'Lower Decks' is in my top 5 favorite Star Trek Next Gen episodes. A must-see ep for everyone. There were several things that made Lower Decks work, IMO.
The first thing they did right was instant characterization of these new recruits. This was something TOS did well. On any given episode, if you heard Scotty say a line, you knew that he was a hard-working, extremely capable, slightly cantankerous, individual. If you heard Spock say a line, you knew he was a very intelligent, scientifically-minded, misfit. If you heard Chekhov say something, you knew he was a plucky, young, happy-go-lucky type. Whenever they showed up on the screen, we fell in love with them (again). (Aside: I think this is one reason why JJ chose to use the TOS characters for the ST reboot films, rather than the characters from any other incarnation of Trek.) The characters in TNG, by contrast, were less well-defined, and less distinct from each other. We eventually learned who they were, but it had to happen over the course of many episodes (seasons, even).
The Lower Decks recruits had a little of that TOS magic in that, every scene we saw them in, they revealed who they were and made us fall in love with them. When we saw Sam Lavelle trying to hobnob with Riker and mistakenly calling him a Canadian, we knew that this was a kid with big plans, he was gonna go places, he was a bit of a brown-noser, and boy was he wet behind the ears. When we saw Taurik's cold, dry, wit when addressing the "roommate" issue, we knew that this was an irritating, cynical, cold-blooded individual who didn't care what other people thought of him. (The head-butting between Lavelle & Taurik also reminded us of the similar, uneasy, relationship between Spock & McCoy, which made me reminisce.) When we saw Sito Jaxa sparring blindfolded with Worf, we learned that this was a young girl who wanted to prove herself, and wasn't easily duped. At last, she did get a chance to prove herself by helping the Cardassian to return in the escape pod. We were saddened at her loss along with the rest of the Enterprise crew when Picard announced she had been killed.
Another thing LD did well was giving everyone a chance in the spotlight. This is a hard thing to do with a large, ensemble, cast. They did it well in ST4 by giving every member of the crew a job they needed to do to help get a humpback whale back to the future. The three young recruits all had their individual moments (Taurik with La Forge in engineering, Lavelle with Riker, Jaxa sparring with Worf), and their occasional "come togethers" (playing poker midway through the ep, sitting together in Ten-Forward remembering Jaxa at the end). It also helped that in their individual/"spotlight" scenes, they connected with a TNG crewmember that we already knew and could foil off of them.
It's just a pity that these recruits didn't become the cast of Voyager.
The first thing they did right was instant characterization of these new recruits. This was something TOS did well. On any given episode, if you heard Scotty say a line, you knew that he was a hard-working, extremely capable, slightly cantankerous, individual. If you heard Spock say a line, you knew he was a very intelligent, scientifically-minded, misfit. If you heard Chekhov say something, you knew he was a plucky, young, happy-go-lucky type. Whenever they showed up on the screen, we fell in love with them (again). (Aside: I think this is one reason why JJ chose to use the TOS characters for the ST reboot films, rather than the characters from any other incarnation of Trek.) The characters in TNG, by contrast, were less well-defined, and less distinct from each other. We eventually learned who they were, but it had to happen over the course of many episodes (seasons, even).
The Lower Decks recruits had a little of that TOS magic in that, every scene we saw them in, they revealed who they were and made us fall in love with them. When we saw Sam Lavelle trying to hobnob with Riker and mistakenly calling him a Canadian, we knew that this was a kid with big plans, he was gonna go places, he was a bit of a brown-noser, and boy was he wet behind the ears. When we saw Taurik's cold, dry, wit when addressing the "roommate" issue, we knew that this was an irritating, cynical, cold-blooded individual who didn't care what other people thought of him. (The head-butting between Lavelle & Taurik also reminded us of the similar, uneasy, relationship between Spock & McCoy, which made me reminisce.) When we saw Sito Jaxa sparring blindfolded with Worf, we learned that this was a young girl who wanted to prove herself, and wasn't easily duped. At last, she did get a chance to prove herself by helping the Cardassian to return in the escape pod. We were saddened at her loss along with the rest of the Enterprise crew when Picard announced she had been killed.
Another thing LD did well was giving everyone a chance in the spotlight. This is a hard thing to do with a large, ensemble, cast. They did it well in ST4 by giving every member of the crew a job they needed to do to help get a humpback whale back to the future. The three young recruits all had their individual moments (Taurik with La Forge in engineering, Lavelle with Riker, Jaxa sparring with Worf), and their occasional "come togethers" (playing poker midway through the ep, sitting together in Ten-Forward remembering Jaxa at the end). It also helped that in their individual/"spotlight" scenes, they connected with a TNG crewmember that we already knew and could foil off of them.
It's just a pity that these recruits didn't become the cast of Voyager.