“All Good Issues”, “What You Go away Behind”, “Endgame”… Now “The New Subsequent Technology” turns into the most recent addition to the pantheon of memorable “Star Trek” season finales, because the franchise’s solely out-and-out comedy, “Decrease Decks”, goes out in fashion.
After final week’s multiverse-hopping adventures, the race is on to save lots of the prime universe from a fissure in house and time that threatens to destroy existence as we all know it. The episode additionally supplies an opportunity for the entire lead Cerritos crewmates to shine, whereas sharing the highlight with a number of supporting characters from earlier season 5 missions.
This sequence finale appears like the top of a chapter, however leaves sufficient intriguing unfastened ends to maintain the potential of a spin-off alive. (Within the minds of followers, at the least — it is essential to level out that Paramount+ have advised nothing of the kind!)
This is a rundown of how the Cerritos turns into the unlikely savior of actuality, and what this ultimate episode means for the way forward for the Decrease Deckers.
Spoiler warning! Warning suggested if you happen to’re but to observe the “Decrease Decks” finale
Why is the prime “Star Trek” universe underneath risk?
Two phrases: Harry Kim.
In final week’s episode, “Fissure Quest“, the USS Voyager’s perennial ensign flew the interdimensional Beagle craft right into a rift in house and time, setting off a sequence response with the potential to destroy all the multiverse. Captains William Boimler and Lily Sloane tried to mitigate the issue by directing damaging soliton waves right into a single universe — the prime “Star Trek” timeline Boimler used to name dwelling. Sadly, left unchecked, it’s going to destroy this quantum actuality.
William additionally manages to ship a warning to his transporter doppelganger Bradward, whose screams of “We’re all gonna die!” are fairly restrained given the circumstances.
Saving the universe feels like greater stakes than the Cerritos crew are used to?
Sure, it is a far cry from the second contact conditions which are historically Captain Freeman and co’s bread and butter. Fortunately, she believes Bradward’s story about his “undead transporter clone” and is fast to alert Starfleet command to the hazard.
It seems that the fissure will be simply sealed with a “subspace gluonic beam”. The issue? Getting there requires navigating a Schrödinger risk subject (S-field) that remaps matter into different potentialities from the multiverse — one projection predicts a Starfleet officer with a cactus for a head.
On some other day Starfleet would not have nominated a California class vessel just like the Cerritos for such an essential mission, however the Enterprise cannot make it in time. Apart from, whether or not it is “destiny or entanglement”, the connection between the 2 Boimlers makes the Cerritos the logical candidate for the mission.
Frankly, on days like these, the very last thing you need is a pair of Klingon blood wine retailers arriving in your doorstep on the lookout for safety from an unhinged Chook-of-Prey commander who needs them each lifeless…
Why does Relga have such an issue with Ma’ah?
Whereas Klingon commander Relga is spoiling for a combat with anybody she will discover, she’s additionally out for revenge on Ma’ah for killing her two brothers.
We first met Ma’ah when he was a Decrease Decker on the Klingon vessel the Che’Ta’ in “wej Duj” (season 2), underneath the command of Dorg, one in every of Relga’s brothers. Ma’ah referred to as out Dorg for his dishonorable habits in the direction of the Federation, and ended up killing his captain after they settled their dispute the old style Klingon method. He was then promoted to captain, however later betrayed by his crew, who deserted him on Sherbal V, the place he met (and befriended) Beckett Mariner (“The Inside Combat”, season 2). Though he ultimately obtained his ship again, he was dishonorably discharged for permitting his crew to grab management within the first place.
The oversight council that made the choice was not fully neutral, nonetheless, seeing its membership included one other of Relga’s brothers, Bargh. Having gone dwelling to work on the household blood wine farm (“A Farewell to Farms“, season 5), Ma’ah initiated the Ceremony of Compelled Conscription to regain his fee. Within the inevitable Klingon combat to the demise, he ended up killing Bargh — who had, to be truthful, figuratively and actually stabbed him within the again.
Ma’ah subsequently went again into enterprise together with his brother Malor, and it is on a supply run that they run into Relga, prompting them to ask for asylum on the Cerritos. Their pursuer has little curiosity in listening to about her siblings’ misdemeanors, in fact, and calls for that Captain Freeman hand them over.
What occurs within the Schrödinger risk subject?
“All palms brace for bizarre,” says Captain Freeman, and it is a fairly good abstract of what to anticipate in an S-Area. In actual fact, it ought to most likely have been named after “The Hitchhiker’s Information to the Galaxy” writer Douglas Adams, seeing because the phenomena it creates are remarkably just like the freaky side-effects related to the Infinite Improbability Drive that powered the Coronary heart of Gold.
In the course of the episode’s chilly open, one in every of Relga’s Birds-of-Prey turns into the primary to expertise the S-Area’s freaky damaging energy when the crew and their vessel get a makeover in step with the Klingons in “Star Trek: Discovery”‘s first season.
Adjusted defend harmonics on the Cerritos — which Freeman shares with Relga as a courtesy — supply some safety, however the California class ship nonetheless goes via a speedy sequence of refits, briefly taking the type of:
- A Freedom class vessel with a single warp nacelle (just like the USS Firebrand in “The Subsequent Technology” episode “The Better of Each Worlds”)
- A Terran Empire ship (“By the prophets, our weapons are wonderful!” says Shaxs, who sadly would not get to make use of them)
- A Sovereign class vessel (just like the USS Enterprise-E within the “TNG” motion pictures)
- An Oberth class vessel (just like the USS Grissom in “The Seek for Spock”)
- A Galaxy class vessel (just like the USS Enterprise-D in “The Subsequent Technology”)
- A Miranda class vessel (just like the USS Reliant in “The Wrath of Khan”)
- A number of others that do not seem on display screen
The Klingon ships, in the meantime, stay comparatively unchanged — presumably, as Dr T’Ana suggests, as a result of their designs have been the identical for many years: “They at all times need their ships to appear like huge silly birds.”
Fortunately — in one other hat tip to Dr T’Ana — there is a “sneaky underhanded Kirk-style trick we will use to f**ok her up like they did within the previous days”, as demigod Ensign Olly (launched in “Of Gods and Angles“, season 5) fires a lightning bolt to disable Relga’s shields. The following Schrödinger shock wave causes them to devolve into “senseless proto-Klingons stuffed with rage”, and their ship is destroyed.
How does the Cerritos shut the rift?
Teamwork. Whereas California class ships are pretty old-fashioned by Starfleet requirements, Rutherford realizes their versatile performance is a advantage, and — after ditching his implant to unleash some super-fast engineering — diverts the rift’s power into the Cerritos’s dilithium chamber. In impact, the fissure is now powering the ship.
Then, when the Cerritos bifurcates into two quantum potentialities, each controlling the opposite, co-science leads Tendi and T’Lyn go into anime-mode to unite as “science besties”, bringing the decoupled ships again collectively.
Alas, after they get inside vary of the fissure, the gluonic beam would not shut the rift because it ought to, so Malor suggests constructing a dam to include the power. The plan is successful, however it leaves the now-stable rift in a completely open state.
What does this imply for the way forward for the “Decrease Decks” characters?
Paramount+ has already confirmed that “Decrease Decks” season 5 would be the present’s final, however this finale opens up loads of alternatives for a spin-off — simply as “Star Trek: Picard” left the turbolift doorways open for the as-yet-unconfirmed “Star Trek: Legacy” follow-up, that includes Seven-of-9 as captain of the rebranded USS Enterprise-G.
There are particular “Deep House 9” vibes to the brand new set-up. In “DS9”, the eponymous house station was the gatekeeper for the newly-opened Bajoran wormhole that offered a path to the Gamma Quadrant. Starbase 80 — whose retro design makes it impervious to the rift’s tachyon emissions — is poised to satisfy an analogous function on the doorstep of this new portal to parallel universes. Carol Freeman will get a Benjamin Sisko-like gig as rift overseer, and a present that targets the multiverse relatively than a single universe might be a brand new frontier for the franchise.
Again on the Cerritos, in the meantime, the Decrease Deckers have all risen to key positions on the bridge — most notably Mariner and Boimler, who’re newly promoted Captain Ransom’s picks as provisional first officers. Though the dynamic on board could have shifted, there’s nonetheless potential to spend extra time with a crew who embrace the very fact they don’t seem to be the most effective Starfleet has to supply. “This is not the top of the story,” says Mariner on the finish of the episode. “It is the start.” You’ll be able to’t assist hoping that is true — not least as a result of Tendi and Rutherford certainly have to get collectively quickly.
Each episode of “Star Trek: Decrease Decks” is obtainable to observe on Paramount+.
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