5 Ups And 2 Downs From Star Trek: Lower Decks

1. A Lower Decks, To Lower Decks

The entire conceit of the original Next Generation episode Lower Decks was that there was fundamental injustice to the way the show was presented. You have your starring characters of senior officers, and you mistakenly think that somehow they run the entire ship and everything would simply cease to exist if they weren't around.

But no, you're wrong, there's an entire crew with their own motivations and backstories and hopes and dreams and relationships it's just that you don't see them because they're stationed on... lower decks.

Three episodes into this now and I feel like I've got a real firm grasp on Boimler and Marriner, but know virtually nothing about T'Endi and Rutherford. The former two have really shown us who they are, why they're here, and what's driving them to do things, whereas the latter two watched a pulsar in a Jefferies Tube last week and... well, that's pretty much been it.

Their time will come, I'm sure (and in fairness Rutherford got a lot of screentime in episode 2), but heading into our 4th installment next week there's already a major imbalance between our principal cast members. The writers have come up with two really interesting characters here, and I wish I got to spend more time with them.