HERE THERE BE SPOILERS
With “All In,” Discovery opens up the second half of its fourth season with a strangely funny installment that uses the evidence of connection between Book and Burnham to highlight how the DMA issue has divided them. The episode is as good for laughs as it is for the incredibly painful emotional set piece that forms the story’s core. Though not without issues, “All In” sets the stakes we’ll be playing for throughout the rest of the season.
Plot Ahoy!
President Rillak orders Burnham to spend time gathering as much information about Species 10C as she can, after she dresses down both Burnham and Vance for having failed to realize what Book and Tarka had planned. After her departure, Vance countermands her order to Burnham and instructs Burnham that she should continue her investigation into Book’s whereabouts so far as the parameters of her official mission will allow.
She recalls a connection on what appears to be a floating casino barge who might have not only information regarding Species 10C considering that the closest civilization to the relevant portion of the galactic rim has no relationship with the Federation. However, this mysterious contact from Burnham’s courier days has connections everywhere and might be able to put hands on the sensor data they need to determine what’s going on with 10C. As it just so happens, those same connections make it likely that he also has a line on the type of pure isolynium that Tarka would need in order to create the isolytic weapon he intends to use to destroy the DMA.
She takes Owo with her to the pleasure barge, and she does discover that Book and Tarka are aboard, trying to barter for the isolynium, but Haz Mazaro establishes that neither Book nor Burnham has the funds necessary to acquire the isolynium. The problem is that Haz Mazaro has no real allegiance to either Book or Burnham, but he’s perfectly willing to let them play Leonian poker against each other to raise the funds necessary to purchase the isolynium he has on hand. However, that also requires that Burnham and Owo scrape together enough latinum for the buy-in.
Initially, a bit stumped, Owo discovers a fighting ring and persuades Burnham to let her go fight for money. She loses two bouts, but on the third, after they’ve driven up the odds against Owo, Burnham bets their entire latinum supply on Owo who very handily defeats her opponent. They take their winnings to the poker table where Burnham and Book use what appears to be a long-developed system to force every other player to fold. Eventually, Book wins, using his greater skill at Leonian poker to his advantage. Burnham allows him to depart with Tarka.
She returns to Federation HQ where Rillak once again demands to now why she allowed Book to depart, and Burnham reveals the proverbial ace up her sleeve. She placed a tracking device on the isolynium, so she’ll know where Book and Tarka have gone to build their weapon. Meanwhile, folks have analyzed the data she acquired from Haz Mazaro and have concluded that the DMA is not a weapon but rather a mining dredge. 10C has been mining boronite, and everyone concludes that 10C will see the destruction of the mining mechanism as an act of war. Given how advanced 10C is, that would be a war the Federation could not win.
Analysis
“All In” raises the stakes for this back half. If Book and Tarka manage to destroy the DMA, then they will effectively doom the Federation and possibly most of the Alpha and Beta Quadrants. However, the episode conceptualizes the potential destruction of all known life in those quadrants as a backdrop. The real beating heart of this episode is the conflict between Book and Burnham. At one point, Burnham begs Book to remember that the Federation will use every tool at its disposal to stop him, including her. Book merely shakes it off, implying that achieving his vengeance is worth the destruction of all of the good will, all of the ties he has to the Federation, again including his ties to Michael Burnham. The episode even reminds us how close they are by having them play off of each other at the poker table in order to make his decision hit that much harder.
Interestingly, I think Book believes his motivations to be something other than the same sort of thirst for vengeance that drove Ahab to self-destruction. He reminds Burnham that he was smuggling Trance Worms to safety when she met him, and this reference implies that he still believes that destroying the DMA will save lives. The problem with this believe is that it simply isn’t logical. First off, the act of engaging with the DMA will result in nothing other than death. Book doesn’t anticipate surviving the isolytic explosion, which makes sense given that the explosion will likely irreparably damage subspace in that area. When he rescued Trance Worms, he preserved life, so the action itself differs on a fundamental level. While Book doesn’t have access to the data Burnham recovered from Mazaro, he still knows that there is a possibility that his action could result in severe retaliation by a technologically advanced species. He just doesn’t care. Book therefore shares less with Albert Schweitzer than he does with Captain Ahab.
Burnham begs him to reconsider, but she does not expect her efforts to bear fruit. The use of the tracking device on the isolynium implies that she knows quite well that her argument will fall on deaf ears, and there’s something tragic about her efforts to plead with Book. They’re both looking at the death of their relationship because neither will budge. Book’s wrong here, and there’s not really any way around that. Admittedly, it’s easy to say that when I can sit here behind my keyboard without suffering through the deaths of everyone and everything that I love, but I do like that the episode never shies away from the immorality of Book’s actions. Burnham, on the other hand, is in the right here, but it doesn’t matter because Book treasures his vengeance more than he does his love. The moment between them is a horrible one.
The episode counterbalances the heaviness of this plot-line with the ridiculousness of the barge generally and Owo’s cage-fighting specifically. From the bored attendant helping Burnham and Owo cash-out to Owo’s hilariously great efforts at misleading the betting populace, the episode provides plenty of comedic relief. I do, however, dislike that once again, Owo gets used as a plot element. We only get crumbs of her backstory when those crumbs serve an important need in the plot, and “All In” is no different. That said, she gets a fantastic moment in which she terrifies Tarka by reading him like a book.
Still, despite the episode’s levity, “All In” hints that there may not be a happy ending in the cards for Book and Burnham. There’s a very real sense that in making off with the isolynium, Book has crossed some sort of Rubicon. Even though Saru believes Burnham can bring him back, for the first time this season, I’m not sure I agree.
Rating:
Three cups of Earl Grey Tea
Stray Thoughts From the Couch:
- Y’all, I am here for Culber yelling at his space-Roomba. I’m not saying that I haven’t yelled the same thing, but I’m not not saying it either.
- If Mazaro’s barge is so hostile to the Federation, why on earth do Burnham and Owo beam down in uniform? That still bothers me.
- There’s a Changeling card counter!
- Let’s talk boronite for a moment. Species 10C has a use for it, and we already know from Voyager that the Omega Molecule can be synthesized from boronite. I’m wondering if Disocvery plans to have 10C using the particle to power its civilization.
- I love the caper-feel of the episode.