Star Trek: Lower Decks Brings Back the Cerritos’ Version of Ultron
WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Star Trek: Lower Decks Season 1, Episode 10, "No Small Parts," now streaming on CBS All Access.
In its sixth episode, Star Trek: Lower Decks introduced a murderous artificial intelligence program. This program was called Badgey, and it was created by Ensign Rutherford to work as a helpful training assistant inside the holodeck. While he started out friendly, however, it wasn't long before Badgey became a murderous program who turned against his creator.
At the end of the episode, Rutherford defeated his "son," but Badgey still remained inside the holodeck. At that point, it was clear the program would return to haunt the Cerritos one day -- and that moment comes in the Season 1 finale.
Click the button below to start this article in quick view. Start nowIn "No Small Parts," the crew of the Cerritos comes under attack by the Pakleds, who are now an incredibly powerful enemy. They are able to trap the ship, and they begin a total invasion, threatening to kill the entire crew. With very little options to survive, Rutherford devises a plan to defeat the Pakleds by planting a virus inside their ship. However, he doesn't have this virus just yet -- he needs someone to create it for him.
Rutherford then heads back into the Holodeck and wakes Badgey up. When the program returns, Rutherford has no choice but to remove his safety features, so the program can be his most murderous self. When given the instructions to create a virus to take down the Pakleds, Badgey rapidly comes up with several options. Rutherford then uploads Badgey into his cybernetic implant to take him aboard the Pakled ship. There, the Ensign instructs the program to unleash the virus, but Badgey doesn't comply. Instead, he says he will wait for the Pakleds to kill him first. Turns out, Badgey is still angry at Rutherford over the events of their previous confrontation, which ended with the Ensign "killing" his son.
Badgey activates a self-destruct sequence, something that Shaxs ends up using to his advantage. Since Badgey is in Rutherford's implant, Shaxs rips it off and sends the young Ensign flying back to the Cerritos. Shaxs then keeps Badgey onboard the Pakled ship, and the self-destruct sequence takes out the entire vessel -- Badgey and Shaxs included.
The death of Shaxs is a huge loss for the crew of the Cerritos, and the moment comes as a shock for the typically lighthearted animated series. While the return of Badgey cost the life of one of the Cerritos' best officers, he was also instrumental in saving the lives of everyone else. Badgey is a twisted addition to the Star Trek universe, and although he was technically destroyed in the Pakled ship explosion, there's always a chance he will return again.
Streaming on CBS All Access, Star Trek: Lower Decks stars Tawny Newsome as Ensign Beckett Mariner, Eugene Cordero as Ensign Rutherford, Jack Quaid as Ensign Brad Boimler, Noël Wells as Ensign Tendi, Dawnn Lewis as Captain Carol Freeman, Jerry O'Connell as Commander Jack Ransom, Gillian Vigman as Doctor T'Ana and Fred Tatasciore as Lieutenant Shaxs.
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