Pike and M’Benga get locked contained in the deserted outpost, sieged by a horde of zombies attempting to get inside. One of many Klingons searching the pair is swarmed by the zombies, torn aside, and devoured. (I can not think about the Klingons contemplate that an honorable technique to go.)
Ever since George Romero’s “Night time of the Dwelling Useless” turned zombies into go-to film monsters, their onscreen portrayals have diversified. The Kenfori-zombies are the fast-moving form, not lumbering dullards. Tying their origin to crops additionally feels pulled from “The Final of Us.” In that online game/TV collection, the zombies aren’t really undead. As an alternative, the story suggests what would occur if the true cordyceps fungus advanced from possessing ants to possessing human beings. The set for the deserted outpost on Kenfori, crammed with plant growths containing half-devoured human stays, resembles each “The Final of Us” and Alex Garland’s sci-fi movie “Annihilation.”
The existence of flicks in the way forward for “Star Trek” is contentious. By the twenty fourth century, cinema seems to have misplaced any cultural relevance in favor of the holodeck’s interactive storytelling.
Given Pike and M’Benga’s familiarity with “the Z-word,” one has to imagine that zombie motion pictures (or not less than books) nonetheless exist within the twenty third century, although. “Star Trek: Enterprise” confirmed that, on the very least, people are nonetheless watching James Whale’s “Frankenstein” motion pictures within the twenty second century. Are they nonetheless watching George Romero photos within the twenty third?
Wherever Pike and M’Benga discovered about zombies, it wasn’t from their “actual” world. Sure, one way or the other, “Star Trek” has by no means performed correct, undead zombies earlier than. The franchise has performed vampires, witches (“Catspaw”), and even devils (“Satan’s Due”), however not zombies. The closest factor to zombies in “Star Trek” earlier than “Shuttle to Kenfori” was within the “Enterprise” episode “Impulse.” In that episode, the Enterprise NX-01 crew comes throughout a wrecked Vulcan ship, the Seleya. The ship found a mineral, trellium-D, that’s poisonous to Vulcans, making them much less clever and violent. When the Enterprise will get to the Seleya, the crew have degenerated into an unrelenting horde.
Like how “Shuttle to Kenfori” appears influenced by “The Final of Us,” “Impulse” (which aired in 2003) nods to the then-recent “28 Days Later” with its quick zombies that are not really zombies, simply individuals contaminated by a “rage virus.” “Star Trek” has and at all times will likely be set sooner or later, however it connects its viewers to the long run by drawing on their current. You possibly can observe that by which motion pictures which “Star Trek” collection chooses to homage.
“Star Trek: Unusual New Worlds” is streaming on Paramount+, with new episodes of the continued third season premiering on Thursdays.
