Valles Marineris is a decidedly mixed bag for me. It delivers high-stakes spectacle and terrific individual performances. Saffron Burrows is absolutely phenomenal as Battle Commander Cassell; she dominates every scene she's in, making her character's desperate plight immediately empathetic .

On top of that, the visual production is genuinely breathtaking. The special effects take Strange New Worlds' already stellar track record up another notch—from the menacing scale of the Interstellar Squall to the stunning rendering of prehistoric Earth and its dinosaurs. The away team's excursion into the past is a blast. Watching the crew navigate Earth from 65 million years ago—trying to bypass a T-Rex without causing a butterfly effect—is classic sci-fi fun. The dramatic irony of their extreme caution, only to realize the dinosaurs were going to be wiped out just hours later, lands really well. And, of course, La'an punching a dinosaur in the face is an instant classic moment.

Where the episode truly gives me pause, however, is in its heavier thematic choices and ethical implications.

First, the story leans heavily into inspiration from Edgar Rice Burroughs' A Princess of Mars, with Pike even quoting Burroughs directly. While Burroughs is a foundational sci-fi figure, his legacy is deeply problematic due to his explicit support for eugenics and scientific racism—themes that heavily permeated his work. Given that Strange New Worlds has occasionally stumbled when tackling eugenics topics (such as Season 3's Four and a Half Vulcans), invoking a known eugenicist’s framework feels like a tone-deaf choice.

Even more troubling are the massive moral implications of the episode's climax. Pike faces an agonizing choice: stop Cassell to preserve the timeline, or allow her to destroy an entire planet. By standing down, Pike effectively sanctions the deliberate genocide of the Dol'drm, alongside the collateral extinction of both the ancient Martians and the dinosaurs.

While saving humanity’s future is logically understandable, the episode fails to give this cosmic tragedy the emotional weight it demands. The Enterprise's own antimatter cell is the literal weapon used to annihilate billions of living beings—including two sentient, spacefaring civilizations. I wanted to see much more pushback from the crew. The brief moments of hesitation we got didn't feel anywhere near sufficient for a crew actively participating in multi-species extinction.

One thing that is neither positive nor negative, but is starting to concern me, is the show's persistent Doctor Who references. When discussing the Interstellar Squall, Pelia casually mentions having seen one up close before because she "was in a police box at the time". Following her previous line about a "time-traveling doctor I once knew" and the blink-and-you'll-miss-it TARDIS easter egg on screen last season, these references are getting remarkably overt.

Don't get me wrong: I love Doctor Who, and if all of this pays off with an actual crossover, I am completely down for it! But the show needs to either deliver on these setups or pull back, because dropping explicit hints without resolution is starting to feel like audience baiting. The cleanest way to execute it would actually be on the Doctor Who side—when the Doctor eventually returns from its current limbo, give us Carol Kane as a companion for a few episodes! Seeing Pelia's adventures in the TARDIS over on Doctor Who would pay off her line in a fun, satisfying way without disrupting the tone of Star Trek with a full-blown crossover on the Enterprise.

Overall, this episode was good, but not great. It was an enjoyable romp and had plenty of elements I liked, but it once again drifts toward ethics that feel counter to Star Trek's ethos. While it isn't nearly as egregious as Four and a Half Vulcans last season, it remains troublesome. It was enjoyable, and I’d watch it again, but its underlying moral choices hold it back. I rate this episode in the B-Tier with Lieutenant Commander.

HD3 Episode Rank: Lieutenant Commander (B+ Tier)