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In Star Trek: Discovery (Season 1, Episode 4), the “tardigrade” that the crew of the Discovery had taken from the Glenn

killed Landry, the Security Officer of the Discovery.

This felt, for lack of a better word, rushed. She ordered the tardigrade tranquilized, and was prepared to rush in to lop off a claw, despite Michael’s rather sensible warnings. She was, after all, the Security Officer, and hadn’t shown such extreme recklessness previously. In-universe, why was she so confident that a few seconds of sedation would render it safe to drop the containment field?

It was also rushed on the scale of the show: she was pronounced dead very quickly, and the show moved on to other things (despite her having seemed, in my impression, Lorca’s right hand). So on a highly related note, was there an out-of-universe explanation for this, which might explain the apparent sloppiness? For example, did the actor not want to sign on for more episodes?

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  • Since you put it in quotes, I'll point out that tardigrades are real; I know them as mainly by the name "water bear".
    – Izkata
    Commented Oct 10, 2017 at 0:21
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    @Izkata - Of course, but that thing certainly isn't a tardigrade. ;) that's what I meant.
    – Adamant
    Commented Oct 10, 2017 at 1:09

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From the point of view of story structure, Landry is a counterpoint to Stamets--she's a complete loyalist to Lorca. She has no illusions about him, but she'll do what he asks. Unlike Burnham, who shares Lorca's long-term objective without necessarily sharing his short-term ones, Landry will follow the letter of Lorca's orders, willingly and without hesitation.

What we're missing right now is anything that would tell us why she was so devoted to the letter of Lorca's orders that she'd do something so wildly dangerous. At this writing, IMDB still lists Rekha Sharma as appearing in later episodes of the series. IMDB is not always accurate, but it's at least possible that we will see more of Landry in flashbacks to Lorca's own, as yet unexplored past.

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    Hmmm, yes. It wasn't the letter of Lorca's orders, though. If Lorca had told her to do exactly that - sure, she'd do it despite any misgivings. But his orders hadn't even changed. They were the same he'd given Michael - which she carried out somewhat more successfully.
    – Adamant
    Commented Oct 9, 2017 at 23:07
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    She also might get resurrected.
    – Worse_Username
    Commented Oct 10, 2017 at 14:11
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    @Worse_Username I have to admit I'm half-expecting Landry to turn out to either be one of a clone series or something similar :-)
    – Michael Scott Shappe
    Commented Oct 10, 2017 at 14:14
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Short answer: Landry was an idiot.

Longer answer: Landry had multiple times disparaged Burnham and in her own words was there to babysit Burnham because Lorca was concerned she'd go off-track, and Lorca had ordered them to figure out a way to turn Ripper's physiology into weapons. So Landry's dead-set on obeying the order, and thinks Burnham is getting off track and delaying finding out what Lorca wants to know. She is, in essence, being the arrogant know-it-all who's determined to show off in front of someone she views as inferior just to show her up.

That the inferior warns her against doing it just makes her want to do it more to shut her up.

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