7 Ups & 1 Down From Star Trek: Lower Decks 5.1 — Dos Cerritos

Lower Decks is always bursting with throwbacks and Easter eggs, but with two Cerritoses to observe, there might not be much room for the whales. In the teaser alone, there were more references— "somewhere in the Beta Quadrant" — than you could throw an ancient Bajoran tablet at. I'll leave you with Seán for his now thoroughly comprehensive two breakdowns of that.

The rub of half the episode — a quantum fissure — is, of course, its own reference. Poor Worf hopping around there with all that birthday cake! (I don't much like surprise parties either.) Not quite a party game, but 'Vulcan chess,' T'L'yn's Kal-toh move in the scene post-opening credits was clearly a reference to Seven of Nine's mastery of "elementary spatial harmonics" in the opener to The Omega Directive.

Given the link to The Animated Series episode The Pirates of Orion, we might also suppose that "The Great Plague" mentioned by D'Erika Tendi, sister of, was the 'choriocytosis' that had infected Spock. Orions do (typically) have green blood, so their biochemistry might be just as susceptible as a Vulcan's to the disease. Moreover, the Orion vessel in Dos Cerritos was a "medical frigate," compared with the 'science vessel' of similar design (the D'Var with ancestral link to the Tendis) in crossover Those Old Scientists.

Finally, a personal favourite, after "Klingon Kouture" on issue 47 (need it be reminded!) of Fleet was "Blood is the new black". Could that be an homage to Kate Mulgrew's Litchfield legend and a reference to the curiosities of purple/Red? Anyhoo, can't stop to discuss — "the Continuum awaits"!