Star Trek: The Next Generation - Episode 172 (Journey's End)

Note:  This review was originally posted to my Epinions account.

Way back in the first few seasons of The Next Generation, it seemed like Wesley Crusher was always there to save the day. It earned him a bad reputation because it seemed like this teenage kid knew more about the ship than all of the engineering personnel on the flagship of the Federation. Eventually, it came time for Wesley to go of to Starfleet Academy. It seemed like the natural progression of the character. However, things may not have been what they seemed.

In “Journey’s End,” Wesley returns to the Enterprise as the ship is about to go to the newly formed demilitarized zone, or DMZ. In a treaty with the Cardassians, the Federation handed over several colonies. The residents of those colonies have to be relocated before the Cardassians can properly claim their new property and start surveying it. The trouble is that the residents of one of the planets don’t want to leave. Even though they’ve been there for only 20 years, they feel an attachment to the land.

The Enterprise has been sent there to mediate things and see if he can get the colonists to leave. Picard is to use whatever means he sees fit to remove them. Wesley sees what’s going on and feels that it’s wrong. He openly defies the captain and makes things worse. Picard calls Starfleet Academy and finds out that this isn’t unusual; Wesley has been acting up in class lately. Upon being questioned about it, Wesley admits that he’s dreading his graduation from the Academy. He doesn’t want to be in Starfleet.

A solution is worked out that isn’t exactly what Starfleet expected, but is acceptable to everyone. I don’t want to give away how the episode ends. What I will say is that you have to have seen the rest of the series prior to this episode to fully understand it. I don’t think someone could fully understand Wesley’s history by being told. There are several aspects of the series that come into play in this episode. Also, this episode sets up episodes of Deep Space Nine and hints at the series Star Trek: Voyager. This episode is not for the casual viewer.

The writing for this episode is great. Captain Picard is given a difficult problem. Like Wesley, he also knows that what he’s been ordered to do is morally wrong and the admiral giving him the orders argued against it. However, Picard has too much invested in his career to risk it over this. Even if he did, Starfleet could simply find another captain to command the Enterprise.

I’d give this episode four stars. As I said, it’s not for everyone, but someone collecting the episodes on VHS should buy this one. I’d say that it’s not really essential, but has a high replay value.


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Star Trek The Next Generation - Episode 79 (Remember Me)

It was odd how many things failed on the Enterprise.  If it wasn’t the holodeck trapping someone inside and possibly killing them, the ship’s main computer was on the fritz threatening to blow up the entire ship.  Sometimes, that wasn’t enough.  Sometimes, you needed a problem so big that a particular boy genius had to create them.  Enter Wesley Crusher.  Here’s a teenager that’s allowed to run an experiment on the warp drive of Starfleet’s flagship.  Said flagship is about to leave a starbase, so it would be nice to have the engines back.

Wesley’s mother, Dr. Beverly Crusher stops by after showing mentor and good friend Dr. Dalen Quaice to his quarters.  He’s so busy with his experiment and so distracted by La Forge’s requests to end the experiment that Wesley barely notices that his mother disappears in a flash of light.  Wesley takes that as his cue to get lost.

The next morning, Dr. Crusher decides to visit Dr. Quaice only to find that he’s not there.  When she reports him missing, Worf doesn’t recall hearing of him.  Since Worf is the chief of security, it would have been nice if someone had told him about a passenger.  Funny thing, though.  Captain Picard doesn’t recall approving the request that Dr. Crusher sent in weeks ago.  Not only that, but there’s no record of anyone with a similar sounding name anywhere in Starfleet’s database.  (Yes, it’s an unusual name, but really?  Isn‘t the Federation’s population in the trillions or something?)

Slowly, the rest of the ship disappears.  It starts with her staff.  Eventually, even Captain Picard disappears, leaving her alone on a ship that she’s unqualified to operate by herself.  It doesn’t stop there.  The entire universe is reduced to a sphere several hundred meters in diameter.  She eventually realizes that she’s not broken.  Maybe the universe is.  She eventually realizes that she’s trapped in Wesley’s experiment and is able to get out.

This was one of those episodes that never sat well with me.  You know when someone tells you a story that makes no sense and as you think about it, the story makes less sense than it did before?  This is one of those stories.  First, consider that Wesley Crusher notices a flash of light, despite being distracted by his experiment.  What would this have looked like to Dr. Crusher?  She makes no mention of being surrounded by a ball of light.

Not only that, it takes her almost the entire episode to realize that it’s her that was affected by the experiment.  She and everyone else in her pocket universe blame the experiment early on.  At first, she thinks it was Dr. Quaice.  As more people disappear, it becomes less likely that it’s the warp bubble picking people off one by one.  That would have been a great moment for Dr. Crusher to realize what was going on.  Instead, we get this realization that seemed forced.  I know it’s not an easy thing to pull off, but it could have been handled much better.

Eventually she does figure it out and decides to run back to Engineering, thinking that being where she was when the experiment went haywire will help.  At this point, two apertures have opened up near her.  There’s no reason to think that engineering is special, but there’s an aperture waiting for her when she gets there.  She makes it out just as her pocket universe collapses in on itself.

Another thing:  If the entire universe has collapsed in on itself and there’s just a blue energy field several hundred meters in diameter, where did Dr. Crusher and The Enterprise come from?  There should have been no place to build the ship.  Both of Dr. Crusher’s parents would have disappeared.  Everything is gone except for her?  I know it’s supposed to be a metaphor for losing everything, but that’s something I keep getting hung up on whenever I watch the episode.

There’s also something I’d have to go back and check on.  The warp field equations Wesley was using for his experiment were based on Kosinski’s work.  You may remember him from the first-season episode, Where No One Has Gone Before.  At first, he seemed like a genius until it was discovered that his companion was doing all the heavy lifting.  If so, why would the equations be of any value.  For that matter, how would they create a pocket universe based on what Dr. Crusher was thinking?  It wasn’t until the ship got to the edge of the universe that thought mattered.  It seems like a bit of a stretch to me.

The entire episode seemed forced.  If you’re watching the episodes straight through, either on Netflix or DVD, it’s at least somewhat entertaining on the first view.  It’s also easy to skip.  You’re not missing much in terms of continuity if you don’t watch it.  The only thing that was memorable about the episode was how bad it was.



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Star Trek: The Next Generation - Episode 6 (Where No One Has Gone Before)

Note:  This review was originally posted to my Epinions account.

Even though the Enterprise is a new ship, Starfleet feels that an engineer by the name of Kosinski can do quite a bit for the Enterprise’s warp drive. The warp drive is what allows ships to go faster than light. Kosinski claims that he can make the engines more efficient.

Upon arriving in engineering, he has his assistant enter the equations. (The assistant is known simply as The Traveler, as his given name is unpronounceable to us.) The chief engineer of the Enterprise thinks that the equations are full of crap, but things seem to go pretty well, if only for a few minutes. Soon, the Enterprise is sent millions of light years away. Using the warp drive, it would take over 300 years to get home.

Wesley Crusher was the first to see what was really going on. He noticed The Traveler phasing in and out of our reality. He tries to tell Commander Riker, but Riker won’t listen to him. When the ship tries to get back home, things get even worse; the ship ends up on the outer rim of the universe. The thing is that Commander Riker notices what Wesley had.

The Traveler is drained, but feels that he can make one more attempt. Before trying, he tells Captain Picard that Wesley is different. Much as Mozart was a prodigy for music, Wesley is an prodigy when it comes to Engineering. Picard agrees to encourage Wesley. Fortunately, the third time is a charm; the Enterprise ends up back where it started, but The Traveler disappears. On the bridge, Wesley is made an acting ensign.

There are two things that I noticed about Kosinski. First, despite being in a Starfleet uniform, he has no combadge. It seems that everyone in the uniform has the small communications device where they can reach it; not Kosinski. The second thing is that he’s pretty arrogant for an ensign. He’s convinced that he’s the best thing to happen to engineering since the slide rule. He’s not going to let anyone tell him he’s wrong. (Especially not some lowly chief engineer or first officer.) When Kosinski is finally proven to be wrong, it comes as a great shock to him that everyone else really was right, after all.

There’s also the issue of Wesley. This episode sets into motion his Starfleet career, which would also end with The Traveler seven years later. This episode would set up several others and have long-lasting effects. I don’t know if the writers had necessarily planed it that way, but it was a good thing that this was dealt with so early in the series.

I’d give this episode four stars. It’s a simple episode, but there’s something to be said for simplicity sometimes. If you can make it this far in the series, you might see that Wesley isn’t the only one with promise. It seems like the main characters are beginning to find themselves. I would definitely recommend this episode to anyone.

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