While Sylvia and I were watching The Pitt a couple of weeks ago, a demented idea popped into my head.
Imagine an emergency room doctor who never learned how to be dispassionate, how to remain composed and professional when faced with the daily horrors of the ER. This hypothetical doctor can hold his emotions in check for the first few minutes of diagnosis and treatment, but then he breaks down in tears and has to complete his work while sobbing brokenly, whether he's treating a broken toe or a mortal gunshot wound.
In a real-world setting, I would expect that such a doctor would be eventually dismissed for his effect on morale--both patient morale and the morale of everyone else in the ER.
But imagine further that this emotional doctor also happens to be a preternaturally gifted genius who saves people in even the most desperate medical circumstances. Time after time, he saves patients that no one else could have saved. Once, his colleagues called him Doctor, Empathy, M.D., with the M.D. standing for "Mucho Depressing" instead of "Medical Doctor." But now, they see him with a mixture of bewilderment and awe, calling him "Master Diagnostician," "Master of Disease," or "Medically Divine." His colleagues can find Doctor Empathy exasperating, but they can see the value of his work, so they devote themselves through getting Doctor Empathy through each shift with his--and their--sanity intact.
I think this might make a pretty good dramedy.
I came to the latest iteration of Star Trek with low expectations, given my disappointment with Star Trek: Discovery and its last three seasons in particular. But I must say, I feel like the show keeps getting better with each successive episode, and "Come, Let's Away" is certainly its best hour yet.
Once again, I'm glad that the showrunners have learned you don't need world-ending stakes to create suspense and meaning in science fiction. I note this because the stakes for this episode change as the story progresses, to excellent effect; it starts as a training exercise, entertwined with the fate of a budding relationship, progresses to a hostage situation, and then pulls the rug out from under the audience with an 11th hour turn that reveals the stakes are higher than this cast has ever faced--and as a bonus, the good guys lose in a big way by the time the curtain drops. Characters we came to enjoy over the course of the first five episodes meet their final fates here in a way that feels organic and earned, relationships evolve naturally, and we learn things about our protagonists and, in a welcome return, one of our chief antagonists--Paul Giamatti's Nus Braka.
Indeed, there are couple of scenes with Nus Braka and Holly Hunter's Chancellor Nahla Ake that are utterly compelling, a master class in acting from both performers.
Crucially, the plot points all make sense, too, progressing logically, and none of the characters are stupid; they make good decisions, they have backup plans--and they still lose, because the opposition is just a couple of steps ahead. It's great to see--proper drama with relatable stakes.
Come, let's bring on the last three episodes of season one!
P.S. I do have thoughts on last week's episode, "Series Acclimation Mil," but I haven't put them to . . . well, not to paper, but to screen. I haven't decided how I feel about the episode yet, because there are parts I genuinely love, and parts I have reservations about, and I haven't decided if the problems are with the episode or my perception.
"Progress." Not a bad concept, but would have been way cooler if they'd incorporated some Federation tech--a shuttle, for example. 
