Spoilers Star Trek: Lower Decks 1x06 - "Terminal Provocations"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
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It's completely different because the characters in those TOS episodes you mentioned were actually participants in the things they are referencing and they are referencing them not for no damn reason but because there was a situational reason for it.
Tucker and Sulu are characters that have zero connection to the LD crew and are referenced solely because it makes for very lazy "jokes" for the Trekkie audience. In some cases, even for Starfleet officers, there's very little reason they should know the level of detail that they do. For the most part, captains are sometimes famous, but their support staff officers generally are not. To take one example, there's no reason why Mariner should know much of anything about Counselor Troi, let alone how many outfits she likes to wear.
It's just very, very lazy fan service.
This episode was actually mildly enjoyable, but the fact that the character Fletcher goes from "likable, easy-going person" to "stunningly incompetent moron" without a whiff of explanation is just yet another example of the very lazy shortcuts this show takes in the writing every week.
And the constant pairing of Tendi and Rutherford REALLY is running out of gas. The characters have zero chemistry and are just so unbelievably similar in their conception that the show really should have come up with a different personality for one of them. There's no comic tension between them at all, no give and take. Just "Hey, I'm nice! I'm happy!" "I'm nice and happy, too! Whee!"
While it would be a drastic move, they should really get rid of one of them and create someone new.
And the constant pairing of Tendi and Rutherford REALLY is running out of gas. The characters have zero chemistry and are just so unbelievably similar in their conception that the show really should have come up with a different personality for one of them. There's no comic tension between them at all, no give and take. Just "Hey, I'm nice! I'm happy!" "I'm nice and happy, too! Whee!"
While it would be a drastic move, they should really get rid of one of them and create someone new.
See, I love happy people. I would be happy with just a Tendi and Rutherford show.
Sounds about right. I could see this coming out in the early-'00s with virtually nothing being changed about it. It feels more of the era than Picard does. But since Picard's supposed to be the start of a new era, a.k.a. the dawn of the 25th Century, that works for me.
I noticed a certain robustness and cohesiveness to the animation and flow in this episode that was not in as obvious an evidence in the previous five outings, which earned an 8 rating from me. I liked how the two parallel stories intersected, the chief getting frustrated at not being able to fire, and the to the death fight sequence with the "can I help you" holodeck feature. I'll be rewatching this season at some point I can already tell--a well deserved 9 in my mind... 
There is a damn reason. The damn reason is to make you laugh.
If that doesn't work and you don't find it funny, well, hey, guess the show isn't for you. But it's there for a damn reason.
No, it is not. It is a metatextual joke that leans on the fourth wall without quite breaking it in order to invite us, the audience of ST fans, to laugh at ourselves and our obsessions with ST trivia. It also emphasizes the principal characters' inexperience and fixation on comparing themselves to people they perceive as more accomplished than themselves.
That format of joke may not work for you. But it has a comedic and artistic purpose beyond "hey remember that," and it is frankly fundamental to what LD has revealed itself to be as a series so far.
If that format of joke does not work for you, I think you would be happier not watching the show, because it is just clearly not a series whose DNA is consistent with your tastes.
Completely disagree. I really enjoy seeing Rutherford and Tendi paired up together.
I do agree there will need to be some tension between them eventually, but I think so far they're a nice counterpart to the always-in-tension Mariner/Boimler pairing.
This is episode 6. Episodes are 20-some minutes long. Time-wise that's the same as episode 2 or 3 in an hour-long drama. Have some perspective.
Literally, there is no way for anyone to know how famous or not-famous a given captain or crew might be in the context of Star Trek, let alone what a given character might know. We know from Deep Space Nine that there is a Federation News Service, but we don't know anything about really about what they cover, who reads them, etc., let alone what other media exists in the ST Universe. For all we know, Troi was frequently featured in the 24th Century equivalent of Vogue for her many outfits.
It seems reasonable to me, given that Enterprise is canonically the flagship of the Federation and has saved the galaxy numerous times, much of Starfleet (and for that matter, the general public) would know not just Captain Picard but most of his senior staff. In the real world, there are books and TV interviews and movies based on the exploits of modern military heroes. If there's at all a parallel between the Trek universe and ours, there would be multiple books written by and about the Enterprise crew, holovids featuring them saving the Federation from the Borg, preventing the Klingon Civil War, etc. Troi might be a minor part of that, but she would still be a part of it.
Given that Mariner is the daughter of a captain and an admiral, it's not unreasonable that she would know more about Starfleet than the next ensign. It's not even a stretch to think that she might have become personally acquainted with Troi or other members of the Enterprise crew through her parents.
I have no doubt that Badgie will be the recurring villain that Mike McMahon promised.
That video makes me want to lose my religion!
Remember all the press obsessed with Kirk at the beginning of Generations, or that "the whole galaxy" tuned in to watch Picard lose it in that interview in the opening to Picard? Voyager makes it clear Kirk's adventures are required reading at the academy, so Starfleet people are definitely gonna know about his adventures.
Right, but at the same time in Picard, there was someone who worked for Starfleet who didn't recognize Picard on sight.
And while Kirk was famous in his time and canonically had at least some of his adventures taught at the Academy, that doesn't necessarily mean that people would know about Uhura, Sulu, Scotty and Chekov.
We can only know from what gets shown that Mariner knows enough about them that she knew Sulu as "the sword guy," and in the latest episode, Freeman orders Shaxs to execute evasive pattern Sulu-Alpha.
Canonically, according to "some guy" named Gene Roddenberry, a famous holo series was made about TOS.
A similar one we know exists about ENT that Riker is a fan of.
I'm assuming Mariner is literally referencing them because the "joke: of Lower Decks is that it's a show by Trekkies about Trekkies....just IN THE TREKVERSE.
There's literally a scene where Mariner establishes her Trek street cred over Boimler. WHO DOESNT KNOW WHO GARY MITCHELL IS! *shudder*
Sulu was famous as Captain of the Excelsior and was instrumental in unraveling the Khitomer Conspiracy. We don't know his career post-Khitomer, but it's generally assumed to be influential and he may be the same Captain Sulu who sponsored Chakotay in 2344, suggesting a very long career in Starfleet.
In the Shatnerverse novels, authors Judith & Garfield Reeves-Stevens establish that Sulu served three terms as President of the United Federation of Planets some time between TUC and TNG.
So, back to the episode:
1. Did Fletcher brain-damage himself with his attempt at increasing his brain power?
OR
2. Was Fletcher's only skill being the ability to duck and weave from responsibility while leaching from his friends?
I'm solidly #2. My interpretation of Fletcher is that he's developed one skill in life and the others interpret it as diplomacy as well as the Power of FriendshipTM. In fact, it's the skill of covering his ass and deflecting blame for problems that he runs into. He rapidly hits the Peter Principle when he's out in space and there's problems he can't deflect without outright lying or Starfleet Code of Justice criminal behavior. It actually fits with the Roddenberry Utopia that people DON'T suspect how bad Fletcher is or try to help him before reporting him.
It also fits with Riker just having him court martialed as we see that, for all his problems with Jellico, Riker runs just as tight and nasty a ship -- he comes down HARD on Ro and that kid from Lower Decks. Which is what Fletcher needed as he has no business on a starship.
1. Did Fletcher brain-damage himself with his attempt at increasing his brain power?
OR
2. Was Fletcher's only skill being the ability to duck and weave from responsibility while leaching from his friends?
I'm solidly #2. My interpretation of Fletcher is that he's developed one skill in life and the others interpret it as diplomacy as well as the Power of FriendshipTM. In fact, it's the skill of covering his ass and deflecting blame for problems that he runs into. He rapidly hits the Peter Principle when he's out in space and there's problems he can't deflect without outright lying or Starfleet Code of Justice criminal behavior. It actually fits with the Roddenberry Utopia that people DON'T suspect how bad Fletcher is or try to help him before reporting him.
It also fits with Riker just having him court martialed as we see that, for all his problems with Jellico, Riker runs just as tight and nasty a ship -- he comes down HARD on Ro and that kid from Lower Decks. Which is what Fletcher needed as he has no business on a starship.
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And there's also a Strange New Worlds story that has Chekov as Federation President. Kirk's crew had more future Presidents than the Constitutional Convention.
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