WARNING: Contains SPOILERS for Star Trek: Lower Decks, season 4, episode 9, "The Inner Fight".
Summary
- Lt. JG Beckett Mariner is revealed to have been friends with Ensign Sito Jaxa, connecting "Lower Decks" to "Star Trek: The Next Generation" and potentially paving the way for Sito's return.
- Ensign Sito Jaxa was killed by Cardassians while on a dangerous mission, deeply impacting Worf, Captain Picard, and Mariner in "Lower Decks."
- Ensign Taurik was intended to become a recurring character in a potential eighth season of "Star Trek: The Next Generation," but plans changed when the movie franchise was launched.
Star Trek: Lower Decks was heavily inspired by the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode of the same name, but what happened to these original Lower Deckers after TNG ended? "Lower Decks" focused on four of the USS Enterprise-D's junior officers, Ensigns Sito Jaxa (Shannon Fill), Taurik (Alexander Enberg), Sam Lavelle (Dan Gauthier) and Nurse Alyssa Ogawa (Patti Yasutake) as they awaited news of their potential promotions. The TNG episode is one of Mike McMahan's favorites, and it heavily influenced his animated comedy series Star Trek: Lower Decks, which is also purely focused on the lives of the junior officers aboard the USS Cerritos.
Star Trek: Lower Decks season 4, episode 9 confirmed that Lt. JG Beckett Mariner (Tawny Newsome) had been friends with Sito Jaxa at Starfleet Academy. In connecting Beckett and Sito Mike McMahan explicitly confirms Mariner's links to Star Trek: The Next Generation and its own Lower Deckers. Now that he's built that bridge, it would be interesting to see if TNG's original Lower Deckers make a comeback in Lower Decks' season 4 finale or beyond.
