If—like some of my friends—you bounced off the first few episodes of Star Trek: Lower Decks, but are willing to give it another try, I offer this Top 10 14 list, arranged in chronological order. Two of the top 14 are from Season 1, and three are from each subsequent season. And the last episode of each season is in the Top 14 (and the penultimate episode of each season is in the Top 14 except for season 3).
Why the Top 14? Because I won’t compile a best-of list without “The Inner Fight,” my favorite episode and an important precursor to the next episode in the list, “Old Friends, New Planets.”
| Episode | IMDB Rating | Rank | Season | Episode |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CrisisPoint | 8.1 | 13 | 1 | 9 |
| No Small Parts | 8.6 | 4 | 1 | 10 |
| I, Excretus | 8.4 | 9 | 2 | 8 |
| wej Duj | 8.7 | 3 | 2 | 9 |
| First First Contact | 8.6 | 6 | 2 | 10 |
| Reflections | 8.1 | 11 | 3 | 5 |
| Hear All, Trust Nothing | 8.6 | 5 | 3 | 6 |
| The Stars at Night | 8.5 | 8 | 3 | 10 |
| Twovix | 8.2 | 10 | 4 | 1 |
| The Inner Fight | 8 | 14 | 4 | 9 |
| Old Friends, New Planets | 8.6 | 7 | 4 | 10 |
| Fully Dilated | 8.1 | 12 | 5 | 7 |
| Fissure Quest | 9 | 1 | 5 | 9 |
| The New Next Generation | 8.9 | 2 | 5 | 10 |
Paramount has worked hard to offer new on-ramps to the Star Trek universe:
- Discovery was the first Trek series specifically designed to be bingeable, with season-long story arcs and a cast even more representative of humanity than past series.
- Lower Decks is aimed at the Adult Swim crowd or Simpsons fans, offering a humorous take on the tropes of the franchise, and of science fiction in general.
- Prodigy is meant to introduce tweens and teens to Star Trek using CGI animation, without expecting them to know the conventions of the franchise.
And Strange New Worlds offers “Strange New Takes on Familiar Old Characters,” in a more episodic format, to shore up the base of traditional Trekkies.
My youngest had little interest in Star Trek, but when I started to watch Season 2 of Lower Decks on its debut, he was intrigued, and we went back and watched Season 1 together first. Even though the series has tons of Easter Eggs and in-jokes for folks who’ve seen almost every Star Trek episode, it is usually accessible to new fans, too.
Another reason I love Lower Decks is because a lot of Trek canon is, at this point, just silly (e.g., Hodgkin’s Law of Parallel Planetary Development, the holodeck, the transporter, the Q Continuum, Klingon time crystals). So it’s fun sometimes to just full-on embrace the silliness. Though, having recently rewatched Star Trek: The Animated Series, I’m impressed with how the writers of Lower Deck often pack an A, B, and C story into less than a half-hour.
Methodological note: I actually interrupted my rewatch of the entire franchise in chronological order to review the first three Lower Decks seasons to develop my own top 10, but then I decided to just trust the wisdom of the crowd. These are IMDB’s top 14. My major disagreement: “Cupid’s Errant Arrow” is in my personal Top 10, for its allusions and story, and my new favorite conspiracy board of all time.
Anyway, go binge the Top 10 14 episodes!
Photo credit: StarTrek.com
Originally published 23-09-09, as an actual top 10. Updated with the stats for Season 4 on 24-09-01, as a Top 11. Updated with the stats for Season 5 on 25-04-19, as a Top 14.
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