30th Anniversary TNG Episode Discussion Marathon

[Nate the Great]

February 4th, 1991, "Devil's Due"

Let me just say, I don't like this one. People pretending to be gods when actual gods like Q, Travellers, and Douwds are running around gets old real quick when not written properly, and Ardra is NOT written properly.

Fiver (by FatMatDuhRat)


The Episode

MARLEY: You don't believe in me.
DATA: I don't.
MARLEY: What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your senses?
DATA: I don't know.
MARLEY: Why do you doubt your senses?
DATA: Because a little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats. You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. Why, there's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are. Humbug, I tell you. Humbug.

I thought this wasn't an accurate Christmas Carol quote, but it turns out all Data changed was adding "Why" before the gravy line and "Humbug, I tell you, humbug."

Then again, maybe I've watched too many movie adaptations. I don't read the book that often, the closest I get is the Patrick Stewart audiobook, which I don't think is 100% authentic.

DATA: Yes, sir. I have studied the philosophies of virtually every known acting master. I find myself attracted to Stanislavsky, Adler, Garnav. Proponents of an acting technique known as the Method.

Stanislavsky was a Russian theater actor and director. Any classic movie fan worth his salt will know of Danny Kaye's routine based on him, which Tom Lehrer turned into "Lobachevsky."

Hey, any excuse for a Tom Lehrer link, right?

Stella Adler ran a Studio of Acting in Los Angeles starting in 1949. A student of Stanislavski, her school later trained such actors as Marlon Brando, Robert De Niro, and Kate Mulgrew. How's that for a coincidence?

Garnav is the obligatory fictitious addition to the list, or as TvTropes calls such examples, Famous, Famous, Fictitional.. I'm disappointed that he didn't namedrop Anton Karidian (AKA Kodos the Executioner). Karidian certainly seems like a guy who would be a proponent of The Method.

Chakoteya comments in the transcript that Stewart himself is a Method actor. Which makes Picard's comment that he's vaguely familiar with it all that funnier.

DATA: Sir, I have modified the Method for my own uses. Since I have no emotional awareness to create a performance, I am attempting to use performance to create emotional awareness. I believe if I can learn to duplicate the fear of Ebenezer Scrooge, I will be one step closer to truly understanding humanity.

I don't think "fake it 'til you make it" works in this case. While I have no doubt that given enough centuries Data can internalize a complicated procedure to decide which fake emotion to display in most situation (a million IF-THEN gates, so to speak), it still won't give him real understanding. Whoever said the human race was logical and all that.

PICARD: Transporter room three. Lock onto the science team and beam them aboard.
CHIEF [OC]: I've locked onto Doctor Clark. I can't pick out the others. It's a mess down there.
PICARD: Then beam Doctor Clark aboard by himself.

What? Do enough cellphones in one place scramble individual lifesigns from ship's sensors? The sensors that can identify a single person on a planet by species, gender, and approximate age in seconds? Isn't this a situation for beaming up everything and disabling weapons in transit?

CLARK: First contact was made by a Klingon expedition seventy years ago.

Seventy years ago was 2297. You'd think they'd still be restructuring their economy and dealing with Praxis fallout at the time to spend time on exploratory missions. Yeah, yeah, STVI hasn't been made yet.

TROI: This situation is deteriorating, Captain. The people are approaching levels of anxiety that could lead to suicide.

They're not anxious enough YET? I shudder to think what Troi thinks is a justifiable level of anxiety for suicide.

PICARD: No. I'm going down to the planet myself.
WORF: Sir, you run the risk of being taken as an additional hostage
PICARD: Mister Worf, you and Mister Data will accompany me. Mister O'Brien can keep a lock on our communicators. He can pull us out if necessary.

Yeah, 'cause that kind of arrogance has NEVER backfired! Talk about contrivances...

DATA: So you do purport to be the mythic figure Ardra?
ARDRA: I have many names, my pale friend. I'm Mendora in the Berussian Cluster. Torak to the Drellians. The Klingons call me Fek'lhr.
WORF: You are not Fek'lhr.

Only mention of Mendora, the Berussian Cluster, Torak, or the Drellians. B'Ellanna mentioned Fek'lhr in "Barge of the Dead". It's a shame that TAS was noncanon at this time, as this would've been a great place to mention Lucien.

PICARD: I have encountered many who more credibly could be called the devil than you.

Oh, the list we could make. Q, of course. The God of Sha Ka Ree, who I still refer to as The One. Trelane. A rogue Kelvan. Apollo, even!

PICARD: Q would never bother with contracts.
TROI: Or economic forecasts.
PICARD: I noticed that too, Counsellor. I had the distinct impression of in the presence of a flim-flam artist.

It's a shame Data is on the planet, because I'm sure some members of the audience don't know what a "flim-flam artist" is.

TROI: She has an incredibly focused mind. It was virtually impossible to sense any deception. Or anything else, for that matter.

I'm going to assume that Deanna was referring to Vulcan-style mental discipline. No doubt a Vulcan can lock down their telepathic transmissions to almost nothing for a short amount of time. What bothers me is that Troi was implying that Ardra has mental discipline as opposed to a gadget that can block telepathic transmissions (yeah, I know Data said that it wasn't possible, but that doesn't mean the idea isn't stupid).

[Nate the Great]

ARDRA: Yes. When the contract came to term, I gained clear title to the planet, anything on the surface, in the air or in orbit. So you see, the Enterprise belongs to me now as well.

The sheer stupidity of this statement gives me a headache. Did the locals have spacefaring capability a thousand years ago? Furthermore, how does Ardra intend to "claim" her prize? Even if she really was a rogue Q or whatever, she can't run the ship without a crew.

DATA: Sir, do you believe Ardra is, to use the vernacular, a con artist?
PICARD: Yes, I do, Data. And I believe it is our job to out-con the con artist.

Star Trek uses the out-X the X thing a bit too much if you ask me.

PICARD: You know, there's nothing about you I find tantalising. On the contrary, I find you obvious and vulgar.
ARDRA: Easily fixed. (Victorian clothing) I can be your ideal woman, Picard. Prim and proper. And chaste, until I succumb to your charms. Or would your fantasies turn more toward a professional woman, one perhaps who wears a Starfleet uniform? Perhaps I could even be
TROI: Someone close at hand and yet unattainable. I can do anything for you, Captain. Anything you could ever imagine.

I don't see Picard as being into historical romances. And the idea of Picard being attracted to Troi is just as repugnant as Professor X being attracted to Jean Grey (which actually happened).

Of course, this scene is another hint that Ardra is a fake. She hasn't met Crusher, nor does she know enough about Picard to properly gauge his sexual desires.

DATA: The case involves a contract dispute over services rendered by a Klingon craftsman on the construction of a Ventaxian home.

I'll try to stop making jokes about Klingon civilian careers, but I do wonder why you'd have Klingon civilians hanging around this planet after it was discovered.

LAFORGE: Hey, I think we've found something here. There's a sudden jump in Z-particle readings just about the time the Enterprise disappeared.

Z particles carry the weak nuclear force. What this has to do with exotic cloaking devices or transporter systems is beyond me.

PICARD: I am prepared to offer an added incentive. If you win, I'll take you to the ruins of Ligillium.
ARDRA: The Zaterl Emerald? You know where it is?
PICARD: Yes, I do.

Only mention of the Zaterl Emerald. I wish they could've namedropped the Rejac Crystal. It might actually be plausible that Data confiscated it back in "The Most Toys."

LAFORGE: A cloaked ship.
PICARD: She has a Romulan cloaking device?
LAFORGE: More likely a bad copy of one.

Even at this point we knew that the Romulans weren't the only ones to use cloaking devices. For the moment let's put Klingon devices aside, there's still the ones on Aldea and Minos.

PICARD: The Enterprise?
LAFORGE: Exactly where it's supposed to be. Ardra extended her cloaking shields around it, set up a subspace damping field to interfere with normal operations. I've isolated the frequency spread and penetrated the field.

Nonsense. Ardra's ship can't be that big, and you'd need a huge power source to extend shields around a Galaxy-class. Furthermore, is everyone on the Enterprise so incompetent that they couldn't reveal themselves before Geordi found it? They couldn't even launch a shuttle to help Picard, or just get far enough a way to use communications?

The Fiver

Sorry, this one is competent but not exactly quotable.

Nitpicker's Guide

* Ardra beams through shields a few times. I don't call this a nit, that's only a rule for standard transporters. Her system is nonstandard and may even involve a variant of Bok's subspace transporter system.

[Nate the Great]

February 11th, 1991, "Clues"

Fiver by Derek

The Episode

Captain's log, stardate 44502.7. Early completion of our mission at Harrakis Five has allowed me to grant extra personal time for many of the crew. This has come as something of a relief, since our recent tight scheduling has prevented pursuit of the leisure activities that are a normal part of life aboard the Enterprise. I expect our journey past the Ngame Nebula to be uneventful, and am personally using the time to fulfill a promise to a colleague.

I hate it when the captain's log outright says that the episode will take place in between the exploring that the show promised us. Hate hate hate. Furthermore, you can only hear Picard say "I expect the next few days to be boring" and be proven wrong so many times before it gets tedious. There's no particular reason why a mission can be important to one part of the crew but not to the rest, providing us with a counterpoint. Or maybe have the ship involved in a mission that can be dropped if necessary.

GUINAN: So I had a little trouble getting into the dress. It took me a little while to figure out exactly what I was supposed to do with these. (stockings and suspender belt)

Guinan was on Earth BEFORE the Dixon Hill era! Whatever clothes she had to wear around Mark Twain had to be less comfortable than this stuff! Yeah, yeah, "Time's Arrow" hadn't been thought of yet but her great age and time around humans has been established.

MADELINE [OC]: Captain Picard? Sorry, there's no Captain Picard here. You should try down at the docks. Ships come
...
DATA [OC]: Captain, Lieutenant Commander Data here. Please excuse the unusual interruption, but under the circumstances I thought that patching communications through the holodeck programme would be less obtrusive.

Data patched communications through a holographic telephone system but didn't remember that Picard is portraying Dixon Hill or to assume an era-appropriate character? I hate actions that require a character to be very smart and very stupid at the same time.

Furthermore, this whole bit isn't needed, the holodeck should instantly pause when a communication from outside is detected.

DATA: Sir, I should re-align the ship's clock with Starbase four ten's subspace signal to adjust for the time distortion.

What a coincidence, I just talked about this in the PNQ thread. I promise I didn't plan this.

CRUSHER: Nothing broken, Chief, but the ligaments around the elbow have been twisted pretty severely. What on earth were you doing when you fell?
O'BRIEN: Hanging a plant for Keiko. It's part of her running project to give me a green thumb.
CRUSHER: How's it working?
O'BRIEN: Everything I touch seems to turn brown and wither away.

It's amazing how much of O'Brien's DS9 characterization started in TNG. It's a shame that today's shows don't seem to believe in subtle character building.

DATA: Coming in now, sir. The probe is within visual range of the planet.
PICARD: On screen.
(the planet is green)
DATA: Sensors indicate a hydrogen-helium composition with a frozen helium core.

How could a planet develop a frozen helium core? I'd think there'd be enough gravity pressure to at least make liquid helium.

PICARD: Mister Data, run a full diagnostic to make sure the wormhole didn't permanently damage the sensors.

What? Wormholes can damage sensors enough to give distorted readings of this precision? I don't think gravity buckling can do that.

PICARD: Oh, Diomedian scarlet moss. I didn't know you were an enthnobotanist.
CRUSHER: It's a hobby.

Enthnobotany is an actual field, it's the study of how the people of a given region study and use the local plants. I don't think it's quite the correct term for this case. Exobiology would be more accurate.

You'd think that Diomedian scarlet moss would never reappear in the expanded universe, but a novel actually mentions it. Insert remark about the fans caring more about the Trek universe than the current producers here.

PICARD: Doctor, we were not unconscious for a full day. Everything on board indicates that we were out for thirty seconds. The ship's chronometer, the computer, everything.

The chronometer is not part of the computer? I wouldn't mind the idea of an isolated "black box" chronometer synchronized with Starfleet Command if such a thing were actually possible, but it's not.

DATA: Captain, I have a hypothesis. The twenty-second century physicist Pell Underhill conjectured that a major disruption in time continuity could be compensated for by trillions of counter reactions. That effect may have allowed Doctor Crusher's mosses to arrive at the other side of the worm hole with the unanticipated growth.

Pell Underhill also appeared in a few novels. I repeat my earlier comment. Oh, and Data's attempt to pull an explanation out of nowhere is just nonsense. If the wormhole affected these spores that much, it should affect other stuff as well. Doesn't Keiko have an entire arboretum of alien plants that could equally be affected by this affect?

CRUSHER: A transporter trace analysis might give us another indication of how much time has actually passed.

I get what they're going for, but anything a study of the transporter traces could reveal should be discoverable by a biobed a lot faster.

LAFORGE: I've got some good news, and some bad news. The good news is that we were right about the computer's chronometer. There's a security programme to prevent tampering, but it looks now like it was disabled and a new programme put in its place. Someone has reset the clock.
PICARD: If that's the good news, what's the bad news?
LAFORGE: That Data and I are the only ones aboard this ship capable of doing it.

How stupid are the other members of the Engineering staff? Does Geordi even have assistant Chief Engineers?

PICARD: Do you know what a court martial would mean? Your career in Starfleet would be finished.
DATA: I realise that, sir.
PICARD: Do you also realise that you would most likely be stripped down to your wires to find out what the hell has gone wrong?
DATA: Yes, sir. I do.

Meaningless aside, but the British spelling used by Chakoteya is starting to get to me. Those red squiggles get annoying sometimes. Back on topic, doesn't Data have the right to refuse any such intrusion?

The Fiver

hug: Stick 'em up!
Guinan: What's going on?
Picard: He thinks I cheated at Fizzbin.
Thug: Hey, all I want is a piece of the action.

Is this missing first line thing ever going to be fixed, Zeke? Nice Fizzbin joke, but don't forget that Kirk defictionalized the game afterwards and later the Ferengi discovered it.

Troi: Ugh.
Picard: Counsellor? Are you okay?
Troi: Sorry, I just thought about kissing Riker with a beard.
Riker: On you or on me?
Picard: Worf, why don't you escort Troi back to her quarters? And see if you can't plant seeds for future W/T 'shippers.

Troi: AHHHH!
Worf: What is it?
Troi: I just thought about marrying Riker with a beard.

I don't get this running gag, unless it's supposed to be a reference to the later movies. Furthermore, it's inconcievable that Troi never kissed a bearded Riker before the movies (even tossing out Tom Riker scenarios).

Data: It's possible that a planet might look like a giant smiley face.
La Forge: And how do you explain the words "Have a Nice Day" at the bottom?
Data: A virtually impossible arrangement of bread, apples, and very small rocks?

Now there's a subtle Monty Python joke.

Picard: Data, you've been lying this entire episode. What would you do in my place?
Data: I would drop the charade and make out with Dr. Crusher.

In the novel Immortal Coil when Data dates Worf's replacement as Security Chief Geordi disapproves. Data cites Troi/Riker and Picard/Crusher as previous examples of senior officers dating. Geordi says that Picard/Crusher was just theoretical. One wonders what conclusion you could reach about Geordi's lack of success with women being a result of him just not being able to recognize attraction in general.

Troi: Why am I always the one who gets possessed?
Data: Because if you weren't, you'd get even less screen time.

Actually, in this case all of the other senior officers were needed for the detective plot, so it fell to Troi by default.

Memory Alpha

* First appearance of Worf's mok'bara class.
* First mention of Alyssa's name.
* Picard uses the term Paxan without learning it. Oops.

Nitpicker's Guide

* Poor O'Brien. He had to fall off the chair with the plant three times, twice on purpose.
* Phil also mentions Data's rights as defined in "Measure of a Man."
* He also noticed that Picard never learned the term "Paxan."
* He also notes the ethnobotany thing.

[Nate the Great]

Oh, and while some alien species would have circadian rhythms that are close enough to 24 hours that they could be modified to a standard day, there have to be others that are nowhere near it. You couldn't possibly knock-out everyone and have them wake up with the expected amount of energy.

[Nate the Great]

February 18th, 1991, "First Contact"

This one will be a lot more fun...

Fiver by IJD GAF

The Episode

NILREM: He took a severe blow. Possible trauma to the telencephalon.
TAVA: Start fifteen octares of quadroline. We'll need a complete del-scan series.
NILREM: I can't find his cardial organ.

I appreciate the alien medical terms, but you can go too far. "Cardial organ" instead of "heart" is just stupid. Telencephalon is another word for the cerebrum.

TAVA: He's missing three costal struts on one side and four on the other.

Costal cartilage means the bits of the ribs that connect to the sternum, flexible to allow for expansion during breathing. I think they're implying that Riker has fewer ribs than they do. Of course you wonder why any alien race that otherwise has bilateral symmetry would have different numbers of ribs on each side.

(holds up a foot)
NILREM: He has digits on his terminus.

Foot! Foot! Furthermore, how can a bipedal species walk without toes?

RIKER: It's for a neighbour's child. Was there anything else found? I had one piece of jewelry, a metal pin.
BEREL: No, I'm sorry, this was all we found.

This is a perfect mission for a subcutaneous communicator. And let me get this out of the way: Riker should not have been on this mission, there has to be a corp of pre-first contact people who could've done this.

(Everyone say hi to Carolyn Seymour, taking a break from being a Romulan)
MIRASTA: At twelve point four after launch, the warp field generator will be activated.

Seymour only played two Romulans, Taris in "Contagion" and Toreth in "Face of the Enemy". Her other Trek role is Mrs. Templeton in Janeway's stupid holonovel (I'm not looking forward to that one in the Voyager retrospective in 2025).

MIRASTA: We have the prototype design for the warp engine. It would simply be a matter of building the actual production units. If I get your approval today, ten months, maybe less.

Thank goodness people realize that it takes awhile to make a warp core. That's one of my problem with the sheer proliferation of starships between Wolf 359 and the Dominion War.

PICARD: My name is Jean-Luc Picard. This is my associate Deanna Troi.

Seriously, where are the First Contact specialists?

TROI: Captain Picard is from a planet called Earth, which is over two thousand light years from here.

Do the locals even have a unit comparable to a light year? You gotta feel bad for the Universal Translator sometimes. "153576.2 thingamajigs from here."

MIRASTA: You've had people on our planet?
TROI: For several years.

With the number of near-warp planets out there, how many people are in the pre-First Contact corps?

BEREL: Well, it's getting out of control. I don't know what else he is, but he is still a patient in this medical facility and we have a responsibility for his care and recovery. Remind them of that, will you?

Thank you for acting rationally.

BEREL: Mister Jakara, we have been unable to confirm anything you told us. No physician named Crusher is on file. Not on this planet. Your address in Marta's an eating establishment. The cook has never heard of Rivas Jakara.

Seriously, the pre-First Contact team didn't rent out an actual location on this planet to maintain the cover? And why would Riker provide info that can't be validated? Why are we paying these specialists if they're so bad at their jobs? (We should take their holodeck rations back! )

MIRASTA: He's an android, Chancellor. A constructed being.
DURKEN: A machine?
DATA: In a manner of speaking. The term artificial lifeform would be more accurate.

How is Data not a machine? If he had used a more demeaning term I could understand Data defending himself.

DATA: No, Minister. He has not returned to our designated transport coordinates. We have continued to scan the capital city without success.

He's in a hospital. No shielding and the only human being on the planet. The ship's sensors can't find him? How would the locals have the slightest idea about how to block sensor scans?

PICARD: I've been saving this for a special occasion. My brother on Earth produces fruit known as grapes, which he turns into wine.

Nice reference to "Family", but the bottle should've showed up again. Minimal research says it's about five glasses per bottle.

DURKEN: My world's history has recorded that conquerors often arrived with the words, we are your friends.

And Earth's as well. Thank goodness for common sense.

DURKEN: What do you want?
PICARD: A beginning.

Overly simplistic. We want to protect you from other races who would exploit you. We want to learn your culture and teach you ours. We want to shield you from the mistakes we made when we first ventured into space.

DURKEN: And if I should tell you to leave and never return to my world?
PICARD: We will leave and never return.

SF Debris approved of this, but I don't. I would certainly promise to stay away for a couple generations and check in again then, but "never return" is a little final.

We never get an indication that an exotic power source is being used, so we have to assume antimatter. You don't want to leave that stuff in the hands of people afraid of change, it's a massacre waiting to happen.

DURKEN: I can infer from that directive that you do not intend to share all this exceptional technology with us.
PICARD: That is not the whole meaning, but it is part of it.
DURKEN: Is this your way of maintaining superiority?
PICARD: Chancellor, to instantly transform a society with technology would be harmful and it would be destructive,
DURKEN: You're right, of course.

Exactly. This society hasn't proven that it can safely used the tech it has NOW, more would be disastrous.

DURKEN: I will have to say this morning, I was the leader of the universe as I knew it. This afternoon, I am only a voice in a chorus. But I think it was a good day.

A nice sentiment. I know I wouldn't handle it as well.

RIKER: Now, will you help me?
LANEL: If you make love to me.
RIKER: What?
LANEL: I've always wanted to make love with an alien.

If the Universal Translator is so sophisticated that it can translate an idiom as complicated as "make love", our heroes shouldn't have the problems that it keeps having with the thing. It should've just said "have sex."

LANEL: Will I ever see you again?
RIKER: I'll call you the next time I pass through your star system.

That sounds more like a Kirk line.

TAVA: They've aggravated the injury to his renal organ.

Renal means the urinary system. If they're saying Riker damaged his privates, this is one subtle and dirty joke for the time period.

BEREL: I'm just a physician, Minister. I don't know much about affairs of state, but he is a living, intelligent being. I don't care if the Chancellor himself calls down here. I have sworn an oath to do no harm, and I will not.

Thank you.

PICARD: Centuries ago, a disastrous contact with the Klingon Empire led to decades of war.

First contact with other warp-faring species should have nothing to do with first contact with a species that has just developed warp. As for "decades of war", that's a rabbit hole lined with barb wire that I choose not to go down since it touches Enterprise, Discovery, etc.

RIKER: No. We're here on a mission of peace.
KROLA: Such noble creatures. Why do peaceful people develop such lethal weapons? Or do you still insist it's just a toy?

Riker never should've had a phaser on him. At the very least, they couldn't put a fingerprint scanner on the thing so only Riker could use it? I would've programmed these things to self-destruct unless touched by an authorized user every X hours during a mission like this.

KROLA: Perhaps, like many conquerors, you believe your goals to be benevolent. I cannot.

Oh boy, is that another discussion. You gotta give the writers props for not pulling their punches.

MIRASTA: I'm sorry to say he's probably right. Captain Picard, I have one last request. Take me with you.
DURKEN: She will be unhappy with the restrictions I must place on her at home, Captain.
PICARD: We may not be back here in your lifetime.

This line confuses me. Why can't they return in her lifetime?

[Nate the Great]

The Fiver

Tava: Actually I was thinking more along the lines of looking for a pulse.

Missing first line alert!

Berel: Chairs. By the way, do you have a rational explanation for your funktastical anatomy?
Riker: I'm from China. As a boy I was caught in a mechanical rice picker and --
Berel: I didn't think so.

Cute reference. And it wasn't rational in TOS, either.

Picard: Nanoo, nanoo!
Troi: Phone Home!
Mirasta: Hmm... you appear to be new around here.
Picard: Perhaps, but we can reverse the situation, right O'Brien?
O'Brien: (over the comm) Yub! Yub!

I get the Mork and Mindy and E.T. references, but what's with the yub yub thing?

Picard: Don't worry, they're all like that. Now then, what would happen if we hovered over the capital city with our saucer section and caused massive damage to major urban areas, at least until we were stopped by a computer virus?
Mirasta: I don't think my people would like you very much, but they'd still be dumb enough to spring for a sequel.

Was this written before or after the ID comver? And is Independence Day still the cultural touchstone that it was twenty years ago?

Lanel: Are you an alien?
Riker: Yes, Miss..?
Lanel: My name is as indicated, but you can call me
Lilith. Can you be my Kirk?

It may seem impossible to compare Lanel with Lilith, but then you remember some of the sillier moments from Cheers, like the time Frasier hypnotized her...

Krola: Hi I'm Krola, but you can call me Kroke.

I tried to find a Kroke that this could be referring to, but I came up empty.

Memory Alpha

* They had to break the rule that says that the main characters have to be the ones that stuff happens to. It was never broken again. You can learn more from SF Debris' review.

Nitpicker's Guide

* Phil also points out the subcutaneous transponder thing.
* He questions why the locals couldn't detect the ship in orbit.
* Why would Durken call his own planet "Malcoria III"? For that matter, why hasn't the pre-First Contact team told the Federation the real name of the planet by now? They really are incompetent!

[Nate the Great]

March 11th, 1991, "Galaxy's Child"

It was good to see the return of Leah Brahms, but they really made the "ice queen" phase last for too long.

Fiver by Marc

The Episode

PICARD: Yes, Mister La Forge. It seems that the exemplary nature of your work has caught the attention of Starfleet Command. In fact, someone is coming on board just to see the engine modifications you've made.
LAFORGE: Who, Captain?
PICARD: The Senior Design Engineer of the Theoretical Propulsion Group. Doctor Leah Brahms.

This hardly seems like a job for Leah. Shouldn't she have an assistant who can do this?

GUINAN: You know, Geordi, everybody falls in love with a fantasy every now and then.

I'll buy that Guinan wouldn't be one of those "only weirdos fall in love with holograms" people, but she's still taking this too well.

LEAH: The matter-antimatter ratio has been changed. The mixture isn't as rich as regulations dictate.

Not the intermix ratio nonsense again! I'll be growling in the corner if you need me...

LEAH: The magnetic plasma transfer to the warp field generators doesn't correspond to the recommended specs.

Of course it doesn't! Some idiot is pumping extra matter into the warp plasma!

LEAH: You've charted a completely new swap-out schedule for main components replacement.
LAFORGE: You bet. I found the Starfleet estimates for the MTBF units to be unrealistic.

This seems a little petty and below Leah's level. She works in the theoretical field, not the nuts-and-bolts part.

DATA: The anomaly is orbiting the seventh planet, sir. It is a mass of plasma energy contained within discrete boundaries by an outer covering of silicates, actinides, and carbonaceous chondrites.

The actinides are all radioactive. Maybe I can buy that they're part of some interior fusion "stomach", but why would they be part of the skin?

Carbonaceous chondrites are a category of meteorite material. The Gekli (what the novels call this species) could sure make use of such a material for armor, but if they're implying that somehow muscles are made of this stuff, that just doesn't work.

RIKER: Alert science stations to standby. Tell them to coordinate all efforts with Commander Data.

I thought Data was already in charge of the science teams.

LAFORGE: You remember, the crystal's been reoriented to adjust the direction of the lattice structure.

Nice callback to actual technobabble used in "Booby Trap." They were trying to pump more matter and antimatter into the core, despite that not being the problem they were trying to fix.

LEAH: It's curious. this modification was due to be introduced.
LAFORGE: In the next class starship.
LEAH: Yes. How did you know?

The next class of starship should've already been introduced! You have to imagine that the Nebula class was a modification of the Galaxy specs. I jolly well hope that the modification has been introduced by now!

LAFORGE: I make a great fungilli.
LEAH: I love fungilli.
LAFORGE: Is that right?

This tidbit was in "Booby Trap", but it seems like reaching in this case. Incidentally, fungilli doesn't really exist, but of course the Star Trek Cookbook has a recipe for it.

DATA: Sensors are having difficulty penetrating the interior.

But you did earlier and found a mass of plasma energy! Besides, the skin is made out of meteorite material, something the Enterprise should know how to scan!

PICARD: Reverse course, Ensign, three hundred kph.

Quarter impulse is 18,665 kps or 67 million kph. Three hundred kph is a crawl, I wonder how few thrusters you need for that kind of speed.

COMPUTER: Warning. Radiation levels at sixty five millirads per minute and rising.

Fatal radiation levels vary by person, but let's use a common threshold of 1000 rad. 65 mrad/min means 50% casualties in 15000 min or 256 hours or 11 days.

RIKER: All decks prepare for radiation protocol.

You'd think this would be automatic, or Data would've done it by now. Now that I think about it, why doesn't each hull have an inner core with extra radiation shielding?

COMPUTER: Warning. Radiation levels at three hundred millirads per minute and rising. Lethal exposure in one minute.

300 mrad/min means 50% casualties in 56 hours. For lethal exposure in one minutes you need 1000 rad/min, or more than three times what they're currently getting. If only they were smart enough to toss an "iso-" in there...

DATA: Radiation patterns no longer coherent.

Thank goodness he didn't say that there was no radiation. As I mentioned before, the actinides in the skin will be radioactive by themselves for awhile. (The half-life of actinides is like 20 days, so these Gekli must eat a lot of meteorites).

PICARD: We're out here to explore, to make contact with other life forms, to establish peaceful relations but not to interfere. And absolutely not to destroy.

I'll just throw up a link to this powerful moment. Poor Picard.

TROI: Captain, everything you did was consistent with established Starfleet procedures.

Is that supposed to make him feel better, Deanna? Are soldiers supposed to not feel shock from killing people just because it's their duty? Go that way and you end up with Jem'Hadar, you don't want to go that way!

LAFORGE: Okay. Computer, subdued lighting. No, that's too much. I don't want it dark, I want it cozy.

I get that the computer can't possibly be programmed with every possible command to alter the lighting level, but I'd think "subdued" should be one of the possibilities.

COMPUTER: Please state your request in precise candlepower.

Is Geordi supposed to dig out a tricorder to measure the current candlepower?

Incidentally, "candlepower" was an obsolete unit even when the episode was made. We use "candela" now. Technically 1 candlepower is about 0.981 candela, but nowadays they're more or less equivalent.

But of course, given that the metric system has taken over by the 24th century, they should be using lumen (1 lumen=1 candela-steradian, where a steradian is the 3D equivalent of a radian, or the curved area of a light projection divided by the square of the distance from the light source to the curved area)

LAFORGE: See, it's not a matter of precision, computer, it's a matter of mood. Brighter than this. More. More. A little more. Hold. Right there. Perfect.

Seriously, dimmer switches are extinct in the 24th century? The computer can't configure a panel with a virtual scrollwheel for Geordi to do it himself? And frankly, with the number of failed dates Geordi has under his belt, he should've configured a "romantic lighting" preset with the computer by now.

LAFORGE: Now, some music. Maybe a little soft jazz. No, that's not right. Let me think here. Oh, I got it! Some Brahms! A piano etude. Nah, that's too corny. Probably everybody thinks of that.

Playing Brahms in front of Brahms IS corny. And by the way, an "etude" is just a short song designed to improve a player's proficiency with an instrument. He just told the computer to play a random song.

LEAH: Oh, you've changed.
LAFORGE: Yeah. The uniforms are so formal.

Yeah, you're having dinner in his quarters! Even if you didn't think it was a date, you should've known it would be informal! You're an idiot, Leah. Or in other words, they deserve each other.

LEAH: To be honest, people find me cold, cerebral, lacking in humour.

So the initial hologram design in "Booby Trap" was accurate, Geordi just didn't know it. It's a nice touch.

DATA: This new concentration of energy was detected only after the surrounding material became inert.

I'm having trouble with this. Data found the radioactive slush of the Gekli's stomach before and he didn't find Junior?

CRUSHER: It's dangerous to generalise about new life forms, but based on my experience with other beings who bear their young in this manner, I'd say that the offspring is still premature. Otherwise, it would be able to break through the outer body shell of the parent.

I won't get into a full gynecological rant, I'll just ask how Crusher came to this conclusion. You've never met anything like a Gekli before! Even Gomtuu seemed more-fleshy for lack of a better term, than this thing.

WORF: I advise against this, Captain. The parent proved to be a threat to the ship. We do not know how the offspring will react.

This would be a great time for a saucer separation. If only they'd filmed the model in more shots to begin with to allow for them. The ship won't separate again until Generations.

By the way, only the full six-foot model could separate. By this time the smaller four-foot model had supplanted it as the main model. However, reused footage could be used for most of it; the main problem was rebuilding the Battle Bridge set every time.

LEAH: The first thing I'd like to do is inspect the power transfer conduits.
LAFORGE: You realise the only way to inspect them is to crawl inside.
LEAH: I designed them, Commander. I know what's involved.

Do you? I thought you focused on the warp core.

LEAH: The acoustic signature doesn't sound right.
LAFORGE: You're probably the only other person in the galaxy who could pick that up.

I bet Data could.

LAFORGE: It's a mid-range phase adjuster. Puts the plasma back into phase after inertial distortion.

Inertia should only be an issue at impulse speeds. Why do you care about the plasma when the warp drive isn't in operation?

[Nate the Great]

DATA: The first incision is complete.
CRUSHER: Ideally the offspring should now be able to push through the outer shell of the parent by itself.

So by "first incision" you meant "only incision." Data, I thought you were more precise than this, even if you keep lying about the contraction thing.

LAFORGE: How could it have been so far off? It was based on every piece of information on record about Leah Brahms. Okay, with an admitted margin for error. but this is an error that's a light year wide.

Or, y'know, she got married after the program got made. You wanted the design lab at Utopia Planitia as it was when the engines were being designed. That was five years ago, she's had time to get married.

LAFORGE: Computer never even told me she was married.
GUINAN: Computer glitch?
LAFORGE: Must have been.

Or you never asked. Although if the computer knew that the real Leah was married and then made a hologram that would flirt with Geordi, that's a whole other kettle of fish.

GUINAN: You saw exactly what you wanted to see in the holodeck. Sure, the computer made it look like her, gave it personality, but when it came to the relationship. La Forge, you filled in the blanks. And you had a perfectly wonderful, marvellous little fantasy. until the real Leah showed up and ruined it. She's probably done the most horrific thing one person can do to another, not live up to your expectations. So I'd take a good, hard, long look at her, La Forge. See her for who she is, not for what you want her to be.

Why couldn't Deanna have a few of these speeches? This is one instance where you don't need Guinan's wisdom to make the advice work.

RIKER: It might be wise to put some distance between us before we initiate warp drive.
PICARD: Very well. Five hundred kph. Ensign. Engage.

Actually, as long as you're not pointed at Junior, the warp field shouldn't bother it at all. The whole point of the compressed Z-axis is the forward lobe of the warp field going ahead of the ship.

I wonder if they could've blamed the warp inability on the radiation from the actinides...

DATA: Sir, the life form is draining energy directly from the fusion reactors.

No, it's not. Junior is nowhere near the fusion reactors. And don't tell me that its sucking on plasma conduits or something, Data said directly from the reactors. And they could shut down conduits.

DATA: Sir, is the appellation Junior to be the life form's official name?
PICARD: No, it is not.

Cute moment.

HOLO LEAH: I'm with you every day, Geordi. Every time you look at this engine, you're looking at me. Every time you touch it, it's me.
(Geordi runs in, too late)

What? Leah wanted the program, not a recording of the previous session of the program. Furthermore, if the computer is recording every holodeck session whether it's asked for or not, that's invading on a lot of privacy.

WORF: Captain, its total volume has increased by eight point five percent in the last three hours. I now read it at forty six million cubic metres.

I really want to use these figures and e=mc^2 to turn the required mass into a required amount of energy that Junior would have to suckle, but that's too pedantic even for me.

The E-D is 5 million metric tons. Meteorites are 3 g/cm3, so 46,000,000 m3 is 138 million metric tons. With that discrepancy you'd have massive gravity effects, the structural integrity field must be working overtime.

LAFORGE: Okay. All matter in space vibrates in a specific radiation band.
LEAH: Twenty one centimetres. That's good, Commander, that's very good.

21 cm is the wavelength of interstellar hydrogen gas. That doesn't count as "all matter".

LEAH [OC]: Now at point oh two centimetres.

That counts as microwaves. 21 cm is radio waves.

The Fiver

La Forge: She's welcome to it, sir.

Missing first line alert!

Riker: Is that a spacegoing lifeform orbiting the planet up ahead?
Data: Yes, sir. Such a phenomenon has never been seen before.
Picard: It reminds me of the spacecraft-creature we discovered at Beta Stromgren last year.
Riker: And of the interstellar jellyfish we found at Deneb IV on stardate....
Data: I meant "before we started our first mission," sir.
Riker: Oh. My mistake.

Like I said before, this thing doesn't really resemble Gomtuu. As for the Farpoint Jellyfish, that's far enough to fit under "such a phenomenon". I actually think that the jellyfish could shift between matter and energy forms at will to travel or interact with other jellyfish.

Leah: People often find me cold, cerebral and humourless. They say I'd make a good hologram.

Is this an EMH joke as well as a "Booby Trap" joke?

Worf: The newborn infant is following the Enterprise!
Troi: Perhaps it thinks the ship is its parent.
Picard: Very likely. Something similar once happened to the U.S.S. Konrad Lorenz.

Konrad Lorenz was an Austrian zoologist. Part of his work involved how geese imprint. Talk about an obscure joke.

Memory Alpha

* The double joke involving the Galaxy-class Enterprise never occurred to me.
* First appearance of the Jeffries Tubes as seen going forward. "The Hunted" used a completely different design.

Nitpicker's Guide

* Geordi takes the dilithium chamber offline while the ship is still at warp. Oops.
* Phil has a long screed about the intermix ratios. At one point the creators tried to explain that the ratio differs with speed, but back in "Coming of Age" they were clear that 1:1 is the only ratio. Oops.
* Technically candlepower is just intensity of a light source, not the actual illumination of the room, what they really should've been using is luminance.
* They talk about Junior being over the spacedoor for Shuttlebay 2. However, Junior is over the starboard side shuttlebay, which is Shuttlebay 3. I guess the Okudas were asleep this week.
* If the ship is in energy-saving mode, why is the holodeck operational? Does Leah have an override code like Geordi did in "Booby Trap"?
* Phil asks why they didn't just shut down the warp engine to cut off the "milk" flow. I think Junior would've drained all the auxiliary energy modules and caused more trouble. Besides, they needed the engines to get rid of Junior.
* If the warp core is at full blast providing energy, why isn't the flashing of the core going at high speed?