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I’ve been enjoying the very short stories by Treklit authors in the recent issues of Titanbooks Star Trek Explorer magazine.

I see that they’re promoting anthologies of short stories, with a new third one due to be released soon. However, it’s not clear if these are just compilations of previously published stories from the magazine, new content or a mix of both.

Anyone have the earlier releases?

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Went to watch the next generation before bed and it won’t pull up any of the episodes or continue where I left off. Instead it shows the extras tab and related shows and about.

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The title may allude to a line of dialogue from LD’s first episode, “Second Contact”, where Mariner says she was once trapped in a sentient cave for weeks: “You ever been trapped in a sentient cave? That’s a dark place that knows things.”

This episode consists mainly of flashbacks to unseen adventures in caves, but since these are new ones, it doesn’t qualify as a clip show like TNG: “Shades of Gray”.

The Cerritos is in orbit around the planet Grottonus. Mariner hates caves, probably due to her experience described above. Boimler remarks that caves kind of look the same, a sly reference to the reuse of cave sets in various TNG-era series.

Mariner sarcastically mentions how rocks successfully block centuries of technological process. In LD: “Mining the Mind’s Mines”, it’s said that it’s not a real day in Starfleet until comms get blocked.

Tendi talks about being trapped together (in a turbolift) right after the “rage virus” outbreak. We didn’t see them being trapped, but the rage virus incident happened in the first LD episode, “Second Contact”. Picard was trapped in a turbolift with some children in TNG: “Disaster”, and Una was trapped in a turbolift with Spock in ST: “Q and A”.

LT Steve Levy is a science officer best known for claiming that Wolf 359 was an inside job and that the Dominion War didn’t happen (LD: “No Small Parts”). Gammanite is a fictional element that Levy used to boost communications signals in a previously unseen adventure. He’s voiced by Fred Tatasciore, who also voices Shax.

This is Kyron IV’s first appearance in lore. Coincidentally, Kyron IV was the name of a character in the fantasy comic book Soul Saga by Steven Platt, the character being King of the Dominion and father to Princess Persephone. Also, a chyron is the term for an electronically generated superimposed caption (named after the Chyron corporation).

In the flashbacks, our Lower Deckers are wearing LT jg pips, which places these after LD: “Twovix”.

Vendorians are a shapeshifting race first seen in TAS: “The Survivor”. A Vendorian was last seen in LD: “Envoys” on Tulgana IV, disguised as an Andorian. Vendor Prime was seen on a star chart in PIC: “Maps and Legends”, which placed it within the territory of the Romulan Free State, in the Beta Quadrant (in LDs time that would place it within the Romulan Star Empire).

Boimler lists Levy’s conspiracy theories: Wolf 359 wasn’t real, Q doesn’t exist, Picard is a hologram and the Doctor isn’t (he also believes they are living in the Mirror Universe). Levy’s description of Vendorian brood pods and young bursting out of chests is reminiscent of Gorn breeding practices as mentioned in SNW.

Levy claims the Vendorians falsified data that going at warp speed damages subspace. If this is correct, that provides a canon explanation for why the Warp 5 limit imposed in TNG: “Force of Nature” was quickly forgotten after TNG ended. Previously, it was suggested by off-screen sources that either warp engine design was improved so as to prevent such ecological damage or that the variable geometry nacelle pylons seen in the Intrepid-class were also supposed to compensate for it.

The idea that the Vendorians are putting people through tests of character and morality is new, although such tests are usually from more powerful or omnipotent species, like the Metrons in TOS: “Arena”, the Melkotians in TOS: “Spectre of the Gun”, the Vians from TOS: “The Empath, the Q from TNG, and so on.

This is the first mention of Porgian swamp rash, although Porgs are the cute little penguin-like creatures seen in Star Wars: The Last Jedi. Also the first appearance of Balkus IX. The Star Wars reference may not be a coincidence, since the brain-eating Grafflax sounds like “Graflex” - the Graflex 2 Flash Gun was used as the basis for Anakin/Luke’s lightsaber prop in Star Wars: A New Hope and it’s still called a Graflex lightsaber in fan circles.

Thusa transferring her “base mind by dermal contact” to Rutherford is reminiscent of Spock transferring his katra to McCoy at the climax of ST II, except that this transfers their consciousness into a protein mass that creates a cloned infant version of themselves. Rapid alien-induced pregnancies are also a trope in Star Trek, most notably in TNG: “The Child” with Troi and in ENT: “Unexpected” with Trip.

The trope of an apparent monster turning out to be defending her offspring turns up in TOS: “The Devil in the Dark”.

Delta Shift were our Beta Shift Lower Deckers’ nemeses in previous seasons (LD: “Terminal Provocations”, “Room for Growth”). The ones accompanying Mariner are ENS Karavitus, ENS Asif and ENS Amadou. ENS Moxy is not present.

The shuttle that Mariner crashes is the Kings Canyon. As with all Cerritos shuttles, named after a Californian National Park. She was last seen in LD: “In the Cradle of Vexilon”.

“Dunsel” is a term used by midshipmen at Starfleet Academy to describe a part that serves no useful purpose (TOS: “The Ultimate Computer”). Rutherford used the same term in LD: “The Stars at Night”. Pergium is an element used as fuel in nuclear reactors (TOS: “The Devil in the Dark”). Amadou and Mariner pronounce it with a hard G, i.e. “PER-gi-um”, when in the original episode it was pronounced “per-JEE-um”.

As Mariner ages, she gets a grey streak through her hair like her mother, Captain Freeman.

Mariner says they’ll get T’Ana to grow Asif a new leg. She may be referring to the biosynthetic limbs used as prosthetics (DS9: “It’s Only a Paper Moon”), which use synthetic muscles in their construction.

Tend’s flashback begins right at the end of “Second Contact”, with the same dialogue from the episode, with the ship still showing damage from the rage virus outbreak.

Synthehol is indeed supposed to affect the people like alcohol, except that its intoxicating effects could be dismissed at will (TNG: “Relics”). However, starships still carried supplies of real alcoholic drinks as the taste difference was allegedly apparent to connoisseurs.

A targ is a Klingon animal, like a cross between a boar and a dog with spikes on its back, kept as pets (TNG: “Where No One Has Gone Before”).

Tendi mentions another unseen cave story where they met themselves, but they turned out to be aliens from the future pretending to be them, harkening to story elements from episodes like TNG: “Time Squared” and TNG: “Future Imperfect”.

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LoglineThe Lower Deckers go on a classic cave mission.


Written by: Ben Rodgers

Directed by: Megan Lloyd

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• The episode title is a reference to the spaghetti western, “A Few Dollars More”.

    • “A Few Dollars More” was the sequel to “A Fistful of Dollars” which TNG referenced with title of season six’s “A Few Datas More”.

    • Badgey as introduced in “Terminal Provocations”. Jack McBrayer reprises the role here.

• The Kalla system was first seen in “Firstborn”, and it’s where the USS Cerritos fought the Pakled clumpship “No Small Parts”.

    • Here we see Drookmani scavengers collecting Rutherford’s lost implant. We already saw this happening at the end of “The Stars at Night”, but the scene ended before revealing it was the Drookmani collecting the implant.

• The Drookmani captain is voiced by Fred Tatasciore, the actor who voices Shaxs.

• The Droomani lower decker is voiced by Paul Scheer, the actor who voices Billups.

• The bisected circle emblem on the Bynar ship as also seen on the high tech fanny packs the Bynars wore in “11001001”, as well as this episode.

• The Bynars are speaking in the language we heard in “11001001”, and we see their text shown a display, also from that episode.

• While we never saw a Bynar ship in any previous iteration of Trek, I did think it worth pointing out that they are a species where two individuals are linked and act in unison, and here we see what would be a single captain’s chair on almost any other species’ ship is actually a loveseat, occupied by two Bynar.

• The Mysterious Threat adds the Bynar ship to it’s collection.

• Badgey appears to be controlling the Drookmani who salvaged him via glowing cybernetic implants, which immediately invokes the Borg. It also makes me think, however, of the fact that after having been beamed into space in “Datalore”, we learn in “Brothers” that Lore was rescued by Pakleds.

• Rutherford has outfitted the Sequoia shuttle with a grappler. The NX-01 Enterprise was equipped with grapplers as seen “Broken Bow”, and so were its shuttlepods, which we saw in “Similitude”.

    • Boimler expressed excitement over the NX-01’s grapplers in “Those Old Scientists”, as did La’an.

• The Daystrom Institute was first mentioned in “The Measure of a Man”, and is named for Richard Daystrom from “The Ultimate Computer”.

    • The view of the Daystrom Institute is recreated from the PIC episode, “Remembrance”.

    • The Daystrom Institute’s Self-Aware Megalomaniacal Computer Storage room was first seen in “Where Pleasant Fountains Lie”.

• Peanut Hamper was introduced in “No Small Parts” and given over to the custody of the Daystrom Institute in “A Mathematically Perfect Redemption”.

    • Peanut Hamper is played by Kether Donohue.

• AGIMUS was introduced in “Where Pleasant Fountains Lie”, where we also saw him placed in Daystrom Institute custody.

    • AGIMUS is portrayed by Jeffery Combs, who has played a number of roles across DS9, VOY, and ENT, including:

       • Tiron - “Meredion”

       • Penk - “Tsunkatse”

       • Krem - “Acquistion”

• Lord Tyrannikillicus was first seen in “Where Pleasant Fountains Lie” and is voiced by Shaxs’ voice actor, Fred Tatasciore.

• We saw AGIMUS’ drones in “Where Pleasant Fountains Lie”, but only depicted in a mural on a world he had conquered, or in a fantasy he had; this is the first we’ve seen an actual drone.

• AGIMUS states the Mysterious Threat’s attack on the Bynar ship occurred on stardate 58934.9.

• The Drookmani ship is outfitted with a number of canons. In “Terminal Provocations”, the first episode to depict the Drookmani, their ship has no weapons at all, and uses a tractor beam to throw space junk at the Cerritos.

”Almost as noble as the time you snapped my [beep]ing neck!” Badgey is still upset about the events of “Terminal Provocations” when Rutherford had to ”kill” him in order to save his and Tendi’s lives.

• Rutherford’s hug causes Badgey to split into two separate entities, one of whom is named Goodgey. In “The Enemy Within”, Captain Kirk was separated into his good and evil halves.

    • Perhaps worth noting that Goodgey is silver, similar to the combadges worn by the Cerritos crew.

    • Badgey also splits off his logical aspect in Logic-y. Spock dreamed about being split into his human and Vulcan halves in “Spock Amok”.

”This stuff is great! All we have on Orion are, like, sharp little pebbles.” It as established in “Second Contact” that there is no sand on Orion.

    • It was also established that sand gives Boimler a rash, but he doesn’t mention it here.

• Tendi is barefoot in this scene in Ecuador.. Unrelated, this scene is also lifted directly from the pitch for the proposed Quentin Tarrantino Trek film that was being talked about back in 2017.

”Do you guys want to take a root beer float break?” Root beer is like the Federation, so bubbly and cloying and happy. It’s insidious.

• The EMH used neurazine gas to incapacitate the Romulans who’d hijacked the USS Prometheus in “Message in a Bottle”.

• The Tyrus VIIA research station was seen in “A Quality of Life”. It’s where the Exocomps were created by Doctor Farallon and developed sentience.

    • The interior of the Tyrus VIIA research station is recreated from “A Quality of Life”.

• Badgey develops a plan to travel at warp 9.9 and transfer himself across subspace to the entire Federation. In “Threshold” we learned that an object traveling at warp 10 exists at all points of the universe simultaneously.

• We are introduced to Peanut Hamper’s father, Kevin. In “No Small Parts” Peanut Hamper declared that the only reason she joined Starfleet was to upset Kevin.

• Among the Federation material we see Badgey infect are:

    • A subspace relay which appears to be identical to the “ancient space capsule” the USS Enterprise D located in “The Neutral Zone” which contained three surviving humans from 20th century Earth who had been cryogenically frozen.

    • The Cerritos

    • The USS Vancouver where we see Barbra Brinson from “Cupid’s Errant Arrow”

    • The VCF Sh’vhal from “wej Duj”, commanded by Sokel

    • Starbase 25, first mentioned in “The Slaver Weapon” and seen in “An Embarrassment of Dooplers”

    • Deep Space 9 from DS9

    • Douglass Station which was introduced in “Second Contact”

• Badgey, now all powerful, turns a light blue tone, and exists simultaneously across his past, present and future. He departs to an empty dimension to create a universe.

    • Badgey expresses that he has become tired of Earth. These people. Being caught in the tangle of their lives. Also, for some reason he now has human genitals fully visible on screen.

    • Badgey ascends as O’Connor did in “Moist Vessel”; he has six arms, and the outline of a great bird appears around him, with three circles at its head. He says he might hang out with the Q Continuum, introduced in “Encounter at Farpoint” or check out the Black Mountain, which Shaxs told Rutherford of in “We’ll Always Have Tom Paris”. As he ascends, we see he is travelling towards the Koala. Why is it smiling? What does it know?

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Found this through this post by StillPaislyCat and thought it was interesting so I wanted to share it and see what people thought

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The episode is named "Caves". It's about caves.

Caaaves.

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Kev & Rob back up their truck of gold pressed latinum to Uncle Quark's Youth Casino in "Parth Ferengi's Heart Place", then compare their picks for the best Ferengi-centric episode, "Ménage à Troi" (TNG) and "The Magnificent Ferengi" (DS9). Also stick around at the end for their thoughts on the recently-completed run of Very Short Treks!

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I poked around a while and couldn't find anything, I see memes from y'all all the time and the progressive nature of Star Trek has got me. I wanna watch it.

Where do I begin?

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It was so good, I am sad to have finished it.

Are there any canon DS9 comics, books, etc. that continue where it left off?

I've finished TOS and TNG, but neither left me with a feeling of sadness like DS9 has.

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StarfleetAcademy ‘will be funny’ according to Alex Kurtzman.

He’s also confirmed at the NYCC panel today that the writer’s room is back at work after the WGA strike.


Given the heavier #thriller background (Absentia) of one showrunner Gaia Violo, and youth supernatural CV (TheMagicians; NancyDrew) of Noga Landau the other, sounds as though Tawny Newsome is there to bring some lightness and fun.


I’m really looking forward to seeing more in the 32nd century StarTrek.


I’m also pleading 🙏 let David Cronenberg’s Kovich be involved.

I would love so much to have some of The Magicians mysterious vibe with so true humour mixed in. Glad to know that they’re going for something less earnest than the tone of Discovery for this show, it didn’t seem to be working in the Discovery episode with Tilly and the cadets.

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"Our experts predict the renegades will gather support from other Jem'Hadar units, launch a general insurrection, and effect a complete takeover of the Dominion in less than a year."

A Dominion civil war sounds sick.

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