Spoiler Warning: There are spoilers ahead for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Seasons 1-4. Spoilers are also present for the following Star Trek productions: The Original Series, The Final Frontier, and The Next Generation.
At the start of 2026, I wrote that Strange New Worlds’ fourth season was almost certainly a top contender for my coveted “TV Show of the Year” award. But now that we’re seven episodes in, I can put my hand on my heart and say that, honestly? I’ve really only enjoyed two of them.
And, as you might’ve guessed, Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass ain’t one of the two.
I’m kind of in two minds about the episode – and, as we go along, I’ll talk about one way that I think its story could’ve been salvaged, because there was a genuinely emotional story for Captain Pike that I think should’ve gotten more attention. On the one hand, the deliberately melodramatic soap opera stuff was so tacky and awful that I’m left scratching my head as to who thought it was a good idea. (As well as who keeps allowing writer Dana Horgan to remain employed). But on the other, Pike’s arc had merit – at least in theory – and I’m disappointed that this story of grief, loss, and mental health wasn’t explored in more depth and in a better way.
I’ve said this before, particularly with Discovery and Picard, but modern Star Trek has been shockingly bad with its depictions of mental health. There have been some genuinely well-intentioned ideas; storylines involving our favourite characters and their struggles that absolutely are worth exploring. But in almost every instance, the execution of these character arcs and narratives have been, in a word, atrocious.
And so it was in Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass with Captain Pike.
It was a good idea to revisit what happened to Pike at the end of Season 3 and explore how losing a partner – and mourning the life they could’ve led – was causing him pain. This is something Star Trek has always done: looking at real-world issues through the lens of science-fiction. In this case, Pike *literally* saw and experienced that alternate life, but if you take it as a metaphor, many, many people have gone through loss, grief, mourning, and reflecting on the possibility of a different outcome and a different life.
Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass lets us see this from a different angle with La’an and Spock, too. Captain Pike is literally in mourning; grieving the death of not only Captain Batel but the nonexistence of his daughter, Juliet. La’an, though, is metaphorically “grieving” the end of her romantic relationship with Spock, understanding that their breakup was right for both of them, while still feeling that sense of emptiness and wondering what could’ve been.
Those storylines, had they taken place in a stronger, more grounded narrative framework, were absolutely worth examining. There was a point to be made about loss and grief, and how the end of a relationship can be devastating – even if it was the right decision. For La’an, as she potentially gears up for an exit from the Enterprise (in keeping with the season’s idea of “boldly going one step closer to where it all began”; i.e. moving characters into place in time for The Original Series), that could mean stepping away from the ship to help her move on from Spock (and Kirk, I guess). And for Captain Pike… well, we saw a tiny glimpse at the very end of the episode of how he’s still emotionally wrecked by what happened.
The soap opera story, though, completely ruined any chance of those narrative arcs being successfully explored, and I’m genuinely left feeling shocked at the stupidity of the show’s writers and producers – not for the first time this season, I should say. Did they *genuinely* think that this kind of overly-melodramatic soap opera spoof was the best way to examine complex themes of mental health, mourning, grief, loss, and more? What do they think this soap opera stuff added to the story? Could they not recognise that the tone of such a story is in complete contrast to its serious themes?
There are a couple of ways an episode like Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass could’ve been made to work. One would’ve been to lean fully into the soap opera stuff and treat it like a comedy story. Strange New Worlds has done several episodes with overtly comedic premises, and some of them have worked better than others, admittedly, but when they get it right, it works. Look at Human Best Friend earlier this season as an example: it leaned fully into its “Dude, Where’s My Car” and “The Hangover” inspirations, and what resulted was a genuinely fun, light-hearted story.
Alternatively, if the focus of the story was to be on such serious things for two of the show’s main characters, then the soap opera stuff could’ve been limited to short vignettes; we could’ve gotten a taste of Trelane’s meddling but without turning nine-tenths of the episode into a tonally jarring mess.
For me, I think themes as serious as grief and loss really need a dedicated storyline – one that *isn’t* wrapped up in the trappings of Strange New Worlds’ latest genre parody. And I feel the consequences of both modern Star Trek’s cut-down, ten-episode seasons as well as the show’s imminent cancellation in the way two completely, fundamentally incompatible concepts were forced together. The result was a mess; an episode that didn’t know whether it wanted to be silly or serious, tried to be both, and ended up succeeding at neither.
Two groups of writers and/or producers clearly had competing ideas. One was to revisit Captain Pike’s family from the end of Season 3, and explore these themes of loss, mourning, and how Pike’s imagined reality could be a metaphor for people in the audience who are going through similar grieving processes. And the other idea? “Let’s do a silly soap opera parody with all the dramatic musical stings, close-up shots, and overblown lighting! Won’t that be fun?”
And then, somehow – perhaps because the show only had a few episodes per season, or because cancellation loomed – some utter, abject*moron* decided to put both ideas together into one single episode. Is it a coincidence that both Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass and Level-Five Transporter Accident, with its appalling ending, share a writer? Hmm.
If I’d been Strange New Worlds’ showrunner, and two groups of writers had approached me with these ideas, I’d have picked the more serious one. That isn’t because Star Trek can’t be silly, Star Trek shouldn’t do comedy, or even because I don’t like genre parodies. All of those concepts can work in Star Trek, have already worked in Star Trek, and can be a lot of fun. But having already had several overtly comedic stories across the show’s run, *and* with several other “big swings” into different genres already on the books just in Season 4… I think I’d have said “no” to the soap opera and insisted on doing a more in-depth look at the themes on Pike and La’an’s sides of the story in a more straight-laced setting.
There *can* be value in contrast; in juxtaposing a serious idea against an inherently silly setting. But doing that successfully requires finesse, and frankly, it requires a level of production and writing quality that I don’t think either Strange New Worlds or indeed modern Star Trek as a whole have demonstrated themselves to be capable of. Ambition is great! We should all endeavour to be ambitious in our writing and with our creative ideas. But there comes a point where ambition runs into the brick wall of reality, and for me… I think some of the show’s producers and writers need to recognise their own limitations.
Maybe a really exceptional writer-director-producer combo could’ve pulled this off. But clearly, no one in the Strange New Worlds writers’ room or on the production side is at that level.
This episode’s writers *certainly* weren’t.
I’m also hyper-aware of the fact that this is now the *second* episode this season – after Level-Five Transporter Accident – where the bulk of the story didn’t “really” happen. Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass’ ending isn’t as bad as “but it was all just a dream” (though let’s be honest: nothing could be as bad as that), but despite leaving the characters with most of their memories of what took place… it still scrubs those events from the show’s internal reality.
Again: that’s pretty fucking weird, isn’t it?
Maybe there’s supposed to be a point about making emotional connections through fiction, and how the emotions we feel when reading a book or watching an episode of television are no less real just because it was fiction that elicited them. That might be an idea worth exploring – but again, such a concept would require higher-quality writing, a planned narrative arc, and less of a tonal clash between the soap opera silliness and the characters’ real lives.
In a way, I like this idea a lot. My website exists because I find value in fictional worlds like Star Trek; spending more time in those worlds, with those characters, is fun for me and always will be. And I don’t deny the power of all forms of media to evoke strong emotions. The emotional reaction we have to an episode of Star Trek, a movie, a book… those are *real*, even if the stories and characters aren’t. And there’d be value in an exploration of the idea of exploring that kind of emotional connection.
But that isn’t what Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass was going for – and even if it had been, it didn’t work.
I feel rather sorry for Anson Mount. After being functionally absent for most of Season 4, his first real spotlight ended up being a tonally muddled episode where two clashing ideas just couldn’t be forced together cohesively. That means that what is objectively one of Mount’s best – and certainly his most emotional – performances in the role of Captain Pike came in an episode that’s honestly better left forgotten, for the most part.
Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass managed to hit the right emotional note with Pike… at the tail end of the story. And seeing him break down, expressing those emotions he’d been holding onto since the end of Season 3 genuinely hit me. But they didn’t hit as hard as they might’ve if the rest of the episode had been stronger and more grounded, and because Pike’s moment of emotion came right at the end of the episode, just as the credits were about to roll… I just don’t think it landed as hard as it should have.
If Strange New Worlds wanted to do this kind of story, examining Pike’s mental health and his emotional state after losing Captain Batel and Juliet, then it realistically needed to be part of a completely different narrative framework. Trying to squash genuinely complex emotional storytelling for the man who’s (allegedly) the show’s main character up against this bizarre and over-the-top genre parody didn’t work.
What’s more, it should’ve been obvious from the *concept* stage that these two ideas couldn’t work together, which is why I stand by what I said above: the people who came up with this idea, turned it into a complete script, and greenlit it for full production are stupid, idiotic people who shouldn’t be working in this industry! It was *painful* to watch parts of Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass because of how cringe-inducing it was… and that would be bad enough on its own, but when you add into the mix that there was an actual, genuine story worth telling that the soap opera pastiche shat all over? It’s unforgivably bad, to be blunt.
I’m in favour of Star Trek trying new things. And I’m in favour of Star Trek trying out stories in radically different genres and with completely different tones. Part of the franchise’s appeal, at least for me, is its episodic nature, and that the Enterprise can warp away to a new planet, new aliens, a new adventure, and a new kind of story each and every week. I’m not saying “don’t do these kinds of genre stories,” and I’m not saying “Star Trek has to be 100% straight-laced and serious every single time.” That wouldn’t be fun.
But what I am saying, at least in this case, is that the genre parody fundamentally could not work with the more complex themes that the other side of the episode wanted to address, and by trying to force these two diametrically-opposed ideas together, what resulted was neither a successful homage to soap operas nor a clever and relatable exploration of themes of loss and grief. And frankly, that should have been obvious to all involved well before the episode even had a finished script.
Uhura’s story, seeing Pike as her father (for inexplicable reasons) was little more than a piss-take of similar soap opera plots over the years. And I mean… I get it. Two totally unrelated characters, who viewers have known for years, are suddenly revealed to be father and daughter or mother and son or long-lost conjoined twins. I get it. It’s a soap opera trope. But did it need to be such a big part of Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass? And what was the point of it for Uhura?
For Pike, this story tracks insofar as it set up his arc of confronting what happened to his family in the life he led and lost. But for Uhura… what are we supposed to get from this storyline? Am I missing something? She sees Pike as an important mentor figure in her life. Great. We knew that already. But given where Uhura is in her character journey – and the season’s stated aim of moving characters “one step closer to where it all began” – what are we gaining by putting her, of all people, into this soap opera plotline with Pike? I know it wasn’t real (and it was obviously not supposed to be real), but still. This was such a big part of the episode – and not just from Pike’s perspective – and yet we gained basically nothing from it.
I’m not from the United States (and I’m not a viewer of American soaps), so I confess that I didn’t know who actress Deidre Hall was when she was introduced as Counsellor Eleanor Chivers. If you’re in the same boat as me, Hall has played one of the main characters on the American soap Days of Our Lives since 1976, so bringing her aboard for an episode with this soap opera style was a genuine coup for Strange New Worlds. If you’re British, like me, I guess this would be akin to bringing William Roache (Ken Barlow on Coronation Street) on board for a guest-starring role.
Outside of the soap opera pseudo-reality, we didn’t get to spend too much time with Chivers. I liked her outfit, which I felt drew a little on TNG’s Dr Crusher for inspiration, being a similar length and colour, but obviously a bit more elaborate with its collar and the way it fastened. And I think it’s interesting that, at least in this era, the Enterprise has a counsellor on board.
However, given last week’s (re)introduction of Dr Boyce – who, as the ship’s former chief medical officer, served as kind of unofficial counsellor to Captain Pike… well, bringing Counsellor Chivers into the mix as well might arguably complicate things. I thought, at first, we were going to learn that Chivers was one of Trelane’s creations, a fictional character he invented for the sake of his dramatic production. But Chivers is, apparently, a fixture aboard the Enterprise.
I think you could argue that it makes sense for Pike to seek out an *actual* counsellor, given where he’s at emotionally, instead of trying to talk to someone like Dr Boyce, Una, or Dr M’Benga, so it’s not necessarily a *bad* thing. And starships having counsellors is clearly not uncommon for Starfleet in this era; I think there was someone in that role aboard the USS Discovery, or at least I remember it being mentioned.
I would’ve definitely liked to have spent more time with Pike and Chivers outside of the soap opera sequences; Pike’s breakdown in her office had all of the ingredients to be the kind of hard-hitting moment that his storyline needed more of, and Anson Mount genuinely gave an exceptional performance in that scene. It was just cut too short for an episode that wanted to do other things.
Within the soap opera reality, though, I don’t really know what to say. Chivers was – surprisingly, perhaps – the least-offensive of the soap opera fluff. Deidre Hall wasn’t hamming it up in the way that most of the show’s regulars were, leaving her character to feel like simultaneously the most-grounded and least-likely to be real at the same time. An odd mix… but then again, that’s Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass in a nutshell, eh?
Season 1’s The Serene Squall reintroduced us to Spock’s half-brother, Sybok – albeit only briefly – and ever since, I think a lot of Trekkies have been wondering whether Sybok would be back before Strange New Worlds comes to the end of its run. And as I was saying above with Pike and La’an and their complex storylines… I would not have chosen to bring back “Sybok” in this form, if I had been in charge! In this case, though, that’s for a different reason.
Pike’s story (and La’an’s too, to a lesser extent) needed to be more grounded and serious if the messaging was going to stick the landing. But Sybok, because he’s such a uniquely interesting character within the broader lore and canon of Star Trek… well, I think he deserved to be handled better. Being reduced to essentially a joke; a gag parodying the “evil twin” cliché from bad soap opera storylines… I mean, I think even Sybok – who was a part of what is usually considered the weakest film, at least of The Original Series era – deserved better than that.
Moreover, there was a chance for Strange New Worlds to explore the feud between Sybok and Spock – and perhaps between Spock and his father, Sarek, too – in more detail than we ever got in TOS or The Final Frontier. If I were making a list of potential characters and stories to return to for a potential “Captain Pike show,” I’m not sure I’d necessarily have picked Sybok. But having teased the character back in Season 1, I can see the value in revisiting him, expanding on his backstory with Spock, and going into more depth about their conflict.
Such a storyline could have set up the events of The Final Frontier, or at least leaned into Sybok’s “share your pain” philosophy that would be so important to the events of that film. And I’m left lamenting, really, that Strange New Worlds took nothing but this character’s name to do a very silly (and far too long) gag or bit with it. Once again… what was the point?
That last question – “what was the point?” – could really apply to 90% of the episode, to be honest. Previous genre parodies have (usually) made the case for themselves; even if I didn’t personally like the finished product, I could at least see what the writers and production team were going for. But in this case, I’m really struggling to see what the intention was in doing a soap opera spoof other than… to do a spoof.
And is *that* a good use of the show’s time when there are a mere nine episodes remaining, and fewer than fifty in total?
If this was Season 1 or 2, with Strange New Worlds potentially looking at a six-, seven-, or eight-season run, I still wouldn’t *like* this episode, but I think it might’ve felt less offensive. However, we’re now nine episodes from the show’s finale, and I just don’t think there was time to waste on a genre parody or spoof that not only didn’t have anything to say in and of itself, but that also ended up actively detracting from what should’ve been a powerful, emotional, and relatable arc for two of the show’s main characters.
With the exception of Anson Mount, who did well with Captain Pike’s emotional torment, the only other performer I could really single out for praise is Rhys Darby, who reprised his role as Trelane from Season 3’s Wedding Bell Blues. We’re sticking with the idea that Trelane is a kid, and Darby brought almost a sense of childlike wonder to the character, despite having phenomenal powers and abusing them to toy with the emotions of the crew.
I also found it interesting that Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass introduced another member of the Q Continuum as Trelane’s teacher/advisor. I wasn’t wild about the Q-inspired costuming, though: the judges’ robes that Q wore in The Next Generation were meant to be a copy of something from Earth in the mid/late 21st Century, and I felt that leaning on that idea for inspiration kind of misunderstands or muddles that. A very minor point, admittedly, and one that you might say is a nitpick. But I like Star Trek to be consistent with itself, and for me, this other Q wearing an outfit clearly at least partially inspired by those judges’ robes wasn’t right.
Oh, and if you missed it last season: yes, Rhys Darby’s character is the same Trelane as Kirk will encounter in The Original Series, and he’s a member of the Q Continuum. Spoiler alert for Wedding Bell Blues, I guess!
There were a couple of funny moments in Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass that successfully won a chuckle, or at least made me smile. Dr M’Benga having a disease as ludicrously-named as “space madness” was one of them, because it was just so utterly absurd and silly.
And it was also a funny bit to see Trelane and his teacher munching on buckets of popcorn as they watched Captain Pike wrangling with the memory of his daughter; neither of them expected that “storyline” in Trelane’s fantasy world, I guess. It was a funny moment, in any case.
But that’s really all the praise I have for this… well, this disappointing mess.
Do I need to tell you, for the fourth or fifth time this season, that I can respect the commitment to the bit; that fully and whole-heartedly embracing everything about a genre in this kind of genre parody is, in some ways, commendable? Because I feel like I’ve been saying that a lot, of late!
Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass is the first episode, really, where I feel that everyone involved should’ve known that the core concept and storylines wouldn’t work. The hammy over-acting, the ridiculous dialogue, and the attempt to blend a full-throated soap opera pastiche with complex themes and long-running storylines for main characters was a genuinely bad idea. And I’d actually quite like to know how this concept made it all the way through the production process. How is it that no one – not one single person from this pretty accomplished group of television writers and producers – didn’t stop for a second and say, “yeah, this ain’t gonna work”?
Like Chonitons Through the Hourglass is saved from the title of “worst Strange New Worlds episode” by the existence of Subspace Rhapsody and the “but it was all just a dream” ending to Level-Five Transporter Accident. But that’s it. That’s the best I can say about it… and I guess that makes it the third-worst episode of the series.
Like Chronitons Through the Hourglass isn’t just a disappointment because its soap opera parody was over-the-top, hammy, and silly. Those things made me roll my eyes, sure, but as someone who isn’t a soap fan, perhaps that side of the story would never have been “my thing,” and that’s okay. Not every episode is gonna be a ten-out-of-ten for every viewer, especially with such narrative and genre diversity on display. But because the episode’s other side had an important and potentially powerful and emotional message about grief and loss… the failures of the soap opera fluff feel infinitely worse.
I would’ve been down for an episode exploring Pike’s grief, either through a sci-fi lens or just… by playing it straight. And I liked the attempt to draw a comparison between Pike’s grief and La’an’s feelings about her second heartbreak. But those ideas got precious little time and attention in an episode that wanted to be something else – something fundamentally incompatible with those loftier ideas. The choice should’ve been to either massively reduce the soap stuff to a few small vignettes, drop it entirely, or else abandon the serious themes and lean fully into the parody.
I know what I’d have chosen, if I had the option.
Star Trek’s sixtieth anniversary is in just a few days’ time, and we’re going into the anniversary with *this* as the most recent episode. That… would not have been my preference, I’m not gonna lie. And now that Strange New Worlds Season 4 is three-quarters done, there are still only two episodes that I can say I fully enjoyed and didn’t find glaring flaws in. It’s such a shame that this show – which I’ve said repeatedly has been my favourite of Star Trek’s modern revival – just isn’t on top form at the moment.
Next week, we’re going to get Orders of Magnitude – an episode which promises “an alien pursuit that grows far beyond its original orders.” Maybe that’ll be a better, more grounded, or more interesting story. Maybe it’ll be *orders of magnitude* better than a soap opera parody or an episode that ends with “but it was all just a dream.” We can but hope, I suppose.
Thanks for joining me for this review. I really don’t like being so negative about Star Trek, and especially about Strange New Worlds when there are so few episodes remaining. But… here we are, I guess. I’m crossing my fingers and hoping for better things next time.
I’ll be writing something celebratory on the 8th for Star Trek’s official sixtieth anniversary, so I hope you’ll join me for that. And earlier in the year, I wrote up re-watches of Where No Man Has Gone Before, which was TOS’s second pilot, The Royale, which was my personal “first contact” with the franchise, and a few other pieces, too, like my encounter with William Shatner, some “what-if” scenarios, and some fascinating fan theories that I found! I’ve also reviewed Season 1 of Starfleet Academy and the video game Across The Unknown, which is based on Star Trek: Voyager. I hope you’ll check out some of those pieces if you have the time. You can also find the rest of my Strange New Worlds reviews by clicking or tapping here. As always… Live Long and Prosper, friends!
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Seasons 1-4 are available to stream now on Paramount+ in countries and territories where the platform is available. The first three seasons are also available on DVD and/or Blu-ray. The Star Trek franchise – including Strange New Worlds and all other properties discussed above – is the copyright of the Skydance-Paramount corporation. Days of Our Lives is the copyright of NBC/Corday Productions/Peacock. This review contains the thoughts and opinions of one person only and is not intended to cause any offence.
Trekking with Dennis 