Spoilers Star Trek: Lower Decks 3x09 - "Trusted Sources"

[fireproof78]

I think the producers have stated:

1. They don't like doing romance to begin with.

2. They only did this because Jennifer was so popular.

It tracks that they broke up the relationship because so many people were complaining about not enough Jennifer. So they realized they could only do Mariner/Jennifer if she was a main character and they didn't want that.

So out Jennifer goes.

Good for them. Just appreciated.

 

[Charles Phipps]

I wish they'd taken the extra step in this episode of having Mariner flat out say, "I didn't say anything bad!"

And then have no one believe her.

Because, really, that would have avoided the "sitcomness" of it and made their response even worse.

 

[Vger23]

This one was pretty good. That’s two in a row. The humor here was much less sophomoric than it has typically been. I liked the story and the callback/sequel aspect landed really well. Revisiting this system was definitely an element that was worthy of a LD-style follow-up. I liked seeing the Breen again and I liked the twist at the end that Mariner was actually positive with the reporter, and it was Freeman’s hand-picked people who soured things.

Episodes like this seem to work for me. Peanut Hamper, Badgey, and Mugato sex a little less so. To each our own I guess.
7/10

 

[Amaris]

I wish they'd taken the extra step in this episode of having Mariner flat out say, "I didn't say anything bad!"

And then have no one believe her.

Because, really, that would have avoided the "sitcomness" of it and made their response even worse.

I think she was assuming people had already seen the video, or maybe the scuttlebutt had passed around the ship. Honestly? It's more the idea that no matter how much you love your crew, how much you show them you care, even if you're otherwise a rebel, that they would assume the absolute worst of you. It's very heartbreaking, and not easy to recover from.

 

[Charles Phipps]

I legit assumed the Texas-class vessel was Mariner from the future at one point.

 

[Amaris]

I legit assumed the Texas-class vessel was Mariner from the future at one point.

I had the same momentary thought!

 

[cooleddie74]

I like the NA-01 registry. Reminds me of non-canon registries I've seen on Archer Era ships that weren't NX-class vessels.

 

[Tuskin38]

The second I heard that noise I knew it was going to be the breen. it's a very distinct noise.

 

[Noname Given]

That’s something that was first mentioned in TMP, they routinely used warp drive in system in TOS and it was largely ignored later, with a few exceptions such as “Inferno’s Light”. Ironically enough, Enterprise used warp drive in system on two occasions in “Symbiosis”.

They routinely go to warp inside a system in every TV incarnation of Star Trek since 1966. It's the DS9 Inferno's Light admonition/warning about going to warp inside a star system (along with the time Kirk commented on them doing it in ST:TMP as well), that's the outlier here.

 

[Sci]

Honestly I'm glad Beckett resigned. She's not starfleet material. she's definitely the free-spirited type and I'm glad she's going on her own adventures.

Starfleet is the worse for her absence. Sometimes having some free spirits is a good thing for a hierarchical organization.

As part of the Dominion, they must've broken some part of the treaty when they fired on the Cerritos

Unless I'm mistaken, the Breen Confederacy did not actually join the Dominion the way the Cardassian Union did, but merely signed a treaty of alliance with it.

One would imagine. Unfortunately, we know the Prime Directive would likely disallow interfering with Brekka's fate or the Breen's actions against them.

I don't think the Prime Directive would require any such thing. When the Romulans were supplying the House of Duras during the Klingon Civil War, Starfleet's decision to expose Romulan aid was said to be consistent with the P.D. I think the P.D. almost certainly allows the Federation to fight against the invasion of sovereign worlds by foreign powers.

Three fully automated ships...AGIMUS, Peanut Hamper, and Badgey?

If AGIMUS, Peanut Hamper, and Badgey were to hijack some Texas-class ships and cause problems, I could see that feeding into the anti-synth hysteria that PIC S1 established swept the Federation in the 2380s.

It's like Mariner is a over grown little girl.

How do you get that much pie jam/filling to be dripping all over the carpet from the Turbo Lift to the bunk beds?

Is she seriously 5 y/o and just diving into the pies with her bare hand?

It's an animated sitcom. You gotta give it some leeway to be cartoonish sometimes.

Seriously, was the California-class or USS Cerritos the only ship in the fleet that didn't get the counter measures developed against the Breen Energy dampening weapons?

I mean, the Cerritos didn't completely lose power the way the Defiant did, so clearly it did receive the counter-measures against the Breen energy-dampening weapon. The Breen just kicked the Cerritos's ass because they're more powerful ships even with conventional weapons.

2. Carol Freeman really is a TERRIBLE captain and should have taken Kirk's advice: never let them promote you past Commander where you being a hardass and jerk won't get you into trouble.

I don't think she's a terrible captain, but she's still got some personal insecurity to work on.

4. The news services in the 24th century are absolutely awful.

Not sure I agree.

First off... while Nuzé's report was clearly biased... it's not like anything she said was untrue. I could easily see two different people looking at what's happened aboard the Cerritos and coming to radically different conclusions about whether or not Freeman is a good captain. I don't think she's a bad captain, but I do think a reasonable person might think she is.

Secondly -- Nuzé is from the same network that the unnamed reporter who did the hit piece on Picard in 2399 was from, FNN (Federation News Network). So even if you think Nuzé's report was unfair, that's more an argument that FNN is awful, not that news services in general are awful.

Personally, I like to imagine that FNN's primary rival is the Federation News Service, the organization Jake worked for during the Dominion War, and that FNS has a sterling reputation for fairness and independence. Maybe FNN is their more sensationalist rival. Sort of a BBC News vs. SkyNews sort of thing.

5. So it's 17 years after Season 1 of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Which means that it's been at least a dozen years since Sisko disappeared. That sucks. Apparently, Sisko really was an absentee father.

We don't know that. For all we know, Sisko might have returned for the birth of his daughter, and then have spent the next few years periodically returning from the Celestial Temple to stay in his daughter's life.

6. I liked how passive aggressive the Onarans are to the Federation. It's pretty clear they want nothing to do with the Federation and rightly so.
7. Speaking of which, WHY do they blame Picard? It's kind of weird because all he did was absolutely nothing.

I mean, I can see someone being pissed at Picard even if they don't blame him per se.

This episode makes it sound like Picard did something wrong when he didn’t.

I think the episode suggests that Picard's decision could be seen as right or wrong by reasonable people and that neither side is 100% correct.

And as far as checking up on the planets? They weren’t Federation members, so why would he or any other Starfleet captain have done so?

I mean, when your state knows that its decision to withhold assistance means an entire planet full of people are going to go through intense addiction withdrawal that has the potential to escalate into mass violence, and your state does not follow up by offering medical assistance and/or diplomatic mediation services... that's pretty damn shitty. Picard may have made the right decision not to enable the Ornarans to continue getting their drug, but it was absolutely wrong of the Federation not to follow up and offer medical aid. There's a strong chance that massive numbers of people died unnecessarily and an entire society traumatized.

And to be honest, I'm not sure why the Cerritos even needed to check up on them. It's not like either planet asked them to come.

Well, that's the point of Project Swing By. It's an exploratory program to investigate what was happening on worlds the Federation hadn't been in contact with for a while. Plus Starfleet's whole thing is that they go out and investigate things. The Federation is not a "mind your own business and never try to talk to the neighbors" society.

The Ornarans didn't even want or need their help (which, of course, fed right into the plot of the episode.) They weren't Federation members and the Federation was under no obligation to do anything for them.

The idea that the Federation has no obligations to foreign societies seems pretty dubious to me. Particularly when it makes a decision that causes people to suffer.

But I actually note that the episode seems pretty condemnatory of Picard rather than supporting his decision. Yes, the planet of drug addicts eventually fixed themselves but the implication was that it was after a decade and a half of horrific civil war as well as other consequences. They also want nothing to do with the Federation, which implies to me that they really do blame Picard and company for their callousness.

On the other hand, there's a level of respect they seem to have for Picard but not for the Federation. Maybe their attitude is one I think is reasonable: "Yeah, Picard made the right call by not enabling our addiction, but the Federation fucked us over by condemning our entire society to dangerous withdrawal symptoms and mass violence without offering us medical assistance. We don't blame Picard for the Federation's failure to follow up, but a lot of our people died because the Federation didn't offer medical assistance. So, y'know, okay Picard, whatever, but fuck the Federation for letting us hang. You say you wanted us to stand on our own two feet? Well, we did. We got over our addiction, we solved our problems, we're standing on our own two feet. Now fuck you and get off our planet."

I tend to agree. While his decision to not help the continuation of the exploitation was correct, some federation help in the transition period could have saved a lot of lives.

Exactly.

It’s interesting to see that Starfleet is totally fine in providing such aid now, 17 years too late!

Well, we know that the Federation President in 2372 was Jaresh-Inyo of Grazer, and we know that by 2375 he was no longer President. Maybe whoever the Federation President is now is someone who wants to offer higher levels of foreign aid than whoever was President in 2364.

I didn’t get that impression. I thought they were happy to see Starfleet but simply had no use for their help. They got over their problem by themselves, just like Picard had originally hoped. Yes, they pointed out the suffering they had to go through in order to get better, but it didn’t seem like they were blaming Picard or Starfleet for that.

Oh, they were absolutely pissed at the Federation. Hence the, "Yeah, hi, listen I'm busy, gotta go" attitude. That's not how you treat a foreign culture that's trying to contact you whom you want a good relationship with.

Why would the LGBT community (or anyone, for that matter) have a problem with Mariner and Jennifer breaking up? Is it unrealistic that, given that level of distrust, a romantic relationship of any kind is over?

I mean, sure, but it's not like Jennifer and Mariner are real people. Their relationship problems are decisions the writers make. I could imagine someone wishing that the writers had written Jennifer as believing Mariner.

I like the NA-01 registry. Reminds me of non-canon registries I've seen on Archer Era ships that weren't NX-class vessels.

Honestly, it bugged my little continuity obsessive side because we've previously seen that the Federation Starfleet uses "NX" as their registry prefix for experimental ships, which the Texas class obviously is. It also bugged me because the registry number that follows the "NX" was never reset before and always roughly followed whatever the registry numbers of that ship's era were -- the Excelsior was NX-2000 at a time when new ships were crossing from the late 1900s into the 2000s; the Defiant was NX-74205 at a time when new ships were five digits starting with 7; the USS Prometheus was NX-74913 at around the same era; the USS Protostar is NX-76884; the Osler is NX-75300; etc.

It's not a big deal, and we can rationalize it by saying that Starfleet decided that an entirely new kind of fully autonomous, possibly-sentient-A.I.-run vessel deserves its own kind of special registry, but I don't like it. Not the kind of thing I give a lot of weight to even if I don't like it, though.

 

[Farscape One]

If I am remembering correctly, every single episode has referenced something or used an element of DS9. (And an entire episode set there!!!)

I cannot understate how much I LOVE THAT!!!

 

[Anduinel]

I don't think she's a terrible captain, but she's still got some personal insecurity to work on.

Absolutely. I get that Freeman (and Cali-class crews in general) have a bit of a chip on their shoulders over being looked down on and that this situation was pretty much set up to hit every single one of her blind spots, but if she'd for a single second considered that her carefully choreographed plan could have backfired, she wouldn't have deep-sixed her relationship with her kid (and possibly her crew, depending on the fallout).

 

[Tuskin38]

5. So it's 17 years after Season 1 of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Which means that it's been at least a dozen years since Sisko disappeared.

Half a dozen. Lower Decks Season 3 takes place in 2381, DS9 season finale took place in 2375.

Honestly, it bugged my little continuity obsessive side because we've previously seen that the Federation Starfleet uses "NX" as their registry prefix for experimental ships, which the Texas class obviously is. It also bugged me because the registry number that follows the "NX" was never reset before and always roughly followed whatever the registry numbers of that ship's era were -- the Excelsior was NX-2000 at a time when new ships were crossing from the late 1900s into the 2000s; the Defiant was NX-74205 at a time when new ships were five digits starting with 7; the USS Prometheus was NX-74913 at around the same era; the USS Protostar is NX-76884; the Osler is NX-75300; etc.

It's not a big deal, and we can rationalize it by saying that Starfleet decided that an entirely new kind of fully autonomous, possibly-sentient-A.I.-run vessel deserves its own kind of special registry, but I don't like it. Not the kind of thing I give a lot of weight to even if I don't like it, though.

I don't see the issue, it's an entirely new type of vessel, fully automated, not a typical starfleet ship.

 

[NCC-73515]

The second I heard that noise I knew it was going to be the breen. it's a very distinct noise.

I liked how they seem to be saying "WTF is THIS?" in Breen when the autoship appears:
BRLKFHVBLZFHBV?!?! - KHBFHFBLSZH!!

 

[Tuskin38]

I liked how they seem to be saying "WTF is THIS?" in Breen when the autoship appears:
BRLKFHVBLZFHBV?!?! - KHBFHFBLSZH!!

Basically mirroring the Cerritos bridge.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Honestly, it bugged my little continuity obsessive side because we've previously seen that the Federation Starfleet uses "NX" as their registry prefix for experimental ships, which the Texas class obviously is. It also bugged me because the registry number that follows the "NX" was never reset before and always roughly followed whatever the registry numbers of that ship's era were -- the Excelsior was NX-2000 at a time when new ships were crossing from the late 1900s into the 2000s; the Defiant was NX-74205 at a time when new ships were five digits starting with 7; the USS Prometheus was NX-74913 at around the same era; the USS Protostar is NX-76884; the Osler is NX-75300; etc.

I think the Admiral said the Texas class USS Aledo just passed it's Sea Trial phase when it had it's "Big Damn Heroes" moment and saved the USS Cerritos.

This is the 3rd time that the USS Cerritos has been saved.
Bold choice to pull the same gimmick 3x times in back to back seasons.

Usually when you're in the Sea Trial phase AKA "Shake Down Cruise" for a ship, you're LONG past the Experimental phase and are about ready to commission the ship into service. Realistically, it should be called "Space Trial" phase and not "Sea Trial", but that's another Maritime phrase that gets borrowed but not updated.

I'd assume it gets the NA for (Naval Autonomous) since it's a fancy Automated Ship with AI running on board.

Personally, I like to imagine that FNN's primary rival is the Federation News Service, the organization Jake worked for during the Dominion War, and that FNS has a sterling reputation for fairness and independence. Maybe FNN is their more sensationalist rival. Sort of a BBC News vs. SkyNews sort of thing.

Or is a jab at CNN for it's biased reporting.
Kind of like Reuters vs CNN.

 

[Tuskin38]

The Breen Rifle was an option in that Lower Decks character creator app before this episode aired. I wonder if anything else snuck in there.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

I mean, the Cerritos didn't completely lose power the way the Defiant did, so clearly it did receive the counter-measures against the Breen energy-dampening weapon. The Breen just kicked the Cerritos's ass because they're more powerful ships even with conventional weapons.

So they got a "Partial Counter Measure", but to be dead in the water just because the Energy Dampner Weapon hit them is REALLY bad on top of losing shields.

 

[Tuskin38]

The ship Mariner and archologist is on is named Free Spirit
https://twitter.com/gaghyogi49/status/1583152063973834752

 

[CaptainWacky]

Freeman and Jennifer both not even being willing to hear Mariner out felt over the top, to the point where I thought the reporter was an alien messing with everyone's minds for a moment. But I guess it had to happen for the plot and you can understand why they would initially think the worst given Mariner's history.