Wednesday 15 November 2017

I hope Captain Lorca isn't evil (non-spoiler)


The most recent episode of Star Trek: Discovery has completely changed my mind on Captain Lorca. The whole season up until now I have been waiting for the moment when he rips off the mask, as it were, and we find out this was all a plot by Section 31 or something.

Then that conversation with Stamets happened. I won't go into details to avoid spoilers but in that moment I changed my mind. I still think Lorca is a deeply damaged man and dangerous to his ctew in ways that not even the needs of war should excuse but I no longer think he's pursuing any sort of secret agenda. I think, and I hope I'm right, that he's just what he's been revealed to be: a captain who lost a crew under tragic circumstances who hasn't properly dealt with those feelings and is using the war as a way to get closure. Its not healthy and its not admirable but I want it to turn out that underneath it all he's being honest all those times he tells Stamets and Michael that once the war's won he wants to use the spore drive to explore the farthest reaches of the galaxy.

I just think that there's too much cynicism in science fiction these days and that it would do some good to have Lorca be, beneath all the trauma, exactly what he claims to be: a true believer Starfleet captain. 

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