10 Greatest Star Trek Moments In 2024
1. Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jooooleeeeene!
*Warning! Spoiler alert for season five of Star Trek: Lower Decks.*
You'll notice a theme building here between this and our Ups & Downs article for the Lower Decks episode Fissure Quest. It's not Dolly Parton, although that always helps, it's the just "Jolene" of the credits. After nearly 20 years, Jolene Blalock has returned to Star Trek. To quote an awestruck alternate Ensign Mariner, "Boims, I think that's T'Pol".
Season five of Lower Decks had already had more guest stars than you can waggle a farm targ at. Sam Witwer, Mary Chieffo, Debra Wilson, and Stephen Root have all appeared. Sing a song of Soong, Brent Spiner then popped up as purple-headed Data in Fully Dilated.
Fissure Quest took "Special Guest Star" to the interdimensional next level. Garrett Wang's Harrys fought one of their own — a PROMOTED Kim, no less. Not to be pipped to the post, Andrew Robinson's Garak, Alexander Siddig's holographic Bashir, and Alfre Woodard's Lily Sloane were also drafted back in.
Like the refrain, it all returns to Jolene. It's no secret that Blalock was unhappy with the character development for T'Pol in season three of Star Trek: Enterprise in particular. Rightly so. As Blalock told SFX Magazine back in 2004, "You can't substitute tits and ass for good storytelling!" Blalock was also forthright in her views on These Are The Voyages…, calling it "insulting" in an article for the Boston Herald in 2005.
With a more than busy life away from the cameras, Blalock may simply not have had time to come back to Star Trek. Fan clamour for her character's return has never gone away. Though an alternate version was sitting on the bridge of the Anaximander, the joy and the shock was still the same. To answer Mariner's rhetorical, this definitely was T'Pol. Gasps were heard across the multiverse!