Cora Buhlert's Blog, page 50

Star Trek Discovery visits the planet formerly known as Vulcan in “Unification III”

It’s time for the latest installment in my ongoing episode by episode reviews of season 3 of Star Trek Discovery. Reviews of previous episodes may be found here.

Warning: Spoilers behind the cut!

So far, season three of Star Trek Discovery has oscillated between episodes that are very typically Star Trek and episodes that deploy space opera tropes that Star Trek has rarely played with. Last episode was one of the latter, so it makes sense that the following episode would be an example of the former. And indeed, “Unification III” is the most Star Trekky of Discovery episodes, which not only resolves its central conflict in a courtroom drama cum dissertion defence (Camestros Felapton calls it “an ancient Earth ritual called ‘defending your phd thesis’ but with space elves and more apostrophes” in his review) but which also refers back to earlier seasons of Discovery, the original series, The Next Generation and Star Trek Picard. Even the title is a reference to the Next Generation two-parter “Unification” and indeed implies that this episode is a direct sequel, albeit one that is set 800 years after the original. Honestly, you couldn’t find a more typical Star Trek episode, if you tried.

However, “Unification III” also engages in one of the most annoying things about Star Trek Discovery, namely the continuing humiliation of Michael Burnham. Season one was pretty much all about humiliating Michael, season two was much better in that regard, but season three falls right back into the bad old habits again. And so episode starts off with an extended flashback of Michael getting humiliated and demoted (not without reason) in the last episode without recapping any of the bits about “Scavengers” that were actually fun. And then, the Michael humiliation porn continues this week with almost no interruption. It’s too much even for AV-Club reviewer Zack Handlen, who doesn’t particularly like Michael.

But before we get to the humiliation porn, we get a very nice scene of Michael beaming aboard Book’s ship (which still has no name and is still parked inside Discovery‘s shuttle bay) looking for some comfort, which leads to Michael and Book having sex (which is very tastefully handled, probably because Sonequa Martin-Green’s pregnancy was already showing at this point) and some candid pillow talk afterwards. Michael confesses that she is no longer sure, if Discovery is where she belongs, and Book, who feels not welcome aboard Discovery, tries to persuade her to just quit and travel through space with him and Grudge. He also tries to tell Michael that no, the fate of the universe does not rest upon her shoulders (though in Star Trek Discovery, it usually does) and that someone else will figure out the Burn thing eventually. And indeed, part of me just wanted Michael to say “yes” and “Screw Starfleet”. But she’s still Michael Burnham, and so she must not only suffer, the fate of the universe also really does rest upon her shoulders.

In the next scene, we get Michael reuniting with Tilly, after Tilly basically tattled about her unsanctioned absence to Saru. Okay, so Saru would have noticed Michael’s absence anyway sooner or later anyway (and why does the Discovery‘s computer not alert Saru, if someone is leaving the ship?), but tattling on your friend is not a nice thing to do. Tilly also wants to know why Michael didn’t tell her about her plans, whereupon Michael says that it would have put Tilly into an even worse position with Saru. Tilly, however, insists that she still would have liked to know. Though I full understand why Michael didn’t tell Tilly. Because much as I like Tilly, she is about the last person aboard Discovery I would trust to keep a secret.

Michael and Tilly also analyse the black box/flight recorder Book and Michael found last episode and find that the Starfleet ship to which the flight recorder belonged also exploded at a slightly different time than the other two Starfleet ships from which they have flight reocrders.  So the Burn really did spread from a certain location. Michael tries to triangulate the location based on the information from the three flight recorders, but Tilly reminds her that space is three-dimensional (finally someone remembers) and that they need more data. Tilly also has an idea where to find that data. For all through the galaxy, there are scattered sensors belonging to a classified experiment known only as SB-19. Those sensors may well have recorded useful data.

Saru and Michael promptly inform Admiral Vance about these findings and ask for the SB-19 sensor data. Whereupon Admiral Vance informs them that procuring the data might be a problem, because SB-19 wasn’t a Federation experiment. It was run by Ni’Var.

Since Michael and Saru both react with a blank look, Vance corrects himself, “Oh yes, you probably know that planet better by its former name Vulcan. This leads to another barrage of questions and Vance offering some catch-up of 900 years of galactic history. For starters, Vulcan changed its name, because it’s no longer inhabited only by Vulcans, but the Romulans also live there now (Jean-Luc Picard would be very relieved to hear that someone has finally agreed to take in the homeless Romulans).

“But aren’t the Romulans enemies?” a disbelieving Saru asks, whereupon Vance explains that the Romulans are actually a Vulcan offshoot (a fact that was not known until the original series episode “Balance of Terror”, which takes place after Discovery jaunted into the future) and that Ambassador Spock worked hard to reunite the two people and that his efforts succeeded (sort of), even though it took centuries. “Spock did what?” Michael exclaims, since she has no idea what her little brother has been up to since she left.

But Michael has barely time to deal with those revelations, when Vance drops another bombshell. Because Ni’Var left the Federation about a hundred years before, shortly after the Burn. Which is something of a shock, because Vulcan was a founding member. On the other hand, Earth also left the Federation and they were another founding member. And indeed, Michael insists that the Vulcans would never leave the Federation – it must have been those Romulans. “No, actually the Romulans wanted to stay”, Vance replies. He also reports that diplomatic relations with Ni’Var are difficult, because Ni’Var doesn’t trust the Federation and won’t hand over the data.

However, Vance also has a brilliant idea. Since the people of Ni’Var venerate Spock as their uniter, they might just listen to his sister (whom no one was supposed to ever mention again, but maybe the Vulcans just ignored that bit and the Romulans never agreed in the first place), when they won’t listen to anybody else. Saru points out that he demoted Michael, but Vance won’t hear anything about that. And so Discovery is off to Ni’Var a.k.a. the planet formerly known as Vulcan.

En route, Michael – and Book, since they’re together at the time – catches up on Spock’s remarkable history, accessing the files of one Admiral Jean-Luc Picard and treating us to a clip of Leonard Nimoy as Spock in the original “Unification” two-parter. I suspect it was not just Michael who got misty-eyed at seeing Spock again (and nothing against Ethan Peck or Zachary Quinto, but for most of us, Leonard Nimoy still is Spock). Though Michael is also a very proud big sister. Book laughs and tells Michael that she and Spock are both such overarchievers (and Michael hasn’t even mentioned her other brother yet, the one who wanted to talk to God). But Book also likes Spock, at least what little he’s seen of him.

When Discovery arrives at Ni’Var, they are greeted by a hologram of President T’Rina. Tasha Rosling, the Canadian actress playing T’Rina, looked very familiar, , there was no role which really stuck out to me. Finally, I realised that the actress reminded me of Swiss singer and TV personality Paola Felix, who was a staple of German TV, when I was a kid.

T’Rina is happy enough to see Michael, though a tad miffed, because Discovery just popped up without triggering Ni’Var’s long-range sensors. She also refuses to hand over the SB-19 data, because that subject is still sensitive more than a century later. Cause it turns out that SB-19 was not just a bunch of sensors, but a system of stargates (wrong franchise, folks), which the Vulcans developed as an alternative to dilithium, since the Federation was running out of dilithium even before the Burn, because they overstretched themselves. The Federation pushed the Vulcans to develop the SB-19 system faster than the Vulcans were comfortable with. Then the Burn happened and the Vulcans believed that the SB-19 experiment was the cause, so they shut down the experiment and left the Federation, because 900 years of putting up with humans was enough for them. Coincidentally, that huge Vulcan flounce also proves that the Romulans are not the only drama queens living on Ni’Var.

Michael points out that while she and Tilly haven’t been able to fully pinpoint the origin of the Burn, they do know that Vulcan a.ka. Ni’Var was not it. But T’Rina remains adamant. She’d love to help, but the situation is just too politically volatile. After all, Ni’Var is the planet of drama queens.

Saru is willing to leave it at that. Michael, however, isn’t. And being Michael, she comes up with a brilliant plan, which she unfortunately neglects to discuss with anybody else beforehand. To be fair, it was probably a spur of the moment idea, but it might still have been a good idea to run her plan past Saru first. On the other hand, Saru probably would have said no. And so Michael asks T’Rina, if they still follow the old ways. “Of course,” T’Rina declares, “We’re Vulcan, after all.” Whereupon Michael informs her that as a graduate of the Vulcan Science Academy (and we wonder how much Michael enjoyed dropping that tidbit, considering that how the Vulcans treated her on her graduation ceremony) she invokes the T’Kal-in-ket, an ancient Vulcan ritual that is part trial and part PhD thesis defence.

T’Rina is not at all pleased, because Michael just forced her hand, while Saru is just exasperated that Michael once again made a move without informing him about it first. Michael, however, is confident. After all, she has scientific proof that Ni’Var was not the source of the Burn. T’Rina warns her that proof alone won’t help, because things have changed a lot in the past 900 years.

One of the things that have changed is that the challenger at a T’Kal-in-ket now gets assigned an advocate, a member of the Quowat Milat, the order of Romulan warrior nuns who speak with absolutely candour and only support lost causes, whom we first encountered in Star Trek Picard. T’Rina also informs Michael that this particular Quowat Milat sister has taken an interest in her specifically.

I have to admit that I was halfway expecting a distant descendant of Spock’s to show up. He might well have decided to further his unification project by marrying a Romulan. After all, that’s what Sarek did with Amanda. However, when the Quowat Milat sister lifts her veil, it’s none other than Gabrielle Burnham, Michael’s long lost mother whom we last saw in “Perpetual Infinity” last season. Michael has been searching for her mother on Terralysium, but instead Gabrielle somehow ended up on Ni’Var (to be fair, her adopted home planet is a logical place to look for Michael) and wound up joining the Quowat Milat. Michael is of course overjoyed to see her mother and also confides in her that she isn’t sure if Discovery and Starfleet are still right for her. This proves to be a mistake.

But first, we get the T’Kal-in-ket, which turns out to be a very Vulcan affair with torches, gongs, an audience of Discovery crewmembers as well as random Vulcans and Romulans (the way to tell them apart is that Vulcans still wear the same silly hairstyle they’ve always favoured, while Romulans have regular hairstyles) and a quorum of three whom Michael has to persuade of her cause. The quorum are V’Kir, an extremely arrogant and snotty Vulcan, who’s likely a latter day version of the Vulcan logic extremists we’ve seen in previous seasons of Discovery (and am I the only one who finds it problematic that Vulcans of colour are inevitably jerks), N’Raj, a Romulan who’s the most likeable of the bunch, and Shira, who represents those who are descended from both Romulans and Vulcans (though aren’t they the same species anyway?) and doesn’t say much.

Though the T’Kal-in-ket is almost oever before it began, because V’Kir, who is the chairvulcan, wants to dismiss Michael’s cause, because she has no new information to answer. The people of Ni’Var already know that the Burn spread and where it originated. Michael insists that they don’t know everything and that her data proves that the source wasn’t Ni’Var. N’Raj points out that if there’s a chance that Ni’Var wasn’t the source after all, they should maybe listen, but V’Kir won’t hear any of it. His mind is made up. Ni’Var is responsible for the Burn and the Federation made them do it.

Now we know that Michael has the tendency to literally consider herself responsible for the fate of the whole universe, a card she even plays during the inquiry. “Hey guys, I travelled through time to save all life in the whole fucking universe and this is how you thank me?” However, considering yourself responsible for the fate of the whole universe isn’t just a Michael thing, it’s a Vulcan thing. And the Vulcans have spent the past hundred years thinking they were responsible for the end of the Star Trek universe as we know it. And now they would just like to wallow in guilt undisturbed. Like I said, they’re all drama queens.

V’Kir points out that even if Ni’Var should not be responsible for the Burn, they still don’t trust the Federation. And since Michael speaks for the Federation, how shall they trust her? Michael declares that she’s from Vulcan, too, and Spock’s sister, so they can trust her. And no, the Federation is not manipulating her, even though it totally is.

At this point, Gabrielle Burnham decides to make a last-minute play for the coveted 2020 Darth Vader Parenthood Award for Oustandingly Horrible Fictional Parents by basically stabbing her daughter in the back. And indeed Dr. Burnham a.k.a. Sister Gabrielle might have had a chance, if I wasn’t already 99 percent sure who this year’s winner will be. So nice try, Gabrielle, but the other candidate was simply more horrible. Keep trying.

Gabrielle informs the quorum that Michael is not telling the truth and proceeds to lay Michael’s painful history in great and exhaustive detail, telling everybody present that Michael tends to defy orders again and again, that she got prime Philippa Georgiou killed, that she started the war with the Klingons and that she defied orders again to get the Burn data and was demoted in the process. Oh yes, and Michael doesn’t even know, if Starfleet is still the right place for her.

All of those things may be right, but it’s still a dick move by Gabrielle and if she were my mother, I have told her to get lost and never come near me again. But this is still Star Trek and so Gabrielle’s dick move only triggers an impassioned speech from Michael how she travelled 900 years into the future to save all life in the universe from the evil AI Control (that should work with N’Raj, since we know that Romulans hate AIs) and that they could just be fucking grateful, cause without her sacrifice, their whole shitty future wouldn’t even exist. All right, so Michael swears a little less, but that’s more or less the gist of it. “Now she speaks the truth”, Gabrielle declares triumphantly.

Now in Star Trek, particularly from The Next Generation onwards, passionate speeches frequently save the day. However, Ni’Var is still the planet of the drama queens and so the quorum instead descends into internecine squabbling, as old enmities and disagreements between Vulcans, Romulans and hybrids come to the fore. Whereupon Michael decides to out-drama-queen them all. She bangs the gong, declares that she won’t undo the good work that her brother has done to reunite Vulcans and Romulans and that she withdraws her request. Then she walks out in an epic flounce.

And that epic flounce is successful, too, for T’Rina is so impressed by Michael (and Saru, since she quite seems to like everybody’s favourite Kelpian) that she hands over the data anyway. She also informs Michael that she now understands how Spock became the man he was. Because he was clearly influenced by his big sister. T’Rina might even be right, because Spock and Michael are very similar characters. They both do what they feel is right, orders and consequences be damned. They’re also both willing to sacrifice everything to protect the people they care for. And they’re both overarchievers who think that the fate of the entire universe rests on their shoulders. Finally, Spock’s decision to reunite Vulcans and Romulans was exactly the sort of unsanctioned maverick action that Michael keeps getting in trouble for. Which makes the fact that quite a few people dislike Michael but adore Spock so hypocritical. Because they are very similar people in different packages.

Afterwards, Gabrielle visits Michael in her quarters. Amazingly, Michael does not kick her out, but they even reconcile. Michael’s ordeal has shown her that she still wants to be part of Starfleet and Gabrielle tells her that she doesn’t have to change the new person she’s become, but can remain with Starfleet as her new self.

That’s all nice and well, except that I don’t agree that Starfleet is a good fit for Michael and likely never was. The only reason she joined was to prove something to Sarek and the Vulcan Science Academy. But she doesn’t have to prove anything to them anymore, so maybe going off on her own with Book would be a better choice for her. However, as io9 reviewer James Whitbrook points out, Michael is the protagonist and the series is so focussed on her that only does everything have to revolve around her, but there was only ever one outcome for her dilemma.

The fact that Discovery is more focussed on a single character than any other Star Trek series except for Picard lies also at the heart of the B-plot of this episode, namely who will be Discovery‘s first officer now that Michael has been demoted. Saru has clearly made his decision and approaches Tilly. If you think that a) Tilly is an ensign and there are plenty of people on board who are more experienced and outrank her, b) Tilly never even completed the command training program and c) this is the second time Saru picks a first officer just because he likes them and look how well that worked the first time around, then you’re not alone. Tilly makes all of these points herself.

Saru gives her time to consider, so Tilly talks to Stamets, which gives Anthony Rapp to show off some of his marvelous facial expressions. Stamets also isn’t entirely sure how he feels about Tilly of all people being his boss. However, he enlists the bridge crew who all tell Tilly how much they love her and that they want her to do the job for which several of them likely were in line themselves. So Silvia Tilly is now the Discovery‘s new first officer.

Tor.com reviewer Keith R.A. DeCandido is okay with this decision, even though it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, and his wife is thrilled. And yes, Tilly is a very likable character and a fan favourite. However, making Tilly of all people Number One also illustrates a huge issue with Discovery, namely that the show is so focussed on Michael that many of the other characters are criminally underdeveloped. Michael is out for obvious reasons, Stamets and Culber both have jobs already, Jett Reno, who would have been a fantastic choice, is only recurring but not a regular character, Georgiou is a psychopath from the mirror universe. And the bridge crew, who would have been the most likely pool of candidates, are so underdeveloped that only Dettmer and Owosegun have anything approaching personalities. So Tilly is really the only person listed in the opening credits who can take the job. Season 3 has done a lot to remedy that and give the bridge crew more to do, but the intense Michael focus of the show is still a problem, even if Michael has now decided that her place is with Starfleet and Discovery after all.

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Two New “In Love and War” Stories Available: “Neutral Ground” and “Ballroom Blitz”

I have another new release announcement to make. This one is for the two latest stories in my In Love and War space opera romance series.

Now I don’t always write in chronological order and I’m in good company there, since Lois McMaster Bujold and Fritz Leiber didn’t do it either and they’re both highly acclaimed multiple award-winning authors. And so, both new stories slot into an earlier place in the In Love and War chronology. Besides, the In Love and War stories largely stand alone anyway, though you’ll get more out of the series, if you read them all.

The first of the two new stories is another one to come out of the 2020 July Short Story Challenge, where the aim was to write a short story per day during the month of July. It’s something of a side story, set just before Collision Course and featuring Mikhail’s former commander, Colonel Brian Mayhew of the Republican Special Commando Forces.

It’s been established throughout the series that Mayhew has contacts in the Imperial military. In this story, we finally get to meet one of those contacts, General Roderick Crawford, who’s basically Mayhew’s Imperial counterpart or rather the counterpart of Mayhew’s boss General Honold. Even though they’re theoretically sworn enemies, Mayhew and Crawford get along really well with each other. Unlike Mikhail and Anjali, they don’t draw any conclusions from this at all.

In this story, Mayhew and Crawford meet over tea, coffee and pastries to discuss the very embarrassing matter of Mikhail and Anjali running away together. And yes, there are recipes in the Author’s Note.

So accompany Brian Mayhew and General Roderick Crawford, as they meet on…

Neutral Ground

[image error] Two old soldiers share a coffee and fight for their lives

The Republic of United Planets and the Empire of Worlds have been at war for eighty-eight years now. But nonetheless, Colonel Brian Mayhew, deputy commander of the Republican Special Commando Forces, meets with his Imperial counterpart General Roderick Crawford to discuss an incident that’s a problem for both of them. For two of their elite soldiers fell in love and ran away with each other, an embarrassment to the Republic and the Empire both.

However, this secret meeting is not as secret as the two men think. And so Mayhew and Crawford are soon fighting for their lives side by side…

This is a novelette of 9500 words or approximately 32 print pages in the In Love and War series by Hugo finalist Cora Buhlert, but may be read as a standalone.

More information.

Length: 9500 words

List price: 0.99 USD, EUR or GBP

Buy it at Amazon US, Amazon UK, Amazon Germany, Amazon France, Amazon Netherlands, Amazon Spain, Amazon Italy, Amazon Canada, Amazon Australia, Amazon Brazil, Amazon Japan, Amazon India, Amazon Mexico, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple iBooks, Google Play, Scribd, Smashwords, Thalia, Weltbild, Hugendubel, Buecher.de, DriveThruFiction, Casa del Libro, Vivlio, 24symbols and XinXii.

The second new In Love and War story originally came about, when I was putting together my annual round-up of Valentine’s Day themed science fiction, fantasy and horror stories and thought, ‘You know, you ought to write another Valentine’s Day story, because holiday stories usually do well.”

So I wrecked my head trying to come up with an idea and finally thought, “Why don’t I write a Valentine’s Day story for the In Love and War series?” After all, it’s space opera romance set in a universe where everybody is descended from people who originally came from Earth, so it makes sense for there to be a Valentine’s Day in that universe. And so the idea was born to send Anjali and Mikhail on a romantic date that’s rudely interrupted by people with blasters.

Unfortunately, it was maybe two weeks before Valentine’s Day 2020, when I had the the idea to write a Valentine’s Day themed adventure in the In Love and War series. Besides, what had been supposed to be a short story turned into a fully fledged novella instead, so the story was not finished in time for Valentine’s Day. And then the pandemic happened and I found myself rather unexpectedly nominated for a Hugo Award and so the story ended up on the backburner for a while, until I picked it up again in the fall of 2020. However, I didn’t want to hold a finished story back until next February either, so instead of being released in time for Valentine’s Day, the story now comes out closer to Christmas.

Anjali and Mikhail celebrate their first anniversary in The Taste of Home. The Valentine’s Day story happens at an earlier point in their relationship, so I rearranged the series order yet again and slotted it inbetween Bullet Holes and Dead World.

Romance, action, crime, food, gratuitous destruction of property – this story has it all. So follow Mikhail and Anjali, as they get caught up in a…

Ballroom Blitz

[image error] Anjali and Mikhail go on a Valentine’s Day date. Trouble ensues.

Once, Anjali Patel and Mikhail Grikov were soldiers on opposing sides of an intergalactic war. They met, fell in love and decided to go on the run together.

Now Anjali and Mikhail are trying to eke out a living on the independent worlds of the galactic rim, while attempting to stay under the radar of those pursuing them.

It’s Valentine’s Day and so Mikhail and Anjali enjoy a well-deserved romantic dinner. But their date is rudely interrupted, when they find themselves caught in the crossfire of a turf war between two rival gangsters.

This is a Valentine’s Day novella of 23200 words or approximately 78 print pages in the “In Love and War” series by Hugo finalist Cora Buhlert, but may be read as a standalone.

More information.

Length: 23200 words.

List price: 2.99 USD, EUR or 1.99 GBP

Buy it at Amazon US, Amazon UK, Amazon Germany, Amazon France, Amazon Netherlands, Amazon Spain, Amazon Italy, Amazon Canada, Amazon Australia, Amazon Brazil, Amazon Japan, Amazon India, Amazon Mexico, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple iBooks, Google Play, Scribd, Smashwords, Thalia, Weltbild, Hugendubel, Buecher.de, DriveThruFiction, Casa del Libro, Vivlio, 24symbols and XinXii.

The title Ballroom Blitz is a reference to the eponymous 1973 song by the British glam rock band The Sweet by the way. I chanced to hear it on the radio one day, while writing the story, and thought, “This is the perfect title for the up to then untitled story.”.

This covers for both stories are by the hyper-talented Tithi Luadthong. In the case of Ballroom Blitz, the cover actually came before the story, because I liked that image so much that I modelled the club where Anjali and Mikhail go for a night of romance and dancing after the image. And yes, that giant chandelier plays an important role in the story.

If you want to give the In Love and War series a try before buying, Double-Cross, another adventure of Anjali and Mikhail, is this month’s free story, which you can read right here on this blog.

And if you want to read the entire series of sixteen stories, the cheapest way to do so is via this handy series bundle, which is available exclusively at DriveThruFiction.

There’ll be at least one more new release announcement for 2020, maybe two, closer to the holidays. But for now, stay safe and healthy and have a happy Thanksgiving and/or First Advent, if you’re celebrating.

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Tha Mandalorian and Baby Yoda meet up with old friends and enemies in “The Siege”

Now I have this week’s Star Trek Discovery review out of the way, it’s time for my episode by episode reviews of season 2 of The Mandalorian again. Previous installments may be found here.

Also, since Star Wars is a Disney property now, may I remind you that Disney is not paying the royalties due to Alan Dean Foster and possibly others as well.

Warning: Spoilers under the cut!

Mando’s quest to find the second-to-last Jedi Ahsoka Tano will have to be postponed for a bit, because the Razor Crest simply can’t go any further after the beating she’s taken. Mando’s attempts to enlist Baby Yoda’s help for repairs inside the Star Wars equivalent of a Jeffries Tube fail, because the instruction are too complicated for a toddler and Baby Yoda also manages to cross two wires in spite of Mando’s urgent appeal to do anything but that and gets himself electrocuted in the process (Don’t worry, he’s fine). In many ways, that scene calls to mind a similar scene in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, where everybody’s other favourite alien baby Groot also fails to understand instructions regarding a detonator. What is it with Disney-owned space opera characters and trying to make toddlers do electrical repairs?

We are now treated to a sweet scene of Mando and Baby Yoda eating some soup. Mando lifts his helmet just enough to be able to drink the soup (spoons are apparently not a thing in the Star Wars universe) and Baby Yoda tries to take a quick peek. Which makes me wonder if the fundamentalist Mandalorian “Never take of your helmet in front of others” rule also applies to family members and children in one’s care and if Baby Yoda has really never seen the face of his Dad. Now I have no idea about the development of Yoda’s species, though Baby Yoda behave very much like a human toddler. And as the so-called “still face” experiment proved, human babies need to see their parents’/caregivers’ facial expressions to develop and thrive. So now I worry about Baby Yoda’s emotional and psychological development. Honestly, Mando, you’re a clan of two. You can take your helmet off in front of the kid.

Mando decides that he’ll need to have the Razor Crest repaired, so he heads to his old familiar stomping grounds in Nevarro. Except that Nevarro has changed a lot since Mando was last there (And how long has it been since the end of season 1 anyway? Weeks? Months?). The central town (cause all planets in the Star Wars universe only have one town, even Coruscant, only that the city covers the entire planet there) has cleaned up nicely, the market looks much more inviting and the various lowlives that used to hang out in town have largely gone underground (quite literally in one case). There is even a statue of the heroic droid IG-11 in the background, which was a nice touch. And it’s all due to the new magistrate Greef Carga (whom I suspect wasn’t elected democratically) and the new marshall Cara Dune, whom we see in action early on, taking out some alien bandits and adopting their supposed dinner, a meerkat like creature. As Tor.com reviewer Emmet Asher-Perrin points out, the aliens are of the same species a member of which harrassed Luke Skywalker in the Mos Eisley cantina in A New Hope, before losing an arm to Obi-Wan’s lightsabre.

Greef Carga and Cara are happy to see Mando, even if they can’t quite suppress a few smirks and jabs about the state of the Razor Crest, which is so badly damaged that Mando can’t even fully lower the ramp and instead has to hop down. Baby Yoda gets some cuddles and Greef Carga even insists on carrying the little one around. Cause ever since Baby Yoda saved his life back in season one, Greef Carga is his number one fan.

While the Razor Crest is being repaired (by his best people, Greef Carga declares), Cara and Greef Carga show Mando around town. We meet another familiar face, Mythrol, the blue gilled alien that Mando captured in the very first scene of season one, well before we even met Baby Yoda. Nobody seems to know whether Mythrol is the name of the character, as Guardian reviewer Paul MacInnes believes, or of the species, as AV-Club reviewer Katie Rife thinks, but since we have no other name, I’ll go with Mythrol for now. Last time, we saw Mythrol, he was frozen in carbonite. Greef Carga thawed him out (though Mythrol still complains about vision problems in his left eye) and put him back to work as an accountant, though he will have to work of his debts (Mythrol made the bad decision to steal from Greef Carga) for 350 years. I hope his species is that long lived.

Greef Carga and Cara Dune also have a proposition for Mando. Since it will take a while for the Razor Crest to be repaired, they’d like his help with a mission. For it turns out that even though Greef Carga and Care Dune have cleaned up and control most of Nevarro, there is an old Imperial base on the far side of the planet that they’d like to be rid of. The base is still active, but should only have a skeleton crew. “Piece of cake”, they assure Mando.

Mando decides to go along on the mission, because Greef and Cara are his friends and besides, Greef Carga promised him the much needed repairs on the Razor Crest for free. But first Mando reluctantly drops off Baby Yoda at the local school – formerly the bounty hunter guild headquarters – which Greef and Cara assure him is safe. Coincidentally, this school with a battered protocol droid serving as teacher is the only school of any kind we’ve ever seen in Star Wars. The closest thing to a school we’ve had previously was a clone indoctrination facility in Attack of the Clones. Of course, Baby Yoda is still too young for school and by far the smallest kid there. But he has the Force, which he promptly uses to steal some blue macarons from another kid, though to be fair, he does ask first. Still, somehow I don’t think that this is what Yoda had in mind, when he said, “Use the Force.”

The bulk of the episode is given over to Mando, Cara Dune, Greef Carga and Mythrol (who initially is only there as a driver, but eventually gets a lot more to do) trying to blow up the Imperial base, which is not nearly as deserted as they initially assumed. For starters, the supposed skeleton crew are a whole lot of Stormtroopers, who fare about as well against our heroes as Stormtroopers usually do. Mando literally throws one from the landing deck to the ground far below. There are technicians and other Imperial personnel as well. Our heroes quickly deal with them.

The base is drawing geothermal energy from Nevarro’s everpresent lava flows, so Mando and the gang decide to cut the cooling lines, which should lead to the lava overflowing and destroying the base. It’s a solid plan, but unfortunately the controls for the cooling system happen to be right above a lava shaft with no railing and some angry Stormtroopers firing at our heroes. In the end, Mythrol is the one who deactivates the cooling system, while Mando, Cara and Greef cover him.

The Imperial base looks very much like any Imperial outpost in the Star Wars universe, down to the very retro looking switches and data sockets we’ve seen first in A New Hope. It’s also notable that the Empire still doesn’t give a shit about even the most basic of safety precautions. Platforms have no railings, trash compactors have no emergency shutdowns, reactors can be accessed via entirely unprotected shafts, control systems are located above bottomless chasms, again with no railing. Even though railings and emergency shutdown systems were commonplace in the real world even in 1977, when A New Hope came out. It seems as if technology progressed very differently in the Star Wars universe. Emmet Asher-Perrin has a theory why that might be so.

On their way to escape the base that’s about to blow up, Mando, Greef, Cara and Mythrol come across a lab with deformed humanoid beings pickled in blue liquid. They also fine a holographic message from Doctor Pershing, the scientist we saw doing strange things to Baby Yoda in season one, to Moff Gideon, which contains some very worrying information. For Doctor Pershing regrets to inform Moff Gideon that the experiment failed, because the subject rejected the blood transfusion they were given. And unfortunately, Doctor Pershing doesn’t have any more high M-count blood left, because he was only able to take a little from the donor, since the donor was still a young child. Mando knows what this means. The reason Moff Gideon (whom our heroes didn’t even know was still alive) wants Baby Yoda is to use his blood in his experiments. Which means that Baby Yoda (and a whole school full of kids) is in mortal danger.

There are a lot of speculations about what precisely the experiments Doctor Pershing is perfoming for Moff Gideon are about. Is Moff Gideon trying to create his own Force-sensitive supersoldiers, as io9 reviewer Germain Lussier and AV-Club reviewer Katie Rife suspect? Is he trying to clone Palpatine, as Emmet Asher-Perrin suspects? Whatever it is, it’s certainly bad news for our heroes.

And so Mando takes off on his jetpack to rescue Baby Yoda (a scene which sadly happened off screen), while Cara, Greef and Mythrol have to fight their way out. When their way is cut off, Cara commandeers an armoued and armed Imperial ground transport and the three of them escape, pursued by Stormtroopers on speeder bikes and later TIE-fighters. The action scenes in this episode – which was directed by Carl Weathers, who also plays Greef Carga – are truly impressive, particularly the lengthy chase scene in the canyon.

Just as a TIE-fighter is about to blow up the transport, Mando comes to the rescue in the newly repaired Razor Crest and proceeds to take out the remaining two TIE-fighters (Greef Carga had shot one of them down) with some impressive flying manoeuvres, while Baby Yoda sits in the passenger seat, munching macarons and cheering. The little one clearly loves fast movements of any kind. But anybody who has ever ridden a rollercoaster on a full stomach knows that this is not a good idea. And so Mando blows up the last of the TIE-fighters only to be rewarded with some blue vomit, which he manfully tries to clean up, though personally I don’t think a cape is at all suitable for cleaning up baby puke.

The episode ends with Greef Carga getting a visit from Captain Teva of the New Republic, whom we last saw in “The Passenger” two weeks ago saving Mando, Baby Yoda and the Frog Lady from the monster spiders. Captain Teva wants to know just why an Imperial base suddenly exploded (you’d figure the New Republic would be grateful, no matter what the cause) and if a wandering Mandalorian was involved, but Greef Carga isn’t telling. Neither is Cara Dune, even after Captain Teva brings up her past as a Rebel shocktrooper and tries to re-recruit her. He even leaves her some kind of badge. But Cara wants nothing to do with the New Republic, at least for now, and Teva asking her if she lost someone on Alderaan doesn’t help either. After all, it’s obvious that every survivor – and so far we’ve only met two, Leia and Cara – must have lost not just their home, but their families and friends as well. Talking of which, Alderaan certainly breeds impressive women, even if there is something of a backlash against Cara Dune because of some unfortunate remarks actress Gina Carano made on Twitter.

The scene then shifts to what looks like a slightly redesigned Star Destroyer, which is introduced in perfect New Hope manner. Aboard that ship, a female Imperial officer – the first and only female Imperial soldier we’ve ever seen, though the First Order did have several women in its ranks – receives a message from one of the mechanics who repaired the Razor Crest. The tracking device has been installed, the mechanic reports. Thrilled, the young officer reports this to Moff Gideon. So Mando and Baby Yoda are not just in danger, they’re also bringing that danger to the doorstep of the second-to-last Jedi in the universe.

This episode was almost pure action. For once, it also contained more callbacks to Star Wars itself, particularly A New Hope, than to other genres. However, unlike some of the other action heavy episodes, “The Siege” also moves the story forward, because we now know just why Moff Gideon is after poor Baby Yoda.

There have been some complaints about the meandering and episodic nature of The Mandalorian, but then the show follows (and has followed from the very first episode on) the old “a stranger comes into town” pattern that lies at the heart of anything from The Fugitive and Route 66 via Doctor Who and the original Star Trek (and The Next Generation, since Star Trek only had longer arcs from Deep Space Nine on) via the 1970s Incredible Hulk and The A-Team to Jack Reacher. It’s a very old pattern that goes back to the pulp era (Conan and Eric John Stark and pretty much every pulp series character are variations of “a stranger comes into town”) and likely even further to the dime novel era. It’s also a pattern that works, which is why it has been used for so long.

It seems to me as if the complaints mainly come from younger viewers who are used to the heavily serialised storytelling style of many TV shows of today. Indeed, a commenter somewhere said that they had problems adjusting to the episodic style of The Mandalorian, because the more serialised style of e.g. Game of Thrones was much more common, which made me think, “Uhm, how old are you exactly?” Because serialised TV-shows were not at all common until the 1990s. Twin Peaks is the first US TV-show that was heavily serialised, soap operas like Dallas or Dynasty notwithstanding. And even well into the 2000s, the majority of TV shows still used the episodic “case of the week” format or were hybrids that had a few arc episodes and a lot of standalone cases of the week. It’s only very recently that fully serialised shows became more common, probably because of the lower episode counts of streaming series. And The Mandalorian has a lot more internal continuity than e.g. The Fugitive or The A-Team, which can usually be watched in any order.

Now I’ve said before that I quite like the “a stranger comes to town” approach and use it for several of my own series. And I’m happy that there are still TV shows which use that time-tested approach, because while fully serialised TV shows can be a lot of fun, you also can’t watch too many of them at the same time.

Even though The Mandalorian is a brand-new show using cutting edge technology, it feels very retro. And so a more retro approach to storytelling is certainly appropriate.

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Star Trek Discovery goes on an unsanctioned mission in “Scavengers”

It’s time for the latest installment in my ongoing episode by episode reviews of season 3 of Star Trek Discovery. Reviews of previous episodes may be found here.

Warning: Spoilers behind the cut!

Now that Discovery has successfully rejoined Starfleet, the ship gets a technology update. The nacelles are detachable now, the consoles have been retrofitted with programmable matter and the crew get new badges, which double as communicators, personal transporters, tricorders and holographic emitters. Everybody geeks out about the cool new future science except for Dettmer, who’s still not herself, and Linus whose personal transporter keeps taking him to the wrong location. Poor Linus seems to be the designated comic relief in this crew. Not that Discovery doesn’t need the occasional comic relief, but maybe someone else could do the butt of the jokes once in a while?

Stamets is also not all that happy with his engine room being rearranged, though he does like the improvements Adira has made to the spore drive interface, which also allow him to ditch the implants he needed to operate the spore drive. Stamets also notes that Adira seems to be lonely and that they are talking to themselves. Though we know that Adira is really talking to their late boyfriend Gray whom they can see, even if no one else can. Stamets asks Adira what’s going on and actually gets them to open up to him, which leads to a sweet scene of Stamets and Adira bonding over the shared loss of a loved one who wasn’t fully gone after all. This is only the B-plot of this episode, but it’s very sweet one and gives Stamets, Culber and Adira some extra character development, too. And yes, I’d love to see Stamets and Culber adopting Adira (and Gray).

Even though Discovery has a lot of cool new tech and the only functioning drive in the galaxy that can cross large distances in the blink of an eye, Admiral Vance, who appears to be a new recurrent character, keeps them in reserve for emergencies, because Starfleet is having trouble with an Orion crime syndicate called the Emerald Chain.

More trouble is coming, when Discovery suddenly finds herself hailed by a ship from outside the Starfleet headquarters distortion field. When they answer the call, the bridge crew find themselves faced with none other than Grudge, Book’s very large and very fluffy cat.

It turns out that Book sent his ship and Grudge on autopilot to find Discovery, which begs the question how he knows where to find them, since the location of Starfleet headquarters is supposed to be secret and even Discovery herself took three episodes to find them. Also, with dilithium so rare and long range trips extremely difficult, how exactly did Book get enough dilithium to send his cat to Michael? It’s a question that’s never really adressed, because “Scavengers” has other things to do. Because the ship (Did it ever get a name?) carries not just Grudge, but also a holographic message from Book.

Book tells Michael that he found another black box – yes, flight recorders are still called black boxes in the 32nd century – of a Starfleet ship destroyed in the Burn on some planet and that he’ll get it for Michael. If he doesn’t come back in a week, he’s setting the ship on autopilot to bring Grudge to Michael. Since Book’s ship and Grudge are now here, Book obviously did not come back and is very likely in trouble.

Michael of course wants to go after him. For starters, she owes Book (and she also likes him, though she doesn’t want to admit it). And besides, Michael really needs that black box to find out what caused the Burn. Because if the Burn destroyed all dilithium using ships in the galaxy at the same time, all flight recorders should have stopped recording at the same time. However, the two surviving black boxes of Starfleet ships Michael found during her year in the wilderness both stopped recording at different times, which suggests that the Burn didn’t happen everywhere at once, but that it started somewhere and then spread. Michael believes that if she can find a third black box, she can triangulate that starting point and hopefully find out how the Burn happened.

Michael explains all this to Saru to convince him to let the Discovery go after Book. However, Saru responds that they are on call and have to be ready to take off anytime within 48 hours to deal with the Emerald Chain problem. Saru also thinks that a single holographic message and a cat won’t sway Admiral Vance, albeit without asking him first.

So Michael, being Michael, does what she always does and goes off to rescue Book and retrieve the black box anyway. Though she at least takes along Philippa Georgiou who tells her, “You had me at unsanctioned mission.” However, unbeknowst to Michael, Philippa is still suffering from occasional blackouts, which are accompanied by flashbacks (flash forwards/flash sideways?) of someone getting stabbed and someone screaming. Those visions are brief and there is some debate about what exactly Philippa is seeing here. Is it a traumatic memory of the mirror universe? Is it a premonition of things to come? Is she experiencing the death of her prime universe counterpart?

That said, when Philippa Georgiou is not having blackouts and weird visions, she is still the Empress Philippa the Merciless we all know and love. And so she and Michael borrow Book’s ship to fly to the planet where Book was last headed, posing as dilithium dealers. Meanwhile, Philippa teases Michael mercilessly about her feelings for Book (of course, Michael denies that she has any) and her questionable taste in men (Michael basically goes for hot bad boys, first the secret undercover Klingon Ash Tyler and now space outlaw Cleveland Booker). She also calls Book “the blob whisperer” and when Michael counters that transworms are not blobs, Georgiou replies that she was referring to Grudge.

Upon approaching the planet, Michael and Philippa are hailed by an Orion named Tolor who runs the local salvage operation (and is the nephew of an Orion crime boss, it turns out) who tries to keep them from beaming down and instead points them to the exchange where all deals are handled. Georgiou, however, bullies him into letting them beam down anyway and then continues to give her best Galactic tyrant cum crime lord impression. Michelle Yeoh is clearly having a lot of fun in these scenes.

The planet (if it ever gets a name, I don’t recall it) is a scavenging operation portrayed by some kind of quarry or sandpit. The actual work is done by slaves who are kept in line by an implant at the back of their necks which makes their heads explode (demonstrated quite gorily on an unfortunate Bajoran slave). The guy who is forced to install the implants is an Andorian named Ryn. Ryn is a former member of the crime syndicate. When he tried to incite a slave rebellion, he had his antennae chopped off for his trouble and was given the job of installing the discs, which makes all slaves hate him and thus reduces the chance of further rebellions.

Book, of course, has been captured and also turned into a slave. He and Michael cast longing looks at each other that thankfully escape Tolor, but not the antennaless Andorian Ryn. Georgiou sends her supposed employee Michael off to inspect some salvaged equipment with helpful slave Book, giving them some time to catch up. Book and Michael hug, Book tells Michael that she shouldn’t have come and should just forget about him, Michael tells him that she’ll free him and everybody else. Book tells her that he did manage to hide the black box away (they’re about the size of a ball pen in the 32nd century) and also that they’ll have to make whatever move they’re going to make in 45 minutes, before the shift ends and the slaves are sent back to their living quarters.

Georgiou figures out where Tolor is keeping the controller for the slave implants, namely in his pocket. She also manages to assemble a weapon from some scrap and then provokes Tolor to have her and Michael arrested, so they can get to the command centre. Meanwhile, Book and Ryn are rallying the slaves and telling them to be ready for the great escape.

At first, everything goes as planned. In the command centre, Georgiou and Michael show off their martial arts skills and take out the guards. But then, Philippa Georgiou experiences another blackout/flashback at the worst possible time and briefly passes out, while Michael is having an unexpectedly difficult time dealing with Tolor. Meanwhile, the slaves are trapped between a rock and a hard place, when the perimenter fence does not go down in time, while the Andorian guards are in hot pursuit. Tolor has his hands on Michael’s throat and all seems lost, when Georgiou finally recovers, knocks out Tolor, grabs the controller and switches off the perimeter fence. The slaves leg it for a convenient transport vessel, while Georgiou and Michael use Book’s ship to blast the slavers and their base to smithereens.

Tor.com reviewer Keith R.A. DeCandido is a bit bothered by this, because blowing up things and people is not the Star Trek way and who knows how many of the other guards were hapless conscripts like Ryn? I’m not a huge fan of the indiscriminate slaughtering of random guards and henchpeople myself and try to minimise it in my own fiction. However, I also am not particularly sorry about some slavers getting blown up (and in true Hollywood action movie style, we don’t actually know if they’re dead). Not to mention that the wholesale slaughter of Stormtroopers over in Star Wars, whom we know are either brainwashed and conditioned clones or forcibly conscripted and conditioned child soldiers, is much more problematic and yet attracts comparatively little criticism. So in short, occasionally it’s okay to blow up the bad guys, especially when they’re happily shooting at the good guys and are much better shots than Stormtroopers on average.

One of the Andorian guards takes aim at Book, but Ryn throws himself in front of book and takes the blast in the chest. He’s near death, when Michael beams Book and Ryn aboard the ship, but luckily Ryn gets better due to the miracles of 32nd century medicine. We don’t actually learn what happened to the liberated slaves, though I hope that Starfleet either sent them home, if they have one, or found a place for them to settle somewhere, if not.

In his review of the episode, Camestros Felapton points out that the whole slave liberation plot seems rather familiar, a story that has been told dozens of times before. And indeed, it is. However – and that’s the interesting thing – it’s not a story that Star Trek has told particularly often before and certainly not with lots of explosions and bad guys getting blown up. Indeed, “Scavengers” is Star Trek doing a 1940s Leigh Brackett style planetary romance. In fact, Leigh Brackett wrote several stories about evil corporations – including everybody’s favourite, the Terran Exploitation Company (Recruitment slogan: “Why work for the lesser evil, when you can work for us?”), and the barely more likeable Terro-Venusian Mining – kidnapping and enslaving people and aliens to work in mines. The 1945 Retro Hugo winnes for Best Novel Shadow Over Mars has a slave uprising and prison break scene, as does the 1944 Retro Hugo finalist for Best Novelette “Citadel of Lost Ships” and the 1949 Eric John Stark adventure “Enchantress of Venus”. All three stories feature depicable villains, heroic sacrifices and space rogues who are the distant granddaddies of Cleveland Booker.

Even though Leigh Brackett’s influence on today’s space opera genre is huge, it is far more notable in Star Wars and latter day works like Firefly or Guardians of the Galaxy than in Star Trek, probably because Gene Roddenberry still bought the old chestnut that “the space opera and planetary romance of the golden age was forgettable trash and just westerns in space” hook, line and sinker and so the original Star Trek was far more influenced by the sort of serious business science fiction found in mags like Astounding or Galaxy.

But even though season 3 of Discovery has been a lot more consistent than previous seasons, it does seem to alternate between episodes that are very typically Star Trek (“People of the Earth”, “Forget Me Not”, “Die Trying”) and those which draw on space opera tropes which have not been explored in Star Trek a whole lot (“That Hope Is You”, “Far From Home”, “Scavengers”). I for one like this approach, because it gives Star Trek Discovery a chance to spread its wings a little rather than rehashing plots that have already been done ad nauseam in the original series, The Next Generation, Voyager, Deep Space Nine and Enterprise. “Scavengers” was Star Trek Discovery doing a Leigh Brackett type story and I for one enjoyed it a whole lot.

However, Michael is not a character in a Leigh Brackett story of the 1940s, but in a 21st century Star Trek series. And so there must be consequences for her behaviour, because we can’t possibly have Starfleet officers running around liberating slaves that Starfleet couldn’t be bothered to help (to be fair, Starfleet is busy and overstretched as it is). Therefore, Tilly goes to visit Michael in her quarters and finds only Grudge. After having ascertained that Grudge has not eaten Michael and being used by Grudge as a convenient cat toy/climbing aid in a delightful scene (and Tilly stresses that she is not a cat person), Tilly alerts Saru that Michael is missing. Saru is very disappointed, his trust in Michael as severely damaged as it hasn’t been since the last hours of the Shenzhou. Saru also wonders whether he should inform Admiral Vance and Tilly, who’s supposed to be Michael’s best friend after all, tells him that he should, because otherwise all of Discovery will be blamed for Michael being Michael.

I don’t blame Saru for being more cautious and rule-following, because that fits his character. And Saru is a very good captain, even if he is not James T. Kirk. However, Saru has known Michael for years. He should know by now what she’s like and that she’ll always do what she thinks is right, chain of command and consequences be damned. If that’s such a problem for him, then why the hell did he ask her to be his first officer in the first place? Also, Michael did come to Saru first and he turned her down, even though he should know her well enough to know that she’ll do it anyway, because that’s who she is. And in fact, if Saru or Tilly or Stamets or even Linus or any member of the bridge crew ever found themselves in trouble, Michael will move heaven and Earth to rescue them, consequences be damned, because that’s who she is. I would have thought that Saru knows this by now. I also wonder just why it’s such an issue that Discovery might have to go into action without a first officer, because Saru has handled Discovery without a first officer lots of times by now and he always pulled it off, because he is good at his job.

Anyway, once Michael gets back with Georgiou, Book and Ryn, she gets a dressing down courtesy of Admiral Vance, though at least she gets to snog Book in the turbolift first, even though they are briefly interrupted by Linus, who still hasn’t figured out how his transporter works. Though Vance is a fair person by the admittedly low standards of Starfleet admirals and so he tells off Saru, too, for not even bothering to tell him about Michael’s plan, but just assuming the Admiral would have said “no”. Though he makes it very clear that he would have said “no”, because Starfleet doesn’t have the resources to determine the reason for and source of the Burn. Michael points out – quite rightly – that if they don’t know what the hell happened and how to prevent it from happening again, they will never be able to rebuild the Federation, but Admiral Vance isn’t having any of that.

What follows is an awkward scene of Saru demoting Michael to science officer again, though he at least admits that Michael made it clear that she didn’t really want the job in the first place. AV-Club reviewer Zack Handlen and io9 reviewer James Whitbrook, neither of whom are big Michael Burnham fans, both quite like this development and some of the commenters are pissing themselves with joy, because Michael finally experiences consequences for her actions. Meanwhile, I found the last ten minutes or so of the episode actively unpleasant, because I hate “military person gets dressed down by superior” scenes in general. And the one time I wrote one (in the final chapter of Honourable Enemies) I wrote it from the POV of the person getting dressed down and made it very clear that the superior doing the dressing down is an awful person.

There’s even a third “Michael gets dressed down/humiliated by an authority figure” scene in “Scavengers”, when Michael confronts Philippa Georgiou about her blackouts. Georgiou confesses that they have been happening with increasing frequency and when Michael asks her why she didn’t tell anybody, not even her, Philippa replies that there was another Michael Burnham in the mirror universe who asked Georgiou to trust her and then beytrayed her. Of course, Empress Philippa the Merciless not trusting anybody makes sense for the character. But why bring up the betrayal of Mirror Michael (if that’s what it was, since we have only Lorca’s word for what happened and he’s not exactly trustworthy), considering Mirror Michael is supposedly dead and Prime Michael a very different person? In fact, those parts of the episode feel very much like, “Hey, remember season 1. Cause we sure do.”

That said, Michael getting demoted is a much more reasonable response to her behaviour than throwing her in a slave prison (maybe that’s why the Federation isn’t particularly bothered by the Orions using slave labour, because they used to do it, too) for life. And unlike season 1, I sympathise with the POVs of Saru and Admiral Vance as well here. All of these people (and Kelpians) are just trying to do their best. And a large part of the problem here is that these people just don’t talk to each other, because a lot of trouble could have been avoided that way (and indeed note how much better the Stamets and Adira subplot went, because these two decided to trust each other and talk to each other). Discovery was only on call for 48 hours and Book and the other slaves would likely have survived another two days. Not to mention that Starfleet could have sent another ship to rescue Book, liberate the slaves and acquire the black box. Which is why this whole duty versus personal loyalty conflict feels a bit contrived, because it didn’t need to be a conflict.

Also, Star Trek does have a long history of maverick captains and officers, including Michael’s brother Spock, ignoring orders to do what they feel is right. And all of those maverick captains and officers have almost never gotten in trouble for their actions (and they did, e.g. “The Menagerie”, it was very clear that Starfleet was in the wrong), even if those actions were truly questionable or flat out wrong like Sisko’s in “In the Pale Moonlight”, an episode that is ironically beloved, though I always disliked it. So why the Michael hate in certain quarters, when she’s only doing what pretty much every other Star Trek captain or first officer before her has done as well? Not to mention that other filmic space operas like Star Wars or the original Battlestar Galactica (not to mention Raumpatrouille Orion) were full of characters who flat out ignored orders (in the case of Apollo and Starbuck in the original Galactica with the tacit approvement of Commander Adama and Colonel Tight) at times.

Now growing up in postwar (West) Germany, blindly following orders was never a good thing. Indeed, we saw plenty of elderly Nazis and not so elderly border shooters play the “But I was just following orders” card and largely not get away with it. Of course, there was also the underlying message of “Well, the Nazis and Communists gave evil orders, but our orders are good, because we are a democratic state, not that we allow you to vote, because you’re too young and can’t be trusted.” However, I and many others were sceptical and decided that nobody’s orders should be followed blindly.

People in the US and the UK don’t have that socialisation and they also grow up with a much stronger glorification of the military than we do. And in this light, it’s notable how many maverick heroes US pop culture has produced in spite of this. Though Star Trek has its roots in the 1960s, which were extremely critical of authority figures everywhere, while Star Wars has close ties to the anti-Vietnam War movement and the counterculture of the 1970s. Battlestar Galactica grew out of this same milieu, though it’s much more pro-military (and very much anti nuclear disarmament, which went completely over my head as a kid). However, as I’ve noted here, maverick heroes seem to be in decline and even General Leia Organa now insists on others following orders, when she never much bothered with that sort of thing herself.

I have said before that my ultimate yardstick for the moral behaviour of spaceship captains is not “What would Kirk do?” or “What would Picard do?”, but “What would Commander MacLane do?” And Michael’s actions in “Scavengers” absolutely pass that test.

That said, I am beginning to believe that Starfleet maybe isn’t the right place for Michael and probably never was in the first place, especially since it’s obvious that she only joined in the first place to impress Sarek. And season 3 does a good job of showing Michael’s ambivalence towards Starfleet, especially after a year of being free of orders and admirals.

However, I’m not sure where the series is going with this. Because even if Michael is probably better off outside Starfleet, i sincerely doubt that they’ll have her quit, since she’s the star (unless Sonequa Martin-Green, who just had a baby after all, wants out). Of course, Star Trek doesn’t necessarily have to tell only stories that involve Starfleet, just as Star Wars doesn’t only have to tell only stories that involve Jedi and people named Skywalker. But while Star Trek: The Adventures of Michael, Book and Grudge – Space Rogues and Star Trek Discovery would both be fun shows, a single show can’t really be both.

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Two Articles in One Day

I’m blogging elsewhere yet again and I had not one but two articles go up today.

The first article is at Galactic Journey. It’s a follow-up piece to last month’s article about East and West German comics in the 1950s and 1960s and focusses on the wide and wonderful world of French, Belgian and Dutch comics. There are a lot of samples of the various comics discussed as well as some historical photos of Brussels and Antwerp in the 1960s.

Why Brussels and Antwerp? Because that’s where I originally discovered and read many of the comics in question as a kid in the 1980s. In retrospect, I should have included some photos of Rotterdam as well, because that’s where my Dad worked in the 1980s and where I discovered and read a lot of those comics as well, almost always in the store, because Franco-Belgian-Dutch comic albums were pricier than US comic books and my reading appetite was more voracious than my pocket money plentiful. I’m also still grateful to the nice booksellers who just let me read in peace, even though they probably knew that I only bought something, when I had saved up enough money.

But even though I’m familiar with all of the comics featured in the article and consider many of the characters childhood friends, the article nonetheless required more research than I initially assumed. For starters, I only read the comics in album form, mostly in the store, so I had no idea where which strip had originally been published. In many cases, I didn’t know the names of the creators either, not to mentioned that many French and Belgian artists work under one word pseudonyms. And if that wasn’t confusing enough, many comics have a French and a Flemish title. Furthermore, most of these titles have never been out of print since they first appeared in the 1950s or 1960s. However, publishers, logos and covers change and therefore a 2020 copy of e.g. Astérix et Cleopatra does not look like a 1965 copy of the some album. Luckily, there are some excellent French and Belgian comic databases and websites. Even better, I can read French and Flemish well enough to navigate them

Finally, I had little idea for how long many comics had been going. In retrospect, it should have been obvious that the sword and sorcery comics I enjoyed as a teen clearly dated from the 1970s and 1980s, but sword and sorcery comics just weren’t a thing in the 1960s. But several strips I thought originated in the 1960s – particularly those with female protagonists like Yoko Tsuno, Comanche, Franka and Natacha – turned out to date from the 1970s and beyond. The Franco-Belgian comics world of the 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s was very much a boys’ club with few female characters other than Wiske and Aunt Sidonie of Suske en Wiske fame and Bianca Castafiore of Tintin fame. Though the original Barbarella just slipped in, since her adventures first appeared in 1962. So did Lieutenant Blueberry, the western series Jean Giraud drew before he became Moebius for good, which debuted in 1963. Meanwhile, Valérian et Laureline just missed the boat, since they won’t appear until 1967.

Nonetheless, I had a lot of fun writing that article and revisiting a lot of old friends. It also makes me wonder why the Franco-Belgian-Dutch comics are not more appreciated in the English speaking world beyond some staples like Tintin (and note that Tintin lost the 1944 Retro Hugo to a not very good and racist Wonder Woman comic) and The Smurfs, because the sheer variety and quality of Franco-Belgian-Dutch comics is just amazing.

The other article of mine that went up today is on a subject that immensely important, though not nearly as enjoyable as Franco-Belgian-Dutch comics. For it turns out that Disney has not been paying royalties to Alan Dean Foster for his novelisation of the first Star Wars movie (which would subsequently become known as A New Hope), Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, the first ever Star Wars tie-in novel, as well as the novelisations of Alien, Aliens and Alien 3 since they bought up Lucasfilm and 20th Century Fox. Today, Alan Dean Foster and Mary Robinette Kowal, president of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, went public with the issue and held a joint press conference. I covered the press conference for File 770 and wrote an article about it. My fellow Best Fan Writer Hugo finalist Adam Whitehead also reports about the issue at The Wertzone.

Basically, Disney claims that they purchased the rights to sell the novels in question, when they purchased Lucasfilm and 20th Century Fox, but that they did not purchase the obligations to pay Alan Dean Foster royalties, as required by the original contracts. This flies in the face of every contract law in the world. As I said in the File 770 article, I translate a lot of contracts for my day job and every single one contains a clause that in case of a merger or buyout, any rights and obligations are transferred to the legal successor of the company that signed the contract. So what Disney is doing to Alan Dean Foster is flat out illegal.

I own a copy of the original Star Wars novelisation, which has the distinction of being the first English language science fiction novel I ever read, as well as Splinter of the Mind’s Eye. My battered paperback copy of Star Wars, purchased in 1988 at an import bookstore at three times the cover price, proudly states on the cover “5 Million in Print”. I can only imagine how many more copies must have been sold in the thirty-two years since.

As Mary Robinette Kowal said in the press conference, the potential implications of Disney’s behaviour are huge. Hundreds of Star Wars tie-in novels have been published since Alan Dean Foster wrote Splinter in the Mind’s Eye, not to mention comics and other media. Disney also purchased the rights to 81 years worth of Marvel Comics, a whole lot of X-Files tie-in novels which came out in the 1990s and early 2000s, lots of Muppets and Simpsons related books and other media, novelisations for all sorts of other movies and TV shows, etc… And Disney isn’t the only huge media conglomerate out there. There are others who may be just as bad. Alan Dean Foster’s case may very well be just the tip of the iceberg.

Two years ago, I wrote that Disney gobbling up media companies like potato chips was cause for concern, even if they had largely been benevolent so far, though there were signs of that changing. Disney’s behaviour in the Alan Dean Foster case is far from benevolent and I hope that they will come around and pay the outstanding royalties soon.

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The Mandalorian and Baby Yoda get their bacons saved by “The Heiress

Now I have this week’s Star Trek Discovery review out of the way, it’s time for my episode by episode reviews of season 2 of The Mandalorian again. Previous installments (well, actually just two and an aggregate review of season 1) may be found here.

Warning: Spoilers under the cut!

“The Heiress” starts off with the Razor Crest – badly beaten up after last week’s icy adventure – finally making it to Trask, which turns out to be a watery world that is home to several amphibian species. After a perilous descent and near-crash, Mando does manage to land the Razor Crest on a floating landing platform, only for the ship to promptly tumble into the sea to the sighs of several watching Mon Calamari (that’s Admiral Ackbar’s species).

Luckily, the Mon Calamari have what looks like an AT-AT Walker that has been retrofitted with a crane (and looks incredibly cool) and can fish the Razor Crest out of the water, but Mando’s poor ship is beaten up even worse now, not to mention covered in kelp. Mando pays the local harbourmaster to repair and refuel the Razor Crest. A strange hooded woman watches them and Frog Lady is finally reunited with her husband in a remarakbly sweet scene. The Frog People still look like escapees from Wind in the Willows to me, but I like them. Not to mention that they are the only aliens (or humans for that matter) on Trask who don’t try to double-cross Mando.

Can I take a moment to say how much I adore the grungy industrial look of Trask with its walking cranes (so cool) and fishing trawlers? Trask very much looks like Bremerhaven or Cuxhaven on a typically grey North German winter day and I for one love the idea that the Star Wars universe also has a planet (moon actually) that looks like the area where I grew up. Even the people match and so we get Mon Calamari wearing cable-knit sweaters and Quarren (apparently that’s the official name of the species, though I remember that the action figures were called “Squid Head” back in the day. I even had one, because it was the only Star Wars figure my Mom could find) in oil cloth jackets and southwesters. All that’s missing is someone wearing a fisherman’s shirt. Trask clearly is the Bremerhaven of the Star Wars universe and while that may not be a compliment, I still love that a place like this exists.

As promised, Mr. Frog points Mando to where he may find other Mandalorians, which turns out to be the local inn. Not that Mando really needed Mr. Frog to tell him that, since the local inn is always the logical place to find anybody in the Star Wars universe. But it means that we do get to see the Star Wars equivalent of a harbour bar, which looks very much like the typical rougher kind of harbour bar (i.e. the kind of harbour bar and restaurant where actual sailors, fisherman and dockworkers go, not the seafood restaurants that cater to tourists) you can find in harbours everywhere. The Croaking Foghorn from the Hallowind Cove series is a typical example. Though the Trask harbour bar serves seafood chowder via hoses dangling from the ceiling. Mando orders a bowl of chowder for Baby Yoda, only to find that it comes with an extra helping of live squid/facehugger, which promptly attached itself to Baby Yoda, so that Mando has to rescue the little guy. This never happens at Cap Horn in Bremerhaven.

Mando greases the palm – pardon, fin – of the Mon Calamari landlord, who points him to a Quarren fisherman who supposedly knows where to find the Mandalorians living on Trask. However, this requires taking a cruise on a Trask fishing trawler, which looks remarkably like an Earthly fishing trawler. Mando and Baby Yoda stand at the railing, looking out at the sea. It becomes very clear at this point that Mando is very much a landlubber, because anybody who knows anything at all about fishing will find the modus operandi of this fishing trawler very strange. And I’m not talking about the blatant disregard for safety regulations such as “Make sure that there’s nobody standing (or sitting or floating) under suspended loads.” No, the nets employed by the Quarren fishermen are suspiciously small, as is their catch. In commercial fishing, nets and catches are much bigger.

However, the Quarren captain then informs Mando that the fish they just caught are not the catch at all, but just fodder for a monster (according to iO9 reviewer Germain Lussier it’s called a mamacore) that they keep in the hold. Which begets the question: Why do the Quarren keep a monster in the hold, if they only just set out on their trip? If the monster is the cargo and mamacore a delicacy for the people of Trask, why wouldn’t they have unloaded it, while in port? And what sort of fishermen are these that they feed their catch to a monster that lives in their cargo hold?

The answer is: The Quarren are not fishermen at all, they’re pirates. And the true catch they’re after is Mando’s shiny beskar armour. So the Quarren inform Mando that they’re about to feed the mamacore and ask him if he and Baby Yoda want to watch. And when Mando and Baby Yoda in his float cradle step close to the water-filled cargo hold, the Quarren captain throws Baby Yoda’s float cradle into the hold. The monster promptly gobbles him up and Mando just as promptly jumps in after him. This is what the Quarren were waiting for. All of a sudden, steel bars close over the cargo hold, trapping Mando and Baby Yoda. Mando managed to hold on to the steel bars, but the Quarren stab at him with pikes and harpoons.

Things look very dire for our favourite duo. But lucky for Mando and Baby Yoda, a trio of Mandalorians in blue armour – two women and a man – show up and make fish food out of the Quarren. They also rescue Mando and Baby Yoda, though the float cradle gets damaged again. It turns out that Mando didn’t need to look for his fellow Mandalorians – they found him.

It’s interesting that this is the second time in as many episode that Mando and Baby Yoda were rescued from a very likely fatal trap by a third party, namely the X-Wing pilots last week and the mystery Mandalorians this week. What makes this even more interesting is the American storytelling convention (which I violate a lot) that the protagonist must always save themselves and not rely on others to save them, otherwise they are passive characters. So for the protagonist of an American TV series not to save himself (and this is not the first time either – there were several instances in season 1 where Mando needed the help of someone else to save him) is extremely unusual. But then, the show consistently stresses that Mando may be a mighty warrior, but he’s not invincible or invulnerable. He needs help and he needs it quite often. Personally, I like this, especially since I’m not a huge fan of protagonists who always save themselves, because it has become a cliché by now.

However, nearly getting drowned and eaten by a monster is not the last shock in store for Mando, for no sooner have they dispatched of the treacherous Quarren that Mando’s three rescuers take their helmets off. And as we’ve seen in season 1, Mandalorians never take their helmets off. And indeed, Mando promptly accuses his three rescuers of not being real Mandalorians and demands to know where they get the armour from.

The leader, a woman named Bo-Katan Kryze (played by Katee Sackhoff, who is best known for playing Starbuck in the new Battlestar Galactica, but we will not hold that against her) replies that she was born on Mandalore and that the armour has been in her family, which is one of the oldest families on Mandalore, for generations. This must feel like a sting to Mando, since we know that he was adopted and not born a Mandalorian. “Well, then why did you take your helmet off?” Mando wants to know. Bo-Katan and her comrades exchange a telling glance. “Oh dear, you’re one of them”, she says.

For it turns out that the Mandalorians who adopted and raised Din Djarin are actually a fundamentalist splinter group named “The Children of the Watch” who are determined to make Mandalore great again or some such thing. This explains why other Mandalorians we’ve seen have no problems with taking off their helmets, since Jango Fett definitely walked around helmet-less in Attack of the Clones. It also explains why Mando and his clan wear their armour in shiny natural beskar, while other Mandalorians, whether the Fetts or Bo-Katan and her group (apparently, they’re called the Nite Owls), paint theirs. Finally, it explains why Mando doesn’t know about a lot of things, e.g. what Jedi are and what the Force is, that the Mandalorians should theoretically know.

This is certainly an intriguing development and not just because it allows the writers to explain away some obvious plot holes such as why did Jango Fett take off his helmet, when it’s supposedly such a big taboo. No, the revelation that Din Djarin was taken in and raised by a group of religious zealots also upsets his whole identity. For it turns out that “the way” is actually just one of several possible ways. It also turns out that there is a lot the Mandalorians who raised Din Djarin never told him. Not to mention that Din was never even given the chance to make his own decisions – he was traumatised child indoctrinated by religious fanatics. Bo-Katan calls them terrorists, which is a bit hypocritical, because according to Guardian reviewer Paul MacInnes she used to be a member of that group herself, before she decided that she doesn’t want to wear a helmet all the time. I wonder how this will play out in future episodes. Will Din Djarin begin to question “the way” and find his own? Will he call out the Mandalorian armourer from season 1 and ask her some hard questions? Will he actually take that bloody helmet off once in a while?

But for now, Mando decides that since those are not the Mandalorians he’s looking, he doesn’t want to talk to them either. And so he grabs Baby Yoda, activates his jetpack and takes off, while Bo-Katan and her comrades blow up the fishing trawler/pirate ship. On the docks, more trouble is waiting for Mando in the form of the very pissed off brother of the Quarren pirate captain. The Quarren and his friends are itching for a fight, because they believe Mando has killed his brother. However, before a fight can erupt, Mando has his bacon saved once again by Bo-Katan and her comrades.

Once the Quarren are dealt with, the four Mandalorians retire to the harbour inn. Bo-Katan and her people take their helmets off and enjoy the seafood (though the chef really should make sure the food is dead first before selling it), while Mando sits there sullenly with his helmet.

Now we also get Bo-Katan’s story. For Bo-Katan is not only the member of a very old and prominent Mandalorian family, she’s also the heiress to the throne of Mandalore, hence the title. Though I have to admit that I’m a little disappointed that the Mandalorians have a monarchy, too. Why is almost every planet in the Star Wars universe a monarchy of some kind, unless it’s a hellhole ruled by criminal clans like Tatooine?

As AV-Club reviewer Katie Rife and Tor.com reviewer Emmet Asher-Perrin point out, the character of Bo-Katan Kryze originally appeared in the Star Wars: Clone Wars and Star Wars: Rebels cartoons, also voiced by Katee Sackhoff. Both reviewers also fill in some backstory about the character. Now I have to admit that I never watched the Clone Wars and Rebels cartoons. I tried, but I just cannot abide CGI-animated cartoons. So I have no idea what happened in those cartoons. However, you don’t really need to be familiar with the cartoons, because “The Heiress” tells you everything you need to know about Bo-Katan.

Bo-Katan wants reconquer Mandalore and regain the throne and she wants to enlist Mando’s aid, religious zealot or not, because Mandalorian warriors are in short supply. Mando, however, wants nothing to do with Bo-Katan and her mission. First of all, his people told him that Mandalore is cursed and that they can never return there (I now wonder whether they were simply kicked out). And besides, Mando already has a mission. He has to deliver Baby Yoda to the Jedi. “What do you know about the Jedi?” Bo-Katan asks him. Mando confesses that he doesn’t know anything about the Jedi, just that he must find them. Luckily, Bo-Katan knows where to find one of the few surviving Jedi. She’ll give Mando the location, if he helps her with a little job.

For Trask is a smuggler hub (now there’s a surprise) and an Imperial freighter full of smuggled weaponry just happens to be standing on a landing field, ready to take off. Bo-Katan and her people want to raid that freighter and steal the weapons for their quest to reconquer Mandalore. After all, it’s not as if the Imperial leftovers can run to the New Republic to complain. However, Bo-Katan and her people could use an extra pair of hands and a jetpack. So Mando drops Baby Yoda off at Mr. and Mrs. Frog’s, not without admonishing Baby Yoda to behave himself and not eat his babysitters’ future children. Then he joins Bo-Katan and her Nite Owls for their heist.

The Imperial freighter has to fly at a low altitude in the harbour area, which gives our Mandalorian quartet a chance to sneak aboard. The Stormtrooper guards are no match for them, because – as one of the Mandalorians puts it – they couldn’t hit the flank of a bantha. Is it me or is The Mandalorian making a lot of fun about the Stormtroopers’ lack of marksmanship skills? Of course, I know that the bad shooting abilities of the Stormtroopers are something of a standing joke among fans, but normally it’s not a joke made in the movies/TV shows themselves. Never mind that random guards or troopers are never good shots in any books, movie or TV show. Because if they were, the protagonists would be dead and the story over.

And so the Captain of the Imperial freighter only realises that something is off, when a Stormtrooper lands on the windshield of the freighter. The Captain is played by Titus Welliver, who plays Harry Bosch in the eponymous crime drama and who also was in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.. He’s well cast here, because the actor seems to specialise in playing unlikeable officials. And yes, I know that Harry Bosch probably wasn’t supposed to be unlikable, but I stopped watching in disgust when Harry Bosch shot an unarmed suspect about ten minutes into the first episode. Coincidentally, Titus Welliver is not the only Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. veteran to appear in this episodes. Simon Kassianides, who plays the male member of the Nite Owls, also was in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. as a Hydra agent.

The Captain orders the pilots to pull up the freighter now and then contacts the guards in the cargo hold telling them to hold off the intruders by all means psosible. And indeed the guards manage to close the doors in time to lock the Mandalorians out of the cargo hold. Unfortunately, they also lock the Mandalorians into the cargo control room, which turns out to be a very bad idea, when the Mandalorians just open the cargo ramp and dump the Stormtroopers out of the ship. The look on Titus Welliver’s face, when he hears about this, suggests that he wishes he had the power to force-choke someone.

Mando tells Bo-Katan, “Well, you got your weapons, so let’s go.” Whereupon Bo-Katan informs him that she has no intention to take off with the weapons, but that she wants to take the entire ship, because the Empire stole something from her she desperately wants back. Mando wants nothing to do with any of this, but unfortunately he can’t leave either.

Meanwhile, the Captain now calls his superior, who turns out to be none other than Moff Gideon who very narrowly managed to kill Mando, Baby Yoda and the rest of the gang at the end of season 1. We also learn that the object that Bo-Katan so desperately wants back is the darksabre, i.e. the cool purple lightsabre Moff Gideon was wielding in violation of its intended use to free himself from a crashed TIE-fighter at the end of season 1. Apparently, the darksabre may only be wielded by the ruler of Mandalore or some such thing, do Bo-Katan really needs it back to gain the throne.

The Captain asks for reinforcements, but Moff Gideon declares that it’s too late for that and that the Captain knows what he has to do. So the Captain shoots the pilot and co-pilot (who look as if they really didn’t see that coming, even though you’d figure any Imperial soldier would know that they are expendable by now) and takes the ship into a nosedive, intending to crash it.

I have to admit that I do wonder about the motivations of those Imperial holdouts. Yes, the likes of Moff Gideon and Grand Admiral Thawn (I assume he exists somewhere in this universe) probably hope for the chance to crown themselves Emperor – a pity Palpatine isn’t actually dead. And the Stormtroopers may not actually have a choice due to their conditioning. But what do mid-level officers like the freighter captain, the loadmaster (I assume that’s what he was supposed to be, though he apparently had no idea how the controls of the cargo hold work) or the two pilots get out of remaining loyal to the Empire? They’ll never be Emperor and most likely they’ll just get to die for the cause. I also wonder whether Moff Gideon and his people are the group that will eventually become the first order or if there are multiple Imperial holdouts.

So now our Mandalorian quartet really has to get to the cockpit to save the ship and themselves. However, a squad of Stormtroopers stands between them and the cockpit and they seem to have rediscovered their marksmanship skills in the face of impending death. Heroically braving blaster fire, Mando takes them out with a grenade and the quartet storms the cockpit. Mando and one of the others try to get the ship back under control, while Bo-Katan tries to get the location of her misplaced darksabre out of the Captain, who tells her that what Moff Gideon will do to him will be infinitely worse than anything Bo-Katan can do. Then he kills himself with an electrical suicide capsule, which really seems like overkill, considering plain old cyanide will do just as well.

Bo-Katan once more asks Mando to join her in reconquering Mandalore, but Mando insists that his mission to deliver Baby Yoda comes first. And so Bo-Katan tells him where to find one of the last remaining Jedi, a woman named Ahsoka Tano, who was an important character in the Clone Wars and Rebels cartoons, where the two of them crossed paths. I have to admit that I initially assumed she was going to say Luke Skywalker, since he should be attempting to rebuild the Jedi around the time. Though considering what happened with Kylo Ren, I wouldn’t entrust any child to Luke Skywalker. That said, if there was another surviving Jedi all the time, I wonder why Obi-Wan or Yoda never sought her out (Luke probably doesn’t know about her existence). Did she not want to be found? Did she tell Obi-Wan and Yoda to take a hike? Or is that good old Jedi sexism coming to the fore again?

Mando picks up Baby Yoda from Mr. and Mrs. Frog who have welcome a little tadpole into the world. Baby Yoda actually behaves himself for once and does not try to eat the tadpole, but instead plays with it. And so Mando and Baby Yoda are off to find the second-last Jedi. To bad that the Mon Calamari harbourmaster thought it was a great idea to decorate the interior of the Razor Crest like a cheap tourist trap seafood restaurant, much to Mando’s chagrin. One of the facehugger octopus creatures also snuck aboard and thinks that Baby Yoda looks very tasty, but luckily Mando is on the case and so it’s Baby Yoda who gets to enjoy a seafood snack.

“The Heiress” was the shortest episode of the season so far, only 36 minutes long, but it feels longer, because it’s packed with both action – and the heist was truly thrilling – and information. We learn a lot more about the Mandalorians and Din Djarin’s place in their society, which is not what he thought it was.

That said, I don’t trust Bo-Katan and I don’t think we’re meant to trust her either. According to the people who’ve watched the cartoons, she actually does have a claim to the throne of Mandalore, though I don’t think she’s the best person for the job. Because Bo-Katan not only lies to Mando, she also clearly uses her knowledge of his fraction of Mandalorians and their beliefs to manipulate him.

Also, while Bo-Katan and her people may think that the Children of the Watch are religious zealots and terrorists, they actually seem to be the most palatable fraction of Mandalorians we’ve seen so far. For Bo-Katan is a manipulative liar who is trying to gain the Mandalorian thrones by violence and the Fetts are mercenaries who has no problems cozying up to the Empire, even though the Empire attacked and nigh exterminated their people. Meanwhile, the Children of the Watch may be a bit extreme about the need to never take off their helmets, but they also take in orphaned children, thus doing something about the massive orphan problem in the Star Wars universe, and actually seem to care about the welfare of those children, even if they indoctrinate them into their beliefs and turn them into child soldiers. But then, that’s no different than what the Jedi do, only that the Jedi don’t just take orphans. It’s also notable that the Children of the Watch were willing to risk their lives to help Mando and Baby Yoda, because it was the right thing to do. Besides, Din Djarin actually turned out a good person, which is more than you can say for Bo-Katan, let alone the Fetts.

Even though a lot of fans idolise the Jedi, the narrative itself actually portrays them critically from the original trilogy on. The Jedi are directly responsible for the fall of the Republic due to a series of unforgiveable blunders, then the few survivors spend twenty years doing fuck-all. Yoda and Obi-Wan manipulate Luke and everybody else for that matter and when Luke attempts to rebuild the Jedi Order, it turns into an unmitigated disaster. Luke himself realises in The Last Jedi that the Jedi just don’t work and that maybe it’s time for them to end.

But while the Star Wars narrative has always been critical of the Jedi, the case isn’t quite so clear with regard to the Mandalorians, maybe because most of what we know about them does not come from the movies, but from ancillary media like tie-in novels, cartoons, TV shows, etc… Particularly, The Mandalorian has done a great job in fleshing out what was initially just a bunch of (well, actually just two) fearsome warriors in really cool armour. And the fact that there are multiple fractions of Mandalorians isn’t really surprising, because all religions tend to develop schisms over time. In fact, it’s more surprising that the Jedi didn’t develop schisms and fractions, unless you consider the Sith or the Knights of Ren the results of a Jedi schism.

I’m not sure where the show is going with this, but what I hope to see is Din Djarin decide for himself what it means to be a Mandalorian and what the way is. I also think Baby Yoda is infinitely better off with Din Djarin than with the Jedi, because the Jedi are actually terrible at raising children.

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Star Trek Discovery is determined to fulfill its mission or “Die Trying”

It’s time for the latest installment in my ongoing episode by episode reviews of season 3 of Star Trek Discovery. Reviews of previous episodes may be found here.

Warning: Spoilers behind the cut!

So far, the overarching plot of season 3 of Star Trek Discovery has been the search for what remains of the Federation and Starfleet. Thankfully, the writers are less determined to draw out that plot as long as the search for Spock in season 2, let alone the search for a direction for the show in season 1. And so the Discovery arrives at Starfleet headquarters at the beginning of “Die Trying”, since Adira finally remembered the coordinates now she has been reunited with the memories of the Tal symbiont.

If there has been one overarching theme this season, it’s that Discovery is never actually welcome wherever it goes. “Die Trying” does not break that trend, for when Discovery finally reaches the new cloaked Starfleet headquarters in deep space they’re not exactly given a warm welcome. Though at least no one is shooting at them this time, which is an improvement from Discovery‘s arrival in Earth orbit. Furthermore, the Discovery crew and the audience get to geek out over the various advanced Starfleet vessels, including a Constitution class vessel with detachable nacelles, a future Voyager, a USS Nog in a tribute to the late Aron Eisenberg who played Nog, the first Ferengi to join Starfleet, in Deep Space Nine, and a flying rain forest (shades of Silent Running, whose ship famously reappeared in the original Battlestar Galactica). Camestros Felapton calls this scene “starship porn” and that’s very much what it is. But we’re science fiction fans and we love ourselves some starship porn.

Saru, Michael and Adira (since she has Admiral Tal’s symbiont and memories) are beamed aboard the new Starfleet headquarters, where they are met by one Admiral Vance (Oded Fehr, looking very handsome indeed). Vance is harried and stressed out, trying to keep what’s left of Starfleet running. He tells Adira point-blank that while he was friends with Admiral Sanna Tal, he doesn’t know Adira from Adam and sends them to a medical evaluation. Vance listens to Michael and Saru’s story, but he doesn’t trust them. For starters, Starfleet records indicate that the Discovery was destroyed in the 23rd century and also make no mention of the spore drive. Saru and Michael explain that Starfleet likely erased all traces of the Discovery‘s time leap, the spore drive, the info dump sphere and Control from its archives. And indeed, the viewer knows that this is exactly what happened from the “We shall never speak of this again” scenes in the season 2 finale.

Another issue is that the Discovery and her crew are time travellers and that time travel has been outlawed in the 31st century following the Temporal Cold War we encountered (via one of its agents) in Star Trek: Enterprise. Now I would have understood, if they had never decided to mention that particular plot point again, considering Enterprise was not very good. Though it’s still nice to see it referenced here. However, since time travel is illegal now, Michael, Saru and the Discovery crew are theaoretically criminals. Saru points out that they had no way of knowing any of this (It seems Captain Archer really did never speak of his encounters with time agents a hundred years before Discovery again) and Michael also reminds Vance that she and the Discovery crew risked their lives and left everything they knew behind to save all life in the galaxy, but Vance is unmoved. After all, he has no way of knowing if Michael and Saru aren’t time agents after all.

And so Vance orders Michael, Saru and the Discovery crew to undergo an in-depth debriefing to make sure everybody’s stories match up. These debriefings are conducted by sophisticated holographic AIs (who shockingly do not turn out to be evil – yet) and lead to a lot of funny scenes. Tilly babbles, Jet Reno asks the hologram for nachos and Nhan just repeats her name, rank and serial number over and over again. When the hologram asks Stamets, if he considers himself essential personnel, he replies, “You haven’t been talking to Dettmer, have you?”

“You were dead?”, a hologram asks Hugh Culber, “Do you mean clinically?” “No, emotionally as well”, Culber, who gets a lot of great moments in this episode, replies, “Oh yes, and I was murdered. But I get along with my murderer now.” Honestly, I can’t even fault 32nd century Starfleet for being sceptical about the claims of the Discovery crew, because if you try to sum up the first two seasons of Discovery, the events really do sound insane.

However, the best holographic interrogation – pardon, debriefing – is that of Michelle Yeoh’s Empress Philippa Georgiou. The 32nd century medical scans quickly reveal that she’s from the Mirror Universe and so the holograms of course want to know what she’s doing aboard Discovery. However, Empress Philippa the Merciless is not talking to holograms, though she does reveal that she had an affair with Leland who eventually became the evil AI Control. And so she throws them off balance by blinking several times in rapid sequence and finally causes them to fizz out, whereupon the man behind the curtain (quite literally) reveals himself, a white-haired gentleman wearing thick-rimmed glasses who looks as if he wandered onto the set from a later season episode of Mad Men. Throughout the episode I kept wondering why the actor looked so familiar (Camestros Felapton initially suspected it was Ted Danson), until the end credits revealed the truth. That was David Cronenberg, legendary director of avantgarde horror films, who is about as unlikely to appear in an episode of Star Trek as Werner Herzog was to appear in Star Wars.

The verbal sparring between Philippa Georgiou and David Cronenberg’s character is a pure delight and Cronenberg’s character is probably the only person in two universes who ever won a verbal duel with Philippa Georgiou. For Cronenberg’s character, who knows a lot about the Mirror Universe, not only correctly deduces that Philippa the Merciless – the woman who cares about nothing and no one except power – clearly cares about someone aboard the Discovery, he also drops the bombshell that the Terran Empire fell centuries ago (well, Mirror Spock predicted that it would) and that the Mirror and the Prime Universe are drifting further apart and that crossings haven’t been possible in more than 500 years (which suggests that Deep Space Nine‘s Mirror Universe shenangigans may have been among the last contacts), so Philippa is all alone and cannot go back. This clearly affects Philippa much more than you’d think, as evidenced by the fact that she sort of zones out, when Michael wants to talk to her.

The question now is who is David Cronenberg’s shadowy character with a fashion sense that’s more than a thousand years out of date? Is he Section 31? Cause I bet that they’re still around in the 32nd century. Is he from the Mirror Universe himself and is that why he knows so much about it? Is a time traveller or time agents wandering around in front of Starfleet’s very noses? I really hope we’ll see him again and find out.

Admiral Vance eventually comes to the conclusion that while the Discovery and her spore drive are useful, the only person they need to operate it is Stamets. They don’t really need the rest of the crew, especially since they are all traumatised and not exactly trustworthy from Vance’s POV. And so Vance plans to reassign them to other duties. Both Saru and Michael are obviously not at all happy about this, though Michael is a lot more blunt about expressing her displeasure, much to Saru’s chagrin.

This leads to one of several conversation between Saru and Michael throughout the episode, where Saru berates Michael for her impulsiveness and her tendency to talk back to superior officers. Which makes me wonder why exactly is Saru surprised by Michael’s behaviour? After all, Michael has always been a maverick who does what she thinks is right, often without even informing others about her plans first, and for whom order are only optional suggestions. And no matter how often Michael gets in trouble for it – which Saru actually reminds her of – she’ll keep doing it. And Spock is exactly the same, someone who also does what he thinks is right, orders, regulations and laws be damned. I do wonder from which parents Michael and Spock got it, from Sarek or Amanda. Or did Spock copy Michael’s behaviour, because he privately idolises his older sister and wants to be just like her, even if he is no longer allowed to talk about her in public?

I always find it fascinating how different people – both in the show as well as viewers and critics – react to Spock and Michael, even though they’re very similar characters. But while everybody loves Spock, even those who find themselves at the receiving end of his behaviour, Michael gets a lot of criticism. See AV-Club reviewer Zack Handlen who calls her an insensitive idiot for her behaviour towards Vance, while iO9 reviewer James Whitbrook wonders whether it’s Michael’s year in the wilderness that makes her behave as she does.

Personally, I think that while Michael’s year in the wilderness may have exacerbated her maverick tendencies, but they have always been part of the character from day one. After all, Michael had pretty much the same discussion with Saru and the Philippa Georgiou from our universe way back in the very first episode and we all know how that ended. However, what Michael’s year in the wilderness has done is cause her to loose some of her illusions about Starfleet. Because even though Starfleet never really lived up to its ideals and has personally screwed Michael over several times, Michael has always believed in the ideals of Starfleet. Now, however, she basically tells Saru that to her, Starfleet is the people and not so much abstract ideal, which actually matches how I view Star Trek in general. I’ve always viewed Starfleet and the Federation critically and the reason I keep watching Star Trek, unless it gets too bad (later seasons of Enterprise and Deep Space Nine), are the characters. Saru, on the other hand, still believes in Starfleet’s lofty ideals and uses a very simplified example of comparing the so-called “Dark Ages” (which we now know is a misnomer) to the Renaissance to explain why. Though I won’t quibble with Saru’s rather simplified view of history, because he’s after all an alien, the first and only of his species, who was rescued by humans representing Starfleet, and thus swallowed human and Starfleet propaganda hook, line and sinker. And indeed Saru’s joy on hearing that his homeworld joined the Federation (as did Nhan’s, who is similarly overjoyed about this) is touching.

That said, while I applaud Michael for finally viewing Starfleet a bit more critical, Admiral Vance is actually one of the most likeable Starfleet admirals we’ve ever met. Yes, he’s sceptical of Discovery, her crew and their motives, but then he has a good reason to be. And unlike most other high-ranking Starfleet officers we’ve met, he’s not an arsehole or an isolationist or xenophobic jerk or – heavens beware – a traitor, which is actually a refreshing change, as Tor.com reviewer Keith R.A. DeCandido points out.

Which brings us to the actual plot of the episode. And yes, there is one. For it turns out that the Discovery is not the only problem Starfleet headquarters are dealing with. They have also been hit by an influx of alien refugees, who are all infected with some kind of disease that’s slowly killing them. And because the refugees passed through many different planets on their way to Starfleet headquarters, no one knows where they picked up the disease, let alone how to cure it.

Michael is determined to solve this mystery and also show Vance what Discovery and her crew can do. And so she decides to pilfer the list of planets that the aliens visited, before Saru reminds her that maybe asking would be a better approach. Vance insists he doesn’t need help, though he does hand over the list. And indeed, Michael and Saru use their 23rd century knowledge to pick out on which planet the disease originated. For one of the worlds on that list has been flagged by Starfleet in the 23rd century as badly polluted, which caused the local plant and animal life to mutate. This knowledge was lost over the centuries and when the refugee aliens landed, they unwisely ate the plantlife and became ill.

In order to develop a cure, Starfleet needs an uncontaminated and unmutated sample of the plantlife from the plague planet. Luckily, the Federation created a flying seed vault (modelled after the real world Svalbard Global Seed Vault), which contains samples of all plantlike from all worlds in the Federation. Even more luckily, that seed vault was not destroyed by the burn, but is still around, though inaccessible to Starfleet, because it’s too far away. However, Discovery can travel anywhere in the universe nigh instantly due to its spore drive. And so Michael takes Discovery – with the entire crew plus two of Vance’s security officers as watchdogs – to the seed vault, while Saru stays behind as a hostage. I wonder what Vance was going to do with him, if Michael had not reappeared with Discovery? Fed him to Georgiou?

The seed vault ship is trapped inside an ion storm, so Discovery has to fly in and pull it out with her tractor beam. Dettmer’s PTSD flares up, but gets under control soon quickly enough to allow her to pull off that dangerous operation. Meanwhile, Vance’s aide, one Lieutenant Willa, gets a first hand example that though Discovery‘s methods are very unorthodox (“Your relationship is not very professional”, Willa remarks, when faced with Stamets, Jet Reno and Tilly bickering, while solving problems), they get things done.

Now “Red-blooded person/people from the past end up in a bloodless future and show them how things are done and rejuvenate said bloodless future” is a very old science fiction trope that goes back at least to Buck Rogers and Philip Nowlan’s Armageddon 2419 A.D. in 1928. The 1993 movie Demolition Man is a latter day example. Again, this is a trope which Star Trek has never really done. It will be interesting to see how they handle it.

The seed vault has caretakers, which rotate at regular intervals. And the current caretakers just happen to be a scientist and his family from Nhan’s homeworld, which wasn’t even part of the Federation when Discovery left – Nhan was the first and only one of her kind to join Starfleet. So Michael, Doctor Culber (in case someone needs medical attention) and Nhan beam aboard the seed vault, where Nhan can finally ditch her breathing apparatus. Aboard the seed vault ship, they find a jungle, which suggests that some of the seeds got out and sprouted, but otherwise the place seems deserted. They finally find the family enjoying some quality time, but they’re only holographic projections. And when they finally find the real family, the mother and the two children are in cryostasis, though Hugh Culber determines that they’re already dead. The father is missing, though he does show up when Michael beams into the seed vault and attacks her. He also seems to be having problems, because he phases in and out of existence.

Aboard Discovery, Stamets, Reno and Tilly determine that the seed vault ship was hit by a coronal mass ejection – or a solar burp, as Tilly calls it – and that the resulting radiation killed the mother and the children. The father survived, because he was in mid-transport, when it happened, but was knocked out of phase. I can’t be the only one who wonders what the radiation did to the seeds and the plants and if the seeds are even still usable, but the episode never adresses it. The Discovery crew manage to put the grieving father back together, but he’s basically catatonic and unable to help. Too bad that his voice print is needed to retrieve the seeds. Nhan and Michael try to comfort him and Nhan explains that her culture values family extremely highly and would basically do everything for their children. Meanwhile, Culber points that there is nothing that can be done for the man’s family – they’re dead. Which makes me wonder how he can know that 32nd century medical technology can’t revive those people. Especially considering that Doctor Culber himself was very definitely dead and still got better.

Michael eventually does get through to the grieving father by telling him that the antidote synthesised from the seeds will save other families. Culber wants to beam the man aboard Discovery for treatment, but he refuses. He’ll stay with his family, even if that means death by radiation sickness. Michael and Nhan want to honour his wish, but there is one problem. With the caretakers dead, who will watch over the seed vault? And so Nhan volunteers to stay behind to take the caretaker’s place. It’s a decision that literally comes out of nowhere, because until this episode, we knew next to nothing about Nhan. Which is very reminiscent about the way Airiam was written out last season – in an episode which also featured Nhan more than usual – where we also only learned more about the character in the episode she was killed off. And now that we finally learn a bit more about Nhan and her background, she is written out as well, which is even more of a surprise, since actress Rachel Ancheril has only been promoted to the opening credits this season. Of course, Wilson Cruz was only promoted to the opening credits after his character was already dead, so we may see Nhan again. Though I am very worried about Kayla Dettmer now, because finally getting some character development is apparently dangerous to your health in Star Trek Discovery. As is being promoted to security chief, because Discovery has gone through three of them already (that horrible woman who was eaten by the tardigrade, Ash Tyler and now Nhan).

The Discovery returns to Starfleet headquarters in triumph – and sans Nhan. The aliens are cured and Admiral Vance finally accepts that yes, Discovery can help him put Starfleet and the Federation back together. And so things end on an optimistic note – or do they? For Michael has noticed a mystery. Cause Adira played the very same melody on her cello that the caretaker family sang aboard the seed vault ship, even though the characters lived in different sectors of space and should never have encountered each other, let alone the same melody. Even more intriguing is that everybody in the future seems to know that song. Of course, there are plenty of melodies in our world that almost everybody around the world knows – “Happy Birthday”, “Ode to Joy”, “Silent Night”, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, “The Blue Danube”, “Yesterday”, etc… – that a time traveller from nine hundred years in the past would not recognise. Maybe the mystery song was simply the hottest viral pop hit in the galaxy just before the burn. Still, it does plant a new mystery for the Discovery crew to resolve.

This is another episode of Discovery that’s perfectly fine and entertaining (and gorgeous to look at), even though it’s not exactly a standout. As Camestros Felapton points out in his review, the quality of season 3 of Star Trek Discovery has been consistently good with not a bad episode among them. It seems Discovery has finally found its feet after one and a half seasons, which is a very good thing. And next week, we apparently meet Book again, who is my favourite of the new characters introduced this season (sorry, Adira and Gray).

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The Elusive Allison V. Harding and How to Suppress Women’s Writing… Again

Allison V. Harding, horror and fantasy author of the 1940s, is nigh forgotten these days, even though she was prolific, publishing thirty-six stories in Weird Tales between 1943 and 1951, as well as six non-genre stories in Weird Tales‘ sister magazine Short Stories.

I reviewed two of her stories, “Ride the EL to Doom” and “Guard in the Dark”, for my Retro Reviews project, and liked what I read, so much that I put “Ride the EL to Doom” on my ballot for the 1945 Retro Hugos.  Others must have agreed with me, because “Ride the EL to Doom” made the longlist for the 1945 Retro Hugos, as did Harding’s novelette “The Day the World Stood Still”, one of her rare forays into science fiction. I didn’t review “The Day the World Stood Still”, though Steve J. Wright did.

Allison V. Harding is also a mystery, because we almost nothing about her. Of course, there are plenty of pulp authors about whom we know next to nothing, but most of them are one or two story wonders, not one of the top ten most prolific contributors to Weird Tales. Furthermore, Allison V. Harding was clearly popular in her day, as the letter columns and reader polls in Weird Tales indicate.

So why do we know so little about her, even though the history of Weird Tales is fairly well documented? Part of the reason is that early Weird Tales scholars like Robert Weinberg didn’t much care for Allison V. Harding’s stories and dismissed them as forgettable fillers and therefore never even bothered to research the author.

What we do know about Allison V. Harding is that the name is a pseudonym. The person behind this pseudonym was unknown, until Sam Moskowitz dug into the files of Weird Tales in the 1970s and found that the cheques for the Harding stories were addressed to a woman named Jean Milligan, an attorney and daughter of a prominent East Coast family. Jean Milligan was also married to Charles Lamont Buchanan, assistant editor of Weird Tales and Short Stories. So mystery solved. Or is it?

Because there are also people who believe that the author of the Allison V. Harding stories was not Jean Milligan at all, but Charles Lamont Buchanan himself who used his fiancée and later wife as a front to avoid the appearance that he was publishing his own fiction in the magazine he co-edited. But more on that later.

For almost seventy years, there was little interest in the works of Allison V. Harding. Her stories were rarely reprinted, not even by the indefatigable August Derleth who kept a lot of Weird Tales authors in print via Arkham House, until the fantasy boom of the 1960s and 1970s suddenly made authors like Robert E. Howard and H.P. Lovecraft hot properties again.

However, it seems that we’re in the middle of an Allison V. Harding mini-renaissance. Her stories are getting more attention than they have received in decades and there is even an Allison V. Harding reprint collection from a publisher called Armchair Fiction available now entitled Allison V. Harding – The Forgotten Queen of Horror. It’s certainly an apt title, though sadly, the paperback collection is only available on Amazon.com, not on the international Amazons. Armchair Fiction folks, if you happen to be reading this, please check the “expanded distribution” checkbox on the Createspace/KDP Print interface or Ingram Spark or whatever you’re using, so the international Harding fans among us can order the collection without having to pay horrendous shipping fees.

As for why Harding is experiencing a renaissance at this particular moment in time, a large part of the reason is probably that vintage pulp magazines are more accessible these days than they have been in seventy years. Original copies of Weird Tales are expensive and rare collector’s items, but pretty much every copy of Weird Tales and many other pulp magazines may be found online in their entirety at archive.org. So those of us who enjoy vintage speculative fiction can now read those vintage pulp magazines again the way they appeared on the newsstands seventy or eighty years ago and are not just limited to the stories that anthologists considered important enough to reprint. And some of us stumbled upon Harding’s stories and thought, “You know, those ‘forgettable fillers’ are actually pretty damn good.”

So why do Allison V. Harding’s stories speak to us today, when they obviously didn’t speak to previous Weird Tales scholars? Part of the reason may be that scholars of Weird Tales tend to focus either on sword and sorcery or Lovecraftian cosmic horror. And that was not what Allison V. Harding wrote. Most of her stories were what would be called urban fantasy now, tales about supernatural going-ons in the modern world (in fact, a lot of what could be found in the pages of Weird Tales in the 1930s and 1940s is urban fantasy). But unlike contemporary urban fantasy writers, the monsters of Harding’s stories are rarely vampires, werewolves and the like. Instead, her monsters are the mechanical objects of the modern age. Harding liked to write about haunted machinery and objects (which was something of a trend in the 1940s, also see the Retro Hugo winners “The Twonky” by Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore and “Killdozer!” by Theodore Sturgeon), whether it was EL-trains, automobiles, steam shovels, telescopes or toy soldiers. Her characters are often working class people like construction workers, motormen, conductors, truckers and steelworkers, though scientists, lawyers, teachers and journalists also appear. There is a certain noir sensibility to her stories and her descriptions of industry and urban life in the 1940s are dripping with atmosphere. In short, it’s good stuff and quite different both from the cosmic horror of H.P. Lovecraft (though Lovecraftian monsters occasionally show up in Harding’s work) and his acolytes and the more gothic horror of writers like Dorothy Quick. In many way, Harding’s stories are more reminiscent of Stephen King (whose 1983 horror novel Christine is maybe the last hurray of the haunted machinery story) than of her fellow Weird Tales authors of the 1930s and 1940s.

Armchair Fiction‘s Allison V. Harding collection is also getting some attention online. Sandy Ferber recently reviewed it for Fantasy Literature, as did Paperback Warrior, a blog that mostly reviews vintage crime novels, thrillers and men’s adventure novels. Both reviewers praise the stories and of course, also go into the mystery that is Allison V. Harding’s identity. And once you start to dig into Harding’s identity, you’ll quickly come across the claims that Allison V. Harding was a pen name for Lamont Buchanan rather than his wife Jean Milligan.

Sandy Ferber notes that some of the stories feel as if a man wrote them, some feel as if a woman wrote them and that it’s impossible to know either way. He also suggests that Lamont Buchanan and Jean Milligan may have been a couple writing together like Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore. That’s one theory that actually makes a lot of sense.

The Paperback Warrior reviewer, meanwhile, comes to the conclusion that Allison V. Harding was a pen name for Lamont Buchanan, because no woman could have written those stories. And why? Let’s have a quote:

There is no way hell that these stories were written by a woman of 1940s America. The first two stories have no female characters at all, and the even the third story is told through a male’s eyes. Furthermore, “The Frightened Engineer” has many technical details about turnpike road construction, a stereotypically manly pursuit in the 1940s.

Another large factor supporting this conclusion is that these stories are really good, even excellent. Without question, a female author was capable of excellence. However, I’m not buying for a second that the talented author of these stories threw her typewriter out the window without authoring another published word for the next 53 years of her life.

Sorry, but much as I like the Paperback Warrior blog otherwise (cause they do excellent work spotlighting vintage crime and adventure fiction), that’s just egregiously sexist. First of all, it’s not actually all that easy to tell an author’s gender by their writing alone. When I put some of my own writing into that online tool that supposedly determines the author’s gender from a writing sample, the program usually thinks I’m female when I put in a sample of my fiction and male when I put in a sample of my non-fiction. However, I don’t actually change genders, depending on whether I’m writing fiction or non-fiction.

We all know the case of James Tiptree Jr., whose writing Robert Silverberg described as “ineluctably masculine”, until Tiptree was revealed to be a woman, Alice B. Sheldon – oops. And having read Tiptree’s/Sheldon’s fiction many years after her identity was revealed, i.e. with the benefit of hindsight, I always thought that several of her stories were very obviously written by a woman. On the other hand, neither Leigh Brackett nor Andre Norton have ever struck me as particularly feminine writers. Both frequently had male POV characters. Norton wrote a lot of boys’ own adventures in space and Brackett’s stories featured macho heroes and had a very hardboiled noirish style. On the other hand, Dorothy Quick almost always had female POV characters and is the only golden age writer of any gender whose stories consistently pass the Bechdel test. C.L. Moore and Margaret St. Clair can go either way, with some stories feeling more female and others feeling more male. The only published story (under that name) by Ruth Washburn not only isn’t particularly feminine and has a male POV character, the lone female character is also a stereotyped shrewish wife. The 1945 Retro Hugo finalist The Winged Man, credited solely to E. Mayne Hull, but attributed to Hull and her husband A.E. van Vogt, features an all-male submarine crew with the only female characters being a bunch of offensive amazon stereotypes from the future escorting a bridezilla to her wedding who are too stupid to understand the science of WWII era submarines. The sole female character in “The Martian and the Milkmaid” by Frances M. Deegan is also something of a caricature, though Deegan also hints that her (male) narrator is not exactly reliable. Alice-Mary Schnirring’s “The Dear Departed” barely has any female characters at all, as does “The Werewolf’s Howl” by Brooke Byrne. So in short, the women SFF writers of the golden age and beyond were all over the place with regard to female POV characters and themes.

Also, it’s quite an assumption to make that a woman in the 1940s wouldn’t have been familiar with the technical details of construction work, EL-trains, railroads, bulldozers, etc… that are found in Allison V. Harding’s work. For starters, there have always been women who were interested in technology. And in the 1940s, a lot of women were actually working in factories, as conductors, train drivers and in other traditionally male occupations to replace the soldiers that were fighting overseas. Furthermore, Jean Milligan may have come into contact with the technical details in her job as an attorney, if she worked on contracts, liability cases and the like. And according to the information Tellers of Weird Tales dug up, one of her sisters was married to an engineer, so she might have gotten the details from her brother-in-law. Or maybe she simply found heavy machinery fascinating. We have no way of knowing.

As for why Allison V. Harding suddenly stopped writing, people of all genders stop writing for all sorts of reasons. Furthermore, a lot of pulp authors just seem to vanish after a handful of stories, only to show up in a different genre later on. For example, Mona Farnsworth had five stories published in Unknown in 1939/1940 and then seemingly vanished, until she reappeared as an author of fourteen gothic romances in the 1970s. Did she really stop writing during the thirty years inbetween or did she work in a different genre or under another name? That’s something else we’ll probably never know.

As for the arguments that Allison V. Harding was really Charles Lamont Buchanan, I don’t find them all that convincing. For starters, there was no taboo against editors publishing their own work during the pulp era. John W. Campbell and Frederick Pohl both published their own work, though they used pen names, and no one objected. Pohl also published his then wife Judith Merril. So if Lamont Buchanan really did write the stories, he had a reason to use a pen name, but no reason to hide his identity from Weird Tales editor Dorothy McIlwraith. And even if Lamont Buchanan wrote the stories, it makes no sense for him to use a female pen name. Yes, Weird Tales was probably the most woman-friendly SFF magazine of the pulp era with a large female readership and a lot of female contributors, but the majority of the writers were still male. And while pen names were common during the pulp era, cross-gender pen names were not all that common and I can’t think of a single example of a male writer using a female pseudonym during the pulp era. So why would Lamont Buchanan use a female pen name for stories that were not even particularly feminine in tone and subject matter?

ETA: German critic and fan Peter Schmitt points out that Robert A. W. Lowndes did publish two stories “The Leapers” and “Passage to Sharanee” in 1942 under the female pen name Carol Grey. Bobby Derie confirms this, so there is at least one precendent. Bobby Derie also points out that H.P. Lovecraft occasionally ghostwrote for women writers and that the resulting stories appeared under the women’s names.

Peter Schmitt has also dug up a story attributed to Donald Matheson in the table of contents but to Florence Matheson in the byline in September 1934 issue of Amazing Stories. ISFDB lists the author as Florence rather than Donald. Whoever they were, we know nothing about them.

The fact that Allison V. Harding’s stories only appeared in Weird Tales and Short Stories, i.e. magazines Buchanan and Dorothy McIlwraith co-edited, is not as big a clue as it seems either, for plenty of pulp authors only wrote for one magazine or one publisher. For example, the above mentioned Frances M. Deegan almost exclusively wrote for magazines of the Ziff-Davis company, because the company was based in her hometown and she had developed a good relationship with editor Raymond F. Palmer, as she explained in the biographical note that went with one of her stories. Interestingly, Frances M. Deegan was also suspected of being either a house name or the wife of a Ziff-Davis assistant editor, who also happened to be called Frances, though those claims have been largely debunked.

Another argument is that no one in Jean Milligan’s family knew she was a writer. However, not every writer shares their work with their family and the family quite often doesn’t care either. If you asked the members of my extended family, quite a few probably have no idea that I’m a writer either. Furthermore, Jean Milligan might well have wanted to keep her writing secret from her family. It’s also possible that she worried being published in a lurid pulp magazine like Weird Tales (though it was somewhat less lurid by the time Harding was publishing there) might have harmed her professional reputation. That’s why C.L. Moore published under her initials, after all, because she feared that her employer, a bank, might find out.

As for the claim that Lamont Buchanan was both an editor and a writer of non-fiction, whereas Jean Milligan was not known to have written anything other than legal briefs, I’m not sure why writing books about baseball and the history of the Confederacy or the two party system in the US would necessarily predispose someone more to writing horror and urban fantasy than writing legal briefs would. And comparing the writing style of Lamont Buchanan’s non-fiction books to the Harding stories would only be of limited use, because fiction and non-fiction are different, though certain idiosynchracies might pop up.

ETA2: Anya Martin of the Outer Dark podcast and symposium, who has done some research into the mystery that is Allison V. Harding, points out on Twitter that Jean Milligan wrote during her teens and was a member of her high school literary club. Anya Martin has also dug up a page from Jean Milligan’s high school yearbook and an article from her hometown paper the New Canaan Advertiser, which confirm her literary activities.

Jean Milligan died in 2004, Lamont Buchanan in 2015, so it’s no longer possible to ask them directly, though it was possible well into the 21st century (and I’m side-eying all the Weird Tales scholars who’d rather pore over a crumpled shopping list by H.P. Lovecraft than interview the few surviving Weird Tales contributors/possible contributors).

As it is, we will probably never know for sure who wrote the Allison V. Harding stories, whether it was Jean Milligan, Lamont Buchanan or both of them together.  However, the strongest evidence we have is the fact that the cheques were adressed to Jean Milligan and the simplest explanation is that the person to whom the cheques were adressed was also the author of the stories. So what’s the need to come up with a convoluted theory to explain why someone else wrote the stories than the person whose name was on the cheques?

It’s still peddled as received wisdom in many circles (and not just the obvious ones either – you find this misconception both on the left and on the right) that women did not read or write speculative fiction before [insert date here]. Like pretty much any received wisdom, this is wrong. On the contrary, there were quite a lot of women writing science fiction, fantasy and horror even during the golden and radium ages, let alone later. Just as there were women editors, artists,  fans, etc… And it wasn’t just the one or two token women whose names we still remember either, but a lot of women whose names have been forgotten. The straight white boys’ club of SFF never existed.

However, it’s also true that women writers are less likely to be reprinted than male writers (though there are plenty of stories by male writers, including very good ones, which have never been reprinted either). The fact that early anthologies like The Great SF Stories anthologies edited by Isaac Asimov and Martin Greenberg tended to favour stories originally published in Astounding over stories originally published in Weird Tales or Planet Stories or Thrilling Wonder Stories, which were more female friendly, doesn’t help either. And while August Derleth did a lot of good work keeping the work of Weird Tales authors in print via Arkham House, he also favoured the male contributors to Weird Tales over the women.

The misconception that SFF was a white boys’ club prior to [insert date here] came about because women writers are more likely to be forgotten due to a combination of factors. Sometimes, you can see this happening in real time, e.g. how the Cyberpunks consigned the feminist SF of the 1970s to the memory hole as “stale” and “not worth remembering”. And how many of us bought into this claim hook, line and sinker? I certainly did, until I actually looked at Hugo and Nebula finalists of the 1970s and found not just a whole lot of good works, but also a whole lot of women.

Furthermore, the whole barrage of tactics Joanna Russ outlined in How to Suppress Women’s Writing is also still aimed at the women writers of our genre’s past. Over the past seventy years, Poor Allison V. Harding has been subjected to a whole bunch of them. First, we have “pollution of agency” a.k.a. “She wrote it, but it’s not really art and she isn’t really an artist”. And so Harding’s stories have been dismissed as forgettable fillers that just took up space in the magazine, which could have been filled by H.P. Lovecraft or Robert E. Howard, if they hadn’t died six or respectively seven years before Harding started publishing.

And once people started realising that many of those Allison V. Harding stories are actually pretty good, we get “denial of agency” a.k.a. “She didn’t write it” (the claims that Charles Lamont Buchanan wrote the stories) with a side order of “false categorising” a.k.a. “She wrote it, but she had help”, in this case via categorising Jean Milligan as the girlfriend/wife and possible collaborator of Charles Lamont Buchanan rather than a writer in her own right.

Nor is Allison V. Harding the only victim of these tactics. We can see the same tactics on display with many of the women writers of the golden age and beyond.  For example, early reprint anthologies often attributed the collaborations between Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore solely to Kuttner, even though we know that almost all of the Lewis Padget and Lawrence O’Donnell stories were collaborations. Thankfully, later day anthologists have corrected this. And as I explained in my Retro Review of “Black God’s Kiss”, C.L. Moore’s Jirel of Joiry stories also get hit with “pollution of agency” a.k.a. “She wrote it, but it’s not really art and she isn’t really an artist” in the form of “Well, those stories are not really sword and sorcery, because they’re not like the Conan stories”.

Frances M. Deegan, prolific contributor to Fantastic Adventures, Amazing Stories and several detective fiction pulps, was long considered a house name used either by the Ziff-Davis assistant editor William Hamling or his wife Frances Yerxa (who was a writer in her own right), even though evidence shows that Frances M. Deegan was a completely different person than Frances Yerxa.

E. Mayne Hull is also usually mentioned only as the wife of A.E. van Vogt, even though she was a writer in her own right. It’s also notable that the 1945 Retro Hugo finalist “The Winged Man” was attributed to both Hull and van Vogt (because ISFDB, which is usually the most reliable source in these matters, insists it’s a collaboration), even though the magazine publication in Astounding lists only Hull as the author.

Meanwhile, Dorothy Quick, who is one of my favourite golden age rediscoveries, is remembered more for having befriended Mark Twain at the age of eleven than for her stories, even though she was a fine writer and prolific contributor to Weird Tales, Unknown and other pulp magazines. Yet very little of her work has been reprinted, whereas much worse stories by male writers which appeared alongside Dorothy Quick’s work have been reprinted.

No one denies that Margaret St. Clair existed or claims that she was really a man, but we mainly remember her for two novels from the 1960s, Sign of the Labrys and The Shadow People, because Gary Gygax decided to list those in the Appendix N to the first edition of the Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Master’s Handbook. And true, Sign of the Labrys is very good (sadly, I haven’t yet read The Shadow People). However, Margaret St. Clair had a lengthy career ranging from just after WWII to 1981 and wrote many excellent works, most of which are out of print, so we have a clear case of “isolation” a.k.a. “she wrote it, but she only wrote one [or two] of it”.

I don’t think it’s necessarily maliciousness or even intent that causes even well-meaning critics to dismiss the women SFF writers of the golden age and beyond. However, the patterns are very notable. And it’s sad that even though it has been almost forty years since How to Suppress Women’s Writing first came out, we’s still dealing with the same old tactics today.

 

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First Monday Free Fiction: Double-Cross

[image error]Welcome to the November 2020 edition of First Monday Free Fiction. To recap, inspired by Kristine Kathryn Rusch who posts a free short story every week on her blog, I’ll post a free story on every first Monday of the month. Well theoretically, this is the second Monday of November, because I forgot to post the story last week, but it’s still a free story and it will remain free to read on this blog for one month, then I’ll take it down and post another story.

Later this months, I will be releasing two new adventures of Anjali and Mikhail, my pair of intergalactic mercenaries on the run from two regimes that want them dead. So I thought I’d share Double-Cross, an earlier In Love and War adventure, with you today.

I tend to call the In Love and War series space opera romance, because the protagonists are a committed couple having adventures in space, but the individual stories are all over the genre map. This one has a strong cyberpunk vibe, largely because it was inspired by by two pieces of cyberpunk artwork, this one and this one. It also is a science fictional crime story. As with all the In Love and War stories, the cover art is by the hyper-talented Tithi Luadthong.

So accompany Anjali and Mikhail, as they retrieve some stolen medical nanites and deal with a…

Double-Cross

The independent rim world of Kyusu was infamous for its pervasive cloud cover and its constant, never-ending rain.

Landing on Kyusu was dangerous because of the low visibility. Yet its spaceport was one of the biggest on the rim. For Kyusu was also a major hub for both legal and illegal trade along the galactic rim.

The capital Shusaku was a neon-drenched maze of skyscrapers and open air markets offering literally any legal good in the galaxy and most of the illegal ones, too, provided you knew where to look.

A man and a woman strode side by side through the neon labyrinth that was Shukasu, their movements perfectly synched, indicating close companionship.

The man was tall with pale skin, striking blue eyes and long black hair that he wore tied back in a ponytail that was now dripping wet. He was clad in a long back synth-leather coat, the collar of which he’d pulled up against the rain. This was Captain Mikhail Alexeievich Grikov, formerly of the Republican Special Commando Forces, now wanted as a deserter and traitor.

The woman by his side was a good head shorter, with brown skin, sparkling dark eyes and black hair tied into a straggled braid. She was clad in utility pants and an electric blue tunic, topped by a poncho of transparent plastic as protection against the steady downpour. This was Lieutenant Anjali Patel, formerly of the Imperial Shakyri Expeditionary Corps, now wanted as a deserter and traitor.

They’d met on the battlefield of the eighty-eight year war between the Republic of United Planets and the Empire of Worlds, fallen in love and decided to go on the run together. Their flight had brought them to the independent worlds on the galactic rim, the only place in the galaxy where they could live in relative safety, far from the forces of the Empire and the Republic both that pursued them, determined to bring them to heel.

And now their flight had brought them to Kyusu, while their work as mercenaries had brought them to the rain-drenched markets of Shukasu.

Anjali looked up. Before her loomed two towers of stacked up freight containers, covered over and over in neon ads, many of them rendered in the boxy characters of the old script of Kyusu. A makeshift bridge stretched between the two towers, also covered in ads.

“Are you sure this is the right place?” she asked Mikhail, “Because I’m cold and soaking wet and not really keen on trudging through the rain for another couple of hours.”

“The pharmacist we interrogated said ‘the Open Market’. So unless you’re losing your touch…”

“I’m not,” Anjali replied.

The guy had practically peed himself as soon as he saw the dagger with the Shakyri crest at her waist. And afterwards he’d been only too eager to talk. He’d talked like the proverbial waterfall, confessing to every single substance of dubious legality he’d ever sold in his shop. No intimidation necessary, the problem was getting him to stop talking.

“…this should be the place.”

Anjali was still doubtful. “There are dozens, probably hundreds of markets all over the city. How can we be sure that this is the right one?”

In response, Mikhail pointed upwards at the makeshift bridge that stretched between the two towers. It was emblazoned with the words “Open Market” in Standard or rather what the Republicans insisted on calling Standard in their infinite arrogance.

“I’d say that’s a pretty big hint.”

Anjali still wasn’t convinced. “And how do we know that this is the Open Market the guy at the pharmacy was talking about? After all, the place where we found the pharmacist was also called Open Market.”

“Public Market,” Mikhail corrected.

“Same difference.”

“Not if you’re Kyusan, apparently.” Mikhail flashed her a quick smile. The rain pasted a few stray hairs to his forehead. “What’s the matter? I thought you liked markets and shopping.”

“I do,” Anjali said, “But not for days on end and not in constant rain.”

She tried to look dignified in spite of the downpour, but instead she only managed to look like a drowned kitten.

“And besides, we still haven’t found a decent Rajipuri spice merchant in this swamp. Let alone a clothing, jewellery or weapons merchant.”

To Anjali, the quality of a market was directly proportional to the number of Rajipuri merchants to be found there. And the many markets of Kyusu really sucked in that regard. Though she should probably grateful there was no jewellery merchant, cause that would only encourage Mikhail to buy her things they couldn’t afford and that weren’t appropriate for a mere peasant like her anyway.

“We did find a shop that sold bootlegs of Rajipuri vid dramas,” Mikhail reminded her, “You liked those.”

“I just want to know whether they’ll hang Roshani for that murder she didn’t commit or whether she’ll be saved at the last possible minute.”

“She’ll be saved, of course,” Mikhail said, “And then there’ll be a big song and dance number. Isn’t that how those stories always go?”

“Not always,” Anjali said. She’d tried to introduce Mikhail to the joys of Rajipuri vid dramas, but so far he failed to get it, “When I was a kid, we watched a vid drama where the heroine Chandara was actually hanged for a murder her husband committed. Okay, so maybe the fact that the drama was called Trial and Execution should have tipped us off, but it was still a shock. My sister Lalita was in tears for days.”

Mikhail flashed her a quick smile. “What about you?”

“I fantasised about breaking Chandara out of prison and making sure that bastard husband of hers was hanged instead.”

Mikhail winked at her. “You would have pulled it off, too. If Chandra…”

“Chandara.”

“…had been real. But now let’s get on with the mission, so we can go somewhere warm and dry and watch some of your new bootleg vids.”

“Maybe we could first stop at one of those noodle bars that are everywhere,” Anjali said, “Cause a bowl of hot noodles sounds heavenly just now.”

Mikhail nodded. “Sounds good. First mission, then noodles, then home.”

***

So Mikhail and Anjali ventured into the compound of converted shipping containers that made up the Open Market.

The mission was to retrieve a shipment of medical nano-agents that had been stolen from the smuggler kingpin who was hoping to make a fortune with them. Okay, so the client was a crook and the nanos were not just illegal, but also cheap knockoffs of the military grade medical nano-agents that coursed through Mikhail and Anjali’s veins. But a job was a job and beggars couldn’t be choosers. And so they went about their business, scanning the shops that made up the Open Market.

Half of the businesses could be dismissed out of hand. Stalls that sold fresh vegetables and prepared foods, clothing stores, body modification shops or businesses that sold com units and vid players were all unlikely to carry bootleg medical nanos.

“The pharmacist we interrogated did say the guy’s name was Shibuki, right?” Mikhail asked Anjali, when he was both thoroughly wet and thoroughly sick of running about in the rain.

“He definitely said Shibuki,” Anjali confirmed, squeezing water from her braid, “Too bad we don’t know which of these shops is owned by Shibuki, because we can’t read the script.” She shot Mikhail a questioning glance. “You can’t read that, can you?”

The script was similar to the one used on the Republican world of Shubashi. It was logographic script, complicated to learn. And though Mikhail had tried, once upon a long time ago, he’d never been very good at it.

“Not nearly well enough,” he admitted.

“So you can read that.” Anjali looked serious impressed. “Is there any language in the universe you don’t speak or read?”

“There are plenty of languages in the universe I neither speak nor read,” Mikhail countered, “As for this language, I can tell that shop over there offers hot noodles…”

He pointed at a business on the other side of the street, where patrons were sitting along an open bar, slurping noodles.

“…and that the one behind us sells hairstylers…”

“That’s no big deal,” Anjali said, “I can tell what those shops sell just by looking at the displays.”

“However, I can’t tell if any of them are owned by someone named Shibuki.”

“So how do we find this Shibuki then, if we can’t even read the language?” Anjali wanted to know.

Mikhail flashed her a quick smile. “Simple. We ask.”

Since the noodle bar across the road was too busy, they decided to try the hairstyler shop instead.

A chime rang, as they entered. The owner of the shop, a woman in her fifties with a complicated upswept hairdo that suggested she was the best customer of her own devices, bowed profusely and complimented Mikhail and Anjali on their beautiful hair. Then she immediately launched into a spiel about how her hairstylers could arrange that beautiful hair into the most elegant styles in mere minutes.

“I’m sorry,” Mikhail interrupted her, “But actually we’re looking for someone named Shibuki. Do you know where to find him?”

The woman scoffed. “You should rather invest in one of my products than in Shibuki’s services. My products will make you pretty. Shibuki’s just a hack.”

“Oh, we’re not planning on engaging Mr. Shibuki’s services,” Anjali, who’d been studying holos of the hairdos the stylers could produce, said, “We merely need to talk to him. And afterwards, we may be back for some of your very impressive products.”

The woman smiled, her painted lips forming a blood-red crescent. “You’ll find Shibuki’s shop at the corner of Akira and Yuzu Street. But be careful. Shibuki is a crook.”

Anjali replied with a smile and a bow of her own. “Thank you, madam, but I think you’ll find that we can take care of ourselves.”

“You’re not thinking of buying one of those things, are you?” Mikhail asked once they were outside in the rain again. He loved Anjali’s hair just as it was, even now when it was dripping wet, and he wasn’t at all sure how he’d feel about the towering beehives an automatic hairstyler produced.

Anjali shook her head. “Goodness, no. Not my style.” Her voice turned quiet. “I just thought how much Lalita would love something like that.”

Lalita was Anjali’s younger sister, aspiring to become an actress in those silly vid melodramas Anjali liked so much. Anjali hadn’t seen her or the rest of her family in almost ten years now, ever since she left to join the Shakyri Corps and her family disowned her.

Silently, Mikhail reached out to squeeze her hand. Sometimes, he forgot he wasn’t the only one who’d lost his family to the war.

They found Shibuki’s shop exactly where the woman had said it would be, on the corner of two neon-drenched streets. It turned out to be not a pharmacy or a clinic, as they had expected, but a body modification parlour.

“No wonder we couldn’t find it,” Mikhail remarked, “Who would look for medical nanos in a place like this?”

“Well, I guess getting yourself injected with nanos does count as body modification,” Anjali replied, “Besides, the body modification parlour could be a front for his real business.”

Mikhail looked at the shop, at the screens displaying functional piercings, cyber-implants and animated tattoos as well as more traditional forms of body modification.

“Have you ever been inside one of those places?” he asked.

Anjali shook her head. “Nope. A bindi and pierced ears is as far as I’ll go. You?”

Mikhail nodded. “When I was a cadet, I had the names of my parents and my sister tattooed on the inside of my wrist, so I wouldn’t forget them.”

Anjali was still holding his hand. She turned it over and gently pushed up the sleeve of his coat, revealing smooth, unmarked skin. “But…?”

“The nanos erased it, just like they erase all other old scars.” Except for the ones that really mattered.

“I’m sorry.”

“Brian Mayhew said it was all right, that I would always carry their names tattooed on my heart.”

When they entered the parlour, a tattooed and goateed man, Shibuki most likely, was inking a complicated animated tattoo into a customer’s back. The customer was a young man, pale-skinned and blonde. Not Kyusan then, but probably a spacer on shore leave.

Shibuki did not even turn around, he just waved vaguely at them. “Take a seat. I’ll be right with you.”

Mikhail and Anjali exchanged a glance.

“Should we wait?” Mikhail whispered, switching to the Imperial tongue, so they wouldn’t be overheard.

““I don’t know.” Anjali glanced over to where Shibuki was tracing the outline of a foam-crowned ocean wave onto his customer’s back. “Any idea how long that will take?”

Mikhail thought back at the time it took to tattoo three simple names in a dead language onto his wrist ten years ago.

“Too long,” he said and got to his feet.

“Excuse me,” he called out, switching back to Standard.

“I said I’ll be right with you,” Shibuki hissed and mumbled something under his breath in his own language.

Mikhail did not sit down again. “This will only take a minute,” he said, “Madame Yasuhiro sent us.”

The effect was immediate. Shibuki dropped the tattoo gun and ran, vanishing through a beaded curtain into what Mikhail assumed was the backroom.

Anjali sighed, “Why do they always do that?” and set off after him.

The customer sat up, a look of pure confusion in his eyes and a half finished ocean wave tattoo on his back.

“You’d best come back some other time,” Mikhail said to him, “Mr. Shibuki is busy right now.”

The customer nodded mutely, grabbed his coat and shirt and left.

Once he was gone, Mikhail locked the door and lowered the shutters, so they would not be disturbed.

Meanwhile, Anjali had easily caught up with Shibuki and had him in a control hold. She pushed him out of the backroom and onto the chair the customer had just vacated.

Mikhail drew his blaster and levelled it at Shibuki, while Anjali strapped him to the chair with a set of insta-cuffs.

“Is this how far Masako Yasuhiro has fallen that she has to hire offworlders now?” Shibuki spat, struggling futilely against his bonds.

Mikhail settled down on the counter, the blaster casually resting on his thigh. “All right, Mr. Shibuki, let’s make this as easy as possible. My partner and I are here to retrieve a shipment that Madame Yasuhiro seems to have misplaced. Tell us where it is and we’ll be on our way.”

“Do you take me for an idiot? I know how Masako Yasuhiro operates. I tell you where it is and you’ll kill me.”

“We’re troubleshooters, not assassins,” Mikhail countered, “You have my word that if you give us the medical nanites you appropriated, we’ll let you go.”

Shibuki was still defiant. “And what if I don’t?”

Anjali picked up the fallen tattoo gun and switched it on. The gun buzzed, the needle vibrating faster than the eye could see.

“You know, I always wanted to try out one of those,” she said to Mikhail.

“Be careful with that,” Shibuki snarled, a hint of panic in his voice.

Anjali ignored him. “In the Empire in the olden days, criminals and thieves were branded with their crimes. The practice was abolished, but I always thought it was a good idea to warn people, so they know who they’re dealing with.”

She turned to Mikhail.

“How about the word ‘thief’ tattooed on his forehead in colour-changing nano-ink? To warn his customers.”

She leant closer to Shibuki, the buzzing tattoo gun still in her hand.

“Stop,” Shibuki cried, “I’m no thief, I bought the medical nanos from Madame Yasuhiro for a fair price.”

“That’s not what she told us,” Mikhail countered.

“You work for Masako Yasuhiro and you want to warn people about me?” Shibuki exclaimed, “I’ll tell you something about your boss. She’ll double-cross you, because she double-crosses everyone. I bought the nanos from her fair and square. We just had a… a disagreement over the price.”

“That’s an issue you should take up with Madame Yasuhiro,” Mikhail said, “We’re merely here to retrieve the nanos. So if you could just tell us where they are…”

Shibuki practically deflated. “They’re in the bottle with chartreuse nano-ink.”

Mikhail and Anjali exchanged a look. “What the hell is chartreuse?” Mikhail wanted to know.

“Top shelf, second bottle on the right.”

Mikhail picked up the bottle in question. It looked just like the other bottles of nano-ink that Shibuki used for his animated tattoos, except that according to the label, this particular nano-ink came in an ugly, green-yellow colour.

“Looks like snot or puke,” Anjali remarked, “Who the fuck wants a tattoo in such an ugly colour?”

“No one,” Shibuki said, “That’s why I’m using it to hide the medical nanos. Because nobody in their right mind ever chooses that colour.”

Mikhail put the bottle in a pocket of his coat. Mission accomplished.

“All right, you’ve got the nanos,” Shibuki whined, “Now let me go. You promised.”

Mikhail nodded to Anjali who put down the tattoo gun and released the insta-cuffs that bound Shibuki to the chair.

However, Mikhail still kept him covered with his blaster. “No false moves. We leave and you can reopen your shop.”

“Reopen my shop?” Shibuki emitted a bitter laugh. “I’ll pack up my stuff and make a run for it and hope I can get out of the city before Masako Yasuhiro finds me.”

***

Some twenty minutes later, Mikhail and Anjali were strolling side by side through a street that was lined with eateries offering all sorts of delicacies.

Anjali cats a surreptitious glance over her shoulder.

“What’s wrong?” Mikhail asked quietly.

“I have a feeling we’re being watched.”

She paused and looked around again. The street was bustling with people, all engaged in business of their own.

“I can’t see anything, not even Kyusan Peacekeepers. Maybe I’m just paranoid.”

Mikhail shook his head. “I trust your instincts. So let’s be careful and stay alert.”

Anjali’s stomach chose that moment to grumble. “I’m still hungry,” she said, “So what about those noodles you promised me?”

Mikhail nodded and pointed at a shop a little down the street where the customers were sitting outside, slurping bowls of noodles. “That looks promising. So what do you say?”

A few minutes later, Mikhail and Anjali were sitting at one of the colourful plastic tables on the sidewalk outside the restaurant, a bowl of hot noodles in front of them. The food was excellent. The broth was hot and spicy, the noodles had just the right texture and the various toppings — seaweed flakes, chopped scallions, pickled vegetables, soy balls and a poached egg — complemented the noodles perfectly.

But in spite of the fine food, Anjali still felt that tell-tale prickle at the back of her neck that someone was watching them, stalking them. Once, she even thought that she’d spotted a flicker of movement from the corner of her eye. But when she turned around, all she saw was a large vid display on the side of a building that played what looked like a Kyusan vid drama.

Mikhail shot her a concerned look. “You’ve still got that feeling?”

Anjali nodded. “What about you?”

Mikhail considered for a moment, then he nodded. “I can’t put my finger on it, but something is wrong.”

“So what do we do?” Anjali asked.

“Finish our noodles, deliver the cargo and head back to our quarters.”

But they never got that far.

It was the briefest of moments. The tell-tale red dot of the targeting system of a sniper rifle, reflected for a split second in a condiment bottle on the table. But it was enough.

“Down,” Anjali yelled and hit the floor. Less than a second later, a projectile ripped through the awning of the noodle bar and lodged itself in the counter.

All around, the patrons screamed and made a run for it. Tables and chairs, bowls, glasses, chopsticks, noodles and condiment bottles went flying everywhere.

Anjali and Mikhail sought cover behind the counter, which was solid enough that a regular projectile could not penetrate it. They both had their weapons drawn.

“Fuck! I knew someone was watching us,” Anjali exclaimed.

“Can you see where the sniper is?”

Cautiously, Anjali peered over the edge of the counter and scanned the street, that was suddenly a lot emptier, now the civilians had fled. On the wall display she’d noted earlier, an over-made-up woman was engaged in what appeared to be a tense scene with a silver-haired man. Her complicated hairdo was marred by a human silhouette bearing a rifle.

“Up there, at the wall display.”

Another movement caught her eye. Not at the display, but along the wires that stretched across the street.

“Bad news. There’s two of them.”

“You sure?”

Anjali nodded. “The sniper and another who’s sitting on the wires. That one doesn’t seem to have a rifle, just…”

Anjali peered over the edge of the counter again.

“Looks like some kind of knife or… nope, it’s a sword.”

“Not the Republic then,” Mikhail said.

Anjali looked at the two dark figures again. They were clearly professionals, but they did not move like any soldiers she’d ever seen.

“Nor the Empire either.”

Mikhail fired over the edge of the counter into the general direction of the sniper, but only hit the wall display. It exploded in a shower of sparks and parts of the image went dark.

The sniper answered with a projectile that shattered a bowl and dumped broth and noodles onto them both.

“Must be local talent,” Mikhail remarked.

“But who? Shibuki? Cause he didn’t strike me like the type to pull off a stunt like this.”

Anjali peered over the edge of the counter again. “Fuck, the one with the sword is dropping to the street.”

“Is the street clear?”

Anjali nodded. “All civilians have fled. Just them and us.”

Mikhail’s eyes met hers. “All right. I’ll take care of the sniper, you handle the one with the sword.”

The second attacker had almost reached the ground now. He was clad in a black utility coverall. Above the damaged wall display, the sniper was still keeping watch.

Anjali and Mikhail nodded at each other and burst into action.

Mikhail jumped to his feet, his own blaster drawn. He fired. The sniper returned fire, but Mikhail was quicker. He dove for cover and the sniper’s bullet only hit a pot of noodles that was still simmering on the stove. They exchanged fire once more, then the sniper cried out and fell from the display onto the awning of a shop selling fragrant dumplings in wicker baskets.

Anjali did not even wait for Mikhail to do his part. She vaulted over the counter and met the second attacker on the rain-slick street. The man had his sword drawn. In response, Anjali drew her dagger.

For a few seconds, they just circled each other. The assassin suddenly lunged with his sword, but Anjali sidestepped his attack. Undaunted, the man swung his sword in a wide arc that would have decapitated Anjali, had she not ducked just in time.

However, the attack also left the swordsman’s flank wide open. Anjali used that chance and kicked him in the side with all her power. The man staggered, but he did not fall, not yet. And he still had the sword.

Time to change that. While the swordsman was off-balance, Anjali attacked again, this time aimed her kick at his wrist. Her foot connected and the man yelped, but he did not lose his sword.

He swung his sword once more at her, while Anjali slashed at him with her dagger. His blade only managed to slash the sleeve of plastic raincoat she wore. Anjali was luckier and drew blood. Only a little, but it was enough to slow the attacker down.

And then Mikhail was there, attacking the swordsman from the other side and drawing his attention long enough that Anjali could ram her dagger into his thigh. It was only a flesh wound, but it was enough to drive the attacker to one knee.

He tried to get up again at once, but the ever present rain came to their aid and the swordsman slipped in a puddle.

The fall itself wasn’t very bad, if the attacker’s sword hadn’t gotten in the way, neatly impaling him.

Both Mikhail and Anjali rushed to the swordsman’s side, but it was too late. The man was dying.

“Who?” Mikhail demanded, “Who hired you?”

The man looked at them. “Madame Yasuhiro,” he said, blood trickling from his mouth.

Anjali and Mikhail exchanged another glance.

“So Shibuki was right. Yasuhiro did try to double-cross us.” Anjali shook her head. “Where do you find those crooked clients?”

“They’re not all crooks,” Mikhail replied, ever so slightly wounded.

In the distance, the sirens of Peacekeeper groundcars wailed, drawing steadily closer.

“I suggest we leave, now.”

Anjali nodded. “And then?”

“Then we’ll pay a visit to Madame Yasuhiro.”

***

Masako Yasuhiro had hired the best security money could buy. But it wasn’t enough to keep a very angry and very determined Shakyri warrior and an equally determined and equally angry ex-member of the Republican Special Commando Forces out of her luxurious penthouse office atop one of Shusaku’s tallest buildings.

And so, once they’d disabled her security system and taken out her bodyguards, Mikhail and Anjali burst into the office of Masako Yasuhiro, their respective weapons drawn.

Masako Yasuhiro rose, as they entered, hands held to her sides, clearly visible. She was a striking woman, no longer young, but endowed with the smooth agelessness that cost a fortune to buy. Her jet-black hair was pulled into an intricate up-do and provided a stark contrast to her elegant white gown.

“So I take it you have recovered my merchandise, Mr. Grikov, Miss Patel. But why burst in here instead of making an appointment like civilised people?”

“You know why,” Anjali said, keeping her blaster trained on Masako, “By the way, those assassins you sent after us won’t be coming back.”

“That’s a pity,” Masako Yasuhiro said, “And they came so highly recommended, too. Still, it seems that I underestimated you. And since you’re here, I suspect you’ll want your payment.”

Untroubled by the blasters trained on her, Masako rounded her desk and pressed her thumb to a scanner concealed inside what appeared to be an antique cabinet. The door opened and Masako withdrew a small bag of synth-silk.

“Pearls,” she said, “Natural pearls. Extremely rare, extremely valuable and — unlike credits — untraceable. I suspect you prefer it that way.”

She tossed the bag at Anjali who caught it with one hand, the other still holding the blaster.

Anjali opened the bag and glanced inside. She’d only seen pearls in vid dramas so far, but these sure looked like the real deal. Her brother Milan would know for sure. After all, the last time she’d seen him, he’d been an apprentice silversmith, dealing with materials way too precious for a mere peasant like her.

“And now, if I could have my merchandise,” Masako said.

In response, Mikhail took the bottle of ugly green nano-ink from his pocket and set it down next to a potted plant that looked like a full-size tree shrunken to miniature size.

“Why?” he asked, “Why did you try to double-cross us? It can’t be about the payment, since you’re clearly willing and able to pay.”

Masako settled down behind her desk again. “I know who you are, who you really are.”

She pressed a button and an old service portrait of Mikhail, with his hair still cut brutally short, appeared on the wall screen behind her.

“Grikov, Mikhail Alexeievich, Captain, former member of the Republican Special Commando Forces, wanted for desertion, defection and high treason. And…”

Masaki swiped across the air and another image appeared, a service portrait of Anjali in the green and gold uniform of the Shakyri Corps.

“Patel, Anjali, Lieutenant, member of the Imperial Shakyri Expeditionary Corps, wanted for desertion, high treason and fraternising with the enemy.”

Masako raised a perfectly arched eyebrow.

“The prize on both your heads is extremely impressive, too.”

“Is that why you did it?” Anjali demanded, “To collect the bounty for us?”

“Oh, please.” Masako rose again and picked up the bottle of medical nanos disguised as tattoo ink. “The bounty would merely have been a bonus — it does say dead or alive, after all. But the real prize is the blood flowing through both your veins. Or rather what is contained therein.”

Masako placed the bottle in her concealed safe.

“Don’t look so shocked, Mr. Grikov. I deal in bootleg medical nano-agents. Of course, I know what the secret of the Republican Special Commando Forces is. My bootlegs are only a pale copy. The nanos in your veins, Mr. Grikov, are the real deal and worth a fortune. Even better…”

Masako closed the safe again.

“…it appears the same nanos are flowing through your veins as well, Miss Patel. Which is fascinating. For personally, I had no idea that sexual transmission of medical nanos was even possible.”

“It’s not,” Anjali said.

“It wasn’t like that,” Mikhail said.

Masako cut them off with a dismissive wave of her hand.

“It’s really none of my business. And now take your payment and leave.”

“And why should we do that, considering you tried to double-cross us?” Mikhail wanted to know.

“He’s right,” Anjali added, “Why shouldn’t we take you out here and now? Or better yet, call in the Peacekeepers, so they can tear your operation apart.”

Masako seemed utterly unruffled by the threat. “Yes, I suppose you could do that. On the other hand, I’m a professional and I know when I’ve lost. And if you leave now, you still have enough time to buy a passage off world, before the representatives of your government arrive. Both your governments.”

“You called in the Republic?” Mikhail demanded.

“And the Empire?”

“Of course. They’re paying good money, even for your exsanguinated corpses. And I am, above all, a businesswoman. And I think you’re, too.”

Masako rose and bowed to them, a clear note of respect in her bearing.

“It was nothing personal,” she said, “And the pearls are worth more than the bootleg nanos, much more. So I suggest you take the pearls and run. Leave Kyusu and live to fight another day. After all…”

She bowed again, deeper this time.

“…we’re all professionals here.”

The End…

***

That’s it for this month’s edition of First Monday Free Fiction. Check back next month, when a new story will be posted.

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The Mandalorian Deals with Monsters and the Troubles of Parenthood in “The Passenger”

It’s time for my episode by episode reviews of season 2 of The Mandalorian again. Previous installments (well, actually just one and an aggregate review of season 1) may be found here.

And yes, I’m still annoyed at whoever thought it was a good idea to have Star Trek Discovery and The Mandalorian air not just at the same time, but on consecutive days. Have some consideration for the reviewers, particularly those of us who are not tied to the big pop culture websites.

Warning: Spoilers beyond this point!

“The Passenger” begins where last week’s episode “The Marshall” left off. Mando and Baby Yoda are on their way back to Mos Eisley with a chunk of krayt dragon meat and Boba Fett’s sarlacc battered armour. However, before they can get there they are ambushed by what thankfully only turns out to be a bunch of garden variety bandits. Life is certainly rough on the fringes of the Star Wars universe and once again, we see that the fall of the Empire hasn’t improved life for the majority of the population at all. For the New Republic isn’t interested in doing anything about the rampant crime problem on the galactic rim. They have other concerns, as we’ll eventually see.

The bandits trash Mando’s speeder bike and unseat both Mando and Baby Yoda with the old rope trick that the Ewoks already successfully used in Return of the Jedi. Mando is able to fight off three of the bandits without any problems, but the fourth – a diminuitive being which is either a droid dressed like a jawa or a cyborg jawa – takes Baby Yoda hostage and puts a knife to the little one’s throat.

Now we get Mando in full Papa Bear mode. He tells the cyborg jawa (sorry, but I just like the idea) that if he hurts Baby Yoda, there’s no place in the universe where Mando won’t find him. I’d believe him, too. Mando also offers the cyborg jawa whatever he wants of the wreckage and cargo in exchange for Baby Yoda. The cyborg jawa wants the jetpack – Mando’s sparkling new jetpack, not Boba Fett’s battered one – so Mando gives it to him and the cyborg jawa finally lets Baby Yoda go. The little one runs to Daddy as fast as his little feet will carry him. Baby Yoda is clearly in the development phase where babies and toddlers like to explore the world around them. But sometimes, that world is just too scary and all a baby – even a fifty-year-old baby with Force powers – wants is Daddy. I strongly suspect that a large part of the reason why everybody loves Baby Yoda is not just because he is incredibly cute, but also because he behaves very much like a real small child would.

Once Mando and Baby Yoda are reunited, Mando pushes a few buttons on the remote control on his armour and the jetpack first throws off the insolent cyborg jawa and then returns to Daddy as well. Of course, the speeder bike is still trashed, but that dosn’t stop Mando. He just walks all the way to Mos Eisley, carrying Baby Yoda, Boba Fett’s armour and the rest of the cargo.

Once in Mos Eisley, we get a glimpse of the cantina (Does Mos Eisley only have one bar or is the cantina just the coolest bar in town?), where Peli Motto is playing cards with an insectoid being she calls Doctor Mandible. Doctor Mandible looks very much like a giant ant, which probably an in-joke, because Peyton Reed, who directed this episode, is best known for directing the Ant-Man films.

According to Peli Motto, Doctor Mandible knows someone who knows someone who knows where to find some Mandalorians. However, in order for Mandible to spill the beans, Mando needs to join the sabaac game they’re playing and the stakes are quite high. Relunctantly, Mando joins and Peli promptly fleeces them both.

I wasn’t familiar with actress Amy Sedaris beyond a washing powder commercial in which she appeared a few years ago, but I like Peli Motto a lot. She’s a tough frontier woman who does what she has to to get by. Peli Motto obviously likes Mando and Baby Yoda, but that doesn’t stop her from fleecing him. And so she not just tricks him into joining the card game, but she also gets Mando to give her his chunk of krayt dragon meat (which she has a droid grill on a podracer engine). Peli Motto also has no time for any macho posturing. When Mando shows up with Boba Fett’s battered armour, she takes one look at it and says, “Oh, you finally found another Mandalorian and you killed him.”

The person Doctor Mandible knows who knows where to find more Mandalorians turns out to be an alien woman. The character and her species have no name and since Mando doesn’t speak her language, she can’t tell him her name either. The credits list her as “Frog Lady”. The name is appropriate, because in many ways, the Frog Lady looks like a character from Wind in the Willows who has accidentally wandered into the Star Wars universe. The Frog Lady indeed knows where to find more Mandalorians and they’re nearby, too, on a world named Trask. However, there’s a catch. For the Frog Lady wants Mando to take her and her eggs (which she carries around in a glass container filled with blue liquid) to Trask, where her husband is waiting for her to fertilise the eggs. Those eggs are the last (and probably only) eggs she’ll ever lay and they need to be on Trask by a certain time or the Frog Lady will never have a family of her own. Furthermore, the eggs cannot tolerate hyperspace travel, so Mando will have to take the Frog Lady to Trask at sublight speeds.

Mando isn’t at all happy about this. He’s not a taxi service, as he points out, and besides, the Star Wars galaxy is a dangerous place full of pirates and bandits and way too dangerous for sublight travel. But a deal is a deal and so Mando takes the Frog Lady and her eggs to Trask.

The trouble starts very soon. First of all, Baby Yoda is very fascinated by the Frog Lady’s egg container. And the reason he is fascinated is because he thinks those eggs are very yummy. Mando catches him in the act and valiantly tries to stop him, but Baby Yoda is a toddler and he’s not listening to anybody. Several critics are troubled by the fact that Baby Yoda snacks on the eggs of an intelligent species – the last and maybe only eggs the poor Frog Lady will ever have. I’m not wild on that aspect myself. Yes, the Star Wars universe is a place where there’s always a bigger fish to quote Qui Gon Jinn and we know that Baby Yoda is carnivorous, but eating the eggs of an intelligent species is still wrong. And yes, he’s a toddler who doesn’t grasp the impact of what he has done, but that’s why he needs his Daddy to teach him right from wrong. Which Mando tries, though not very successfully so far. And indeed, Guardian reviewer Paul MacInnes views the episode as an analogy on the troubles of parenting.

Because it’s a long trip, Mando eventually goes to sleep and we finally see his and Baby Yoda’s sleeping arrangements. Turns out that Mando’s bunk is in a compartment we saw in an earlier episode where it was used to keep Baby Yoda safe and out of trouble. And yes, he sleeps in his armour. Baby Yoda, meanwhile, has his own dedicated hammock, which is very cute.

Mando’s nap is rudely interrupted, when the Razor Crest gets company. Luckily for Mando, the ships hailing the Razor Crest are not bandits or space pirates, but New Republic X-wings, so he and his passengers should be safe for now. The X-Wings are on patrol, looking for Imperial holdouts. And since the Razor Crest is a clone war troop ship, it attracted their attention. The X-wing pilots are played by Paul Sun-Hyung Lee and Mandalorian co-producer Dave Filoni who look as if they’ve just stepped out of 1977, but then it’s always 1977 in the Star Wars universe. Mando assures the X-Wings that he’s not with the Empire, but the X-wing pilots insist that every ship needs to have a transponder now, which the Razor Crest doesn’t have. Mando assures them he’ll get it fixed during his next stop and wishes them the least enthusiastic “May the Force Be With You” you’ve ever heard. However, the X-wing pilots demand the ship’s log to verify his identity. Mando tries to stall, but when he sends them the log, the X-wings suddenly go in attack position. Mando decides to take that as a cue to get the hell out of there and a merry space chase ensues that soon leads into the atmosphere of an icy planet.

Mando shakes the X-wings off by landing the Razor Crest in an ice cave. However, the ship is too heavy for the ice layer, so the ice shatters and the Razor Crest falls deeper into the cave and is badly damaged in the process. Mando is understandably pissed off. His ship is trashed and they’re all trapped on an ice planet. Mando also fears that once night falls, he, Baby Yoda as well as the Frog Lady and her eggs might freeze to death. So he rigs up a heater and some emergency rations, which Baby Yoda eats with considerably less enthusiasm than frog eggs. But then adult Yoda displayed a similar lack of enthusiasm about Luke’s emergency rations of Dagobah.

Since there is nothing he can do for now, Mando goes to sleep and Baby Yoda huddles close to Daddy in a moment that is just incredibly cute. Mando is once more rudely awoken by the voice of an old enemy, the villainous android Zero whom Mando had shot way back in the season 1 episode “The Prisoner”. However, Zero has not come back to life, but the Frog Lady has used the vocaliser in his severed head to communicate with Mando and guilt him – by appealing both to his Mandalorian pride and the fact that he is a parent, too – into repairing the Razor Crest and getting her to Trask.

So Mando gets on the job, while Baby Yoda frolicks about in the snow. And once again, he behaves like a real toddler would, when they see snow for the very first time. Meanwhile, the Frog Lady has wandered off, taking her eggs along, in what is a spectacularly bad idea. After all, they are on an unknown planet in a cave in the Star Wars universe. And while in the Star Trek universe, you can find mythical shrines and sacred pools in caves, in the Star Wars universe, there is only one thing to be found inside a cave and that’s monsters. Honestly, has there ever been a single cave in Star Wars which was not inhabited by a monster?

Mando and Baby Yoda follow the Frog Lady and find her and her eggs taking a bath in a hot spring. Yes, I understand that the Frog Lady is cold, she’s an amphibian, after all, but deciding to take a bath in the middle of a crisis makes little sense. Also, if she’s so eager to get herself and her eggs off the planet, why doesn’t she help Mando with the repairs? Seeing that she could rig up a communicator out of a severed droid head, she clearly has the skills.

Mando tells the Frog Lady in no uncertain terms to gather her eggs and go, because it’s not safe. And because the Frog Lady has a lot of eggs, he helps her gather them. Baby Yoda wants to help, too, but Mando tells him “No”, because he worries – not without reason – that Baby Yoda will gobble up another egg. So Baby Yoda wanders off towards some very sinister looking nodules in the cave, which look highly reminiscent of the Alien eggs from the other late 1970s filmic science fiction franchise. And indeed there is an Alien vibe to this whole episode, from Peli Motto basically cosplaying Ripley from Alien to the sinister eggs. One of the eggs starts to open and Baby Yoda waddles over, still eager for a snack. Uh-oh.

Inside the egg, there is a small white spider critter, which Baby Yoda promptly eats. However, there are a lot more eggs and they’re opening, too. Double uh-oh.

Mando finally catches on to what his happening, helps the Frog Lady gather the rest of her eggs and rescue Baby Yoda from a bunch of very pissed off mini-spiders. This soon draws somewhat bigger spiders and then even bigger spiders and finally a huge spider the size of a house. Triple uh-oh.

Now our trio are on the run. Frog Lady hops ahead on all fours – and yes, she does move like a frog. Mando shoots spiders, while carrying the eggs and Baby Yoda. Mando blows up the tunnel, bringing down the roof on the giant spider, but there are still a lot of little ones. The three make it back to the Razor Crest, but the spiders are swarming the ship. Mando shoots and even deploys his flame thrower, but there are just too many for him. Finally, he, Frog Lady and Baby Yoda pile into the cockpit, Mando shoots the last of the spiders, closes the door and is about to take off. However, the giant spider Mando buried in the cave isn’t dead. It suddenly shows up above the Razor Crest, effectively pinning the ship to the gound, and tries to bite its way into the cockpit with its very sharp teeth.

The spider creatures are called the krykna and first appeared in some unused Empire Strikes Back concept art by Ralph McQuarrie, as John Saavedra explains at Den of Geek. They later appeared in some of the tie-in novels as well as in the Star Wars: Rebels cartoon. This is their first live action appearance, if you can call CGI critters live action.

All seems lost for our heroes – or is it? For just as the giant spider is about the swallow the Razor Crest and her crew whole, laser fire can be heard outside the ship. Someone has come to our heroes’ rescue, but who?

The rescuers turn out to be none other than the two X-wing pilots who – though obviously not the sharpest knives in Princess Leia’s cutlery drawer – have finally tracked down the Razor Crest and just in the knick of time, too. The pilots make spider barbecue and inform Mando that they’ve checked his record and found that there is an outstanding arrest warrant for him due to his part in the prison break from the season 1 episode “The Prisoner”. However, the record also shows that Mando helped to apprehend several dangerous criminals – well, that is his job, after all – and that he risked his life to protect a New Republic officer during that same prison break. So they’ve decided to let Mando go… for now. But woe betide him, if they ever catch him without that transponder again.

The portrayal of the New Republic in The Mandalorian has always been ambivalent and “The Passenger” reinforces that impression. For starters, the New Republic are obviously pretty useless. Instead of doing something about the crime, corruption and slavery running rampant in the Star Wars galaxy – Tatooine alone really needs a good clean-up and there are probably a hundred similar planets out there – or tackling the huge social issue of homeless orphans at the mercy of whoever will take them, the New Republic wastes its time by harrassing passing space ships for minor traffic regulations.

We also see that as far as the ordinary citizens of the Star Wars galaxy are concerned, not a lot has changed now the Empire is gone. Yes, there is a new sheriff in town, but for the vast majority of people in Star Wars galaxy, life is still a hardscrabble existence. And with the Empire gone and the New Republic weak, some things like the rampant crime and slavery problem have even gotten worse.

The scenes with the X-wing pilots also serve as a reminder of Mando’s outsider status. The Mandalorians clearly did not get along with the Empire – the Fetts notwithstanding – since the Empire tried to wipe them out, but they don’t really trust the New Republic either. Mando’s resigned and unenthusiastic “May the Force Be With You” says it all, really. To an outlaw like him, one regime is much like the other and the best thing one can do is to keep under the radar.

In many ways, The Mandalorian shows the broken people and worlds that the war between the Empire and the Rebellion left behind, whether it’s ex-Rebel trooper Cara Dune, ex-Imperial magistrate turned bounty hunter Greef Carga, the ex-Imperial slave turned moisture farmer Kuill, Werner Herzog’s unnamed character trying to hold on to the lost Empire, Baby Yoda who has become an asset all sides fight over, even though he’s only a toddler, or Mando himself who’s lost everything more than once and just tries to somehow muddle through. Here we have another parallel to the western, for the cowboys and gunslingers of the historical Old West were often disaffected Civil War veterans. A large number of them were also black, former slaves looking for a better life. Interestingly, the actual western genre rarely touches on this aspect – and indeed it took me a long time to make the connection – probably because the Civil War was (and is) still a raw wound. Space westerns handle this aspect better, probably because the space setting allows writers to address themes that would be too raw to tackle in a real world setting. See Firefly, where Joss Whedon sneakily made American viewers side with the analogues of former Confederate soldiers. Or see The Mandalorian, which shows the lost and broken people on all sides.

“The Passenger” ends with Mando, Baby Yoda, the Frog Lady and her eggs (and from the look she gives Baby Yoda as she wraps her arms around the egg container, she knows exactly what he’s done) crammed into the cockpit of the Razor Crest – since the rest of the ship is full of holes – and on their way to Trask once more. Mando goes to sleep, Baby Yoda (who has managed to grab yet another egg) on his lap, and this time he actually gets to sleep. At least until next week.

Compared to last week’s episode, this episode feels very slight. Not a lot happens except that Mando makes an unscheduled stop-over on an ice planet and fights some monsters. Quite a few reviewers such as Tor.com‘s Emmet Asher-Perrin or The AV-Club‘s Katie Rife were also disappointed, because the episode was so slight and also doesn’t address the still open mysteries such as Moff Gideon and the darksabre or who the scarred person with Temuera Morrison’s face we glimpsed last week on Tatooine was.

However, so far season 2 of The Mandalorian is remarkably similar to season 1. And in “The Child”, the second episode of season 2 (which was nominated for a Nebula Award after all), Mando hangs out with a lot of non-human creatures, has his ship trashed, loses a fight against a bunch of jawas, fights a big monster – the mudhorn which is now his sigil – and would have lost, if not for outside intervention – in that case by Baby Yoda using his Force powers. In short, the second episode of season 2 has almost the same plot – or lack thereof – as the second episode of season 1. The Mandalorian is a show that takes its time. Yes, the showrunners know that we have questions and that we’re burning to learn more about Moff Gideon and the darksabre and Temuera Morrison’s character. And they’ll get to those questions – eventually. But they also like to take detours along the way and if that means that Mando will spend an episode fighting monsters, then he will.

That said, I do feel that “The Passenger” falls a little flat compared to last season’s “The Child”. A large part of the problem is that unlike Kuill, with whom Mando hung out during “The Child”, Frog Lady doesn’t talk much. And indeed, the episode wuld have worked better if Frog Lady had been given more dialogue, either on her own or via the Zero head. A heart to heart between Mando and Frog Lady about the challenges of parenthood would certainly have been nice.

If last week’s episode played up the western elements, this episode plays up the pulp science fiction elements. In many ways, “The Passenger” feels like a short story from a 1940s issue of Planet Stories. Furthermore, the structure of The Mandalorian with its fairly short serialised chapters is also reminiscent of the movie serials of the 1930s and 1940s, where Flash Gordon or Buck Rogers would occasionally spend an episode stumbling through ice caves and fighting cardboard monsters as well. The Flash Gordon and Buck Rogers serials have long been identified as one of the main roots from which Star Wars sprang (though my teen self, who watched those serials after I had watched Star Wars, was utterly baffled by this, because they looked so very cheap and silly), so it’s certainly fitting for The Mandalorian to go back to that structure.

All in all, this was a fun but slight episode of The Mandalorian. But then, this has always been a show where the whole is bigger than the parts. And I for one look forward to where Mando and Baby Yoda will be going next.

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