The second season finale of Star Trek Lower Decks is upon us, with ‘First First Contact’, and things are getting shaken up a bit.  *Warning!  Some Spoilers Ahead!*

This season has been a mixed bag, with things generally getting better, so there’s an overall feeling that going into season 3, it could finally be hitting a decent run of episodes.  This is in keeping with the standard operating procedure of most Star Trek shows, which start to work properly during their third seasons.

Sadly, ‘First First Contact’ is a bit of a mixed bag itself, with some great elements and some absolute atrocities.  On the positive side, it looks like the characters are getting more of an equal shake with things, and there is less focus on the massive misstep that is Mariner (Tawny Newsome).  Overall, they have toned down her character and even though Mariner grates a little here in ‘First First Contact’, it’s nowhere near the level it was in earlier episodes.

Mariner is unfortunately also involved in one of the horrors of this episode, as they bring in a hoary old trope of a character ruining something for another.  Captain Freeman (Dawnn Lewis) has been given the nod that she is due a promotion and may move up to a bigger class of ship.  Obviously, Mariner can’t have that, so starts meddling and telling the rest of the bridge crew.  As you’d expect this causes trouble and puts Mariner and Freeman at odds with each other.

It seems the writers keep doing this kind of thing, when it would have been far better to find a more elegant reason for the rest finding out, and there being more drama.  As it stands, it’s just a petty, cheap thread in what could have been a much stronger episode.  It’s also at odds with how the rest of ‘First First Contact’ works, as that has some nice character development, and a much more balanced story.

Elsewhere for instance, Tendi (Noël Wells) gets deleted off the medical roster and makes an assumption that she is about to be booted from the Cerritos.  This is also a bit of a tired device, but in this case it holds together without becoming irritating.  What it does prompt is the continuing expansion of the friendship between her and Rutherford (Eugene Cordero) and something which feels natural.  I would guess that the writers have a handle on those two and Boimler (Jack Quaid), but still don’t really know how to handle Mariner, so have painted themselves into a corner with the character.  They urgently need to figure it out though.

The overarching threat this week in ‘First First Contact’ is damage that occurs to an Excelsior class ship while attempting a first contact situation.  This prompts the Cerritos to have to help and use a novel solution to do so.  While this is essentially a secondary element to hang things from, it is robust and a solid Star Trek problem.  It also allows most of our heroes to act like Starfleet and do some Starfleet-y things, while bringing in some quality references.  Full kudos for bringing in Cetacean Ops, and Sonya Gomez (Lycia Naff), who was once an ensign on TNG!

There is also a shock ending, which will no doubt lead to a plotline that echoes a couple of TNG episodes and Star Trek VI, but it’s a good cliffhanger to end on.  It definitely pulls the rug out from under the narrative up until that point and leaves the audience guessing as to exactly how this will play out.  On an even better note, it looks like Tendi will get more time, which is long overdue, as she is clearly one of the more interesting characters.  So, while Season 2 has been an improvement and the evidence is there, we can but hope that Season 3 is where everything begins to gel perfectly.