[Nate the Great]

February 1st, 1988, "11001001"

Fiver (by Marc)
Transcript
Memory Alpha

PART ONE

The Episode

Summary of key points:
* It feels too soon for such a complete overhaul of the computers. In retrospect I wish this episode could've been put off until after "Contagion": the Iconian virus is certainly reason enough for a complete computer overhaul.
* If Barclay's holoaddiction was supposed to be so weird, the creators need to stop presenting episodes like this and "The Big Goodbye" and "Booby Trap." Over and over again we get Starfleet officers saying how you need to keep your perspective and distance when it comes to relationships with holocharacters.
* I hate plots where the heroes aren't given a choice in the matter because "you might say no." That's flat-out lazy writing. Bynar is a Federation world, and this seems like prime humanitarian mission material.
* The Bynar race in general raises a few too many questions, but I'll skip them. Except for one: why are only two Bynars assigned to this task? Even if you don't need teams physically at each of the three computer cores, this does seem like a problem you can speed up by throwing more people at it.
* The perceptual filter hasn't been invented yet, and it irks me.
* Who left Wesley in charge of Engineering again? It doesn't matter that they're not polywater drunk again, there are other Engineers about. (And who is the Chief Engineer this week?)

PICARD: What about you, Number One? You've earned a rest.
RIKER: I've never been very good at organising my time off. Something'll turn up. It always does.

Why is this line here? Why are you making Riker look bad if it doesn't service the plot? At least have him say "I was planning to X, but I'm open to other interesting activities if they present themselves."

RIKER: Worf, it's just a game. A little friendly competition, You work up a sweat, you have a few laughs, and you make new friends.
WORF: If winning is not important, then, Commander, why keep score?
TASHA: I think he's pulling your leg. Believe it or not, Worf is developing a sense of humour.

I hope so.

RIKER: Keep notes. This project might turn out to be of interest to scholars in the future.
LAFORGE: Really?
RIKER: Well of course. Think about it. A blind man teaching an android how to paint? That's got to be worth a couple of pages in somebody's book.

I get the joke, but this one does seem a bit insensitive. Was Gene asleep this week?

CRUSHER: Well, since then I've been working on an approach that combines cybernetics and regeneration. It sounds impossible, I know, but I have found an approach which will work. I mean, what an opportunity. To have a chance to talk with Doctor Epstein.

Sheesh, you can tell the Borg haven't been invented yet, can't you?

RIKER: All right. What should I choose? Computer, I'd like some place to play some music. A little atmosphere.
COMPUTER: Specify.
RIKER: Jazz.
COMPUTER: Era?
RIKER: Circa 1958.
COMPUTER: Location.
RIKER: Kansas City. No, wait. New Orleans. Bourbon Street Bar, New Orleans. Around two a.m.
COMPUTER: Programme complete. Enter when ready.

I'm glad that this era of building programs via verbal commands (and frankly insufficient verbal commands) won't last forever. Why is any of this junk important? "1950s-era Earth jazz club, late at night" is adequate for this purpose.

MINUET: My name is Minuet and I love all jazz except Dixieland.
RIKER: Why not Dixieland?
MINUET: You can't dance to it.
RIKER: My girl.

Always remembered the Dixieland quote.

RIKER: I know you are a computer-generated image, but your smell, your touch, the way you feel. Even the things you say and think seem so real.
MINUET: Thank you.
RIKER: How far can this relationship go? I mean, how real are you?
MINUET: As real as you need me to be.

Ugh. And Reg (and Geordi, and Harry...) are the freaks?

MINUET: Enchantee. Comme c'est merveilleux de vous voir ici.
PICARD: Incroyable! Vous etes Parisienne?
MINUET: Au fond, c'est vrai, nous sommes tous Parisiens.
PICARD: Oui, au fond, nous sommes tous Parisiens.

Rough translation:

MINUET: Enchanted. How wonderful to see you here.
PICARD: Unbelievable! Are you from Paris?
MINUET: More or less, we're all Parisians.
PICARD: Yes, deep down we're all Parisians.

PICARD: The holodeck has been able to give us woodlands and ski slopes, figures that fight and fictional characters with which we can interact, but you, you're very different. You adapt. You spoke to me in French.
MINUET: It was very simple. When I heard your name, I merely accessed the foreign language bank.
PICARD: That's very impressive.

Apparently "Picard" means a person from Picardy, an area in northern France. According to Memory Beta he's La Barre, Haute-Saone, which is south of the Picardy region (I suppose one of his ancestors moved south taking the name with him).

(Data is continuing to paint, or not to paint)
LAFORGE: Now what are you doing?
DATA: I am awaiting inspiration.

I hope Geordi packed a lunch, Data won't be inspired until "Birthright". Hehe...

LAFORGE: I don't know. There's no one on duty here, and we're getting some very strange readings from the magnetic containment field.
DATA: The field is deteriorating.

There should be someone in charge of Engineering, keeping an eye on the warp core. And couldn't they have created a technobabble reason why the antimatter can't be dumped?

COMPUTER: Decks two through four to cargo transporters. Decks five through ten, proceed to transporters one, two, three and four. Decks six through sixteen, proceed to transporters five, six, seven, eight, nine and ten.

First, where are the escape pods? Second, wouldn't the wall arrows from "Encounter at Farpoint" be of use here? Just have the computer say "follow the wall arrows to your nearest transporter room."

RIKER: It's uncanny. I could develop feelings for Minuet, exactly as I would for any woman.
PICARD: Doesn't love always begin that way? With the illusion being more real than the woman?

Ugh. Repeat previous comments about Reg and Geordi here, but toss Harry Kim and Janeway into the pile as well.

COMPUTER: Initiated as a programmed response. The magnetic field containing the antimatter had weakened. There was no fail-safe available.

So they outright said it: there are no fail-safes. Not "all fail-safes have malfunctioned", "there are no fail-safes at all."