In what we’ll name the “A-story,” Captain Freeman will get wind of the truth that the junior officer within the crew employs one thing referred to as “buffer time,” which suggests they mainly fake like sure duties take longer than they actually do. This joke comes straight from Scotty in Star Trek III: The Search For Spock when Kirk realizes that Scotty all the time multiples his “restore estimates by an element of 4.” Mainly, when Captain Freeman realizes that everybody within the crew makes use of what Rutherford calls “artistic estimating,” she immediately implements cut-off dates and quotas on everybody’s duties on the ship, in every single place. This concept permits Decrease Decks to create a shipboard disaster that’s completely of their very own making. It retains the present true to its construction as a office sitcom in area, however if you happen to’ve ever seen the Voyager episode referred to as “The Voyager Conspiracy,” you’ll discover one thing acquainted right here. Boimler is under no circumstances the Seven of 9 of the USS Cerritos, however he does love work and he does love effectivity. And, identical to Seven, a part of the episode is designed to remind Boimler that he must loosen up.
In the meantime, the “B-story,” focuses on easy methods to comply with the principles whenever you’re combating aliens with crystal spears who’ve been profoundly offended. And that is the place the continuous Captain Kirk jokes occur. Sure, Commander Ransom usually does leg-leans harking back to Riker, however he’s clearly the Kirk of this collection. That mentioned, Mariner has confirmed herself to additionally be the Kirk of the present, too, insofar as she loves to interrupt guidelines and she or he positively kicks ass. On this episode, she will get, what is maybe, the very best joke in the complete collection saying, “Circled by spears, this can be a basic! What am I Kirk, what is that this, the 2260s, all proper.”
Some may say this type of meta-joke goes too far, as a result of Mariner shouldn’t be making jokes about Kirk a lot. However, as we already know from Icheb in Star Trek: Voyager, Starfleet officers within the late 24th century have defied Kirk the identical approach we love Batman, solely on this case Batman could be an actual individual. Marnier is clearly a Kirk fan, and when she exhibits Ransom all of her scars, it could be clear that she’s extra of a Kirk than him. And, in some methods, that’s sort of what the episode is about. When Ransom goes out into the ring to combat the enormous inexperienced area monster (who is definitely a pleasant man) he rips off his shirt and proceeds to do mainly all of Kirk’s signature combat strikes.
