Star Trek: Discovery Season 4 Episode 10 Review: The Galactic Barrier
Diana Keng
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Well, son of a gun. It looks like Tarka might have actually been telling the truth.
On Star Trek: Discovery Season 4 Episode 10, Tarka's backstory comes out in a series of flashbacks when he leads Book to the site of his former Emerald Chain imprisonment.
To balance the introspective, emotive bent of his exposition, elsewhere, Discovery crosses the galactic barrier in a series of highly risky, never-before-tried, in-truth-completely-theoretical maneuvers, carrying not just one but TWO presidents onboard.
As with any script that includes him, Kovich rules his scenes with his deadpan delivery of soul-crushingly indisputable facts and calculated predictions.
The council gathered to discuss first contact with Species 10-C has an air of apprehension and the sense of being balanced on a knife's edge.
There is also despair. Despair that they'll be able to do anything to save any more worlds from the DMA. Despair that anything they can do will be done in time. Despair that Species 10-C will even care what the DMA is doing.
Kovich: I understand their emotional desire to be present when we make contact. I wish I could be there myself.
Burnham: You're not coming?
Kovich: Unfortunately, there are other urgent matters that I must attend to.
Ndoye: I cannot fathom anything even remotely as urgent as this.
Kovich: And I intend to keep it that way.
That Kovich has something more important than making first contact with Species 10-C is truly terrifying. I'm with General Ndoye on that one.
When they emerge at the other end of this encounter, I look forward to finding out what exactly kept Kovich away from the mission to the galactic barrier.
It's a neat bookend to the season that President Rillak chooses to join Discovery for this (presumably) final mission, just as she made herself at home on the bridge during their mission to the space station on Star Trek: Discovery Season 4 Episode 1.
It's a parallel not lost on Burnham, and she's comfortable enough with Rillak now that she addresses it head-on.
Burnham: I can't have you questioning my orders on the bridge.
Rillak: I presume we're now clear on the difference between asking a question and questioning.
There's also an elegant closure in their antagonism when Burnham has Rillak share the news about the DMA's new proximity to Earth and Ni'Var.
In times of crisis, people need to know that their leaders are not rattled by uncertainty or overwhelming odds. They need to know that there is a plan, that they'll be okay.
Burnham
It segues nicely into Burnham's own declaration of faith in Rillak's leadership.
I like that Burnham falls in with leaders she believes in versus following the fashion of politics, but I worry that we've never seen Rillak's vice-president who has had all the powers of the president conferred to them.
If something were to happen to Rillak on this mission, would the new president follow the path that Rillak has laid out?
How far has Burnham come from her days as First Mutineer?
When I was a child, I, like many of you, dreamed of going where no one has gone before. None of us could've imagined it would be under these circumstances. With so much uncertainty, so much at stake. We don't know what we'll find. We don't know how we'll be received.
Burnham
Tarka's tale is more than sound but less than fury. For a character so hell-bent on riding high on his genius, he harbors a lot more regret and guilt than one would expect.
Rather like a reverse Patty Hearst, he comes to care for Ourous, the mark he'd agreed to infiltrate for the Emerald Chain.
He cares enough that it's devastating for him that the guard outs him to Ourous.
He cares enough that Ourous's forgiveness might be the greatest boon ever bestowed on him.
It says something for the lack of a villainous presence this season that part of me still resists believing in Tarka's warm, fuzzy underbelly.
I really wanted him to have a nefarious reason for wanting the DMA power source, some negative, vendetta-esque motive.
I wanted Book to denounce him for his unscrupulous methods and come to the realization that this is what grief can do left unchecked and given fuel and opportunity.
But I can live with a couple of companions-by-chance, severed from their loved ones by force and by choice, coming together over pipedreams that one can teleport to another dimension and the other can come back from causing an intergalactic incident.
It's part of what drives me, I think. Refusing to be powerless like that.
Book
To be honest, though, with all his brilliance, couldn't Tarka have found a way to communicate with Species 10-C before this and just ASK for a DMA power source? Nicely? Oh, wait.
With two major plot threads taking up so much room, it would be easy (and unfortunate) to overlook the quieter moments happening.
Saru and T'Rina's burgeoning romance is so adorably tender, I could scream.
Their interactions are so measured, so thoughtful, so emotionally fraught, it's like the first draw of a bow over violin strings, filled with divine tension and purity of spirit.
Both come to their relationship with tremendous pressure on their shoulders. T'Rina, of course, carries the weight of responsibility for Ni'Var and its citizens, while Saru is responsible for Su'Kal and holds a seat of authority on Kaminar.
Still, their connection seems to alleviate their burdens rather than add to them, and that might be exactly what love in this time and circumstance needs to be.
And then there's Discovery's First Family.
Stamets's need to express his pride and love for Adira -- as well as his complete inability to do it subtly -- is endearing.
Fair warning, but I will always reach for you if it seems you're hurting.
Stamets
Adira's slow realization that their place with Stamets and Culber will always be safe and assured is just as touching.
Looking at the many characters touched with the isolation that is often comorbid with intellectual brilliance, there's a cautionary tale to be drawn from how Adira and Stamets are fostering growth in each other versus Tarka's desperation when he loses Ourous.
It probably helps that Stamets has had Culber by his side for a long time. If he hasn't learned genuine humor and empathy, he is now capable of a reasonable facsimile.
Burnham: Stamets, we'll need those thirty seconds on shields right now.
Stamets: I'll do my best not to kill us.
Burnham: Always appreciated.
Assuming Book and Tarka successfully traverse the galactic barrier, there will be a race into the unknown that should carry us to the end of the season.
How will Species 10-C receive these alien visitors? Will communication prove possible?
Will Ourous be found? Did he make it "home"? Could he have been used as a double-bluff to drive Tarka to complete the inter-dimensional transporter?
Hit our comments with your thoughts and theories!
Diana Keng was a staff writer for TV Fanatic. She is a lifelong fan of smart sci-fi and fantasy media, an upstanding citizen of the United Federation of Planets, and a supporter of AFC Richmond 'til she dies. Her guilty pleasures include female-led procedurals, old-school sitcoms, and Bluey. She teaches, knits, and dreams big. Follow her on X.
