Episode 214, Season Finale: “Such Sweet Sorrow Part 2”
The Star Trek: Discovery season 2 finale was an exhilarating thrill ride from beginning to end, filled with a spectacular space battle, edge of your seat fights, and surprising twists that lead to an ambiguous end for the crew of the Discovery, and the start of Pike and Spock’s new adventures aboard the Enterprise.
Episode 214 picks up right where Episode 213 left off: The Discovery and the Enterprise are surrounded by several Section 31 ships, weapons at the ready, awaiting the sphere data upload so Control can finally have what it needs to become fully sentient and wipe out the universe. Our heroes have a two-fold plan: send out as many shuttles armed and ready to battle and defend Burnham who will fly in the Red Angel suit to a point far enough away from the battle to open a wormhole where the Discovery will follow her through to a point in time that is over 900 years in the future.
The other part of the plan involved the shuttles and Enterprise clearing a path for Burnham and the Discovery while making sure Control didn’t follow either into the wormhole. If they can’t stop that from happening, then Control will upload the data from Discovery and, well, you know…it’s only the end of all life in the known universe; no big deal.
As the battle begins, Georgiou taunts Control (in the body of Captain Leland) to beam aboard the Discovery so she can end him once and for all. Saru thinks that’s a dumb plan, but Georgiou isn’t about to let someone tell her how to handle business, and she and Security Chief Nhan lay the trap, and once the Discovery drops its shields to let Burnham and Spock out of the docking bay, Leland beams over and goes for what he thinks is the data…only, it’s not where he thinks it is, and Georgiou and Nhan commence to kick his ass.
They fight for several minutes as Georgiou leads Leland to Engineering where the Spore Drive containment room is. She lures him in and steps out, locking him in, but they both know it won’t hold long. Georgiou quickly begins working through a pattern on the computer and turns to Leland with a devilish grin and lets him know she just magnetized the room, meaning all the millions of nanites that Control used to reanimate Leland’s body will be painfully drawn out and Control will die “screaming” as she gleefully watches.
Meanwhile, the space battle rages on, and the Enterprise’s dish is hit with a torpedo that doesn’t explode. Admiral Cornwall and Number One try to disarm it, but they can’t, so the brave admiral makes the ultimate sacrifice and closes the section off and arms the torpedo, killing herself, and only herself in the process. Everyone else aboard the ship is saved thanks to her bravery.
Section 31 has a ton of ships and tiny drone shuttles just putting the Discovery and Enterprise through the paces when a Klingon ship drops out of cloaking and starts destroying the Section 31 vessels. Saru’s people are there as well. It seems Tyler has been busy gathering friends and enough ships for the fight. Once they arrive, they quickly turn the tide of the battle in favor of our heroes.
With that done, all that’s left to do is for Burnham to open the wormhole so she and the Discovery can jump 900 years or so into the future…only, her suit won’t let her put in the coordinates. She and Spock try to work out the problem and realize they’ve only seen five of the seven red signals hat started the Enterprise on its mission during the Klingon war in the first place. Burnham then realizes that to go forward, she must first travel back in time and make the red signals appear.
Now, here’s where it gets fracking tricky: Burnham, in the new Red Angel suit, travels to all the places the crew of the Discovery visited over the course of this season. And, each time she lands at a location, she realizes it was her in the suit — and not her mom — leading the Discovery to make important decisions so they could save the universe. Yes, I’m fully aware that it was established that Burnham’s mother had a suit that she traveled in several times back and forth through time, but now, at this point, we see Michael Burnham as the Red Angel, making those same jumps. Good lord my head hurts. Time travel is confusing, y’all.
Anyway, with all the past points set, Burnham’s suit allows her to put in the time and coordinates for her jump to the future, so she and the Discovery head into the wormhole, as the Enterprise destroys any Section 31 ships and shuttles that try to follow. It is worth mentioning though, that once Leland was killed by Georgiou, the Section 31 ships all stopped in their tracks, so it was like shooting fish in a barrel for the Enterprise.
Once Burnham in her Red Angel suit and the Discovery (with its crew) went into the wormhole, that’s the last we see of them. Spock then narrates some cut scenes where he talks about Starfleet Command putting a gag order on anyone involved with the operation. To anyone who wasn’t there, the Discovery is considered destroyed; all souls lost. Tyler is made the new commander of an overhauled Section 31; one without a computer like Control.
Spock then shaves his beard, puts on his familiar blue Starfleet uniform, and walks onto the bridge of the Enterprise as Captain Pike gives the order to jump into warp.
So, as a finale episode goes, “Such Sweet Sorrow, Part 2” was perfect. It had over-the-top action, a great storyline, and plenty of emotional moments like Spock and Burnham saying I love you to each other; Stamets and Culber getting back together; Admiral Cornwall’s sacrificial death; and Pike telling the crew of the Discovery goodbye, calling them “family.”
Season 2 of Star Trek: Discovery was better than its first season, and that’s not something that can be said by many shows out there today. I don’t know how season 3 will unfold, especially since Starfleet records now show the Discovery and its crew to be destroyed. But since the ship and Burnham are now 900+ years in the future, the possibilities for storylines are endless. I can’t wait to see what season 3 brings.
Episode Grade: A+
Season Grade: A
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