This is Patrick Stewart's favorite episode because it's the first one that he got to direct. But even Stewart knows it's not really a great episode. It's more of a lark in the writing department. I'm admittedly torn because it's certainly somewhat childish in the way that many episodes from the first two seasons were, but since the characters have matured and grown since then, it helps the story to play out with some valid psychological profiling. So even though I'm critical, I'm not as frustrated with it as I would've been at one time.
Of course, I liked it much better when I was a teenager and looking back on it I see that the character of Jenna D'Sora is very much like a brooding teenager in the opening scenes. She and Data are modifying some torpedoes to probe a dark matter nebula. She can't concentrate on work because she's feeling drawn back towards the man she'd just broken up with. Data starts giving her the reasons why they are no longer together as per her request. I always imagined that previous conversation in my head as if it were playing out in a locker room at high school - If I ever start acting like I like him again, remind me why I dumped him! Naturally, Data would take a statement like that quite literally and execute the command without any flowery language or attempts to be ginger about it. Jenna thinks it's sweet that he'd taken the request so seriously. After a torpedo is launched it creates a beautiful display which most likely affects her mood.
Later on they're giving a musical performance along with Keiko O'Brien. Normally you see Data at the violin, but this time he's playing in the woodwind section. Jenna is insecure about her playing and Data compliments her. Like I said, it's all just very reminiscent of how teenagers behave when they're trying to attract the attention of a potential boyfriend or girlfriend. You can see that she takes his comments about her playing to heart even though he's just giving a neutral critique with no intentions behind it. Later they sit with Miles and Keiko. When they begin to offer anecdotes about the situations they find themselves in as a couple, Jenna begins to hang on Data and respond in kind about their time spent together. Data is confused but goes along with it since she hasn't said anything untrue and since he's always trying to learn about human behavior and humor and small talk is a good practicing ground. Miles and Keiko look a little creeped out by her behavior since they know Data isn't a normal man And I feel the same way, but I also know that women like Jenna really exist. I remember being this insecure at one point and perhaps some people always remain this way through their entire adult lives regarding relationships but I just don't know anyone like that personally which is why I keep thinking the story is a touch on the juvenile side. However, her psychological state is actually accurate on the point that she'd broken up with a man that she considered to be too unemotional and then moves on to being attracted to the same sort of man again. Many women and men follow relationship patterns which can be detrimental unless both of the parties involved can grow and break the pattern. When they go back to work on more torpedoes she initiates the relationship officially with a kiss.
I think their relationship would've made a better subplot. If the subplot of this episode hadn't been so weak I think they could've at least evened out Data's experience with other facets that could be mixed with it as it was in the episode Data's Day. All we've seen at this point is that something funny is going on because things start moving around the ship, like Dr. Crusher's hypospray. Anyway, after Jenna makes the first move Data proceeds to ask advice from all of the senior officers. Again, this part seems very much like high school behavior. Or do people still behave like this? I seriously don't know because I've never had a new relationship in my adulthood. But for Data it makes sense since he's never been in a serious relationship before. And his experiment in this seems valid and probably overdue as well since part of Data's character development was that he studied human behavior by mimicking it. This story is a lot more serious as far as Data really trying to understand love rather than his brief fling with Tasha Yar or being hit on by McKenzie from Ensigns Of Command, both of which focused on sexual or physical situations only. Guinan is all on board for it. Geordi warns him about dating a girl who is on the rebound but then acknowledging his own poor luck with women tells him to ask someone else. Worf's perspective is always amusingly different. Troi is interested to hear that he's considered a family life as part of living as a human and both she and Riker advise caution, but can't bring themselves to discourage him since his intentions to learn are sincere. Picard wants no part of the conversation since he's busy directing - *wink* So Data chooses to pursue the relationship and brings Jenna flowers and although she's probably not comfortable that he's been speaking about her to so many people she, again, finds the fact that he's written a sub routine devoted to her and their relationship sweet and caring and is ready to go along with it, even though he is naturally awkward and mechanical throughout.
So, while objects continue to go moving around on the Enterprise and they approach a class M planet within the dark matter nebula, Data continues to learn about the complexities of love. At first it seems to be going well since she has things to teach him such as how comments about how messy she keeps her quarters aren't necessarily the right thing to say, or the importance of dropping what he's doing when his girlfriend comes to see him. Later he comes to her quarters to deliver the line, "Honey, I'm home!" that Stewart and probably most of the audience finds so absurdly funny. Yes, he uses a contraction, but I don't think anyone really cares in this case. But it's when his behavior as an attentive companion is nearly perfect that she sees the emptiness of it all. He begins to tidy her quarters to help the mood and that just aggravates her even more. So he tries to instigate a lover's quarrel and throwing out stereotypical accusations like "you are not my mother." It really is quite comical, especially when he stops mimicking anger and calmly explains that he is following a formula for fighting and making up as couples are apt to do. They have several kissing scenes in this episode, all appropriately rigid and unnatural do to the fact that Data is a machine. But their make up kiss is an important one since the audience is then told exactly what is running through his mind when he's engaging in this type of contact and it's nothing like passion or warmth. Now Jenna sees the pattern in her choice of mates that the audience spotted at the beginning. And it makes all of what went on up to this point worth sitting through, since it brings all of the childishness into sobering perspective.
Meanwhile the rest of the crew finally figures out that a dark matter nebula is a bad thing and that it's causing all of the strange anomalies on the ship. When they try to move away quickly people get injured and die, as you can see one crewman gets, for lack of a better word ( and from the wrong fandom) splinched. I think I remember seeing images of something like this long ago on another science fiction show like Land of the Lost, but it's foggy. Data comes back to work to explain that the dark matter is causing deformations in space and that the ship's sensors can't see them in time to maneuver around them due to its size. So Worf suggests having a shuttle craft guide the Enterprise through it and the situation essentially becomes a recreation of the the one in Booby Trap where delicacy is required to navigate through an asteroid field. Also like in Booby Trap, Picard nobly takes the helm of the shuttle to do the maneuvering through the pockets of deformed space. It's a little more exciting since the shuttle glances on them several times and ends up exploding with Picard beamed out right at the last second at the end of the journey.
Jenna comes to Data's quarters for a dinner date that they had planned and breaks up with him in a round about way by explaining how she's seen the error of trying to have a relationship with another unemotional man. Data agrees with her assessment in his usual neutral manner which is oddly chilling to watch. However, he does pick up on the fact that they will no longer be a couple and after confirming this assures her that he will delete the program he'd made for the relationship. She's hurt, he's left alone with spot, and the audience is left to wonder if either of them actually learned anything. So it was a worthwhile episode in the end as one that invites thought and reflection.
It was weak and mostly silly, however I can't be as hard on it as I have been with similar types of episodes since the characters were perfected at this point and there were a couple of serious points to ponder. I'll go three and a half stars on this one.
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