Star Treks: Lower Decks – Season 5, Episode 8: “Upper Decks”

Synopsis: The U.S.S. Cerritos crew works together to fight off an attack of Clickets.

This episode can be seen as an illustration of two of James Hillman’s central concepts of archetypal psychology.

In “Upper Decks,” the U.S.S. Cerritos is near Bhunger V, feeding ground of the buhgoon, a space whale-like species. Freeman holds a staff meeting with the bridge crew. Dr. Starfleet informed the crew about an increase in chatter from the Clickets, an insecticide species that hates being complimented. Shaxs has a vision and requests a day off. A Starfleet scientist is coming aboard to study the buhgoon, that are being upset by something. Crew members from the Beta Shift and Delta Shift are trying to get a buhgoon aboard into a Shuttlebay when an asteroid crashes through. A buhgoon enters the Shuttlebay and licks the asteroid and develops cloaking abilities. Buhgoons, now cloaked, take over the Shuttlebay. The scientist reveals that he is not from Starfleet, he is a Clicket, and he and his crew are after the buhgoons. The Clickets try to take over the ship but the Beta and Delta shifters work together and capture a group of Clickets in the shuttle bay. T’Ana attacks another Clicket. Freeman then remembers that Clickets hate being complimented and starts praising them on everything she can think of. The Clickets retreat. Afterward, Freeman’s husband comes aboard to celebrate their anniversary, which Lt. Commander Steve Stevens arranged as a surprise.

In this episode, each different member of the crew all had their roles to play in the efforts to defeat the Clickets when they came aboard the Cerritos. And each crew member also worked with other crew members in concert to keep Cerritos running smoothly and overcome threats, as per their Starfleet training. The crew aboard Cerritos can be analogized to the different archetypes that are within each of our psyches and the Starfleet training the crew shares can be compared to a shared human heritage in archetypal patterns. These are two of the central tenets of Hillman’s archetypal psychology.