By the way, I didn’t hate this episode. I didn’t love it, but it gave a lot of background to SAM that made her more interesting than “the weird hologram girl”. And I loved the DS9 references, including the appearances from Jake. And we find out that Dax is on the faculty?! I hope that wasn’t a throwaway, and she becomes a regular character (plus I think the actor did a good job).
I loved DS9, for me it ranks 3rd after Strange New Worlds and Enterprise. There aren’t that many references to it in later shows, so seeing the love in this episode was great.
I also liked that Avery Brooks gave his blessings to this episode, and gave permission to use his voice toward the end.
Holy shit, I did not recognize her with that stuff on her face. No wonder I liked her. I remember Tawny from one episode of SNW (the crossover with Lower Decks) but I also watched her on Space Force. Yet I didn’t recognize her at all.
My problem is not that the show is fixated on aiming for the tween and teen demographic, but that their approach to it is so formulaic: of course the usual romance and rivalries, insecurity and belonging, but even more that each character is working so hard on defining themselves in relation to, and individuating from, their generally dysfunctional families of origin. So this goofy cute one is SAM’s dealing with her overbearing “parents”, last week Jay-den’s parental disapprovals, Admiral’s daughter big daddy issues, fish boy can never be good enough, Betazoid kids dealing with … parental expectations, and of course idealized absent momma.
I suspect many teens are not all that drawn to these issues as enough to keep them coming back without actually moving a good story in each ep.