TL;DR – A fascinating exploration of leadership and command when time is running out and your back is against the wall.

Disclosure – I paid for the Paramount+ streaming service that viewed this episode. 

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Introduction –

Today’s episode gets to the heart of the very premise of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. When you have a prequel so connected to the very origin of Star Trek, you always knew the direction the show was heading towards, the endpoint. But to get there, you need to lock some key features in, and today is just one such time.

So, to set the scene, the USS Farragut is off surveying an uninhabited planet called Helicon Gamma. It was a standard, almost dull mission for Second-In-Command Commander James T. Kirk (Paul Wesley). Until a gravitational beam tears the planet apart and heavily damages the ship. The USS Enterprise was able to arrive and help, only to discover the thing that was destroying the planet had returned and swallowed the Enterprise whole. Now, from here, we will be looking at the episode as a whole, so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead.

Plot Analysis

The episode centres on Kirk discovering his command style, which might have been a very dry subject matter if they hadn’t thrust him into it when he was not prepared and where he has no lifeline to call on. In some respects, we get hints of the classic The Original Series episode The Doomsday Machine, where a captain is thrust into a situation that they are not ready for. It also hints back to one of the core aspects of Kirk’s lore in that he is the only person ever to win the Kobayashi Maru exercise. This means that he has never had to fully deal with the responsibilities of command up until this point.  

What the episode very much understands is that as he takes command, we, the audience, will be drawing direct connections to the Kirk that we know. In that respect, Paul Wesley brings out the goods because you can feel that this is a Kirk that we understand, but who is still on his journey. To help with that, the story peppers in sly and not-so-sly references to relationships that we know will come in time. Asking for miracles from Mr Scott (Martin Quinn) being the most obvious example, but also the touching speech he has with Spock (Ethan Peck) when it looks like the crew is one step away from stripping him from command. I think it was telling that only the crew Kirk will meet in the future are the ones that ended up staying on the Farragut.    

Production

From a production perspective, a lot is going on in this episode. There is a lot of hand waving away to make a lot of it work, like where the rest of the crew on the Enterprise is when all the gasses are killing anything that breathes air. I know there will be some who will be upset that all of the Farragut sets are clearly just redressed Enterprise sets. You would have thought the bridge wouldn’t be quite the same, but you can live with those choices when you know the budget was needed for some of the bigger effects this episode commanded. However, the real treat was finally getting to see inside Pelia’s (Carol Kane) quarters. Though, if we’re being nitpicky, the USA flag should not have 50 stars.  

Command

At its heart, this episode is a meditation on command. Throughout the episode, we are presented with different styles of command being juxtaposed with each other. Honestly, I thought this was a clever way of exploring the topic, especially when, at the end, you realise that none of the different types of command, for example, the more cautious style we see at the start, were wrong. They all have their strengths and weaknesses. While the reveal of who the Scavengers felt really forced. What it did lead to was one of the best discussions in Star Trek, when Kirk and Pike (Anson Mount) talk at the end. It is here where we focus on the main thing that differentiates command: the consequences. Kirk killed 7,000 people to save two ships, probably 100 million on the next planet, and who knows how many in the future. But those 7,000 still weigh on him, and they should. It is the episode when Kirk feels the accountability of command in a very acute way.     

Conclusion

In the end, do we recommend Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Sehlat Who Ate Its Tail? Yes, we do. This was such a fascinating episode, with everyone’s back against the wall, trying to eke out a win when none of the odds are in your favour. But more than that, it is exploring what it means to be in command when you want to be an ethical leader, and that was fascinating to watch. Have you seen Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The Sehlat Who Ate Its Tail yet? Drop your impressions in the comments below.

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

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Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds
Directed by – Valerie Weiss
Written by – David Reed & Bill Wolkoff
Created by – Akiva Goldsman, Alex Kurtzman & Jenny Lumet
Based On – Star Trek Created by Gene Roddenberry
Production/Distribution Companies – CBS Television Studios, Roddenberry Entertainment, Secret Hideout & Paramount+
Starring – Anson Mount, Ethan Peck, Jess Bush, Christina Chong, Celia Rose Gooding, Melissa Navia, Babs Olusanmokun, Martin Quinn, Paul Wesley & Rebecca Romijn with Carol Kane and Zoe Doyle, Rong Fu, Jo-Anne Leach & Paloma Nuñez