This episode may be among the best of the season. With a valid reason for a slew of heart-warming callbacks to treks-past, the episode delivers on that touch of nostalgia it desperately yearns to provide with each episode. What may be more important is that the episode contains a solid narrative. 'I, Excretus' not only plays on the core premise of Lower Decks and the undervalued crew of the Cerritos, but it also crafts a story that feels original, providing a fair amount of much-needed growth for both the lower deckers and the senior officers. Aside from the overuse of a bit of juvenile humor, well done.
6 Reviews
Great Episode!
amani-preston2 October 2021
This episode is nearly perfect! I've watched it multiple times (and will continue to do so, I'm sure). Lower Decks has really found its footing during this season - it has gotten so much better. I, Excretus of Borg is one of my favorite episodes of this show. Great episode!
I gave the last episode a 9. This one gets a 2! If you want to know why, read my rant.
julianmarku30 September 2021
Warning: Spoilers
So at first I gave the episode a 6 because I thought it was good episode and I kept thinking about it and I reached a very harsh conclusion. This episode was the most disappointing episode of this season. I honestly don't understand how people are giving it a 9 when it is so against everything the other episodes have been building up. Let me tell you why I think so:
So the episode is about frauds and hypocrites hiding their terrible performance from a terribly bad instructor who rigged the tests to keep her job because the tests were getting too easy. So why didn't she make them difficult from the start?! She didn't have to fail the whole crew of the ship but she could prove that it was effective! But they had to have a villain in this episode so they upped it up to "efficiency expert is bad because tests and performance reviews are bad!" Very weak and forced writing.
The second thing is that the writing is up the wall: Mariner screwed up her tests and Freeman points out that the tests are public, so anyone can see them. Why didn't Mariner know that?! I did not see a single screen in that room for viewing the tests. So how did no one know that Boimler was in that simulator with the freaking Borg! One of the hardest tests imaginable...
Secondly, if the tests are public then the crew could have easily made them available to Starfleet and proved that they were rigged by simply comparing them to other ships who did the exact same tests! So the plan was a self-defeated plan from the start!
Thirdly, the episodes starts by showing that Freeman is an incompetent leader and by the end of the episode, she and the whole crew, the entire crew did not learn a single thing! They are not better people, they did not learn anything. They are terrible by forcing a crewman to go through the most traumatic experience imaginable in their time and endanger the whole crew even more on a stupid plan that seatbelts could have solved! Honestly, you are not a better person when the bad guy stomps on your toy and the good guy starts throwing punches. So the plan itself was terrible.
Next, for the sake of taking revenge and "convincing" the drill instructor that reality is not as easy as a simulation (while also ignoring that life doesn't have a redo button like a simulation) Freeman endangered the lives of the whole crew because she wants to make a point. Correction: she wants to show that the crew is so used to her incompetence that they basically learned to live with it. I bet every single abuser in history wants to use that excuse! Just: "why are we talking about it now? They got used to it!" Said every abuser ever.
And yes, Freeman is an abuser: She starts the episode by forgetting her own people in deep space to freeze to death then went to endangering her crew in dangerous REAL alien encounters and black holes to FORCING HER ENSIGN TO SUFFER POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER BY BORG ASSIMILATION THROUGH REALISTIC VIRTUAL REALITY!
Last and not least. Boimler was doing very well in that simulation. Why did he have to stop and not do well anymore? He could basically repeat the test as long as he wanted. Why did he get to repeat it while others did not? Why did the simulation not stop when he was already captured when it stopped for Mariner when she got caught!? If the same rules applied for Mariner's test and it did for Boimler then Marioner'a simulation should have went on all the way through torture in the torture machine of the Empire! Terrible writing this episode.
So Boimler went through torture and assimilation, through the whole experience and it was done as a joke? Did no one considered that this person was going through psychological torture!? Who wrote this episode?! They are a very sick person. This episode seriously soured everything season 2 had been doing right until now for me.
Next, remember those last 7 episodes of comradery and we were finally building on the characters and they were getting close? Yeah, this episode, everyone just forgets that Boimler is stuck in a nightmare! No one cared about him! It's so good that they didn't build any character development in the last 3 episodes! Oh wait... they did! This just ruined all of it!
Finally, this episodes proved that the epic trailer we got was just a huge bait and switch I was afraid this was going to happen and the episode just proved it. We got baited! Everyone thought we were going to see a serious Borg episode or a Mirror Universe episode! BUT NO! We got teased. It was all for a joke. A very unfunny joke. It's no wonder they pushed this episode so far ahead. They basically put the best episode in front of it to trick you into thinking that everything was getting better and going somewhere. Well it was, until this episode jumped out like a brick wall and trashed the whole experience.
I honestly hope that people realize that this singular episode is the worst this season and stop comparing it all the other episodes before it which were much better.
I am here to tell you that your gut is right. This episode was terrible and there is nothing wrong with believing that if it's your honest opinion.
So the episode is about frauds and hypocrites hiding their terrible performance from a terribly bad instructor who rigged the tests to keep her job because the tests were getting too easy. So why didn't she make them difficult from the start?! She didn't have to fail the whole crew of the ship but she could prove that it was effective! But they had to have a villain in this episode so they upped it up to "efficiency expert is bad because tests and performance reviews are bad!" Very weak and forced writing.
The second thing is that the writing is up the wall: Mariner screwed up her tests and Freeman points out that the tests are public, so anyone can see them. Why didn't Mariner know that?! I did not see a single screen in that room for viewing the tests. So how did no one know that Boimler was in that simulator with the freaking Borg! One of the hardest tests imaginable...
Secondly, if the tests are public then the crew could have easily made them available to Starfleet and proved that they were rigged by simply comparing them to other ships who did the exact same tests! So the plan was a self-defeated plan from the start!
Thirdly, the episodes starts by showing that Freeman is an incompetent leader and by the end of the episode, she and the whole crew, the entire crew did not learn a single thing! They are not better people, they did not learn anything. They are terrible by forcing a crewman to go through the most traumatic experience imaginable in their time and endanger the whole crew even more on a stupid plan that seatbelts could have solved! Honestly, you are not a better person when the bad guy stomps on your toy and the good guy starts throwing punches. So the plan itself was terrible.
Next, for the sake of taking revenge and "convincing" the drill instructor that reality is not as easy as a simulation (while also ignoring that life doesn't have a redo button like a simulation) Freeman endangered the lives of the whole crew because she wants to make a point. Correction: she wants to show that the crew is so used to her incompetence that they basically learned to live with it. I bet every single abuser in history wants to use that excuse! Just: "why are we talking about it now? They got used to it!" Said every abuser ever.
And yes, Freeman is an abuser: She starts the episode by forgetting her own people in deep space to freeze to death then went to endangering her crew in dangerous REAL alien encounters and black holes to FORCING HER ENSIGN TO SUFFER POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER BY BORG ASSIMILATION THROUGH REALISTIC VIRTUAL REALITY!
Last and not least. Boimler was doing very well in that simulation. Why did he have to stop and not do well anymore? He could basically repeat the test as long as he wanted. Why did he get to repeat it while others did not? Why did the simulation not stop when he was already captured when it stopped for Mariner when she got caught!? If the same rules applied for Mariner's test and it did for Boimler then Marioner'a simulation should have went on all the way through torture in the torture machine of the Empire! Terrible writing this episode.
So Boimler went through torture and assimilation, through the whole experience and it was done as a joke? Did no one considered that this person was going through psychological torture!? Who wrote this episode?! They are a very sick person. This episode seriously soured everything season 2 had been doing right until now for me.
Next, remember those last 7 episodes of comradery and we were finally building on the characters and they were getting close? Yeah, this episode, everyone just forgets that Boimler is stuck in a nightmare! No one cared about him! It's so good that they didn't build any character development in the last 3 episodes! Oh wait... they did! This just ruined all of it!
Finally, this episodes proved that the epic trailer we got was just a huge bait and switch I was afraid this was going to happen and the episode just proved it. We got baited! Everyone thought we were going to see a serious Borg episode or a Mirror Universe episode! BUT NO! We got teased. It was all for a joke. A very unfunny joke. It's no wonder they pushed this episode so far ahead. They basically put the best episode in front of it to trick you into thinking that everything was getting better and going somewhere. Well it was, until this episode jumped out like a brick wall and trashed the whole experience.
I honestly hope that people realize that this singular episode is the worst this season and stop comparing it all the other episodes before it which were much better.
I am here to tell you that your gut is right. This episode was terrible and there is nothing wrong with believing that if it's your honest opinion.
Not funny
Rasalgheti_200020 January 2022
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