An AI gaining sentience struggling with emotions would have been an interesting standalone plot, when told out of context. But we do have context: the entire season till now has been crew members talking about emotions and attending counselling. So the reveal ended up hilariously ridiculous. The AI has emotional distress too! Lol
Zora the computer chose her avatar to be some generic concentric circles circumscribing a rectangular box showing waveforms of her voice. Like, this is what the creative team can come up with? Those useless holographic displays have more details than a sentient AI's sense of self!
Back to the beginning of the episode. Starfleet sent Discovery, their most valuable asset, into the subspace rift left behind by the anomaly. You know, instead of a science vessel. Or better yet, an unmanned probe mayhaps? Saru mentioned other similar encounters by the Enterprise and Voyager. Which Enterprise and which Voyager? And why only ships that the audience know of?
Discovery then entered the void. At first the crew was unable to comprehend the concept of "there's nothing". Then spontaneously logic returned, they sent a probe to probe the space, which got disintegrated. With a sudden showcase of maturity and leadership, Burnham decided to abort the mission! What a surprise indeed. But they couldn't leave, due to the lack of navigation landmarks. Even my smartphone has inertial measurements. Same can be found on all commercial airlines, because GPS isn't always available. But a starship doesn't have gyroscopes in the future. Right...
Unlike "the Void" encountered by Voyager in S05E01, the nothingness of this void served no purpose other than a ticking timebomb that threatened to destroy Discovery. In Voyager, Janeway got depression after a few months travelling in the void, that's a legit reason to talk about emotions. There's also a sinister plot, and a message about environmental protection in the end. There's no such thing in Discovery. Squandering all that room for creative freedom on fire and sparks.
Afterwards some problem solving with technobabble happened, which managed to somewhat resemble science instead of nonsense. Photoacoustic effect is a real phenomenon, just FYI. Nice to know the writers still remember that this show is Sci-Fi. But in the end all the logic went out the airlock. The entire crew has to beam to the pattern buffer to stay alive, but Burnham wearing a spacesuit remained on the bridge alone, and survived the trip because the AI sang a song to her. Yeah whatever.
You know what? Drop the sentient AI, and tell the storyline backwards, from the perspective of a third party encountering a vacant Discovery drifting in space. Reveal the plot step by step as a mystery, and end the episode with the third party discovering the crew alive in the pattern buffer. There you go. Where's my paycheck?
Zora the computer chose her avatar to be some generic concentric circles circumscribing a rectangular box showing waveforms of her voice. Like, this is what the creative team can come up with? Those useless holographic displays have more details than a sentient AI's sense of self!
Back to the beginning of the episode. Starfleet sent Discovery, their most valuable asset, into the subspace rift left behind by the anomaly. You know, instead of a science vessel. Or better yet, an unmanned probe mayhaps? Saru mentioned other similar encounters by the Enterprise and Voyager. Which Enterprise and which Voyager? And why only ships that the audience know of?
Discovery then entered the void. At first the crew was unable to comprehend the concept of "there's nothing". Then spontaneously logic returned, they sent a probe to probe the space, which got disintegrated. With a sudden showcase of maturity and leadership, Burnham decided to abort the mission! What a surprise indeed. But they couldn't leave, due to the lack of navigation landmarks. Even my smartphone has inertial measurements. Same can be found on all commercial airlines, because GPS isn't always available. But a starship doesn't have gyroscopes in the future. Right...
Unlike "the Void" encountered by Voyager in S05E01, the nothingness of this void served no purpose other than a ticking timebomb that threatened to destroy Discovery. In Voyager, Janeway got depression after a few months travelling in the void, that's a legit reason to talk about emotions. There's also a sinister plot, and a message about environmental protection in the end. There's no such thing in Discovery. Squandering all that room for creative freedom on fire and sparks.
Afterwards some problem solving with technobabble happened, which managed to somewhat resemble science instead of nonsense. Photoacoustic effect is a real phenomenon, just FYI. Nice to know the writers still remember that this show is Sci-Fi. But in the end all the logic went out the airlock. The entire crew has to beam to the pattern buffer to stay alive, but Burnham wearing a spacesuit remained on the bridge alone, and survived the trip because the AI sang a song to her. Yeah whatever.
You know what? Drop the sentient AI, and tell the storyline backwards, from the perspective of a third party encountering a vacant Discovery drifting in space. Reveal the plot step by step as a mystery, and end the episode with the third party discovering the crew alive in the pattern buffer. There you go. Where's my paycheck?
