Section 31 reveals that Georgiou has been dwelling on the sides of Federation area, working a disreputable bar underneath a pseudonym. She’s pulled again into service when a Section 31 crew underneath the command of increase Alok (Omari Hardwick) wants her assist to seek out an extremely damaging weapon. Rounding out the crew is Vulcan (form of, however I received’t give that away right here) Fuzz (Sven Ruygrok), the shapeshifting Quasi (Sam Richardson), the Deltan Melle (Humberly Gonzalez), a mech-suited warrior known as Zeph (Robert Kazinsky), and human and Starfleet true believer Rachel Garrett (Kacey Rohl).
As that forged record exhibits, Section 31 is fond of creating references to Trek lore. Garrett, in fact, will develop into the Captain of the Enterprise-C and a significant character within the beloved Next Generation episode “Yesterday’s Enterprise.” Quasi is a Chameloid, a member of the alien race performed by Iman in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. Alok’s augments tie him to the Eugenics War and Trek large dangerous Khan Noonien Singh.
But these references solely function floor stage easter eggs, which makes Section 31 extra like a recreation of Fortnite with Star Trek skins than a feature-length continuation of the beloved franchise. In reality, Section 31 appears to tug most of its visible inspiration from video video games, with shiny graphics and ostentatious digicam actions. After the Mirror Universe prologue, we’re handled to a mission abstract delivered on to the viewers, as if we’re gamers preparing for the following stage.
To these with out a lot funding in Star Trek, the online game analogy could not sound so dangerous. After all, we’ve had some actually nice online game variations these days, with Fallout and The Last of Us. But Section 31 feels extra like final yr’s doomed Borderlands film, executed a lot worse.
Yes, you learn that proper. All of the ugly visuals and self-satisfied humor that marred Borderlands seems in Section 31, besides gaudier and louder. The characters converse in lingo that’s gone old-fashioned in 2025, not to mention the far future (“Chaos is my friend with benefits,” says Garrett as a means of expressing her rising acceptance of dysfunction). Section 31 presents its crew as a band of outcasts who always squabble, a trope executed greatest most just lately by James Gunn in Guardians of the Galaxy and The Suicide Squad.
But as a substitute of creating the characters fascinating or likable in any means, screenwriter Craig Sweeny writes everybody as a jerks who insult each other to show their toughness. That doesn’t forestall director Olatunde Osunsanmi (a Discovery veteran, like Sweeny) from treating every toothless one-liner as a Don Rickles-level burn, and chopping to a close-up of the roaster cackling at their very own joke each time.
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