All four of the Lower Decks crew must testify in front of an angry alien named Clar about seemingly unrelated incidents while the Captain and the rest of the command crew remain suspended in front of them.
1. Maybe Boimler has to be a stickler for the rules
Mariner’s testimony shows the four main characters in the repair bay, missing the red alert as Rutherford accidentally disabled them in an attempt to make them louder. As Mariner and Boimler sprint to the bridge, Boimler wants to confess while Mariner insists that they wing it.
Mariner manages to finesse her way out of giving any real advice to the Captain, but when Boimler tries to do the same , he utterly fails and embarrasses himself in front of every Commander. Boimler at his worst gives off a teacher’s pet vibe combined with an unhealthy aspiration to climb up the chain of command. But maybe he has to. Mariner is a natural and has a great deal of experience to boot. Boimler on the hand isn’t, and has to work twice as hard to get similar results.
2. The Commander’s always seem to be doing something really cool and important
The commanding officers’ cliquey-ness is on full display in this episode. Each of the ensigns’s testimony showing a story en media res with the ensigns trying to play catch up, particularly in Tendi and Rutherford’s testimonies.
Seeing the work of the Federation of Planets being carried out from the point of view of the “redshirts” remains one of the show’s greatest strengths. This episode has an interesting spin on that strength by having the episode show this.
3. Rutherford and Tendi are basically the same person
I’ve been lenient in the past because supporting characters can take a few episodes to get as fleshed out as the main characters; but Sam Rutherford and D’vana Tendi are similar to the point of being interchangeable.
Even their testimonies are almost beat for beat the same joke, with slight variations. The person testifying is put in a dangerous situation by their commanding offers and given no real context about what exactly they are doing. Parts of their story are missing and the person cross examining them gets frustrated by the lack of information they get.
Besides their department and some alien or cyborg jokes thrown in, their enthusiasm, passion for their work, and aversion to confrontation or being disliked makes them feel like they’re basically the same person.
4. Boimler’s a suck up but he’s not blind
Because the three ensigns’s stories don’t adequately reveal what the bridge crew did, Boimler is forced to explain that neither they nor the commanders really know what’s going on most of the time. Boimler then cites their log reports and gives examples of times they’ve made mistakes in order to prove his point about their fallibility.
Boimler continues to be more and more fleshed out beyond a rank hungry goody-two-shoes by showing he sees the commanding officers in a positive but realistic light.
5. Captain Transparent
The big reveal of the episode is that, despite all the evidence to the contrary, the commanding officers are not on trial and the four ensigns are not witnesses; but the alien assumed to be the prosecutor is throwing the commanding officers a party to commemorate the success of whatever it is that they did.
Mariner calls out Clar for giving them every reason to think it was in fact a trial as the Cerritos crew awkwardly leave. After Boimler’s speech, Captain Freeman promises to be more transparent with them in the future; but doesn’t answer any of their questions about what transpired as it is classified. It really hammers the point home that Freeman can’t really be forward with them – – and shows you why Mariner hates people in command so much.
