Star Trek Strange New Worlds Episode 3 Recap: Ghosts of Illyria

Number One was an unknown when she appeared in Trek's first pilot, but she was revived for the second season. It's not like Star Trek's apocryphal material hasn't tried to shine a light on Number One in those many generations off-screen. It does so in a way that you don't have to be a Trek fan for it to be popular, because it layers it into a much more universal morality metaphor along the way. Cool jackets are involved.

There is a two-for-one package deal on Star Trek scenarios. The fan-favorite stranded Away team members, who have appeared on-screen just once in Enterprise, are investigating a colony of Illyrians, a minor but important Trek race. As the duo investigates what could have happened to the Illyrians on Hetmet IX, the officers who do make it back up to the Enterprise suddenly find themselves coming down with a strange disease: an addiction to light caused by a deficiency of vitamins D and E.

Next-Level Sound can be experienced.

Theater-like sound surrounds you with spatial audio with dynamic head tracking.

It doesn't take long for the virus to spread all over the enterprise, with a dash of The Naked Time. As things go from bad to worse on the ship in Strange New Worlds, there is more to it than that. On the ground, Pike and Spock encounter mysterious energy spirits that are trying to attack the place they have managed to seek shelter in from the storm. When it becomes clear that she is safe from the disease, Number One discovers that she is not the only one hiding something. Throw in the occasional attempts by the Chief Engineer Hemmer and the Security Chief La to open up incredibly dangerous sources of light and you have a recipe for disaster.

The big twist is that the light virus was caused by the Illyrian's body creating anti-bodies for it naturally. The colonists on Hetmet IX succumbed to the disease trying to reverse their Illyrian augmentation to join the Federation, thanks to a little fella named Khan Noonien-Singh. Even a flagship like the Enterprise is staffed by imperfect beings, human or otherwise, and that becomes even more of a classic morality tale.

Each person on the ship has made a sacrifice or fudged rules to make up for traumas and prejudice of the past. As La'an, herself from a background of being bullied due to her family's history with Khan, she screams at Una that she is a monster and then has to confront and reconcile with her. The reason the virus got from Hetmet to the ship was because Menga hasn't updated his medical transporter. If her captain and friend would still do that if she wasn't in that position, it would be darkly and most fascinating.

It's a great way to acknowledge an idea that Star Trek loves. It's one that its modern iteration loves most of all, especially Discovery, which has been something of an obsession of late. The idea is that the elite beings of utopias like the Federation are better off not trying to maintain that illusion of enlightened perfection. They could find acceptance and humility if they sat down and talked to each other. The crew could have helped him and avoided a crisis if he had been honest about his daughter. If she was open about her Illyrian heritage, the prejudice against her people would be slowly corrected, and she wouldn't have to worry about it.

The blessing and curse of Strange New Worlds was built on the love of the episode format classic Star Trek, so it's unknown whether or not any of this will be brought up again. Is there a plot about Illyrians being accepted into the Federation despite its rules against genetic modification? How much of the show is about the future of Menga and his daughter, and how much is about the privilege of being accepted as a member of her species. These are fascinating ideas and thoughts that Strange New Worlds throws up in the moment, it will be a shame if they are left untouched as the show goes on to chase new riffs and other ideas. The fact that the show is willing to dive into them immediately is a sign that it can follow up on some fascinating threads with these characters already.

Do you want more io9 news? Check out when to see the latest movies from Disney and Lucasfilm, what's next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about House of the Dragon and Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.