Recently, Star Trek: Lower Decks brought the fandom back to the 1960s through a callback to one of the worst episodes of Star Trek: The Original Series there ever was; "Who Mourns for Adonis?" Lower Decks brought in a character named Olly, who is the granddaughter of Zeus. The same Zeuds supposedly lived on the planet Pollux IV, where the original series episode previously mentioned took place.
It was a tongue-in-cheek connection. There wasn't much to tie the character to that episode other than the initial connection. It was cute, and a lot of people liked it. Yet, we were left wondering; why did Lower Decks picked that episode to call back to. More importantly, why does it seem like shows, namely Lower Decks, are constantly doing that?
It's one thing to call back to First Contact, the Wrath of Khan, or "In the Pale Moonlight" but a bad episode? That doesn't make any sense. So why do it when there are so many impressive pieces of Star Trek storytelling to remind fans of or revisit in a new context?
Well, I have some ideas.
The first reason I came up with for why a new series would call back to a bad episode comes down to recontextualizing. Adding more story or clearing up some confusion around plot elements. In doing so, you may clear up some plot holes and add some life to the plot in hindsight. It doesn't make the episode better, it does make it more important in the canon, however.
The other reason to call back to it involves embracing the absurd. In an episode like "Spock's Brain", no amount of added information can make that episode not hilarious, for all the wrong reasons. So instead, a show like Lower Decks can bring levity to it. If you embrace the absurd it becomes far more easier to enjoy something and be less critical of it. With a show like Star Trek: Lower Decks, you have the unique ability to do just that.
You can embrace the silliness with some episodes through the lenses of the already silly Lower Decks. Considering there aren't many shows like Lower Decks, you don't have the opportunity to tie into a bad episode often, without the fear of having the newer episode rejected outright. Because Lower Decks thrives on the absurd, any bad piece of Star Trek writing becomes useable as a callback for Lower Decks.
That's the beauty of the show. It allows us to enjoy the silliness of the franchise.