Boimler is reassigned on a mission with Mariner to the Daystrom Institute on Earth while Rutherford’s boss, Chief Engineer Billups, is forced to fix his mother’s ship and reconcile with his past royal past.
1. Mariner Doesn’t Think Boimler’s Ready
At the beginning of the episode, we see Boimler is looking forward to wrangling giant centipede with Ransom and tackling more dangerous missions in order to bolster his experience. Unfortunately, he gets reassigned with Mariner to bring a dangerous computer to the Daystrom Institute on Earth.
While they both get pulled into an anomaly and get stranded with the computer on habitable but hostile planet, the evil supercomputer reveals to Boimler that Mariner asked Ransom to reassign Boimler for his own safety. There are several well placed hints that Mariner still doubts Boimler capabilities, when he laments that he could be on Dansk fighting centipedes, Mariner casually mentions that he could also have died.
As is so often the case with Mariner, she doesn’t do this out of malice or spite towards Boimler but out of a sense of concern for him. While she is prone to ribbing and teasing her fellow ensign, her most hurtful actions towards him are more an issue of patronising him and meddling as a result. This is all the more ironic when you consider this is the main crux of the arguments between herself and her mother Captain Freeman.
2.The Royal Stud
Apparently, the Chief Engineering Officer of The Cerritos Andy Billups is the son to the Queen of Hysperia and heir to the throne. Although the Queen insists she merely wants her son’s help fixing her engine, Billups expects another one of her mother’s tricks. Queen Paolana often attempts to trick him into having sex, as by Hysperian law, this will make him become the new king of Hysperia.
The Hysperian ship Billups and Rutherford visit in order to fix the engine is fantastical and medieval in its style. Billups even begins to use the Hysperian vernacular for engineering terms, which make the dull engineering terms sound like they’re magic. Rutherford attempts to acclimate but is quickly stopped by Billups, who seems to regret doing so himself.
3. Rutherford’s Comfort Zone
Rutherford, being the talented engineer that he is, is chosen by Billups to assist him on his mother’s ship The Monaveen. Rutherford is nervous about being on such a culturally different and prestigious ship.
Despite taking a minute to find his feet, Rutherford ends up loving his time on The Monaveen, enjoying the food and festivities on offer.
Once Queen Paolana’s plan to fake her and Rutherford’s death so her son will take up the throne becomes clear, he springs into action to save his boss and stop him from losing his virginity. It turns out Queen Paolana still believes her son’s vocation is beneath him.
4. Tendi’s Comfort Zone
While Tendi was a huge proponent of Rutherford stepping out of his comfort zone, she ironically is the one who is put out of hers. When it is believed Rutherford and Queen Poalana perished in a tragic accident, Tendi blames herself for encouraging Rutherford to go on The Monaveen.
When she apologises to Rutherford for pressing him to go he tells her that he had a great time on The Monaveen and is somewhat unphased by the fact that Tendi briefly thought he was dead; calling it “another day in Starfleet.” Tendi’s nervous agreeable laughter highlights how emotional of an experience it was for her to think her best friend was dead and believe herself to be the one responsible for it.
5. Boimler outsmarts AI
Believing the shocking revelation of Mariner’s betrayal has thoroughly convinced Boimler to follow his advice, the evil supercomputer AGIMUS works with Boimler to restart the computer. Although this solves Mariner and Boimler’s issue of being stranded on a damaged shuttle cruiser, plugging AGIMUS into the computer could potentially be disastrous.
Thankfully, Boimler stunning Mariner was all part of an elaborate plan to convince the AGIMUS that he had successfully tricked Boimler. As AGIMUS monologues his evil plan and rebukes Boimler for falling for his trap only to realise he is only connected to the dimmer switch.
Boimler manages to prove Mariner wrong in a very mature way, unlike last season when he lorded his brief moment of superiority over her, he seems content in the fact that he solved the problem they both faced.
