TV Review: ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ Delivers With Its Series Finale
by Frank Martin
There was a lot promised with the series finale of Star Trek: Discovery. The tech everyone was after was supposed to do wonders and unlock the secrets of the universe — even though Burnham (Sonequa Martin-Green) and the rest of the Discovery crew had no idea what it would actually do. The season also promised a pretty big war with the Breen that required some fancy political maneuvering. All of this combined to set the final episode up with big stakes. But all in all, it delivered exactly what it promised. The characters had a proper, nostalgic send-off that had been building all season long with some fun callbacks and maybe even a little set up for the future.
After chasing Moll (Eve Harlow) through the machine’s portal, Burnham entered a bizarre space that had more portals to other worlds. Meanwhile, Discovery continued battling the Breen outside while Saru (Doug Jones) was tasked with stopping more Breen from showing up. Sensing a way to activate the tech, Moll took a chance but failed. This led to Burnham activating the tech on her own and meeting a member of the species they believed created it. It turned out, someone had built the machine before them. They used it to seed the galaxy with humanoids. It was up to Burnham now to use the tech next, but she decided it was too powerful and dangerous for any one person and sent it into a black hole.
After that, the episode had a fairly long epilogue revealing Burnham, effectively, at the end of her life. She got herself a happy ending alongside Booker (David Ajala), who had a son with her. It would be interesting to see how the episode would have ended without this concluding passage. It does put a definitive capstone on her story, but that doesn’t mean this era of Star Trek is gone forever. It was discussed that Moll would be recruited by Starfleet, probably for black ops missions. This provides a whole other avenue to explore this part of the timeline besides the in-development Starfleet Academy. Nevertheless, Discovery definitely got the ending it deserved.
Star Trek: Discovery is now streaming on Paramount+.
