WHY WE LIKE IT: Wasn't expecting a tearjerker.
WHY WE DON'T: The alien entity's story is a little slim, all things considered.
REVIEW: Like the previous episode, there are really three threads to follow in An Obol for Charon. Unlike the previous episode, the themes and plot points are linked together in a much better way. As the title intimates, all three stories are about moving on to another state of being. We have a dying entity converting itself into a database before it blows, a dying Saru coming out of his illness as a new and improved Kelpien, and Tilly being sucked into the mycenial network by "May". Even better, it ties into the seasonal arc with its "Red Angel" and odd spatial anomalies. Before we sink our teeth into each thread, let's do a bit of house work and talk about the early scenes dealing with that bigger plot. First, we meet the recast Number One. Rebecca Romijn is a good get, but we don't see enough here to really feel like she's the same character Majel Barrett played in The Cage. Hopefully, we'll see her again (or else why get such a recognizable guest star?). Before all hell breaks loose, there's a pleasant staff briefing that gives the bridge crew something to do (yay!), including the odd comedy alien Linus (yay! of course, the point of him here is to mention the universal translator, which will come into play later - I bet Doug Jones gets a hoot out of someone being more covered up than he is, for once). What doesn't work so well for me is the surprise appearance of Commander Nhan, as if she could get into that room without anyone noticing. It's weirdly staged, and she doesn't really bring anything to the table except a Discovery-style TOS mini-skirt. Did Pike just leave the door open for his Enterprise staff to join missions any time they want? Anyway...
The A-plot which makes the rest possible is an encounter with an ancient entity that acts like a black hole, but is actually sentient and trying to communicate. Once again, a Discovery villain proves not to be one (the only villains we've seen this season have been on the Klingon side, and haven't interacted with the ship), but its communication causes a number of mishaps that make it appear dangerous, even hostile. There's a good deal of fun at the beginning when the previously mentioned universal translator goes on the blink and makes the crew speak in tongues. I'm sure fans from around the world got a kick out of it, and hope their language wasn't mangled the way mine (French) was. Has someone built a complete list yet? I really want to know. Eventually, it's all sorted thanks to Saru and his particular empathy (he can feel death coming thanks to those powers, and this is a massive being about to die), and Pike decides to put Starfleet's sacred ideals first. It's pure Trek, but I do wish the entity had a little more personality. "Unknowable" works for the story, but it can only be considered a MacGuffin. I thought it might be a First Federation ship when I saw it, but of course, that would have broken the timeline.
Isolated in engineering, Tilly falls prey to Mushroom May again, and dry comedy sparks fly as Stamets and Jett Reno try to help her. I could do with Reno putting a little more mischief in her attitude, as she's almost TOO dry. I like her and I don't want her to become the one-note duct-taping character she's dangerously close to becoming. The highlight from this section is the engineers having to drill a hole in Tilly's skull and having her sing Space Oddity as sole anesthesia. Great moment. Eventually, the big spore monster eats her up and transports her to the network while it makes the engineers trip out. To be continued, of course, but it's already clear that Stamets will mothball the spore drive on account of the destruction it's causing to May's people. He just gave a big speech about pollution and the evils of dilithium mining, after all. As with some of the Klingon stuff last week, this season of Discovery really wants to walk back some of the decisions made by the original regime. We also have Pike blaming holographic communications for the Enterprise's shipwide systems failure... wanna bet that gets mothballed too?
But the crux of the episode is really Saru's story. The sphere entity helped trigger his vahar'ai, a condition we learned about in the Short Trek The Brightest Star, which apparently signals the end for a Kelpien. Either they get culled (butchered? by the Ba'ul) or go mad from the symptoms (and die? are euthanized?). With no Ba'ul around, Saru soldiers on, trying to find a solution before he inevitably has to go. And for a minute there, I thought they would really kill him off. Just the way everyone on the bridge stood up as he left for his death bed. The way he made Burnham promise to use his diaries to help the Kelpiens. The way we were given more information about him - BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE! - addressing his relationship to Burnham, and showing us that his quarters are a garden. And that performance from Sonequa Martin-Green! Wow. Forced to release her friend from his pain, unable to do it at first, finding the resolve to do the unthinkable... And then, the ganglia fall off by themselves, and her confusion, relief, worry, elation, all mixed together on her face. Alone worth the price of admission. And then what it means: Kelpiens have been dying from fake news for centuries, their organizing principle, what we might even call death worship, a lie probably perpetrated by the Ba'ul. I have a feeling we'll be going back there sooner than we thought. And we have a new Saru to explore, one that has gone through his race's equivalent of andro/menopause if not puberty and on the verge of finding out what's next in a Kelpien's NATURAL life cycle. They are born in fear, possibly as a protection measure, but what are they capable of once that danger sense is no longer necessary?
LESSON: Learn a second language, you lazy bum.
REWATCHABILITY - Medium-High: Even the more tired tropes get a nice twist, and the Saru stuff is really quite good... and will prove important!
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