A Mathematically Perfect Redemption

 DVD, Lower Decks S3 (A Mathematically Perfect Redemption)

Mathematically perfect name? I don't think so, and the title's as ironic as her name because this is no redemption story, but instead a typically cynical reminder of the negative, depressing sludge that infests the modern view of Trek, far from the inspiring, genuine and refreshing attitudes shown in the old stuff. But aside from the crudeness of Peanut Hamper's language and superior, unkind attitude, and the 'adult' innuendoes, I was wondering why I hadn't liked this episode at all, originally rating it as the worst of the series so far, lower even than the worst examples of Season 1. I knew there was an unpleasant twist at the end where Peanut Hamper reveals she was shamming all along, having got in contact with the Drookmani scavengers for a way off the planet she crashed on, but otherwise it wasn't as bad as I recalled, and that's probably because there actually was a genuine redemption story for her in Season 4 (the only truly good episode of that season for me). Expectations always play a part and as this had gone down as the worst I kept seeing things to enjoy, such as the beautiful scenery and music, or the alternate opening titles. None of it's enough to redeem the irredeemable, but even the battle at the end with those Cerritos Phaser Arrays lancing out beams as the Drookmani cause devastation, was actually quite a visual treat, especially rare to see a battle in low orbit atmosphere rather than space. And it's always good to see a villain get her comeuppance, permanently caged in Self-Aware Megalomaniacal Computer Storage at Daystrom on Earth (as seen in 'Picard').

Right next to the evil Agimus! I did enjoy Jeffrey Combs' brief cameo, as I did J.G. Hertzler's return as the eye-patched Drookmani Captain (his second role of the season after playing a Ferengi knock-off of Martok, it's just a shame both actors have appeared in some of the worst instalments of this series!), but how can you have two 'DS9' greats in an episode and not have them meet? A wasted opportunity, and again, it can't heal the deep wounds etched in Trek by episodes like this. Yet those wounds have been healed by the Season 4 episode so it doesn't seem quite so bad as it did, but I think the biggest problem is that I don't like seeing horrible, unsympathetic characters (especially ones who are supposed to represent the best of Starfleet), used as a joke: the punchline is that you trusted this 'person' and she double-crossed everyone for her own selfish ends. Ho, ho, ho, isn't that amusing? No, it's not. It's simply a sad indictment on how Trek is run these days. And not only to focus on a guest character (never a good idea in almost any Trek, Nog notwithstanding), but one of the worst New Trek has come up with, almost at the level of Mirror Georgiou and Michael Burnham, both characters deserving of the title worst-written and acted in all of Trek...

Bad judgement is what it is, and I like a series to experiment and try something different from time to time. If it'd been an episode all about Agimus I'd have been much happier: for one, Combs is one of the best things in Trek, whatever he does, and secondly, he's not meant to stand for good, he doesn't represent Federation values so there isn't that 'hilarious' poking at the 'goodness' of the organisation to the level that it could be argued the galaxy would have been done a favour if Starfleet and the Federation had both been wiped from existence (maybe it's a commentary on Western culture which is in the process of degenerating beyond repair, but if so I'm pretty sure it was entirely unintentional and blind, just a reality they didn't notice, but nor is it in any way aspirational or inspirational!), since we've seen them commit such evil and too many terrible choices and directions. Not that they were ever really perfect in old Trek, but there were usually mitigating circumstances: a misguided Admiral, an unsanctioned division, a Captain gone insane, not the calculated, precise evil we see far too much represented in Starfleet or Federation actions. But this episode is only a symptom of all that, not the cause or the end result so that's enough about that.

There are other things I can admit to liking about this one, for a start being able to see the events of the end of Season 1's finale from Peanut Hamper's perspective, since that was the best stuff in a weak season. And her line about the bird people being the poor man's Aurelians is a fun Trekference to 'TAS,' always appreciated. We even get a rare Trekference to modern Trek, when she talks to Rawda about how she'd wanted to run away to Freecloud - unfortunately it's also a reference to another of the worst episodes in 'Picard,' so I suppose it fits... And that's about all I can say in the positive. I suppose it shows engagement if I'm actively noticing inconsistencies or nitpicks. Doesn't it? But about those opening titles where Peanut Hamper floats pitifully about in a junk field, left behind after the battle where the Titan (the good-looking version of the ship, unlike the Titan-A, which 'Picard' really should have brought into live action except for their need to turn it into the Enterprise-G at the end of Season 3), saves the Cerritos: why can't she simply propel herself out of there? Maybe she needed to recharge, however that works, that could be the reasoning as she does take time to recover when first on Areolus. But once she's cobbled together a warp-capable one-man ship, shouldn't she drop out of warp immediately the warp engine flew off, and yet she seems to coast in warp for a bit longer?

The other thing that didn't make sense to me was how can she have a Father? Aren't Exocomps built? Weren't they even built by Starfleet? I don't remember the actual backstory of the little robots that could, although I do remember they don't communicate through human speech, which would have been a much more daring and challenging way for the writers to create Peanut Hamper, but also would have made her less 'relatable' - but they failed on that count even with human speech! And then they couldn't have her swearing and badmouthing everyone, which is so funny... isn't it? Having an Exocomp character, as I'm sure I wrote in my review for 'No Small Parts,' could have been a terrific idea, I'd have loved to have learned more about the little guys. Sadly, as is so often the case, we don't really see any race develop, it's quite strange how much has been dropped when such things were part of the fascination and nuance of Trek. What do we even know about Drookmani, for example? Even races created for this series, which tends to be the relatively closest to being truly Trekky, aren't afforded the necessary work of fleshing them out, and that's sad.

One minor point of interest regarded the Prime Directive and whether Peanut Hamper had actually broken it - we discover the Areore were once warp travellers themselves until technology tore their society apart and they rejected machines, so there was no danger there, although that brings up the issue of if a people have turned away from technology to the extent that they've forgotten how they lived, would that require them to rediscover warp before the Federation would contact them? That isn't the case here, since the Areore are still able to use the technology, as demonstrated by Rawda who pilots a big ship to defeat the Drookmani, nor have they forgotten their past, it's just a point I'd never considered before. But even if they hadn't had a technological past, I don't think Peanut Hamper had broken the Prime Directive anyway since they seemed unsurprised that there could be other races beyond their planet and they knew about machines (before we knew they'd been a warp capable species), although it's all academic and we know Peanut Hamper would have happily broken any and all directives if it suited her selfish purposes - it's just sad that we see her helping the 'primitive' people, maybe even regretting her past, only for it all to be shown up as a plan to deceive everyone into letting her back into Starfleet. "What about the needs of the 'me'" is one of her lines, in defiance of the famous Vulcan proverb, paralleling modern thinking.

You would have thought, much like Mirror Georgiou, she was beyond redemption, but you'd be forgetting that sometimes this particular branch of this Trek generation sometimes gets it right, even if they left it for another season before they chose to. I'd have been happy if they never brought her back at all, but it turned out to be the high point, which is quite radical, although knowing the cynicism of the writers I can well believe they bring her back again in Season 5 in order to undo her redemption, but I sincerely hope not (and that we never see her again). The character, and this episode, was an almost completely wasted opportunity for the sake of some cheap jokes that weren't even witty or funny - waste a valuable episode on a crotchety, objectionable monster (even the reference to the Tom Hanks film, 'Castaway' where she creates her own mock-up of a n Exocomp to have someone to talk to, shows her character when she's quick to discard it in her bid to escape), all framed in the kind of wondrous alien planet with what could have been a fascinating bird culture but is really only there to laugh at innocence, earnestness and the 'stupidity' of inferior races, and play out villager cliches (because knowing science makes us so 'great'), of more kiddie fare. Bad tone, bad taste, bad waste.

**