I am hoping for a bit of an extended finale. Maybe something closer to 40 minutes rather than the usual 25.
Spoilers Star Trek: Lower Decks 5x09 - "Fissure Quest"
- Thread starter Commander Richard
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I am hoping for a bit of an extended finale. Maybe something closer to 40 minutes rather than the usual 25.
This is the happiest I've ever seen Jessie Gender. 
Keeping with LDS tradition, the eighth episode of the final season is quite an event. It's also, similar to some big episodes of the past (Wej Duj, A Mathematically Perfect Redemption, etc.) outside of the primary perspectives of the core Cerritos crew. It's an episode of Lower Decks, but at the same time, not quite one.
The multiverse conceit of this season arc allowed them to go whole hog here with the cameos, and oh boy, do they ever. Lily Sloane, T'Pol, Garak, Bashir, and many variants of Harry Kim, all voiced by the original actors. And a Curzon Dax variant, voiced by some dude. Plus of course William Boimler and an alternative version of Mariner. LDS has never hit the special guest star thing this hard - it's massive fanwank, and mostly successful.
I'm happy as hell that Garak/Bashir was confirmed as a couple, though given these are alternate reality versions, there's still some plausible deniability. Alexander Siddig and Andrew Robinson still have amazing chemistry, and give renditions much closer to their old characters than what they did in the audio dramas. Making Garak a plain, simple doctor and Bashir a hologram was a bit random, but I guess it was meant to represent alternative universe weirdness.
The same cannot be said for T'Pol and Curzon Dax though. Most of the issue with this pairing is the use of Curzon here seems a misfire. Obviously people will care less given it's not a classic Trek actor reprising the role, but the depiction of him in this episode leans very heavily on the episode Blood Oath and little else. I always considered Curzon more of a drunken old letch than a fierce, fun-loving warrior. T'Pol mostly just deadpanned his barbs, and spat some exposition. I think they pulled a few punches where they could have gently ribbed Enterprise (like the Archer comment). Considering what they did with Harry Kim here, I'm not sure why they didn't.
Harry Kim (the many Harry Kims) was great up until the end, where the joke lost coherence. The motivations of Lt. Kim made zero sense here. He decides to mutiny at beginning of the third act, so he can take the ensigns back with him. Then the ensigns mutiny, and he's doing this because?!? I can kind of excuse this because in an already comedic series, this one takes itself even less seriously, but it would have been better (if less funny) if only one Kim was still an ensign, and they mutinied instead.
I don't quite get the Lily Sloane reveal either. I guess her ship was not traveling through space, but just visiting alternative Earths (with Vulcan crew members, somehow) and was just pulled to where Boimler & co could find it due to their actions. But...how is she still alive? I guess it's somewhat sensible as only 60-some years have passed for T'Pol, so the portals could come from points in the past as well. That doesn't explain why so many have been happening during the 5th season of LDS though.
Turning to the "core cast," it was interesting to see the evolution of WIlliam Boimler into a jaded, aged-past-his years captain. I'm glad they didn't play up the Section 31 stuff and just moved on. I think the little touches of how much he missed the Cerritos crew were touching. And it was nice to see a more anxious take on Mariner as well.
Overall, I thought the episode was the funniest and best put together of the season. It's a little bit of a downer that everything in this episode happens in an alternate reality and doesn't impact our actual main characters, but that's forgivable with only an episode left. However, I do need to ding it a bit because of how completely nonsensical the resolution of the final act was. I can suspend disbelief, but only so far, and this ran at least a half mile past that.
The multiverse conceit of this season arc allowed them to go whole hog here with the cameos, and oh boy, do they ever. Lily Sloane, T'Pol, Garak, Bashir, and many variants of Harry Kim, all voiced by the original actors. And a Curzon Dax variant, voiced by some dude. Plus of course William Boimler and an alternative version of Mariner. LDS has never hit the special guest star thing this hard - it's massive fanwank, and mostly successful.
I'm happy as hell that Garak/Bashir was confirmed as a couple, though given these are alternate reality versions, there's still some plausible deniability. Alexander Siddig and Andrew Robinson still have amazing chemistry, and give renditions much closer to their old characters than what they did in the audio dramas. Making Garak a plain, simple doctor and Bashir a hologram was a bit random, but I guess it was meant to represent alternative universe weirdness.
The same cannot be said for T'Pol and Curzon Dax though. Most of the issue with this pairing is the use of Curzon here seems a misfire. Obviously people will care less given it's not a classic Trek actor reprising the role, but the depiction of him in this episode leans very heavily on the episode Blood Oath and little else. I always considered Curzon more of a drunken old letch than a fierce, fun-loving warrior. T'Pol mostly just deadpanned his barbs, and spat some exposition. I think they pulled a few punches where they could have gently ribbed Enterprise (like the Archer comment). Considering what they did with Harry Kim here, I'm not sure why they didn't.
Harry Kim (the many Harry Kims) was great up until the end, where the joke lost coherence. The motivations of Lt. Kim made zero sense here. He decides to mutiny at beginning of the third act, so he can take the ensigns back with him. Then the ensigns mutiny, and he's doing this because?!? I can kind of excuse this because in an already comedic series, this one takes itself even less seriously, but it would have been better (if less funny) if only one Kim was still an ensign, and they mutinied instead.
I don't quite get the Lily Sloane reveal either. I guess her ship was not traveling through space, but just visiting alternative Earths (with Vulcan crew members, somehow) and was just pulled to where Boimler & co could find it due to their actions. But...how is she still alive? I guess it's somewhat sensible as only 60-some years have passed for T'Pol, so the portals could come from points in the past as well. That doesn't explain why so many have been happening during the 5th season of LDS though.
Turning to the "core cast," it was interesting to see the evolution of WIlliam Boimler into a jaded, aged-past-his years captain. I'm glad they didn't play up the Section 31 stuff and just moved on. I think the little touches of how much he missed the Cerritos crew were touching. And it was nice to see a more anxious take on Mariner as well.
Overall, I thought the episode was the funniest and best put together of the season. It's a little bit of a downer that everything in this episode happens in an alternate reality and doesn't impact our actual main characters, but that's forgivable with only an episode left. However, I do need to ding it a bit because of how completely nonsensical the resolution of the final act was. I can suspend disbelief, but only so far, and this ran at least a half mile past that.
T'Pol would be 293 years old (2088-2381), so she's not particularly plausible on the surface either.
I'm assuming either time travel or universes where the whole universe kicked off later or slower, maybe due to different planet/galactic rotation/universe expansion speeds creating a relativistic time dilation relative to our universe.
I think Sliders had an episode where they saw Quinn as a kid due to the Earth having a slightly different rotational speed in that universe. Same principle.
Wow that was a fun episode!
The big season mystery revealed, tons and tons of fun crew moments, and what a final line!
If they knew they were being cancelled it makes sense to have a couple of quiet episodes before the big season final, esp with all the guest stars.
Garek and Bashir.... awwww.
Poor Dax! Thought that is one Experienced Up T'Pol!
Kim, Kim, Kim.... just funny.
Engineer Mariner was a nice touch, as was Doctor Garek.
I felt sorry for the crew getting stuck in a strange Quantum Reality at the end there.
Really looking forward to the finale now - I am betting on a Sisko appearance!
The big season mystery revealed, tons and tons of fun crew moments, and what a final line!
If they knew they were being cancelled it makes sense to have a couple of quiet episodes before the big season final, esp with all the guest stars.
Garek and Bashir.... awwww.
Poor Dax! Thought that is one Experienced Up T'Pol!
Kim, Kim, Kim.... just funny.
Engineer Mariner was a nice touch, as was Doctor Garek.
I felt sorry for the crew getting stuck in a strange Quantum Reality at the end there.
Really looking forward to the finale now - I am betting on a Sisko appearance!
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This was really good!
Really solid use of the multiverse concept here. Makes me sad we won't get to see more of Captain Lily Sloane (what a great idea!) in early Starfleet. The fact that the one Kim who managed to get promoted was such an egomaniac about it had me rolling.
William Boimler trusts the fate of his entire reality to the lower deckers of the Cerritos is not the set up for the finale I was expecting, but I think it's kind of great. I don't want it to end, but I'm eagerly looking forward to one last ride.
Really solid use of the multiverse concept here. Makes me sad we won't get to see more of Captain Lily Sloane (what a great idea!) in early Starfleet. The fact that the one Kim who managed to get promoted was such an egomaniac about it had me rolling.
William Boimler trusts the fate of his entire reality to the lower deckers of the Cerritos is not the set up for the finale I was expecting, but I think it's kind of great. I don't want it to end, but I'm eagerly looking forward to one last ride.
That's nice and all, but its kinda shitty to have your main characters sidelined two episodes in a row.
Didn’t he mention this in the episode where he joins the “secret organization”? It was literally a joke in the show.
I just the idea of them having a unique badge.
I'm happier with the "infinite permutations" of Parallel Universes.
That makes me 'Super Happy!'.
So many options to see, so many different possibilities.
None of them will ever replace the original version of "YOU!" in your Multiverse.
I hope not.
That was the joke.
The purple Enterprise seems to have come from the 2360’s of their time, if the only thing different about their universe and the prime one is that everything is purple.
I think the idea here is that Lily and her ship come from the pre-2150’s, maybe 30 years after FC. I haven’t watched the episode yet so I may be wrong.
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Yes, in the captain's log at the start - "an expert on human emotions, after being married to Trip Tucker for decades".
I just want Section 31 to have a "Unique Badge" that doesn't have any resemblence to the 'StarFleet Insignia' or any 'UFP Insignia'.
Just something that is TRULY original.
They probably just asked.
She was always a big fan of Star Trek, so a phone call where she hears "Hey wanna play an alternate universe T'Pol who was married to Trip?" was likely enough to get her okay.
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