Warning: SPOILERS For Star Trek: Lower Decks' Season 5 Finale - “The New Next Generation”
The season 5 finale ofStar Trek: Lower Decks,“The New Next Generation,” features the shocking comeback ofStar Trek: Discovery-style Klingons, five years later.Star Trek: Discovery’s 2017 premiere brought multiple aesthetic changes to its mid-23rd century setting a decadebeforeStar Trek: The Original Series. Rather than recreateTOS-style Klingons with smooth foreheads,Star Trek: Discovery’s makeup artists developed a brand-new look that pushed Klingons' alien features even further.Discovery’s Klingons were supposed to be what Klingons had always looked like, but could only be realized with modern technology and a bigger budget.
In the penultimate episode ofStar Trek: Lower Decks' 5th season, “Fissure Quest”, the collapse of a dimensional rift threatens the destruction of the entireStar Trekmultiverse. Captain William Boimler (Jack Quaid) sends the universe-destroying beam of soliton radiation toStar Trek’s Prime Universe, believing that Lieutenant Brad Boimler and the USS Cerritos crew are capable of handling it. InStar Trek: Lower Decks' season 5 finale, “The New Next Generation”,the soliton beam’s entrance into the Prime Universe creates a Schrödinger field that changes anything caught in it into a different version from the multiverse.
Star Trek: Lower Decks Brings Back Klingons From Star Trek: Discovery
Discovery Klingons Haven’t Been Seen Since 2019
Star Trek: Lower Decks' finale cleverly brings back Klingons fromStar Trek: Discoverywith the help of a well-placed Schrödinger probability field. Before the USS Cerritos or USS Enterprise-E can arrive at the site of the unstable dimensional rift, a group of Klingons are caught in the Schrödinger field.TheLower DecksKlingon crew transforms into hairless, blue-tintedStar Trek: DiscoveryKlingons with especially pointy-looking armor, as their Bird of Prey turns into a version fromStar Trek: Discovery. Later, Relga’s (Roxana Ortega) fleet meet their demise by becoming Proto-Klingons.
How 7 Different Star Trek TV Shows & Movies Redefined Klingons
Different Star Trek shows played parts in redefining Klingons over the years, from simple villains to beloved Star Trek aliens with a rich culture.
Star Trek: Lower Decks' brief transmutation into a different version of Klingons is the first timeStar Trek: Discovery-style Klingons have been seen since the season 2 finale ofStar Trek: Discoveryin 2019.Discovery’s changes to Klingons were controversial amongStar Trekfans, soStar Trek: Discoveryopted to abandon Klingons altogether after the USS Discovery’s jump to the 32nd century. TheKlingons inStar Trek: Strange New Worlds, which also takes place in the mid-23rd century, use the more familiarStar Trek: The Next Generation-era design, suggesting that multiple versions of Klingons exist inStar Trekat the same time.
What Star Trek: Discovery Klingons In Lower Decks’ Multiverse Really Means
All Versions Of Klingons Are Canon To Star Trek’s Prime Universe
Star Trek: DiscoveryKlingons being a part ofStar Trek: Lower Decks' multiversedoesn’t mean thatDiscoveryKlingons—orStar Trek: Discoveryitself—aren’t canon to the Prime Universe. The Schrödinger probability field draws from the deep well ofStar Trek’s multiverse, which the Prime Universe is part of, to turn things into different versions of themselves. Inside the Schrödinger field, the USS Cerritos transforms into other classes of Federation starships that exist in the Prime Universe, like the Sovereign and Galaxy-class. The Klingons' transformation just confirms thatDiscoveryKlingons exist at some point on theStar Trektimeline, even an earlier one.
One explanation forStar Trek: Lower Decks' Klingon transformation might be that there’s a reality whereStar Trek: Discovery-style Klingons have become the predominant variation in the 24th century over either of their less-ridged counterparts.
Star Trek: Discovery’s drastic Klingon changes were surprising, considering the Klingon look fromStar Trek: The Next Generationand its contemporaryStar Trekshows had been the definitive one for years. However, theTNG-era Klingons as honor-bound warriorswere, themselves, a huge change from theTOSera. It makes sense thatStar Trek: Discoverywould want to expand on Klingon culture with a new take. As a celebration ofStar Trek’s deepest cuts,Star Trek: Lower Decksfound a way to say:yes, all Klingons are canonical toStar Trek’s Prime Universe. EvenStar Trek: Discovery’s.
