S01.E11: Asylum

[AnimeMania]

At the edge of Federation space, the crew applies for asylum at Deep Space 13, only for their starship to reveal its shocking true purpose. 

Original Airdate: Thursday, October 27, 2022  on Paramount+      

[Starchild]

I was a little confused, is the RealJaneway stuff, where she's looking for Chakotay, is that a past or present timeline?

[DrBriCa]

1 hour ago, Starchild said:

I was a little confused, is the RealJaneway stuff, where she's looking for Chakotay, is that a past or present timeline?

The Admiral Janeway parts should be more or less contemporaneous with the Protostar events. The Dauntless set out for the Delta Quadrant after the events of the previous episode. Presumably whatever transwarp they use still took them a few weeks to cross quadrants. While en route, Janeway did the holodeck simulation of the last time she'd seen Captain Chakotay, just before they reached the planet.

[Starchild]

Thanks!

[Ceindreadh]

I don't see why they're so worried about 'stealing' the Protostar. 

They didn't steal the ship from Starfleet.  They found it abandoned and used it to escape a dangerous situation.  If anything, Starfleet should be more likely to reward them for returning lost property. 

[readster]

7 hours ago, Ceindreadh said:

I don't see why they're so worried about 'stealing' the Protostar. 

They didn't steal the ship from Starfleet.  They found it abandoned and used it to escape a dangerous situation.  If anything, Starfleet should be more likely to reward them for returning lost property. 

That's the biggest problem. Janeway and Starfleet KNOW that the Protostar was attacked and left for dead. That there is some kind of "time bomb" on it. Yet they are acting like the kids are on some suicide run and as Janeway perfectly said: "Why didn't you call me Chakotay?" Seriously, as a Vice Admiral talking to her holo version of herself, she should be able to shut things down and be like: "Forget it, let's get our answers and blow the damn ship up!"

[Wouter]

1 hour ago, readster said:

That's the biggest problem. Janeway and Starfleet KNOW that the Protostar was attacked and left for dead. That there is some kind of "time bomb" on it. Yet they are acting like the kids are on some suicide run and as Janeway perfectly said: "Why didn't you call me Chakotay?" Seriously, as a Vice Admiral talking to her holo version of herself, she should be able to shut things down and be like: "Forget it, let's get our answers and blow the damn ship up!"

Starfleet does not know what happened to the ship (Chakotay and co are missing, disappeared without trace with exception of the ship suddenly resurfacing). They also don't know about the Vau N'akat (they have yet to make first contact, unless either Gwyn meeting the lone officer on the station or Janeway and co meeting the Diviner on Tars Lamora would count) and don't know about a weapon. The only they know/think is that the Protostar, with an alien crew, visited the relay station and once contact was made with the ship's system, everything went haywire (and Janeway doesn't know even that yet, she first has to pick up the Denobulan in his escape pod).

The show is setting up a season long arc of vice-admiral Janeway chasing the Protostar, in order to "stop the saboteurs", reclaim the ship and get to know what happened to Chakotay and is crew. And because the Protostar crew wants to avoid contact at all costs given they know about the weapon now, they will keep evading her (until they can't, I suppose, probably in the season finale).

[MissLucas]

That was a lot to unpack. I'm really glad that they kept Rok's science skills (I still think her time-warp plot from last season was one of the best things they've done so far). And what exactly happened before Gwyn managed to break out of her glass sarcophagus (bit of nightmare fodder there) - does she still have her thingy (apparently it's called a Neuroflux). I thought a***** Dad had taken it away? I also liked Zero still feeling guilty over what had happened to her.

And of course Starfleet knows what Dral is - he's the chosen one after all. Since not the whole episode dealt with his awesome leadership skills I did not roll my eyes too hard.

Is it a sci-fi trope that the most distant relay stations must be manned by quirky characters who are completely inept? 

Janeway found the Diviner, that should be fun. I hope she brought a stash of her time-travel migraine prescription along for the ride.

[Wouter]

On 10/30/2022 at 12:53 AM, MissLucas said:

That was a lot to unpack. I'm really glad that they kept Rok's science skills (I still think her time-warp plot from last season was one of the best things they've done so far). And what exactly happened before Gwyn managed to break out of her glass sarcophagus (bit of nightmare fodder there) - does she still have her thingy (apparently it's called a Neuroflux). I thought a***** Dad had taken it away? I also liked Zero still feeling guilty over what had happened to her.

And of course Starfleet knows what Dral is - he's the chosen one after all. Since not the whole episode dealt with his awesome leadership skills I did not roll my eyes too hard.

Is it a sci-fi trope that the most distant relay stations must be manned by quirky characters who are completely inept? 

Janeway found the Diviner, that should be fun. I hope she brought a stash of her time-travel migraine prescription along for the ride.

Gywn still has her sword/tool thingy, it was already visible on her right hand while she was trying to disable the Protostar's shields in S01e10. It was funny that Dal didn't manage to cut the sarcophagus with a phaser (was it on stun or another wrong setting?), while Gwyn saves herself.

It's also remarkable that Gwyn hadn't been told - and still isn't being told - what happened to her father. That could potentially still bring some problems.

As for Dal and the alert, I don't think that's a good thing at all (for Dal!) allthough the kids were all happy that Starfleet seems to know what/who he is. I suspect he may be (genetically) augmented/altered, something which is still frowned upon by the Federation (traces from Khan, apparently). Once Starfleet gets an impression of what the Vau N'akat are trying to do, I guess Gwyn will be on their radar soon enough, as well. As I guess that the Dauntless is going to pick up the Denobulan officer in his escape pod, vice-admiral Janeway will likely gets description soon and the similarity with the Diviner will (likely) be noted. If the Denobulan remembers and reports correctly what was said on the station, the kid's claims about escaping from someone who kept them enslaved may ring a bell, having seen Tars Lamora.

I don't think the guy was completely inept, though it was cruel of Starfleet to keep him alone in such a farflung outpost. The initial reception went well enough. Taking off like he did isn't the starfleet thing to do, but then he believed (not wholly unreasonably) that they had been sabotaging the station.

The situation with the calculation of the jump at the end seemed a bit unnecessary, as the Protostar could have moved to pick them up (or used tractor beam as the ETH, did). Rok may be a prodigy but it would take Data to calculate something like that without any tools.

Little detail: Janeway found Gwyn's combadge, which was crushed by the Diviner in the mid-season finale.

Edited October 31, 2022 by Wouter