In a galaxy far, far away. No, wrong one, sorry about that. Written by Mike McMahan with this season’s staff writer Ben M Waller, “Twovix” is exactly what you think it is. Directed by the animation people, we have Barry J Kelly and Jason Zurek to talk about. Kelly has a more limited background from what I can find, though most importantly he was an animation consultant for an episode called “Those Old Scientists.” Zurek, on the other hand, has done Tron: Uprising, Ben 10, Invincible, and DuckTales (woo ohh!). Good creative hands are what I’m seeing.

Returning to the alpha quadrant, we have our old friends back in their correct time, albeit back to doing the busy work as the Cerritos heads out on a top-secret mission. Greeted by Andy Richter (Beljo Tweekle), they find out they’ll be taking something back to Earth. With a name like “Twovix,” I wonder what it could be? All the while Boimler is told he’s getting a promotion at the end of the day, provided he doesn’t screw up. We also get our first proper piece with T’lyn, played by the fantastic Gabrielle Ruiz. Whatever could go wrong on the ship they could have gone to Warp 10 at?

Beljo is a curator and has turned this old piece of ship into a museum. A museum of Voyager? Are you mad? As it turns out, Beljo is very OCD about everything, believing it should all be in its place and never touched. It is an episode of Lower Decks my guy, either the Borg, Klingons, or the Vashta Nerada are going to jump out the walls, shout some nonsense, and we’re going to have a very short adventure. That’s how this series works. We’re four seasons deep, we have a pattern and we’re sticking with it, kind of.

I think the story of our lower deckers being up for promotion, introducing “new” characters, and generally keeping the plot about the ship working together still works. It does feel a little off, especially as Brad is apathetic towards the promotion he might get if he doesn’t screw up. We also have Beckett stepping up to be the enthusiastic one, about Voyager of all things, and Rutherford feels like the afterthought this time around. At the same time, Tendi plays a senior crew member to T’lyn’s Vulcan problem solver junior.

Shock among shocks, something goes wrong on Voyager and because it is Lower Decks it is a reference to the Twovix incident. Yet another transporter accident just so happens to take place in a very contrived way; I’m not angry or upset about it being contrived or another accident, it’s Voyager I have an issue with. I know it is the comfort series and is the most watched of all of them, but “Twovix” does call out Janeway on some of her BS, which Voyager had a lot of for being Star Trek. It is a very cynical show is my point.

Gladly we don’t directly get the “let’s kill it after we’ve identified their individual DNA strands.” Seriously Janeway, killing what had sentience? That aside, it is one story in a week of two, as one of Voyager’s virus’ hid away and broke free, once again wrecking the ship. Particularly Michael Sullivan, The Clown, and Doctor Chaotica. It is a tale of two ships, you could say, as The Cerritos has Billups and T’ana merge to become T’illups, while Boimler needs to be jeered up to save Voyager from the Borg-attized Tak Takian macrovirus.

I want to say I enjoyed “Twovix” while it was around and (of course) the references are great, especially calling out Janeway and the crew of Voyager. Maybe it is a symptom of watching two seasons of Strange New Worlds followed up by three great Doctor Who specials, but it felt… rushed? I know, I’ve reviewed three seasons of Lower Decks already, I love it and its shortness, but something about the story didn’t quite have enough time to breathe. Also, if we’re calling out Voyager, can we at least call out “Threshold?”

We’re literally in a museum of Voyager, that’s the purpose of the episode, to “escort” Voyager to Earth where it will land (in San Fran), and then be held in orbit from then on. Beljo has retrofitted the entire ship to be a shrine of Voyager’s, well voyage through the Delta Quadrant. “Threshold” sex lizards and all. It is an episode for fans of Voyager, and people who have seen all of Voyager. That I think is the problem, it is an episode that’s so deep cut that it is similar to me when I wrote that review of Landlord’s Super.

As an episode on its own, it is simply incomprehensible. As a fan, it works well enough, but as someone who doesn’t love Voyager because Janeway is never really called out on her nonsense, yeah not great. I enjoy how it twists the story of Twovix to be somewhat original, but at the same time, if you isolate the episode the resolution falls a little flat. Honestly, it feels like it is the first episode of Star Trek where the crew has seen some bloody Star Trek!

Ultimately, “Twovix” is a solid episode for the fans, and evidently, that’s what Lower Decks is all about. However, to kick us back into the series after this break where we’ve particularly gone to see some old scientists and a magic man in another man’s underpants, it falls a little flat. I love that we get that tiny reference to “keep quiet about Pike being sexy in person,” even beyond establishing time has passed, it’s just a good moment. Though honestly, I’m just annoyed we also didn’t get someone calling out “Threshold” for its stupidity.

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Lower Decks "Twovix"

7

Score

7.0/10

Pros

• Calling out Janeway.
• Mariner jeering up Boimler is sweet.
• Talking about the sexy captain.

Cons

• Incomprehensible if you haven't seen Voyager.
• Put "Threshold" in a bin and let's never talk about it again.