[Nate the Great]

TROI: What's your mother like, Geordi?
LAFORGE: If you think I'm going to start talking about my childhood, Counsellor, you're way off.
TROI: That's not what I asked.

As someone who's worked with mental health professionals I can tell you that this kind of nonsense is self-defeating. Obstinate insistence that you're not crazy will NEVER convince anyone that you're not. Furthermore, approaching counselling with the mindset that you won't let yourself be helped just means that you're wasting everyone's time with wheelspinning.

TROI: When was the last time you saw her?
LAFORGE: About seven months ago, when she first took command of the Hera. I went to a party she had for her crew. She wanted me to come over and see her, but I was really busy at the time. I mean I suppose I could have made the time to go and see her, but, you know, I just didn't think that. I mean, you know, I, I didn't think that
TROI: You didn't think it would be your last chance to see her.
LAFORGE: That's not what I was going to say.

Self incrimination and coulda/shoulda/woulda statements aren't constructive, and frankly Starfleet Academy should train their cadets to recognize this destructive behavior in themselves.

TROI: You're worried about the disappearance of your mother, guilty that you didn't see her when you had the chance, so you're unwilling to consider that she might be dead. Your need to believe she's alive is so strong that it manifests itself as a physical image.
LAFORGE: But she told me she's trapped on that planet, that she's in danger. Now, if this was some kind of wish fulfillment, don't you think I'd be fantasising her safe and sound?
TROI: No. Because that would be the end of your fantasy. You'd know it wasn't true. The more involved and complicated and unending your story is, the longer you can believe your mother's still alive.

They both have good points here, but I think Troi dropped the ball here by not considering the third option: there's an external alien influence here.

DATA: I have been exploring the possibility of using a tractor beam to pull the Raman from the atmosphere. However, the high level of interference prevents a positive lock.
RIKER: If we set up some sort of relay system?
DATA: That is my conclusion as well, Commander. Two shuttlecraft, staggered between the Enterprise and the Raman, with their shields adjusted to refocus the tractor beam.

I find this idea ridicuous. I would prefer using a small group of shuttlecraft above the interference using their tractor beams to maintain the position of the shuttle that's deeper down looking for the Raman.

LAFORGE: Well the Hera could have accidentally created a distortion that emptied out right here at Marijne Seven.
PICARD: Why here?
LAFORGE: The Hera passed near this planet just ten days ago.

This would've been nicer to know earlier. Furthermore, Geordi would've been able to come up with this theory after his first encounter with his "mother."

PICARD: I want you to know that I am not unsympathetic to what you're going through. Your mother's disappearance is tragic, but I cannot risk your safety on the basis of a dubious hypothesis.
LAFORGE: Captain, if I'm right and there's just one chance in a million that she's alive
PICARD: I'm sorry, Geordi. My decision is made.

Yeah, this is where you relieve Geordi of duty.

RIKER: I just don't like the idea of one of my best officers putting himself in unnecessary danger.
LAFORGE: I guess I feel like I should be the one to decide whether it's unnecessary or not.

Oh boy, is that NOT Geordi's call. It's Riker's. This one needed more discussion.

RIKER: My mother died when I was a baby. All I have is pictures, and the stories that my father used to tell me about her. I begged him to tell those stories over and over. When I was five and I went to school, I started to tell my new friends those same stories, pretending that she was alive. Then I started believing that she was alive, that she'd just gone away, that she was coming back. The teacher got wind of this, and she and my father had this talk with me. They told me it was important to accept the fact that my mother was dead and that she wasn't coming back. And all the hoping in the world wouldn't make it so. In my mind, that was the day that my mother actually died. I cried all that night. But after that, it started feeling better.

A good speech, but it would've been nice to have it earlier, probably in "The Icarus Factor."

LAFORGE: Your mother was dead. There was proof. There was a body, and a funeral. It was a reality.
RIKER: Geordi.
LAFORGE: If I could see a body, if there were wreckage, I could accept it, but my mother has just disappeared.

Again, Starfleet training should've covered this. And Geordi is operating on the premise of "I need to be convinced 100% that she's dead, anything less might as well be nothing." Complete nonsense. As we all know, only Sith deal in absolutes.

DATA: I suspected you would attempt to operate the interface alone.
LAFORGE: Did you?
DATA: I am familiar enough with your behaviour patterns to predict certain decisions.

You'd think Picard would've ordered the thing locked down ages ago.

LAFORGE: Data, if I leave without knowing for sure, then I'll have to live with that for the rest of my life, wondering if I left her to die. I couldn't do that. That's why I've got to do this.

Even IF she's down there, it's Picard and Riker that would be guilty of her death, not Geordi. By anyone's definition he's done all that he can, enough to have a clear conscience.

DATA: I will monitor the interface and attempt to keep you safe. I can not have you confined to quarters for something you have not yet done.

Oh boy, is Data dancing on that mutiny line. Starfleet has confined people for mere intent lots of times in the past.

DATA: We are at ninety percent of tolerance. My calculations show you will reach one hundred percent of tolerance before you are in range of the Hera.
LAFORGE: Then we're going to have to go beyond tolerance.

Ugh, is that a stupid statement. Would people on both sides of the camera stop acting like things like thin lines between safety and danger exist?

PICARD: Meanwhile, I will have to write this incident into your permanent record.
LAFORGE: Yes, sir.
PICARD: Dismissed. Geordi? I'm very sorry that you didn't find your mother.
LAFORGE: Thank you, sir. You know, it was funny. When I was down there, it was so real. I felt like I had a chance to say goodbye.

Well, now Geordi is in the same camp as Worf and Riker. The resolution of Geordi's issue was way too easy, though. I despise it when the writers run out of screentime to resolve the moral properly.

The Fiver

Holt: Oh yes, our ships are so much safer in fleets, like the fleet at Wolf 359.
Picard: Um... transmission loss, breaking up....

Missing first lines alert!

La Forge: Don't worry sir, I'm sure everything will work out. Starfleet declares people dead all the time and yet they turn out alive.
Picard: That regulation only applies to the senior bridge crew of the Enterprise.
La Forge: Mom's doomed!

Hehe.

Riker: Well couldn't we route it through the Holodeck or something?
La Forge: Oh please, like the Holodeck could control anything.

This would've worked better if the episode was BEFORE "Ship in a Bottle".

La Forge: The Raman is a mess. Dead bodies, flashing lights, fire. Why do we want her back again?
Data: The Raman will be issued a new crew to go out and die valiantly.

I don't get where this came from. The Raman will return in the game Starship Creator, but the events were set before this episode.

Data: I have an explanation. Geordi had his hands too close to my bread heater implant.
Crusher: Bread heater implant? You mean a toaster? You're a walking toaster!
Commander Maddox: (over subspace) I KNEW IT!

That joke was too much of a stretch.

Picard: Geordi, I don't mean to call you a liar, but isn't your explanation a little farfetched? I mean, ships just don't appear out of nowhere.
Riker: (over the comm) Captain, I've updated our itinerary with USS Bozeman.

This doesn't work. The Bozeman came out of a known spatial anomaly. There's no proof of such here. And generally speaking spatial anomalies in Trek tend to make themselves known.

Picard: I've decided your punishment will be to listen to my newest speech on the Prime Directive. Don't be afraid to ask questions.

You monster!

Memory Alpha

* They would've done the story with Riker earlier, but apparently it was too similar to "Emissary." I don't see it, none of the Prophets pretended to be the people that they looked like, even the one that took over his mother.
* The crew thought that it was scraping the bottom of the barrel to introduce Geordi's mom. I think they were being overly pessimistic, and perhaps a bit lazy. Any premise, no matter how "lame" can be made into a good episode. "The Thaw" comes to mind immediately.
* The script used Noble, not Nobel, maybe that's where Chakoteya got it.

Nitpicker's Guide

* Geordi asks for a tractor beam to pull the debris off the dead crewman before checking to see if he's dead. Oops.
* The ship is full of ammonia and methane, so Phil has a problem with the probe blowing a hatch. I would argue that for ammonia and methane to explode you also need oxygen, which Geordi doesn't mention.
* The holodeck thing also occurs to Phil.
* Actress Madge Sinclair also appears as the captain of the Saratoga in STIV. She's probably Geordi's great-grandmother.