Spoilers Star Trek: Lower Decks 1x01 - "Second Contact"

The spoiler-riffic end scene with all the rapid-fire namedrops if anyone wants to see, get it before it's taken down.

 

More detailed analysis:
- Stardate 57436.2 - About half-way through 2380. Fits that there's only about "half a season" (10 episodes), if Season 1 covers 2380.
- Douglas Station looks alot like old Earth Spacedock... but isn't Spacedock. I wonder what the scale is, if it can be determined by the starship sizes (probably much bigger than Spacedock).
- The third chair appears to be for the CMO to have a spot on the bridge, or perhaps is an auxiliary chair (maybe that's it's use in general, and Picard favored his Counselor). Freeman might favor having T'Ana around much like Kirk and McCoy.
- I'm not sure how I feel about the "Created by..." credits in the new shows. DS9, Voyager, and Enterprise never had them, even though they perhaps should have. It just seems... I don't know.
- Couple of shuttle names include "Redwood" and "Joshua Tree" - nice theme tying in with the California aesthetic.
- Tendi is from "Outpost 79" - not sure if that's a border outpost (a la the 23 Outposts on the Romulan-Federation border or the 11 Epsilon Outposts on the Klingon-Federation border) or some other outcropping.
- I don't think "Deck 4" would be all the way down, judging from the MSD, but *shrug*.
- They seemed to have fully canonized the three divisions as "Command division", "Sciences division" and (presumably) "Operations division"
- Mariner says "we don't wash our hands" when first meeting with Tendi. Remember this when you get to the end of the episode.
- Adashake Center on Orion, reinforcing the idea of a "Planet Orion".
- Lt. Commander Stevens is the one who paged Boimler to the bridge (per the closed captions). I'm still not sure what job he has, since he's command division. Maybe second officer... but what else?

My bad. I heard "Boimler Program" not "Mariner Program" on first viewing, and just assumed she was breaking into his private holoprogram. Made him a more interesting character if there was this completely unseen side to him. Oh well.

- The timeline seems off. Stevens (per CC) called Boimler to the bridge... and then we immediately (after a commercial break) see Stevens on the away team about to beam up. Given that away team leader Ransom is on the bridge when Boimler arrives, it seems that the away team already beamed up before calling up Boimler... reversing the scenes shown in the episode.
- If Boimler graduated in '79 (one year ago... but also Data's original graduation date!), then he's probably about 23 years old and was born about 2357. A couple years younger than Jake Sisko.
- There's a sword on the Captain's display case. I wonder if that will be used in later episodes, especially with the later reference to "needing a new sword guy". I'll keep an eye on Freeman's Sword. I also thought I saw a USS Franklin model, but it's probably just another California class or the Cerritos herself.
- Ensign Barnes, the daughter of a non-recent Cyborg, works on the deflector dish, but also in main engineering. She's a Trill, but has a human name. Perhaps half-Trill? And if her "dad was a cyborg", he's either dead (RIP Barnes' Dad) or he got the cybernetics removed.
- The Zombie Apocalypse is "happening all over the ship," meaning Ransom couldn't have been the only one infected. So let's not blame it all on him, shall we?
- Billups and the Galardonian Chancellor appear to be talking about an entertainment program that's broadcast over subspace.
- Mariner using an Argo jeep seems to get universal praise. I still have qualms about its existence even 18 years after its introduction. It was somewhat understandable as a personal affectation of Picard's, but as a standard issue wheeled-conveyance... I don't know. Maybe it's meant for civilizations without blowing their mind on anti-gravity, but anti-grav shuttles should be the default.
- Mariner served on the Quito - another ship named after a city (albeit one in Ecuador), perhaps of a more important class. She was demoted and transferred to the Cerritos, probably because her mother is Captain. Although that seems to be her big secret (how can you keep that a secret?)
- Mariner fought a Yeti in a Klingon prison. Is a Yeti some alien species? Or an actual Abominable Snowman that exists in Star Trek Land and has achieved sentience (sapience).

- General Order 5, from FASA: The Federation:

Seems to fit the situation, if Mariner considers herself a Federation Special Representative (and the Galardonians as protected by the Federation, if not citizens). So we may have seen a piece of FASA canonized.

- Transporter Room Eight is on Deck Eight. For a second there, I thought they actually had eight transporter rooms for some reason.
- Despite what Rutherford believes, it's probably a good thing that the hatches didn't recognize his combadge. They're dealing with infected officers, all of whom have important combadges.
- When Tendi is pumping Stevens' heart (he doesn't appear to be infected... why is anesthetic useless? why does he need his heart pumped?), we see three infected strapped together in the background. T'Ana's insistence that you could double them up was increased to three a bed now.
- Boimler has been serving on the Cerritos (with Mariner) for "a year", since his graduation probably, yet he's only been to three planets (not counting Earth and Vulcan). Doesn't seem to have been an exciting year. Also, first contact with the Galardonians (and the Quito) was more than a year ago, but they're only now getting a Second Contact? Freeman has had Mariner under her command for an entire year and only now decides to get her out?
- Barnes, the engineer from deflector control, is operating the Ops Console at the end of the episode. And in the "This Season" trailer.
- The Admiral (Admiral Mariner?) has an interesting uniform. Only one set of admiral pips (four-pip, full admiral) and some sort of shoulder epaulettes and gold piping, but otherwise a standard LD uniform. I kinda wanted to see the Picard Admiral uniform in animated style.
- They seem to be pairing up Tendi and Rutherford, and probably Boimler and Mariner. Oh well.
- Except Mariner considers Deanna Troi to have a "bangin' body". With her all-nude male holoprogram and potential attraction to Deanna Troi, maybe she keeps her options open.

 

There's never been anything remotely like a scene in which one character simply screams a random laundry list of "famous" people at another character asking if he's "heard of them" for no reason.

Not even close.

 

SHUT! UP!!!

God, the show probably would've been more or less fine if it WASN"T FOR HER CONSTANT TALKING RAMBLING AND SHOUTING!

 

Whether you enjoyed or didn't enjoy the show isn't the point. I was "butt hurt" because of the unbelievably condescending tone of the reply and the stupid broad brush I was being painted with as being part of some imagined "conspiracy" of haters.

So, yeah, I'm gonna get pissed off if you do that kind of bullshit.

If you disagree with me and aren't a dick about it, then I'll be delighted to discuss the actual content of the show and exchange opinions, even if we're not on the same page. It's that easy.

 

I’m glad, if a little surprised, to see the initial polling here is so positive. Over 80% at 7 or above, and 70% at 8 and above. It seems to have struck a chord with quite a few people. The Golden Age seems to keep on rolling.

 

The Spacedock model was used on TNG constantly as various different starbases. On TNG, the ENT-D barely fit through the doors, while in the movies, the ENT-A barely fit through the doors. Probably best not to think too much about how big it's supposed to be.

The doctor is glimpsed in the third chair at some point. Maybe it's from the trailer?

Yes, the other shows had creator credits.

 

There was a lot of swooning over Cochran in First Contact.

 

Some characters meeting a famous person in history, who's the foundation of their entire civilization, is a lot different than a character just shouting out a chain of names in rapid fire. (Inclding Gary Mitchel.)

 

I don’t see the difference

 

Really.

Really?!

You don't see the difference between a group of characters traveling back in time and meeting the founder of their entire way of life, and a character just shouting out a string of character names and events completely out of the thin blue sky?

 

Oh and her string of fan-service references she mentions Troi switching from the bunny suit to the uniform. Because, you know, I'm sure that was a noteworthy event in Federation history that made it into the history books for her to learn about.

 

It was a battle between Borg and Romulans. Why would a starfleet ship get involved?

 

they did.
DS9 created by Berman/Piller
VOY created by Berman/Piller/Taylor
ENT created by Berman/Braga

 

She mentions:
- Spock ("dude came back FROM BEING DEAD")
- Khan, who Spock fought, "and some space whales" (probably a misunderstanding of history)
- Sulu, who rocked a sword
- Kirk
- "my man Worf"
- Gary Mitchell (who Boimler doesn't know)
- Deanna Troi ("her body be bangin'! She went from a jumpsuit to...")

Spock is a huge historical figure that even Boimler sarcastically implies he of course knows. This matches TNG's references to his historical importance. Sulu was a Captain as well, so his importance is likely. Kirk goes without saying (see: Star Trek Generations. Don't see: The Naked Now). "My man Worf" (does Mariner really know him?) was almost Chancellor of the Klingon Empire and was highly involved in the end of the Dominion War. Likely a well-known contemporary figure, even if he's only a Commander in 2380.

Boimler doesn't recognize Gary Mitchell's name, which makes sense as he was a Lt. Commander who died on a mission 115 years prior. We see in trailer photos that Mariner has a dartboard of conspiracy-related figures, and might have a theory about Mitchell's death in the Galactic Barrier Incident.

Boimler never confirmed or denied knowing Deanna Troi. Mariner might have some sort of attraction to her or something to explain away her knowledge that Troi wore casual duty wear during her first few years on the Enterprise-D. We know from promos that all the Lower Deckers seem to be familiar with the Enterprise-D on principle, so perhaps the Ent-D has had its adventures highly publicized in some manner, and Troi is a famous name. Or maybe Mariner just learned all about her from her man Worf.

 

My bad. It's amazing how selective memory works. I thought they just jumped to Executive Producer credits for some reason. This is what I get for posting at 4 am.

 

It’s a comedy cartoon, stop taking things so seriously.

 

Noted.

I absolutely did. The joy of trying to watch something with a 4-year-old, and 2-year-old, being as loud as they can, causing me to miss two pieces of dialogue that completely destroyed my take on the scene

This.

And yet, @Michael, a user can post an expletive-filled rant in response to another user, using the terms in a context that would have them being accused of being aggressive if the words were being spoken not written, and you won’t do so much as even mention it? Don’t even reply to that, though, because I fully anticipate there’s some silly interpretation of what is and isn’t considered an attack on some one. The question one should’ve been asking themselves was, did this expletive-filled post calm down a situation, keep it where it was, or potentially risk escalating it further? But, hey ho.

Anyway, the episode...

Loved it. Watched it twice, now. Not easy, when CBS AA doesn’t want to play ball with my VPN very nicely!

Boimler isn’t quite as goofy as he seemed in the trailer. Barring the fact he clearly isn’t a leader, instead more of a follower, he feels like exactly what our Starfleet heroes of the past would’ve been like, when they started out.

Some great humour in the trailer for the season. I can’t wait.