The Star Trek Picard Cast is an in-depth, long-form, community-driven episode discussion of Star Trek: Picard, the new series shown on CBS All Access in the US, CTV Sci-Fi Channel & Crave TV in Canada and Amazon Prime everywhere else. We’re Brian Meloche and Ruthie Rink; we're two long-time Star Trek fans, especially of Star Trek: The Next Generation. We cover the story, characters, and the show’s placement both within the Trek universe and the continuation of the life of legendary Federation Captain Jean-Luc Picard. Together with our listeners, we rate each episode, discuss the highs, lows, and share other thoughts. Thanks for listening!
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Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E18: Mindwalk where Vice Admiral Janeway and Dal have a Freaky Friday moment and it's not to be missed.
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E17: Ghost in the Machine where the crew is stuck in the holodeck and we discover a saboteur on board!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E16: Preludes where we learn a bit more backstory for some of our characters and we meet The Vindicator.
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E15: Masquerade. In this episode, we find more than one secret hiding behind a mask!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E14: Crossroads where the Prodigy crew crosses path with the Dauntless crew. And Murf gets legs.
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E13: All the World's a Stage where the Prodigy crew bumps into a very peculiar group of people who seem to be out of Starfleet's past.
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E12: Let Sleeping Borg Lie where the crew encounters one of the most terrifying enemies in Trek history.
Brian and LT finally talk through the season finale of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S1E10, titled A Quality of Mercy. We thought it was one of the best episodes of this great season of Trek!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E11: Asylum where the crew seeks out Starfleet without knowing the dangerous secret of their ship.
Brian, LT, and Kim talk through Strange New Worlds S1E9, titled All Those Who Wander. We all enjoyed it immensely.
Brian and LT are joined by Trey as they talk through Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S1E8 titled The Elysian Kingdom. We all enjoyed this episode a lot, and it's Trey's favorite!
Chapters 00:00:00 STSNWTT 007 – The Serene Squall (Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S1E7)00:00:36 Intro00:02:11 About The Serene Squall00:04:03 Ratings00:07:08 Yeses00:26:31 Nos00:31:22 Not Good Enoughs00:49:54 Open Hailing Frequencies (Feedback)00:56:45 Our Notes00:59:27 Spot the References01:01:27 Shipwide Announcements (News)01:12:14 Wrap Up
Brian and LT are finally back with an episode recorded in June, covering Strange New Worlds S1E7 The Serene Squall. Although we both considered it a good episode, we also found it our least favorite episode in an outstanding season.
Brian and LT are joined by Rebinge Deep Space Nine and Star Trek Prodigy by RebingeIt co-host James Rowan, as they talk through S1E6 of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, titled Lift Us Where Suffering Cannot Reach. Brian and LT didn't like this one as much as the last five episodes but it still got a high rating (9.5). James loved it.
Brian & LT are joined by Wes Huntington, co-host of the Twin Cities Trekkies Podcast as they talk through Star Trek: Strange New Worlds S1E5 titled Spock Amok. This episode was written by co-executive producer Henry Alonso Myers & Robin Wasserman, and Rachel Leiterman directed it. This episode had a great homage to Amok Time, while also being a good character-based romantic comedy. They all loved it, but Brian a little less, he thought probably due to a poor viewing experience.
Brian & LT are joined by James the Augmented Sailor as they talk through Strange New Worlds S1E4, titled Memento Mori. This episode was written by Davy Perez & Beau DeMayo and Dan Liu directed it. In this episode, the Enterprise gets ambushed by a new enemy that we only see a little of in TOS. This was a great episode, definitely one of the best so far!!!
Brian and Kim talk through Season 2 Episode 4 of Star Trek: Picard, titled Watcher. This episode was written by Juliana James and Jane Maggs and was directed by Lea Thompson. With time running out to save the future, Picard takes matters into his own hands.
Brian, LT, and Kim from Rebinge Deep Space Nine and Star Trek Prodigy by RebingeIt talk through Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, S1E3 titled Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. This episode was written by co-executive producer Akela Cooper & Bill Wolkoff, and it was directed by Leslie Hope. We get to see more of Number One in this episode, as a light contagion affects the crew. We all LOVED this episode. Kim enjoyed it more than the first two, while LT and I enjoyed it less, but only by a fraction.
Brian & LT talk through Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, S1E2 titled Children of the Comet. This episode was written by co-showrunner Henry Alonso Myers & Sarah Tarkoff, and it was directed by Maja Vrvilo. We get to see Cadet Uhura in action in this episode. We LOVED this episode even more than the first one!
For the inaugural episode of the Star Trek Strange New Worlds Talk Through, LT and I talk through Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Season 1 Episode 1, simply titled Strange New Worlds. This episode's teleplay was by Akiva Goldsman, the story was by Akiva Goldsman & Alex Kurtzman & Jenny Lumet, and it was directed by Akiva Goldsman. Overall, we LOVED this first episode and have high hopes for this show. Brian and LT will be two of the three hosts doing this podcast. We're still looking for a third co-host. If you're interested in being a guest or a full-time co-host, please let us know.
Ruthie and Brian talk through Season 2 Episode 3 of Star Trek: Picard, titled Assimilation. This episode was written by Kiley Rossetter & Christopher Monfette and was directed by Lea Thompson. Picard and group time travel back to 2024 to fix the timeline.
We are finally back to covering episodes of Star Trek: Picard, and on this episode of The Star Trek Picard Cast, Ruthie and I talk through Star Trek: Picard, Season 2 Episode 2, titled Penance. This episode's teleplay is by Akiva Goldsman & Terry Matalas and Christopher Monfette (in other words, Akiva and Terry wrote as a team, and handed it off to Christopher who finished it), based on a story by Michael Chabon and Akiva Goldsman & Terry Matalas and Christopher Monfette, and it was directed by Doug Aarniokoski. Picard and the gang end up in a very dark alternate 2400, thanks to Picard's old nemesis Q.
Ruthie & Brian are back and they discuss Star Trek: Picard S2E1, titled The Star Gazer. This episode was written by Akiva Goldsman & Terry Matalas and it was directed by Doug Aarniokoski. Picard is summoned by a species he knows too well, only to be greeted by another foe from his past.
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E10: A Moral Star, Part 2. In this episode the crew tries to take back their ship while the Diviner divides Gwyn's loyalties.
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E9: A Moral Star. In this episode the crew heads to Tars Lamora to make a deal with the devil (or the diviner).
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E8: Time Amok. In this episode the crew is torn apart and must find a way to trust each other across oscillating time!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E7: First Con-tact. Dal and crew make first contact with an alien species and they run into Dal's "mom."
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E6: Kobayashi. We knew we were in for a treat with that title, but we had no idea how much of a treat!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E5: Terror Firma! The crew battles its way to the crashed Protostar with an injured Gwyn and the Diviner in pursuit!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E4: Dreamcatcher where the crew is excited about having an away mission! But this planet has some dark secrets and our crew does not stick together!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E3: Starstruck where Dal tries to play captain (badly) while Janeway schools us all on the Federation and Starfleet.
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy S1E1: Lost & Found Parts 1 and 2! In this ep we meet all of our young characters and get a glimpse of Janeway!
Welcome to Star Trek Prodigy a RebingeIt Podcast! Join us each week for a recap and review of the new Star Trek animated series.
Brian, Kyle, and LT talk through the Lower Decks season finale, S2E10 titled First First Contact. Like last season, the last three episodes ended up being the best of the season, and these were even better than last season. We see an old acquaintance from the Enterprise-D now make it to captain, and the Cerritos saves the day, but not without some twists and turns and an unexpected ending. We can't wait for Season 3!
Brian and LT talk through Lower Decks S2E9 titled wej Duj. Showing the Lower Decks of some of the other ships, this was one of the best episodes of the series. The crew gets some downtime before the biomatter hits the plasma manifolds.
Brian, Kyle, and LT talk through Lower Decks S2E8, titled I, Excretus. This may be the best episode yet of Lower Decks, as the Cerritos Lower Decks and senior officers switch roles and go through the situations of the past!
Brian, Kyle, and LT talk through Lower Decks S2E7, titled Where Pleasant Fountains Lie. Boimler and Mariner have to take an evil computer voiced by Star Trek legend Jeffrey Combs to the Daystrom Institute but crash land on a planet, while Chief Engineer Billups is tricked into a good time by his mom, the Queen. We're not going to explain that one.
Kyle and Brian are joined later in the podcast by LT and the three of them talk through Lower Decks S2E6 The Spy Humongous. This one was good, though it suffers a bit from the issue that is the Pakleds. They are funny, as long as you don't overthink them. Once you do, they don't make a lot of sense.
Brian and Kyle talk through Star Trek: Lower Decks S2E5, titled An Embarrassment of Dooplers. The Cerritos escorts a diplomat with a very weird quirk to a conference at Starbase 25, Boimler and Mariner try to crash a big Starfleet party, while Tendi and Rutherford play with model starships.
Brian and LT talk through Star Trek: Lower Decks S2E4, titled Mugato, Gumato. The Mugato are back, maybe too much.
Brian and Kyle talk through Star Trek: Lower Decks S2E3, titled We'll Always Have Tom Paris. Tendi takes Mariner on a mission, Rutherford is haunted by a mystery, and Boimler's having security issues. And, oh yeah, Tom Paris shows up on the ship!
Brian and Kyle talk through Star Trek: Lower Decks S2E2, titled Kayshon, His Eyes Open. Boimler's got his hands full on the Titan, while Mariner, Rutherford, and Tendi go on an away mission to dispose of dangerous materials belonging to a dead collector.
Brian, Kyle, and LT talk through the season premiere of Star Trek: Lower Decks S2E1, titled Strange Energies. While Mariner and Freeman work on their working relationship, Ransom gets the Gary Mitchell treatment. Rutherford likes pears and goes on a third date with Barnes, and Tendi thinks he may have a condition and will stop at nothing to prove it.
Star Trek: Lower Decks – Season 1 Episode 10 – No Small Parts We’re back with the tenth and final episode of Season 1 of Star Trek: Lower Decks, titled No Small Parts. This episode was written by creator, executive producer, and showrunner Mike McMahan and directed by Barry J. Kelly, who also directed S1E1 Second Contact, S1E4 Moist Vessel, and S1E7 Much Ado About Boimler. SPOILERS AHEAD!!! If you haven’t seen the season finale of Lower Decks, stop right now!!! Go watch it, then come back!!! We’ll be here for you! Mariner’s secret is out… and it’s now more than just Boimler that knows! The cold open starts with Boimler not only telling Mariner that he knows her secret that she is the Captain’s daughter, but everyone else on ship finds out, too! That might have been a little convenient for the secret to be broadcast over a communicator, but it got the job done. Sucking up to Mariner… We see a lot of people sucking up to Mariner all of the sudden, even senior officers you might not expect to do so. We thought one of the funniest was Lieutenant Levy, who I don’t think we’ve seen before, a conspiracy theorist who thinks that Wolf 359 was an inside job (well, if you think that it was led by Locutus, it WAS an inside job of sorts!!!), that the Dominion War didn’t happen, and that Changelings don’t exist. There were other funny encounters, but that one was among the funniest. Ensign Peanut Hamper… We encounter the Exocomps, which were first seen in the TNG episode The Quality of Life, and one has even joined Starfleet and is Tendi’s new recruit. It was interesting to think of the Exocomps as Starfleet officers, but since they became sentient, I guess that makes sense. However, unlike when we saw them in The Quality of Life, this Exocomp didn’t want to make the sacrifice. It was more interested in saving itself than saving the crew. Peanut Lore… Here’s something I didn’t mention on the podcast. It’s funny that the Exocomp was left floating in space, much like Lore was… You may recall that the Pakleds were the ones who found Lore when he showed back up in the TNG episode S4E3 Brothers. I wonder if that will be a story they pick up on in Season 2. Spot the References… Again, there were a lot of references this week. I used this Den of Geek article to help find them. Obviously, the Titan was not only referenced, but seen, but there were a lot more! Did they stick the landing? Most of us agreed that they did stick the landing, though we had a couple of dissenters, including last week’s guest host, LT. Kyle gave it his third 10 in a row, and I gave it my second. This had lots of action, heroes, dramatic tension, and a new bad guy from someone you might not expect. It also left the show in a much different position than where it started. Shaxs is dead, Boimler has been promoted to Lieutenant Junior Grade and transferred to the Titan, Rutherford no longer has his implant and has suffered memory loss, and Tendi, well, she’s Tendi. It seems like the adversarial relationship between the mother captain and the daughter ensign is over, replaced with a much more collaborative one. Chapters 00:00:00 STLDP 010 – No Small Parts (S1E10)00:00:21 Intro00:02:11 About No Small Parts00:03:40 Ratings00:06:37 Yeses00:23:57 Nos00:27:45 Not Good Enoughs00:40:09 Listener Feedback01:15:20 Spot the References01:21:08 Our Notes01:32:49 Shipwide Announcements01:48:58 Wrap Up Final Reminder! Subscribe to the Star Trek Discovery Podcast feed to catch our Discovery episodes! For our next episode, we switch over to the Star Trek Discovery Podcast, and Ruthie returns! We will be discussing the Season 3 Episode 1 of Star Trek: Discovery, titled That Hope is You. The deadline will be 7 PM Eastern/6 PM Central on Friday, October 16, 2020, unless announced on the Facebook group otherwise. Your feedback is SO important to us!!! Don’t forget! If you have been listening to us on the Star Trek Picard Cast feed, subscribe to the Star Trek Discovery Podcast to get the Discovery episodes. If you’re listening to us on the Talk Through Media All-Inclusive Feed, there’s nothing for you to do. Links to us… Want to participate? Join our Facebook group! And follow us on Twitter! And don’t forget to subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts! While you do, we’d appreciate it if you can leave us a review, hopefully, a 5-star! Or, if not, a rating will do!!! You can do the same on Podchaser. Also, you can leave us a review on the Talk Through Media Facebook page. And don’t forget to sign up for our Patreon to get access to our Patreon episodes. Sign up to CBS All Access! Help support the podcast! If you sign up from this link, you’ll help support the podcast, as CBS gives us a small referral fee, and it costs you nothing! Star Trek: Discovery is now streaming on CBS All Access! Click this banner to sign up, and you’ll help support the podcast! Speaking of our Patreon… We have released our eighth Patreon call Sunday, September 27th, where we talked about Lower Decks, the upcoming Season 3 of Discovery, and quite a lot about Deep Space Nine. If you want to listen to it when it comes out, sign up to our Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/brianandruthie for as little as $1/month and you’ll get access! Become a Patron! Watch this episode on YouTube!
Brian, and Kyle talk through the season finale of Star Trek: Lower Decks S1E10, titled No Small Parts. Now that Boimler knows Mariner's secret, it doesn't take long for the rest of the crew to know, too. With the last several episodes being outstanding, we had some trepidation about this episode. Would Mike McMahan and crew stick the landing? We think YES!!! THEY DID!!!
Star Trek: Lower Decks – Season 1 Episode 9 – Crisis Point We’re back with the ninth and penultimate episode of Season 1 of Star Trek: Lower Decks, titled Crisis Point. This episode was written by story editor Ben Rodgers and directed by Bob Suarez, who also directed S1E3 Temporal Edict and S1E6 Terminal Provocations. Joining us this week is a special guest, LT from NC! Mariner again taking charge when she shouldn’t… The cold open starts with a scene where we see Mariner violating the Prime Directive. She takes charge but avoids rules she shouldn’t. It really sets up the end of this episode. However, Freeman offers a compromise that effectively ends the reptiles (Selay?) overthrowing the rats (Anticans?) by offering food replicators. I did get a laugh out of the lizards wanting to bask, and how they taste delicious. Boimler’s simulation taken over… Boimler goes out of his way to kiss butt. LT made a really good observation during the podcast on how Boimler seems to be able to handle interactions with the other ensigns but clams up whenever someone has a higher rank. Boimler, as usual, tries to come up with the perfect answer for Freeman by studying how she reacts to answers, instead of doing what he should be doing, and answer for himself. Mariner really IS messed up… Of course, when Mariner discovers this is a “perfect” simulation, she re-programs it to become a movie, with her as the villain. This movie turned out to be better therapy than the food metaphors spouted from Dr. Migleemo. She ends up facing off with herself. This was both interesting and shows how messed up she is. I hope that she worked out things like it seemed she did. She really is the only one that casts herself as the villain. She really is capable of being an exemplary officer if she applies herself and stops taking short cuts. The budding Rutherford/Billups bromance… The Rutherford/Billups scenes were funny. There was a budding bromance, reminiscent of Laforge and Data, or O’Brien and Bashir, but unrequited at this point. I think they could have explored that a bit more in real life. Tendi explains why she’s not part of the Orion Syndicate… Some Orions haven’t been thieves for over five years! So I guess Orion is not part of the Federation, but some have left to join Starfleet. Mariner did program her to be the stereotypical Orion, something she didn’t appreciate, but she appreciated Mariner getting into this movie even less. So now he knows… I thought it was funny when Boimler ran out of the Captain’s Ready Room screaming like a ninny, as Freeman says he came in unprepared. In actuality, he clammed up after discovering the big secret about Mariner, that she is Captain Freeman’s daughter. What he does with that secret is anyone’s guess. It seems like we’ll know in a few days. Best episode so far! We all agreed that Crisis Point was the best episode of the season. It did go heavy on the references again, almost exclusively from the movies, but they were appropriate both to the story and the situation. This season really seems ready to end on a high note. Will they stick the landing? Tune in next week! Chapters 00:00:00 STLDP 009 – Crisis Point (S1E9)00:00:21 Intro00:02:26 Feedback for Previous Episodes00:07:22 About Crisis Point00:08:39 Ratings00:11:29 Yeses00:28:55 Nos00:33:37 Not Good Enoughs00:35:05 Listener Feedback00:46:25 Spot the References00:53:05 Our Notes01:10:52 Shipwide Announcements01:20:11 Wrap Up We should be back to a regular schedule so the deadline for feedback will be on Fridays going forward… We did not extend the deadline this week! For our next episode, we’ll be discussing the Season 1 Episode 10 of Star Trek: Lower Decks, titled No Small Parts. The deadline will be 7 PM Eastern/6 PM Central on Friday, October 9, 2020, unless announced on the Facebook group otherwise. Your feedback is SO important to us!!! And don’t forget to sign up for our Patreon to get access to our Patreon episodes. Links to us… Want to participate? Join our Facebook group! And follow us on Twitter! And don’t forget to subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts! While you do, we’d appreciate it if you can leave us a review, hopefully, a 5-star! Or, if not, a rating will do!!! You can do the same on Podchaser. Also, you can leave us a review on the Talk Through Media Facebook page. Sign up to CBS All Access! Help support the podcast! If you sign up from this link, you’ll help support the podcast, as CBS gives us a small referral fee, and it costs you nothing! Star Trek: Discovery is now streaming on CBS All Access! Click this banner to sign up, and you’ll help support the podcast! Speaking of our Patreon… We have released our eighth Patreon call Sunday, September 27th, where we talked Lower Decks, the upcoming Season 3 of Discovery, and quite a lot about Deep Space Nine. If you want to listen to it when it comes out, sign up to our Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/brianandruthie for as little as $1/month and you’ll get access! Become a Patron! Watch this episode on YouTube!
Brian, Kyle, and special guest LT talk through Star Trek: Lower Decks S1E9, titled Crisis Point. Mariner turns Boimler's holodeck crew simulation into a movie. We all thought this was the best episode of the series.
Star Trek: Lower Decks – Season 1 Episode 8 – Veritas We’re back with the eighth episode of Lower Decks, titled Veritas. This episode was written by Garrick Bernard and directed by Kim Arndt, who also directed S1E2 Envoys and S1E5 Cupid’s Errant Arrow. Scary trial or party? We see our four ensigns be raised into a dark room that looks very similar to the courtroom seen in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country. We see the senior officers held above in some kind of beam. It all starts out with what appears to be a trial. Mariner’s testimony One of the funniest parts of the episode was the flashback to Mariner’s testimony when she and Boimler had bridge duty on 57818.4. Rutherford’s screwing up the red alert system speaker system in the cargo bay, Boimler’s terrible combination of kissing ass, indecisiveness, his inability to read the room, and make bad strategical recommendations, like the “Crazy Ivan” mentioned in The Hunt for Red October”. Mariner’s misinterpretations of Captain Freeman’s “send them a message” that she took to mean fire phasers off as a warning shot (which I thought that’s what she meant, too) went horribly and caused the alien Clicket ship to attack. All of that was fantastic. You may not have caught it, but the alien captain in this scene was voiced by Kenneth Mitchell, who played the triumvirate of Klingons on Discovery: Kol, Kol’Sha, and Tenavik. He also played a Romulan and a Federation officer in this episode. Unfortunately, she is placed in contempt and gets sent to the eels, before Boimler corroborates her story that they didn’t know what was going on while on the bridge. That’s a pretty bad side effect… We then get another flashback to Rutherford, which we find out his full first name is Samanthan. see a really bad side effect of his cybernetic implants: Missing time. I felt bad for the guy, but this was hilarious. From the feather dance from Star Trek V to catching Billups while he goes on oxygen deprivation (and mentions Mark Twain and Tasha Yar) so was he an engineer on the Enterprise? Then there’s Tendi! Tendi’s a badass! We thought that this covert ops section was also great, and we loved seeing Tendi kick some butt, THEY’RE SCANNING!!! THEY’RE SCANNING!!! And who can forget the appearance of Q!!! John de Lancie reprised his role of Q for this episode, where he appeared both in a flashback and in the present time. Some argued that he wasn’t used enough, but we thought his use was just right for this time around. Best episode so far! We both agree. This was the best episode of the season. It did go heavy on the references, but they were appropriate. We only have two episodes left for the season Chapters 00:00:00 STLDP 008 – Veritas (S1E8)00:00:21 Intro00:02:01 Feedback for Previous Episodes00:11:34 About Veritas00:13:51 Ratings00:16:57 Yeses00:32:21 Nos00:39:54 Not Good Enoughs00:45:54 Listener Feedback01:06:35 Spot the References01:19:37 Our Notes01:22:59 Shipwide Announcements01:31:52 Wrap Up We should be back to a regular schedule so the deadline for feedback will be on Fridays going forward… We did not extend the deadline this week! For our next episode, we’ll be discussing the Season 1 Episode 9 of Star Trek: Lower Decks, titled Crisis Point. The deadline will be 7 PM Eastern/6 PM Central on Friday, October 2, 2020, unless announced on the Facebook group otherwise. Your feedback is SO important to us!!! And don’t forget to sign up for our Patreon to get access to our Patreon episodes. Links to us… Want to participate? Join our Facebook group! And follow us on Twitter! And don’t forget to subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts! While you do, we’d appreciate it if you can leave us a review, hopefully, a 5-star! Or, if not, a rating will do!!! You can do the same on Podchaser. Also, Sign up to CBS All Access! Help support the podcast! If you sign up from this link, you’ll help support the podcast, as CBS gives us a small referral fee, and it costs you nothing! Star Trek: Discovery is now streaming on CBS All Access! Click this banner to sign up, and you’ll help support the podcast! Speaking of our Patreon… We recorded our seventh Patreon call Sunday, September 27th. That episode hasn’t been released yet, but Patrons should all have it this week. If you want to listen to it when it comes out, sign up to our Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/brianandruthie for as little as $1/month and you’ll get access! Become a Patron! Watch this episode on YouTube!
Brian & Kyle discuss Star Trek: Lower Decks S1E8, titled Veritas. A departure from previous episodes, we thought it was the best of the season. Our ensigns are caught off guard when aliens force them to testify about a series of seemingly unrelated events.
Star Trek: Lower Decks – Season 1 Episode 7 – Much Ado About Boimler We’re back with the seventh episode of Lower Decks, titled Much Ado About Boimler. This episode was written by Story Editor M. Willis and directed by Post-Supervising Director Barry J. Kelly, who also directed S1E1 Second Contact and S1E4 Moist Vessel. Ensign Beckett Mariner – What’s her deal? The Captain, First Officer, and Chief of Security go on a covert mission, similar to the one Picard, Crusher, and Worf go on in the TNG episode Chain of Command. Edward Jellico isn’t the “sub” captain this time. Instead, the Cerritos gets Captain Amina Ramsey, a classmate of Mariner’s. She wants Mariner as her first officer during this mission, which Beckett accepts. Unfortunately, Mariner is bungling at every turn. Ramsey figures out that Mariner is taking a dive, an old boxing term given when a fighter intentionally loses, which is to say that she is intentionally performing badly. We still don’t know what Mariner’s deal is. We know she has been demoted and doesn’t want command, but we don’t know why, other than she finds it boring. However, in times of crisis, she excels. I hope we learn the story behind her actions will finally get explained, and that she will finally figure things out once and for all. Speaking of Boimler – You hardly notice it! OK, that’s not true. Boimler plays a big part in the B plot this week. He undergoes a transporter malfunction that causes him to hum at a high pitch and glow. This sends him to The Farm via a Division 14 ship, the USS Osler. We meet a creepy Edosian officer that we never get a name for, voiced by Fred Tatasciore, who normally voices Shax, but Shax didn’t have any lines this week. Joining him are Tendi, who also created an unusual dog that needed to go to The Farm as well. I didn’t know it at the time, but kudos to Nolan North, who plays the role of the command ensign who is experiencing accelerated growth on one side, and reverse aging on the other. We meet a character in a Pike chair, two characters mixed up in a transporter accident, and Anthony, who may be the offspring from the Janeway and Paris’ jump to Warp 10. A really good episode! I don’t know if this was the best episode of the season, but it was certainly the best in a while. It didn’t go so heavy on the references this time, which we both appreciated. Instead, they were more subtle. Chapters 00:00:00 STLDP 007 – Much Ado About Boimler00:00:21 Intro00:01:04 Feedback for Previous Episodes00:02:13 About Much Ado About Boimler00:03:41 Ratings00:04:51 Yeses00:13:24 Nos00:27:58 Not Good Enoughs00:31:04 Listener Feedback00:54:33 Spot the References00:59:33 Other Notes01:07:57 Shipwide Announcements01:13:50 Wrap Up We should be back to a regular schedule so the deadline for feedback will be on Fridays going forward… We did not extend the deadline this week! For our next episode, we’ll be discussing the Season 1 Episode 8 of Star Trek: Lower Decks, titled Veritas. The deadline will be 7 PM Eastern/6 PM Central on Friday, September 25, 2020, unless announced on the Facebook group otherwise. Your feedback is SO important to us!!! And don’t forget to sign up for our Patreon to get access to our Patreon episodes. Links to us… Want to participate? Join our Facebook group! And follow us on Twitter! And don’t forget to subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts! While you do, we’d appreciate it if you can leave us a review, hopefully, a 5-star! Or, if not, a rating will do!!! You can do the same on Podchaser. Also, Sign up to CBS All Access! Help support the podcast! If you sign up from this link, you’ll help support the podcast, as CBS gives us a small referral fee, and it costs you nothing! Star Trek: Discovery is now streaming on CBS All Access! Click this banner to sign up, and you’ll help support the podcast! Speaking of our Patreon… We have now recorded six Patreon calls. We should hopefully be recording our seventh Patreon soon! If you want to listen to it when it comes out, sign up to our Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/brianandruthie for as little as $1/month and you’ll get access! Become a Patron! Watch this episode on YouTube!
Brian & Kyle discuss Lower Decks S1E7, titled Much Ado About Boimler. From the title, you may think this was a Boimler episode, but his character was very much a part of the B story this week. Instead, the Cerritos gets a substitute Captain, and it's an Academy classmate of Mariner's, Captain Adira Ramsey.