Crisis Point

We're nearing the end of season one of Star Trek: Lower Decks. Up until this point, it's been a steady stream of "pretty good" episodes, but I've been waiting for that one "great" episode to come along. It finally did this week, with "Crisis Point."

Mariner bristles when she's ordered to spend time with a counselor, and winds up taking her therapy to the holodeck. There she commandeers Boimler's Cerritos training scenario, turning it into a movie starring her and her friends.

Star Trek has always had an odd relationship with the movies. Where it shines on television is in presenting moving character dramas, cerebral brain ticklers, and tales of thoughtful introspection. And you can make movies that are those things. But Star Trek is also a decades-long franchise, and huge studio franchises demand hundreds of millions of dollars, giant action, and wild spectacle. This is why the truly great Star Trek films are actually few and far between, often the result of a budget slash after a less-successful-than-hoped outing in the prior movie. The Wrath of Khan is as character-focused as the Trek movies get -- and no wonder, it's among the cheapest, and the best one.

"Crisis Point" indulged all the excesses of Star Trek films to hilarious effect. Every episode of Lower Decks is packed with enough Star Trek references that you could imagine re-watching just to make sure you didn't miss anything the first time around. "Crisis Point" multiplied that feeling, just as every Star Trek movie multiplies the spectacle. The story featured -- for no real reason -- an overlong sequence of beauty shots of the Cerritos, a Shakespeare-monologuing villain, a catwalk fight, a ship crash, and more. Even the jokes had jokes: when the "cast" of the "movie" signed off with their signatures (a la Star Trek VI), Boimler dotted his "i" with a Star Trek chevron.

Because "this is what you do with a movie," the aspect ratio of the picture was widened, lens flare was everywhere, "visual effects" from phaser blasts to warp drive looked more over-the-top... everything was just 25-50% more grandiose. And then, because they were really paying attention to the details, every scene was color-adjusted just a little differently, treated with film scratches, and backed by a score clearly composed to evoke the work of James Horner.

But... and here's the key... the actual story was perhaps Lower Decks' most personal, most direct character story yet. It was driving right at Mariner's self-revelation, a real breakthrough moment for her. (And of course, as soon as her change comes, Boimler stumbles onto the secret of her relationship with Captain Freeman, to propel the story in a new direction.) None of what we saw was shocking or especially deep character work, but it mined out more than any primarily-comedic cartoon usually does.

And so I found it Lower Decks' best episode yet. I give it an A-. I'm looking forward to next week's season finale.