10 Greatest Star Trek Moments In 2023
1. Crossover
A link up between Strange New Worlds and Lower Decks could have easily swayed into the list of Worst Moments but there truly was nothing to worry about. Bookending the episode with animated sequences in both time periods, Those Old Scientists seamlessly linked the two eras and styles together.
Allowing Tawny Newsome and Jack Quaid a chance to perform as live action versions of Mariner and Boimler respectively, the story managed to draw in an emotional attachment with their encounter in the past while still navigating Lower Decks comedy elements into the 23rd Century. Clear highlights included Boimler's fumbling around Number One and Mariner's one to one with Celia Rose Gooding's Ensign Uhura. That latter interaction would retroactively give reason to the comms officer's personality throughout canon. Boimler's reaction to Una is a classic, also mirrored by the continued appearance of his Starfleet recruitment poster in Lower Decks itself.
Filled with in-jokes to the rapid nature of the animated show as well as it's "specific references", Those Old Scientists marked a first for Star Trek in that it acknowledged animation as part of canon and incorporated it directly into the story. On a couple of occasions during its fourth season Lower Decks would also nod to the crossover incident that Mariner and Boimler are unable to speak about!
Those Old Scientists was the summit of 2023.