Review: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, "Lost In Translation" | Season 2, Episode 6
Uhura learns the hard way that you can't escape grief
A mark of a show’s quality is how well it handles character deaths. There’s the event itself: how unexpected is it? How does it land on audiences? Surprise, shock, horror, and maybe even relief are all perfectly fine reactions; confusion or indifference, not so much. But then, it’s easy to surprise people with a corpse. (I don’t get invited to many parties.)
The before and after matter just as much, and that’s where most shows tend to run into trouble. Part of that’s just inherent to the fluid nature of the medium; most movies start with script in hand, but a show grows and changes over time, and it’s impossible to go back and edit earlier episodes to make sure everything fits together. Casts in TV shows are not a reliable constant, and not always for artistic reasons, as actors leave for different jobs, or get fired, or choose to step away.
I still don’t know why Hemmer had to die in Strange New World’s first season, and as far as TV deaths go, I’m still…