Star Trek Continues ”Still Treads The Shadows” - Detailed Analysis & Review

This episode of Star Trek Continues takes an alternative look at what might have happened to the USS Defiant after The Tholian Web, making use of a divergence field so as not to contradict In a Mirror Darkly. It also features a guest appearance of Rekha Sharma, before her role in Star Trek Discovery.

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Transcript

Welcome to Nerd Heaven.

I’m Adam David Collings, the author of Jewel of The Stars

And I am a nerd.

 

This is episode 102 of the podcast.

Today, we’re talking about the Star Trek Continues episode “Still Treads The Shadows”.

 

The description on IMDB reads

The Enterprise becomes trapped on the edge of a rift in space where alternate universes meet and Kirk finds himself having to contend with a ghost from his past and danger in the present.

 

This episode was written by Judy Burns

It was directed by Julian Higgins

And it first aired on the 1st of April 2017

 

And this one guest stars Rekha Sharma of Battlestar Galactica fame, and she actually appeared here long before she appeared in Star Trek Discovery. 

 

The Enterprise is investigating a nascent singularity. A gravitational wave engineer has been sent along to help them.

This makes sense to me, while one of Starfleet’s primary missions is scientific, and they have their own scientists, if there is no expert on a given field on board, a guest may be sent with them. And if the leading expert on a field is a civilian, it makes sense that a civilian would go along to work with the crew.

 

There’s a stronger than anticipated gravitational wave. It has consumed planets 3 through 8 in ten days and is about to destroy a moon.

 

It seems our guest, Avi Samara, is on a first name basis with Kirk. She calls him Jim, then corrects herself.

 

They’re detecting an interdimensional rift, like the one Kirk was nearly lost in back in The Tholian Web.

 

They’ve detected a lifeform, it’s not on the moon as they first think, but on a ship. The USS Defiant.

 

Well that’s interesting. Especially since we know what happened to the Defiant after The Tholian Web. It ended up in the 22 century of the mirror universe. (and that episode aired long before this series was thought of)

 

Also when The Defiant vanished, there was nobody alive on board.

 

Samara wants to go aboard to investigate, but Kirk denies her request without explanation.

 

All the dead crewmen Kirk saw last time are gone. The bridge is empty.

 

Bones has found the lifesign. It’s a much older looking Kirk. Cryonically preserved.

 

A DNA scan suggests he’s not a clone because there’s no genetic drift. He’s literally Kirk.

 

Samara’s research suggests that rogue singularities can move from universe to universe.

The Defiant is stuck, halfway between two universes. Her engines have been modified over a long period of time to reach warp 15.

 

Old Kirk arrives in the briefing lounge. All this time he thought they’d left him behind. Now he finds his old crew, still young, and …. Himself.

 

Even old Kirk knows Samara, so they’ve known each other prior to this mission. Given their embrace it seems they were close.

 

Old Kirk remembers the attempt to beam him back to the Enterprise, but he found himself back on the Defient. Samara suggests a divergence field.

Two Kirks. Two Defiants.

They don’t know where our Defiant went, (but we do) but this is the duplicate.

The other defiant has been in another universe for 217 years.

The big question is, who put Kirk in cryo?

 

The old-age makeup isn’t bad. Along similar lines to what was done in the original series. But not at the level of what could be done today with a professional budget. And Vic does a good job of altering his performance, his voice, to help sell it.

It would have been interesting if they’d been able to get William Shatner for this episode to play older Kirk. It would be a good way to bring him back, something he’s sometimes said he’d like to do if the role was more than a cameo. Fan productions have had original series actors appear in the past, and Continues is one of the most professional.

 

Part of me wonders if they actually approached him.

 

Before we can get an answer, a Klingon ship appears.

They claim salvage rights over the Defiant but they’re struck with phaser fire from an unknown source and pulled into the anomaly

 

The only other ship here is the defiant but there’s nobody on board.

That’s when old Kirk appears and orders Uhura to open a channel to the defiant.

 

Kirk speaks to someone called Tiberius. It appears to be an artificial intelligence.

It speaks with Jim’s voice. It claims to be the protector of James Kirk.

 

Samara speculates that given the time, the Defiant computer could have developed multi-tronic circuits. Which is a bizarre statement to me. Is she suggesting that the computer evolved? By itself? That’s a bit out there.

 

Tiberius wants its friend back. It wants old Kirk to be returned.

 

Old Kirk warns against firing at the defiant, saying “you can’t give him the power, it feeds the dark.”

He then clutches his head and Bones rushes him back to sickbay.

That seems to be a foolish move.

Clearly old kirk has information. Information about Tiberius that is vital, that could determine their safety.

And Bones just gets him out of there before he can give that information.

I understand the need to get the older man medical help, he is clutching his head in obvious pain, but this doesn’t give the impression of a medical emergency so life-threatening that they can’t take a moment to let old Kirk explain.

What makes it even worse is that not long after, Bones will confirm there is nothing physically wrong with the man, he’s just old, and will send him to McKenna.

 

Kirk tries to negotiate with Tiberius but it isn’t interested in the crew’s safety. He blames them for abandoning Kirk, which they technically didn’t do. They didn’t know the duplicate Kirk existed. And old Kirk tried to explain this to tiberius.

 

Scotty has found a recording of Tiberius saying “it is forbidden for you to remember.”

That’s creepy. “Know you are safe. The dark will send you home.”

 

A brainwashing device.

Is Tiberius protecting him from something? Something it thinks old Kirk shouldn’t remember?

 

They’ve found the duplicate’s logs.

Duplicate kirk reprogrammed the computer with a new prime directive, to get Kirk home.

It’s started developing a personality. 

Kirk says “he’s imprinting on me.” I’m not sure what he means by that.

 

Now I’m a software developer. Now you can code an artificial intelligence. We’ve done a little of that at our work, with image recognition, but most of my work relates to an asset management system. It has some cleverness and expert knowledge built into it, but it’s essetially a database that stores the details and condition of assets, like bridges.

No matter how much data we store in this system, no matter how many features I code into it, it’s not going to spontaneously become self-aware. It’s going to suddenly transform into an AI application like ChatGPT. 

You can make an AI, but you’ve actually got to code it. Microsoft Word is not suddenly going to turn into Alexa.

 

I’m just not buying the idea of Tiberius, which makes it difficult for me to connect with this story, because its existence is kind of crucial to that story.

 

Anway, after 31 years, Kirk is still failing to find a way home.

 

Old Kirk is back in his old quarters. This was his cabin once. He has a lot fo talk to McKenna about.

It took him 4 months to bury all the crew of the Defiant.

 

McKenna tries to comfort Kirk with the words of The Ancient Mariner.

He was given a second chance to help ensure that others don’t lose hope.

 

Kirk is struggling with a sense of betrayal on two fronts, first from his crew he thought abandoned him, and second, from the only “friend” he’s had in many years.

McKenna says what he needs is to know that although he’s lost all those years, he hasn’t lost who he is.

Interestingly, the best person to help him might be our Kirk. Who knows him better? What would Kirk need to hear if he was in old Kirk’s place?

 

I like that McKenna gets to be a counsellor in this episode.

 

They reminisce about knowing Samara. Apparently they were close when Kirk was a teenager. Samara rebuilt a biplance.

 

Another nice touch is seeing the defiant uniform with its custom logo patch. But we’ll talk more about that when we get to the finale.

 

A question old kirk had to grapple with was

Are you even a captain when you have no crew? Are you a leader when no one is following?

He knew his crew wouldn't leave him, but the decades passed and they never came. You can’t replace them because there are no other societies to integrate into. It was a universe of void. Nothingness.

When does a machine become conscious?

When there is nobody around to say it can’t.

I never said he couldn’t, so he did.

And now he’s as self aware as he is invincible.

 

And this is all nicely poetic, but I’m still not buying it.

 

If he’s self aware, maybe he can be reasoned with.

Kirk says Tiberious is hiding something. Something so horrific that you could never face it.

Old kirk says “the dark.” but he can’t remember what that means.

 

The rift is emitting dark matter.

The Computer suggested a new engine design with the power to open a rift home. In year 51, the computer is sentient.

And bloomin McCoy, just as old kirk is explaining things, he wants to give him another sedative. Why? I dunno, because it’s hard for him to get the words out. I'm sure there’s more to it but the episode doesn’t really explain the stakes to us.

IT almost feels like McCoy is the one trying to keep this horrible secret.

 

Shared realities. Two black holes that must not merge.

McCoy has to finally give him that sedative because old kirk’s blood pressure is going through the roof.

 

Spock speculates on what I think is a really interesting sci-fi idea. Binary black holes. Black holes are basically collapsed stars, right? Two black holes,somehow separated into the two realities? Not sure I’m fully putting together what they’re trying to explain.

Tiberius was determined to blast through the rift.

That would manifest the additional singularity. IF they merge they’ll destroy the entire sector.

Old kirk pleaded with him, tried to shut him down.

Kirk wanted to get home, but not at the expense of this price. The defiant computer must have drained the oxygen to put Kirk to sleep. But how did he get into the cryo pod?

 

Scotty may have a way to disable Tiberius, but they’d need somebody on board the Defiant to do it.

Kirk says he can’t send old kirk back, so they’ll just have to forget that plan and attack the ship.

Okay.

Why is it a given that the only person they can send over is old kirk?

They have an entire crew of officers. It’s a potentially dangerous away mission, yes. But isn’t that what Starfleet officers are trained for? 

Now maybe Kirk weighs up the risk and decides not to put anyone in that kind of danger, but why does he act like Old Kirk is the only one they could send?

 

Old Kirk wants to know how things are with young Kirk and Samara.

They chose their separate paths. I think old Kirk was hoping they’d gotten together.

 

Bones and Spock discuss (rather heatedly, from Mcoy’s side) the nature evil.

Spock argues that Tiberius is not evil. It doesn’t have the capacity for that. It only knows logic.

Bones argues that Kirk was able to forgive because he’s human. Tiberius doesn’t get that. An intelligent machine with no mercy. IF that’s not evil, he doesn’t know what is.

 

Spock doesn’t necessarily agree, but he definitely concede’s McCoy’s point by agreeing to refer to Tiberius as an “evil twin.”

 

I think this. It’s an interesting little philosophical discussion. THe kind of thing you expect from Spock and McCoy’s banter.

 

With the Enterprise hidden, Kirk proposes a game of chess. If Tiberius wins, he gets Old Kirk back. If the Enterprise wins, tiberius helps them close the rift.

Tiberius agrees.

 

Risky.

But I’m sure Kirk has something up his sleeve.

Perhaps he’s going to have the game reprogrammed to let Kirk win. Something old Kirk did to Tiberius once.

This is essentially the same way Kirk passed the Kobayashi Maru.

 

Tiberius accuses Kirk of cheating, but Tiberius cheated as well when he brainwashed his friend.

Then Tiberius vanishes in a cloud of illogic. Now THAT is a classic TOS move.

Old Kirk hopes that the AI is not dead. Kirk says it just has a bad headache.

 

Kirk’s trick was a trojan horse program.

The defiant auto-diagnostic will restart TIberius in about an hour.

There’s a nice moment when Kirk makes it clear he includes Old kirk as a senior officer on this ship.

The black hole is still a problem.

Old kirk is the logical one to go aboard and solve the problem. But he’s not in great shape. Young Kirk puts his older counterpart in command of the Enterprise. He’s going to the defiant himself.

But there’s a problem. He’ll have to take the defiant back through the rift. He’ll end up trapped there, just like the other Kirk was.

 

Kirk has some guilt over leaving his duplicate behind, even though he didn’t know the duplicate existed.

 

Scotty offers to go with Kirk, but Samara says she’s the better choice.

 

At least Kirk won’t be alone in that void universe. He’ll have a friend, possibly something more.

They do some good body doubling work in this episode, having two kirks on screen at once.

 

Old Kirk has sabotaged his younger version’s plan. He uses a hypo on young Kirk and takes him place. Everyone seems cool with this.

 

But bad news. Tiberius is back. Old Kirk pleads with him to try to feel. To find mercy. Kindness.

 

Kirk’s only option is to destroy tiberius. Once his only friend.

It’s a hard thing for him to do. But he has no choice.

 

I like seeing the TNG style tractor beam effect in a TOS setting. In TOS they didn’t have the budget to do an effect for the tractor beam. At least, I assume that’s the reason.

 

I’ve always liked the look of the TNG era tractor beam.

 

It seems Samara wasn’t sure this would be a one way trip.

Old kirk has to stay but Samara doesn’t. He kisses her and helps her escape.

He saves her, but dooms himself to loneliness and isolation for the whatever remains of his life.

I understand. He cares for her. He can’t put her through what he’s been through. IF she came, after he died, she’d be stuck there for decades alone.

 

IT’s a selfless act.

 

And Samar is showing a lot of selflessness as well, wishing she could be with him.

 

When Samara says he’s all alone, Kirk says “Not anymore.”

What does he mean by that?

Perhaps that while yes, old kirk is alone, at least he knows he isn’t abandoned.

 

It’s a bit of a dark ending. But a noble one.

 

This was a mixed episode. There’s some stuff I really liked in it, and some stuff I didn’t.

 

Recka Sharma is pretty good in the episode. For a while there I thought I was going to have to say they didn’t give her anything to do, but they rectified that toward the end of the episode.

 

There were a few logic things I stumbled over, but that could be as much my fault as the episode’s. But the big issue was Tiberius. I just couldn’t buy that.

What lifts up the episode, and possibly saves it for me, is the character stuff. Old Kirk’s pain, his PTSD from what he’s gone through. And the relation between both Kirks and Samara.

 

This isn’t a great episode, but it may still be a good one, ultimately.

 

NEst time, we’ll be talking about the episode “What Ships are Made For” which features a guest appearance by John De LAncie himself, but not as Q.

 

I look forward to discussing that one with you.

 

Until then, don’t forget to check out Jewel of the Stars at AdamDavidCollings.com/books.

 

Live long and prosper.

Make it so.