The Coolest References And Easter Eggs From Star Trek: Lower Decks 'Much Ado About Boimler'

Star Trek: Lower Decks is an animated series written by and for Star Trek fans who live to have that nostalgic itch scratched as much as possible. Thus far, the show's entire first season has the same vibe (and font) as Star Trek: The Next Generation.

One of the coolest parts about Star Trek: Lower Decks specifically, however, is just how many references and Star Trek Easter eggs appear in literally every episode. We've decided to take a look at the episode "Much Ado About Boimler" and break it down to make sure you didn't miss the coolest Star Trek nods the show has to offer.

As a bonus, we're also going to single out places where Star Trek: Lower Decks pays homage to some of the best science fiction that isn't Star Trek — because let's face it, those Lower Decks writers are nerds for more than just the Federation.

Ensign Tendi (Noël Wells) begins our episode by introducing her own little genetic pet project, The Dog. The Dog is the name of Tendi's new pooch which she claims to be an upgraded version of a regular dog. You might think that there's not much you could reference with a single dog, but Star Trek: Lower Decks is here to teach us all not to underestimate the Easter egg-ability of man's best friend.

The first thing to know about The Dog is that it is not a regular dog at all. In addition to floating and talking, The Dog also cracks its bones out of joint and flips up on the nearest ceiling for some classic crab walking. This is a reference to the dogs from John Carpenter's The Thing.

But The Dog, who it's safe to say is a bit of a shapeshifter (at one point The Dog turns into a metal cube), is also a sly shout-out to a Star Trek: The Next Generation episode called "Aquiel" in which Geordi LaForge (LeVar Burton) investigates a missing person and temporarily adopts a dog. Geordi's new dog is a shapeshifting, coalescent organism.

And if we may push up our nerdy glasses at Star Trek: Lower Decks, we also think it's worth mentioning that The Dog is kind of a reference to Khan Noonien Singh, insofar as both Kirk's nemesis and The Dog are genetically modified. Frankly, it's a little shocking that Starfleet let Tendi make a dog — that sort of genetic resequencing is supposed to be against the rules. Do you want Eugenics Wars, Tendi? Because this is how we get Eugenics Wars.

As you might expect from an episode called "Much Ado About Boimler" Ensign Boimler (Jack Quaid) has his own plot, in which he gets into a transporter accident, turns into a glowy man that glows, and gets sent with a bunch of other "freaks" to a place called The Farm to be healed. So many Easter Eggs, so little time.

Boimler's transporter accident involves him being a little out of phase. This is a reference to the TNG episode "The Next Phase," in which Geordi LaForge (Lower Decks sure loves Geordi) and Ro Laren (Michelle Forbes) are in an accident that makes them invisible because they are out of phase.

Once Boimler is on a ship en route to the Farm to be cured, we meet a bunch of other "freaks," two of which are amazing Easter eggs. One person is in a wheelchair that they control with their mind after an accident involving delta-particle radiation. This parallels the accident former Enterprise captain Christopher Pike experienced in the 2260s.

There's also Anthony, who used to be a man but is now a strange salamander creature because of a transporter accident. Star Trek: Voyager fans will immediately recognize that poor Anthony has turned into the same creature Tom Paris (Robert Duncan McNeill) did when he broke the warp barrier in the infamous episode "Threshold."

Amazing fact: The pilot of the ship is an alien with three arms and three legs. Fans of Star Trek: The Animated Series will immediately clock that alien species as Edosian. One way the original animated Star Trek series enjoyed the freedom from live action was by including much more alien bridge crew, including Arex who was an Edosian. We love seeing Lower Decks fist bump its older animated sibling.

Meanwhile, aboard the U.S.S. Cerritos, Ensign Mariner (Tawny Newsome) gets a temporary new captain while the usual senior officers are on an elite mission. The elite mission involves covert uniforms straight out of the TNG episode "Chain of Command," and Mariner even mentions Picard's replacement captain from that episode, Edward Jellico.

Mariner and her new team have to rescue the crew of the U.S.S. Rubidoux from a mysterious alien that is a cross between the tentacle monster from the Star Trek: Enterprise episode "Vox Sola" and the space jellyfish from the TNG pilot episode "Encounter at Farpoint," but who cares? We gotta talk about pineapples!

In the captain's ready room, Mariner throws around a pineapple. You might think that pineapples have nothing to do with Star Trek, but that's where you're wrong! Pineapples show up all over the place. Rom (Max Grodénchik) eats a pineapple in the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "The Assignment," and Harry Kim (Garrett Wang) wears a pineapple-themed Hawaiian shirt in the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Alter Ego." A captain, however, would only have a pineapple in her ready room if she loved pineapples, and that, my friends, is why this is a reference to the Enterprise episode "Silent Enemy," in which Hoshi Sato figures out that Malcolm Reed's favorite food is pineapple just in time for his birthday.

That's right, Star Trek fans: The coolest, sneakiest Easter egg in the Star Trek: Lower Decks episode "Much Ado About Boimler" is a pineapple. What will that show's writers reference next week?