Not much to go on with this episode. They were still trying really hard to push
the Ferengi as a primary adversary. In
"The Lonely Among Us" where they had kept the threat alive indicating
that the Ferengi had had dealings with both the races in the episode. But, for as flippantly as they treated that
part of the story, it was no more successful than the introduction of the
Ferengi in "The Last Outpost."
Still, this one is a slight improvement for the poor,
struggling new villains. As I mentioned
before they decided to go with a little one on one action between DaiMon Bok
and Captain Picard. A simple revenge
tale. Bok accuses Picard of murdering
his son in a battle that the Ferengi started without provocation. Really, it begs the question, how are these
people allowed in "civilized" space?
The Klingons of old were at least a warrior race... the Ferengi seemed, in
the beginning, to be no more than highly advanced pirates. I suppose that's the idea behind their desire
for "profit" in a universe where money (at this point) doesn't
exist. But they're tolerated because
they have a homeworld, I guess, instead of treated like criminals.
It's not a bad concept on the whole; just done unevenly and
sloppily. A mind control device that
makes Picard relive the incident in a way that would damage his own ship and
people that he cares for. Kind of a
stretch since they made the Star Gazer such an inferior ship to the
Enterprise. They also added the touch of
doctored records to make it seem like Picard was the aggressor of the incident
which really didn't amount to anything.
It was like two different storylines at play. Storylines that could've been separated into
two different episodes, though thankfully, they didn't do that. Also, another gaff in that Troi could read
the Ferengi emotions in this episode but later it was determine that Betazoids
couldn't read Ferengi. But, I don't want
to whine about small things like that.
It shows that improvements were made and this is one case where the
later plot device is a nice improvement.
And then you have Wesley the Wonderboy saving the day in
lieu of a chief engineer. Very
weak. And what's more, in a list of the
unfairness to the character of Wesley, after they made him an acting ensign and
were openly supporting his chance to evolve as the Traveler indicated, they
still didn't take him seriously for a long time. That was fine before he had responsibilities,
but no longer acceptable at this point.
The scene in question is further evidence of over-simplistic writing
that was geared more towards tweenagers of the 60's. The Young Adult demographic was just so much
smarter by the late 80's... or if not smarter, more cynical and less
innocent. I'll have many complaints
on Wesley over the course of episodes,
but I'll always reiterate that it's not the fault of the character or actor;
it's the writing and directing that makes him nearly unbearable at times.
The saving grace was Patrick Stewart's acting, and I think
that's what they were going for. It was
a good "Picard" episode.
"As was The Lonely Among Us."
My only complaint about this is that in this first season they seemed to
be leaning towards a simple triad of main characters, no matter how many others
there were. Kirk, Spock, and McCoy in
the first series, with Kirk as the star of the show. In this series they were starting to single
out Picard, Riker, and Data, with Picard as the star of the show. If "The Lonely Among Us" had been
made later on, it wouldn't have been a malevolent entity and they would've
created a throw away character that would be happy to go and be one with it
exploring the galaxy. This is a revenge
story on Picard. Trying perhaps to
emulate the Khan-Kirk dynamic. I'm only
pointing this out as a bad thing because as the show progressed, all of the main
characters ended up being developed beautifully and if they'd stuck to this
template, it would've been very unsatisfying.
I'll be bringing up the pattern again later. I'll also be referring back to this season
often when they tweak and retool these early concepts and improve them, much
like they did with the Bok-Picard rivalry in the last season.
Two stars.
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