Thursday, May 07, 2020

Star Trek: Short Treks -- Season 2 Episode 3 (Ask Not)


When they named the series Star Trek: Short Treks, they weren’t kidding.  Ask Not is only 8 minutes long.  Almost all of it is in one room.

Cadet Thira Sidhu is on Starbase 28 when it’s seemingly attacked.  She’s told to watch over a mutinous officer, who turns out to be Captain Christopher Pike.  Since it’s been established that he’s an officer after this, we can assume something’s up.

Pike tries everything to persuade Sidhu to let him go.  They quote regulations a few times.  He brings up her brother, who might fall victim to the attack.  There are several angles that Pike tries to no avail; Sidhu stands her ground.

It is revealed to be a test.  It’s almost like a Kobayashi Maru scenario in that there’s no really appealing choice.  She can either restrain a captain or possibly let a mutinous officer go.  The only difference is that there is a correct choice here.  If Pike did mutiny, he would no longer have authority over a lower-ranking offier or cadet.

It’s a very effective story.  I’m not sure if these shorts are meant to tie in to existing series, but it occurs to me that these episodes could serve as a backdoor pilot of sorts.  It would be a way of gauging new characters and scenarios.  It could also be just a short story meant to entertain fans.

So far as I know, this doesn’t tie in to either of the first two seasons.  This was released after the end of the second season, so it might be a tie-in for the third season.  We’ll have to wait and see.


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