Eight eps in, and I still say I like this show better than anything on TV or film with the Star Trek name since DS9 went off the air.

So far it's avoided one of the biggest pitfalls the Orville keeps facediving into. The Orville wants to have it both ways, showing the crew to be idiots when it suits the comedy, wants us to take them seriously when it suits the drama, and both get undercut.

Lower Decks is a straight comedy, but though the characters screw up at times, they are never shown to be anything other than competent at their jobs (Well, I'm not sure about the Captain or First Officer). A lot of the comedy is pulled from character quirks, and a lot from just how silly the Star Trek universe can look if you run into alien gods, space jellyfish, holodeck malfunctions and space anomalies week after week. "Much Ado About Boimler" had me worried the show had taken a really wrong step by suddenly turning Mariner into Jar-Jar Binks and showing the Federation as much darker than it should be. But by the end of the episode it proved me wrong and I felt silly for not trusting the writers at this point.

Reactions still seem to be mixed, and I wouldn't recommend anyone subscribe to a streaming service just for this, but trust me. When this goes somewhere people can watch it more easily, give it an honest try. It's only found firmer footing since the show has gone on. Between three seasons of Discovery and Picard, I really don't think I realized how much I've missed an optimistic future in a weekly episodic format.

And the Dog was hilarious.