Star Trek: Discovery – Season 5 Episode 4 Recap & Review

Face The Strange

Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 Episode 4 begins fifteen hours previously, with Moll and L’ak meeting with a dodgy dealer. They hand him a bag of platinum. The dealer tries to raise the price of it, but it turns out Moll has poisoned the latinum and takes the item from the dying dealer. 

L’ak is uncertain. But Moll assures him they’ll get ahead of the USS Discovery. She continues that once they have the Progenitor’s tech, they’ll be free. She tells him they have to hurry to catch Discovery on Trill. It is revealed that the device obtained from the dealer is the same one planted on Adira Tal in the final moments of the previous episode.

Elsewhere, the device activates in Adira’s quarters on the Discovery. It hops off the uniform, runs across the room and disappears into a girder.

In his lab, Stamets spots the bug and watches as it disappears into the wall. Burnham gets a report from Owo, revealing that she’s picking up some odd readings, and something has broadcasted a signal from the ship. Burnham and Rayner try to beam to the bridge, but they go nowhere. 

The ship is moving, but the lights flicker and a klaxon sounds. Rayner asks if they are under attack, as Burnham tries to contact the bridge but nothing seems to be working. Burnham and Rayner head to the bridge on foot and find the rest of the crew unconscious and wearing 23rd-century Starfleet uniforms. Rayner and Burnham realise they’re in a wormhole and have travelled back in time. Discovery follows Burnham as she goes through the wormhole into the future. Turns out, they haven’t just travelled back in time, but they’re actually jumping through time. 

Rayner thinks it must be a time bug known as a “chronophage.” He explains they’re leftovers from the Temporal War that disable an enemy vessel by causing it to cycle through time. Burnham thinks it has something to do with Moll and L’ak.

The time jumps continue, and Burnham decides that tracking the time cycles isn’t enough. Zora suggests more data. She recommends variables: the ship’s location, distance and speed. Burnham hones in on speed, as they are traveling through not just time but also space. By measuring Discovery’s speed to the time cycle lengths and considering additional dimensions, a pattern is found. It’s a conical wave. Another time jump begins, demonstrating the pattern they found was accurate. Rayner hopes they end up in an era where Stamets is alive., so he can help them. 

Burnham eventually arrives in the future and explains the situation, and that she’s undertaking an important mission for the future Discovery. Burnham demonstrates her personal knowledge of several crew members to prove her story, as Airiam, Tilly and the rest of the crew are confused at her appearance.

They remain skeptical of Burnham’s claims, but she says she will convince them all to trust her judgment in the end. Burnham reveals she saw Airiam die, and she recounts the climax of “Project Daedalus.” Airiam convinces the rest of the crew of Burnham’s legitimacy and asks what help Burnham needs. 

Rayner tells the story about Burnham arriving at the bridge and not feeling like she belongs. He tells YB she deserves to be there and pleads with her to trust her instincts, which he knows are currently telling her to stand down, with YB seemingly convinced. Discovery’s warp bubble is broken, and Rayner puts the device on the chronophage. Another time jump occurs, and they arrive back to the present day, which is fully intact.

The episode ends with the rest of the crew caught up on the chronophage. In the six hours since the time jumps began, the DOTs have found a warp signature that matches M’ak’s ship. Rayner compliments Rhys on his theory, which proved to be accurate. However, M’ak’s trail disappears, as Burnham orders the bridge crew to begin work on solving the mystery.

The Episode Review

Episode 4 feels like a classic throwback episode of Star Trek: Discovery, and it is the best episode of season 5 so far.  The serialised story continues and the plot of this episode is very entertaining with aspects of time travel.

Burnham and Rayner are a great team-up, and they are the central focus of the episode, as they put their differences aside to save the Discovery and the crew. There are some great action sequences and some quieter character moments that hit all the right notes.