cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/792370
I think Under the Cloak of War has broken into my top 10 episodes of all time.
Seeing Chapel and M’Benga’s struggle with having the Klingon responsible for one of the most traumatic moments in their life aboard the ship was tough to watch.
The performances from Jess Bush and Babs Olusanmokun were absolutely perfect in conveying their deep hatred for man they are being told by Starfleet is now an ally.
I wasn’t a fan of M’Benga but after today he, along with Chapel are possibly my favourite characters on the show. I still can’t got on board with Ortegas though, sorry.
I don’t think it was much of a twist. Between the doctor’s actions in The Broken Circle (using the protocol 12 combat enhancer to fight his way through a ship of Klingons with Nurse Chapel, as recapped at the start of the show), the Special Ops Andorian trying to recruit him to the mission (and the doctor declaring that his days of doing such things were behind him), the re-introduction of the P12 green vial, and the repeated aggressive physical contact between M’Benga and Dah’Ruk, it was pretty well spelled out for us before the end of the episode.
maybe I just did not fully understood everything until it was over. I found it confusing that the reason to call him butcher was not the killing of civilians but he killing his own men.
In the end he wants to keep the fact that he didn’t kill his own men because that seems to be the reason for starfleet to really considered him a defector? I honestly see that as a weak argument. particularly several years after he has been successfully working as an ambassador.
I feel that if his lies would have been clear earlier we could have had more intense scenes between them and his character could have been developed a bit better