• The episode title is a play on the TNG season episode, “Lower Decks”, which also served as the inspiration for the name of this series.
• Boimler’s beard has progressed to the point where his moustache and goatee have connected.
• Rutherford appears to have shaved off his beard, perhaps indicating that after the previous episode’s michelada incident, he’s no longer trying to emulate Beardler.
• Halloween has previously been mentioned in:
• “Catspaw” - Bones compared the situation he, Kirk, and Spock found themselves in to the holiday
• “The Big Goodbye” - A holodeck character insulted Captain Picard by claiming his uniform made him *”ready for Halloween.”
• “Crisis Point” - We learned that Mariner dressed up as Toby the Targ for Halloween on multiple occasions.
• “Those Old Scientists” - We learned that Boimler dressed as Pike for Halloween on the USS Cerritos
• Additionally the USS Discovery’s registry number, NCC-1031, is a reference to the date Halloween falls on
• Mariner claims she was ”trapped in a painting,” but describes the situation more as being trapped in a holoprogram, a more common experience on Trek.
• V’Ger appeared in “Star Trek: The Motion Picture”.
• It’s Steve Stevens! From Star Trek! Stevens is voiced by Ben Rodgers, former story editor and writer on the series.
• We haven’t seen Stevens since season four’s “Empathological Fallacies”, and he hasn’t had any dialogue since season three’s “Crisis Point 2: Paradoxus”.
• This is the first episode where we get some insight into Stevens’ role on the ship as Cap’n Freeman’s personal assistant.
• A pathogen caused ensign Barnes devolved into a cavewoman, not unlike what happened to Riker in “Genesis”, while simultaneously developing the ability to read minds, similar to Gary Mitchell and Elizabeth Dehner in “Where No Man Has Gone Before”, or Charlie Evans in “Charlie X”.
• ”The who?” Freeman previously acquired a star chart of the neutral zone from the Clickets before upsetting them with her courtesy in “Veritas”
• ”My team refreshed all the Cordry rocks in the ceiling panels on the bridge.” We get a technobabble explanation for the debris that occasionally falls from the bridge ceiling when the ship is hit by an attack, such as in “Yesterday’s Enterprise”.
• The Cordry rocks may have been named for Marian Cordry, the director of Paramount’s Star Trek franchise library and archive.
• ”Well, they look like cows to me.” Ransom has never seen a cow.
• The researcher/Clicket infiltrator Zurkel is played by Paul F. Thompkins, who also voices Doctor Migleemo.
• The ensigns trying to wrangle the buhgoon are from both beta and delta shift, calling into question how the shift system works entirely.
• This is the first time we’ve seen Federov wearing more than a towel.
• The buhgoon have a natural cloaking ability. Other living beings with the ability to cloak include:
• Beings infected by the Tarchanne parasite - “Identity Crisis”
• The beast captains Picard and Dathon confronted - “Darmok”
• The hunters from Yautja Prime - “Family”
• Jem’Hadar - “The Jem’Hadar”
• Tosk - “Captive Pursuit”
• Ransom begins his story with, ”Back a few hundred stardates ago.” A hundred stardates is roughly 36.5 days in 100 stardates, Ransom is talking about a matter of months.
• Tempassa was mentioned in “Ties of Blood and Water” as the location of a raid by the Shakaar resistance cell. Shaxs was established as having been part of that cell in “Hear All, Trust Nothing”.
• Shaxs has a Bajoran flag, as seen in “The Star Gazer” in his quarters.
• Billups mentions having had a bagel and it giving him an upset stomach in his logs. In “Starbase 80?!” it was established that Billups is branching out from only eating hot cereals.
• In “Twovix” Westlake had commander pips after being restored to his original form, yet here he’s back to being a lieutenant. Perhaps it was just a piece of sweet corn?
• ”We’re good to go the next time some virus makes everyone sing or whatever.” Sadly we haven’t seen any singing viruses on Star Trek. Nurse Westlake’s hyposprays would not do much in the case of a quantum probability field, like the one in “Subspace Rhapsody”.
• Feeman tells the pregnant crewperson she wasn’t aware they weren’t human. There are a number of species outwardly indistinguishable from humans. The non-extinct, non-shapeshifting ones include:
• Earth Two natives - “Miri”
• Betans - “The Return of the Archons”
• Eminian - “A Taste of Armageddon”
• Capallans - “Friday’s Child” - While human in appearance, all Capallans were notably tall and large
• Argelians - “Wolf in the Fold”
• 829-IV natives - “Bread and Circuses”
• Neural natives - “A Private Little War”
• Iotians - “A Piece of the Action”
• Ekosians - “Patterns of Force”
• Zeons - “Patterns of Force”
• Kohms and Yangs - “The Omega Glory”
• Elasian - “Elaan of Troyius”
• Morg and Eyemorg - “Spock’s Brain”
• Minarans - “The Empath”
• Fabrini - “For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky”
• Platonians - “Plato’s Stepchildren”
• Scalosians - “Wink of an Eye” - While outwardly indistinguishable from humans, they do move too fast to be seen by humans
• Gideons - “The Mark of Gideon”
• Ardanans - “The Cloud Minders”
• Sarpedion natives - “All Our Yesterdays”
• Deltan - “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” - All Deltans are bald and are considered to be conventionally attractive by human standards
• Bandi - “Encounter at Farpoint”
• Betazoids - “Encounter at Farpoint” - Betazoids have all black eyes
• Ligonian - “Code of Honor”
• Edo - “Justice”
• Tarellians - “Haven”
• Angel One natives - “Angel One”
• Mordanites - “Too Short a Season”
• Aldeans - “When the Bough Breaks”
• El-Aurian - “The Child”
• Omega Sagitta system natives - “The Outrageous Okona”
• Ramatasian - “As Loud As A Whisper”
• Angosians - “The Hunted”
• Rutians - “The High Ground” - Two-tone hair seems to be a species trait, and colours appear to depend on gender
• Ventaxians - “Devil’s Due”
• Yedera Prime natives - “Shadowplay”
• Sikarians - “Prime Factors”
• Teplans - “The Quickening”
• Takarians - “False Profits”
• Vori - “Nemesis”
• Mari - “Random Thoughts”
• Dinali - “Critical Care”
• Ba’ku - “Star Trek: Insurrection”
• Toroth system natives - “Desert Crossing”
• Illyrian - “Damage” - Illyrian appearances vary depending on their genetic modifications, but most of the ones we see on SNW appear indistinguishable from humans
• Kwejian - “That Hope is You, Part 1” - Their foreheads do light up when using their psychic abilities
• The pregnant alien is voiced by Phil LaMarr, who also portrays Admiral Freeman, Dirk, and handful of other characters.
• ”I felt stuck out of phase, like Geordi and Ro…” Winger Bingston Jr. references the events of “The Next Phase” in his one man show.
• We previously saw this model of Clicket ship in “Veritas”.
• ”Ransom role!” Ransom has previously called out names while engaging in physical activity, specifically during the combat with Vindoor in “Temporal Edict”, he alternatingly yelled ”Kirk!” and ”Spock!” while hitting the Galrakian with double fist strikes.
• The tear in Zurkel’s disguise looks very reminiscent of torn mask worn by a Malurian disguised as an Akaali in “Civilization”. Both are on the left side of the face, and show a very alien visage beneath false, human(esque) flesh.
• ”You are the worst commander I’ve ever had in my life.” It was established in “Envoys” that Castro served on the Enterprise, though which one wasn’t specified. Still, barring time travel, that narrows it down to Riker, Data, or whomever had the position after Data.
• Billups is briefly stuck in a tube, apparently dying, in a scene inspired by Spock’s death in “Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan”.
• The cadet who approaches Billups about a burned out indicator light previously asked Boimler for advice in “wej Duj”. He is voiced by Nolan North.
• It’s the Freemans’ anniversary, which raises the question of whether or not they got married on Halloween.
• It appears that the holodeck location Admiral Freeman selected for their anniversary dinner is Café des Artistes, as seen in “We’ll Always Have Paris”. The chairs are different, but the balcony and the view are the same.
• ”No. I have made a joke at your expense. Boom.” The real joke here is the perpetuated myth that Vulcans never lie.
In all fairness to Ransom, maybe he was thinking of the spider cows from S01E01?