What the second episode lacked.

You'd be a lazy writer if you could write. In the original series that this show is spoofing, the writers would have found a way to sabotage the zoo or find some political leverage etc. Everything doesn't have to be kill kill kill; that's just more lazy writing.

I would have been satisfied if, instead of rescuing the child, at the end of the episode Kelly had turned to Ed and said, "We ARE going back to rescue that child."

To which Ed replies, "And everybody else. As soon as we figure out how."

That way you don't get the impression that they saved the kid, but not the poor guy who'd been there 30 years, AND it sets up a future episode. You're also not stuck wondering how they did it, and why that part was left out of the story.

I thought the same thing about the ship being scanned/disguised.
I don't remember exactly what the robot character said about adapting the disguise technology, but the disguised buoy exploded. Don't think they would have salvaged much from that.
How did they adapt that technology?

"I get irked when I hear people seem to imply that the mere
mention of some issue, like your mention of"

So you get irked, when you HEAR .. (how do you hear here?).. [that] people SEEM .. to IMPLY .. that.. mention, 'like your mention'..

Could you have been more convoluted if you had tried?

Just say what you are going to say, geez. There's nothing wrong with saying: "I get irked when people use an issue to elevate a TV show".

Or you could say "Just because a TV show uses a tired plot, doesn't mean it suddenly has artistic merit".

When you use a run-on sentence, where 'you get irked', 'when you hear', 'people seem to imply', 'mere mention of issue, like your mention', you lose your reader.

Your 'irkedness' adds no value to your point, and just how careful do you have to be to say "SEEM TO IMPLY"? You can just say "imply". Sheesh!

Or better yet, don't even use 'imply'. Have you really written over 3500 posts before this one, and yet not learned to be more direct in your communication? I use a lot of words, and I write long sentences, too, but your run-on sentence makes it seem that you plan to want to imply that writing an expression prolongs the attempt to wish to get closer to dreaming of getting near an explanation that could possibly seem to imply having an actual point.

It may be disappointing but it's also not stupid. Not every plot element has to be wrapped up in a single episode.