• The sehlat referenced in the episode title is an animal native to Vulcan, first mentioned in “Journey to Babel” where we learned that as a child, Spock had one as a pet. The first time one was on screen was “Yesteryear”.

• Kirk opens his first officer’s log with, ”Stardate…what is a stardate?” On this show? Please do not get my started. However, stardates have been part of Trek since the show’s second pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before”.

    • A memo provided to writers on TOS stated that, stardates were to obfuscate what century TOS was taking place in, and stated that Stardates were unique to their point in the galaxy, so they didn’t to follow from one episode to the next.

    • For TOS, TAS, the TOS movies, and SNW, stardates generally all follow the system set up for TOS, wherein there are four digits and a single digit percentage point following a decimal; the percentage point divides the day into tenths. SNW has had some variations, including having two numbers following the decimal, and once even using the Kelvin timeline method of calculating stardates.

    • DIS used the same four digits and a percentage point of the other 23rd century shows, except it’s numbers only ever increased. And upon transitioning to the 32nd century for season three on, they used six digits and a percentage point. On the whole though, Stardates were relatively rare in the series.

    • TNG, DS9, and VOY used a system introduced in TNG, where stardates began with 4, indicating they were set in the 24th century, followed by the corresponding season of TNG – i.e. all the TNG season three stardates begin with 43 – and then three random numbers, and another digit fallowing a decimal place. Sometimes within a season the number would decrease.

      • An obvious issue is that TNG, DS9, and VOY collectively ran for 14 years, from 1987 to 2001. The DS9 season five and VOY season three both had stardates beginning with 50, which would indicate they were in the 25 century, despite it being 2373.

    • The Kelvin universe stardates are just the year according to the Gregorian calendar, followed by the date expressed as the number of days in the year. So, 2009’s “Star Trek” was set in 2258, January 1 would be 2258.1, and December 31 would be 2258.365. Presumably.

    • PIC seasons one and two did not use stardates because showrunner, Michael Chabon, was not a fan. Season three did include stardates for two episodes, both of which began with 78, presumably indicating that they continued counting from the TNG, DS9, VOY seasons to reach that for the number of in universe years that had passed.

    • According to LDS co-producer, Brad Winters, LDS and PRO used a “unified stardate theory” devised by Trek science consultant, Doctor Erin MacDonald. LDS began with stardates starting with 57, in season one, but did not follow the one year per season convention that was used for TNG, DS9, and VOY.

    • So, to answer the question posed by Kirk in his log, stardates are a headache.

• Kirk’s log continues by complaining that he’s bored with the mundanity of space exploration. Kelvin Captain Kirk’s log at the beginning of “Star Trek Beyond” had a similar complaint.

• The USS Farragut’s interiors are reused USS Enterprise sets with little redress beyond the battle damage. We see the bridge, the captain’s ready room, and sickbay. Despite Scotty being dispatched to engineering, it does not show up on screen. In fact, we have yet to see the engineering set for the Enterprise this season, either.

    • The Farragut bridge lighting is more white than the Enterprise, and obviously the displays are off the ‘Farragut’.

• The * Farragut* is captained by a Vulcan named V’Rel. The first captain Kirk served under aboard the Farragut was Garrovik, though he would have died in 2257, four years earlier, as per the TOS episode, “Obsession”.

• ”Risk is why we’re here, isn’t it?” This line from Kirk’s speech in “Return to Tomorrow”, ”Risk is our business.”

• Chapel, Uhura, Spock, and Scotty all beam over to the Farragut, which is notable as they’re all future members of Kirk’s crew aboard the Enterprise during TOS. The obvious exception in the group is La’An, whom there has been some foreshadowing of a romantic involvement with Kirk, specifically in “Subspace Rhapsody”, and he will no doubt ghost her for a three breasted purple woman at some point, hence the reason she does not continue to serve aboard the ship. Or she’ll live(?) up to her red shirt reputation by the series end.

• The Destroyer of Worlds is designed with a mouth, and swallows the Enterrise whole. Other times the hero ship has has been fully engulfed by another ship include:

    • In “Distant Origin” the Voth beamed the USS Voyager into their city ship

    • In “Endgame”, a Borg sphere captured the Voyager, though it was all part of the plan

    • In “The Crossing” the Wisps disabled the NX-01, and brought it into their ship

    • In “Countdown” and “Zero Hour” Xindi-Aquatic ships were used to transport the NX-01

    • In “That Hope is You, Part 2” the Viridian tractored the USS Discovery A aboard

    • In “Let Sleeping Borg Lie” the Protogies flew the USS Protostar into a dormant Borg cube

    • in “The Last Generation”, Data flew the USS Enterprise D/USS Syracuse through a massive Borg cube

• The Destroyer of Worlds is made up of a variety of other cultures ships, including Klingon. In “Samaritan Snare” we were introduced to the Pakleds who lured more advanced species in and stole their technology. We eventually saw Pakled Clumpships in LDS’ “No Small Parts” with a breakdown of all the species’ components.

    • Scotty and Spock make note that one of the other ships is a D7-class Klingon ship. The D7-class would only be about four years old at this point, the design having been finalized in “Point of Light” and the first completed vessel being seen in “Through the Valley of Shadows”.

      • This assumes we ignore the Klingon Sech-class cruiser in being referred to as a D7 by a shuffleboard computer in “Choose Your Pain”, but that was also quite clearly a different spaceframe.

• We learn that the Destroyer of Worlds is something of a local legend, known to remote colonies, as well as other species, including the Klingons and the Gorn. The Klingons call it the Chack-Ka, or Annihilator. In “Where Silence Has Lease”, Worf shared that there was a Klingon legend about ”a gigantic black space creature which was said to devour entire vessels.” We have no indication if the Destroyer of Worlds was the inspiration for that legend, but it’s a neat idea.

• Captain V’Rel has a three-dimensional chess board in her ready room. Kirk and Spock were first seen playing three-dimensional chess in the second TOS pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before”.

    • The board appears to be the one sold by The Nobel Collection with a custom stand, as previously seen in “Lost in Translation” but with custom pieces as well.

• ”Those are the signatures from the picked-apart alien ships we saw in Nessie’s gob.” Scotty also made reference to the Loch Ness Monster in the TAS episode, “Bem”. Nessie’s only other mention was in ENT episode, “Stormfront, Part II”.

• Scotty appears unclear on what to call Kirk while he’s acting Captain. In “Behind the Lines” O’Brien explained to Nog that it is an old naval tradition that whomever is in charge of a ship is referred to as captain, regardless of rank. Presumably Scotty skipped that day.

• Pelia implies she is at least 5,000 years old. Previously she’d indicated she was at least 3,000 years old.

• This is the first time there’s been any indication that Starfleet vessels use copper wiring in their consoles, a fact that is necessary for Pelia’s plan in the episode to work. Her plan is:

    • Strip the copper cables out of the bulkheads

    • Collect all the catalytic converters from the shuttles in the shuttle bay

    • Raid sickbay’s supply of sudafed

• Kirk informs Scotty that the Destroyer of Worlds was harvesting aldentium from the world it destroyed. In “Family”, Data described aldentium as a mineral that is ”firm and chewy, but with a slight resistance to the bite.”

• Pelia’s quarters are full of enough junk that Kivas Fagio would have heart palpitations looking at it. We saw in “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow” that she was transferring a significant amount of personal affects to the ship. Here we see:

    • An Atari video game system, which is kind of like the titular game from “The Game” but more addicting.

    • ”This is a, uh…personal massager?” Oretegas confirms that vibrators still exist in the 23rd century.

• Pike and La’An come up with the idea to fill the umbilical stealing resources from the Enterprise with baryon particles from the waste system. We learned in “Starship Mine” that baryons are accumulated during warp travel, and need to be eliminated as part of starship maintenance.

• Kirk’s plan uses the Farragut’s now useless warp nacelles as improvised missles, causing the Destroyer of Worlds to disable itself with it’s own grappler cables attempting to catch them. The first time we saw Kirk order Scotty to detach the nacelles of the Enterprise was in “The Apple”.

• The waste tank La’An has the baryon particles in is cylindrical with a handle on one side, very similar to the holodeck biofiler waste tanks seen in “Moist Vessel”.

• We learn that once again the greatest monster is man! The core of the Destroyer of Worlds is the XCV-100, an Earth ship lunched in the 21st century, after World War III. The ship bears the flag of the United States, as well as a blue Starfleet delta with the United Earth symbol on it, a logo also seen on the Friendship 1 in “Friendship One”. This would be the earliest vessel to bear a delta, so far.

    • Other Earth ships that vanished include:

      • The Ares IV - “One Small Step”

      • The Bonaventure - “The Time Trap”

      • The USS Franklin - “Star Trek Beyond”

    • The ship was meant to carry humanity to the stars, and was presumably conceived of by billionaires attempting to escape the mess they made of Earth. Pelia claims ”they were the best of us,” which explains the distinctive red cap among the junk in her quarters.

• Data served Scotty Aldeberan whiskey in “Relics”.

• The episode ends with strains for the TOS theme playing after Pike calls Kirk “Captain Kirk.”