- Title: Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – Ad Astra per Aspera
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Throughout its various iterations and decades on television, Star Trek has always enjoyed a good courtroom drama from time to time. “Ad Astra per Aspera” picks up the thread of last season’s cliffhanger by offering us the trial of Una Chin-Riley (Rebecca Romijn). Due mostly to his stubbornness, Captain Pike (Anson Mount) is able to enlist the help of one of the universe’s best attorneys (), although her personal backstory to Number One does create some conflict. Although other characters get small moments here, such as Lieutenant La’an Noonien-Singh‘s (Christina Chong) struggle to discover how Una’s secret was discovered, this is really an episode for Rebecca Romijn who doesn’t disappoint.
With the episode’s title coming from Una’s own testimony about herself and why she joined Starfleet, and later reiterated in her lawyer’s closing remarks, “Ad Astra per Aspera” examines what Starfleet is and what it should stand for. While Una manage to get off on a technicality, despite in fact being guilty, the legal maneuvering to do so that challenges Starfleet to live up the ideals it claims to stand for helps push the episode further making it a more memorable episode than some of the previous Star Trek courtroom dramas.
