For all Trekkies across the world, there is no shortage of movies and television series. One of the most popular and successful Star Trek shows in recent memory, Star Trek: Lower Decks, will be flying off into the sunset following its final fifth season. The animated Paramount+ series was created by Mike McMahan and features the vocal talents of Tawny Newsome, Jack Quaid, Noël Wells, Eugene Cordero, Dawnn Lewis, and Jerry O’Connell.
Lower Decks is a comedic spin on the Trek saga. It follows the support crew serving on the U.S.S. Cerritos, one of Starfleet’s least respected ships. Throughout the series, the crew must keep up with their duties while the ship deals with constant hazards.
At New York Comic Con 2024, Collider’s Therese Lacson sat down with McMahan, Newsome, Quaid, Cordero, and Wells to discuss sending a love letter to Star Trek, the show’s crossover with Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, and the evolution of each character. You can check out the full conversation in the player above or read the transcript below.
The Season 5 “Finale is a Love Letter to ‘Star Trek: Lower Decks'”
COLLIDER: I am devastated that this is the last season. Mike, what has it been like looking back on this series? What has been the moment that you are the most proud of when it comes to Lower Decks that you can point to, like, “Yeah, I did that ?”
MIKE MCMAHAN: You guys haven’t seen it yet. It’s in the finale of Season 5. There’s a moment where Tawny’s character, Mariner, gives a little bit of a thesis on Lower Decks and Star Trek, and Star Fleet and friendship, and all sorts of stuff. I didn’t know we were gonna have this season. If Lower Decks is a love letter to Trek, the finale is a love letter to Lower Decks.
Tawny is the heart of all of that. You made my wife cry when she watched it!
TAWNY NEWSOME: No, you made your wife cry.
MCMAHAN: I always make my wife cry.
JACK QUAID: Guys, you both made Mike’s wife cry.
NEWSOME: No, I mean you wrote it! [Laughs]
MCMAHAN: I also like this one scene where we had these Romulan cruisers that were scanning all the time, and we had this whole bit where we’re like, “They’re scanning again!” That’s a little less relatable, but I do really like that scene.
NEWSOME: Constantly scanning, and everyone was just on high alert at scanning, which is the most Trek thing ever.
I don’t want to be scanned either.
MCMAHAN: No, get out of here with the scanning!
The ‘Lower Decks’ and ‘Strange New World’ Crossover Proved One Thing
We need a live-action Lower Decks!
Tawny and Jack, you guys had the live-action crossover with Strange New Worlds . I was in love with it. What was it like not only portraying your characters in live-action but also being in the costume and being on the set, and being in that world instead of having to imagine it in your mind?
NEWSOME: It was really cool to have the camaraderie but to actually be at work. Because we all record separately, we don’t really get to have that. So, even though they aren’t our usual cast members, we quickly fell in with and were welcomed in by that cast in such a way that just felt like family — very sleepover energy. I loved it.
QUAID: Big sleepover energy! I think what really helped was being able to be directed by Jonathan Frakes. That was unbelievable. He’s so cool. I just had the best time getting to actually be on a practical Enterprise set. Tawny was touching so many things and breaking so many knobs. She broke a lot. It was amazing. I don’t think I’ve ever had more fun than I did on that set. That was just unbelievable.
NEWSOME: I think the AD, to this day, still loathes us.
QUAID: In the best way.
NEWSOME: I think he was just like, “The rest of these actors are so disciplined and so good at getting on their marks saying their lines, and we were [mimes pushing buttons and makes spaceship noises].
QUAID: We made those sounds a lot, too. Whatever she just did, that was us.
MCMAHAN: The episode came out amazing. People love it, which I do think means we need an opportunity to get Noël in live-action, too, and the whole Cerritos crew.
What you’re telling me is that the show isn’t canceled; you guys are just going into live-action.
MCMAHAN: No, yeah, the show is canceled.
NEWSOME: It’s fully canceled.
MCMAHAN: But we would happily go into live-action. We live most of our lives in live-action.
EUGENE CORDERO: We need to have another conversation with Mr. Plus.
Well, Mr. Plus, if you’re watching this, you should take note.
NOËL WELLS: He’s having a hard time with Ms. Negative.
NEWSOME: Well, their relationship is just very polarizing.
MCMAHAN: Magnet jokes!
Tawny Newsome on Mariner’s Season 5 Evolution
We’ve seen Mariner grow a lot throughout this show. In the season, we get to see a different version of her, and that version of her has some sort of power. She’s in a position of power. Do you think that Mariner craves that, or is it something that she wants no part of?
NEWSOME: [To McMahan] What do you think? She acts
like she doesn’t but she does?
MCMAHAN: She certainly doesn’t like authority over her.
NEWSOME: But then that means you got to be the boss and be in charge, and that sounds like work and responsibility.
MCMAHAN: I think Mariner would be a great captain. I don’t know if she wants it.
NEWSOME: I think she wants to be Khan, alone on a planet somewhere, and just be in charge.
MCMAHAN: He has the Khan gang, the Khan pals!
NEWSOME: That’s true. But before they showed up, wasn’t he just alone for a minute?
MCMAHAN: I think Mariner would love to hang with the Khan pals. No Khan, just the pals.
WELLS: Oh, I thought you said… Is it a Khanpound?
QUAID: We have to stop doing these puns!
WELLS: I’m sorry! It was an accident.
The Evolution of Rutherford and Tendi’s Relationship in Season 5 of ‘Lower Decks’
Rutherford goes through a lot of trials without Tendi around. It’s a lot of him being stressed out and not being able to function without her. Is there a potential for a romance between these two characters, or is it strictly platonic?
CORDERO: When I think about it as a whole for the series, even in this season, y ou don’t get to watch much television where two characters, who are supposed to possibly have a will-they-won’t-they, are just platonic and great friends. I think that this show has shown that it exists in the world, and it’s great. Don’t stress yourself out, little dudes out there who are like, “She’s just my friend! She can’t just be my friend!” [Laughs]
WELLS: This is a tale for boys about how you don’t have to bang your friends.
NEWSOME: You don’t have to pursue every woman who talks to you.
MCMAHAN: You do not have to bang your friends. Eugene’s right. They’re definitely in love but, as an engineer and a scientist, it’s a different type of love than we usually see on TV.
WELLS: And to protect that love, they’re not wrecking the love…
MCMAHAN: They’re not even doing it on purpose. It’s hard to understand.
NEWSOME: There are different types of love.
MCMAHAN: They love getting in that warp core.
NEWSOME: You made that sound weird.
Jack Quaid Teases His Favorite Boimler Arc
Boimler meets a lot of different versions of himself who are both more successful and more confident than him. What do you think is holding back this version of Boimler?
QUAID: I don’t really think anything is holding him back. I think [Boimler]’s whole arc throughout the whole show has always just been to embrace himself and lean into his confidence. To me, Boimler is, for me personally, a little manifestation of my own anxiety. I just want him to start believing in himself. I think the best version of Boimler is the one on the Cerritos. I think that he just needs to start accepting that. Sometimes, he just learns all the wrong lessons. [Laughs]
Honestly, Mike, this is one of my favorite throughlines for Boimler you’ve ever concocted. I won’t give anything away, but there is something that physically changes on him every episode, and shoutout to the animators for making that happen. That could not have been easy.
MCMAHAN: They actually make everything happen on this show.
QUAID: They do make everything happen.
MCMAHAN: Remember the first season when Boimler got pooped out by that spider cow thing? He’s come a long way since then.
QUAID: That was a core memory for me.
MCMAHAN: The art in that moment is so funny to me. But he’s come a long way.
Noël, in this season, just from the beginning, we see Tendi embracing her Orion roots more. There’s a running joke where she says, “We’re not all pirates. Some of us can do other things,” but she does become a bit of a pirate this season. I just wanted you to expand on that, especially since we get to meet her family and her sister.
WELLS: I like the arc. I took it into psychological terms in the sense that she tried to run away from something that she thought was bad about herself, and then she returned, and then she tried to apply this benevolent goodness to reality and how she thinks reality should be working and testing it out and seeing how that doesn’t always work and that maybe there is something valuable about these other parts of her past and her personality. You watch her fuse them together. Then we get this badass Tendi, who maybe is no longer running away from her past. It’s like a hero’s journey for her, where she comes back to this place, and she has these experiences, and she sees the impact that she has had and that it’s not as black and white as she originally thought it was.
That’s amazing. I just have to say this is a weird moment for me because I can hear your voices, and I can see your characters, but you’re all real people, which is a very fan-person thing for me to say.
NEWSOME: If you close your eyes, do you feel like you’re just watching a fucked up version of the show?
No, I see myself animated and in the show.
NEWSOME: Whoa! That’s cool!
WELLS: Now I see you animated!
MCMAHAN: Do you want to close your eyes and have them all welcome y