27 Dresses? Try 14 GIFs!
of the cast of Star Trek: Discovery being wildly appealing
Dame Margaret is off this week, leading literary pilgrims and I am on a relaxing staycation with my family, so this issue is briefer than usual & is laser-focused on one thing: GIFS, captions, and brief context designed to ensorcell you into watching Star Trek: Discovery. Two seasons are on CBS All Access, with the third set to premiere in October. You have plenty of time to catch up! Or rewatch!
Do I over-identify with the protagonist of this show? Who can say?
This is Michael Burnham (played by Sonequa Martin-Green). She’s a human raised in a Vulcan-human family (in fact, she is Spock’s sister, raised by his parents after her biological parents are killed by Klingons). She’s considerably more brilliant than I am and I aspire to her level of moral clarity and bravery. A very tough cookie who also loves & cares for her family & friends, and always sticks up for the little guy? Role model! Did she start a war via an act of mutiny? Regrettably, yes. We all have things we need to work on!
I know what you’re thinking: Sophie, did you dye your hair red and cosplay as a Starfleet Ensign?
Yes, own your ambition and your space-Titian hair!
Cadet Sylvia Tilly (Mary Wiseman) grows so much as a character over the course of Discovery’s two seasons, from being a little dithery to assured, from questioning her value as a friend & future officer to cherished bosom friend and integral strategist. Also she is an icon of ADHD excellence whose often-digressive approach to problem-solving is the very thing that gets the team out of many an intergalactic scrape. Love!
Jason Isaacs gets to turn to the camera very dramatically in this show
Captain Lorca is...complicated? His arc has a lot of ins, a lot of outs, a lot of what have yous, but what really matters (as is so often the case in Star Trek) is how committed Isaacs is to the more baroque aspects of the performance. What he does best of all is set up both the crew and the viewers for this guy in Season 2:
Space Dad!
Look at this caring silver fox. You will love Captain Pike (Anson Mount). You will love his leadership style (refreshingly not-unhinged and quite reasonable, unlike some Captains Lorca we could mention!). You will love his ability to bring out the best in his crew/space babies. You’re going to love his dimple. Like everyone else on this show, Captain Pike is the best! You will love him, it is space law.
One good thing about Lorca: he brings Ash Tyler on board Discovery.
Ash Tyler (played by Shazad Latif) is a former POW who teams up with Captain Lorca in a daring escape from a Klingon ship. He gets to do lots of brave derring-do stuff and has a dizzying storyline featuring lots of PTSD and some Manchurian Candidate-inflected beats, but my favorite thing about this performance is all the soulful smouldering Tyler gets to do in his relationship with Michael Burnham. (Bim & Nichole have covered this in-depth in an episode of Thirst Aid Kit, I highly recommend it!) Their relationship aesthetic is best characterized as saudade-drenched mutual face-clutching and as a lifelong devotee of slow-burn romance, that is extre-he-heeeemely my shit. I mean, look at this:
An electrolytes drink for the soul, is what this is. Who gave him eyes like that? Said he could keep them?
Ok, now we need to talk about Michelle Yeoh, who effectively plays two roles due to some wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey stuff, and who is having the absolute time of her life doing so. Behold, the requisite Walking Slowly Towards A Questionable Fate!
Some type of feathery cape is happening! INTO IT!
Pretending to be disgusted by a baby she was just fully cooing at. Give this woman more comedy roles!
Continuing to execute her own high kicks in fight sequences. A reminder: Michelle Yeoh is 58 Earth years old.
These two. Sigh.
Broadway star Anthony Rapp and My So-Called Life’s own Wilson Cruz are a couple here, and although their characters (engineering & space mycology whiz Paul Stamets and deeply caring Dr. Hugh Culber) go through some really misguided and cruel Kill Your Gays plot nonsense, the actors give lovely performances and have a very lived-in, established couple energy that balances out the star-crossed lovers dynamic between Burnham & Tyler. My one note is: let Anthony Rapp sing!!! Please!
When you adore your beloved and also will absolutely tell him when to cool it, already
Saru!!
Ok, so this wonderful character -- Commander Saru, the first & so far only Kelpien to serve in Starfleet -- doesn’t do it for me, thirst-wise, but I do not presume to judge others’ crushes, and he’s so important to the show that I must include him here. In addition, Saru is played by Doug Jones, who you may remember best as The Creature in The Shape of Water, and I knowwwwww many of you were horny on main for him in that role! So! Saru is the cool-headed, cautious (perhaps to a fault) foil for Burnham, and watching his character develop over the course of the first two seasons has been a joy. Jones’ performance is a minor miracle of voice-and-body acting, and I can’t wait to see what’s next for Saru in Season 3.
What you’ve all been waiting for: SPACE MUSHROOMS
Longtime readers may know that I love fungi. I just think they’re very cool, growing the way they do, being the great composters of our planet. I have been known to hop out of the car to take a photo of an interesting-looking fungus in my travels. They’re fascinating & mysterious & we share a lot of DNA with them, which is fun to think about. ANYWAY, the Discovery’s secret navigational weapon is a hyperdrive that runs on space mushrooms. They call it the mycelial network, but that’s just fancy future space talk for Space! Mushrooms!
I’m not suggesting that anyone should have sexual feelings about space mushrooms, but I am suggesting that everyone wonder why this is the first tv show audacious enough to posit that space mushrooms are a viable means of intergalactic travel. I don’t know, I guess I just thought that, as a species, we were more creative than that, but it seems not. I’m not angry, just a little disappointed. I will survive this setback, I’m sure. Probably.
Two Bossy Dames is brought to you by:
this hilarious impression of that one fly that gets stuck in your house and slowly drives you completely around the bend
the same comedy genius’ parody of Fox News on this week’s DNC convention
Rob Delaney’s real talk about his vasectomy (it is very good & funny & sincere, promise)!
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