'Star Trek: Discovery' Recap - 'The War Without, The War Within'

Written by John Edward Betancourt

THIS IS THE EMERGENCY SPOILER ALERT SYSTEM...YOU ARE ADVISED TO READ AT YOUR OWN RISK...

I think it’s safe to assume, that I’m not the only fan of Star Trek: Discovery that was bracing themselves shortly before last night’s episode. Because let’s be honest, last week’s tale ended in grim and foreboding fashion and when this show goes dark, it goes dark, meaning that it made sense for this week’s story, ‘The War Without, The War Within’ to take us to some supremely bleak places and well, this one ended up being quite the pleasant surprise. Because while it did indeed drag us through the proverbial mud, it also managed to set the stage for Burnham’s redemption.
 
But, before we get too deep into that, let’s dig into the tough stuff, since two key things happened in this episode when it comes to the war, the first being that in this tale we learned that the Klingons haven’t won the war just yet, but they are damn close to doing so. It turns out, that in the nine months that Discovery has been missing, the Klingons have resorted to the wholesale slaughter of the Federation, using their cloaking devices to aid in suicide missions on Starfleet bases, which has helped to decimate a third of the fleet and it’s allowed for the Empire seize another twenty percent of Federation Space and well, that kind of aggressive action has brought the Federation to its knees.
 
That means that Starfleet is desperate to save what’s left of the Federation and that’s where the second key element comes into play. Because in essence, Starfleet seems ready to abandon the principles that founded the United Federation of Planets since much of this episode dealt with some behind the scenes deal making between Sarek, Emperor Georgiou and Admiral Cornwell so that the Federation could finally enjoy a victory against the Klingon Empire and well, while on the surface it seems as though the plan devised in this story is a simple one designed to get the Empire’s attention, I couldn’t help but notice that the audience is more or less in Burnham’s shoes when it comes to this plan, in that something far more ominous is coming together in the shadows and it’s likely something that none of us will approve of.

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​But since we cannot discuss what that might be without more information in hand, it’s time we move on to Burnham’s journey in this tale because this is the episode that served as Michael’s reckoning. Because every decision she’s made this season came around full circle and honestly, it was quite surprising to see people straight up call her out for her actions and the past that she refuses to step away from. Georgiou pointed all of this out first and it was further reinforced by way of a verbal lashing from Ash later on in the episode and you know what? They’re right to put her on notice. Because in reality, while Burnham has been bold this season and done some good things, she has yet to deal with her actions or her past, and I think this is a brilliant stroke of storytelling.
 
Because there’s a realism that comes with adding that kind of twist since so many of us deal with trauma and pain in similar fashion. We push ahead as we need to, we process the parts we can handle, and the rest gets buried for another time and the beauty of a story like this, is that Burnham can hide no longer from her pain and her past and now more than ever, she’s going to have to deal with all of it. Because if she stands on the sidelines this time around, horrible things are going to play out since we all know that Mirror Georgiou is likely playing one hell of a long con to get what she wants and the Federation now stands on the precipice of sliding into incredibly dangerous territory.
 
In the end however, this was simply a fascinating episode through and through. We’ve never seen the Federation reeling quite like this in the franchise’s storied history but it was wonderful to see the series resurrect a quality character study during a time of war, something we saw during Deep Space Nine’s run because both of these issues have to be resolved, and both go hand in hand and it should be fascinating to see what Burnham does next to put her past to rest and to save the Federation from extinction. Either way, kudos to Discovery for trying something different with its penultimate episode and hopefully this grand setup pays off in spades when we get to next week’s season one finale. Until then. 

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