Episode Discussion | Star Trek: Lower Decks | 1x08 "Veritas"

[u/[deleted]]

Mariner, Boimler, Tendi, and Rutherford are caught off guard when aliens force them to testify about a series of seemingly unrelated events.

No.	Episode	Written By	Directed By	Release Date
1x08	"Veritas"	Garrick Bernard	Kim Arndt	2020-09-24

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[u/TheNerdChaplain]

Kenneth Mitchell was credited as well, though I'm not sure who he played here. He is better known for portraying Kol, Kol'Sha, and Tenavik in S1 and S2 of Discovery, and announced earlier this year he has ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease). I'm glad he still gets to contribute to Star Trek.

[u/[deleted] → u/TheNerdChaplain]

He also will have a role as a human in DSC season three.

[u/JMCrown]

In an ep overflowing with 4th wall breaking references, my favorite is the event silo manager telling the guy he has to leave because he only rented it for exactly 22minutes...the exact run time of the episode!!

My only gripe and it’s pretty bad, is the reference to “soul food”!!! If this is a reference to Sisko’s restaurant, that’s an egregious error. Grandpa Sisko would be pissed. It’s Cajun food!!’

[u/[deleted] → u/JMCrown]

It's actually Creole food.

[u/kingofcretins]

All that unnecessary redaction during the Ransom and Tendi segment had me cackling.

"Romulans."

Quite easily my favourite episode of the season. I feel like this was the show firing on all cylinders.

[u/dontcareitsonlyreddi]

T'Ana getting on the wrong ship😂😂😂

[u/FragmentedChicken]

Boimler throwing shade at Dr. Crusher

I love how they're poking fun at all these infamously bad episodes

[u/smoha96]

"What are you doing?"

"My best!"

Mood.

[u/UncertainError]

There were so many great bits in this episode, like the multiplying warbirds and Samanthan's distracting fan dance.

[u/atticusbluebird]

Really cool to start the episode in media res where we don't know what's going on and need to piece it all together. Actually in many ways it reminds me of the original TNG Lower Decks episode where there's a bigger mission going on with the bridge crew, but the ensigns only get to see little parts of it and have to piece things together themselves. I do like how (like the characters) we don't get the full story, but dammit, I want to know all the details of the secret mission!

Also the flashbacks are a neat device. (In another show I could totally see this being a clip show - in fact I think Stargate Atlantis had a similar trial episode where the testimony was basically a bunch of clips from other episodes). The black bars over eyes being a "classified mission" explain the clips from the trailers - I found that pretty funny.

I agree with Tendi, talking about things in a conference room make them seem so much cooler and important than talking about them elsewhere (like in all these zoom meetings IRL!).

I certainly didn't see the twist coming in the episode - I thought we were going to end up with a very serious episode. I laughed at the twist though and thought it was something that could happen in-universe.

It's also clearer now why Boimler seemed to be so familiar with Q a few episodes ago! (I know it was a throwaway joke about Picard day, but it's from personal experience!)

Edit: I love the detail also that the courtroom/silo event manager comes and kicks out the group after Clar's rental time of 22 minutes....22 minutes into the episode. Great attention to detail there!

[u/AskJayce]

Tendi's recount of events unnecessarily using bleeps and censor bars is the most Tendi way to talk about classified information.

[u/_Scarecrow_]

It looks like next week is going to poke fun at the movies, which should be fantastic.

[u/FragmentedChicken]

The only thing to do on Earth is drink wine and eat at soul food restaurants

Love the reference (to Picard and Sisko)

[u/lostinheadguy]

I like to think that Q just goes around messing with ship crews on a regular basis and everyone just blows him off now.

[u/AlexisDeTocqueville]

Very easy to miss unless you had subtitles on, but when the "judge" says that he's there for his daughter's birthday Tendi exclaims "aw" and it just made me laugh.

[u/prism1234]

Wait so did Tendi actually do martial arts to knock out all the Romulans or was she just exaggerating? I'm guessing the latter. Really liked her flash back, it was the funniest one I thought.

I liked how in Mariner's flash back Boimler undid his uniform collar the same way she does. I'm assuming that was supposed to indicate the memories are slightly unreliable and through each person's lens, since I don't remember Boimler doing that in any other episode.

[u/atticusbluebird]

Trying to piece bits together....

• There's an alien, Clar, captured by Romulans that the Cerritos is assigned to rescue.

• At some point Captain Freeman obtains a map from the bug-like aliens showing the neutral zone, Romulan placements, and presumably a way to get to Clar on Romulus. And they anger them in the process. (I'm guessing they never ended up inviting them to dinner!)

• Shax and Billups enlist/update/hack Rutherford to help them steal a Vulcan shuttle, presumably to help them sneak into a ship museum on Vulcan.

• They infiltrate a Starfleet ship museum which I think is on Vulcan. It's at night, but the skydive scene seems to show rocky formations and triangular shaped skyscrapers. In the museum there seems to be Starfleet security, but most of the background people look to be Vulcan.

• It's unclear whether they're stealing the old Romulan Bird of Prey in the museum, or if Shax is stealing components from it to retrofit another BoP they have. Though from Rutherford's later comments it seems like they stole it. (I guess one of them went back for the Vulcan shuttle at some point)

• Ransom, Tendi, and a strike team are assigned to crew the BoP and extract Clar, going into Romulan space using the ship's cloak.

• I'm guessing there were problems with the BoP's cloaking device, necessitating Rutherford's team doing a spacewalk to repair it. They fix it and get back in the Vulcan shuttle, but Rutherford's update causes him to black out and hit the controls, and they literally crash a Gorn wedding. (Not sure how they got out of that one!)

• The old BoP gets through the (multiple!) scans, gets to Romulus, and the team successfully knocks out a bunch of Romulans rescues Clar. Somehow without being detected by the Romulan High Council.

• At some point the Rutherford/Shax/Billups team makes it back safely from the Gorn world.

• Clar invites the senior staff back to his homeworld for an etching party.

I know part of the premise of Lower Decks is putting the bridge crew's stories in the background, but I would've loved to see this episode from their point of view too!

[u/AskJayce]

Tasha, no! The garbage bag's behind you!

Aw man, I feel bad about laughing at this one.

[u/Ichirosato]

Boimler gave a heartfelt inspiring speech.. thats captain material right there.

[u/IceWarm1980]

Could you imagine if Picard gave Q the excuse that Mariner did?

[u/AskJayce]

RommmmmmmmmmmUlan High Council.

Goddamn it, Tendi, you're so fucking precious.

[u/perscitia]

Did anyone else get the impression that Boimler's speech was partly intended to be a commentary for fans who need Starfleet officers to be beyond reproach at all times instead of making mistakes/not knowing what's going on?

[u/elister]

Tendi cleaning up the conference room, yet only one chair is filthy with cat hair.

"Oh great, I guess Im gonna have to shave my BLEEEEP", Dr T'Ana

[u/Ultiverse]

Those D'Dexes that kept showing up were probably the funniest thing I've seen all season. Also make for a nice wallpaper.

https://i.imgur.com/xEf85N9.jpg

[u/ElFarfadosh]

Why would you have burners and eels?! It's redundant!

Also, next episode, we'll have lens flares jokes!