TL;DR – It is a solid, fun episode that makes the most of its silly premise.

Disclosure – I paid for the Paramount+ streaming service that viewed this episode. 

Star Trek: Lower Decks Review –

There are many ways in which Star Trek Lower Decks can shine, and one of the best of them is when they decide to go on a deep dive into the lore to find something to explore. Sometimes, that can be expanding on Orion culture for the first time since Enterprise, and other times, it can be a love letter to Star Trek’s fondness for caves. Today, we dive all the way back to the era of Those Old Scientists, with some demigods and a fight over angles.

So, to set the scene, the USS Cerritos has been positioned next to the Veraflex Nebula for weeks as it hosts peace talks between the Orbs and the Cubes, the photonic species that live there. It is hard to get people to talk when they complain that the ship has too many edges or that article ten is wrong because ten has an o in it. But as this goes on, Mariner (Tawny Newsome) is put in charge of an ensign, Olly (Saba Homayoon), on their last chance and gets some home truths when one of the diplomats turns up dead. They have to investigate because they are not high enough status to arouse suspicion, which, of course, went down as well as you would expect it to. We will be looking at the episode as a whole from here, so there will be some [SPOILERS] ahead. 

Of Gods and Angles is quite a contained episode as we sit in one location and let the calamity come to us. This is a good plan because it gives us some time to focus on character development for both Mariner and Boimler (Jack Quaid), who is still desperately trying to grow a beard. The heart of this episode is the fact that Mariner has reached the position where she can be an active mentor to someone who is acting very much like she was at the start of season one. When it comes to Mariner’s growth, the series has had this habit of taking two steps back for every step forward, but I am glad that since the end of last season, the show has committed to having her develop as a character.     

I very much liked the chaos that paring Mariner with Olly brought to the proceedings as everything was sitting there on the edge of total collapse. Linking the show back to Who Mourns for Adonais? it was a choice, but I think they pulled it off. It helped create the dynamic between the two that helped carry the episode. The Cubes and the Orbs hating each other just because of their shape is a little on the nose, bar the fact that they lean into it, and also, Let That Be Your Last Battlefield exists. While I did think we were heading for a reverse Romeo and Juliet situation long before they dropped the reveal, I believe they committed enough to it to make it work.

While this is all happening, Boimler is desperately trying to become besties with Dr T’Ana (Gillian Vigman) because that is what his alternate back at the start of the season did. This is such a silly story, but you can’t help but root for him even when it goes as disastrously wrong as you would expect it to do. Watching T’Ana kick the living stuff out of Boimler was a fun moment, even before she threw an elbow drop in there like a boss. This is one of the storylines that has been percolating along throughout the season, and I wonder where it will end up as I think I agree with Tendi (Noël Wells) that Boimler and now Rutherford (Eugene Cordero) might be learning the wrong lessons from all of this. But then I am desperate to know, what the heck is in T’Ana’s book club?     

In the end, do we recommend Of Gods and Angles? It was a fun blast that had a smile on my face for the whole runtime. My only slight concern is that we don’t have that many episodes to go, and I am starting to wonder if they will wrap everything up this season?

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

Have you seen Star Trek: Lower Decks yet ?, let us know what you thought in the comments below, feel free to share this review on any of the social medias and you can follow us Here. Check out all our past reviews and articles Here, and have a happy day.    

Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Star Trek: Lower Decks
Directed by – Brandon Williams
Written by – Aaron Burdette
Created by – Mike McMahan
Based Upon – Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry
Production/Distribution Companies – Secret Hideout, Titmouse, CBS Studios & Paramount+.
Starring – Tawny Newsome, Jack Quaid, Noël Wells, Eugene Cordero, Dawnn Lewis, Jerry O’Connell, Fred Tatasciore & Gillian Vigman with Gabrielle Ruiz, Saba Homayoon, Roan Lai, Paul Scheer & Carl Tart