• The episode begins where “Hegemony” ended, with Captain Pike [Anson Mount] in a state of shock as the Gorn starships attack the USS Enterprise.

• Number One [Rebecca Romijn] suggests jamming the Gorn communications so they can’t co-ordinate attacks, similar to how in the Kelvin universe, the the crew aboard the USS Franklin was able to override the drone swarm’s signal in “Star Trek Beyond”. Presumably due to budgetary constraints, Uhura uses a Beastie Boys soundalike as opposed to actually broadcasting “Sabotage” this time.

    • It was established that the Gorn use light for ship to ship messaging in “Memento Mori”

• Spock [Ethan Peck] suggests tagging the Gorn destroyer with an element called wolkite that will allow it to be tracked through subspace. In “Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country” Spock put a viridium patch on Kirk’s uniform so that he and Doctor McCoy could be tracked after being taken prisoner by the Klingons. And, in “Star Trek Beyond” Spock suggests a necklace he gave Uhura could be used to locate her thanks to its unique radiation, though he claims he did not originally intend to gift his girlfriend a tracking device.

• Season three opening credits changes:

    • There is a slightly different angle on the close up of the bussard collector

    • At approximately 42 seconds in, the season two opening featured a port side profile the saucer bathed in an orange light, whereas the season three iteration shows the ship traveling through a green gas cloud

    • At approximately 51 seconds, the season two opening showed a close-up of the secondary hull as the sEnterprise travelled away from a glowing orb at about a ¾ angle, and in season three, we have a low angle on the starboard side of the secondary hull which pulls out to reveal the ship traveling away from a fiery burst

    • Season two’s opening showed the Enterprise traveling through the atmosphere of a planet with what appears to be extremely large plant stalks at 55 seconds, and season three’s intro does the same, but this time it appears to be at night, whereas season two’s was in the morning

    • About 67 seconds into the season two opening, the Enterprise is flying towards a tower in a planetary atmosphere, and in season three, we see it traveling through planetary ring with a Klingon D7 battlecruiser in the foreground

    • At 70 seconds in, on the season two opening, the Enterprise is flying through the planetary ring, but there’s no Klingon ship and the asteroids are on fire, and in the season three sequence, the Enterprise is flying towards the aforementioned tower, but the landscape is snow and ice, as opposed to clouds or mist

    • Approximately 72 seconds in, and the Enterprise is flying through an asteroid field in the season two opening, and in season three it’s is flying in orbit of a tiny green planet

    • Season two’s opening has the same tiny green planet sequence at approximately 75 seconds, and season three’s intro features a shuttlecraft leaving the shuttlebay before the Enterprise warps away

    • At 77 seconds, in season two, the Enterprise is flying above some glowing green volcanoes or craters, and in season three we see one of Starbase One’s biome pods with some mountains surrounded by water, with the shot eventually zooming out to show more of the starbase and the attending fleet; In addition to Enterprise and other Constitution-class, or Sombra-class starships, spaceframes featured include:

      • What appears to be design inspired by the NX-01

      • A freighter with a number of cargo pods

      • A starship with underslung nacelles and a dorsal mission pod

    • Approximaety 80 seconds in to season two’s opening, we see a Starbase One biome pod with a snowcapped mountain

• When the Enterprise drops out of warp into the fleet, we see the USS Pablo Picasso, which is the same spaceframe as the USS Kelcie Mae from “Under the Cloak of War”.

    • There appears to be Nimitz-class starships with new, cylindrical nacelles, as part of the fleet.

• In Pike’s ready room we see a close up of the star map, featuring part of the Gorn Hegemony’s claimed territory, and just outside that territory is the Cestus system; a colony on Cestus III being attacked by the Gorn in “Arena” was that episode’s inciting incident; the Gorn captain claimed that the Federation colony were invaders into their space.

• Pelia [Carol Kane] and Scotty [Martin Quinn] attempt to integrate the device he created to hide his shuttle from the Gorn, as mentioned in “Hegemony”, into the Enterprise systems.

    • Martin Quinn has been added to the cast as one of the stars of the show.

• La’an has flashbacks to her time as prey on a Gorn breeding world as an adolescent, which we learned about in the series premiere, “Strange New Worlds”.

• George Samuel Kirk [Dan Jeannotte] speculates that the digestive chamber that he and the rest of the away team were placed in breaks down living bodies to create fuel for the Gorn destroyer, which would indicate that a bunch of rendered humanoids can somehow power an absolutely massive ship capable of warp, and with seemingly impenetrable shields. Guess the Federation should feel silly for relying on matter/anti-matter reactions.

    • Doctor M’Benga [Babs Olusanmokun posits that the digestive chamber might simply be making food for the Gorn. What both he and Sam fail to realize is that the Gorn are using the biomass to create a giant, Kaiju sized Gorn that they’ll need to assemble a team to go on a suicide mission to defeat, but if they’ve got enough Paragon or Renegade points they’ll be able to complete the mission without losing anyone.

• Chapel [Jess Bush] and Spock speculate they could use a Number One’s genetically modified Illyrian DNA to fortify Captain Batel’s [Melanie Scrofano] human system to give her a chance of surviving the Gorn parasites hatching. We learned that Number One is Illyrian and her genetic modification is able to prevent all sorts of problems, up to and including a warp core overload, in “Ghosts of Illyria”.

• The screen in Pike’s ready room shows a map of the Finibus system, the Galdonterre system, and the Kessik system.

    • Enterprise visited Finibus III in “Memento Mori” and found that the colony there had been attacked by Gorn.

    • The Albino hid on Galdonterre III and escaped before Kor, Koloth, and Kang could locate him, as per “Blood Oath”

    • We learned in “Prophecy” that B’Elanna Torres was born on Kessik IV.

• ”Uhura and I have been pouring over all available data on the Gorn.” When Kirk asked Spock about information regarding intelligent life in the region of space near Cestus III, Spock replied, ”Nothing specific, Captain. Unscientific rumours only. More like space legends.”

• Number One tells Pike that Gorn sightings correlate to coronal mass ejections, something Sam speculated in “Hegemony”.

• Chapel and Spock wear red biohazard suits, seemingly inspired by the ones worn by the away team that visited the Psi 2000 Federation outpost in “The Naked Time”

• ”If this goes sideways, it’s Valeo Beta all over again.” The *Enterprise was dispatched to Valeo Beta V in “All Those Who Wander” and found Gorn.

• ”Enterprise, against an entire armada? We wouldn’t stand a chance.” Enterprise and the USS Discovery held off an armada of automated Section 31 starships, including Enterprise covering Discovery’s escape through a time portal, in “Such Sweet Sorrow, Part 2”.

• La’an’s brother, Manu, was previously mentioned in “Memento Mori” and “All Those Who Wander”.

• This is the first instance of Gorn text being seen on screen. The TNG comic, “The Gorn Crisis” also featured a Gorn alphabet, but it was not the same symbols as shown here.

• Enterprise was able to beam out ”several hundred” surviving Parnassus colonists from the Gorn destroyer in a matter of less than a minute, through critical levels of radiation, and their own shields. In “Crisis Point”, Rutherford exclaimed, “It’s a movie. You can beam whatever you want. You can do all sorts of beaming stuff in a movie.”* No, wait, that doesn’t actually apply here.

• ”I can’t help wondering if we didn’t create a problem for someone else to solve later.” “Arena” takes place about seven years after this episode, and by that point the Federation will have apparently have forgotten all knowledge of the Gorn.

• ”I’m Erica Ortegas. I fly the ship,” Ortegas’ [Melissa Nevia] catchphrase originated in “Among the Lotus Eaters”.

• Pike begins to pray after saying his father won. We learned in “New Eden” that his father taught comparative religion.

• Batel objects to Number One’s genetically modified Illyrian DNA being used in her treatment. Batel was responsible for persecuting the case against Number One for lying on her Starfleet application.