Star Trek: TNG Reviews - From Start to Finish!

Hey everyone. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to abandon the DS9 thread. But things got a litle crazy at hme (Fiance in the hospital, and now on bedrest to be specific). I'm gonna try to get back into the DS9 reviews when things settle down over here, but if someone else wants to pick up the slack for me I won't bitch about it, heh.

That's no excuse. Don't let it happen again.

The Pegasus

Two great episodes in a row! This episode introduces the phased cloaking shield first mentioned in The Next Phase. In that episode there was speculation that the Romulans were working on a phasing cloak device. But in The Pegasus we find that Starfleet actually beat them to the goal many years ago. Riker's first commanding officer, Admiral Pressman, comes aboard the Enterprise with special orders. He wants the Enterprise to locate and salvage the USS Pegasus, his former vessel and the first ship Riker ever served on.

But there is something else going on here besides a salvage operation and Riker is NOT happy to see his former CO. Seeing Pressman brings back terrible memories of the Pegasus. Apparently an experiment in phased cloak technology aboard the ship got out of control and the senior officers aboard the ship mutinied against Pressman. Riker, being young and inexperienced, grabbed a phaser and defended his captain. They escaped from the starship just before it supposedly exploded. Starfleet intelligence closed the hearings on the matter and now, with Pressman, they are quietly trying to resurrect the phased cloak experiments. I wonder if Section 31 was involved in all this?

This puts Riker into a real bind because he must keep all this information secret from Captain Picard. Picard knows something fishy is going on and warns Riker that if his actions endanger the ship he may find himself out of the job. While searching for the Pegasus in an asteroid field Picard must also contend with a Romulan warbird that is also searching for the missing ship.

The Enterprise locates the remains of the Pegasus inside a large asteroid and Pressman orders the Enterprise into the asteroid. The Romulans promptly seal the opening behind them. When Pressman locates the cloaking technology, things come to a head and Riker must decide where his loyalties lie. He decides to tell the truth to Picard. They adapt the cloaking shield for the Enterprise and escape the asteroid. Picard charges Pressman with violating the treaty which specifically forbade Starfleet from developing cloak technology. This time no one is coming to Pressman's defense.

This was a very strong Riker episode and a nice change of pace from some of the high-concept sci-fi plots this season. One of the best episodes of the season. A very DS9-ish episode, with the characteristic chess games between interstellar powers and the corrupt Starfleet admirals. Admiral Pressman was a great guest character and seeing the Enteprise go into cloak mode was pretty sweet. There were some parallels between this episode and The Enterprise Incident and the next time the issue is brought up, the USS Defiant will make its grand debut on DS9. I've heard that this episode was referenced in the final episode of Star Trek: Enterprise, but I don't even acknowledge the existence of that series and never saw that particular piece of shit, so I don't really know if that added anything else to this story.

Rating:

Homeward

Another long lost family member visits the Enterprise in this episode. But at least this character has been mentioned a couple times before. We meet Worf's foster brother Nikolai for the first time in this episode and TNG gives us one final Prime Directive episode before the series concludes.

Some of these Prime Directive episodes are so frustrating. On the one hand, there are some interesting discussions about interfering in other societies and the problems involved in cultural contact. But in almost every Prime Directive episode Picard comes off as a total cunt. He'd really let an entire species die because of the Prime Directive? Somehow I don't think the directive was meant to apply to such extreme situations.

It is fine as a guiding principle for the Federation and it makes sense to have something like that in place, but when the Prime Directive becomes an unbending law it makes Starfleet seem cowardly and incompetent. So Picard would rather see an entire race die out rather than risk a bit of cultural contamination? That is absurd. They are really just supposed to sit there and watch an entire civilization be destroyed? Didn't Picard learn anything from his experiences in The Inner Light?

Bad Picard episode, but a decent Worf episode. Michael Dorn finally gets to act without his extensive Klingon makeup on and it is strange how different he looks. His brother Nikolai takes extreme measures to save the Boraalan people (good for him) and Worf must deal with his audacious brother, whom he has always had a hard time getting along with.

Nikolai does not give a flying fuck about the Prime Directive and does not apologize for trying to save the Boraalan people. He transports a village of Boraalans onto the Enterprise holodeck in the hopes of relocating them to a new world. This is an interesting use of the holodeck. Try to fool a primitive culture into thinking they are taking a great journey to a new home. Worf is unhappy with Nikolai's actions but is forced to play along in order to safegaurd the Boraalans and keep them from being exposed to a wider world they cannot possibly comprehend. Bit of a stretch for Worf, who is about as deep as a puddle of water but he manages. In the process, he also starts to understand and even respect his older brother.

The Boraalans are successfully relocated to a new world after a rather strange journey through the holodeck. It sort of reminded me of the PC game, Lemmings, where you had to lead all the stupid lemmings to the exit without killing any of them. However, one of the Boraalans inadvertently steps outside of the holodeck and finds himself on board the fantastic starship Enterprise. He cannot deal with the shock of this knowledge and kills himself. Clearly, there is some logic in minimizing cultural contamination but, as I said before, allowing an entire culture to die out for that reason is an extreme and nonsensical interpretation of the Prime Directive. IMO.

We learn that Nikolai has also been shacking up with one of the Boraalan beauties (Penny Johnson, who will later play Kassidy Yates on DS9!) and decides to stay with them on their new world. The foster brothers say their final goodbyes. Ironically, Worf will also lose his biological brother Kurn later on in DS9.

This was probably not the best Prime Directive episode of the series (Who Watches The Watchers probably gets that honor) but it was decent, other than the horrible mischaracterization of Picard. Oh, sure he comes around in the end and agrees with Beverly that they did the right thing... but that was after the fact. He takes credit for the success of the operation but he had nothing to do with it! If it wasn't for Nikolai those people would have been annihilated. Picard would have twiddled his thumbs and played his stupid flute while they all died horribly. Nice. The Boraalans weren't a very interesting race. They're about the same as every other pre-industrial civilization on Trek, but the episode wasn't really about them. Nikolai was a fairly interesting guest character and pretty brave and honorable in his own way.

How many more long lost family members are gonna show up this season? We learned about Deanna's dead older sister, we had an episode about Geordi's mother, we had an episode about Data's mother, and now we've met Worf's other brother! Enough already....

Rating:

Sub Rosa



Fuck Brannon Braga and fuck Jeri Taylor!

That's all I have to say about this giant pile of shit.

About the only noteworthy thing about the episode was the craaaazy Scottish groundskeeper who reminded me of Groundskeeper Willie from the Simpsons.

Oh... and Beverly does a convincing job with the fake orgasms. That was kinda hot. Gates should do some ginger porn.

Rating:

ten episodes left until the finale!!

These Are The Voyages is set during The Pegasus, and features Riker examining the final mission of NX-01 as inspiration for what he should do in the situation.

It was absolutely terrible, and I demand you watch it for completion's sake.

And because I want someone to know my pain. Back to Voyager reviews...

As the seasons wore on, TNG increasingly had to rely on guest stars to bring interpersonal conflict, as Roddenberry's writer's bible made it verboten for the crew to fight amongst themsleves.

DS9, luckily, wasn't bound by such silliness.

What is with all the backward comparisons to DS9? Like TNG was trying to live up to DS9 or something. TNG did come first. So shouldn't the comparison be switched around ? Like, Why was DS9 redoing so many TNG ideas ?

Actually, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise all followed Roddenberrys "evolved humans" edict, they just found loopholes to get around it.

On DS9, they made most of the main characters aliens (Dax, Worf, Quark, Odo, Kira), which meant they could have conflicts without breaking the rule.

On Voyager, they had Neelix, Kes, Tuvok and the Doctor as the non-humans, and Chakotay, Paris and Seven as the humans who technically didn't represent humanity, either because they joined the Maquis, or because they had their humanity taken away by the Borg. (They even took special care to mention that Lon Suder was a Betazoid, just in case anyone got the wrong idea.)

Enterprise got around the rule entirely by setting the entire series in the pre-Federation era, so they could claim humanity just hadn't to the TOS level yet.

DS9 really did undercut Gene's vision pretty sharply.

O'Brien went from being one of Gene's shining examples of humanity on the Enterprise to basically falling apart the moment he stepped on DS9. He started swearing, snapping at Jr Officers, self destroying his marriage - all in the first couple of episodes.

Seems to suggest that all you have to do to shatter Gene's vision of humanity is to turn the lights down and change the decor. It made humanity's entire evolution seem pretty weak.

Thanks.

I remember reading something from Ron Moore about Worf getting the more interesting storylines in TNGs later seasons because he was exempt from the conflict rule as a Klingon. He was the only TNG character who could have a child out of wedlock, or kill an enemy in cold blood, or be a negligent father... they did a bit of that with Ro as well. It couldn't have been a human ensign trying to bully Troi in Disaster.

That's because he was married to the bitchiest woman in the quadrant.

IMO, he should've airlocked Keiko halfway into the first season.

Or you could just argue that the veneer of civilization remains thin no matter what century it is.

With DS9, I forgot to mention Bashir, who was exempt from the "evolved humanity" rule by virtue of his being genetically enhanced, and Ben Sisko.

Sisko was almost a violation of the rule, until they retconned him into being part Prophet at the beginning of Season 7. After that, the character was free to do things like have a petty personal grudge against a Vulcan Starfleet captain, and to be bitter about 20th century discrimination against blacks in Las Vegas.

Nah.

No matter what horrors O'Brien suffered, he was always back to normal by the next episode.

yes, but Gene's evolution of humanity was supposed to be beyond that. Humanity was supposed to have 'grown'.

Bryan Fuller claimed the edict was still enforced while he worked on DS9 and Voyager.

http://out.com/detail.asp?id=19106

^
I'm sure that's just the excuse they gave him every time he wanted to introduce a gay character. "Picard and Riker hooking up?!? Whoa, whoa there Bryan. Let's remember Gene's vision. Save it for Superman."

By the middle of TNG's run it was almost open season. Otherwise how do you explain characters like Vash ?

Stupidest decision ever. Like Sisko or anyone else with a Federation background had any concept of the idea of discrimination! I mean, I kind of get it after that episode "Far Beyond the Stars," but...really? I just don't think soapboxing has any place in what was otherwise a fun romp of a holosuite episode.

I could see it. There are plenty of people today that teach their children to hold grudges about things that happened decades or centuries ago, I don't see why that'd change. (O'Brien, for example, knows all about one of his ancestors experiences with labour unions.) From what we saw of Grandpa Sisko, I can easily imagine him teaching little Ben all about the history of race relations in America.

I've gotta agree with you there. I think they just needed a reason to keep Sisko from joining the plan until the end, but they could have had him busy with war-related paperwork or something.

Ah...I'm glad to know he's not straight. I wouldn't want to confuse him.

Ten...



Lower Decks

I don’t know what happened last week but this was much, much better! This episode explores the lives of four junior officers who are currently serving aboard the Enterprise. This was a cool idea and it was a nice change for the show. For once, the episode does not focus on any of the main characters of the show. Rather it views the main characters, the command crew, from the perspective of four lower ranking officers. Crew evaluations and promotions are coming up and it has the crew both nervous and excited.

Nurse Ogawa has been a regular on the show since the fourth season but it is nice to finally get an episode that fleshes out her character more. We learn that she is engaged to another of the officers aboard the Enterprise. Dr. Crusher is a friend and mentor to Ogawa and the scenes between them are pleasant. Ogawa is a shoe-in for a promotion. One of her friends is a young Vulcan named Taurik who is serving in Engineering under LaForge. Like most Vulcans, he is brilliant and a bit arrogant and he tries very hard to impress LaForge, who gets annoyed by Taurik’s eagerness to please. But he eventually earns LaForge’s respect and they even strike up a bit of a friendship. And Taurik, no doubt, will get his promotion too. Taurik is played by the same actor who plays Vorik, another young Vulcan engineer serving on board USS Voyager. Was this supposed to be the same character? Because the two are almost identical. Or maybe they are supposed to be brothers?

We also meet Ensign LaVelle. He is a confident young man who is trying to get a promotion to Ops. If he wants that promotion he is gonna have to impress Commander Riker. Unfortunately, Riker is not very impressed with LaVelle at the moment and thinks he is trying too hard. Ironically, LaVelle is probably very similar to what Riker might have once been like as a young ensign. There is one amusing scene in Ten Forward where LaVelle tries to strike up a conversation with Riker but it ends up being very awkward. LaVelle confides to his friends that he is worried about his status on board the Enterprise.

And finally we meet Ensign Sito Jaxa, a young Bajoran woman who is competing with her friend LaVelle for the promotion to Ops. We’ve met Sito before. She was one of Wesley Crusher’s teammates from the ill-fated Nova Squadron. Like Wesley, she was forced to redo a whole semester at the Academy and was ostracized for her involvement in the events depicted in The First Duty. It has not been easy for her and she has the most to prove. She is played by the lovely Shannon Fill and is one of the more interesting guest characters to show up on this show in quite a while. I really sympathized with her character. She strikes up a nice friendship with Worf, her commanding officer and mentor. And Worf gives her some comfort and advice when she gets a serious tongue lashing from Picard for her involvement in the accident at the Academy. Picard is very harsh in this scene and almost brings the young Ensign to tears, but we learn that there was a specific purpose to this.

When a Cardassian dissident comes aboard the Enterprise, Sito is asked to go on an important mission to ensure the safe return of this defector to Cardassia. The mission is very dangerous but Sito eagerly accepts the risks. She wants to prove that she has what it takes to serve aboard the Enterprise. She is forced to work with an enemy of her people and there is a good chance she may not make it back, but she wants to go anyway.

Aside from these four junior officers we also meet Ben, one of the civilian waiters in Ten Forward. He is friendly with both the junior officers and the senior officers and he even plays poker with both groups of officers. This episode crosscuts between the two poker games and gives us an amusing look into some of the crew dynamics aboard a starship. I have a feeling that Guinan was supposed to be in this episode but they weren’t able to get Whoopi Goldberg, so they created the character of Ben to take her place. In fact we don’t see Guinan at all this season though we will see her again in Generations.

Sito Jaxa succeeds in her mission and is able to return the Cardassian back to his homeland. But she does not return from the mission and we learn that she was killed trying to get back. Both her friends and the senior officers are devastated by the loss of the brave young woman. I was sad to see her go too. She was a great character and I would have liked to have seen more of her.

But this was a great episode from start to finish, with some interesting guest characters and a fascinating look at a different side of life aboard the Enterprise. The episode ends with a moving scene of Worf sitting down with the other young officers and commiserating with them over the loss of their mutual friend.

This is another episode which mentions border conflicts along the Cardassian border and we all know what this is leading up to. I’ll have more to say about this in later episodes, but ever since Chain Of Command the Cardassians have become the major enemies of the Trekverse. Seasons 3 and 4 were dominated by the Klingon/Romulan storylines but the last two seasons of the show have really focused more on the Bajorans/Cardassians and that region of space. Another indication that we are close to the end of TNG and that the baton is being handed over to DS9.

Rating:

Nine...



Thine Own Self

Another Data-centric episode. As I've noted before, Brent Spiner can make almost any episode work and he does a good job in this one. The storyline is definitely nothing original but it was still mostly entertaining.

There isn't a whole lot to say about it. On a mission to recover some radioactive materials, Data loses his memory during a power surge and comes into contact with a pre-industrial civilization that does not know what to make of him. These people are only just beginning to understand basic scientific principles and methodology and incorrectly assume that Data is an Iceman living in the nearby mountains. Not knowing what to call him, they give him the name Jayden.

This makes for some amusing scenes. Data becomes friendly with a young girl and her father and slowly begins to regain his memory. The radioactive metal fragments are inadvertently spread around the village and the village people turn on Data when everyone starts to become ill. The title is a reference to the fact that, despite his loss of memory, Data's core character remains the same. He is a scientist, first and foremost, and works quickly to try and find a cure for the disease. He also butts heads with Talur, a local 'scientist' who has trouble keeping up with Data and his research.

Data is finally able to cure the village of the sickness but not before he is impaled through the chest and buried underneath the village. The Enterprise crew is able to retrieve Data's body and reactivate him. I liked seeing Data have to work himself out of an unusual situation and some of the village sets and costumes were impressive for the show. There was also a subplot about Troi taking the Bridge Officer's test and becoming a Commander. Again, interesting stuff but not really a whole lot to write home about. An average episode but well written and mostly entertaining.

Oh, yeah. There was one amusing line where Riker says to Troi, "Congratulations. You've just destroyed the Enterprise." Foreshadowing of things to come?

Rating:

Lower Decks is really an outstanding episode.

As I recall, there was no confirmation that Jaxa's mission succeeded.

And, the fact that Jaxa did not return alive,
indicates that the ruse was not successful, and the mission failed.

As I remember it, the plan involving Jaxa was proposed by the Cardassian
defector; to provide a cover story for his return.

This was a suicide mission.
One that was not necessary to achieve the objective.
It seems to me, that there were plenty of other ways to return the operative to Cardassia,
that would not place the life of a Starfleet officer in such dire peril.

Starfleet invests a considerable amount of resources in the training of each officer.
To throw away the life of an officer, on mere window dressing to the actual objective;
in my opinion, represents a serious failure of command.

Picard never should have sanctioned this plan.
And he never should have allowed anyone under his command to be used in this way.

Eight...



Masks

The Enterprise encounters a rogue comet and is transformed into an ancient alien city! Kind of a ridiculous premise. I know many people dislike this episode, but for me it is a guilty pleasure.

Although the concept borders on silly, I am a sucker for any episodes dealing with archaeology, ancient civilizations, or understanding an old culture through symbols and artifacts. I just like this sort of stuff.

Granted, it doesn't make much sense. Why exactly would this alien civilization create an informational archive which transforms passing starships into recreations of their ancient society? And how exactly does the pulse reorganize matter at the subatomic level to create not just artifacts and structures from this society, but living things as well??

Okay, it doesn't make ANY sense. The Enterprise computer systems are corrupted by this alien information, and Data's memory banks are also corrupted by this information so that he begins taking on hundreds of distinct personalities from this ancient civilization. It gives Brent Spiner an excuse to act out of his normal character and play a bunch of different ones.

But this isn't the first time Data's body has been commandeered by some alien force. At least Picard gets to use his knowledge of archaeology to try and understand some of these riddles. It was kind of cool to see him interpret these symbols and work out the mythology of this culture. Is this how real archaelogists do it? Probably not... but then Indiana Jones is hardly a realistic archaeologist either. The mythology and the architecture sort of reminded me of some pre-colombian civilizations on Earth... like maybe the Toltecs or Mayans or something.

Anyway, this is an episode that falls apart if you think about too much. As I said, it is a guilty pleasure of mine. It isn't really a good episode but I am always entertained when I watch it, and it makes me think about ancient civilizations and mythologies and that sort of stuff. Also, the idea of putting on masks to become different personalities sort of reminds of the video game, Majora's Mask, from the Zelda series. Yeah, kind of random... but if you've played the game you know what I'm talking about. Not much else to say about this. I'm sure many will disagree with my rating for this one!

Rating:

"Taurik is played by the same actor who plays Vorik, another young Vulcan engineer serving on board USS Voyager. Was this supposed to be the same character? Because the two are almost identical. Or maybe they are supposed to be brothers?"

Doubt it. Knowing Berman and Braga they probably put out a call for a Vulcan and the actor showed up with a copy of his performance as Taurik.

"Look I know how to do Vulcan. See I did it in this episode."

"ok you're hired."

IIRC, Picard blows the cover to the Romulans on the spot without even consulting Star Fleet or anything. I understand his rationale, but it is the wrong call to make for someone dedicated to Starfleet, IMHO. No matter what, he was now in the loop on Pegasus and should have used that to make changes from within and not undermine Star Fleet as a whole.

Seven...



Eye Of The Beholder

Other than the short scene at the end of Parallels, we haven't heard a single word about a possible Worf-Troi romance this season. Anyone watching the episodes would just think that nothing ever came of it. This episode finally addresses the idea of a Worf-Troi romance, except it really doesn't. We find out it was all in Troi's head... or most of it anyway.

This is also something of a murder mystery episode, although not a very good one. A Lt. Kwan from Engineering kills himself and Worf and Troi are tasked with finding out what has happened. Troi feels some sort of psychic imprint at the site of his suicide and that leads them to believe someone coerced Kwan into jumping. Troi enters into some sort of psychic memory and sees herself back at the Utopia Planitia shipyards, where the Enterprise was first constructed. We learn that Kwan once worked at the Utopia Planitia shipyards and the hunt begins to determine who else was with him during that time. Troi also encounters another creepy telepathic dude named Pierce who seems to be tormenting her.

While Troi and Worf are working together on the case, they start to get a little closer and Worf pretends he has a deep, sensitive side so he can get some of that Betazed ass. But first he decides that he needs Riker's permission to proceed so there is an awkward scene in Ten Forward where Worf tries to ask him if he would have a problem with this new relationship. Worf doesn't quite get the words out, but Riker seems to indicate that he has no problem with Worf seeing one of his ex-girlfriends. This will be revisited again in the series finale. Worf and Troi apparently consummate the relationship but the next day Troi sees Worf making out with some other chick. As she stands aghast, they just start laughing at her. Troi grabs a phaser and blows a hole through Worf's chest. She then runs off to kill herself just like Lt. Kwan did. Oh, and Dylan cheats on Brenda with Kelly and this, like, causes total drama!

I don't watch Star Trek to see adults act like juveniles in awkward teenage romances. Again the Trek writers demonstrate that they have no clue how to write real, mature romances. On TNG the relationships often feel forced and waifer-thin. It was hard to like this episode. For one thing, I don't know of anyone who really liked the Worf-Troi relationship. Even the actors have said it was a bad idea. We only saw it addressed in three episodes and it was completely ignored in every other episode of the season. Even in this episode we find out that it was all just a part of Troi's telepathic experiences. None of it was real except for the scene with Worf and Riker. So the teen drama crap wasn't real either, but that still doesn't make me feel a whole lot better about the episode.

Instead of focusing on the Worf-Troi stuff, this episode should have given us some backstory on the construction of the Enterprise D. That would have been cool. They could have kept the murder mystery angle, but they also should have given us a look at life at the Utopia Planitia shipyards and maybe even a look at some of the arguments and controversies that came up during the construction of the Enterprise. That would have been more interesting than this Melrose Place bullshit.

And why was everyone so shocked about Kwan's suicide in the beginning of the episode? Did everyone forget that Worf was ready to kill himself back in Ethics? Heck, even Worf acts like he doesn't understand why someone would end their own life, when he nearly did the same thing a few years ago! And does Data really not understand why someone would want to kill themselves? Did Geordi have to explain it to Data like he was some sort of simpleton or a first season Wesley Crusher?

This episode was a mess of bad ideas. Instead of being a cool look into the history and construction of the Enterprise, it ended up being another Troi episode about creepy telepathic dudes and an ill-conceived romance between two of the main characters. I'll pass.

Rating: