Lower Decks - "Moist Vessel"

[CharlesPhipps]

I'm getting the odd feeling they're going to be Christmas 2022.

Oh dang that'd be great. Even better if you also stuck in 'Mugato, Gumato' aka the one decidedly unfortunate ep of season 2.

But they brought back the TRUE Ferengi: vicious capitalists who easily beat up Starfleet!

[griffeytrek]

Has anybody told Chuck that in season 2 there is actually an episode about an Emergency Mummy Delivery? The mans a psychic.

[griffeytrek]

It did make it stagnant. Voyager so wanted to keep the TNG tone they completely wasted most of their unique elements. There was still enjoyment to be had but still.

Famously Ron Moore said it was the most unhappiest writers room he'd ever been in. The writers all wanted to write TNG and talked extensively about how they loved everything about TNG from Klingons to Ferengi to the Federation's inner politics and Borg. He said that all of them (except for him) were quietly fuming or not so quietly fuming they were stuck with a premise that made all of those elements impossible to use.

UPN was no help because they wanted Voyager to be their TNG.

It's funny how after TNG ended, that writing staff essentially split in two, one migrating over to DS9, and the other on VOYAGER. Those that went to DS9 did so because they craved to do something very different from what TNG did, but they also had at their disposal the established Alpha Quadrant that they could play with down the line.

Those that went to VOYAGER did it because they wanted to keep making TNG stories with new characters. Except the show Michael Piller was creating turned out to be something the writers hated working on. And Piller ultimately left VOYAGER because the writing staff were not engaging with what he wanted to do. Scuttlebutt is that some of the writers lead by Brannon Braga told Berman either Piller would leave or they would leave.

It's too bad Piller passed away, because I wonder if he would have ever opened up about his frustrations with VOYAGER. We hear more about it now from other writers because time has passed enough for them to be open about it. Even Ron Moore admits when he was deciding to join VOYAGER, the writers at DS9 were trying to discourage him from doing that because they knew it would be a mistake. And they were right.

There is a great story from Doug Drexler who worked on both Voyager and Moore's BSG that explains so much about the two shows. On Voyager as soon as filming finished the set crew would go in and completely do up the bridge set. The carpets got steam cleaned. Every spot of paint touched up. Every surface polished like new, and then everything wrapped in plastic wrap to protect it until the next day. The set remained immaculate for every day of the seven years of filming. Every night it was reset to be like new.

Over on BSG they designated the main CiC set the "designated smoking area". They not simply allowed but encouraged people to eat there. Spills and stains were left in place. They barely picked up the garbage. And in doing this the set got dingier, more nicotine stained and more weathered as the show went on. The steady organic deterioration of the set reflected what was going on in the story. It refelected the deteriorating condition of the lone ship without any other resources. Just as with the effects department they had the CGI Galactica rigged so that the model going forward would show every hit, every bit of damage as the show progressed. There was no nightly reset. Quite the opposite.

[Hero_Of_Shadows]

Just as idle speculation, what do you think Mariner's position on the senior staff/bridge crew was?

We saw her complete some paper work with Ransom.

She switched to wearing gold.

It's an position that was open, nobody got exchanged with Mariner.

It's an position that Freeman felt ok with having it be left unfilled before this episode.

[Mabus]

I'm getting the odd feeling they're going to be Christmas 2022.

Doesn't Chuck usually wait until a series is over and only then do a Worst of the worst Christmas special?
He still didn't review that rapey Orville episode when he binge-reviewed season 1.

[TGLS]

I'm getting the odd feeling they're going to be Christmas 2022.

Doesn't Chuck usually wait until a series is over and only then do a Worst of the worst Christmas special?
He still didn't review that rapey Orville episode when he binge-reviewed season 1.

Well that's part of the reason I said an odd feeling. I'm pretty sure is a quality related delay though.

And of course it's possible the rapey Orville episode wasn't requested either

[Riedquat]

I also reject the conceit of treating Trek as some tangible universe where everything must align tonally and be 100% consistent with each other. I get there's fans out there that want to see Trek treated as if it's almost a docudrama, but that approach would have made Trek stagnant.

Consistency of tone in the overall setting and in individual episodes can be two very different things. I think the former's important, and I completely agree with you when applied to the latter.

[Makeshift Python]

I also reject the conceit of treating Trek as some tangible universe where everything must align tonally and be 100% consistent with each other. I get there's fans out there that want to see Trek treated as if it's almost a docudrama, but that approach would have made Trek stagnant.

Consistency of tone in the overall setting and in individual episodes can be two very different things. I think the former's important, and I completely agree with you when applied to the latter.

Pretty much. Each show has their own style and tone that wouldn't easily translate into the other. DS9 sort of bumped into this with "Trials and Tribble-ations" when the bar fight broke out. On TOS, the music is scored in a way that makes the fight feel facial and light. On DS9 it's scored as if it's an actual dramatic fight scene and the juxtaposition between sound and image is jarring, and that's despite the fact that it's a fairly lighthearted DS9 episode.

[stryke]

But they brought back the TRUE Ferengi: vicious capitalists who easily beat up Starfleet!

Enterprise did that too and it was equally awful. Hell maybe I prefer the Enterprise episode and I never say that.

I was really worried about LD being Rick and Morty: Trek style and after the shaky first couple of episodes I was relieved to find out it was way better than that. That episode alas was everything I feared it was going to be with fapping, body horror, random for the sake of being random, and tasting shit cause why not by that point.

[CrypticMirror]

The Rick and Mortyfication of pop culture is a horrible thing to behold. I think LD has far too much of that in Season One. Season Two dials it back, except for episode where Mariner goes full murderous sociopath, but it is still there in the show's DNA. And art style. I wish they'd shift art style too. Even TAS, with its stock footage and vanishing legs, has a better art style than LD has because of the RaM influence on it.