‘Star Trek: Lower Decks’ Recap – ‘Starbase 80?!’

11/17/2024

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Still from ‘Star Trek: Lower Decks’ Courtesy of Paramount+.

Caution: This article contains spoilers for Episode 505 of ‘Star Trek: Lower Decks’. To revisit the previous episode, click here.

One unfortunate truth about people in the modern world, is that we still have tendency to judge people on reputation and concept alone, and it makes sense as to why. For we are emotional beings who process what we hear and read about through our emotions often, and if we hear something polarizing about a person or a place, in any capacity, we will have that response, and we will judge accordingly. Because our emotions and our brains believe… we must have a formed opinion about that response and well, what makes this unfortunate, is that it tends to lead to embarrassing moments for us all. Especially since it brings forth an all-important lesson.

In that, we should never judge a book by its cover, and never quite believe what we hear. Because what the world tells us versus the reality of the situation don’t always align, and it is painful to know that we might have hurt someone or impacted a business or a destination, courtesy of silly prejudices or goofy rumors that make no sense, and it doesn’t matter how wise we become or how much we learn in this life. For this is related to our core responses, and that makes this a lesson we have to learn often, and likely will long into the future, as evidenced by the next episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks on Paramount+. A feat that ‘Starbase 80?!’ accomplished, by bringing the crew of the U.S.S. Cerritos, to that dreaded place.

Courtesy of a navigational malfunction, following a very wet mission that Cetacean Ops took the lead upon, and well… since the dreaded Starbase 80 was the nearest place to get repairs, the ship made their way there and prejudices and assumptions absolutely came into play. After all, this downtrodden, Those Old Scientists-era looking station, was run down and filled with quirky officers that were likely called cast offs and buffoons somewhere down the line. Plus, very little worked in this place. If anything, its appearance and its functionality was similar to a decommissioned, heavily used oil rig from our century and that led to all kinds of problems for the crew. Since they simply could not get anything done, or the find the parts they needed. Not to mention, things got weird.

Still from ‘Star Trek: Lower Decks’ Courtesy of Paramount+.

Because midway through the search for parts, the crew of the Cerritos, began to exhibit zombie like behavior. The kind where they often licked things, and touched people in a creepy manner and well, Mariner thought that was related to the station itself and its reputation for being a forgotten place by Starfleet and most of the Federation. But it quickly became clear, that there was something more at work here, and with a quality team up and some hard thinking and great science, it was made clear that the problem arose on the Cerritos. For a strange entity took over the ship and its crew through technology and was exploring the world through their conscious mind. But with some fine observations from new friends at Starbase 80 the crew was able to stop this infection and save the day.

All of which was proof positive of how we judge a book by its cover because of first impressions, or a lack of understanding or the rumors we hear. Because for five seasons now, Starbase 80 has the been the butt of a lot of jokes in this show, funny ones for sure, but this series loves to go deeper, and well… we learned so much here. Such as how this station is indeed forgotten by Starfleet, and it casts off people it cannot find a right fit for and that doesn’t mean it is a place for defective people or some kind of doomsday station for punishment. It’s just a square peg in the round hole that is Starfleet and filled with capable officers who have accomplished wonders without the vast resources of the Federation and well, had everyone come in with open minds they would have seen that.

But alas, judgment is strong, and those pre-conceived notions came into play and reminded them, and us, of the lesson at hand and that made for one lovely episode. One that once again, spoke to bigger concepts about humanity and things we could and should be doing differently in our chaotic world right now and that’s wondrous. Because that is what the franchise stands for and that is what the franchise expresses best. Of course, it also did it here in a hilarious manner, since the quirkiness was real, and the problems were vast, and hopefully the captain and Ransom got out of that incident with the bats with just scratches instead of puncture wounds. But that aside, this was just more vintage Star Trek, and a chance to see an infamous place, one that was not at all, what we thought it to be. Until next time.

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