Phasers Set To Stun: Lower Decks S5.E9 Fissure Quest

0:01 Space the Final Frontier. Join us for a bold conversation our prime directive to recap our favorite Star Trek shows, both new and old, to engage and debate about all things Trek. Prepare to energize with Phasers Set to Stunt. Welcome back to an all new episode of Phasers Sect to Stun, where we continue to show our love for everything Star Trek in this ongoing series from a film by podcast which focuses on every dimension of the expanding Star Trek universe by covering television, movies, animation, directors, merchandise, and much much more. Plotting your course on this final voyage of the Us of Cerritos to Shapoor Trek Crew.

1:03 I'm Wayne Whiten, I'm David Burns, and I'm Skot Hoffmann. Today we are talking about the ninth episode of the fifth season of Star Trek Lower Decks, titled Fissier Quest, written by Lauren Maguire and directed by Brandon Williams. So, Scott, why don't you give us a short summary of the episode. But like you said, Wayne, we're in the next to last episode of Lower Decks and they're going out with a bank. This was one of the best of the series on so many levels. In my opinion, we're further than ever into the Quantum Fissure plot thread, where we catch up with Captain Boimler in the Defiant class an Axamander I'll try to say that, and they shortened it to Nacient. He was recruited by Section thirty one in season two, and we're finally finding out what he's been doing.

1:47 His crew has been chasing the people behind these fissures and trying to clean up the mess they left behind. He's joined by Paul Curzon, Decks, and a bevy of ensigns, all who are Harry Kim. The things change when a two Pip Kim comes aboard along with an alternate Mariner, and they finally catch up to the culprit of this multiversal mess, the USS Beagle. Their crew is from a different type of starfleet, not the mustache twiling villain type, but the type that explores different realities to learn more about ourselves. This is backed with so many details and amazing characters. I honestly just want to dive in and start talking about it without saying anymore. I also can't wait for the next week's episode, even though I don't want it to end. I want to say a quick congratulations to both Lauren maguire and Brandon Williams. Obviously we've talked about Brandon a ton, we've had him on the show.

2:41 Just seeing his name in the credits for this next last episode is amazing and he did not disappoint with his direction, nor did Lauren with the writing. It was both just pitch perfect. And we now have one one with a full beard. But we're good. Yes, yeah, finally that's how you know it's end. Let's tell you know what the ending is. You get the Reker beard. Now we're good. All right, David, what do you think of the episode? There is a lot to enjoy about this episode, so much as crammed into this little amount of time that it's over before you realize it. One of the things I love that they addressed in this is because of you know, tackling the whole multiverse thing. I loved that because I'm so sick of it with Marvel, I'm so sick of it with DC. I'm so glad that they tackle that, Like I'm so sick of the multiverse. So I love I love all of that, and I also love the fact that the bad guy really wasn't the bad guy. It was like they didn't realize what they were doing. And then you know, we get the the two Pep Kim who actually causes the biggest problem of all, which obviously we're going to figure find out in the last episode.

3:50 But overall, I love this episode. Yeah, I agree. You know, Boiemler said that I'd be happy to never hear the word multiverse ever again, and I've always agreed with that, you know, especially you know, with all the Marvel stuff. But this is the first time Star Trek has ever tackled that that I'm aware of, and I'm really enjoying it, especially because we get to see a lot of returns. You know, it's great seeing some love given to Star Trek enterprise with this episode. Yes, and of course, you know, it's incredible to hear Jeline Laylock back to play to Paul. I mean, she she's been very elusive when it comes to Star Trek. She rarely ever makes a convention appearance or talks about the show. It's not that she doesn't she hates a show, or she's trying to distance herself. She's just too busy, you know.

4:34 I loved her character on Enterprise, and it's so glad to have her back because she was such a strong lead. And all of them, I mean, it's great hearing them all. You know, I never thought that we would ever see, you know, Baser and Garrick or any of them, you know, back doing Star Trek again. Here they are. It's funny. It was kind of like that data moment when a few episodes ago when I had to stop and listen, is that Brent Spiner? And then in this one, Paul I had to like stop and listen, is that Julien and the shirt up? Oh my god, it is, yeah, and it was It's great that, you know, the bad guy this season ended up not really being a bad. Guy at all. You know. It's just you know, a crew, a different star fleet exploring the universe, you know, the different universes. You know, they don't even know they're causing any damage.

5:24 You know. Now we got this this universe threatening phenomenon for the lower Deckers to solve. And I think, honestly, this is a perfect way of ending the series, since they have to end it by giving him something that's just like exponentially ridiculous and difficult to solve. I can't wait till the next episode to see how they solve this. But what a jerk move. Oh yeah, you're right, it is. It is Where to send that. To the one reality? What that's not there the whole When he looked at the that. Goes yeah, I know that was my favorite. What a cliffinger, But I. Mean great that he has that much faith in his own lower Decks crew. He knows that if anybody can handle what's coming, not necessarily, are they going to be able to stop it? Are they going to be able to live with it, roll with it, do whatever they need to do, right, they're the only people that can handle it. It was great seeing that that other boiler Boimler Dave, like you were saying, like the whole multiverse thing.

6:27 He just seems so exhausted with the whole thing, ye, which is kind of speaks to how they wanted to handle the season. Right, We're not going to throw like you know, crew cut what did he say, crew cut nelix aggurated thing. I was like that just to do it, just because it feels like it's a bit lazy, But the ways that they brought it in was fantastic. I mean seeing to Paul was great knowing that they got the original cast for Garrick and Basher. I know that's a deep cut for DS nine for them to be married, and I love that he is an e mh. Yeah, that was a nice little touch. It was.

7:08 But the character I loved seeing most was Curzon Dax, who I don't remember ever seeing. It was just all these stories from Cisco about the old man and also the kind. Of stuff, but it was so brief appearances. It was so brief flashback appearances that you can barely even say he even appeared. Yeah, you know, we we mentioned a few times about the animation. I know we talked about that last week, that the animation was really good. We talked about one shot when they were on the Klingon world and how incredible that was. There's one shot. In this episode that just I was like, whoa, that. Was a shot when you get that really distant shot of the two ships between the two fishures when talking about Yeah, I loved that shot. That was incredible and that's one of my favorite shots of this whole season in my opinion.

7:54 Oh yeah, yeah, the whole episode is beautifully animated. You know, from the character's movement to the action. It's just wonderfully dredged by Brandon Williams. Yes, he does a great job and he really knocked it out of the bark with this one. Yeah. Well, animation wise, one of the ones that hit me the most was when Paul is trying to take all that contra from Curzon and there's that little blur moment where you see kind of two Cursons on either side. When I was watching this the second time, I was kind of wondering if that would be the only time that we saw this crew, because I kind of want to see like war with Paul I do. How does that pass on?

8:35 Right? Brilliant casting. We got so many great people coming. Back, Alfred Woodard her back and slow. That was the That was the data moment where I was like, I don't recognize Oh my god, And I kind of realized at the same time that Meredior did. Right. Yeah, I didn't either at first until she said her name, like, oh gosh, it is Yeah, I was trying to who that was. Now. The fact that they are wearing kind of enterprise era uniforms, is it fair to say that maybe the USS Beagle is one of the first ships that they've been using for this purpose, because it seems like wouldn't their federation have figured out the whole two fissure problem they were trying to solve.

9:21 I would say, yeah, it was probably one of the first. Yeah, okay, okay. I'm also kind of interested in how long this has been going on. So if if William Boimler has been recruited by Section thirty one and has been working within the whole time on this fissure thing, is that how long it's been happening. It's just behind the scenes. That I didn't know it. Yeah, I guess, so it could be. Yeah. How about how about the the panel keeps coming down and hitting people? Yeah? Oh yeah, yeah. You even hit the ship that I dude, I lost it when it hit the ship. I'm like, are you kidding me? And I love seeing a Defiant again. Yeah, yeah, Like that was fantastic. You can tell there's a lot of love DS nine on the series.

10:01 And they put a lot of attention to detail because the sets matched the Defiant sets that were used in Deep Space nine. I like the line where to Paul and Mariner, we're talking about big starfleet nerds and to Paul kind of implied that Archer is a giant star Fleet nerd. Yeah. Yeah, and then you know, Lily has a great line where she talks about Zef didn't get it for a minute either, so it's almost kind of saying, like, you know, maybe an older character isn't willing to kind of see this new way of exploring, but saying that it was exploring the multiverse is to learn more about ourselves, which just seems like a classic Lower Decks kind of line and something that crystallizes what they've been saying about this season in the series all along. Right, it doesn't have to be some kind of multiversal threat. It's a great one like it all kind of it's kind of born and wraps up in the same episode, you know, right, even though we see those repressions in the next episode, but I don't know that that kind of focus on humanity.

11:14 Is great to see. One of my favorite lines in this episode, probably for the whole season, was when Dak says, calm down, everyone's gonna get their ascaped. Yeah. I love that. Yeah, I love that line. Or I'm Harry and Kim. That had to be really cathartic for Garrett Wang to say that line. So now that we've given our opinions on the episode, let's take a look at the characters themselves. Which character do you think shines the most this week? David, I have to go with to Paul. We know how awesome she is from Enterprise, and she she carries over into this episode with that, but what she did in order to save the memory of Dak's really sent that over the top for me in my opinion. So she's smart, she's brilliant, she's beautiful, she's everything in one package, and she shows that again here in this episode.

12:10 So without a doubt to. Paul Scott, I'm gonna say, Harry Kim, I just can't identify which one, because there's one that says a line when two Pip Kim is, you know, going off the deep end and starting to take things over. One of the Harry's talks about just enjoying the experience of being in Starfleet, that it's it's valuing relationships more than rank, which just seems to speak to like every other Harry is fine with it. There's just one it was just so fed up with it that he couldn't stand it anymore. So.

12:52 The fact that they don't necessarily want a pip makes them pip worthy to me? What about chewing? I chose Harry Kim as well. It's obvious that they're making fun of the fact that he's an insign, and it seems like that he'll always be an insign. But you know, it's been a joke in the Star Trek community for so many years now, and of course lower decks best at taking those those silly things as jokes and going wild with it. But I love the how one Harry Kim, you know, makes it past his fate and gets promoted and he actually ends up being the bad guy of the episode and then getting blown up. So you know, maybe being an insign forever in such a bad thing, you know, But how could he not shine this episode? I mean there's eight of them, eight times the Harry Kim in this episode, so he has to stand out.

13:43 Although I think it's interesting how many Harry Kim's there were, Like, was that part of kind of saying, oh, I see how Brent Spiner seems to be like somebody who has had more roles in Star Trek universe than anything else. We'll go ahead and give Garrett a big head start by just giving a whole crew Fillry Kims. If you had a choice to be any character that appeared in this episode, which one would it be and why? Scott, I'll let you start with this one. All echo what Dave was talking about and go with to Paul taking on Curzon's Catra, which I don't know what that would feel like like. It feels like it would be a lot to hold in the brain, but to experience all the lifetimes of Curzon, including the experience with Cisco before DS nine, I assume I've always been interested in learning more about the old man. At the same time, there's kind of a Shepherd book quality where I don't really need to know those older stories, right, but it would be fascinating to kind of learn more about them.

14:41 Yeah, Dave, what about you? It's the same answer for me. It's I'm going to Paul again for this answer for exactly what you said. I couldn't imagine what it would be like to get to know the experiences of someone's life experiences, you know, like that getting to know and see everything they saw, getting to know everything they knew had to be very, very overwhelming, and for that to happen would just be something incredible in itself. So yeah, I agree with Scott both of my answers, and this is for to Paula. Well, for me, I think I chose Captain Ollie Sloan or actually any one of the crew of the Beagle. You know, as much as I tire hearing about the multiverse with with other properties. She really convinced me with her speech, just like she convinced h boymore fascinating. You know, it really would be fascinating to explore these different realities and you know, being able to see what could be or what you just missed or or you know, what shouldn't be. You know, I just when you think about it, it's the you know, the possibilities are endless, and it would be interesting to see, you know, how Earth, how the universe, how Starfleet, all that would have progressed if things have been different.

15:52 Yeah, that's a good answer, Wayne. Okay, now, because my favorite part where we dive deep into the episode and see if we can't pull out any Easter eggs, and boy we did in this episode. They were a lot in you know, with lower decks there's always a lot, but this episode had a lot. Start off, the the USS Aximander is a Defiant class starship, just like the USS Defiant Deep Space nine. Apparently, doctor Lewis Zimmermann got his long term medical holographic program up and running in his universe. In the regular Star Trek universe, he tried to create a new version of the hologram using doctor Julian Basheer's form, but it was stopped when it was revealed that Basher was a genetically enhanced human that was in the Deep Space nine episode Doctor Basher.

16:35 I presume that's a really good episode from the series. I suggest y'all'll go out and watch that. It's also mentioned that To Paul was married to Trip Tucker for sixty three years in her universe, but in the regular Star Trek universe, to Paul and Tucker ended their relationship and Tucker was killed in the line of duty in the final episode of Star Trek Enterprise, which was called These Are the Voyages. It seems that the USS Voyager had similar fates in many of the different universes. One of the Kims mentions fighting the Borg and aliens trying to steal their organs. That was a reference to the Videans from the early years of the series. Also, one of the Kims is wearing a white and black racing uniform that was seen in Voyager's episode Drive. This one I actually found interesting, and I really had to go back and look because I knew it. It looked familiar, but I had to really do some research. The design for the USS b Goal that's not a new design, it's a very similar design that was created for a really early version of the USS Enterprise. That version could be seen in one of the pictures that was on the wreck deck in Star Trek the motion picture, and was also used as a model in the film Star Trek Into Darkness. The Klopians were last seen in the Lower Decks first season episode Must to Do about Boimler, but they were much friendlier than they were in this episode. Yeah, they were all right. As Scott had mentioned earlier, Captain Lily Sloane and her crew where twenty second sin Re Starfleet uniforms similar to the design of the USS Enterprise, but the bridge and the corridors the Beagle were also

18:07 very much like the NXO one Enterprise from that series. You'll also notice that Captain Sloan's uniform is purple. Well, the rest of her cruise is blue. I'm not sure if this was intended, but I think it might have been because of the changes that the costume department made on the series Star Trek Enterprise at the beginning of season three. They had dyed the uniforms blue from their original purple, and I think that they just did that as a little call in joke back to that. And while the production staff were able to get back many of the legacy actors to voice their characters in this episode, they didn't really have to worry about the voice of Curtis on Dax. We mentioned that he hardly appeared in the series, but when we did see him, he never said anything, so it just could get anybody to see his voices. And finally, Joanline Blaylock's credit at the end of the episode isn't a mistake. According to producer Mike McMahon, she asked to be credited simply as Jolene.

19:00 I think a couple other things that kind of stood out to me, And I had forgotten about Frank Owen Smith, who played Curzon in the Emissary, and it kind of seems like this is who the Curson that we see supposed to be designed after Yeah, but it more struck with me that it almost seems like Curzon was almost designed to almost resemble Picard, which would have been kind of interesting if Cisco had grown up with Curson looking like Picard or at least similar to Picard, and then knowing what happens at Wolf through five nine. It also felt like maybe the original series was the only series that this episode did not touch on, Like you get a little bit of Star Trek, the animated series, you get Next Generation Voyager Deep Space nine, Like there were a lot of a lot of content from a lot of different series in this one.

19:48 Thought that's interesting. I had thought about that. I had actually went through to see if that maybe every Star Trek series had been mentioned. But other than the reference to the fact that there's a moorgified Kirk, just mentioned a Kirk that's fine from the original series. And of course there's no mention to Discovery in this episode, so I didn't left that. But everything else is mere So this in this way, I see the episode as a love of Star Trek, you know, Oh yeah, it's it's their their love letter, Charlves Star Trek fans. Great way to end. It, You can neverly tell. When they got together in the writing room there, they're like, we're out of time. We only got one last season, so we need to cram in as much as we can to give nods to all these other series and shows, and that's what they're doing.

20:29 Yeah, they did a great job with that. Yeah that it just sets us up for a great finale. Yep, I don't know what's going to happen. It's very interesting that it almost seems like Boimler was saying that whatever universe has to deal with this is doomed. Yeah, I'll be interested to see where that goes. I would hope it's not. But yeah, we'll have to see. And it's sad that our last episode for this show is coming out on Christmas Day, because that is not a Christmas present we want to give the last episode of Love Lower Decks. No, but if it's a good episode, then we'll be happy to give. It to you. Yes, yeah, it'll be better sweet, and it would be you know something that I would I would continue to just tell people about, Like, if you're a fan of Star Trek, you've got to watch this.

21:09 You've got to give it a shot. And Lower Decks over the last five years has just been an incredible experience. But one of the things that I'm grateful especially I'm going to bring this up because of this episode, is the fact that so many cast actors and actresses from Star Trek have been able to return to reprise their characters. H you know, characters, actors and actresses that we'd never hear again or see their characters. It's been an incredible experience with everything over the last five years. It's something that I didn't see where this was going when when the first season got announced that they were doing a Lower Decks Star Trek animation. I didn't see where they were going to go with this show. But man, it's been one heck of a five season ride. Now, Yeah, and that's it for this episode of Phasers Set to Stunts Look at Lower Decks Season five, episode nine.

21:57 We'd like to open a channel to our listeners and here just what you thought about the most recent episode and the season in general. Who knows, we might even mention you on a future show. Of course. You can email us at a film by Podcasts at gmail dot com, find us online at a film by podcast dot com, follow us on Facebook, Instagram, or other social media and if you're looking for more exclusive content our swag, you can join our Patreon and see what incredible gyms are hidden within. A big thank you to our fellow trek nerd Scott and David for joining me on this another fascinating episode, Absolutely great kay. Next episode, we take a look at episode ten, the final episode of Star Trek Lower Decks, titled The New Next Generation. This is the end and we look forward to warping back to the Soritos one final time to discuss them in phasers set to stunt