9 Ups & NO Downs From Star Trek: Lower Decks 5.9 - Fissure Quest
Fissure Quest is a Star Trek episode for the ages, across the ages, and dimensions.
'Quest' barely covers it. 'One hell of a universe-hopping romp' might be better, but still falls short. Second to last — and with all due respect to the standout Fully Dilated — Fissure Quest comes firmly in first as the best episode of the season so far. In fact, whatever happens next week, Fissure Quest is, by rights, one of the best of the series, full and all engines stop.
"The guest star list is sick," to re-use a line from Gabrielle Ruiz. Spiner was mighty fine, and we thought Harry, revealed in the official trailer was great enough. The multiple Kims weren't even the half of it! From the very beginning, we were picking our disbelief up off the floor.
Fissure Quest achieves something rather noteworthy. It combines the return of many beloved characters with a gripping plot. We'll assume that time flows differently in their respective universes, relative to our own / the Prime, but such minutiae hardly matter when things are this good.
Oh, and before we forget, there's 'Beard Watch' to consider. Bradward's was full, whilst duplicate William was five o' clock shadow, probably channelling how his namesake emerged from the womb.
Through Fissure Quest, and through five seasons, Lower Decks proves that you can incorporate and innovate at the same time.
10. UP — (Pen)Ultimate Premise
It was in season three that Boimler's transporter double — William (by any other name would not swing leg so high) — had his death faked for him. We'd neither neurocine nor heard of him since his recruitment into that unnameable organisation. In Fissure Quest, he was back de-PHI-ing the quantum odds across universes as Captain of the aptly named Anaximander.
Before all of the special guest stars, the penultimate episode of Lower Decks shines by its basic premise. By way of Bradward, Fissure Quest is brilliantly bookended by its 'I wonder / I wonder no longer' conceit, executed with flair. William remains different enough to be his own person, but still a Boimler, and definitely not 'evil' as that maniacal laugh at the end of Crisis Point 2: Paradoxus might have suggested.
As the two-part culmination of the season-long arc, we couldn't have asked for better. A Section 31 ship crewed by officers from across the multiverse was an inspired idea. The fact that the 'spacetime potholes' weren't nefarious in their artificial nature, merely an oversight in that famous need to 'seek out,' was a great surprise reversal.