IR TV Review: STAR TREK - STRANGE NEW WORLDS - EPISODE 2 (“The Griffin Incident”) [Paramount+-S4]

Reading the initial title, this reviewer imagined there was some hidden ode to "Family Guy" in this episode especially after Seth McFarlane has done "Orville". But Episode 2 of Season 4 of "Strange New Worlds", “The Griffin Incident” is simply much more horror, speaking the psychological state of the three main characters in the episode with La’An, James Kirk and Spock. La’An started battling something in the last episode so it very much seems like this in an inherent ispath to destruction. The T’Pring situation is slightly tricky (and has been throughout the series) because the context of "Amok Time" still stands. That is in slight disarray but the concept and why Spock sees certain things are not. The mythology is interesting yet still evasive but that response is simply because we seemingly have more science than the 1960s just like 2050 will look different from now.

The psychotropic effects of whatever this ghost ship is putting out definitely creates some interesting imagery. The most has to do with Kirk involving Carol and David from "Star Trek II" and his brother Sam from the original series. There are two lines that are Easter eggs but are very prophetic. And one image almost pulled from "Alien: Resurrection is gory but very impactful even if it happens in a different way. Spock and La’An are seeing their inherent nature shown to them. One can control it. One cannot. They also talked about Section 12 (which sounds an awful lot like 31 but dealing with paranormal). Of course there are harks to “Event Horizon” as well so SNW continues its homages to different genres the writers and creators obviously enjoy. B

By Tim Wassberg