sure the Real Captain Lorca would be found in the transporters.

What a waste of an episode… filler and feelings…. Rinse and repeat

What an empty, disappointing episode. Discovery feels smaller and smaller every season.

the basic idea of the episode was already good. and it would have been really great to connect the MU and the 32nd century. in the end, however, the solution and especially the writing was weak. there could have been so much more …

what really annoys me is how owo and bryce are said goodbye with a side sentence, “so long …” and so on. the way DISCO treats secondary characters is really sad at times. there should have been much more space for a bridge member like owo … sad. again and again we are given hints of interesting background stories, but then nothing else happens. that’s really lousy. compare that to the way supporting characters in earlier series were built up into really multi-faceted carriers of stories …!!

This episode was the perfect opportunity for the series to bring back Prime Universe Lorca.

Instead of having Mirror Saru be the one that brings the ISS Enterprise from the Mirror Universe to the Prime Universe, it should have been Lorca that does it.

Additionally, they could have revealed that Lorca was STILL onboard the ship, trapped in the transporter buffer like Scotty was in Relics.

What Is Red Matter In Star Trek & Why Is It So Dangerous?

When taking on one of the most beloved sci-fi franchises of all time, J.J. Abrams made a calculated decision to attempt to ensure his success. Instead of earning the ire of fans by besmirching established canon, the 2009 "Star Trek" film became  one of the better Star Trek movies by entering a different timeline. Long before the Marvel Cinematic Universe doubled down on the multiverse, Abrams introduced a time travel plot line where Jim Kirk's (Chris Pine) father is killed by what appeared to be a lightning storm in space. This decision gave Abrams the advantage of calling back to mythology that fans were familiar with while introducing completely new concepts.

One such device was the devastating use of Red Matter. The invention is initially used to make a dying star inert before it goes supernova. Ambassador Spock (Leonard Nimoy) injects the amorphous substance into the star, intending that the Red Matter will create a black hole and consume the event. Unfortunately, he is too late, and the star goes supernova, destroying the nearby planet of Romulus. This tragedy starts a course of events where the Red Matter is weaponized for revenge. A surviving Romulan, Nero (Eric Bana), gets pulled into the black hole and, after capturing Spock, decides to use the Red Matter with terrifying consequences.

While Spock uses the substance in an attempt to save lives, Nero decides to take them. His actions with the Red Matter show how, in the wrong hands, it can yield unthinkable consequences.

Red Matter can cause genocide

Though Spock's intentions were pure, Red Matter is dangerous and should not be taken lightly. In essence, the substance creates a black hole in space that absorbs any material it touches. The technology can be used to contain exploding stars, but as Nero demonstrates in "Star Trek," it can also be mishandled and weaponized. Because the Red Matter creates a singularity in space, Nero uses it to destroy an entire civilization.

Wanting Spock to endure the pain that Nero felt watching his home destroyed, the Romulan plants Red Matter at the center of Vulcan. Just as it did with the star that went supernova, the substance creates a black hole that destroys Spock's entire planet. Both Spock Prime and this universe's Mr. Spock (Zachary Quinto) watch as their home is turned into nothing. Quinto's Spock beams to the surface of the planet to save who he can, and even though he is successful in rescuing his father and other Vulcan elders, he loses his mother after she falls into a chasm created by the planet-wide destruction.

Nero uses the Red Matter to become a war criminal, utterly unremorseful as he enacts genocide on an unsuspecting planet, even though Romulus has not even been destroyed in the Star Trek Kelvin timeline . The events of the film make it clear that, due to its incredible destructive power, Red Matter does more harm than good.

Screen Rant

Star trek: discovery season 5, episode 5 ending explained.

Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5 contains two major reveals about the Mirror Universe and the Breen. We break down what the ending means.

Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Discovery Season 5, Episode 5 - "Mirrors"

• Star Trek: Discovery's next clue is hidden aboard the Mirror Universe's ISS Enterprise trapped in interdimensional space.
• L'ak is a Breen with a blood bounty on his head, and his backstory with Moll is revealed.
• The USS Discovery crew, led by Commander Rayner, helps save Burnham and Book and bring the ISS Enterprise into the Prime Universe, but Moll and L'ak escape.

Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5, "Mirrors," ends with Captain Michael Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and the USS Discovery's crew grappling with jaw-dropping reveals about the Mirror Universe's ISS Enterprise, L'ak's (Elias Toufexis) species, and the next clue in the hunt for the Progenitors' treasure. Written by Johanna Lee and Carlos Cisco and directed by Jen McGowan, the thrilling "Mirrors" sends Burnham and Cleveland Booker (David Ajala) into interdimensional space after Moll (Eve Harlow) and L'ak and the third Progenitors' clue , but they found a lot more than they bargained for.

In Star Trek: Discovery s eason 5, episode 5, Captain Burnham, Cleveland Booker, Moll, and L'ak are all trapped aboard the derelict ISS Enterprise after Burnham's shuttle and L'ak's ship are destroyed by interdimensional space, a dangerous region between Star Trek 's Prime and Mirror Universes . Michael ingeniously uses the Enterprise's tractor beam to send a distress signal to the USS Discovery, where Commander Rayner (Callum Keith Rennie) and the bridge crew find a way to keep the aperture of the interdimensional space wormhole open to fly the ISS Enterprise through. However, L'ak and Moll make their escape, leaving Burnham, Book, and the Starfleet heroes to grapple with the third clue to the Progenitors' treasure, and what they learned and found in the wormhole.

The ISS Enterprise's first and only previous appearance was in Star Trek: The Original Series season 2's "Mirror, Mirror", which introduced the Mirror Universe.

Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 Returning Cast & New Character Guide

Captain kirk's mirror universe iss enterprise now belongs to 32nd century starfleet, it's been a long road for the iss enterprise.

The Mirror Universe's ISS Enterprise becomes the property of the 32nd century's Starfleet and United Federation of Planets at the end of Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5, "Mirrors." Captain Burnham assigned Lt. Commanders Kayla Detmer (Emily Coutts) and Joann Owosekun (Oyin Oladejo) - who don't actually appear in the episode - to fly the ISS Enterprise back to Federation HQ to be put into "storage". However, the acquisition of a major historical find like a 23rd-century Constitution Class starship filled with Terran Empire technology from the Mirror Universe is bound to be of interest to Dr. Kovich (David Cronenberg).

After the Temporal Wars, crossing over between the Mirror Universe and Star Trek 's Prime universe is now impossible, but the ISS Enteprise was trapped in interdimensional space for centuries, which crossing over could still happen.

Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5's ISS Enterprise scenes were filmed on the USS Enterprise sets of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds . Discovery season 5's production took place at the end of 2022, after Strange New Worlds season 2 had wrapped in June and long before Strange New Worlds season 3 filming started in December 2023. The USS Enterprise's bridge, medical bay, transporter room, and hallways were redressed to turn the starship into its Mirror Universe counterpart.

Commander Michael Burnham previously came aboard Captain Christopher Pike's (Anson Mount) USS Enterprise in Star Trek: Discovery season 2.

Star Trek: Discovery's Mirror Universe Revelations

We found out what happened to mirror spock and mirror saru.

Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5's ISS Enterprise appearance answered some big questions about the events of the Mirror Universe after Star Trek: The Original Series ' "Mirror, Mirror." Cleveland Booker learned from the plaque where the Enterprise's missing crew left their story behind that the Terran High Chancellor was assassinated after making reforms. This refers to the Mirror Universe's Spock (Leonard Nimoy), who was urged by the Prime Universe's Captain James T. Kirk (William Shatner) to make reforms to prevent the inevitable collapse of the Terran Empire, which happened anyway.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine 's Mirror Universe episodes revealed that the Terran Empire, weakened by Spock's reforms, was conquered by the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance.

Refugees led by a Kelpien slave-turned-rebel leader - Saru (Doug Jones) - used the ISS Enterprise to flee the Mirror Universe for the Prime Universe in the 23rd century, but the starship was trapped in interdimensional space. The Enterprise's crew eventually used the ship's shuttles and escape pods to abandon the starship in an effort to make it to the Prime Universe. Some did make it through, including the ISS Enterprise's junior science officer, Dr. Cho , who later joined Starfleet and became a branch Admiral in the 24th century.

Jinaal Bix redacted the names of the scientists who found the Progenitors' technology, including Dr. Cho.

Moll & L'ak Escaped Discovery With A Breen Bounty On Their Heads

L'ak is the nephew of the breen primarch.

Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 5 revealed the backstory of Moll and L'ak, including the revelation that L'ak is Breen . Years before Star Trek: Discovery season 5, Moll was a courier who sold latinum to the Breen Imperium, where she met L'ak, the nephew of the Breen's Primarch Ruhn (Tony Nappo), who had fallen out of favor and was working in the shuttle bay. Moll and L'ak fell in love , and L'ak committed a crime against the Breen by consorting with "a lesser being" and removing his helmet to show Moll his true face. Confronted by his uncle, L'ak shot the Primarch and fled with Moll.

Moll and L'ak used one of the ISS Enterprise's remaining warp pods to flee capture.

Moll and L'ak both have an Erigah, a Breen blood bounty, on their heads, and they hope that finding the Progenitors' treasure and selling it to the Breen will buy their freedom. Neither Moll and L'ak want the Federation's help offered by Captain Burnham, and they would "rather die" than be separated in a Federation prison. L'ak was injured in a brawl with Burnham, but instead of seeking medical attention from the USS Discovery, Moll and L'ak used one of the ISS Enterprise's remaining warp pods to flee capture. However, this time, Moll and L'ak left behind a warp trail Discovery can follow.

Cleveland Booker Tries To Connect With Moll

Booker's mentor was moll's absentee father.

Cleveland Booker has personal reasons to connect with and save Moll. Moll's real name is Malinne Booker, and she is the daughter of Book's late mentor, Cleveland Booker IV . Moll's father abandoned her and her mother to become a courier and raise the funds needed to move his family to a new home in the Gamma Quadrant. However, Booker IV's dangerous life as a courier and dealings with criminal organizations like the Emerald Chain made him keep his distance from Malinne, who blamed him for leaving her behind.

Moll doesn't want Cleveland Booker in her life.

Moll became a courier like her father to do what he didn't and earn enough latinum to move to the Gamma Quadrant, but Moll's entire world shifted when she fell in love with L'ak and the Breen placed a blood bounty on their head s. Moll doesn't want Cleveland Booker in her life , but she relents when she has the chance to kill the man who took her father's name. Whether Moll will ever come to see Book as the "only family" she has left, the way Book sees her, remains to be seen.

Commander Rayner Got The Best Out Of USS Discovery's Crew

Citrus mash for everyone.

Captain Burnham left Commander Rayner at the conn of the USS Discovery while she and Book went on their away mission, despite Rayner's reservations about leading Burnham's crew. However, Rayner was impressed that Burnhum learned Kellerun literature to connect with her new First Officer. This knowledge was the key to Rayner saving Burnham from interdimensional space. Burnham used the ISS Enterprise's tractor beam to send a signal the Kellerun commander would understand.

Rayner gained a new appreciation for Discovery's crew and how to work with them as his own crew.

Commander Rayner placed his trust in the USS Discovery's crew to "science" a way to open the wormhole's aperture and pull the ISS Enterprise into the Prime Universe. Commander Paul Stamets (Anthony Rapp). Lt. Sylvia Tilly (Mary Wiseman), Ensign Adira Tal (Blu del Barrio), Lt. Commander Gen Rhys (Patrick Kwok-Choon), Lt. Christopher (Orville Cummings), Lt. Linus (David Benjamin Tomlinson), Lt. Naya (Victoria Sawal), Lt. Commander Asha (Christina Dixon), and Lt. Gallo (Natalie Liconti) all rose to the occasion and found a way to save Burnham and Book. In turn, Rayner gained a new appreciation for Discovery's crew and how to work with them as his own crew.

Dr. Culber Reaches Out To Tilly

Culber has questions science can't answer.

The USS Discovery's counselor, Dr. Hugh Culber (Wilson Cruz), needs a counselor of his own. Culber continues to deal with the unimaginable experience of Trill scientist Jinaal Bix occupying his mind and body in Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 3, "Jinaal." Being taken over by a Trill has left Culber with existential questions, and he hopes finding the Progenitors' technology will provide him with the answers he seeks.

Hugh finds a sympathetic ear in Lt. Sylvia Tilly.

Unfortunately for Hugh, he doesn't believe he can share his feelings with his husband, Commander Paul Stamets because Paul is a man of science, and Culber's questions are ineffable. Hugh finds a sympathetic ear in Lt. Sylvia Tilly, but the answers Dr. Culber seeks are tied to what the USS Discovery finds when they locate the Progenitors' treasure - or so Hugh hopes. Culber, who has already died and been resurrected, may find himself in a new scenario that has pivotal life-or-death decisions in Star Trek: Discovery season 5.

Dr. Hugh Culber's dilemma in Star Trek: Discovery season 5 is a rare attempt by Star Trek to address spiritual questions.

Where Star Trek: Discovery's Next Progenitors' Treasure Clue Leads

The next clue involves water.

Captain Burnham acquired the third clue from Moll and L'ak, which is a vial of water contained within a piece of the Progenitors' treasure map. Burnham is waiting for Commander Stamets to conduct a chemical analysis of the water, which will reveal where the USS Discovery must go next for the 4th clue . However, Michael told Book that Dr. Cho, the former Terran scientist who became a Starfleet Admiral, went back to the ISS Enterprise in interdimensional space and hid her clue to the Progenitors' technology there.

Michael also told Book she saw him in the past during Star Trek: Discovery season 5, episode 4, "Face the Strange's" time loops, and that they were happy back then.

Burnham and Book mused over the lessons attached to each clue. On Trill, finding Jinaal's clue was dependent on Burnham and Booker proving they value lifeforms other than their own. On Lyrek for the first clue, the lesson was the importance of cultural context. Michael surmised that the lesson Dr. Cho left behind with her clue on the ISS Enterprise was to have the hope to shape your own future in Star Trek: Discovery season 5 as the search for the Progenitors' treasure and the answers to life, itself, continues.

New episodes of Star Trek: Discovery season 5 stream Thursdays on Paramount+

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Published Apr 5, 2024

RECAP | Star Trek: Discovery 501 - 'Red Directive'

There's never a dull moment for the U.S.S. Discovery!

SPOILER WARNING: This article contains story details and plot points for Star Trek: Discovery.

StarTrek.com

The fifth and final season of Star Trek: Discovery opens with " Red Directive, " where Captain Burnham and the crew of the U.S.S. Discovery are sent to retrieve a mysterious artifact hidden inside a 800-year-old Romulan vessel – but find that they’re not the only ones on the hunt. Meanwhile, Saru is offered the position of a lifetime.

• Michael Burnham
• Hugh Culber
• Paul Stamets
• Sylvia Tilly
• Laira Rillak
• Charles Vance
• Christopher
• Joann Owosekun
• Keyla Detmer
• Cleveland "Book" Booker

• Federation Headquarters
• U.S.S. Discovery -A
• U.S.S. Antares

As a vessel traverses the stars at high warp, Captain Michael Burnham experiences exhilaration as she clings to its hull in her environmental suit. The captain quips that there’s "never a dull moment" and proceeds to use her phaser in a bid to knock out the starship's engines. Burnham notes that they need to retrieve an item taken from a vault over the comm channel. As her suit advises her that warp bubble stability is declining rapidly, the captain remarks that this is not what she expected to happen when the night started…

"Red Directive"

Four hours earlier, Burnham joyfully converses with Ensign Adira Tal, Lt. Sylvia Tilly, Commander Paul Stamets, and Dr. Hugh Culber at Federation Headquarters, where Cadet Ross introduces them to Tonic 2161 — the official cocktail of the millennium celebration. Though the Federation was founded in 2161, the Burn prevented any widespread festivities when the holiday actually occurred decades before in 3161. Paired with a blue liquid, the beverage’s "floaty bits" — which taste like Bajoran jumja sticks — honor the Federation flag and its starry features.

The captain offers a smile, stating that it’s good to see that the Federation is back and at peace. Stamets nevertheless comes off as melancholic, and Culber discloses that the astromycologist just found out that Starfleet is shuttering the spore drive program. Paul expresses trepidation over his new title of "Scientific Luminary," adding that the Federation’s new Pathway Drive "won out" as the propulsion system of the future. Adira chimes in, remarking that this means the U.S.S. Discovery -A will always be one-of-a-kind, but Stamets replies with skepticism, believing his legacy was destroyed along with Cleveland "Book" Booker’s ship.

Certain he would have figured out the spore drive's navigator problem one day, the scientist emphasizes the potential for rolling out the technology to the whole fleet. His friends exchange concerned glances, but Captain Burnham then assures him that they will all find a new purpose and raises a glass in a toast to change. An aide informs Burnham that her presence has been requested by Federation President Laira Rillak, leaving Stamets to chastise himself for mentioning Book as the captain departs. While Tilly assures him that Burnham has not even talked about Book in months, Culber applies his psychiatric expertise and highlights the significant difference between locking something away and moving on. Tilly notices a fellow officer and goes to visit him, and the rest of the group disperses to "mingle."

On the dance floor, Captain Saru chats softly with Ni'Var's President T'Rina, who recognizes that the Kelpien has news and playfully wonders if she'll be "forced" to mind meld with him in order to learn what has transpired. President Rillak would like Saru to serve as a Federation Ambassador to a coalition of smaller worlds, ensuring that their needs are addressed as the Federation continues to expand. T'Rina appreciates the government’s effort to avoid repeating its past mistakes and observes that the planets’ locations could leave them open to influences from the Tholian Republic or the Breen Imperium.

Saru cites the Federation's need to remain unified, but the post would require that he resign his Starfleet commission. However, as an ambassador, he would be based at Federation HQ, in close proximity to T'Rina and her own duties. Ni'Var's president interrupts her dance partner, stating that — despite their deep love for one another — it is only logical that their relationship not factor into Saru's decision, an observation which seems to unsettle the Kelpien.

Across the room, Admiral Charles Vance approaches Captain Burnham and hands her an infinity-shaped device. The two retreat to a secure location — a featureless, all-white area known as the Infinity Room — and rendezvous with Dr. Kovich, who acknowledges the facility’s over-the-top theatricality. Turning to Burnham, Vance explains that an 800-year old science vessel was just found at the edge of the Beta Quadrant. Discovery needs to jump there immediately, but Kovich will only say that the ship contains "something vital to the security of the Federation." Burnham begins to object, but Kovich silences any disagreement when he reveals that the mission is a Red Directive.

Saru beams into Discovery 's Bridge and receives status reports from Lt. Christopher, Lt. Linus, Lt. Commander Joann Owosekun, Lt. Naya, Lt. Commander Gen Rhys, and Lt. Commander Keyla Detmer. Burnham and Kovich transport aboard and share that the crew will be going on a Red Directive classified mission. Their target? A 24th Century Romulan science vessel that will most certainly attract the attention of scavengers and other nefarious characters. A second Starfleet ship is already en route, but Discovery will arrive first — or so they believe…

Across the quadrant, two helmeted figures pillage the derelict Romulan starship, ultimately removing their protective gear and taking in the ship’s breathable atmosphere. The female — Moll — comments that the U.S.S. Antares is on its way, and her male cohort L’ak sees a second Starfleet ship on their scanners. L’ak believes this means that the Romulan cargo must be "extra shiny," but he suggests they call it a day and enjoy a holodeck for two. Moll asks if L’ak wants "the pebbles or the mountain," convincing her partner to stay the course.

Discovery enters scanning range, and Owosekun detects two lifeforms on the Romulan ship — at least until their lifesigns suddenly vanish. Burnham gathers Owosekun and Rhys for the away team, but Kovich offers some disturbing insight — setting weapons to stun might not be enough, so they are authorized to use lethal force. Shock covers Burnham's face, and Kovich orders her to successfully complete the mission by any means necessary.

The three Starfleet officers beam over to the Romulan vessel's darkened corridors with phasers drawn and begin searching for the trespassers. Aerosolized water droplets notify them that the intruders had not been gone long, and Burnham advises Rhys and Owosekun to keep their phasers on stun. The trio continue on and locate an 800-year old Romulan corpse and an uncloaked — and empty — vault. Realizing the scavengers must be close, the Starfleet officers spin around and open fire. Moll and L'ak materialize in front of them, managing to capture Rhys and Owosekun in containment fields and making their escape.

Captain Burnham pursues, converting her weapon into a phaser rifle and exchanging volleys with her opponents. Moll and L'ak step forward, holding the prize they acquired from the vault and tossing an explosive charge toward the captain. As the intruders beam away, Burnham is tossed through an opening and into space. Fortunately, her programmable matter EV suit automatically activates, and the captain jets toward the outline of Moll and L'ak's ship. Burnham magnetizes her suit as the craft enters warp.

As Burnham works to sabotage the engines, the U.S.S. Antares follows and grabs the ship with a tractor beam. Captain Rayner signals Burnham, who notices the warp bubble has started to collapse and urges the U.S.S. Antares to release its hold on the fleeing vessel. Operating on Burn-era tech and lacking a state-of-the-art Pathway Drive, Rayner knows the Antares can’t pull the enemy craft out of warp. Having previously encountered Moll and L'ak, Rayner is hesitant to let them elude him

Checking in from Discovery 's center seat, Saru informs Burnham — who doesn’t want to miss her upcoming saxophone lesson — that Owosekun and Rhys are being treated in Sickbay. Detmer pilots the Crossfield -class vessel into position and Lt. Gallo prepares to transport the captain to safety. The ride is bumpy, but Kovich resolves to remain on the Bridge until the mission is completed. Burnham repeats her warning to Rayner, advising that the breakup of Moll's ship would also destroy the Antares . Believing that every mission is personal, Rayner pushes back on Burnham's own record, but he eventually concedes.

The three starships, as well as Captain Burnham, drop out of warp. The intruders' vessel spouts numerous probes, and they all leap to warp on different courses. Burnham is beamed right to Discovery 's Bridge, barely able to catch her breath before Rayner's hologram appears to discuss what he describes as the "cherry that they just dropped on our shit sundae." Appearing with a stern face and pointed ears, Rayner states that the probes left behind 20 warp signatures, meaning it will take days to determine which course Moll and L'ak actually took. Kovich voices his displeasure, but Burnham admits she knows someone who can help them find the thieves.

Discovery jumps to a ringed planet, and its captain nervously strolls into the shuttlebay to greet Cleveland "Book" Booker, who beams in and requests permission to come aboard. The somewhat awkward reunion shifts into Discovery 's corridors, where Burnham announces her suspicion that Moll and L'ak used to be couriers. The Federation is expanding and most of the old networks are closed, but Burnham hopes Book's experience, expertise, and insight can assist them in determining the correct warp signature. The two acknowledge that it has been a while since they spoke, and Burnham commends him for the work he has done with the refugees who were affected by the Dark Matter Anomaly. Book is eager to "make things right" in the wake of stealing the experimental spore drive for his own ship.

Burnham and Book confer with Saru, Kovich, Vance, and Rayner in the Ready Room, where the Antares ' captain briefs them on what is known about Moll — a human — and L'ak, a member of an unknown species. The duo, who showed up in the sector approximately two years ago, procured a tan zhekran — a traditional Romulan puzzle box — from the science ship. Kovich claims he is not at liberty to share details about the item and shifts the conversation to Book's detective skills. Factoring in the need to avoid Federation territory and the few fencers who would have interest in a 24th Century haul, Book determines that Moll and L'ak are headed to meet with a broker named Fred — just "Fred" — on Q’Mau. Vance orders Burnham and Rayner to investigate, insisting that they try working together.

The officers begin to walk out, but Saru stays behind to speak with Captain Burnham in private. Noting that a tan zhekran can contain almost anything, including a weapon or a pathogen, the captain is concerned that Kovich won't even tell her the name of the Romulan scientist who owned it. Saru slyly suggests that someone outside of Discovery 's chain of command with access to different databases might be able to assist. Burnham responds with a joyous smile, her expression turning serious as she remembers Saru could soon be leaving for another post.

Back at Federation HQ, Lt. Tilly enters her quarters in the midst of an energetic chat with Lt. Jax. Lamenting over a cadet who refuses to leave the lab during the Academy's Simulation Week, Tilly outlines collaboration's importance to Starfleet's future and — very briefly — ponders whether she could crash every cadet onto an ice moon in order to teach them that lesson. Tilly attributes her talkativeness to the champagne served at the after party, and the two officers exchange flirtatious gazes.

Tilly and Jax — who both love walking and talking — share a clumsy goodbye that nevertheless elicits a smirk from the Academy instructor. Now alone, Tilly orders up a coffee from the replicator. The respite is short-lived, as an incoming communication from Captain Burnham provides another boost to Tilly's energy reserves. Theorizing that Tilly must have had some Andorian champagne, Burnham adopts her "serious voice" and asks Tilly for her help. Always available for her friends, Tilly gleefully responds, "Whatever it is, I’m in."

Discovery arrives at Q’Mau, where Burnham and Book beam down to a small settlement that is surrounded by a desert landscape and rocky outcroppings. Book remarks that it feels like their old courier days, and Burnham asks about Grudge — the Queen is great, she says, "Hi." They disagree about who should have made more of an effort to contact the other, but Rayner's arrival disperses the mounting tension.

Elsewhere in the marketplace, Moll and L'ak are scanned and welcomed into Fred's establishment. Fred, who has the distinctive appearance of a synthetic lifeform, maintains a friendly demeanor, though his guards supply the room with an air of hostility. Fred notices Moll and L'ak's "togetherness," spiritedly contrasting the bilabial nasal of "Moll" with the voiceless velar plosive of "L'ak." The thieves present Fred with their recent finds — isolinear coprocessors, vintage PADDS and tricorders, self-sealing stem bolts, and the mysterious puzzle box.

Intrigued, Fred mentions that he hasn’t encountered such an item in 622.7 years. He unlocks the box by shifting its features into a new configuration, revealing a handwritten diary. The android skims the text, happily offering Moll and L'ak three bars of latinum for the entire lot. The duo replies with a laugh, unsatisfied with the price. Fred refuses to return their items, prompting the pair to burst into hand-to-hand combat with his guards. Moll is struck by an energy blast from the synth’s weapon, and — though her wound is not fatal — L'ak launches into a violent frenzy that results in Fred’s demise.

Book, Burnham, and Rayner locate Fred's lair soon after and confiscate the synth's body so that Discovery can scan his memory. Rayner hurriedly sets off on his own, but Book and Burnham remain to plot their next move. As they realize that Moll and L'ak must have cloaked their ship outside the settlement, Dr. Culber observes Fred's corpse in Sickbay. The android is an old model — dozens of generations before the tech used for Gray’s body — marked with the serial number "AS0572Y." Stamets deduces that the "AS" was intended to honor Altan Soong*, marveling at the 24th Century scientist’s legacy. The astromycologist needs wires to interface with Fred's memory drive, quipping that — luckily — Culber had married a packrat.

Down on the planet's surface, Moll and L'ak speed by Rayner on sand runners — swift transports used by locals to navigate the terrain. Thanks to their patience and foresight, Burnham and Book had anticipated the chase and already rented three of the vehicles. Rayner isn't impressed by Burnham's "strategic advantages," leaving Discovery 's captain to tell Book that she hasn’t disliked someone this much in 930 years.

Meanwhile, at Federation HQ, two security officers burst into Tilly's quarters as the lieutenant prepares to break the shifting fractal encryption which safeguards a secure Federation database. Vance marches in and intervenes, who astonishingly agrees that Captain Burnham deserves to know why her crew is risking their lives for an 800-year old Romulan ship. The admiral says that it is a "shame" he didn't get to stop Tilly in time and allows her to unlock the file. A shaky holo-recording manifests, depicting Doctor Vellek* — the Romulan whose body they had found. The Romulan scientist warns that his knowledge of an ancient technology beyond all comprehension — hidden in the "shadow of twin moons" — must not be lost or fall into the wrong hands.

On Q’Mau, the Starfleet officers close in on Moll and L'ak, but Rayner ventures ahead once again. Book teases Burnham by claiming that Rayner reminds him of another captain he knows, but the situation intensifies once the thieves reach their starship. Moll and L'ak set course for a nearby mountain's tunnel system so as to avoid detection by Discovery and Antares , and sensors detect an explosive charge in one of the tunnel's entrances. Aware that their foes planned ahead to distract their pursuers with an avalanche. According to Saru, Zora estimates there to be a 30% chance that the disaster would decimate the settlement.

Captain Rayner proposes an unorthodox plan — detonate the charge themselves and block Moll and L'ak's escape route. Burnham disagrees, yet her counterpart insists that she is letting stats get in the way of strategy — though possible, an avalanche is unlikely. As Rayner orders Antares to lock phasers on target, Burnham contends that they are on a non-Federation planet and undertaking a classified mission, but Rayner follows through with his plan. Phaser beams strike down from orbit and seal the tunnel, yet Saru confirms that scans show the mountainside remains stable… at least until Moll and L'ak launch a photon torpedo that sends the rattled cliff into a freefall.

Burnham, Book, and Rayner flee from the rising debris cloud on their sand runners, but Zora announces that the avalanche is reaching speeds of 200 kilometers per hour — there is not enough time to evacuate the local encampment. In Engineering, Stamets and Adira run through several solutions, ultimately landing on the idea of combining Discovery and Antares ' shields to serve as a "brake" for the avalanche. Will it work? Stamets thinks — no, hopes — it will work, finally deciding, "Let’s go with 'hope.'"

Captain Saru starts to organize the maneuver, but Rayner does not want Antares to leave orbit and lose track of Moll and L'ak. Burnham emphasizes that the safety of the civilians in the avalanche's path is now their primary mission, and Rayner relents. Discovery and Antares burst through the atmosphere in a tight formation, fusing their shields together and burying their forward saucers into the planet's desert. The avalanche ripples against the energy barrier, but the starships triumphantly hold the line and inspire cheers from the settlement. The relief is lost on Rayner, who watches as Moll and L'ak escape to warp.

Rayner beams back to the Antares , giving Burnham and Book a moment to enjoy each other's company and confess that they both should have called one another. Still bruised from the ordeal, Burnham takes her admission a step further and reveals that she's not sure how to be around him anymore. Book considers the statement, countering that some things are hard to move past. The heart-to-heart is interrupted by a transmission from Tilly, who tells the captain that she has "wild" answers to her pressing questions.

The Discovery -A employs its spore drive to return to Federation Headquarters, where Captain Saru resolves to have his own private conversation with his partner. T'Rina expresses concern over rumors of Saru's eventful mission. The Kelpien reflects on the danger the civilians had faced and recalls something Tilly had once told him — "life is just a blink." Saru struggles to elaborate, aware that fear had constrained him from embracing love while dealing with the cullings of his youth.***

Had he been endangered by the avalanche, Saru would only have been able to think of T'Rina, therefore their relationship must be factored in as he considers his future. T'Rina is his home, his family, and so much more, and he intends to accept the ambassadorship to be alongside her — always. T’Rina welcomes the news, pleasantly surprising Saru when she proposes they "codify" their bond through marriage.

On Discovery , Captain Burnham enters Sickbay to get an update on Fred from Culber and Stamets. They downloaded the last 15 teraquads of data from his ocular processing unit, giving them an extended look at the pages of Vellek's diary. A handwritten diagram depicting the Vileen system's "twin moons" catches the captain's attention, sending her on a mission to meet Kovich on a holographic representation of a barren planetary surface. Kovich admires her tenacity but claims this Red Directive has been classified for centuries. His threat to pass the assignment to another team doesn't phase Burnham, who knows she holds the key to their target's location.

"The Chase"

Kovich lets out a sheepish grin, aware that Tilly and Vance played key parts in briefing the captain. He discontinues the holo, and — as the two stand in his office — he recounts the details. As one of the greatest scientists of his day, Dr. Vellek, was present when a Starfleet captain — Jean-Luc Picard — found a message left by a race of ancient beings — referred to as the "Progenitors" — who created every humanoid species in the galaxy.** Vellek discovered the technology that the Progenitors used to design life itself, but its location was lost when he disappeared 800 years ago.

Now, either Moll and L'ak know where this powerful find is or the diary is the first piece of the puzzle. Starfleet must track down this technology to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. Burnham divulges that Lyrek, a planet situated in an outer sector of the Beta Quadrant within the Vileen system, has three moons — two of which move in perfect sync. Pleased, Kovich proclaims that the greatest treasure in the known galaxy is out there, lightheartedly asking the captain what she’s waiting for. Burnham flashes a smile and replies, "Let’s fly."

* " Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 1 " — The dealer in Q'Mau, Fred, is a Soong-inspired synthetic possessed a memory drive that had a serial number with an attribution to Altan Soong. The self-described "mad scientist" is the son of Noonien Soong , the creator of Soong-type androids. Altan Soong would continue his work despite the Federation's ban on synths. His work (and Dr. Maddox's research), known as the Soong Method, on transferring sentience into an artificial golem body was what helped create Gray Tal's new synthetic body's design in "Anomaly."

** " The Chase " — This Star Trek: The Next Generation adventure was where Captain Jean-Luc Picard found himself in a race with the Cardassians, Klingons, and Romulans to solve a four billion year old genetic puzzle. The Romulan Dr. Vellek, one of the greatest scientists of his day, was among those present when Picard discovered a message left by a race of ancient beings known as Progenitors, who created life as we know it — every humanoid species in the galaxy.

*** " An Obol for Charon " — Following Saru's survival of Vahar'ai , he discovered that the maturation process didn't signal death. It was in fact a biological event in the Kelpien's evolution that removed their suppression of fear. Concerned with their own survival, the Ba'ul who lived on Kaminar with Kelpiens exploited their binary nature to oppress the later group.

• Written by Michelle Paradise
• Directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi

"Red Directive" features a dedication:

For JP, with love.

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Jay Stobie (he/him) is a freelance writer, author, and consultant who has contributed articles to StarTrek.com, Star Trek Explorer, and Star Trek Magazine, as well as to Star Wars Insider and StarWars.com. Learn more about Jay by visiting JayStobie.com or finding him on Twitter, Instagram, and other social media platforms at @StobiesGalaxy.

Star Trek: Discovery Seasons 1-4 are streaming exclusively on Paramount+ in the U.S., the UK, Canada, Switzerland, South Korea, Latin America, Germany, France, Italy, Australia and Austria. Seasons 2 and 3 also are available on the Pluto TV “Star Trek” channel in Switzerland, Germany and Austria. The series streams on Super Drama in Japan, TVNZ in New Zealand, and SkyShowtime in Spain, Portugal, Poland, The Nordics, The Netherlands, and Central and Eastern Europe and also airs on Cosmote TV in Greece. The series is distributed by Paramount Global Content Distribution.

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Original ‘Star Trek’ Enterprise Model Is Found After Being Missing for Decades

The 33-inch model surfaced on eBay after disappearing around 1979. An auction house is giving it to the son of Gene Roddenberry, the creator of “Star Trek.”

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By Emily Schmall

The first model of the U.S.S. Enterprise, the starship that appeared in the opening credits of the original “Star Trek” television series , has been returned to Eugene Roddenberry Jr., the son of the creator of the series, decades after it went missing.

“After a long journey, she’s home,” Mr. Roddenberry wrote on social media on Thursday.

For die-hard Trekkies, the model’s disappearance had become the subject of folklore, so an eBay listing last fall, with a starting bid of $1,000, didn’t go unnoticed.

“Red alert,” someone in an online costume and prop-making forum wrote, linking to the listing.

Mr. Roddenberry’s father, Gene Roddenberry, created the television series, which first aired in 1966 and ran for three seasons. It spawned numerous spinoffs, several films and a franchise that has included conventions and legions of devoted fans with an avid interest in memorabilia.

The seller of the model was bombarded with inquiries and quickly took the listing down.

The seller contacted Heritage Auctions to authenticate it, the auction house’s executive vice president, Joe Maddalena, said on Saturday. As soon as the seller, who said he had found it in a storage unit, brought it to the auction house’s office in Beverly Hills, Calif., Mr. Maddalena said he knew it was real.

“That’s when I reached out to Rod to say, ‘We’ve got this. This is it,’” he said, adding that the model was being transferred to Mr. Roddenberry.

Mr. Roddenberry, who is known as Rod, said on Saturday that he would restore the model and seek to have it displayed in a museum or other institution. He said reclaiming the item had only piqued his interest in the circumstances about its disappearance.

“Whoever borrowed it or misplaced it or lost it, something happened somewhere,” he said. “Where’s it been?”

It was unclear how the model ended up in the storage unit and who had it before its discovery.

The original U.S.S. Enterprise, a 33-inch model, was mostly made of solid wood by Richard C. Datin, a model maker for the Howard Anderson Company, a special-effects company that created the opening credits for some of the 20th century’s biggest TV shows .

An enlarged 11-foot model was used in subsequent “Star Trek” television episodes, and is now part of the permanent collection of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum , where it was donated by Paramount Studios in 1974.

Mr. Roddenberry, who said he gave the seller a “reward” for its recovery but did not disclose the terms, assembled a group of “Star Trek” production veterans, model makers and restoration specialists in Beverly Hills to authenticate the find.

The group included a “Star Trek” art supervisor, Michael Okuda, and his wife, Denise, an artist on “Star Trek” television series and films, and Gary Kerr, a “Trek x-pert” who served as technical consultant for the Smithsonian during a 2016 restoration of the 11-foot model.

“We spent at least an hour photographing it, inspecting the paint, inspecting the dirt, looking under the base, the patina on the stem, the grain in the wood,” Mr. Roddenberry said.

“It was a unanimous ‘This is 100 percent the one,’” he said.

Gene Roddenberry, who died in 1991 , kept the original model, which appeared in the show’s opening credits and pilot episode, on his desk.

Mr. Kerr compared the model to 1960s photos he had of the model on Mr. Roddenberry’s desk.

“The wood grain matched exactly, so that was it,” he said on Saturday.

The model went missing after Mr. Roddenberry lent it to the makers of “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” which was released in 1979, Mr. Maddalena said.

“This is a major discovery,” he said, likening the model to the ruby slippers from “The Wizard of Oz,” a prop that was stolen in 2005 and recovered by the F.B.I. in 2018, and that Heritage Auctions is selling.

While the slippers represent hope, he said, the starship Enterprise model “represents dreams.”

“It’s a portal to what could be,” he said.

Emily Schmall covers breaking news and feature stories and is based in Chicago. More about Emily Schmall

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