Hello and welcome to Truth OR Myth, a Star Trek Web Series that looks at the Truth, or canon, information to dispel any myths that have surfaced on any given topic. In today’s episode, we’re taking a look at Star Trek: Lower Decks in an effort to better understand it’s place in MY Star Trek History.
On August 6th, 2020, the Star Trek franchise took a bold new step with the release of a comedy Animated Series called Star Trek: Lower Decks. And like most of the fandom, I sat back and watched not knowing what to really expect from the show itself. The burning questions here though is, what did I think of the show? Well, today we all find out…
Just a few side notes, First, this video is just my personal opinion about the show, and as such should not be considered fact? or that I’m telling you how to think. We all make our own opinions about how we feel, and given the very nature of opinions means no opinion, even mine carries any more weight than anyone else’s opinion. And opinion is never right or wrong. they are just a personal view on something based on emotion rather than fact. And the second note is this because Star Trek: Lower Decks has not yet been released in video form, all clips are shown in this episode have been screen captured from the show. That means the quality of said clips may have suffered slightly as a result, so I’m apologizing for that in advance.
And finally, I also apologize if I get any of the names pronounced wrong in this video, I’m not perfect, and sometimes I make WILL make mistakes…
Anyhow, with all that house keeping out of the way, let’s begin…
So let’s start out by saying this after the show was announced, I was happy. I had always wondered what a comedy Star Trek show could and would be like. So for me, this was a chance to have one of my own questions, a question I never thought could be, answered in vivid detail.
Finding out Mike McMahan was to be the show runner was a god send for me.
I had been a fan of his since I began watching Rick and Morty back in the day, and so I had absolute faith in his abilities to write and produce a show that would be engaging, intelligent and fit right into the Star Trek Universe. The thing I didn’t expect though, was to get a show that made me not care about something that had always been at the forefront of my mind when watching every other Star Trek series. Something that in fact this channel was originally, primarily based on, and of course, that’s canon.
You see watching the show, I was immediately swept up in the fun of it all, being able to just sit back and enjoy the ride, and I think in itself, that’s the greatest compliment I could give to Mr McMahan. Canon is a wonderful thing to discuss and debate within the Star Trek Community. When fans that understand how it works comment in my comment sections, I’ve always had some really great discussions. But I’ve found over my centuries of life, that too many fans take canon far too seriously, especially when they have the whole idea of canon wrong. They will argue with me or anyone else their incorrect information to the death, and as Show Runner of this channel, it’s always been the policy here to correct these mistakes in order to prevent future arguments between fans.
As I’m sure you can guess, it doesn’t always go as well as Id like, but over all this policy has been a huge success.
But as I was saying, suddenly here I was just enjoying a Star Trek series for what it was, rather than debating canon questions in my head, trying to think of any canon arguments some fans might have a problem with. In fact, I’ve had to watch each episode multiple times, as I find myself drawn back into the stories, rather than analyzing each episode for video on the channel as I had intended. Now, I’ve kept very quiet about this show up until now. I wanted to see exactly what it would offer fandom before I began any deep dives into the series. But, I’ve been constantly asked by you good Tri-Naries to give my official thoughts on this new type of Star Trek show, and so here we are.
Star Trek: Lower Decks is filled with intelligent comedy. In fact, I think most fans of Star Trek will agree that the show plays into a lot of the things we as fans, made fun of in Dark corners when no one was listening. And the Easter Eggs in each episode are fantastic to see and sort of like a where’s waldo situation, having to study each scene repeatedly to attempt to catch them all. The entire production team of Lower Decks needs to be commended, not only for their hard and amazing work but for their amazingly vast and seemingly infinite knowledge of Star Trek. They’ve created something so very special here.
The U.S.S. Cerritos itself has truly grown on me since the first episode. After seeing the first released shots of the starship, I wasn’t too keen on it. Not because of its design, but simply because I was never a fan of that Early TNG Starship design aesthetic that we began to see thanks to the graveyard scene in the Best of Both Worlds. But again, somehow, the design of the U.S.S. Cerritos immediately began to grow on me, and since, has become a fan favourite design of mine. The Oberth style split hull once again being such a nod at nerd fans like myself, harking my own questions after viewing Star Trek III: The Search For Spock of How exactly does the crew get from the Primary Hull and the Secondary Hull. And this design choice fits right in to feel of the entire show. I can’t wait to do a Starship Truth OR Myth episode on the Class, and I’m just waiting for Eaglemoss to release an XL Version of the Cerritos to take it’s placed valiantly in my Star Trek Memorabilia display case.
The characters also fit so well in to the stories created for the show.
At no point have I ever asked myself, do they make sense? Sure they are over-exaggerated characters of the people we’ve come to know and love in every other Star Trek Series, but they don’t overdo it ever. Somehow the characters mesh well with each other and add to the sense of magic I feel as I watch the show. All the actors chosen to voice the characters do an amazing job.
Tawny Newsome and Jack Quaid do an amazing job as the main characters, which again just adds to the excitement I felt while waiting for a new episode to drop. Watching all these wonderful actors bring their animated counterparts to life was a great treat to behold, and although you might think that some of the storylines would be weak, the truth is, they never are. Even the worst episodes of this particular series were never anything less than solidly good for me, and again, that’s saying something in itself. And the premise of the entire show, a not very important starship, travelling around making second contact with aliens species and doing all the grunt work that the hero ships never have to do, at times, has me more enthralled then some of the best episodes of the live-action series.
So what’s my favourite episode of the show? Well, that has to be “Crisis Point“. The entire episode is poking fun at all the Star Trek movies and does such an engaging job of it. Ben Rodgers who wrote the episode and Bob Suarez did an amazing job of referencing just the right points of the Movie Franchise to make this episode shine for me, above the rest. And I hope in the future, like in season 2, they do something very similar, as Id love to see this idea revisited.
Perhaps with Real Mariner, this time-fighting Evil Holodeck Created Mariner in a no holds bars sequel? Just a hope, Hint Hint Mike McMahan, hint Hint. And I have to say my favourite moment from that episode was the Lens Flare Star Trek Kelvin Universe film reference. That was truly magic! Even my Real Life business partner and this channel’s Manager Siren, who Id best describe as a casual Star Trek fan, loved and immediately got the Lens Flare scene, laughing like crazy! And of course, the series finale was just absolutely brilliant! All the cast and staff of Star Trek: Lower Decks truly have a great grasp of Star Trek and what we as fans of the separate series joke about when we think Gene Roddenberry isn’t watching us…
Now I’d be remiss if I didn’t address the canon question in regards to the series itself. Although I said personally I didn’t care either way, this channel does care of course. So here we go, is the series canon?
And the answer is… Yes…
It is a Star Trek series, branded as Trek, by the owners of Trek, the current criteria for canon for the franchise. So then the question becomes, how exactly does THAT work. I mean as we to really believe that the crazy and funny events that we see in Lower Decks are part of Starfleet History?
And of course, the answer again is yes…
It’s not an easy thing to accept, I know. But it is the truth.
Like I said, for me, it doesn’t bother me at all. Nor does it change anything in the live action series for me. Ill still look at each one of those shows with my canon eye wide open, waiting for video topics to present themselves. But I think Lower Decks is different.
Though the events might be hard to fit into canon, given their nature, the nature of the actual series should always be in the back of our heads, realizing what the series actually is, a little bit of Star Trek fun.
And since the series achieves this goal, and achieves it quite well, it deserves more of a break then the series that set out to be as realistic as possible with in the eras they are made.
So is Star Trek: Lower Decks any good? The answer, which should come as no surprise to you all, is Yes, absolutely. If there was one Trek series, that I could be a part of, either writing or voice acting, for me it would be this series.
It truly fits into the Star Trek Universe but on its own terms. It’s new, it’s fresh and echoes all of fandom’s little bizarre questions with the amount of fun those questions deserve. Thank you, Mike McMahan and all the Actors and Production crew of the show for being something so very special to the Star Trek Universe…
Thank you for watching today’s episode of Truth or Myth, what did you think of Star Trek: Lower Decks? Do you agree with what I’ve said here? What’s your favourite moment in the series? Well leave your comments in the section below and don’t forget to like the video and subscribe to the channel, hitting that little bell icon so you won’t miss a single video we release.
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Thanks again for watching, Live long and prosper…
