She acted human. We've all had those less-than-stellar moments where we could've handled a situation differently.
Spoilers Star Trek: Lower Decks 1x07 - "Much Ado About Boimler"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
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She acted human. We've all had those less-than-stellar moments where we could've handled a situation differently.
Or perhaps she recognizes that she would actually be very good in managing this kind of thing often and is afraid of what she might become and of the responsibilities that come with it. Keep in mind that both her parents are high ranked officers and she obviously doesn’t seem keen in becoming just like them.
The way I see it, there are two most likely scenarios.
Scenario 1: Ramsey writes Mariner off. Maybe she writes a formal report documenting Mariner's apparent incompetence. Maybe she just thinks to herself "Man, to think how far Mariner has fallen. I'm glad I didn't actuallly offer her a transfer." Maybe she has to do a little damage control with her own crew after talking Mariner up.
Scenario 2: Ramsey tries to find out what is going on with Mariner. To paraphrase Riker from "Future Imperfect," the Mariner she knows is simply not capable of that level of incompetence. As a friend and a Starfleet officer, or just someone who's curious about mysteries, she probably would want to square the badass Mariner she remembers from the Academy with the fuckup she's encountering on the mission. Maybe not to level of paranoia that Mariner exhibited about Barb, but she would want to know. She either confronts Mariner directly about her "incompetence" privately, or speaks to her captain/mommy, or looks at her service record more closely or whatever. And then when it becomes clear that Mariner hasn't had her brain melted or been switched with an imperfect duplicate, then maybe Ramsey would help support Mariner or at least understand her life choices.
I think Scenario 2 is more likely than Scenario 1.
I'm in between these two positions. The things Mariner did were more than just "only human" screwups that we all might do, but they also such that nobody had their lives made signifcantly more difficult.
- Walking off in a direction that was different from the rest of the team.
- Forgetting the tricorders on the Cerritos instead of taking them down to the planet
- Not hitting the long-range scanners when shs ehould have, pushing the Red Alert button instead, and not shutting it off immediately
- Walkng uncontrollably on the Rubidoux and blaming it on her boots.
- Pretending that the space mystery was so boring.
I feel like the problem is she behaved like a 5 year old with her mother. When not all Starfleet is her mother.
There is a scene which particularly struck me. There, even after all the Mariner's screwups and behaving like a bored children, her friend still tried to help and encourage her
But at the end of the episode we found that was an idiotic ruse and Mariner was making fun of a friend who was really worried and trying to help her. And still after that she persisted in her stupid act (the boots thing). Even if the consequences of her "errors" weren't very serious, I don't know how morally someone can defend her.
But at the end of the episode we found that was an idiotic ruse and Mariner was making fun of a friend who was really worried and trying to help her. And still after that she persisted in her stupid act (the boots thing). Even if the consequences of her "errors" weren't very serious, I don't know how morally someone can defend her.
To err is human; to persist in error is diabolical. For how many days did these idiotic shenanigans go on?
But.. But.., She's the most perfect, greatest, Starfleet officer ever! Sisko and Kirk could really learn from her!
Who's saying that?
I think sometimes people confuse entertainment and the real world. Just because Mariner is one of the more entertaining characters Trek has produced, doesn’t mean she’s the best in-universe at anything.
It's from another discussion where people accused her to be a "Mary Sue" (GASP!!!)
Because, you know, in fiction works this is an unforgivable sin for a female character (and only the female ones).
Obviously the people who accused her of this have no idea what a "Mary Sue" really is and their definition is basically "A strong female character who threatens my fragile masculinity".
I imagine that after the first episode one might have feared a repeat of Rey or Burnham, but after several no, no way, she’s a much more interesting character.
I wouldn't even define these two as "Mary Sue". Heck, I wouldn't define anyone in that way, but that's another discussion.
There are a lot of pretty hateful YouTubers who basically say that.
One refers to Mariner as "Mocky Spock" because she is a black woman like Michael Burnham who he refers to as "Mikey Spock," and in his reviews sarcastically calls her "the best EVAH!" and talks about how Star Trek has been taken over by SJWs and likes making fun of white men. Another refers to her as "POC Jesus bitch."
Never mind that basically every other regular character in Star Trek has been shown to be pretty much stellar in their chosen field if not omnicompetent, never mind that nothing she has done has not been something that other ensigns lieutenants would not have been able to do.
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One of the many reasons I stopped clicking...........
There is a scene which particularly struck me. There, even after all the Mariner's screwups and behaving like a bored children, her friend still tried to help and encourage her
But at the end of the episode we found that was an idiotic ruse and Mariner was making fun of a friend who was really worried and trying to help her. And still after that she persisted in her stupid act (the boots thing). Even if the consequences of her "errors" weren't very serious, I don't know how morally someone can defend her.
To err is human; to persist in error is diabolical. For how many days did these idiotic shenanigans go on?
I don't think Mariner was ever making fun of Ramsey by her ruse, any more than Superman was making fun of those around him by pretending to be mild-mannered Clark Kent back when that was a thing. (There was a commentary from Kill Bill that Superman was doing exactly that, mocking humanity by pretending to be worthless and weak, but I think that is a pretty unfair reading.)
Morality is at least somewhat subjective. In mine, I generally am not going to condemn people who do not have ill intentions and whose mistakes are not obvious to a reasonable person, and do not cause significant harm. As far as we know, Mariner had OK intentions even though she should have just said no, and her actions caused no real harm (a few scary moments when the purifier was clogged, brief shipwide panic that there was a red alert when there wasn't).
If we really want to look at actions through a moral lens, I'd be more critical of Rutherford, who pushed into human experiments with his transporter modifications before having ironed out all the kinks. Even all's well that ends well, it was perfectly possible that Boimler could have been permanently damaged or killed. I suppose it could be said Boimler assumed that risk by volunteering, but still...
And similar with Tendi, who tampered with forces she completely did not understand.
Well, it's a little off topic but recently Superman revelead his secret identity exactly for this reason. He realized secrets can have major negative consequences when they aren’t brought to light. But at least Superman's reasons for the ruse were apparently nobler: not putting in danger his friends (doesn't make a lot of sense, but this was the official reason).
Mariner's motivations were purely egoistic.
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Oh, believe me, I'm aware of those folks. But are you sure that's who @Trekker4747 is referring to? None of the people claiming Mariner is a Mary-Sue are saying so in this thread, as far as I can see. Which lets me think @Trekker4747 is claiming there are people here who actually think Mariner is “the most perfect, greatest, Starfleet officer ever”.
I hate Doomcock.
I, wrongly, referred to Mariner as a Mary Is a while back and I took it back as it's an extreme term that doesn't fit her.
My statement comes from whenever people criticize her actions people rush in to defend her as if she can do no wrong. Someone in this very thread just now said she was one of the most entertaining characters Trek has produced which I see as just as extreme as Mary Sue
/Mockey Spock.
She acted incompetent and put lives and missions in jeopardy, there's no excuse for that behavior.
I, wrongly, referred to Mariner as a Mary Is a while back and I took it back as it's an extreme term that doesn't fit her.
My statement comes from whenever people criticize her actions people rush in to defend her as if she can do no wrong. Someone in this very thread just now said she was one of the most entertaining characters Trek has produced which I see as just as extreme as Mary Sue
/Mockey Spock.
She acted incompetent and put lives and missions in jeopardy, there's no excuse for that behavior.
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