Star Trek

The very first time travel episode of Trek also had the word ”Tomorrow” in the title, “Tomorrow is Yesterday”.

La’an’s security officer’s log records the stardate as 1581.2. So I guess we’re doing this again. You had me for two episodes, SNW.

Spock assures La’an he ”shall make every effort to practice less vigorously going forward.” “Practicing the lute” is a well known Vulcan euphemism first mentioned in the VOY episode “Body and Soul”.

Among the artifacts in Pelia’s collection:

• “The Monet Family in Their Garden at Argenteuil” by Edouard Manet

• A gyroscope

• A print of Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address

• An Egyptian pharaoh’s headdress with crossed crook and flail

• “The Concert” by Johannes Vermeer - which actually was stolen in 1990 and has yet to be recovered - despite what the episode says, the painting was stolen from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, not the Louvre (unless it is found, put on display, and stolen again before the events of this episode)

The device the Department of Temporal Investigations agent gives La’an projects a graphic of the timeline based on the one shown to Seven of Nine by the crew of the 29th century USS Relativity in “Relativity”

The bridge of the United Earth Fleet USS Enterprise has displays in blue and green, whereas the timeline we’re familiar with, the Starfleet USS Enterprise has those same displays in orange.

• Other than some colour settings on the displays, and the badges on the uniforms, nothing else seems to have changed. The uniforms still even have the division patterns on the yokes, identical to those of the prime timeline.

The captain appears to be Sam Kirk’s brother, James T. Kirk, whom we previously saw in “A Quality of Mercy”.

Captain Spock’s Sh’Rel appears to reuse the Vulcan cruiser model introduced as a small transport in “Lethe”. The same model was used for Vulcan fighters in the Confederation timeline in “Penance” and as a much larger warship in “Dominion”.

”You know…maple leafs, politeness, poutine.” As a Canadian, I’m sorry you all were subjected to such a dismissive breakdown of our national character.

UEF Kirk was born on the USS Iowa. Prime timeline Kirk was born in Riverside, Iowa.

• Kelvin Kirk was born aboard a the USS Kelvin’s medical shuttle 37. Early in production for 2009’s “Star Trek” the Kelvin was going to be the USS Iowa, but according to Alex Kurtzman in an interview, "Then we decided that was too radical."

”I’m from space.” This line is a callback to Kirk in “Star Trek: The Voyage Home” where he said, ”No, I'm from Iowa. I only work in outer space.”

Kirk wins a significant amount of cash playing chess. ”I used to play all the time with my first officer.” Prime timeline Kirk played 3d chess with Spock in “Where No Man Has Gone Before”, “Charlie X”, and in “Court Martial” Kirk teases Spock by telling him he may be able to beat his next captain at the game.

• The $20 bills we see appear to all still feature Queen Elizabeth II’s portrait, despite the fact that this episode presumably takes place after 2024. Which would seem to indicate that the process of replacing the queen’s portrait with that of King Chuck III is really dragging, and not that this episode was filmed on location seven months before the queen’s passing in 2022.

• The song that plays during the chess montage is “This Is It” by The Home of Happy, produced in 2021.

• Things the money Kirk wins is able to purchase:

  • Three hotdogs

  • A nice hotel room

  • A bribe large enough to cross the Canadian-American boarder without identification immediately after a terrorist attack

  • A taxi ride

  • Four bus rides

  • Whatever combination of taxi and buses are necessary to return to Toronto

  • A bribe large enough to cross the boarder back into Canada immediately after a terrorist attack

Kirk disables a bystander with nerve pinch, claiming a Vulcan cellmate in a Denobulan prison taught him how to perform the technique. In “The Omega Glory” prime timeline Kirk lamented that Spock was unable to teach him how to execute a nerve pinch to which Spock replied, ”I have tried, Captain.”

Plomeek soup was first mentioned in “Amok Time”.

Kirk’s initial difficulty driving the stolen car mirror’s prime timeline Kirk’s issues in “A Piece of the Action”. To be fair, the automobile in “A Piece of the Action” had a manual transmission.

• We never saw if Kelvin Kirk had any problems getting the car he stole from his step-father started in 2009’s “Star Trek”.

Kirk’s middle name, Tiberius, was established in the TAS episode, “Bem”. Prior to that, the only indication of what his middle name might be was in the second pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before” when Gary Mitchell created a tombstone reading ”James R. Kirk”. The episode ends with Kirk thinking aloud to himself, ”Did Gary think my middle name is Riberius?”

“Most people call him George.” In “What Are Little Girls Made Of” the android duplicate of Kirk infused with his memories claims that only Kirk calls his brother Sam, but in “Operation -- Annihilate!” both Bones and Sam’s wife also call him Sam and the name George is never mentioned.

Kirk mistakenly calls La’an “Noonien-Soong.” We know from “Farewell” that Adam Soong has some involvement with Project Khan, which presumably led to the genetic modification of her ancestor, Khan Noonien Singh.

The song that plays during the car chase is “Modern Art” by the Black Lips, produced in 2011.

“Ok, so Chernobyl, Tunguska, JFK, random gas leak explosions…all of it is about slowing down human progress.” Gene Roddenberry proposed a plot for a “Star Trek III” movie about the crew of the Enterprise needing to travel back in time to stop Klingons from assassinating JFK.

The images on Sera’s tablet are:

• A crater on the moon

• The World Trade Centre attack

• Crop circles

• Toronto City hall - also seen through an Iconian gateway in “Contagion”

• A Romulan Bird-of-Prey - this appears to be the newer digital model used in “Stardust City Rag” and “A Quality of Mercy” - notably, this BoP lacks the painted bird on the underside

Khan Noonien Singh was introduced in “Space Seed” where Scotty said of him, *”I must confess, gentlemen, I’ve always had a sneaking admiration for this one.” After learning that Khan is Canadian, I suddenly understand where Scotty and Kirk were coming from in that episode when they expressed they admired Khan. Notably James Doohan and William Shatner are also Canadian.

Among the drawings outside L’il Khan’s room there is also a drawing of a Babylonian tablet he appears to be translating.

”--and all this is supposed to happen back in 1992, and I’ve been stuck here for 30 years!” In “Space Seed” it is stated by Spock that Khan ruled more than a quarter of the world from 1992 until 1996. In “Farwell” the funding report for Project Khan that Adam Soong had was dated 1996. We also saw the USS Voyager travel to 1996 in “Future’s End” and “Future’s End, Part II” and there is no mention or indication of the Eugenics Wars. “Strange New Worlds” established that the Eugenics Wars happened in the 21st century.

• Spock also says in “Space Seed” that “Records of that period are fragmentary.”

After she’s shot, Sera activates a something in her neck which causes her body to disintegrate, similar to what we see the Tal’Shiar assassins do in “Remembrance” and “The End is the Beginning”.

Upon being prompted, L’il Khan indicates that the photo of himself and six other children shows ”others like [him].” In “Space Seed” there were 84 augments aboard the SS Botany Bay, though 12 of them died due to faulty suspended animation pods. In “Star Trek Into Darkness” Section 31 found Khan and 72 other augments aboard the ship.

La’an leaves Sera’s loaded gun in L’il Khan’s room, and though it’s not explicitly said, I feel like we might know how the superior man makes his escape from a Toronto stripmall cold fusion plant, and becomes ruler of a quarter of the planet.