Star Trek: Discovery (TV Series) New Eden (2019) User Reviews

Finally it feels like Star Trek!

[asp5197 · 7/10 · 25 January 2019]

The first season had its strengths, but for every strength it seemed to have at least one deep flaw. Lorca wasn't everyone's cup of tea, but two episodes in with the arrival of Captain Pike, the exploratory tone of the show for which many Trekkies like myself flocked to The Orville is all but restored.

Exploratory missions to seek out new life and new civilizations, the main element that makes Star Trek Star Trek, are back. This episode had an excellent pure-Trek Prime Directive centered story, great acting, great writing, great direction (let's face it, anything Jonathan Frakes directs turns to pure gold), and an interesting moral complex.

Anson Mount is just an incredible addition to this cast, perfectly cast as Captain Pike. With Pike's leadership style on the bridge plus Saru finally gaining confidence to command it is beginning to feel more like an ensemble cast than a show revolving around Michael Burnham. I feel like that is exactly what this show needs, and with Kurtzman at the helm Discovery and Star Trek in general is moving in the right direction.

The most pure Star Trek Discovery has shown us yet.

[SethaWhenTheWallsFell · 9/10 · 25 January 2019]

This weeks New Eden was yet another example that the new regime behind Discovery are making strides in bringing the spirit of Star Trek into this series. The story involving a prewarp civilization of humans, a science and faith conundrum, and plenty of discussion of the prime directive (general order one).

Trek in the past has played fast and loose with prime directive stories. The best have always found clever ways to bend the rules enough to provide aid without damaging the society. The worst have shown our captains just blatantly disregarding it because it doesn't fit the stories trajectory.

New Eden stands with the good episodes. It is a thoughtful exploration of the concept made more complicated by the fact that it involves Humans removed from Earth before the invention of warp drive technology.

The cast continues to develop and the other bridge officers actually get things to do. This all contributes to what is most assuradly the best Star Trek episode of Discovery yet.

Brilliant episode!

[dwndraper · 9/10 · 25 January 2019]

You could see Johnathan Frake who directed this episode Star Trek influence.

THIS IS STAR TREK

[martymasta · 10/10 · 25 January 2019]

This is the best episode in the show so far, it really felt like Star Trek, mystery, not focused on just a single character, loved it! Hope they keep this up

An actual star trek episode

[umer_salman · 10/10 · 25 January 2019]

Credit where it is due, this actually felt like a star trek episode.

Thank you Frakes

[Xamalion · 10/10 · 26 January 2019]

Finally this is becoming an ensemble show. Was about time. Finally there are glimpses of the federation we know.

Today's Episode S02E02 was the best so far

[sanwit · 8/10 · 25 January 2019]

I couldn't believe it when the credits started to roll that it had ended. I honestly was so transfixed on the screen. I loved this episode. Overall, a good series. But this season has taken it up a notch with regards to production value, production design, VFX, and now, the storyline. Hope I didn't jinx it, and it keeps getting better!

Getting Better...still has a way to go.

[mozillameister · 6/10 · 25 January 2019]

Discovery has been one of the most frustrating shows I've watched in a while. It has good actors playing annoyingly obnoxious characters in cliche'd story arcs.

Finally Discovery delves into a very Trek-like scenario, specifically with a Prime Directive issue. Although I find the survivors new religion highly unlikely to develop and cliche'd concept (something someone with a Coexist bumper sticker would have thought of...but not survivors of a post apocalypse whom are primarily Christian), it was a interesting and entertaining scenario, especially since Discovery has had like maybe 3 real Trek episodes.

My problem with this episode is that the scenario on the planet plays 3rd fiddle with everything else in the show: Discovery/Tilly's adventure with spores, and the season arc. 2nd time in a row Tilly saves the day with an idea that should have been thought of by the rest of the crew, and the planet's purpose was more to enhance the season arc than the scenario itself. Too much time was spent on both that less then a 1/3 was dedicated to the planet expedition.

Even Burnham plays more of a role than deserving so. Instead of learning from Pike about humility and compassion, she seems as a character more interested in proving him wrong and teaching him lessons. Would have preferred if their conversation on the ship never took place and Pike went back on the planet on his own accord. That would make him a much more nuanced character instead of being lectured by Burnham of all people....

It's saying something though that the 2 best episodes of Discovery were helmed by TNG's Frakes. The frantic pace of the past episode is thankfully gone and the episode is stronger for it.

In sum, although I enjoyed parts of New Eden, truthfully Discovery gets in its own way too often to make the episode excel.

A welcome return to Star Trek

[rod_burley204 · 8/10 · 26 January 2019]

The best episode so far, although the previous one was equally good. Anson Mount is making Pike his own character and steals every scene that he is in. Jonathan Frakes continues to prove his Direction skills and love for Star Trek continues. Hopefully he will be directing more episodes soon.

New Eden

[Prismark10 · 6/10 · 2 February 2019]

The one thing left unexplored in the Star Trek saga is Captain Pike. We see the older character in the rebooted movies.

Discovery has the masterstroke of bringing in the younger Pike. Tha man who captained the Enterprise before Kirk. The person we saw in the pilot episode, The Cage.

With Jonathan Frakes as director this certainly feels like an ensemble Star Trek show with familiar conundrums.

New Eden sees Discovery following the a red signal into the Beta Quadrant with Stamets help once again.

They find a small human colony and a church. These are the descendants of survivors from World War III who arrived here somehow 200 years ago.

Pike and Burnham beam in to investigate. They find a group of people who were somehow saved and have combined their beliefs. However the group also contains people of science.

Tilly is meanwhile experimenting with the dark matter asteroid which injures her. She has a vision. Burnham tells Pike of the vision of the red angel she had.

There is a stronger arc here than the first series which was trying to find its feet. It is the red beams, the angel, the manifestation of visions. Also hovering is the character of Spock.

I did feel that Tilly using the dark asteroid as some kind of invisible magnet was just a little too neat and convenient.

Star Trek Discovery rocks.

[chc-10 · 10/10 · 25 January 2019]

This is such a well-written episode with equal parts humor, adventure, and heart. The long form story telling of Discovery allows this season to slowly unfurl revealing glimpses only of the greater mystery the mysterious lights hold.

This episode shows that a greater force is pulling the strings of Discovery, Bourman and stilly while revealing a more ecumenical side of Capt Pike.

Discovery has discovered a second light and tracks it to a planet in the beta quadrant using the spore drive (you didn't think it was gone did you?). Stamits tells Tilly of his trepidation about going into the mycelium network and getting lost with his lover Hugh. Tilly, concerned for her friend, is determined to find a way to use the dark matter asteroid to replace Stamits. However, in taking a tiny piece weighing tons, Tilly is injured.

The Discovery jumps to the location to find a lost human colony that apparently was transported to the planet over two hundred years earlier. The away team learns that they are a faith based community that believes an angel brought them there.

Back in Discovery, it is learned that the radioactive rings are falling towards the planet and will destroy it with the hour.

In sickbay, Tilly is awakened by a long friend who inspires her to figure out a way to use the asteroid to save the planet. She goes to the bridge San uniform to directvthis plan.

Back in the planet, the caretaker of the church who was responsible for transmitting a distress call believes he knows that the away team is from Earth. Pike, however, has ordered that secret to stay secret.

Discovery saves the planet with cool special effects and Tilky searches the computer database for her friend... only to learn that she died when she was 16. The helper was no whom she appeared to be.

After the away team equipment was stolen, and a phased was subsequently played with by a young girl, Pike saved the girl by grabbing the phaser and hurting himself in the process. The away team took Pike into the church where they beamed back to the Discovery- but not before being seen doing so by the church elder and caretaker. The elder believed the angel had returned. The caretaker knew better.

After Pike recovered, Burnam revealed to him her own vision of the angel from the previous episode on the asteroid. After a heart-to-heart with Burns, Pike decided to reveal himself to the caretaker. This answered his questions. Pike gave him a power elk to light the church and the caretaker gave Pike a Helmut camera with video of what happened two hundred years earlier.

Back in Discovery Pike viewer the video of soldiers and others inside the church on Earth, bright lights appearing, and then the angel at the door briefly before the video stopped.

Much better but still...

[maximvanluttikhuizen · 6/10 · 26 January 2019]

After a rough start with some bad writing choices, the producers decided to place veteran Star Trek actor/director Jonathan Frakes at the helm. Also they seem to have listened to some of the criticism after the first season. The result is an episode that is much better then previous episodes but still I have some doubts about the writing (see below). But despite my misgivings, I enjoyed the episode and rate it 6/10. It would have been higher if I haden't seen series 1 :)

SPOILERS AHEAD:

Continuity: At the end of s2e1, Pike give the captaincy back to Saru but at the beginning of episode 2, Pike is captain again. BTW I like Pike more than Saru because a spaceship captain should have a commanding presence and Saru just doesn't have that.

Science: Similar to a sonar in space: If you send a signal to a flash of light that is 51.000 light years away, you will get a return signal after 102.000 years. (provided the source of the light reflects the signal and the signal travels at the speed of light.)

When they arrive at the source, the signal is gone. Not surprisingly because the signal seems to be a light signal and thus has been send 51.000 years ago. But then how did the people of new eden see it. They are only at the surface for 200 years. The writers created a light that travels instantly over 51K lightyears.

Your command sir?: Tilly, Pike and Micheal all defy the orders from their superiors.

Prime directive/General Order 1: they keep stating they cannot intervene at New Eden but do so trice. First Michael questions their beleives, second the away team let them see their equipement and tech (though unintended), last but not least, they save the planet.

In into darkness Kirk get scolded by Pike and demoted to the academy for saving a prewarp civilization. Maybe Pike should spend a year at the academy after this episode.

Back to Basics, and to B5?

[Greekguy · 5/10 · 29 January 2019]

I'd like to say upfront that I like this series and I'm very happy that they're making it and that ST is back on the little screen, but this particular episode, coupled with moments from the first episode of the new season, gives me pause and threatens my joy. There's nothing wrong with the general subject of the episode, which centers around a group of humans transported without their approval to a place where they re-create the society they left - or, more precisely, a more primitive society, thus making sure that the Prime Directive will be invoked.

There's been an episode of ST Enterprise dealing with abducted humans who re-create a pioneer settlement, but that's not the most blatant plagiarism that appears to be taking place here. I may very well be wrong, and I really hope that I'll be able to post a sincere apology in the very near future, but my suspicions are that the writers are recycling the great big reveal from Babylon 5 involving celestial beings that look like angels and serve a similar savior-like function. If that's true, it's lazy. I look forward to being contrite.

WELL DONE FRAKES

[jenabraham-43312 · 10/10 · 25 January 2019]

Just beautiful This episode was perfect !! Loved the beauty shot of Discovery flying through the nebula ... Amazing to have Star Trek back on the screen So good

Classic trek at its best.

[leecun1701 · 10/10 · 25 January 2019]

If you hate this episode there is no hope for you. You don't like Star Trek please leave the planet. This episode called back the great episodes of yesteryear and the classic trek struggle of general order one. Whether it's right or wrong the prime directive will make you question and that's what Star Trek is all about.

Star Trek... is Back!

[ingra88 · 10/10 · 26 January 2019]

What a excellent episode. Great story telling, General order 1, now know as as Prime directive. This episode encompasses, guilt, deception, courage and religion, each flowing into each other. This takes me back to the Trek of the 60's.

Great to see we have more screen time on the other bridge crew, as they work together to solve a crisis and save a planet, without the aid of the Captain.

Holy cow that was Classic Trek!

[keezo9uno · 9/10 · 25 January 2019]

Two episodes in, and I'm digging this season of Discovery. I hope in the future they give a bigger episode count for a season to have stories like this - just pure exploration and how the crew is faced with dilemmas like obeying Starfleet protocol vs being humanist.

Loved it! More of this please!

almost the same

[yachips · 26 January 2019]

Do not put like until you read it completely. You may not like it.

I sincerely hoped that I was wrong about the second season. I read positive reviews and delayed watching the episode. I was almost sure that the second episode is better than "brother". Now I saw. And it was almost the same. The author of the story, unfortunately, inappropriately uses the first directive, as the name Spock or Pike, simply as a familiar label. Remember the Voyager series "The 37's" where it didn't occur to the authors to talk about the first directive, because they understood what they were doing and it wasn't fake. They didn't try to prove that this is Star Trek with the help of labels. As long as the Showranner does not study the topic and is not honest, until then a fake will be obtained.

And tell someone to the author that the speed of light is not infinite. It does not happen all of a sudden - the signal was lit and immediately seen after thousands of light years. This is thousands of years, and not suddenly. I like the first season and I want to see good in the second season, but I find it hard to do it.

5 / 10

PS. We are therefore fascinated by the cosmos, its greatness. Because the light of the stars is the signal of the distant past, and not the signal of car headlights. This is the basics for authors in the science fiction genre. Do not need techno-chatter, you need to understand. And the power of a progressive society from the future is not only in smiles, but also in intelligence without fakes. In Star Trek, progress must be respected, not army solidarity. I think the showrunner is very far from all this..

Therefore, he cannot do the Star Trek. Star Trek must evolve and change, but it does not need Star Wars, etc. He has his own enormous potential, which no star wars have. Reality is more than star wars. Star Trek can take everything from reality and imagination. Star Wars is limited to its fantasy world. A star wars fan cannot do a star trek. Or let him study the theme and try again.

PPS. Can't help but say it again. And they do it with such serious faces, they throw a small colony of the wrecked into trouble. Why turn Star Trek ideas into a farce? If people are shipwrecked and survive, we, from a passing ship, will strictly say "you're on your own. losers weepers, finders keepers. Invent a spaceship and build, then be able to return home," Actors will not be able to honestly play such a fake. It's not necessary to do Star Wars mindlessly sticking to them the Star Trek requisites, its Spock and Prime Directive labels, etc. Star Trek is not about Spock and not about Directives.

Star Trek is not about battles and not about wars. Why it all comes down to confrontation and threats? It is not right.

Getting Better?

[AliensReservoir · 6/10 · 27 January 2019]

Is this disease (STD) getting better? So far and after 1 full season and 1 episode this one is the one which is the closest to a true Star Trek spirit, and I enjoyed it because i was surprised in a good way!

But still some science-physics problems as well as history problem with the TOS/TNG/ like the first directive should not have been applied in this situation as it is not a new civilization (they knew that they came from Earth and so on...).

But overall This the best in the Star Trek Spirit (maybe because it was Cmd Riker who was behind the camera) and I did enjoyed it.

Why 6 out of 10? Too much out of the line compared to history and interpretation as well as some pure physics problem, OK it's "Science Fiction" with the word "Fiction" but there is also the word "Science" in it!

I just hope STD will continue this way ;)

To obey "general order one" or not

[XweAponX · 10/10 · 25 January 2019]

This time the magic red angel signal sends Discovery way out to Church in the Beta Quadrant, and Stamets once again into the mycelial network.

But an alert signal coming from the church appears to have been deliberately sent- long ago. An unusual man, a man with the potential answer for Burnham, Pike, and Spock's common conundrum, is the keeper of an artifact that has answers.

Jon Frakes helms another great one.

Meanwhile, the magic rock hovering in the shuttle bay whacks Tilly silly, she keeps seeing a mystery girl. But as we saw in Short Treks, Tilly can see things others can't, maybe they are not really there.

The red things Pike is charged with finding, keep bringing Discovery to places where people need help, this time, they don't even know they are facing Extinction while Stamets jumps Discovery in a dance above their planet.

So Pike trades something useful to the caretaker of the church, for a glimpse of the past.

But what's past is prologue... er, Epilogue in this case.

This is real

[gabriellagargano · 7/10 · 29 January 2019]

This is a real Star trek episode...because it felt fake like the previous star trek incarnations.

• We should go there
• We have a way to warp to the other side of the universe
• We cannot, there's a ban on that
• Who cares ? That's more important
• Yeah, right, let's move

10 minutes later.

• There are humans here, we should help them get back home (or, at least, get back to 2000+ technology levels, because they are going back to the middle ages)
• 1st directive forbid us to help pre curve civilizations
• Sir, they aren't a foreign civilization, they are a lost human colony
• I said no

Great. This isn't a sci-fi loophole you can dance around, this is a plot hole, this is a half baked "we follow the rules unless we don't follow the rules" trash we've seen a lot in the previous Star Trek series.

Apart for that the episode was fine but you see, here and there, like they are start to going cheap on CGI and related stuff.

Unique episode

[jfcc9086 · 9/10 · 3 February 2019]

At the speed reviews come out, this is ancient allready. However as opposed to my lenghty S2 ep1 review. This is shorter. I saw the name Frakes. I saw all approx. 750 ep and 13 movies over 40y. Knowing that Mr. Frakes helmed it. Gives a definite feel of ST TNG to it. Themed after his IMO 10/10 ST First Contact. Sense of humor included. This is the best ep of Discovery yet, Neo Mudd close behind. DOES feel like a Star Trek old school ep. Only to be matched by a certain Alien that might be as surprising as a The Q, The Borgs or Species 8472...

The first stale whiff...

[betafett-176-53500 · 6/10 · 28 January 2019]

Before the titles even began on this episode I had a feeling of over-familiarity with the set-up. It's the kind of episode that was done ad-nauseum during the Berman/Piller/Braga era of Star Trek. Imagine my zero-surprise then to see during the titles that Jonathan Frakes was directing (his second episode); yet another indicator that the ship is being steered back into the stagnant waters which killed Star Trek in the first place. With a story by Akiva Goldsman (the prolific professional hack with a long list of stinkers to his name---and, to his credit, a well-deserved Oscar for A Beautiful Mind), this entire episode seems to have been devised from the ground up as a break from Discovery's refreshing take on Trek to placate slighted old-skool trekkers who find the overhaul a bit too radical.

Star Trek: Discovery has been a joy until now; a fresh breeze that wafted away the staleness of well over two-dozen seasons (more than 700 episodes) of its predecessors, and ignited a spark of excitement in me for a Trek show (though I, too, throw my lot in with the crowd who dislike the overly-zealous klingon redesign). The revitalization of Star Trek on TV is still in its cups (and CBS seems ready to unleash a torrent of Trek upon us with its announcements of 3 new Star Trek shows to prop up its streaming service), so it's pretty disheartening to see a return to worn out old narratives and tropes in only its 17th episode.

That said... it is only one episode. Hopefully though it's not a sign of things to come.

Issues

[mattmcnerlin · 4/10 · 28 January 2019]

It is probably the best episode of this train wreck of a series. The main issues, apart from the law suit are the characters, development, pace and cannon. We need to get rid of Tilly and Michael, giving the other characters a chance. Get writers that can actually write, get scientific people in the background that informs whether science is correct, like they did in the other series, and pay respect to cannon.

Best episode thus far.....

[eraw-14532 · 10/10 · 27 January 2019]

Incredible, star trek at its finest. Jonathan Frakes should direct all episodes from now on 🤘