Review: Strange New Worlds "Terrarium"
In Strange New Worlds Season 3, Episode 9, “Terrarium,” Erica Ortegas finally steps into the center of a story that has been waiting for her since the series began. Known for her sharp wit, loyalty, and steady hand at the helm, Ortegas has often been the voice of humor on the bridge, the one who quips through tension and grounds the crew with levity. But “Terrarium” cracks that façade open, taking her off the bridge and into the wilderness, forcing her to confront both the physical challenge of survival and the emotional scars left by one of Starfleet’s most feared adversaries, the Gorn.
The Ortegas we meet at the start of the episode is still herself, bold, sarcastic, making jokes even about the danger of flying solo into a gravity well. But beneath the bravado, we sense something else, the need for space, for solitude, for a chance to quiet the noise. She frames this mission as an opportunity to clear her head, a telling admission for a character who has so often hidden behind humor. That sense of internal conflict becomes the seed of the episode. When her shuttle is ripped into a wormhole and she crashes on a desolate moon, Ortegas’ survival is not just about finding water and food, it is about wrestling with the ghosts of her past and the narratives she has been told about the enemy.
The first act of her time on the moon feels almost like a meditation on isolation. She repairs equipment, tends to her wounds, and continues speaking into her log even after the recorder shorts out, a reminder of how essential it is to give shape to one’s thoughts when alone. But it is the flashes of light, the unsettling sense of being watched, that shift the atmosphere from survival story into psychological drama. Ortegas’ instinct is to joke about it, but underneath, we can see the fear, not just of death, but of being studied, observed, and judged by something she cannot see.
When the Gorn enters the picture, the story pivots into deeply personal territory. For Ortegas, the Gorn are not just another hostile species, they are trauma incarnate, a legacy of brutality that Starfleet officers carry like a stain. Her first instinct is pure terror, and it is entirely justified. Yet the Gorn does not attack. Instead, it reveals its own injury and eventually its own loneliness. Here the episode dares to do something Trek has always excelled at, it forces a character and through them the audience to confront the humanity in what has always been framed as inhuman.
What makes this arc so effective is that Ortegas’ trauma is not erased or dismissed. She does not suddenly forget what the Gorn have done to her comrades or the fear she has lived with. Instead, the story acknowledges that trauma and still asks what if one individual could be different. Could the enemy also be a victim of circumstance, culture, or biology? By tending the Gorn’s wound, by sharing food, by finding a way to communicate, Ortegas chooses connection over fear. And in doing so, she heals a part of herself, proving that her strength has never been just her piloting skills, but her capacity for empathy.
Back on the Enterprise, Uhura embodies a parallel kind of devotion. She refuses to let Ortegas be abandoned, even at the risk of lying to her captain. By bumping a 56 percent probability to 61 percent in her report, she crosses a line that could cost her career, but her willingness to bend the rules shows the depth of her bond with Ortegas. This act of faith serves as a counterpoint to Ortegas’ struggle on the moon. While Ortegas is learning to trust an unexpected ally, Uhura is proving her trust in a friend is worth everything.
And then comes the devastating turn. Just when it seems Ortegas will be rescued, La’an instinctively kills the Gorn, acting from her own trauma, her own truth about what the species has done. In that split second, the fragile bridge between enemies collapses, and Ortegas’ newfound friend is gone. The pain of that loss is sharp not only because she cared for the Gorn, but because the death affirms how deep and complicated the scars of conflict run.
It is in this moment that the lights finally reveal themselves, the Metrons. They announce that Ortegas’ entire ordeal has been their experiment, a way to observe how a human and a Gorn might interact. The Gorn, they reveal, did not need Ortegas to survive, it befriended her out of loneliness. Ortegas’ trust, her survival, her sense of being seen, it was all part of their test. Before returning her to the Enterprise, they tell her she will not consciously remember the details, but the feelings will remain. For longtime fans, the callback is clear. The Metrons are the same beings who will go on to test Captain Kirk in The Original Series episode “Arena,” forcing him into combat with a Gorn to measure humanity’s capacity for mercy. Ortegas’ encounter with them adds a haunting prelude to that classic story, suggesting the Metrons have been experimenting with humanity far longer than we ever knew.
This decision raises one of the most provocative moral questions Trek has posed in years. Was it right for the Metrons to strip Ortegas of her memories. On the one hand, they frame it as mercy, sparing her the pain of remembering. On the other hand, it is a theft of her agency, denying her the chance to own her experience and learn from it fully. To be remembered only through a haze of feelings, without context or truth, is to be robbed of part of one’s identity. The Metrons act like gods, deciding not only how species interact but how individuals should carry or not carry the weight of those encounters.
For Ortegas, the result is a kind of haunting. She cannot articulate exactly what happened, but she is left with grief, confusion, and a token, a game piece given by the Gorn. It is a quiet rebellion against erasure, proof that even if the Metrons can manipulate memory, they cannot erase meaning. She knows, deep down, that something extraordinary happened. Something worth remembering, even if she cannot fully grasp it.
In this way, “Terrarium” is not just a survival story, but a meditation on trauma, memory, and the power of empathy. Ortegas begins the episode seeking solitude to clear her head, only to be thrown into a situation where her deepest fears are tested. By the end, she has lived through an impossible connection, only to have it ripped from her and blurred into half-remembered feeling. Yet the strength of the performance and the writing ensures that we, the audience, remember. We carry the truth that the Gorn can be more than monsters, that Ortegas is more than a pilot, and that experiments in empathy, even cruelly manipulated ones, can leave behind sparks of hope.
The question lingers long after the credits. What gives the Metrons the right to decide what we remember. Is survival worth more than truth. And if empathy is the test, did they underestimate how deeply Ortegas already embodied it. Because despite their interference, despite the erasure, she clings to that game piece. And in that gesture is everything, her defiance, her grief, and her refusal to let go of a bond that changed her.
“Terrarium” is both heartbreaking and inspiring. It cements Erica Ortegas as one of the emotional cores of Strange New Worlds and reintroduces the Metrons not as teachers but as manipulators whose morality is as questionable as their power is vast. And in the space between survival and memory, it asks us what kind of species we want to be. For Ortegas, the answer comes not in words but in action, she remembers her friend, even when she is told to forget. And that is the most human choice of all.
