It's going better than I thought.

I think it's a lock that Mike is going to bust Lorca out of his cell because SHE PROMISED HIM she would. They will then escape the over sized ship and eventually get out of the mirror universe. I'm guessing Mike will give Lorca a pass on his naughty past life since he was trying to overthrow an evil empress responsible for the deaths of billions.

Once again, I'm finding it a big stretch to accept some of the basic premises.

Total set up episode but was good. I figured that was the twist a while back but glad it is revealed.

As for spore drive and telling the emperor that was her only out to survive. She may or may not actually go through with it. Plus the spore drive exists in both universes already. Just happens it is used for personal gain in the dictatorship universe instead of it being a star fleet project. The Emperor doesn't know about it because that world is kill or be killed not fostering sharing. Also I assume Stamets doesn't tell her because he is working with Lorca to overthrow her.

Never watched a single ep of Star Trek up to this month. Made a quick search and read that the best ep of all series is from deep space nine, called in the pale moonlight. is this really the consensus? can anyone list me like 5 of the best eps of each series? even though I enjoyed "in the pale moonlight" I just can't believe it's the best ep.

In the Pale Moonlight was a great episode. But, it's not a standalone episode. To fully appreciate it, you'd have to already be a fan of the ongoing storyline and the previous development of certain characters.

Here's a good list for somebody new to Star Trek. You should be able to watch these episodes without knowing much of anything going in.

Star Trek
City on the Edge of Forever- this is almost always cited as the best episode of the original series

Balance of Terror- this is a early first season episode that introduces the Romulans. It's a good cold war parable.

The Menagerie- this is the original series only two-part episode.

Mirror, Mirror- a fun episode showing what an evil Star Trek universe would look like.


Star Trek: The Next Generation
The Inner Light- career minded Captain Picard (no wife, children) has an extraordinary experience when encountering an alien probe.

Darmok- The Enterprise tries to establish first contact with an alien species after multiple failed previous attempts by others.

Q Who- a God-like entity introduces the Enterprise to a dangerous alien species called the Borg.

Best of Both Worlds, parts 1 and 2- The Borg Return

Cause and Effect- fun episode with lots of five card stud poker in it


Deep Space Nine
It's harder to suggest DS9 episodes. In the later seasons of the show, very few standalone episodes were made. And, the later seasons were the better seasons.

Duet- from season 1, this delves into the crimes of genocide committed by the Cardassians while the occupied the planet Bajor.

Voyager
Year of Hell- Voyager, stranded on the other side of the galaxy, has a bad year.

Blink of an Eye- Voyager encounters and alien planet where time passes by much more quickly.

Hope and Fear- an alien offers Voyager a way back home. This is a Borg-connected episode.

Nice list. "Hard Time" was my personal favorite for ds9.

Measure of a Man (TNG) for sci fi philosophy.

Just watched episode 6 again. So many great clues to the Lorca twist.

If Ender's Game twist is like a 9 on the Surprise scale then Lorca was like a 3. IMO his actus reus was never in doubt it was just a matter of finding out the totality of his motivations. Those are still to be determined until we get a full moral picture of his universe.

Yeah that is what I thought. I don't go out of the way to figure out twists but he had the "off" vibe the entire time. I am doing a re-watch and I am enjoying the small details the second time around. I am also with you on I don't know Lorca's true motivations. Lots of shades of grey really. The mirror universe works really well when they don't lock it into weird facial hair one off 2 part episode.

Another fun little clue in my re-watch when Stamets calls Tilly captain in episode 8 when he comes out of the spore drive chamber.

This series sure has some really wild ideas and imaginative twists to it: One person is inside another , persons of a similar identity who travel from a parallel universe to impersonate someone else, a warp drive based on spores, and more. Also, the visual specifics are superb. Tilly is my favorite character or maybe Lorca if it turns out he is not really the worst villain. It can get confusing as hell to follow the plot, the lead female has a male name for starters, and what ever happened to Adm. Kat Cornwell, and are their any women characters that Lorca (combining both universes) has not been with? He sure takes torture well btw. But I'll give it pass on plot. It's entertaining.

Oh that episode needs to digest a bit..... liked it, then thought I hated it then it was okay and then holy crap there is a ton that just happened and I am back to loving the story going forward. Honestly not at all what I thought was going to happen.

The one thing I hated was how one dimensional Lorca became at the end. Went from interesting guy with questionable actions to a one sided bad guy. Luckily that didn't last long so got over it quick.

Agreed. This was a bit disappointing. Episode was lots of fun, though.

Really wanted to see the Defiant on screen, but oh well.

Previews thoughts:

The problem with some shows is there's too much filler. That is not a problem in this show - every episode seems to move the story forward massively. Latest episode was great IMO and sets up for a great rest of season - can the one indefensible weapon the federation has win the war single handedly?

I am not even sure what the official timeline is honestly.

From what I’ve read, this show is meant to be taking place in TOS timeline. It does seem increasingly hard to reconcile that though.

10 years before TOS is when the show is taking place. I haven't heard anyone say if this is taking place in the TOS original universe or not. I think the show is good enough on its own to really matter if this is in the same universe. You could watch this without ever seeing the other shows.

https://www.polygon.com/tv/2017/10/1...riginal-series

Pretty unambiguous and similar things were said before the show started.

One of my biggest Star Trek pet peeves was finally answered on that last episode BTW: Someone finally had automatic turrets in the corridors of their ship. You can warp, can teleport, but can't build these things? Come on Starfleet.