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Old 01-09-2019, 12:38 PM
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January 9th, 1989, "Loud as a Whisper"


Preface: I get the intended message, but this is yet another episode where we are supposed to accept completely implausible plot holes (specifically about telepathy, deafness, etc.) to facilitate character work. Ugh.



Fiver (by Marc)
Transcript

Memory Alpha


The Episode

* Creators, please stop showing Picard in his ready room doing non-work related stuff. He has quarters for that!

* Troi, stop vocalizing private emotional states when they aren't relevant! At best you should ask for clarification and shut up when Worf says that he's not expecting battle.

* "Talk to Riva and not his chorus" should be in the mission briefing. It made Picard look like an idiot and everyone look like they never do any homework for their missions beyond the one-sentence summary.
* Another instance of laser activity as marking a more primitive weapons technology than phasers. Given that we know what lasers can do, I wish they'd ignored the TOS instances of the term as being '60s-era stupidity and invented another term for a more primitive energy weapon technology.
* You'd think there would be technology to nullify energy weapons within a given area. By all means make it extremely bulky so you can't use it without preparation time, and make it so you can only block certain frequencies (I don't think these guys can "modulate the frequencies to a higher EM band", do you?), but it should be possible!
* Worf raises a good point, but you wonder why the Klingons haven't invented a gestural language by now, even if it only includes the concepts needed in battle.
* As SF Debris said, this episode is the exact wrong one to mention the possibility of Geordi getting real eyes. Not only does it conflict with the message, it makes you wonder why they can make substitute eyes but not substitute ears for Riva.


The Fiver

Chorus: Riva is deaf. We three interpret his thoughts and serve as his voice.
Intellect: I speak in matters of logic and reason.
Passion: I represent emotion and spontaneity.
Harmony: And I strive to maintain balance between the others.
Picard: I'm surprised you don't also have a Scottish engineer on your team.
Harmony: We do, but he is on holiday this week.



Nice invocation of the Trinity, but if you're going to invoke Scotty a more specific joke would've been appropriate. He went on vacation to Argelius, he has a hangover from a scotch binge, he's stuck in a Jefferies tube, etc.


Data: I have been studying various sign languages in the hope of communicating with Riva, but I am not sure which one will work best.
Picard: Choose one and give us a demonstration. What would be the sign for "happy"?
Data: " "
Picard: I'd skip to the next choice if I were you.



I wonder how you're supposed to say that out loud. Given that, here's a random list of ASCII emoticons...



Memory Alpha

* So Riva's actor, Howie Seago, wanted an episode to dispell myths about deaf people. I wonder what he could mean, beyond "deaf people have brains just like hearing people". Besides, if hearing people aren't supposed to grab deaf people's heads and shout at them, why did this appear in the episode?


Nitpickers Guide

* If the locals have mere lasers, how did it destroy Riva's chorus layer by layer? I'd think lasers would just punch holes in a person to kill them.
* Phil has a problem with how the chorus's robes were billowing as they beamed in, saying that the transporter would have to manipulate them atom by atom as they were materializing. I think Phil was being overly critical on this one. This isn't the first or last time that people will move during the period when they are within the annular confinement beam. This is just one example of a forgivable cheat that has to exist for the show to exist, just like the humanlike aliens, perfect Universal translation along with holographic projections over everyone's lips to make it look like they're making English words with their mouths, etc.
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Last edited by Nate the Great; 01-17-2019 at 01:10 AM.
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