Review: Star Trek: Lower Decks “Much Ado About Boimler”

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)
After a small but seemingly dangerous incident with the transport, Boimler finds himelf on what could be an abandoned ship. Meanwhile, a visiting ship sub-commands the Cerritos for awhile, run by a friend from Mariner’s past, who calls her out on not trying as hard as they she could.


OUR TAKE
Holy crap, did we just get a western that ended up holding up? With humor that consistently landed? Clear character arc progression? References to older shows that DON’T require progress be stopped for so long to explain? Yeah, I think we may have gotten an episode in this show that is finally showing itself to be worth the wait. A bit of a shame that it’s coming this close to the end of the season, but it’s a definite sign that the writing in this show is fully coming together after who knows how long working on the previous five episodes. I was honestly beginning to lose hope and think that this was just a permanent scenario, but even if we only have three episodes left, I think it’s safe to say they’ll be some of Lower Decks’ finest.

The main course of the episode, despite the title which isn’t a good indication of the episode itself, is definitely the stuff going on with Mariner as she gets to reunite with an old former classmate who used to look up to Mariner but has now gone on to become a captain herself, taking over the ship while Freeman is gone on a mission and asking Mariner to help be in charge for a bit. Mariner, having been shown to get hives whenever she is put on a management level, is shown to be spectacularly terrible at her job, but this turns out to be just a misdirection when things get serious on a rescue mission, showing that she is actually totally capable of being more than an ensign and maybe even a captain but CHOOSES to be a lower decker. The reasons for that aren’t quite clear yet, whether it’s wanting to keep expectations on her low so she doesn’t have to make tough calls or because she doesn’t like the way Starfleet is run, but I do find myself more intrigued by how this arc is shaping out.

And the other arc, which actually focuses on Boimler (and Tendi to a lesser extent) is actually not that bad either! Boimler himself is still pretty hard to deal with, but after a transport accident leaves him glowy for a little while, the place he ends up (a ship full of medical freaks) is a pretty solid gag that both works on its own and is supplemented by if the viewer has previous Trek knowledge, which is basically what I’ve been asking for from these heavy uses of references anyway, so it’s good to see that they’re learning. Last week might have seemed like a fluke but now we seem to be actually showing the writing team really flesh out, likely meaning the last few episodes of the season will be in good hands.