Recap / Star Trek: Lower Decks

The recap page for Star Trek: Lower Decks.

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Unmarked spoilers are present throughout the subpages as well as some of the synopses below. Read at your own risk.

Season 1

The first season of Star Trek: Lower Decks premiered in August 2020.

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1. "Second Contact": Captain Freeman charges Boimler with spying on Mariner during a ground mission. Meanwhile, Tendi's first day on the Cerritos is spent dealing with a zombie plague.
2. "Envoys": Boimler and Mariner's mission to escort a Klingon diplomat is complicated when he steals their shuttle and leaves them stranded. Meanwhile, Rutherford keeps transferring across the ship's divisions in order to have more time to spend with Tendi.
3. "Temporal Edict": Captain Freeman forces the crew to work without rest after hearing about its tradition of "Buffer Time". Meanwhile, Mariner and Commander Ransom are forced to fight in a gladiatorial arena after a diplomatic mission gone wrong.
4. "Moist Vessel": A towing mission gone wrong leads to the Cerritos being terraformed by alien technology. Meanwhile, Tendi's clumsiness prevents Lieutenant O'Connor's spiritual ascension.
5. "Cupid's Errant Arrow": Mariner is convinced that Boimler's too-perfect girlfriend is an alien imposter. Meanwhile, Rutherford and Tendi try to avoid being forced to transfer to the Vancouver.
6. "Terminal Provocations": Mariner and Boimler need to covertly deal with a feral computer core created by another ensign's mistakes. Meanwhile, Rutherford's experimental training program achieves sapience and tries to kill him.
7. "Much Ado About Boimler": When Boimler is left stuck in a partly corporeal state in a transporter accident, he's sent off to "the Farm" alongside other victims of freak accidents and is caught in the middle of an uprising. Tendi and her genetically engineered mutant dog are also sent along for the ride.
8. "Veritas": The ensigns are forced to testify in an alien court about the actions of the bridge crew. However, all of their accounts are filled with holes because Rutherford has amnesia, Tendi has to censor classified information, and nobody tells ensigns anything.
9. "Crisis Point": Boimler uses the crew's private logs to create a hyperrealistic simulation to train for an interview. Mariner deals with some issues by using it to make a holomovie where she's cast as a villain who slaughters the Cerritos's crew.
10. "No Small Parts": Boimler accidentally spills the beans on a secret Mariner did not want her shipmates to know, leading to tensions between the two. While investigating a distress signal, the Cerritos is attacked by the Pakleds, who have become a nascent threat while being ignored by Starfleet.

Season 2

The second season of Star Trek: Lower Decks premiered in August 2021.

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1. "Strange Energies": After being zapped by a strange alien artifact, Commander Ransom becomes a god and goes mad with power. Meanwhile, Tendi is convinced that Rutherford's new implant is messing with his mind and tries to cure him by any means possible.
2. "Kayshon, His Eyes Open": The Cerritos receives a new Tamarian head of security. He's turned into a puppet during a mission to a dead collector's spaceship, forcing the ensigns to fend for themselves.
3. "We'll Always Have Tom Paris": Mariner and Tendi panic when they accidentally break Dr. T'Ana's ancestral libido post. Meanwhile, Rutherford sees Shaxs walking around the ship and becomes obsessed with finding out how he came back to life.
4. "Mugato, Gumato": During a mission to a planet of carnivorous apes, Boimler and Rutherford become convinced that Mariner is an undercover black ops agent. Meanwhile, Captain Freeman is tricked by an alien scam artist.
5. "An Embarrassment of Dooplers": Mariner and Boimler try to sneak into a party using his transporter clone's invitation. Meanwhile, the Cerritos is overrun by an alien who duplicates when embarrassed.
6. "The Spy Humongous": Ransom and Kayshon try to keep track of an extremely incompetent alien spy. Boimler is invited in a group of ensigns who try to advance by copying famous captains.
7. "Where Pleasant Fountains Lie": While escorting a megalomaniacal computer to a secure facility, Mariner and Boimler crash on a barren planet. Meanwhile, Chief Engineer Billups must avoid his mother's attempts to trick him into having sex.
8. "I, Excretus": The Cerritos's crew must go through a series of drills to confirm their continued competency. This wouldn't be so bad if they didn't keep failing every one of them.
9. "wej Duj": On the Cerritos, Boimler tries to pal up with a senior officer during a long warp jump. On a Klingon ship, a junior officer's world is rocked when he discovers that his captain is, in fact, dishonorable. On a Vulcan ship, one crewmember is a pariah for being slightly less emotionless than the rest.
10. "First First Contact": The Cerritos must charge through a field of radioactive asteroids to save another Starfleet vessel, Freeman's impending transfer leads to an uproar in the senior staff, and Tendi becomes convinced that Dr. T'Ana is going to kick her out of Medical.

Season 3

The third season of Star Trek: Lower Decks premiered in August 2022.

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1. "Grounded": Freeman is put on trial under charges of blowing up the Pakled homeworld. Mariner tries to steal the Cerritos to find proof to exonerate her.
2. "The Least Dangerous Game": Mariner and Ransom try to fix a broken space elevator while Mariner is on probation for insubordination. Meanwhile, Boimler shortsightedly agrees to be hunted for sport.
3. "Mining the Mind's Mines": The ensigns must clear psychic landmines that tempt victims with their deepest desires. Tendi must get the captain to pay attention to her during peace negotiations.
4. "Room for Growth": Freeman tries and fails to get the engineers to relax. Meanwhile, Boimler, Tendi, and Mariner try to rig a lottery to give them better living quarters.
5. "Reflections": Rutherford's pre-implant personality reemerges and tries to take over his body. Meanwhile, Mariner and Boimler are assigned to a recruiting booth during a job fair but keep getting bullied by the other groups.
6. "Hear All, Trust Nothing": Freeman's attempt to oversee trade talks with the Karemma at Deep Space Nine turn sour when they kidnap Quark and flee. Meanwhile, Tendi struggles with Orion stereotypes and Mariner tries to get along with her new girlfriend's friends.
   • "Those Old Scientists": In this crossover episode with Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Boimler and Mariner, played in live action by their voice actors (who, by great good fortune, look a lot like their characters), accidentally get flung back in time and end up at the feet of the Enterprise crew. While it occurs at this spot in the LWD timeline, it is officially a SNW episode and aired on July 22, 2023, well after the end of season 3 and a few months prior to season 4.
7. "A Mathematically Perfect Redemption": Peanut Hamper returns after crash-landing on a planet of bird people and joining their society. A seemingly idyllic life on a bird planet is soured when Drookmani scavengers attack.
8. "Crisis Point 2: Paradoxus": Boimler tries to grapple with an emotional crisis when he learns that his clone died. Meanwhile, Tendi's role as the lead in a holomovie helps her realize that she wants to be a captain.
9. "Trusted Sources": When a journalist is sent to the Cerritos, Freeman cracks down on crew schedules to project the best possible appearance. However, someone still spills the beans on the ship's dirty laundry.
10. "The Stars at Night": In the wake of the deployment of the new Texas-class starships and Freeman's abysmal handling of having a journalist on the ship, the Cerritos faces decommissioning, but her replacement may not be fit for duty. Meanwhile, Mariner is reevaluating her life in light of her resignation from Starfleet.

Season 4

The fourth season of Star Trek: Lower Decks premiered in September 2023.

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1. "Twovix": The Cerritos crew head to the Starfleet Museum to visit the iconic starship U.S.S. Voyager.
2. "I Have No Bones Yet I Must Flee": Lieutenant Mariner, Commander Ransom, and a new guy named Gary visit an alien menagerie to rescue two human exhibits, but during the mission, the menagerie's most dangerous (and adorable) exhibit gets out of its enclosure. Ensign Rutherford desperately tries to get promoted. Lieutenant Boimler looks for a good place to sleep.
3. "In the Cradle of Vexilon": Lieutenant Boimler leads his first away mission on an alien megastructure.
4. "Something Borrowed, Something Green": Tendi is summoned back to Orion for a wedding.
5. "Empathalogical Fallacies": A trio of Betazoids cause chaos on the Cerritos.
6. "Parth Ferengi's Heart Place": The crew of the Cerritos explores the culture of the Ferengi's home planet Ferenginar during a diplomatic mission.
7. "A Few Badgeys More": The Cerritos has a not-so-happy reunion with three AI villains.
8. "Caves": Beta Shift recounts their experiences being trapped in caves while trapped in a cave.
9. "The Inner Fight" (part 1 of 2): The Cerritos is sent to pick up a former Starfleet cadet, while Beta Shift has to figure out why Mariner has been acting self-destructive as of late.
10. "Old Friends, New Planets" (part 2 of 2): The Cerritos crew must defy orders to rescue Mariner, while she confronts her past, literally and figuratively, to stop the disillusioned mastermind behind this season’s plot.

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