Review: Star Trek: Lower Decks “A Mathematically Perfect Redemption”

Overview

This fucking bitch. That’s right, I’m talking about Peanut Hamper. The little droid makes it’s long-awaited return from the show’s first season finale and does so on a desolate planet filled with bird people that take her in warmly only for her to turnaround and attempt to dismantle their civilization. Fortunately, Cerritos turns up, imprisons her, and we may be getting a human vs Skynet type of war in the near future.

Our Take

Kether Donohue returns as the aforementioned Peanut Hamper in a plot that largely takes place away from the Cerritos, which makes for a welcome change in setting. But, jeez, just when you thought Peanut was going to turn things around, this show smacks you in the mouth with a feathered wing, and that kudos has to go to episode writer Ann Kim who turns in a fabulous script rife with hilarious dialogue and twists and turns all over the place.

That said, there are some parallels that I couldn’t help but notice. For starters, a lot of the episode feels like Avatar/Pocahontas in that two strangers from different worlds collide in a largely environmental setting which later sets up a climax with someone who is looking to gain from some sort of financial means. Furthermore, fans of Mike McMahan’s former series Rick and Morty probably will notice a number of similarities between the Areore and the Adult Swim series’ Birdperson, especially with Areolus who has that same sort of stoic personality that Harmon’s depiction of Birdperson employs. To be fair, Star Trek: Adventures featured the Aurelians, but I kind of got the impression that Areore were going for a far more comedic take on ornithological species and even looked closer to the aforementioned Birdperson than the Aurelians which looked closer to pterodactyls.

In any event, the comedic elements of the episode were strong enough that even if a number of plot points seemed borrowed from elsewhere, there were enough laughs to be had that I kind of didn’t care. Add in the fact that Titmouse’s production just continues to be breath-taking in its execution, and you can see why this is still one of the top-flight franchises on television and we didn’t even need the show’s principle cast to really help out a whole lot this week. Is more war coming? It seems as though it will be on a few different fronts, but maybe this one will keep people mindful of AI-powered gadgets in the future.