After last week barnstorming episode of Lower Deckexpectations for its final episode are not just through the roof: they have crossed the warp threshold and become freaky little horned amphibians. if Lower Deck can match expectations, Star Trek has one of the greatest series finales on its hands, but at the same time, it just can't be expected. So instead it does as it always does: its own thing.

While last week the focus was placed on William Boimler and his motley crew of multiversal heroes, "The New Next Generation" firmly and correctly passed the baton back to our Boimler, as well as Mariner, Tendi, and Rutherford. And honestly, for a final episode, it's actually surprisingly straightforward with everything it wants to deal with. Certainly, the stakes are extremely high—all truth as they know it is under threat. And yet with an additional layering of Klingon complications that serve little reason other than to bring Ma'ah and Malor back from it's still early in the season (pay well in the consequences of the rest Lower Deck'best half hour, amazing season of the second "wej Duj") and almost threatens to make Lower Deck' the last episode was a bit too busy, Lower Deck it turns out that there are few bumps in the journey.

Boimler and Mariner were trusted by Captain Freeman when they came to him with the message that William had piggybacked on the soliton beam. Starfleet offers a very simple solution to closing the reality-warping breach; It just makes it more challenging Cerritos' age as a ship. The ship got there, made a deal with the Klingons on the way, and sealed it off. Everyone has a heroic moment, the day is saved, and life goes on.

Maybe there will be versions of this finale that are bigger and wilder, to match the cheerfully nerdy cameo-filled set-up of last week. "New Next Generation" refers to more of the reality-changing waves released by the breach that transform the Cerritos' appearance of many iconic Star Trek ship classes, including the Sovereign-Class, the heroic cinematic version of Enterprise (which is also very nice of Enterprise-E is probably still the version of the ship in operation during the Lower Deck). There are so many moments and allowances made for these threats that a big man should have come to help save the day—Captain Freeman's almost mocking request for Starfleet to send a more heroic ship like on Enterprise in the mission instead of them.

But no amount of force that can change the truth can stop the Cerritos ending this journey as the Cerritos we know and love, a humble, rickety California-Class combined with duranium and the sheer passion of its crew. No amount of money could bring Picard, or Janeway, or anyone else Lower Deck can check off after last week's cameo-a-go-go. It's up to you IT characters, the heroes we've followed for five seasons, to get up and face it, regardless of what they think their position or reputation is in Starfleet, because at the end of the day, they're also Starfleet officers. No matter how serious the threat, they will face it and overcome it. And that's exactly what happens. At this point in the show, we've seen all of these characters grow and adapt to all kinds of missions and strange new worlds that Starfleet can throw at them. Some of them are boring, some of them are amazing, some of them are very dangerous, and their reaction to all things is changing. But they are prepared to face the literal end of reality like any other mission because, to our heroes, this is just one mission.

They don't exist know this is a series ending text of Lower Deck. We did, the creative team did, but the walking universe, life must go on, especially since you avoided the chance of life never going on for anyone. After successfully managing to prevent the breach as a solid rift that gave Starfleet a new frontier to explore, Lower Deck' The epilogue is a reminder that these stories go on and on beyond our view of them. Things change on a job like they do on a Starfleet ship: people change assignments and get promoted, people come and go, dynamics shift. That's the case here, as Captain Freeman is offered the chance to lead Starfleet's research into fragmentation, leaving the Cerritos in the hands of Captain Ransom. Boimler and Mariner could act as his joint advisor to the first officers, similar to Tendi and T'Lyn sharing the bridge's science division position. Rutherford gets the least amount of change in terms of his position - his entire arc this episode is about remembering his love of engineering a ship as challenging as Cerritos—but he at least learned to trust his human nature instead of his implant, which was removed completely. There is no great ending here, life goes on.

It might be a little anticlimactic, and it might not match the expectations shown in last week's show. But it is not surprising that this is the case Lower Deck ends: the focus is on itself, its characters, and their love for what they do. Lower Decks a show about love Star Trek as an entertainment franchise at times, but it has EVER a show about people who like to be in Star Trek. People who scrub holodecks so they can chart new celestial phenomena, people who arrange piles of isolinear chips one day so they can be in phaser fights the next. Its farewell is not really a farewell and the simple closing of a chapter in the lives of our heroes is not only a hopeful promise that we will see some version of them again in the future, but that in Star Trek is a never-ending work of progress.

Saving reality is just a day's work when it comes to the best job in the universe, and Lower Deck' The stars have many days of work to come, even if we don't see them often. And that's the best ending Lower Deck can give himself, and become a better love letter Star Trek than any number of familiar faces could have done.

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