This is actually a very interesting episode. Like they’ve been doing all season, Strange New Worlds is highlighting one crew member, taking the time to character develop, and I think they’ve been doing a fantastic job of it. This time it’s Uhura. Ensign Uhura, specifically.
This is Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, season 2, episode 6, “Lost in Translation.” What’s really interesting about the whole thing is you get a chance to see her cognitive abilities, but also her reasoning. Her ability to take a look and go, okay, this is what’s going on. There’s more to it than being the communications officer. It’s about being alert and being very aware.
A Routine Mission at a Gas Station
The episode starts with the Enterprise on a routine mission. I say routine, but the Enterprise has been brought to this very interesting deuterium field, almost like a nebular gas giant. Deuterium is essentially a type of fuel that the Federation uses. Everyone knows about the nacelles, and the nacelles have those big red things in front. I’ve always called them the buzzard collectors, but I guess they’re called the Bussard collectors. Generally speaking, they pull in various forms of radiation from space and see what they can do with it. Sometimes you can use it just for sensors. Sometimes you can use it for actually pulling in and collecting deuterium to use in the warp core reaction, specifically the injectors. So it literally is like fuel into the engine. It’s your gas line.
Sorry. Very technical tangent. Forgive me for that.
What you find out is Pike’s got this nice, new, cool badge. He’s been named Fleet Captain. It’s the station, the Farragut and the Enterprise, so he’s Fleet Captain of two ships and the station itself. The station’s been having trouble getting online. It should’ve been online like six months prior, so they sent them there, and specifically what they wanted was the cold, hard efficiency of a specific Number One. And hey, it doesn’t hurt that she’s got Pelia, who is a hundreds of years old engineer.
So that’s what you end up with: two plots. One is the Uhura plot, with the hallucinations and whatnot. The other is this interesting conversation that’s happening between Pelia and Number One.
The Sound Nobody Else Can Hear
Pike is in the process of pontificating, as he will do, and he happens to catch Uhura asleep at the wheel. She didn’t get much sleep. Her duty roster shows she’s been super busy, and she’s just really been working hard at this whole thing, trying to coordinate the efforts of the Farragut, the Enterprise and of course the station itself. What does Uhura do? She overworks herself, of course.
She’s having trouble sleeping, and she begins to hear a sound. It’s a very specific sound. She hears it, she tries to play it back, and Pike’s like, well, I’m here, let me hear the recording. There is none. That’s our first inclination that there’s something more happening with her than we may have thought.
Then she wants to calibrate some things, and she goes to the nacelles. I guess the wiring for the communications antenna array goes through the nacelles. She’s watching an old video of Hemmer, who, by the way, we get in this episode. Even though it’s Hemmer in a recording, it’s new footage. They actually got the actor back, and I thought it was really cool to see him again in that role. There are some interesting callbacks to him throughout the episode too.
Pelia shows up and she’s like, what are you doing up here? And Uhura says, well, I had some issues in the past, and I used to ask for these adjustments so often that Hemmer finally just said, let me train you how to do it, and they did a recording.
So she goes on the turbolift, and while she’s on the turbolift she hears the sound, and right after it she sees zombie Hemmer. I’m calling him zombie. It’s rough. He looks rough. She’s immediately freaked out.
We cut to her in sickbay, and M’Benga is explaining that because she was in the nacelle room, she has a slight form of deuterium poisoning. Deuterium poisoning can cause hallucinations. Couple that with her lack of sleep, which he catches on the monitors as well, and what you end up with is the realization that she’s exhausted. He basically says she can’t work. You’re done for now, you’ve got to get some rest, you’re off duty. Which she hates.
The Hair Thing, and the Field
Back on the station, they’re trying to get some things working. Una’s getting frustrated. Pelia is sort of butting heads with her, and it comes down to priorities in terms of how to get the thing up and running. Una is really trying to flex hard on her, which is a little uncharacteristic of Una, but you find out a little bit of why later.
Then Uhura wakes up, and she’s got this really cool hair thing on, and I’m sitting here loving it. I love whenever they allow the characters to show their culture. I think it’s one of those features where I sit here and go, that’s so cool, that we’re now at a stage where we’re able to go deeper than surface. Past skin color or ethnicity, and into, hey, here is a cultural difference with this person. We used to take the time with Vulcans and other people and whatnot. Shout out to the Tellarite in the bar this episode, too.
She can’t sleep. She hears the sound, she stands up, and she’s in a large green field, outside. And she’s like, oh, this isn’t normal, this isn’t right. She’s realizing more and more that whatever the thing is, it’s getting worse.
The Kirk Brothers
Then we cut to the transporter room, and a certain Sam Kirk is greeting his brother. We get to see Lieutenant James Kirk, and it’s fun. They go to the bar, they get to walk around, and you get this interesting discussion about their past.
What’s great is we’ve always known a little bit about the relationship from the original series, as well as some B canon books. But seeing them together, with that back and forth that’s very brotherly, is something else. I have my own brother, and I love him to death, but there are times we’ve sort of pecked at each other. What are you doing, what am I doing, what’s going on.
Then you find out James Kirk has been promoted to first officer of the Farragut. Youngest first officer in the fleet. And who was the youngest first officer in the fleet before him? One George Kirk, of the Kelvin.
I thought it was so interesting that they took the opportunity to name drop the Kelvin and name drop George. And if you hear “Kelvin” and your head goes to the Kelvin timeline, this has nothing to do with that. In the original series, James Kirk and his brother were always striving for their father’s approval, because he’d been such a success in Starfleet. That’s what this scene is playing.
So Sam, and I’m calling it what it is, Sam’s being the childish brother. Oh, there you are, you’re making me look bad. Dad has an idea of success, and it looks an awful lot like you. And I’m like, dude, can you be more petty?
You also find out Sam’s first name is George, which we’ve known, but I never made the connection that he was named after his father. So essentially Sam Kirk is a junior. Sam walks away sort of pouty, and James is left there.
A Coda Stuck in the Middle
There’s a quick cut in with Una, and it’s more of Una and Pelia butting heads. But then we cut to a weird sort of stuck in the middle coda piece that I don’t know belonged in this episode. I guess it’s fine.
It’s Spock and Chapel, playing three-dimensional chess. Chapel’s losing, or at the very least being condescended to, not that Spock intends to. Spock is essentially letting her know: listen, there are rules and regulations, things we’ve got to do. And she’s like, I don’t know if I want to go tell, because fraternization requires you to inform that it’s happening. If we say something, it’s an actual thing at that point. And she uses the example of Schrödinger’s cat: at any given point it’s both true that the cat is alive and dead at the same time. It’s a long thing. The Big Bang Theory exhaustively taught us all about it.
The Meet Cute, and the Punch
Uhura goes down to the bar. She’s trying to talk a little bit about what she thinks might be going on, and essentially she’s like, look, I understand, nobody gets it, everybody thinks I’m crazy or tired. She sits down at the bar, and this is the meet cute of Uhura and Kirk. First time they encounter one another.
Uhura is literally like, look, I’m not looking to be hit on. And he’s like, wait, wait. Kirk makes the assumption: oh, Sam does this, he hits on you guys. So Kirk kind of has to apologetically go, yeah, okay. He’s basically just being himself, which is charming.
She gets up to leave, she’s out in the hall, she hears the sound again, and she has another hallucination. This time it’s bodies strewn across the hall. Then she turns and you see another her, with a knife, who tries to attack her. So she fights it out and punches the other her, only to wake up and find she’s punched Kirk. And he’s like, I told you, I’m not trying to hit on you.
Rather than going to sickbay and having to explain why she struck a superior officer, they go back to her quarters. She has a dermal regenerator, and she wants to make sure he’s okay. And he’s like, look, I’ve been through crazy stuff before. I believe you. Now Kirk is helping Uhura investigate. Very cool.
The Saboteur
Back at the station, they uncover a saboteur. I think his name is Lieutenant Ramon. He’s also hearing the sound and going crazy like Uhura, and his whole thing is: this isn’t real, this isn’t real, this isn’t real. He’s trying to tell himself the stuff isn’t real.
What you start to understand is that this scenario gets so dangerous because you don’t know what’s real. You don’t know if what you’re encountering right this moment is reality or not. I think that’s a huge part of this whole thing.
They bring him back to the Enterprise. Uhura has his medical scan and her own information, and Kirk says, look, I’ll take the information over to the Farragut and get some more details. They scan Ramon, and he’s way worse off than she is, to the point that he almost can’t communicate, because the language centers of his brain have been fried.
Uhura rushes up to the bridge on a red alert, and as they’re sitting there the screen starts to crack and explodes out, and everyone is blown out except her. That’s when she wakes up. Pike’s like, I thought you were on leave. And she’s like, yeah, it’s getting worse.
She sits down with Pike to talk, and that’s when Kirk shows up. This is when Kirk officially meets Pike. Up until this point the only time they’ve met is in the alternate future where Kirk is the captain of the Farragut, so that’s interesting. Now we get to see their meet cute, if you will.
Meanwhile, they go back to sickbay, and Ramon has escaped. He’s starting to sabotage the ship, and there’s a reason for that. She eventually finds him in the same nacelle room, trying to disable something. He’s sabotaging a portion of the ship, Kirk shows up and does an emergency transport, the entire area blows out of the ship, and dude, Ramon’s dead.
There’s also this weird bit where La’an passes Kirk in the hall. He’s waiting, and they sort of have this will they talk, won’t they talk moment, because she’s still reeling from her experiences. Again, there are a lot of things peppered throughout this episode that, for an episodic series, felt very much like we’re trying to member berry you already, from two episodes ago, or three episodes ago, or whatever. It was a little jarring, but not distracting, if that makes sense.
What If We’re Thinking About This Wrong
Kirk helps Uhura figure some things out. He wants her to explain what she’s seen, and she gets into a little bit about her family and the shuttle accident that took her parents. Eventually you get to this realization: we need someone’s help, because I think someone might be trying to communicate with us. She’s like, the scans are specifically hitting the communication centers of the brain. What if we’re thinking about this whole thing wrong?
This is what Star Trek does really well. It shows you a scenario that seems cut and dried, and then says, now let’s flip it. It’s very much like Doctor Who in that respect, where Doctor Who will show you something that looks supernatural and then give you this wonderfully scientific alien reason, and you go, oh my gosh, that makes so much sense. Same thing here. You sit there and go, okay, what if these were never hallucinations at all?
They go see Sam, because Sam’s a xenobiologist. She lays it out for him, hypothetically speaking, and he goes, yeah, in a hypothetical world, they could be trying to communicate. So what are they trying to communicate?
This is what I was talking about at the very beginning. She uses her communications training and her understanding, and she really works through the puzzle of it. I loved watching her uncover this thing, because you’re sitting there going, oh my gosh, this is like an auditory communications Sherlock Holmes.
She talks through the whole scenario, and you realize that at every step it’s been about one thing: whatever the aliens are, they’re in trouble. Then they come to the conclusion. We’re pulling them in. What if, in the process of pulling them in and refining them, we’re actually killing them? That’s everything she’s been shown.
Pike Says Okay
Uhura shouts up that we’ve got to stop, and the answer that comes back is, I already brought it online.
We cut to the bridge. She’s telling Pike what has to happen, and at one point he’s like, walk me through this. She explains it. He asks, are you certain? And now zombie Hemmer is there again, but this time he’s the point of communication with her. So she says yes, I’m absolutely certain. He goes, what do we need to do? You need to evacuate everybody, and as soon as you evacuate everybody, you destroy the station.
And he’s like, okay. All right, everybody, do it.
This is what I love. It’s the trust you’re building in your people, and their ability to go, Captain, this is what’s happening, and he goes, okay, then let’s do that. And they do. As soon as the station is destroyed, Pike’s like, is everything better? Zombie Hemmer is now regular Hemmer again. It’s wonderful to see the actor in that role, and I’m excited and encouraged just to see him again, because Hemmer was such a cool part of her life and was so significant. And she’s like, yeah. It’s good.
Una and Pelia Have Their Moment
They evacuate on these escape shuttles, and it’s on the shuttle away from the station that Una and Pelia have their moment.
Una’s like, you gave me a C, and this, and that. And Pelia says, I understand, and if you want to keep saying that’s the reason, fine, I won’t argue with you. But I think the truth is this: you lost your friend Hemmer. I show up replacing him. And every time you see me, you get frustrated and angry.
It’s a good moment. It’s a good come to Jesus moment in terms of how these two communicate. And think about it. You have Una, who potentially could live for centuries herself as an Illyrian with her genetic modifications, just like her lawyer friend had lived for a good long time. And you have Pelia, who is from a long-lived species. Those are very interesting roles they’re laying out.
Overall, I love the story beats. But the episode felt a little bit like a mess in terms of all the things they kept trying to member berry us with. I’m hoping all of this is building to something, which I know it’s not supposed to, because it’s episodic.
Next week is the brand new episode, and I believe we’re going to get our crossover. I’ll see if I can shake, rattle and roll Mrs. Know-It-All and Baby Know-It-All into joining me for that one, because it’s going to be a lot of fun, and I’m ready for it.
The Verdict
Strange New Worlds “Lost in Translation” lands at a solid 8.5 out of 10 on the Know-It-All Index.
I feel like it was a good episode. A little messy in some bits, but the parts that hit, hit well. I love seeing Uhura come into this place of, this is who I am as a professional. And she’s earning and building the love, trust and respect of Kirk, which will come in the future.
Before I miss it, there’s also that moment at the very, very end when Spock joins Uhura and Kirk. It’s awesome, because it’s their meet cute. Essentially they’re saying that in this episode Spock met Kirk here, and Uhura met Kirk here. She’s like, well, you should join us, and they pull back, and it’s wonderfully reminiscent of things to come.
Drop a comment on the video above and let me know what you thought of the episode. I’d love to hear your opinions.
