I enjoyed that. Didn't adore it, but it was about as much fun as I've had with modern!Trek in a while. Ensign Whats-Her-Face being the daughter of the ship's captain and an admiral has some potential.
The premise felt a bit odd for a pilot episode -- watching a crew full of officers go mad would carry a bit more weight if we actually knew some of these people from prior episodes, but I get that the senior staff aren't the focus here -- but it got the job done.
Random thoughts:
- I like the shuttle designs
- That warp core looks like it owed more than a little bit to the Into Darkness design
- The Catian doctor seems like she might be a lot of fun; I hope we get to see more of her soon
- I would have preferred if the senior staff were depicted more in line with what we saw in TNG/DS9/VOY, i.e. totally buttoned up and sober, so that the goofy tone was a cultural difference between upper and lower decks. It just didn't work for me to see the first offer copping the same kind of attitude as the main characters after he got back to the ship. I would find the silly stuff funnier if I felt like it was running in the background of a totally typical episode of Berman-era Trek. Which I think is what they were trying to go for, but it came off too broad and over-the-top.
- The aliens definitely felt like something from Rick and Morty, especially the giant herbivore spider that R̶i̶c̶k̶ Ensign Mariner let "eat" M̶o̶r̶t̶y̶ Ensign Boimler. That's not a bad thing; I like seeing weirder aliens in Trek.
8/10, definitely interested to see more.