Spoilers Star Trek: Lower Decks 2x02 - "Kayshon, His Eyes Open"

Riker had a model of an Oberth in his ready room, I assume it was meant to represent the Pegasus.

 

That's right. I forgot the dividers were in the later TNG films and VOY. Thanks for reminding me of that!

 

Indeed. Apparently Lower Decks cannot just be a fun show but must really say something deep and profound in the world of Trek, as if humor had no value all of its own.

 

The first officer was voiced by Vanessa Marshall.

 

The problem is the references remind people that most of what they're satirizing isn't that different from the actual show.

 

Probably a joke about main character ensigns going to all the briefings despite a ton of Lts. on the ship

One of my big takes from the episode was repeated digs at Disco. Boimlers speech in the cave seemed to rip on it too

Riker has been excellent throughout. Over the top cartoon Riker has been spot on

 

LD Riker is nearly as over-the-top as Season 1 and 2 TNG Riker.

 

Starfleet is military in everything but name. Exhibit A is Riker’s Titan.

 

I sort of liked how the Cerritos sonic shower chamber blended elements from both the TMP sonic shower booth and the ENT decontamination chamber.

 

Oh I'm sure the show is what he pitched. If he went as far as to say he's going to reference past Trek characters/planets/locations/tech every 10 seconds in every episode I'm sure CBS would have loved that. Nostalgia is all the rage these days.

Fair point, hopefully Prodigy will stand on its own merits. I do understand that Lower Decks is supposed to be part parody, I just wish they would tone it down a bit.

 

8- for me.

I really liked most of the episode, all 3 the storylines are clever and work well, I love what they’re doing with the pakled and the thousands of little references in the collector’s ship, I liked A LOT boimler’s stand near the end and his Titan crew mates reaction, I was hoping for more from the tamarins officer but he’s still funny.

I’m not to fond of the reset button ending, though. First of all, one of the main points in Second Chances was that both Rikers were equally the “true one”, one was an exact replica and it was impossible to know which one was the “original” or even if there was a proper “copy”. For boimler this obviously isn’t the case, the copy (interestingly, the one that was beamed on the ship) shows clear difference in behaviour and nobody seems to question this or have any issue to serve with an imperfect and unpredictable copy. Even worse, after the original has saved everybody he’s demoted and sent back to the Cerritos for no reason at all. A transfer makes sense, but the demotion seems really unnecessary to me.

Still, a very enjoyable episode, looking forward to the next.

 

without going to aliens species, Germans don’t seem to have a issue with this (at least in the areas where FKK is still a thing?) I’ve been in several saunas and the showers, as all other areas, were totally for both genders, full nudity was perfectly normal and nobody really cares once you get used to it. Many swimming pools have the same thing, with common showers and changing rooms.

oh wow, this is so going to happen!

I actually double-takes on this, as I was stunned by what I had seen. Poor giant Spock!

I would have liked more something like this as well.

 

I hope they get around to showing "GR's Vision" of "Love Instructors" on starships (Hey, it was a real idea he wanted much like a "Ship's Counselor" ).

As to the episode - it gets a 9 from me.

- Loved the TOS era Easter eggs (especially the 50' skeleton of animated Spock from TAS The Infinite Vulcan - I hope Walter Koenig sees this episode one day soon.)

- LOVED that the characters from the Titan are written like 23rd century TOS era characters in that they like the action and LOVED the scene where they are contrasting their adventures VS younger William Riker from his days on the 1701-D.

In fact one of the reason I LOVE Lower Decks is - outside of the over the top referential comedy at times - they DO write all their 34th century characters more like TOS era characters of the 23rd century era. They all bicker with each other, have contrasting and sometimes conflicting personalities and traits - BUT - in the end the fact that they all really care about each other comes through, and in the end they all work together to resolve the 'plot complications' in an episode <--- And that's an element of the TOS era that is all TOO OFTEN missing from the 24th century era and TNG in particular (although to DS9's credit, the writing staff for that show did stuff like this with the DS9 characters - but still not totally like TOS - and that aspect of TOS is what I always missed and lamented being gone in the Berman Trek era of the 24th century.

Hell, I've seen some of the usual suspects in various online reviews claiming it's an "indictment of Kurtzman/Abrams era Trek..."; but no I don't see it that way as I sure I'm not the only TOS fan who was going "Yeah, these guys are ABSOLUTELY RIGHT about some aspects of Cmdr. Riker's time on the 1701-D....and maybe Mike McMahan is actually a bigger TOS era fan then I thought. This aspect of Kurtzman/Abrams era Trek is one thing many TOS fans love (and probably a lot of TNG fans hate because GR's "Utopian vision of the 24th century"™ doesn't allow for it. If anything the scene with the 'gung ho' Titan covert mission team is showcasing one of the LARGE differences between the TOS and TNG eras, and if anything is a comment in the same vein as last week's: "I know we're not supposed to have interpersonal conflicts..." line from Mariner.

And yeah, their 'fix' for Boimler's transfer to the Titan, yet still needing him to be on the Cerritos<--- We all should have seen that coming from a mile away. They executed it well, and as soon as Boimler mentioned that particular TNG episode's plot, I said, "Yep by the end of this episode we'll have a transporter clone of Boimler, and one will be thrown back on the Cerritos." Plus it's the 'original' as the clone seemed quite at home being "Action-Oriented Boimler".

I also laughed when the clone immediately started sucking up to Captain Riker with the "I like/how about the name William?..."<--- Yep, brown-nose...

Also, anyone find it interesting (and they could have still had the character on the Bridge in her seat and silent), that Deanna Troi was NOWHWHERE TO BE SEEN? What? She oversleep?

The one thing I do feel they need to cut back/tone down is the constant Jazz related references EVERYTIME they have Riker give an order. Sorry, but "Give me Warp in the factor of 5...6...7..8..." wasn't that funny (and was MO, rather groan worthy) the first time they did it. If they continue to have Riker doing that EVERY TIME... (YMMV of course.)

But yeah, another solid outing. Like I've said before, the way they write the character interactions in this show in general makes me LIKE this version of the 24th century a lot - but yeah, it's do to the fact they write said interactions more in the style of TOS character interactions.

 

That was a good episode.

I was sure they'd find some excuse to just demote Boimler back to the regular cast, I'm glad they did the transporter duplicate thing instead. Even if it is kind of a copy of "Space Beth".

I also liked the way the writers were basically saying through the characters "There's room for both dark serial stuff and light exploration stuff in Trek".

 

I gave this a solid 8. Better than last week in almost every respect.

 

Marina Sirtis, when she was young, was a World Class beauty. She had ALOT of admirers from around the world.
And nothing wrong with "Love Instructors", they should delve into that more =D.

I can understand her not being on the bridge all the time, she is the "Ships Counselor" that happens to be married to the Captain. Her presence isn't needed on every mission, especially routine ones that are "Action Packed".

My main issue with his Jazz Catch-Phrase is that I don't understand which Warp Factor he wants, that's inherently confusing unless you know what Captain Riker wants and can decode his personal lingo.

 

"Love instructors?" Ugh. Some things are best left in the past.

 

That's interesting. I didn't see them as TOS-ish at all, but rather as products of the First Contact/ Dominion War era Star Trek that emphasized action, battles, and black and grey clad Starfleet officers toting phaser rifles over things like teaching an android to tap dance.

 

I would have enjoyed more lines for Lt. Kayshon, but seeing as he is the new chief of security, I imagine he will have plenty to do this season.

 

I liked that they had Kayshon speaking "Federation standard" (English), and didn't play on the Darmok crap. That would have gotten really old, really fast. That being said, his failed pick-up attempt at the bar was funny.