In this episode, Enterprise is at an abandoned Illyrian colony, and they're trying to figure out what happened to the Illyrians who lived there. At the beginning, they explain some history of the Illyrians, including that they modify their genes, which is banned in the Federation. I really appreciated that being explained because I knew nothing about the Illyrians before this episode.
When an ion storm comes, Pike and Spock end up getting trapped on the planet, which is already something that seems to be happening a lot.
While Pike and Spock are seemingly the ones in danger at first, the crew on the ship start experiencing weird symptoms where they burn themselves with light. At first it only infects the landing party, but then it quickly spreads to other people.
The learn that the illness is spread through light, which wasn't something I'd heard before. After Covid, any stories about contagions feel a little different, and the idea of an illness traveling through light feels particularly scary because of how hard it is to protect yourself from it.
Spock finds a journal on the colony, and he works out that this particular group of Illyrians wanted to join the Federation. To do that, they needed to "demodify" themselves, and this is ultimately what led to them dying. There are creatures in the storm that might actually be the Illyrians themselves, and they end up saving Spock and Pike, which makes it seem like they're sentient to some extent. It's an interesting storyline, and I'm curious about the show handling more about augments in the future, which should be easy considering Una is an Illyrian.
I really enjoyed this episode. Actually, I would have liked to learn a lot more about this group of Illyrians, and I'm a little sad that that's probably not going to happen. Still, I hope the next episode is interesting in its own way.
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