Drawn Into Lower Decks: recapping Caves

0:03 Mariner Boindler. Starfleet is better with you in it. I know, way man, I had your bag wrong. Yeah, I thought you were like a boring worker drone, and you are. It's a sort of unfair. Hello everyone, and welcome back to Drawn Into Lower Decks, a limited series from a film by podcast that focuses on the animated comedy Star Trek Lower Decks. Each week, we'll get you ready for the newest episode of Star Trek Lower Decks with an animated discussion about the latest not so epic mission of the USS Serritos. Read alert listeners. As always, just know that spoilers are ahead. If you haven't seen the latest episode, please go watch it before you hear what we have to say. As always, I'm SKYT Hoffman and I'm Wayne Whited. You know, we tried to get one of our fellow Lower Deckers, David Burns, to come back with us. I think he get repped up with a certain Lieutenant Levy Levy talking about conspiracy theories, so I'm not really buying it. So as we get close to wrapping up the season, we can hope that section thirty one allows them to come back.

1:14 Well, I can tell you right now that I received a subspace dispatch from Starfleet headquarters that David has been found and I believe there's a rescue mission is on its way right now to bring him back to us. Fantastic, fantastic. I'm miss chatting with him. I'll be glad to see him back when we get a hold of him. So, yeah, this week we're going to talk about the latest episode Caves. Wayne wanted to give us a quick deep dive into it, all right. The lower deckers Boimler, Mariner, Rutherford, and Tendie are sent to Grotenus on an away mission to study moss, only to find themselves trapped underground in a cave. In desperate to find a way out, the four recount stories of past adventures stuck in similar situation, all the while the strangely growing, aggressive moss slowly creeps closer. Yeah, it almost had kind of the moss had kind of a D and D quality to it that seemed like, I guess this creeping moss like a creeping fungus, not quite like slime, but it was getting there. I thought this was a great episode. It was almost like a four in one or a three in one kind of episode. So definitely got our money's worth.

2:28 Written by Ben Rogers, directed by Megan Lloyd, And you know, Caves is a great trope, a classic trope in Star Trek. When we were first kind of hearing about this episode and it was such a simple title, I was trying to figure out, like, could that have like a deeper meaning, Is this like an allegory or something, But no, it was really just simply about caves. Yeah, so very straightforward. I mean, it's got a simple name, but it was a simple episode and we needed something like that because we got two more episodes left. And I have a feeling, well, actually I have more than a feeling. I think I read the uh the press release for them that it's a two parter and it's going to be a big one. So this is a nice little layover, slower episode that that we need before the big stuff hits. Absolutely, that's a good point. I think it was. It was very self contained.

3:20 There was not even a mention of the mystery ship at all, right, which, like you said, is kind of nice. It almost seems like this could almost be a mini sampler for somebody who hasn't necessarily watched much of the show if they just want to kind of a sample, but they're a star Trek fan, this is definitely a place where they could dive in. Oh definitely. I mean, the episode centered on the four lower deckers, so the main characters. We I mean, we saw a little bit of the other characters, but this was there those four. This is their story. Perfect episode for anyone who's wanting to get familiar with the series. Yep. It also could be a very good setup for you know, they this foursome has always been very close from the beginning, so it could be a good kind of refreshing, emotional setup for what's coming in the next two.

4:09 It definitely brought to mind a lot of the cave episodes in Trek. I've always enjoyed those, to be honest, Even somewhere it's just kind of, you know, a cave is a small part of it, and somewhere the entire episode centers around it. One of a few that I've been kind of thinking about in the past couple of days. Some of the favorites. One is Final Mission from Next Generation. That's a good episode Wesley's last Yeah, and it's one of my favorite Wesley episodes because he really does kind of you know, stand up and come in his zone with that one trapped in trapped with Picard in a cave with this inaccessible water source, complete with your standard cave in and standard injured crew member, which seems to go hand in hand with the caves. But as soon as they walk into the first as soon as they walked into this cave system, that's one of the first episodes that came to mind for mem Well, that's a good that's a good cave episode.

5:10 You You've picked one of the better ones of the next generation, perfect example. Yeah, also the Enemy also from generations. Uh it really, I mean probably intentionally it brought to mind Enemy Mine with Dennis Quaid and Iron Eagles, Lewis Gaston Junior. It's an amazing movie and I think it's an amazing episode that you know, let's Jeordi shine in some new ways. What are some of the other kind of tropes that were used to in trek history that kind of come to light in this episode We saw there was actually quite a few of them besides just getting stuck inside a cave. And you know, there was mentioned all the caves look the same, and that's correct.

5:56 They really did. Throughout the next generation Space signed Voyager, they use the same set. Then we also got some others, like the character becoming unexpectedly pregnant. We saw that a few times. The biggest one I remember is the child with Deanna Troy second season opener. And then we've got iron storms causing problems. That's very common Star Trek thing. We have characters that age rapidly, rapidly, that's all the way back to the original series. We've seen that almost every series. And then of course getting suck in a turbo lift you got to have that. I know there was one for Voyager, and then I think there was an episode. There was an episode with Deep Space nine and I believe Wharf was trapped in a turbo lift with children.

6:41 I think, oh no, it's Picard. It was Picard. He was trapped in the turbolift yep, yep. And I think there was a wasn't there a DS nine episode where Kira and Odo are trapped in some kind of a cave like structure and she's infected with something that's gradually turning into a rock. But then that's right, something else entirely is happening. I thought that was a very good episode. But yeah, and they brought back all of them. I think it's it's cool that you mentioned that it's the same cave set that they used for all the different cave episodes, because something I was trying to look for in this episode was to see if they were designing the background to be one cave from one episode or one cave from another, you know, if they were pulling an Easter egg for certain caves. And they did the cave set that we saw in Rutherford's story when he got pregnant that matched well. The cave set that we're talking about, the one that was shown throughout all the series, and the one that they kind of copied here was not as Stage sixteen at Paramount. It was their caves. It was the cast nicknamed a Planet Hell because they hated filming in that best set, and they definitely were calling back to that. It looked just like it look exactly like it. Yeah. Well, and I think it's interesting when you mentioned, like the the ion storms and everything that kind of comes back to this. One of my favorite moments we can just kind of dive right into that is Mariner's line where she says, a bunch of rocks always blocks centuries

8:16 and technological progress. Yeah, that's kind of interesting how much that happens. I mean, you know, we're still trying to get technology right nowadays, so it's understandable. But yeah, that they fall into some of those tropes. You know that it always comes back to a cave in and yeah, it's it's this five and one episode, so the core episode itself, But like you said, we see Rutherford and doctor to Anna basically raising a cave baby. We see Mariner and Delta Shift with the kind of the aging minerals, Boimler and Levy with the Vendalorians, which is a little new to me, but I think in mid series fans will recognize them. And then Tendy and the turbolift during the pilot. I love the fact that Tendy couldn't get a word in edgewise, like she could never tell her story. But of course that was the one at the end of the day that ended up getting out of the jam there. Yeah, what were some of your favorite moments?

9:16 I really liked how simple this episode was. It was just four lower deckers together on their away mission, but it really explored how they're dealing with their new promotions, their new responsibilities and kind of showed how their friendship has grown over the last four years of the series. Tendy's turbolift story was my favorites. That takes place right after the events of the very first episode of Lower Decks, and it really showed how far the characters have went, but it also showed just exactly how close these four are as friends, and that was one of my favorites. Plus, you know the way they were playing games during socks into the circle. Yeah, yeah, that would keep yourself entertained somehow, and when you're trapped on a turbo lift, that's perfect, that's right. That would not be a pleasant game, but they did a good job of keeping themselves occupied. Yeah, I totally agree. I think it's cool that we're at the we're at the point with Lower Decks where we can have a flashback that gives us a sensit of nostalgia for the first episode and it's kind of like, wow, it's that mature at this point.

10:22 So that was cool to see. And yeah, a lot of little bite sized episodes in here. I was kind of worried at first that it would be it maybe think of some of the other TV shows that'll do flashbacks and it just shws clips from other shows, which is a total cop out, but I'm glad we got some original things here. The show kind of arrange, like you said, of their growth, especially with Mariner and Delta Shift, that's something that's been this big animosity. But we saw that character growth of like, look, man, we get the night Shift, we get to clean up all your stuff. We don't get the cool things that happen. We just get to pick up the pieces. It was interesting to see their growth a little bit too, And I want if we might see a little bit more a Delta Shift next season. Oh, I'm sure we will.

11:05 So plenty of deep cuts. One of them was fairly big. We've already talked about a little bit of one in terms of the cave set and also the kind of stuff. But as far as deep cuts, what were some of your favorite Easter exits stood up in this one? There wasn't too many in this episode, but the big one was the Vendorians. They first appeared in the animated series, as you mentioned, the episode's named The Survivor. It's actually a very good episode, and they've they appeared on an earlier Lower Decks episode. This isn't their first appearance on this show. It was called Envoys, And I laughed because apparently they were behind that whole warp speed limit that causes damage to subspace that was going on during the last season of The Next Generation, which was the center of the stories for like three or four episodes, and then completely forgotten about. Yeah, never to be mentioned to get in And I laughed when they brought that up because even that back then, when I first saw that episode, I thought, well, that's kind of a stupid thing to do, you know, limit yourself like that.

12:07 But now it was a whole plot that they were behind. But they were not behind the Klingon Civil War. We got to remember that. Yep, yep, ye Other ones there. Like I said, there wasn't too many, but pergium was mentioned the element in the caves. That was that's used for power reactors. That was first seen all the way back in the original series The Devil in the Dark. That was the one with the horde of the silicon creature that was crawling around on on the ground and laying the eggs a very very very early episode of the series. But it was also mentioned on Voyager Fair Trade and DS nine Proginal Daughter. That's two episodes that's brought up, but this is the first time we've actually seen it since that original episode. And then the only other one I caught was there was a mention of Wolf three five nine. We're all very familiar with that from Best of Both Worlds in Eminsary, but this this episode was about those four characters, so they kept it to a minimum. The the callbacks the other series, yep. Yeah, that that kind of dinner exchange between Boimler Levy and the Vandalorians when he's mentioning, like, you know, Wolf three five nine was a tragedy Q exists, the card isn't some hologram, and the Voyagers emh is a hologram. I was kind of thinking, that's that's interesting.

13:30 I'm sure there's forums where that kind of stuff is. You know, out there is different theories and different ideas. I do feel like that would be a cave system in it of itself, like pursuing any of those would just lead down this giant rabbit hole that'd be kind of hard to pursue. I did think it was interesting when we saw the the Mariner story and there is that idea of that unapproachable element that was crucial to them surviving very much. It's the reason I watched Final Mission again because it reminded me of that giant fountain that they needed to survive but couldn't approach because it would, you know, hit them with an energy beam of some kind. But in generally, it just you know, it pulled up a bunch of tropes that that we're used to in this and I don't know it, it made me want to rewatch a couple of older episodes. There are some where you get a little bit of a cave and not much like Times zero when they had the Opidians and all of the kind of stuff. And I can't remember the name of it, but there's the the Picard episode with the four Lights. It's a two parter. Oh well, chain of Command, Yes with Kardashians, Yes, thank you. Yeah, And I know. So it's one of those things where it, you know, a cave is tangentially related because they have

15:01 to try to go spill lunking in order to achieve the mission, but the whole thing doesn't take place within it. Yeah. I think it's used to great effect in Star Trek throughout its history. And I'm glad to see them kind of you know, give us some love on this one. Oh yeah, and the whole episode when you were talking about East eggs, really, this whole episode's and easter egg to Star Trek as a whole, even including Lowers Decks, it is an Easter egg to itself. Yep. Absolutely, So we've got the benefit of seeing several different stories here, so we've got a lot of people to choose from for a pipworthy moment. One of those chances to see that character growth in the lower deckers. Which one do you think stole the show this week? Oh? Well, this was really hard to choose because all four really received equal time and they all had great stories.

15:54 I think I'm going to give an odd answer, but the spotlight this week was Star Trek itself and how Lower Ducks Decks can pook fun at the settings and the concepts of Star Trek, yet it still fits perfectly within the whole Star Trek continuity. But I also want to give one little notice to Shaks's brief but very hilarious appearance in this episode. It scared me. Yeah, yeah, that was great effect. I'm here to say, just rips it open. With that great lighting cast on him. I thought that was a good pull of all the different stories I tried to think of, you know what kind of shows one of those moments that kind of stands out from all the rest. And for me, I think it was rutherfree, which I know I did in the last episode, but the fact that when they they mentioned the when he mentions the cave Baby itself, he talks about it like it's no big deal. Like I would think that anybody else would like rush home and say like, Okay, so I just went through a really weird thing and tell this entire story. But he's just like, yeah, you take and stride one of those things that just kind of happens, yea.

17:03 And uh So that kind of that kind of attitude, that kind of approach comes through in his vignette when he's uh saving the cave Baby from the giant cave dwelling monster so to speak, when he modifies the tricorder to communicate it with it and speak its language. I felt like that's very star Trek, You're That was a good story, And I liked how they used to Tiana in that part of that that story because we don't see too much of her a one liner sort of thing. She's usually the way the grumpy cat doctor, but we really got to see a different side to her. I mean, she was actually smile, She actually really liked the baby. It was It was a touching scene. Plus, I mean her to cintegrating that that diaper with the phaser, that was a nice call. When't we all love to do that? Yes, yes, I can say that for a fact, as long as there's no residual smell, the last thing I want to smell is burning baby diaper. So before we wrap up, you know, this is one where we again didn't see too much of the ship itself, but usually we talk about getting into the turbolift and exploring some of the other decks and where we'd like to explore. Where would you want to be in this week's episode? Oh, I think I'm gonna I'd want to be on the turblelift with before of them. Yeah, the beginning of their adventure.

18:30 This was right at the beginning of this whole series, of the whole adventure that they're having. They're they're just having fun and being friends, and I want to be their friends too. Yeah, I'm exactly in the same place. I mean, I would I'd want to carefully avoid the rage fungus, and I'm sure that they are parts of that, you know, situation that would get kind of ripe after a little while. But it's the early days when they're just becoming friends and they're not you know, turning on each other. There's no kind of tension or toxicity that develops. They're just four friends hanging out and it was just great to I think it was a great way to wrap up the entire episode to show them all kind of connected, especially that final shot where you see that overhead of them all kind of laying together in kind of a square. It was just a great moment. And I'm sure there's a lot of stories that we didn't hear that what we'd like to hear at some point. And I want to point out this is something we don't mention very much, but I got to mention on this one.

19:36 So I really enjoyed it. Chris west Westlake's score for this episode was just absolutely brilliant, very beautiful music. I hope that we get a soundtrack release for this because I'd love to hear that separate. It was just absolutely outstanding this episode. Yeah, that's a good call. That's a good point. All right, Wayne, Well, thank you again for joining me for this episode. Like you said, hopefully we get David back sometime soon. We'll look forward to that. I think he'll be beaming in very soon. Yep. So, Wayne, how would you like to chat with one of the actual Lower Decks crew? I would love to be able to chat with them. I got a lot of questions. Same. So next week, we're excited to be joined by the director of tomorrow's penultimate episode, Brandon Williams.

20:25 He's coming to us with a perspective as a seasoned storyboard artist on Lowerdecks. He's been on Solar Opposites and a recent Mortal Kombat movie, just to name a few. He's also been the director of two of our favorite episodes from this season, and we can't wait to hear more from him about his trek experience. All right, listeners, Well, we appreciate you joining us for another mission. As always, Hele and Freakancities are always open, so feel free to share your thoughts, predictions, questions on social media. You can find us at a film by podcast dot com, a film by podcast at gmail dot com, on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Tune in next week and we'll see you then Mission see you later, h