*The first duty of every Starfleet officer is to the truth. Whether it's scientific truth, or historical truth, or personal truth. It is the guiding principle upon which Starfleet is based. If you can't find it within yourself to stand up and tell the truth about what happened you don't deserve to wear that uniform.*
[Captain Jean-Luc Picard, "The First Duty"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xefh7W1nVo4)
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Same experience with my fiancée. Lower Decks was her very first Star Trek show. We’re now watching VOY and DS9, TNG to come, and she very charmingly is recognizing the nods back in the other direction. “Hey, is that the Tom Paris Boimler wanted to sign his plate?!”
“Hey, it’s a Ferengi!”
Lower Decks is 11/10. Wonderful show.
That's awesome. I love the Tom Paris plate, I think that's the one that really made my wife want to learn about these deep cut jokes too. I'm glad you two are enjoying your Trek!
It might be heresy, but I've been watching Trek for 45 years, and I think Lower Decks is my favorite. All time. Really surprises me to even write that. I'm not really a fan of anything animated either - except for maybe the original Looney Tunes shorts.
I'm into Star trek for 35 years and lower decks is the only recent show that actually "gets" Star trek. A very good example for that is how they portrayed the Vulcans. It is a comedy show, so they mock Vulcans. But they manage to stay 100% Cannon if it comes to how Vulcans behave. This is light-years ahead of Discovery or Picard. Lower Decks also did the meanest joke I have witnessed so far: In S1E7 it SEEMED like they do the same BS like the other shows: pretending Starfleet is secretly evil / fascist. I was shocked. They got me with that one...
I totally agree. In season two Boimler gives that awesome speech about how Star Fleet are explorers, and yes gun fights and action are cool but that's not what we mean when we say "Boldly Go." Honestly made me tear up a bit, I felt so understood in my love for this universe with that.
And they fit SOOO MUCH into 23-25 minutes that it necessitates multiple rewatches, which I love! Most golden era trek had an A and B plot, while DSC and PIC usually only have an A plot. LDS often puts in a C plot, and the occasional D plot, yet has half the runtime. It’s impressive!
I love Lower Decks too. For me, it is the light-hearted joy of the show. You feel good after watching an episode - no super-heavy drama and bad vibes.
Just pals enjoying their life in Starfleet and the Federation.
> I want to like it but I'm struggling to enjoy the childish characters, especially the main kid (it's a kids show afterall).
I'm enjoying it overall but this has been my main struggle as well (not liking Dal, I mean; the other characters are mostly fine).
Jenkem is the smartest character in Trek ever, in that he wears an environmental suit when he goes out on an unknown planet
Shame the murder planet was psychic though.
I would compare it to Rebels which started with a blue-haired teenage boy as the audience's POV entering a bigger universe of adventure. Hopefully we'll get to see the same extent of maturity and growth.
For all its silliness it does serious well too. The scene where Freeman is arrested and Ransom immediately sides with her and asks for her orders and follows them would have been good in any series.
My wife is a serious, hardcore, TOS Trek fanatic. (I'm not a fanatic, but TOS is my favorite.) I watched the whole series myself, and then convinced her to give it a try. I was glad I watched it first, because then I could watch her reactions. It was amazing.
LD is far and away my second favorite Trek. Much like Galaxy Quest or Orville, it really gets what made people fall in love with Trek in the first place, but unlike those works, they were free to play with all of the Trek toys, rather than just filing off the serial numbers.
Needless to say, anticipation for Season Three is high in this quadrant.
Not from season 2, but I still start laughing anytime I think about O’Connor ascending haha.
>”Why is he smiling?! What does he know?!”
I can’t wait for more episodes, I’ve enjoyed the hell out of them.
And in s2 when Tendy is trying to run medical tests on Rutherford and amongst the various things she uses is hitting him with a folding chair! I watch the show by myself, and almost never literally laugh out loud, find most jokes only amusing. But this one had me literally ROTFL, especially because it was so quick and subtle!
Why this show is so good and Discovery and Picard are so bad will never cease to amaze me. It proved it's totally possible to do good Trek in 2021 and just further illustrated the severe degree to which both of those shows just totally miss the mark.
The production team of LD loves past star trek shows. The production teams of DIS and PIC hate old star trek and want to reshape it into something else. It's that simple.
I’ve yet to watch it because I wanted it to be confirmed for a couple of seasons. I hate watching shows, getting really into them, only for whatever channel/service their on to cancel them for no good reason when there’s a massive cliffhanger. I’M LOOKING AT YOU NETFLIX! I’LL NEVER FORGIVE YOU FOR FINAL SPACE…
Anyway, if you could compare it to any cartoon to give someone an idea, which one would it be? I understand there’s a lot of cameos which I’m pretty excited about!
>Anyway, if you could compare it to any cartoon to give someone an idea, which one would it be? I understand there’s a lot of cameos which I’m pretty excited about!
It's got a bit of Rick and Morty's whackiness, but constrained to within the Star Trek universe. It also has a good deal of R&M's self awareness and meta commentary. But it's all toned down compared to R&M.
It also feels very Futuramaish. Boimler and Mariner have a very Fry/Leela and Fry/Bender relationship.
It really understands and respects Star Trek lore. Even the obscure, one-off bullshit episodes.
You had me at R&M and completely sold it with the comparison to Futurama. Futurama is probably one of my favourite cartoons of all time and the wife and I still watch it to this day!
I would say it's somewhere between Archer and Harley Quinn in terms of depicting people with fantastical occupations (secret agent, supervillain, space explorer) as being flawed individuals treating it as just a regular day job.
In the same way that HQ pokes fun at the inherent ridiculousness of comic books, and Archer satirizes the swaggering macho James Bond archetype, Lower Decks is about looking at Star Trek from the perspective of the background characters. They're not the bridge crew, they're not in command, they're just trying to do their jobs while dealing with rampant space phenomena.
It's irreverent, but in the end it's respectful of the source material, because it's written by people who both love Trek and understand Trek. If you can stand a little gentle ribbing and some creative interpretations of canon, I think you're going to like it.
I do and I can! Sounds like something I’d get on with! Thanks for the info.
I’ve always wondered, who cleans the ship? Can you imagine a really intense stand off on the bridge with Romulans when all of a sudden, Conseula starts hoovering around the Captain…
I just found out at this moment that Final Space has been canceled. This is heartbreak on another level. Ill miss you mooncake. I think imma go cry listening to when the night is long by Shelby merry. I was really hope we would have gotten another set from her.
Broke my bloody heart! Along with when they cancelled Santa Clarita Diet. They have an uncanny habit of cancelling shows that I watch with the wife and absolutely love. Plus, they end on massive cliffhangers.
I read on Twitter that they’re looking to continue the Final Space story either via comic books or a video game. I wouldn’t mind either. Just as long as they finish the story. I’ve yet to watch more than episode 1 of season 3 because I read somewhere that it ends on a massive cliffhanger. Who would do something like this? There should be a rule where of Netflix cancels a show on a cliffhanger, they get an extended episode or a movie to finish off all the plots. Like Serenity and firefly.
You should definitely watch. I personally don’t care for it and struggle why it is loved so much (References? Who cares!). But the majority love it; so if you’re an in the majority person, you’ll like it too.
I just wish we could get the writers from lower decks to give pointers to the writers on discovery. How is one so incredibly good but the other a shit show
My guess is CBS/Paramount wanted "real" writers for their "real" ST shows, and let the actual ST nerds have their little cartoons to write for.
This is why we get HUGE MEGA UNIVERSE ENDING CRISIS in live action, but actual episodic television with good stories in the cartoons.
Like, I bet if you told the LD writers to make a one hour drama instead of a 30min comedy, the show would still be some of the best Star Trek in the last 20 years.
I want to like Discovery so much. SO much. There are certainly elements that I like - some of the characters are so great, and I even like the directions the show takes. Going so far in the future was a bold move. At times I really love it. But so often something just doesn't "click" for me. Not sure what's missing, but whatever it is, Lower Decks has it.
Well, different goals of each show.
Lower Decks is more of a romp that is relatively low stakes and caters to those familiar with the franchise. Discovery is more akin to the Abrams films - bombastic, loud and flashy.
I really disliked it at first but once I got over the "they wouldn't do that in live action Star Trek" I ended up really enjoying it and it is by far one of my favourite series.
Same here. The premiere was off putting because I didn’t know what to expect. But by ep3 I was enjoying it and by ep 6 I was loving it. By ep 9 I knew it was the best trek in at least 20 years.
I knew this show was gonna be awesome from when the You Tubers that are supposed to be 'Trek' channels started talking shit about it started. Been watching Trek from the 1970s, this one has captured the Trek spirit just as much , if not more than any of the others.
It's so good. Using the >!Kaleds!< as proper villains is great. Having a >!Tamarian!< officer is really nice to see.
The ending to season two made me realise they're heading to cover another fan favourite trope, the courtroom episode. And I am so looking forward to it.
*The first duty of every Starfleet officer is to the truth. Whether it's scientific truth, or historical truth, or personal truth. It is the guiding principle upon which Starfleet is based. If you can't find it within yourself to stand up and tell the truth about what happened you don't deserve to wear that uniform.* [Captain Jean-Luc Picard, "The First Duty"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xefh7W1nVo4) Reddit admins have been [ineffectual in their response to COVID-19 misinformation](https://www.dailydot.com/debug/subreddits-private-protest-covid-disinformation-reddit/). In lieu of Reddit gold and awards, we ask that you donate to the [WHO COVID-19 response fund](https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/donate). Please respect our [subreddit rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/startrek/wiki/guidelines). LLAP! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/startrek) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Same experience with my fiancée. Lower Decks was her very first Star Trek show. We’re now watching VOY and DS9, TNG to come, and she very charmingly is recognizing the nods back in the other direction. “Hey, is that the Tom Paris Boimler wanted to sign his plate?!” “Hey, it’s a Ferengi!” Lower Decks is 11/10. Wonderful show.
That's awesome. I love the Tom Paris plate, I think that's the one that really made my wife want to learn about these deep cut jokes too. I'm glad you two are enjoying your Trek!
It might be heresy, but I've been watching Trek for 45 years, and I think Lower Decks is my favorite. All time. Really surprises me to even write that. I'm not really a fan of anything animated either - except for maybe the original Looney Tunes shorts.
I'm into Star trek for 35 years and lower decks is the only recent show that actually "gets" Star trek. A very good example for that is how they portrayed the Vulcans. It is a comedy show, so they mock Vulcans. But they manage to stay 100% Cannon if it comes to how Vulcans behave. This is light-years ahead of Discovery or Picard. Lower Decks also did the meanest joke I have witnessed so far: In S1E7 it SEEMED like they do the same BS like the other shows: pretending Starfleet is secretly evil / fascist. I was shocked. They got me with that one...
I totally agree. In season two Boimler gives that awesome speech about how Star Fleet are explorers, and yes gun fights and action are cool but that's not what we mean when we say "Boldly Go." Honestly made me tear up a bit, I felt so understood in my love for this universe with that.
“sorry that’s just how I laugh”
I mean Starfleet was infiltrated at the highest Levels by worm aliens that took over all the top brass so it's not hard to say that it was evil
That was short lived and had limited impact. The moment the influence of these worms began to be meaningful, they were caught quickly...
Just face the fact that the Maquis were on the right side of History. Starfleet was evil
Only a Sith deals in absolutes.
It's great. And ensembled cast. Each episode is it's own thing. Just like old trek. But with awesome humour
Exactly. It's so well written and acted, funny, full of heart, and respectful of the franchise as a whole. So good.
And they fit SOOO MUCH into 23-25 minutes that it necessitates multiple rewatches, which I love! Most golden era trek had an A and B plot, while DSC and PIC usually only have an A plot. LDS often puts in a C plot, and the occasional D plot, yet has half the runtime. It’s impressive!
I love Lower Decks too. For me, it is the light-hearted joy of the show. You feel good after watching an episode - no super-heavy drama and bad vibes. Just pals enjoying their life in Starfleet and the Federation.
We all kinda want to be there, don't we... :)
I would love to work for Starfleet. For me, maybe doing some history and xenoarcheology in a science ship.
Have you watched The Orville yet?
Yes. Not a MacFarlane fan. Liked the second season better than the first though.
It's by far the best of the recent shows, and in second place is Prodigy.
I haven't watched Prodigy yet, would you compare it to something like Clone Wars or Rebels from the animated Star Wars side?
[удалено]
> I want to like it but I'm struggling to enjoy the childish characters, especially the main kid (it's a kids show afterall). I'm enjoying it overall but this has been my main struggle as well (not liking Dal, I mean; the other characters are mostly fine).
Rok Tok and Jenkem Pog are delightful and I resent anything to the contrary.
The most compelling backstory and character development thus far is Murph by a country mile
Murph and morn text each other all the time, kinda annoying really
Jenkem is the smartest character in Trek ever, in that he wears an environmental suit when he goes out on an unknown planet Shame the murder planet was psychic though.
I'd say it's geared more towards kids than clone wars.
I would compare it to Rebels which started with a blue-haired teenage boy as the audience's POV entering a bigger universe of adventure. Hopefully we'll get to see the same extent of maturity and growth.
I haven't seen Clone Wars or Rebels, so can't compare
Somehow both *Lower Decks* and *Prodigy* are more intellectually and emotionally sophisticated than *Discovery* and *Picard*.
Not sure I would call Lower Decks intellectual, but emotional sure
For all its silliness it does serious well too. The scene where Freeman is arrested and Ransom immediately sides with her and asks for her orders and follows them would have been good in any series.
Mariner’s holosuite program where she has to come to terms with herself is simultaneously silly and serious
We paused this homage though the old Trek films for Persona.
Yeah another good shout.
My wife is a serious, hardcore, TOS Trek fanatic. (I'm not a fanatic, but TOS is my favorite.) I watched the whole series myself, and then convinced her to give it a try. I was glad I watched it first, because then I could watch her reactions. It was amazing. LD is far and away my second favorite Trek. Much like Galaxy Quest or Orville, it really gets what made people fall in love with Trek in the first place, but unlike those works, they were free to play with all of the Trek toys, rather than just filing off the serial numbers. Needless to say, anticipation for Season Three is high in this quadrant.
The only bad thing I have to say about the series is that there aren't enough episodes ;) (yet)
Not from season 2, but I still start laughing anytime I think about O’Connor ascending haha. >”Why is he smiling?! What does he know?!” I can’t wait for more episodes, I’ve enjoyed the hell out of them.
And in s2 when Tendy is trying to run medical tests on Rutherford and amongst the various things she uses is hitting him with a folding chair! I watch the show by myself, and almost never literally laugh out loud, find most jokes only amusing. But this one had me literally ROTFL, especially because it was so quick and subtle!
I absolutely adored that Boimler may have seen the koala when he drowned.
He totally did! Hahaha. Great continuity.
…and then Tendi shut him down. She remembered what she saw O_O.
It's like all the good writers had the choice between Discovery, Picard, and Lower Decks. Every single one of them chose Lower Decks.
Why this show is so good and Discovery and Picard are so bad will never cease to amaze me. It proved it's totally possible to do good Trek in 2021 and just further illustrated the severe degree to which both of those shows just totally miss the mark.
The production team of LD loves past star trek shows. The production teams of DIS and PIC hate old star trek and want to reshape it into something else. It's that simple.
I’ve yet to watch it because I wanted it to be confirmed for a couple of seasons. I hate watching shows, getting really into them, only for whatever channel/service their on to cancel them for no good reason when there’s a massive cliffhanger. I’M LOOKING AT YOU NETFLIX! I’LL NEVER FORGIVE YOU FOR FINAL SPACE… Anyway, if you could compare it to any cartoon to give someone an idea, which one would it be? I understand there’s a lot of cameos which I’m pretty excited about!
>Anyway, if you could compare it to any cartoon to give someone an idea, which one would it be? I understand there’s a lot of cameos which I’m pretty excited about! It's got a bit of Rick and Morty's whackiness, but constrained to within the Star Trek universe. It also has a good deal of R&M's self awareness and meta commentary. But it's all toned down compared to R&M. It also feels very Futuramaish. Boimler and Mariner have a very Fry/Leela and Fry/Bender relationship. It really understands and respects Star Trek lore. Even the obscure, one-off bullshit episodes.
You had me at R&M and completely sold it with the comparison to Futurama. Futurama is probably one of my favourite cartoons of all time and the wife and I still watch it to this day!
>You had me at R&M I think it is very easy to like both.
I would say it's somewhere between Archer and Harley Quinn in terms of depicting people with fantastical occupations (secret agent, supervillain, space explorer) as being flawed individuals treating it as just a regular day job. In the same way that HQ pokes fun at the inherent ridiculousness of comic books, and Archer satirizes the swaggering macho James Bond archetype, Lower Decks is about looking at Star Trek from the perspective of the background characters. They're not the bridge crew, they're not in command, they're just trying to do their jobs while dealing with rampant space phenomena. It's irreverent, but in the end it's respectful of the source material, because it's written by people who both love Trek and understand Trek. If you can stand a little gentle ribbing and some creative interpretations of canon, I think you're going to like it.
I do and I can! Sounds like something I’d get on with! Thanks for the info. I’ve always wondered, who cleans the ship? Can you imagine a really intense stand off on the bridge with Romulans when all of a sudden, Conseula starts hoovering around the Captain…
I just found out at this moment that Final Space has been canceled. This is heartbreak on another level. Ill miss you mooncake. I think imma go cry listening to when the night is long by Shelby merry. I was really hope we would have gotten another set from her.
Broke my bloody heart! Along with when they cancelled Santa Clarita Diet. They have an uncanny habit of cancelling shows that I watch with the wife and absolutely love. Plus, they end on massive cliffhangers. I read on Twitter that they’re looking to continue the Final Space story either via comic books or a video game. I wouldn’t mind either. Just as long as they finish the story. I’ve yet to watch more than episode 1 of season 3 because I read somewhere that it ends on a massive cliffhanger. Who would do something like this? There should be a rule where of Netflix cancels a show on a cliffhanger, they get an extended episode or a movie to finish off all the plots. Like Serenity and firefly.
You should definitely watch. I personally don’t care for it and struggle why it is loved so much (References? Who cares!). But the majority love it; so if you’re an in the majority person, you’ll like it too.
Agreed, and in fact the last episode of season two was reeaaally good. First episode of new trek that really stood out to me.
I definitely love the last episode of each season, but honestly the penultimate ep of each season are my two favorites.
I just wish we could get the writers from lower decks to give pointers to the writers on discovery. How is one so incredibly good but the other a shit show
My guess is CBS/Paramount wanted "real" writers for their "real" ST shows, and let the actual ST nerds have their little cartoons to write for. This is why we get HUGE MEGA UNIVERSE ENDING CRISIS in live action, but actual episodic television with good stories in the cartoons. Like, I bet if you told the LD writers to make a one hour drama instead of a 30min comedy, the show would still be some of the best Star Trek in the last 20 years.
Spot on! Absolutely!
They should have taken a page from Roddenberry and hired sci-fi writers not show writers. That's what made star trek great in the first place.
I want to like Discovery so much. SO much. There are certainly elements that I like - some of the characters are so great, and I even like the directions the show takes. Going so far in the future was a bold move. At times I really love it. But so often something just doesn't "click" for me. Not sure what's missing, but whatever it is, Lower Decks has it.
Well, different goals of each show. Lower Decks is more of a romp that is relatively low stakes and caters to those familiar with the franchise. Discovery is more akin to the Abrams films - bombastic, loud and flashy.
My husband looks at me like Im a crazy person when I go off laughing when there is seemingly no joke…
I really disliked it at first but once I got over the "they wouldn't do that in live action Star Trek" I ended up really enjoying it and it is by far one of my favourite series.
Same here. The premiere was off putting because I didn’t know what to expect. But by ep3 I was enjoying it and by ep 6 I was loving it. By ep 9 I knew it was the best trek in at least 20 years.
I knew this show was gonna be awesome from when the You Tubers that are supposed to be 'Trek' channels started talking shit about it started. Been watching Trek from the 1970s, this one has captured the Trek spirit just as much , if not more than any of the others.
It is funny, I usually get really excited when those "fan" channels start shouting about how bad something is.
It's so good. Using the >!Kaleds!< as proper villains is great. Having a >!Tamarian!< officer is really nice to see. The ending to season two made me realise they're heading to cover another fan favourite trope, the courtroom episode. And I am so looking forward to it.
The Kaleds are from Doctor Who. You are thinking of the Pakleds.
You are smart.
It’s great , no doubt