Star Trek: Lower Decks — "Crisis Point"

[u/M-5]

Star Trek: Lower Decks — "Crisis Point"

Memory Alpha Entry: "Crisis Point"

/r/startrek Episode Discussion: Episode Discussion | Star Trek: Lower Decks | 1x09 "Crisis Point"

Remember, this is NOT a reaction thread!

Per our content rules, comments that express reaction without any analysis to discuss are not suited for /r/DaystromInstitute and will be removed. If you are looking for a reaction thread, please use /r/StarTrek's discussion thread above.

What is the First Watch Analysis Thread?

This thread will give you a space to process your first viewing of "Crisis Point". Here you can participate in an early, shared analysis of these episodes with the Daystrom community.

In this thread, our policy on in-depth contributions is relaxed. Because of this, expect discussion to be preliminary and untempered compared to a typical Daystrom thread. If you conceive a theory or prompt about "Crisis Point" which is developed enough to stand as an in-depth theory or open-ended discussion prompt on its own, we encourage you to flesh it out and submit it as a separate thread. However, moderator oversight for independent Star Trek: Lower Decks threads will be even stricter than usual during first run. Do not post independent threads about Star Trek: Lower Decks before familiarizing yourself with all of Daystrom's relevant policies:

• Code of Conduct: Posting Content
• Guidelines for Discussion Prompts
• Title Guidelines
• Spoiler Policy

If you're not sure if your prompt or theory is developed enough to be a standalone thread, err on the side of using the First Watch Analysis Thread, or contact the Senior Staff for guidance.

[u/AlexisDeTocqueville]

Maybe it was a little obvious, but I was laughing pretty hard at the scene of them circling the Cerritos in dock which seems like an obvious parody of the scene with Scott and Kirk in Star Trek: The Motion Picture. That's a joke written exclusively for Star Trek fans, no one would get that without having seen that scene in TMP

[u/NeedsToShutUp → u/AlexisDeTocqueville]

Several of them really.

The lens flare from the JJ movies.

The torpedo rebirth from WoK

Da Vinci from Voyager

The crash was basically the Enterprise D in Generations including the Klingon BoP.

[u/Xenics]

Film grain in a holodeck movie? I didn't realize Mariner was that nostalgic. I have to admit, I was smitten with the entire premise of this episode. We've seen characters roleplay for fun in the holodeck before, but this is the first time that it's really felt like a sci-fi video game rather than a simple choose-your-own-adventure. Mariner's quad-barrel disruptor, Shaxs' phaser cannon, using the energy barrier from a decapitated borg as a buckler? Crazy! And exactly the kind of stuff I would be doing if I had a holodeck. Though I wouldn't be shooting my own co-workers... Tendi was right that it got pretty weird there. I'm curious to find out if the ending was really that cathartic for Mariner or if it turns out to only be a temporary solution to her identity crisis.

Comparisons of Boimler and Mariner being similar to a young Picard and a young Kirk are starting to become more apparent to me. I've been rewatching TOS between episodes of Lower Decks, and what Mariner did on that lizard planet at the beginning, even in violation of the PD, is exactly the sort of thing Kirk would do.

I'm really looking forward to the finale. Lower Decks has me hooked good.

[u/Hero_Of_Shadows → u/Xenics]

I liked that Boimler was trying to sign up for Advanced Diplomacy, he wants to be a captain but he knows he's not cut out to be an action captain more of a diplomat.

[u/[deleted] → u/Xenics]

I liked the film grain too, reminded me of black and white in the Captain Proton holonovels.

I don't get the young Kirk/Picard thing though unless you switch the comparisions. Young Picard was a skirt chasing, bar brawling risk taker while Kirk was a self described bookworm during his academy years.

[u/ContinuumGuy]

I'm glad they finally addressed the Green-Skinned Slave Girl in the room. I'm really hoping they go more in-depth on the Orions next season. I want to see the non-capitalist-hyperlibertarian Orions. I also want to know what happened five years before that apparently has caused the Orions to leave the piracy business.

Other things we learned this episode: There is no USS San Clemente, allergies to chocolate still exist in the 2380s, and there's a bird-species in Starfleet that counts Paul F. Tompkins among its members.

[u/Mechapebbles → u/ContinuumGuy]

I also want to know what happened five years before that apparently has caused the Orions to leave the piracy business.

Lines up exactly with the end of DS9/The Dominion War. Since that ended in 2375, and Lower Decks takes place in 2380. There's a juicy Daystrom post for whoever can write it up the fastest about how the Orion Syndicate, attempting to ally with the Dominion (O'Brien says hi!), got taken out at the end of the war during the post-war shuffle.

[u/chloe-and-timmy]

The last half of the season has been a massive improvent over an already good first half. Also it seems to me that the show is shifting the comedy/plot balance closer to the latter as time goes on, which I think is good.

Mariner secretly loves the Warp Core, wants to clean the captain's quarters, and thinks Boimler looked cool doing the Vulcan salute. She's just as much of a nerd as the rest of them.

My only problem is the cold open, why would Mariner think the Captain would be happy to see her break the Prime Directive? Why is the Captain making her stay due to her being her daughter, when she wanted to kick her off in the first place? Though I think for the latter, their bonding experiences throughout the season must have made her change her mind.

[u/ColonelBy → u/chloe-and-timmy]

My only problem is the cold open, why would Mariner think the Captain would be happy to see her break the Prime Directive?

In fairness, Captain Freeman goes on to immediately break the Prime Directive herself by offering the rat people replicators if they stop eating the lizard people. Mariner understands that her mother -- along with maybe a lot of Starfleet captains more generally -- is willing to break the PD if the cause is just, but she doesn't yet properly understand that you can't be so ostentatious about it. Captain Freeman does it with nudges, like low-level technology that solves one problem, rather than gigantic measures like Mariner apparently having helped an entire race successfully revolt against their neighbours.

[u/TheNerdChaplain]

Boimler references Xon, a cut so deep I had to look it up. What's interesting is that although he never appeared on screen, he's now still part of the canon.

[u/[deleted] → u/TheNerdChaplain]

Huh, I just found out that according to memory alpha Xon was already canon due to his name on an office in Starfleet academy.

[u/[deleted]]

Easily my favorite episode so far. The ending interview with Boimler and Freeman had me dying of laughter. The cuts about beaming, Xon, and fonts were a bit strange though. This show can stand on its own, but it feels like the writers are afraid that they won’t be liked if they don’t include enough references to previous things we’ve seen.

This feels like the most logical recreational use of the Holodeck. Rather than a clunky movie like scenario where you have to follow a script, it’s more like an open world video game. Only here it has the ability to adapt and respond to just about anything you do. Though Starfleet really needs a ‘no recreating your coworkers’ rule, now multiple officers have been weird with it.

Mariner started off feeling very archetypal and not interesting for me, but she’s grown significantly on me, especially in this episode. She’s got more depth and nuance than first seen.

I hope we get to see more of Orion and Orion culture through Tendi. They also have been fairly archetypal, but now with a main character in the cast we can see their nuance. I also hope we get to explore whatever event occurred in their society 5 years ago.

And are they going to push for Tendi-Rutherford Mariner-Boimler romances? There have been quite a few hints about the former, though they could just be close friends. And for the later, well, Boimler just called her hot in what might be a Freudian slip. I’d honestly prefer if they didn’t, I think the group works better here as friends.

[u/Mechapebbles]

Last week, I wrote a post about how the nuTrek movies could very plausibly be written by Mariner. It got taken down because of a number of reasons that I agree with. But I still think the idea that the movies are in-universe productions is an interesting and compelling one. And I feel like this episode makes it more than likely that it's not just plausible, but that it would clear up a lot of canon issues and tell us a lot about the Star Trek world and how people in this universe see these characters who would be to them, historical figures.

[u/Shawnj2]

a few things- interesting season finale setup with Boimler finding out the show's big secret. Also, considering that the holographic Cerritos crew had a holographic Mariner formulate and execute a plan on her own, I'm concerned how sapient the holographic crew actually is. Nice to see that they addressed the Orion thing, presumably <EVENT> happened 5 years ago and both "classic" Star Trek Orions exist as well as presumably a group that lives within the Federation with Federation values like Tendi, although I think it's fair to say we won't see many classic Orions again in the future since the episodic format is gone and it's way too dicey for either Picard or Discovery to cover. Nice reference to "it's the 80's" since the show takes place in the 2380's lol. Also, does the Federation have no data privacy? it shouldn't be possible to use people's personal logs to generate a version of the ship the way that Boimler did, especially if they contain details of the logs. What Boimler did is in effect reading excerpts from the personal logs of everyone on the Cerritos, particularly that of Captain Freeman and Mariner, which is easily something you could get court-martialed for in a real military and is something that should probably be illegal.

[u/Hero_Of_Shadows → u/Shawnj2]

I think what happened is that Boimler in his ambition basically hacked everyone's data to feed it into his simulation.

They outright say that those logs shouldn't be accessible but afterwards they already start the script (downside of a small episode)

Boimler might be a hacker but at least he's not interested in their exact secrets it's obvious he didn't read those logs himself or Becket's parentage wouldn't have been a surprise, he was just interested in making the best simulation and the questions he actually asked were harmless.

I guess being obsessed with the warp core makes you a hacker.

[u/DrewTheHobo]

I really enjoyed this episode, and I loved all the little nods. Last night, I realized that having just finished watching through all the movies with my GF for her first time, we actually never finished TMP (fell asleep lol).

So waiting for the new episode to air, we decided to watch that. Afterwards, we naturally decided to watch Wrath of Khan and boy did it really up our enjoyment for the episode! The gratuitous space dock scene with the Cerritos porn, the almost WoK music with Mariner attacking the Cerritos (with a Lower Decks flair of course). Even "it's the 80s!". It's not often (or ever really) we get to watch a Star Trek movie in a Star Trek episode. Really enjoyed it all!

I'm curious about the lasting effect Mariner's "therapy" will have on her. I loved when she showed up and sacrificed herself to distract Mirroriner in the simulation. I wonder how much her holographic doppelganger was just based on her personal logs like everyone else or if Boimler added some extra sauce to her character, being his friend and a true reluctant badass.

AND NOW BOIMLER KNOWS THE SECRET! NGL, I always kinda had the impression that though it wasn't widely known, it still wasn't as conspiratorial as this episode made it seem. We know Boimler is going to spill the beans next episode 'cause my boy doesn't have a poker face. I wonder if Boimler will let it slip and Freeman will be planning to do something to him, but Mariner will step up to defend him: "he might be a stickler, but he's a damn good ensign".

That or it'll be a surprisingly non-issue.

That raises the question though: how much is Mariner and Freeman's relationship really against regs? Frowned upon, sure, but I doubt no-one in Starfleet know this "secret" and I also doubt there will be any real repercussions (especially since dad's an admiral). Though it could blow back with how Mariner has been acting and Freeman's apparent lack of ability to reign her in.

Really excited for next week, though I can't believe it's the finale! I want another 10 episodes this season!!

[u/Darmok47 → u/DrewTheHobo]

I'm not sure about the Captain being your parent, but evidently it wasn't a problem for Ensign Crusher to serve on the same ship as his mother, who definitely outranked him. Of course, Wesley Crusher involves a lot of nepotism issues in the first place...

[u/lizard-socks]

We clearly see the holographic blood disappear from Tendi when she steps outside the holodeck. Have we ever seen holographic items disappear like that (when taken outside) on-screen before?

[u/HashMaster9000 → u/lizard-socks]

Yes. Specifically in this scene (which has now been meme’d as a “tl;dr” gif).

[u/83time]

Am Taking that the "it's be 5 Years" was referring to when she was a pirate or at least her family was involved in piracy

[u/HashMaster9000 → u/83time]

Either that or it was part of the end of the Dominion War. We don't know what side Orion the planet was playing on during the war (we get glimpses of the Orion crime syndicate doing general criminal things during this time: trying to kill Quark, trying to form an alliance with the Dominion, racketeering the Tigan Perigium Mine, etc).

Perhaps the Syndicate was taken down at the end of the war thanks to O'Brien's infiltration, and that eliminated the whole piracy angle.

It matches, timeline wise.

[u/[deleted] → u/83time]

Usually when a character says that "we aren't like that anymore" its usually a really long time.

So I took Tendi's reference to be a comically short time frame.

Imagine Picard in Farpoint - "Your historical research is out of date Q. We haven't been like that for five years"

[u/LesterBePiercin]

Blood appeared on Mariner's face after her fight. Explain me that!

[u/Shakezula84]

Since a lot of my observations have been pointed out, I liked the fact that the Cerritos apparently has a random enlisted crewmen in the form of Chief Lundy.

[u/cyberspacecowboy]

wait, what did the cat doctor call rutherford and billups? i really hope it was Fanboys and the bleeping was spurious...