Star Trek TNG Frame Of Mind

Good episode. I always like a good mind bender. It also gives Frakes a chance to stand out as something more than a snotty commander and ladies man. He's actually a really good actor and you don't realize how limited his character is until you see this episode.

It starts with Riker being an actor. You see him in a mental facility talking to a doctor off screen. They are discussing treatments and he's behaving like someone who is trying to convince the doctor that he is sane and rational and fit to reenter society. They seem to be discussing a crime he's committed and whether or not he should stand trial. Riker claims to be innocent while the unseen doctor tells him that he'd already accepted his guilt. Desperate to be believed, Riker soon loses all composure. He begins shouting at the doctor about the treatment he's receiving. The speech he delivers detailing how they've controlled him and drugged him would be repeated throughout the show. His acting is perfect - it's a very dramatic but controlled speech with the appropriate hand gestures that is quite obviously a performance reminiscent of stage acting. And then you see that's exactly what's going on as he loses track of what he's saying and drops the demeanor of a tortured mental patient and smiles in embarrassment. He asks to start back at an earlier line and then we see Crusher suggesting that they stop rehearsing for the night. This was apparently a dress rehearsal of another one of her plays. We also see that the off screen doctor was Data, who's voice I didn't recognize when I first saw this episode. The room of the mental ward is a corner piece set  in a large room where the play will take place. Riker wonders if he's right for the part. Data encourages him by talking about human tendencies towards irrationality. Beverly assures him that he is but thinks that they're probably overdoing it and need a break. He walks through the corridor repeating the last few lines of his speech when he bumps into a strange crewman who stares at him. He doesn't think much of it at first until he's past him but then he stops to watch him walking away as the doors of the turbolift close and he's disturbed by his presense without knowing why. Later, or the next day, we see Picard telling Riker of their destination, a place called Tilonus IV where their government has collapsed into anarchy with several factions having at each other. There was a Federation research team on the planet and Riker is being sent undercover to find out where they're hiding. Pretty typical. Riker gets sent on undercover missions a lot. But there are no exterior shots of the Enterprise showing their location. Worf briefs Riker on how to blend in with the people. He shows him clothes and a pendant that has a communicator in it.  Riker is cutting jokes as always which exasperates Worf, who is a perfectionist who insists that Riker take this briefing more serisously. He shows Riker a knife and begins demonstrating techniques that he'll be required to know when he's down there and accidentally cuts Riker's face as he does so.

He goes to sickbay to be treated but the wound still hurts after Beverly lasers it away. She jokes about him trying to get out of the play when an ensign is rushed in with severe burns. Riker is inexplicably unsettled by the sight of him and tries to explain it later to Troi. He concludes that the disturbing nature of the play is making him jittery. She tells him to have fun with his dark side. But the place where his cut was gives him a phantom pain and he sees the strange crewman behind her. He asks who he is but he's gone by the time she turns to look. Later the scene we saw during rehearsal is being played out before an audience. Data as the doctor is condescending to Riker the mental patient and he launches into his speech that ends with him claiming that although he's surrounded by insanity, he's not insane. But his manner is different now. Instead of coming off as a confident actor, he seems a little unsure of his sanity. The lights fade and brighten again to thunderous applause from the audience which becomes a standing ovation. Data returns and he and Riker bow for the curtain call. After the second bow Riker sees the strange crewman standing next to Picard where he wasn't before and he's not clapping. Confused, he bows once more and when he raises up he's in a closed room that looks like the set of the room in the asylum. When he turns around there is a doctor there, a real one, named Syrus who asks him if he remembers who he is. He is no longer sure. His memories of doing the play on the Enterprise were so vivid that they seem real and the doctor praises him for coming back to reality from his starship fantasy. After some prompting he's made to remember that Starfleet was contacted and never heard of him. Also that his head hurts in the area where the cut had been because he tried to escape and hit his head on the door. When he asks where he is, the doctor tells him that he's on a mental facility on Tilonus IV but won't tell him why. He just leaves and when Riker looks out the small window of the door he sees the hallway of the asylum, not the corridor of the Enterprise.

Later a large attendant escorts him, at phaser point, to the common room to socialize as a reward for his good behavior. Riker tells him that he won't need the weapon, but the attendant says that he said that the last time indicating that it was necessary to subdue him but Riker doesn't remember that. He's sitting at a table eating when another patient joins him at his table. She claims to be a Starfleet officer too who's been captured. He almost believes her as she implores him to not let them tell him that he's crazy. She then says that she's devised a communicator... and pulls out a spoon and begins to talk into it. Another attendant begins to laugh at and ridicule him. Riker tries to explain that he's not crazy like her, but he man tells him that he was brought in kicking and screaming, covered in blood. He says that he'd killed someone and continues to deride his so called sanity. Finally Riker loses control again and attacks the attendant who stuns him. And then he wakes up in his quarters, the entire situation apparently a nightmare. The play hasn't happened yet and he tells Crusher about his dream. She's sympathetic to his nightmare but when she hears the part about the standing ovation, she hopes that that part comes true. So, Riker and Data play out their scene again. This time you can tell that Riker isn't just acting. He's genuinely distressed as he's circling the set. He sees the attendant at the window of the set door and loses track of his lines. He looks around to see if anyone else saw him, but Beverly is just feeding him his next line. He takes it up and finishes the scene. The audience applauds and again he sees the strange crewman that seems to be shadowing his every movement since the beginning of the episode. Angry, he rushes over to him and demands to know who he is and what's going on. His name would seem to be Lt. Suna and everybody is stunned at Riker's behavior. Crusher can't find a reason for his hallucinations and suggests that he get some rest. Troi thinks that the stress of preparing for his mission to Tilonus IV is getting to him. Data was impressed with what he assumed was improvisation during the performance and compliments him on an accurate portrayal of they type of dementia his character was supposed to have. It's a nice, humorous break in the momentum and just as Riker and the audience are relaxing again, Riker thinks he hears the doctor Syrus' voice out of nowhere telling him that he needs another treatment. He decides to go to his quarters. When the turbolift opens up he sees the hallway leading to his cell in the asylum. He closes his eyes for a minute trying to will the image away. He sees the Enterprise corridor again and begins to walk forward when he meets the woman from the cafeteria with the spoon communicator. Spooked, he runs to his quarters and once he's safely inside he here's the clanging of doors shutting. He turns to find that he's locked back in his cell again. He slides down the wall crying out for help and now nobody knows what's real and what isn't anymore.

Riker talks to Dr. Syrus in the cafeteria. He still doesn't know whether he's killed anyone or not, but he's now scared into believing that this hospital setting is reality and that the Enterprise is only a fantasy. He tells Syrus that he wants to willingly participate in any kind of therapy that will restore his sanity. The doctor is pleased but tells him that time is running out since the authorities want to try him for murder. So he gives Riker two options. The first is reflection therapy where a devise will allow him to interact with holograms that represent different parts of his psyche. The other is a procedure that will completely alter his personality. He doesn't want that so he opts for reflection therapy. Syrus brings a machine into his room that scans his brain. He begins to see people from the Enterprise; Troi, Worf, and Picard. They each talk to him about his alleged murder from a different viewpoint while Syrus observes, speaking to Riker in first person as though they were Riker's inner voices. Troi tells Riker how he felt about being cold and frightened in the dark. Worf represents his actions and describes the paranoid feeling he had of being followed and of defending himself against an attacker. Then Picard steps in to rationalize everything and tie it all together describing the alleyway in which the incident took place and pointing out that he was attacked from behind. Then Lt. Suna appears and Riker recognizes him as the attacker. Syrus explains that Dr. Suna is the administrator of the hospital and he met him when he was first brought here. He and the doctors are both puzzled over what this could mean. Suddenly the holograms begin to tell Riker that he's being held captive in this place, that he's in danger and that he needs to leave. Riker is now convinced that they aren't real and tells them all to go away which makes them all disappear. The doctor is very pleased and tells him that he's finally beginning to tell the difference between what is real and what is fantasy. Later in the cafeteria Crusher walks in dressed as a doctor and tries to talk to Riker. He ignores her because he thinks she's not really there even though she's telling him that he was undercover and is accused of murdering someone. So, it seems like a bit of reality to the audience and poor Riker is terrified. She assures him that even though there's a security field around the place keeping them from just transporting him, they'll get him out. That evening he's awakened in his room by the sound of someone forcing the door opened. It's Worf and Data. He refuses to go so they take him forcefully, but with care because they can tell he's confused. He pretends to faint so that Data releases him from his grip and then slips away calling for the attendants. He hides behind them when they show up and you can see the concern on Worf and Data's faces. They disarm and disable the attendants and again force Riker to go with them to another room where they have pattern enhancers to help beam out. Back in sick bay Riker remains silent and suspicious that this is all a dream. They're talking about a Dr. Suna being the head of one of the factions on the planet tying the story into the briefing he got at the beginning of his mission. Just the acknowledgement that Suna isn't a crewman and the reference to the planet's troubles seems like enough of a twist to tell us that this is reality. And Riker looks like he wants to believe when his cut returns. Beverly fixes it and as they continue to talk, it returns again.

Things start to snowball pretty quickly now as Riker realizes that this can't be real since his cut keeps returning. He grabs Worf's phaser and turns it on himself. Even if it's not a fantasy, he just wants it to be over. When he fires on himself the scene shatters like breaking glass. He's suddenly in the hospital with Suna, Syrus and the main attendant talking about him while he looks around bewildered. The attendant is reporting that he tried to escape again, saying that people from the Enterprise came to get him. The doctors decide to do a personality wipe. But Riker realizes that the Enterprise was real place after all because he's still holding Worf's phaser and calls attention to that fact. They tell him it's only a knife so he shoots the attendant who shatters like the previous scene and disappears. He then asks where the attendant went to if he's only holding a knife and when he doesn't get any answers he overloads the phaser which, if it were real, should explode and kill them all. But it only shatters the scene again. The two worlds combine now as he's now on the set of the play with Dr. Suna while the audience is watching as though this isn't unusual. The cut on his head returns again and he now understands that this Suna person is the only constant in all of the back and forth that his mind has been going through. When he points this out to Suna, the audience stands to give another ovation and Riker begins to beat on the set walls until the scene shatters again. Now he's in a room on a table. There's a device with a probe attached to the place on his head where the cut keeps reappearing. This is so different from everything else that Riker now knows that he's finally returned to reality. He hears Suna complaining that he's regained consciousness and that they haven't finished their procedure yet, something called a neuro-chemical drain.

Riker pulls the probe away from his face and sits up to see a table with a lot of familiar items on it - a tricorder, the knife that Worf cut him with, and the pendant communicator that was given to him in the beginning. He moves quickly to disable Suna's assistant, grab the knife and hold it to Suna's throat while he takes the pendant and calls to the Enterprise for an emergency transport. Finally we get a Captain's Log assuring us that Riker is back safely and that Crusher has repaired the damage that he suffered to his long term memory. He's talking with Troi and Picard about the experience. They remind him that he was abducted two days after he'd gone down to the planet. Picard suspects they were trying to get strategic information from him using their neruo-chemical procedure and Troi determines that Riker's mind was using all of his most recent experiences - the play, the mission, etc. as defense mechanisms to protect itself from the probing. Picard recommends that he get some more rest, but Riker wants to tear down the play set first. Beverly tells him that she had people that were going to do it tomorrow, but he insists on doing it himself, alone. It's a legitimate therapy for putting an end to the disturbing experience.
The only question I have is, why is the set still up after the star of the play, Riker, has been gone for at lest 2 days on his mission and perhaps more depending on how long they had him hooked up to their machine? But that's just nit-picking. This was a really good episode. Frakes' acting is superb and he carried the whole show like a pro. It's not the first time he's been in trouble on a strange planet, but it's the best version of that concept. His delivery of the insanity speech changes a little each time and you can really believe that Riker is slowly losing his mind with each repetition. It takes several twists, not just the back and forth between the Enterprise and the hospital. It's dark and disturbing but not overdone. And it was a difficult episode to do because there's so much packed into the episode even though it was more dialogue than action sequences. Very impressive. I don't think it's in my top ten favorites, but it's definitely in my top twenty. Four and a half stars.