The Battle

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Bok, Daimon Bok. Hardly a dashing English superspy, despite the teeth. Instead, he's a Ferengi so deceptive that even though Ferengi minds are unreadable Troi senses his malicious intent (oops).

Nine years ago, Bok's son attacked Picard's ship Stargazer without explanation or preamble. Picard saved his crew with a desperate trick of warp speed and light, destroying the Ferengi and losing his ship. Now Bok has brought Stargazer back OUT OF THE GOODNESS OF HIS HEART and the clearly falsified logs implicate Picard as the aggressor.

Wesley's Acting Ensign uniform- I just realized that rainbow is the three division colours! Indicating, I suppose, that Wes has not yet specialized in command (red), operations (yellow), or science (blue). Or, as the writers overzealously seem to be trying to tell us, young Crusher is unreasonably good at everything ever always! Today he beats Troi and Dr. Crusher to their answers about Picard's brain scan, and comes across kind of arrogant. His britches seem very, very small.

I remember how wonderful a future where a doctor rarely encountered headaches and common colds sounded! I suffered quite vicious headaches for most of my teens, thankfully much less after that. Probably not due to Ferengi, though...

Bok has blown his life savings to buy a pair of Basketballs of Mental Fuckery. Hallucinating, Picard re-enacts the Battle of Maxia, but with the Enterprise as his target. Data devises a defence, catching the Captain's antique vessel in the tractor beam. Riker jars Picard back to his senses so he might phaser the thought-maker.

"The Battle" has good effects and fine performances. The Ferengi come across better, well, more menacing, and did I mention effects? Pretty cool.