Star Trek: Insurrection

** (2 stars out of 5)

And maybe two stars is generous. What the hell, Star Trek?

Data's emotion chip went from permanently fused hardware in Generations, to having an on/off software in First Contact, and now it's like burped tupperware- it's totally removable. Is this also what happened to the creator's brains?

Our programmable plastic pal has apparently gone coo-coo for cocoa puffs, running amok in a peaceful village in his invisible red footy pajamas. He exposes the dirty dealings of the Federation and a gang of cosmetic surgery disasters called the Son'a.  

Interrupted in the middle of what looked like a much better story (involving the diplomatic efforts of flower-munching bead-making fish-goblins called the Evora, and the way they're being rushed into Federation Protectorate status too quickly due to the war), Picard and company rush to Data's rescue. 

They are told to make it snappy while poking around the "Briar Patch" by Admiral Doughy... uh, Dougherty. I mean Beardface.  Riker and Troi start poking around and discover that the Son'a deal ketracel-white to the Dominion and keep two slave races. But who cares! It's just slavery. Riker and Troi start poking around each other and getting in bed together holds their attention better than why the Federation would ever get in bed with these rotting freak shows.

Picard and Worf chase Data down and catch him by singing to him. It is the last good moment in what begins to feel like a nine hour film. Round about then, they meet a race of hippies or dentists or hippie dentists called the Ba'ku. Data strikes up a creepy friendship with a tow-headed youngster, while Picard begins the most tepid romance of all time with the holier-than-thou agrarian leader Anij. Bland, bland Anij.

The Captain and Mr. Data discover a cloaked holoship of Federation design (because an invisible brick has the distinctiveness of the Federation written ALL over it). It was meant for Beardface and his Son'a Cronies to pull a Nikolai Rozhenko with, supplanting the Ba'ku and stealing the planet's metaphasic rings of eternal youth for themselves (and incidentally the billions of other sick and aged races). 

For the Fountain of Youth is what's behind it all. That's why Worf has a giant oily "gorch" on his nose,  why Riker and Troi have rekindled, why Crusher uses archaic slang like "boobs firming up", and why Geordi's eyes have grown in. Why Picard has started to mambo is anyone's guess.

But with billions of sick and wounded people like Geordi out there, Picard cannot conscience letting 600 self-righteous douche-canoes hoard immortality for themselves. He immediately supports the Admiral's plan and boots the Ba'ku from the Briar Patch for the greater good. What? He doesn't?

No, Picard takes the morally confused stance that the needs of 600 people outweigh the needs of the billions, and defends his girlfriend's village against relocation. In much the same way that he did NOT do on Dorvan V, resulting in every Maquis problem ever since.  (It feels a bit like he made exactly the wrong choice for the right reasons both times.) His loyal team of catchphrase-spewing cowboys and cowgirls set out to shoot things down and blow other things up until some sort of compromise can be reached. 

So, kiss your eyes good-bye, Geordi. Kiss your limbs farewell, Dominion-wounded Nog. Kiss whatever you can reach with your tightly stretched lips, undeserving Son'a. Nobody gets nothin' unless they're white, centuries-old know-it-alls who despise the very science and technology that has built Earth's paradise.

Say... that's true. Before they were Son'a (spoilers... but seriously who cares) the Son'a were Ba'ku. The Ba'ku eschew technology. So how did a handful of backward, vain, drug dealing slave owners get the science background to out-science the Federation?

How can you keep the Son'a down on the farm, after they've seen Paree? (By which I mean someplace with urban decay and wee in the streets, not the NICE bits of Paris.)

Oh, also the Ba'ku are magic time wizards or something. But slowing time down is the LAST skill you'll want if you're watching this movie.

I used to be a staunch defender of "Star Trek: Insurrection". 'O.K., it's slow, but it's charming! C'mon, you guys, look at those effects! What a sunny view! I want a pocket squirrel-seal! (Not a euphemism)' But it clearly wore out its welcome. This time I was not just bored, I was a little MAD.

What movie MIGHT have been made with this money? And would I actually be proud to have it on my shelf?

All Good Things...

***** (5 stars out of 5)

If my reviews went to 6 stars, I'm not sure what Star Trek would earn it more. As Tasha Yar says tonight: 'You're in for a treat."

It's a temporal tossed salad or utter madness (is there a difference?) as Captain Picard becomes unstuck in time, leaping from the launch of the Enterprise-D seven years ago to his retirement a quarter century hence.  And while you're delving into the fragments of a man's life, could you also take a look at the total annihilation of all humankind? When you get a second...

Is Picard off his rocker or is there something more sinister at work? No sooner do we wonder when Geordi installed those cool blue eyes and ended up father to Leah's kids, when we're back in the past admiring Troi's cheerleader skirt once again.

And while pondering what Paul Rice was doing lurking eerily behind Beardless Stud Riker at Farpoint, we're suddenly staring down the gob of Tomalak the Romulan, acting curiously Narn-ish. And when we've scarfed our Narn bread it's back to the future with Data the Crazy Cat Lady of Cambridge, and Captain Beverly Picard who got the starship Pasteur in the divorce.

Why is Picard seeing filthy shrieking hobbits? How many anti-time tachyon beams make three? Is there any possible way to stop Worf and Troi from kissing?

We know his crew in the present love Captain Picard, (and not just on Captain Picard Day, the annually mandated holiday of enforced merriment). We know they would follow him into the very maw of death, but was that always the case? And will it always be so?

Perhaps the top-notch writing and Emmy-nabbing visual effects have the answer. Boy, howdy, did I cheer when Admiral Riker flew the old D (sporting a snazzy third nacelle) right up those thug Klingon patoots with some massive frag cannon and jumps to Warp 13! Can you spell Nerdgasm?

I'd say SPOILERS, but this story is 18 years old, just slightly older than I was when I first saw it, more's the pity. So when I tell you the villain of the piece spells his name with a 'Q' you won't be exactly gobsmacked. The trial of humanity has reached a verdict. Paradox will be the death of us... unless the chicken and the egg that is Picard's noggin can fry us up a more satisfying denouement.

"All Good Things..." won a 1995 Hugo Award, so you can read a reserved but entirely excellent review from Ryan at Blogging The Hugos now that you've absorbed all my nonsense.

We've come to the end of the first Star Trek that was mine, all mine. So howl with me at the afterlife to let them know what to watch out for.

The Collaborator

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Bareil has all the fun. Vedeks see more of the vision-inducing Orbs than a lay Bajoran. He gets to dream of Kira in skin-tight workout clothes playing springball and what-not (speaking of laying Bajorans). Of course, this trip turns bad for the non-celibate monk: it features the grisly hanging corpse of some specter called Prylor Bek.  Maybe Bek was a termite who choked on the splinters?

The Kai election is in two days. Bareil is an option for Space Pope, so too is Vedek Winn. You remember Winn? She preaches the conditional love of the Prophets to good little children. But do the disobedient get coal in their stockings... or a disruptor in the face?

Secretary Kubus Oak from the New Yawk area of Bajor, when recognized, is quickly arrested. He was exiled with the other mooks (surviving Occupational Government AKA Sell-Outs). Kira is not inclined to change that ruling.

Winn is more forgiving since Oak can be tapped for delicious, maple syrup-like blackmail.

In the Kendra Valley Massacre, you'll be delighted to learn, 43 freedom fighters including the son of the last Good Space Pope, Opaka, were, well, massacred. Collaborator Bek confessed to giving their location to the Cardassians in his suicide note. Winn declares Bek was merely the pawn... of Bareil. Da-da-daaaam!

Did Kira's boyfriend do the nasty? So to speak? Odo has learned one thing about humanoids: "In extreme situations even the best of you are capable of doing terrible things." So he's seen 'Dance Moms', then.

Bareil's having visions of kissing on Winn and getting stabbed to death by Kira. Only you can decide which is more horrifying. He withdraws... from the election, that is.

Bariel admits Opaka was "The Collaborator": sold out her son to save a thousand lives. He helped sweep it under the rug. So I hope you like Kai Winn! Speaking of dusty old rugs, check out the official Kai garb. Made from old curtains like the Von Trapp kids' play clothes in 'The Sound of Music'.

Preemptive Strike

**** (4 stars out of 5)

Advanced Tactical Training School is tough: half the class washes out every year. That's what Ro Laren was not doing all year: failing. She's now returned to Enterprise with a lieutenant pip. Also, the training is so hard she lost her uppermost nose ridge.

The DMZ is still a frakking felker-storm, as the kids say. Or, more probably, have never said.

Maquis ships of Federation and Bajoran design are shooting Gul Evek's warship. Why can't anybody just leave a perfectly innocent giant Cardassian warship in peace? Picard has Worf separate them with a precise torpedo blast. Explosions are the perfect way to calm people down, don't you think?

Admiral 'Never-A-Good-Sign' Necheyev has Picard send Ro undercover to gain intelligence on the Maquis. This infiltration is the easiest thing anyone's done since the Federation botched the treaty in the first place! Ro really does hate Cardassians, she really does have a bad rep, and her tactics instructor just resigned to join the resistance. (This was meant to reference a character soon to be introduced in Star Trek: Voyager. Due to short memories and dodgy writing, this former fleet tactical lieutenant commander from the DMZ will disconnect that back-story possibility in dialogue years from now. Grumble damn continuity nerd snarf consistency grousing hobgoblins...)

Ro wins the trust of a Maquis cell leader, Macias, by "stealing" medical supplies from Enterprise. Then Picard has her lead the rebels into a trap. (It's in the Honest, Brave, and True Starfleet Manual under the heading New Teen Titans: The Judas Contract, Subsection: The Terra Maneuver. If it would help, Ro is encouraged to talk like a 1930's gangster, take up smoking, and bed a much older man.)

But she can't go through with any of it. Striking from ambush one evening, Cardassians disguised as monks slaughter her good-hearted Maquis mentor. And Starfleet's trickery is of such a dishonourable nature today that, yes, she saves the freedom fighters by turning on Riker and Picard. Who fly back to safety feeling betrayed, irked, and slightly disgruntled. Possibly even miffed!

In "Preemptive Strike" Ro finds a new daddy, dropping Picard like a hot potato for a martyr to a lost cause who liked spicy food. But darn it, Michelle Forbes is a great performer. She didn't make the transfer to DS9, she missed the boat to Voyager, and in both cases it was Star Trek's loss.

Emergence

** (2 stars out of 5)

Prospero Data, or possibly pasty Johnny Depp as Wizard Gandalf, rehearses The Tempest for Picard. "One final creative act before giving up his art forever." But the Captain and the android narrowly avoid being run over by the Orient Express. Wouldn't you know it? The holodeck's broken again...

A magnascopic storm in the Mekorda sector, for lack of a more delicate term, knocked up the Enterprise. It has become fruitful and is great with child.

The ship suddenly jumps to warp 'luckily' avoiding a theta explosion the sensors weren't designed to detect, but then did somehow. SCIENCE! The circuitry is full of brightly coloured crazy straws, perhaps appropriate to the drunken way the ship is behaving...

Holodeck gunslingers and medieval knights are doing jigsaw puzzles on the train. All in all, a mobster delivers another brick to a wall. Worf shovels coal to get them to Jeffery Tambor Beta VI and all the vertion particles the ship can eat. We've never heard of vertion before, but clearly it's the cosmic equivalent of pickles and ice cream.

The replicators and transporters created a brightly coloured hairball in the cargo bay, then coughed it up. There is much rejoicing... while D Jr. wanders off by itself. Deejur? Nobody names it.

Picard hopes that whatever the hell got built from their fantasies will be honourable. But, really, isn't it more likely to suffer from the Living Spaceship equivalent of fetal alcohol syndrome?

It might be the writers of "Emergence" who were inebriated. Let me get this straight: Enterprise spontaneously grew an imagination, reproduced, and reverted to normal function so it conveniently cannot take any responsibility. The carbon units infesting Enterprise are unable or unwilling to investigate the Strange New Life because uh... it ran away really fast or something. That looks pretty bad in a report, so what are they celebrating? That even their ship is a terrible parent?

It's the unfunny version of the episode 'The Practical Joker' with an unsettling dash of 'I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant'. If instead of dropping infants into toilets you dropped them into outer space. (In case you didn't guess, yes, I feel sorry for the Little Lamp. That is because I am crazy.)

Bloodlines

*** (3 stars out of 5)

The Wrath of Bok! Picard's greatest nemesis re-emerges after six years, having paid his debt to society. And apparently paid to have his brain transferred into the body of Gral (last seen in DS9's 'The Nagus').

Bok sends a hologram to taunt Picard with a threat to the life of the son he never knew he had: Jason Vigo. Picard did have a dalliance with Miranda Vigo 24 years ago. Her son by a Starfleeter is living on a hardscrabble world called Camor V.

Bev's DNA test confirms Jason's parentage. Jean-Luc takes him into protective custody and shows off his proud collection of tedious artifacts. Not the best plan: Jason has a criminal record for petty theft. Jason hits on Troi, his golden shadow security lieutenant Sandra Rhodes, and anyone he happens across. We're sure Riker's not the father?

Jason is dying of something genetic. He tells Jean-Luc the tale of his selfless, determined mother Miranda who worked her butt off to educate and feed orphans, until she was killed in the street for her groceries.

15 years to the day after the Battle of Maxia, Bok abducts Jason by subspace transporter over 300 BILLION kilometres away. (Oh, transporters can do that, now. Well, today they can.) Picard risks following with the experimental new process. Seems Bok messed with Jason's DNA to make him pass as a Picard, giving him a deadly disorder to boot. Bok is turned over to the Ferengi authorities again and Crusher cures Jason.

I think we can all assume his real father was Thadiun "The Outrageous" Okona. Or Riker. So what if they were too young? Apparently nobody cares enough to investigate, least of all Jason. In fact, I think his real dad was Jason "The Red Hood" Todd. PROVE ME WRONG, INTERNET!

"Bloodlines" made me notice how much of this final season is devoted to parenthood. And no bad thing: the series is called The Next Generation, after all. Yet a disappointing pattern is emerging: that  these mighty heroes don't make good parents. Just as the Federation apparently fails developing worlds like Camor, Turkana, Bajor and so on, so do starship captains fail their kids, biological or otherwise. So far, anyway. PROVE ME WRONG, STAR TREK!

Firstborn

*** (3 stars out of 5)

For some reason, Alexander's school chum is afraid of Worf. Maybe it was last month when everyone who'd turned into capering monkeys had to hide from him or get eaten...

In any event, Alexander's not exactly a chip off the old block: the kid doesn't even want to kill people when he grows up! Worf's eager that Alexander not miss out on the First Rite of Ascension, which must be accomplished before one's 13th birthday. (Is Worf jumping the gun here? Alexander could only be, at best, SEVEN YEARS OLD.)

Alex does love the festival of Kot'baval on Maranga IV. It's Klingon Disneyland! Along with stylized dance fighting, they sing about Kirok (who brought irrigation to the locals back in 'The Paradise Syndrome')

That night, Worf and son are saved from non-dance fighters by K'mtar, apparently a trusted advisor who has 'become part of the family'. He even has the family forehead!

K'mtar's dubious that the House of Mogh has pinned its future on a boy who knows more about water balloon warfare than actual warfare. And he blames the muggers on the Duras sisters.

CROSSOVER! Riker returns his Quark Vouchers for the location of the sisters. They were claim jumping a Pakled mine, stranding a Dopterian whose "personal code of conduct prohibits sharing".

K'mtar pushes for Alex to go to Klingon school. Alex pushes back owing to Alexander having a brain between his ears which he doesn't want some jerk scooping out with a bat'leth.

When Riker catches the Duras sisters, it seems their knife used against Worf includes a symbol for Lursa's as-yet-unborn son. Which is because K'mtar is really Alexander from 40 years in the future! Given the chance to change the past, he hoped to alter his young destiny or commit retroactive suicide. (Wait, Paradox much?) In his future, Alexander became a peacemaker, leading the House of Mogh away from feuding, and for his trouble, Worf got killed.

Worf tells his son to stay true to what he believes. 'The cause of peace IS a just cause."

"Firstborn" shows us that Alexander grew up to look a lot like his REAL father, Dr. Mora Pol of Bajor. Assuming K'Ehleyr was slumming. I'm kidding! James Sloyan brought top quality to this show no matter what make-up they slapped on him. (Or what story they crib from the Animated Series.)

Journey's End

***** (5 stars out of 5)

Approaching graduation but feeling miserable, Wesley discovers that, for a Helm Boy, he has done a poor job at choosing his own course.

Remember how Admiral Nechayev never shows up with GOOD news? Dorvan V, a North American Indian colony world, has been given to the Cardassians in that horrible treaty. The Federation Council has found it necessary to fuck them over for the greater good.

Picard is ordered to play Evil Eviction Landlord. Chief Anthwara understandably does not want to condemn his group to a nomadic existence again. Also, pemmican from the replicator just sucks.

Wes meets kindly Tom Jackson, of course. Dorvan V is, after all, way, WAY North of 60. The soft-spoken man tells the cadet that all life is sacred, and suggests a vision quest: "If you are sacred, then you must treat yourself with respect."

Anthwara feels Jean-luc is here to make up for his Spanish ancestor Javier Picard, who was on the wrong end of the bayonets in 1690.

In a vision, Jack Crusher's spirit tells Wesley to stop following a path not his own. Wes stands with the colonists against Worf's evacuation goons.

As the red men open fire on the grey men, Wesley simply WILLS time to stop... and it does. An altogether different grey man appears: Wes' Indian guide in a more familiar form. Wizard, angel, or just a guy marching to a different drum, the Traveler stopped by to help a friend.


Anthwara's people avert full-on war by choosing to stay under Cardassian jurisdiction. And only good will come of it forever!

(Most kids just backpack across Deneb for a summer, but when you're a space/time savant like Wes, you're going to have to figure out exchange rates for other dimensions.)

"Journey's End" matters a lot to me. It's tangled up in my feelings of confusion at that time. The Next Generation really was coming to an end, and I was discovering that I was not much good at growing up. I was troubled in spirit and I needed a friend.

Spiritualism is often ignored or comes to no good in the world of Star Trek. The Traveller seems like a much better choice to follow into the mystic than Sybok or Dr. Severin. But writer Ron Moore found an important truth here about Wesley: 'Starfleet's cool, but it's not for everybody.'
Where Wes drops out of a life of science for one of mysticism, I would soon be making the opposite journey, and less bravely. Either way, for best results, befriend a Native Canadian!

Genesis

**** (4 stars out of 5)

Reg Barclay comes to sickbay for Terellian Death Syndrome, which he does not have, while Riker comes in for cactus butt, which he DOES have.

It seems there's a downside to the magical meds of 2370, and this time it's not Pulaski's fault. Barclay's life expectancy of merely another 80 years (and everyone else's too) is jeopardized when Dr. Moreau, sorry, I mean Crusher makes a tiny, unprecedented error with a synthetic T-Cell.

Data's Spot and Nurse Ogawa are pregnant, by different fathers, one assumes. At least, "Andrew Powell" doesn't sound like a Catian name...

Speaking of embarrassing screw-ups, Worf suffers from wandering torpedo syndrome. Leaving Spot in Barclay's care, Data and Picard chase down the wayward bomb.

Worf's eating like a pig and Troi's drinking like a fish, which turns out not to be an expression.

By the time Picard and Data get back with Slurpees for the whole gang, somebody has wrecked up the power transfer grid and left the ship drifting in darkness. And the answer to the question:
Are we not men? is A: We are Devo.

It's a blast from the past as obsolete DNA springs to life and mutates everyone into mindless creatures. (Pants were the first thing to go, so it's a darn good thing the ship cleans itself.) 1,011 individual life forms (if Data is not counting himself and Picard) may mean that the dead guy with the claw marks and broken spine is the only one. Maybe. (Shudder)

Spot's kittens were safe from the virus that turned her into an iguana. Yes, I know cats were never iguanas. Since when has Spot done anything normal?

Similarly, Monkey Ogawa's amniotic fluid contains the necessary cure. Data creates a retro virus while Picard (himself morphing towards lemurhood) lures a very literally Horny Worf away with the fishy pheromones of Frog Troi. I'm not making this up. I'm not sure how anyone DID! (Seek help, Brannon Braga, you magnificent bastard.)

Beverly (her face quickly reconstructed after a brush with Rock Lobster Worf's ACID VENOM CHEEKS) is in questionably high spirits.  It's a big 'laugh on the bridge' when Troi says she'll have to clear her schedule. Apparently nobody liked Dern. (You know, the redshirt Worf or maybe Riker ripped up. To shreds, you say?)

The ghoulish and multifarious make-up effects of "Genesis" still somehow lost their Emmy to a fairly standard episode of Babylon 5. But despite Star Trek Magazine's wild claim that this is the worst episode of the season, it sure works for me. Ever since I saw Disney's Pinocchio, where naughty boys are turned into donkeys, I had a terror of being turned into a beast. Which the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles had only partly cured me of by the time I saw this in 1994. Very Scary. And yes, it's also silly. The lack of dignity is itself kind of horrible.

Eye of the Beholder

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Lt. Dan Kwan becomes suddenly, uncharacteristically miserable and throws himself into the nacelle plasma stream. Why would he do it? Did he look ahead in the script?

Troi and Worf investigate the tragic suicide, and is usually the case in these matters, things get steamy!

I knew some girls back then who LOVED the idea of 'Beauty and the Beast' on the Enterprise. I WAS NOT amused. Then (as now) I was convinced there was a right guy for Troi (Mr. Riker) and a wrong guy (Mr. Worf). I'm all for Betazoid jungle fever, but years of set up with Will seemed for naught when Troi suddenly gets her some Klingon Nookie. Granted it's marginally safer than Wookie Nookie, but Worf's not exactly Troi's speed, is he?

Then again, maybe she's started "the phase" early. No, not the mid-life increase in Betazoid sex drive. The 'Twilight' phase.

Troi's visions lead her to creepy Walter Pierce, and Geordi finds a skellington! It's poor Marla Finn, missing since the Enterprise was built.

Worf, who once regarded mating with a deep sense of duty, now casts his eye on some cheap tart in blue... and it's NOT Troi!

When Deanna catches Worf and Ensign Tart in each other's arms, they just laugh at her.  Enraged, Troi grabs up a phaser and shoots Worf dead. She races to the nacelle... but before she can throw herself in, Worf wakes her up. That's right, it was all in Troi's imagination!

Pierce had a Betazoid grandmother, you see, and thus he left some ghost imprint behind when he killed Finn, her boy-toy and himself. An imprint that (until it killed Dan) no one empathic had ever noticed before... in eight years. Likely story.  Sorry, I sometimes forget to type "wildly un" before I type "likely".

"Eye of the Beholder" Not a dream! Not a hoax! Not an imaginary... oh wait.

Playing God

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Dax in a towel! There IS a god!

5000 host candidates per year, and only 300 Trill symbionts available. This creates a lot of resentment, a fair amount of disgruntlement, and occasional violent fruit-loops. Initiate Arjin is on the works hard, eats his greens, never has any fun side of the Trill spectrum.

Curzon Dax had a well-deserved reputation for being extra hard on initiates. He was mean to Initiate Jadzia, for example. Since nobody tells us what the guidelines are, it's tough to say whether Curzon was toughening up the candidates or just mean for kicks.

Jadzia Dax plays the outrageous field supervisor. She's overly familiar with Flex Metallo, her "wrestling" partner. She makes it seem as though if Arjin wants a worm, he's going to have to look into a lot of tequila glasses.

Meanwhile, O'Brien is hunting wascaway wabbits, I mean Cardassian voles. My lovely wife Trish wondered whether the vole would make a good cat-copter...

The Trills accidentally drag home some subspace 'seaweed' that turns out to be a baby universe. In the grand tradition of 'Horton Hears a Who' the potential itsy-bitsy civilization(s) within must be protected and returned to safety. Except the Who Village wasn't rapidly expanding.

Kira, whose regular-size civilization will be the first to vanish if they fail, considers simply stepping on these ants.

Odo disagrees. "I don't step on ants, Major. Just because we don't understand a life-form doesn't mean we can destroy it." It's hard to hear him over the slurps of people eating live Klingon food and shovelling heaps of dead voles out the airlocks.

"Playing God" has something important to say.  A vivacious, well-rounded message. But I can't figure out what it is because it started with damp Dax in a skimpy towel.

Masks

**** (4 stars out of 5)

Moussaka is waking!

Yes, the Greek food I had for lunch is angry, and planning a vengeful return.

What could be lurking under the accumulated comet dust of the ages? Why, it's the Lost Library of Someplace other than Alexandria. And in Soviet Someplace, LIBRARY READS YOU!

Our starship begins to transmute into Quasi-South American temples and arcane symbols as Mr. Data provides the voices for a cast of mythological misfits. All of them have a beef with something called Masaka. (Apparently, she's hot stuff.)

One minute Data's a devout worshipper, the next a frightened child, and often he's the capering trickster Ihat. (By the way, Apple is due to release the iHat next year. With four cardinal points on its Masaka-Proof brim, all of your multiple personalities will want to wear one!)

Data dons the mask he made in art class and sits on a throne to oversee the final change of his vessel into the Transformer Aztekimus Prime.
Picard uses the improv skills he learned in archeology class to don the mask of the moon man Korganu and coax Musaka down from the sky. (I wish he'd do that now, this is one bloody hot summer for us roasty-toasty Canadians.)

"Masks" is Brent Spiner's show and he's amazing, though I've read how difficult a time he had making sense of multiple roles from an unexplained alien mythos. My favorite is his 'old man by the fire', kind of the D'Arsay alien version of the Chronos archetype. He's still so captivating.

Re-enact the episode with your loved ones HERE! (Click for hilarious comic strip link. Will not transform your couch into a stone Olmec head. Probably.)

Thine Own Self

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Troi returns from a class reunion with a greater desire to pursue her career, by which she means bossing people around and shooting at bad guys, apparently. You, know, like a psychologist. She notices Beverly sitting in the big chair on night shift and takes the courses to move up to Commander rank herself.

Deanna has a particularly hard time with the engineering emergency portion. She fails it three times and Riker tells her she's just not qualified. As Malibu Stacy once giggled: Thinking Gives You Wrinkles! Troi earns some Thinkles today and beats the test by sending her simulated friend Geordi to his simulated demise. Like a boss!

The pre-industrial civilization on Barkon IV gets a shock when a Federation probe crashes there, and a strange pale monster with amnesia wanders into town with a suitcase full of radioactive death.

Garvin the magistrate befriends the odd ice man, and Garvin's daughter Gia names him 'Jayden'. Gia says her mother has gone to "a beautiful place where everything is peaceful and everyone loves each other and no one ever gets sick." Although he cannot remember why, Jayden also believes there is such a place.

Unable to remember what his valise contains, Jayden passes the contents out like rock candy.
Hair begins to fall out and skin to burn. Local sage Talar treats with rest and fresh air.

Jayden believes his shiny metal fragments caused the sickness, but before he can cure it the locals attack him and tear half his face off.  Icepick for the Ice Man! His head is full of lights and shiny metal which they don't find reassuring.

You know the rest. Monster saves village, angry mob spears and buries monster. Act in haste, repent... oh, sometime.

"Thine Own Self" raises the question: if there was a ST:TNG season 8, would Data have made a better vampire or a werewolf?  Second rumination: this is not the last time half of Data's face will be torn off. Fortunately, Geordi must have a vat of Data Spackle somewhere.

(And many thanks to my amazing wife for the portmanteau word 'Thinkles'.)

Lower Decks

**** (4 stars out of 5)

The senior staff seem to keep the underlings out of all the interesting stuff when an injured Cardassian beams aboard.

Ensigns Sam Lavelle and Sito Jaxa are chums, and up for the same promotion.  They also hang out with Nurse Alyssa Ogawa, a gossipy Ten-Forward waiter called Ben, and Vulcan straight man (aren't they all?) Ensign Taurik.

Despite her Nova Squadron mis-step, (back in 'The First Duty') Sito's doing well as Worf's security protege, although Picard tells her flat out that he doubts her character. After that body blow to her confidence, Sam looks a little ridiculous when he says Riker's too mean. And Taurik charts new frontiers in Ridiculousity when he can't get his mean boss (yes, Geordi, apparently) to notice him. Teacher's pet Alyssa loves her boss, gets a promotion, and her boyfriend proposes to her. Ben beats The Peons and The Opening Credits alike at poker. What, me worry?

Worf keeps Sito after martial arts class to blindfold her and beat her up. She only passes this "gik'tal challenge" by finally telling him off. Pointing out that gik'tal is Klingon for "to the death", Sito asks if it was even a real challenge. Worf admits he can't speak Klingon. Just kidding. He actually says: "Perhaps next time you are judged unfairly it will not take so many bruises for you to protest."

Sito gathers the courage to face Picard again: which is what the Captain wanted in the first place. He needs her bravery on maximum for a dangerous mission. She's got to help smuggle Cardie double agent Joret Dal back into enemy space, while posing as his bounty. It works all the time in 'Star Wars'...

Two days later, the Cardassians celebrate the death of their 'One Millionth Escaping Terrorist', good for one free round of war reparations and a medium-sized muffin basket. Hooray...? For the good guys...? No? Oh... just sadness.

"Lower Decks" brings slice of Enterprise life from an outside perspective, which was a such a good idea they made it a TV Trope. The ugly uncertainty of the ending is most effective, as it still bums me out. 'Killed during escape' might actually be the best case scenario but they've left me feeling it might be worse. Sito's 'Tee Hee, Dr. Crusher gave me fake bruises' exchange with Worf now seems just awful. Is it better drama to get to know a security guard before they die? I felt just as bad about Sito dying for a cause as I did about Yar dying at random.

Sub Rosa

** (2 stars out of 5)

Starfleet is very damn serious about demerits. They don't even let Wesley go to his Great-Grandmother's funeral.

Beverly Crusher's Nana, Felisa Howard, has passed away. The 'sure and certain hope' mentioned at her service is not of the resurrection, but she gets one anyway.  Yerggh.

Nana lived on Caldos Colony, terraformed to resemble Scotland. The Howard women (except Beverly's mom and Beverly) all had green eyes. Bev has inherited a house, a candle, and... A CURSE!!!

According to high-functioning lunatic Groundskeeper Ned Quint, the candle has been "a carse on the Hoowards" for generations. (It even cursed Howard The Duck!) In Nana's journals, the only 'curse' is Ronin, the 34-year-old lover who liked him some 100-year-old Nana!

Not by coincidence, Beverly has some sex dreams about a man-ghost. Troi does not seem overly concerned... although you'll recall: Troi was once knocked up by an energy being in her sleep! (D'ya think Wesley wants a new baby brother?!?)

Ned claims the Howard family ghost is angry and causing storms by sabotaging the weather control grid. As ghosts often do these days. The bodiless specter seemingly enjoys a classic John Forster ditty, particularly the lyric that goes: 'the pleasure of entering Beverly far outweighed any feelings of guilt.' Invisible Ronin spins a tale of falling for red-headed Jessel Howard in 1647 Glasgow AND HER EVERY LAST FEMALE DESCENDANT EVER SINCE. In twenty years, there's no chance I'm the first to say... ICK. I guess I should be thankful a ghost can't collect STDs.

"I admit... it's unusual." remarks Troi, Mistress of Understatement.

Crazy the Central Casting Groundskeeper dies trying to fight the thing in the weather machine. Beverly's eyes turn green. From orgasms, I guess.  Bev resigns to live on Caldos. Well, how is Captain Picard supposed to compete with a sex-ghost?

Ronin possesses Nana's Mouldering Corpse to electrocute Geordi and Data. Beverly finally turns against her hot mess ghost boyfriend and phasers him right in the candle.

"Sub Rosa" is a showcase for Gates McFadden's acting talents and Frake's direction. Plus, I'm sure it's fun times for the goth romance crowd. Personally, I think it makes 'Catspaw' look dignified. It's overwrought, shuddering nonsense from end to end- but, damn, if they didn't give it 110 percent.

Homeward

*** (3 stars out of 5)

You know about plasmonic reactions, right? Presumably caused by the Gizmonics Institute, they strike without warning and destroy planets by broadcasting appallingly bad movies.

You know about Worf's foster brother, right? Starfleet Academy drop-out and cultural anthropologist Dr. Nikolai Rozhenko, stationed on Boraalis II. He broke the Prime Directive, popped out of his duck blind in Boraalan guise, and led a single village to safety when their world died. They're hiding in a cavern, in a canyon, and their nose is number nine.

When Picard hears of it, he plays the closed-minded hard-ass and refuses to let Nikolai save any backward medieval bastards under a forcefield. (Too bad they weren't Crusher's son or Data's pen pal, but, hey, thems the breaks.) Nikolai defies Mighty Saint Picard with a damn clever trick: he re-creates the shelter caves on a holodeck, beaming up all the survivors while they sleep.

Now despite the shattered Prime Directive, the crew are forced to assist him in re-locating the tiny society to a similar world called Vacca VI. Nikolai tells the villagers that Shrunken Forehead Worf is their 'Space Moses'. They plan to make it look like they walked to Vacca by gradually modifying the holodeck terrain. Except the holodeck (surprise, surprise) is broken: showing glimpses of the grid beneath. It even accidentally lets the village chronicler, Vorin, wander out into the halls. Nice locks, Holodeck.

Vorin's bad luck continues: Dr. Crusher can't erase his memory of their traumatically alien vessel and they can't let him go back and tell the others. Especially since they (weirdly) told him the whole truth: his planet being utterly destroyed and all. If Vorin tells the others he'd either be thought a madman, or their beliefs might be ruined by too much knowledge.

Unlike the Mintakans the last time someone broke a duck blind, these people are apparently too delicate for the truth. Pessimism seems the primary trait of their culture. Pessimism and hoodies.

Nikolai's Boraalan baby-mama Dobarra says something telling: that most of them were resigned to death and Nikolai is the only reason they lived.  He's going to make his life with the transplanted villagers since apparently he doesn't need to account for his illegal heroism.

Speaking of irresponsible lack of accountability, Vorin committed suicide out of severe culture shock while nobody (including the ship's shrink) paid him the slightest attention. Nice save, Utopian Future.

Stunningly, Picard now takes credit for the day's partial success. "Our plan for them worked out well." OUR plan? Your plan was non-interference and hanging your head in sorrow! This was Rozhenko's plan and you just came along. Sorry, Cue Ball. (Sadly, according to biblical precedent, I am doomed to be eaten by bears for mocking the authority of a bald man.)

"Homeward" closes with Worf's statement that their parents will understand Nikolai's decision.  I'm not so sure. Raising their grand baby in the sticks? Without the medical skill to treat hybrid complications, or even simple cancer? Doubtful. Still, the kid's not going to be poor: lawyers like Paul Sorvino make a great living.

The Pegasus

**** (4 stars out of 5)

It's Captain Picard Day! Delighted children make papier-mache heads and crayon scrawls in Jean-Luc's honour. Then, on to merrily smashing a Pica-nata full of caviar and dusty old pottery shards, before donning fedoras and muttering the traditional "Oh, Stop, my heart" until an early bedtime under a Personal Relaxation Light. For kids!

Cagey but ebullient Admiral Eric Pressman of Starfleet Intelligence swoops in on a mission to recover his long-LOST starship Pegasus. He's LOST his hair, and, you guessed it, LOST his mind.

Seriously, once you're promoted to Admiral they must give out free passes to some island where nothing makes sense.

See, Pressman was Will's first commanding officer. Twelve years ago an accident on a secret mission ended in mutiny. Young Will defended his Captain against the entire crew who turned against Pressgang... uh, Pressman. Why did they revolt, you ask?

The UFP-Romulan Treaty of Algeron prohibits the Federation from developing cloaking technology. And sneaky Pressman built a cloak that was also intangible! It got everyone killed and his ship stuck half-in half-out of an asteroid. Now the Admiral wants it back because... uh... I dunno. Heavy drinker?

Speaking of which, what wing-nut makes a deal to abandon an entire line of defense technology unilaterally? "We're ABOVE all that CLOAKING DEVICE folderol. Oh, you Romulans go right on using them. Here, have some of our colony planets, too. No, no, they won't mind. Why, yes, I AM drinking trilithium! Yes, it DOES taste ghastly, but simply ALL the diplomats are doing it nowadays."

Picard sternly chides his boss, debates the merits of the illegal machine, and uses it to escape the nasty black Romulan anyway. Moral dilemma, shmoral dilemma!

"The Pegasus" once more brings us Riker skipping merrily away from murder charges, madmen in the admiralty, and (as with the Cardassian Treaty) the reminder that Federation Diplomats are simply BEGGING to get screwed over.

Parallels

***** (5 stars out of 5)

Triumphant in the bat'leth tournament on Forcas III, Worf returns to a surprise birthday party presented by his seemingly deliberately culturally insensitive friends. Even in 2370, the rights to the Happy Birthday song seem to be unavailable, as they sing him 'For He's A Jolly Good Fellow' in Klingon. Troi points out to the disgruntled birthday boy how difficult it was to translate: "There doesn't seem to be a Klingon word for "jolly"."

Worf experiences sudden dizziness and the entire world is changing around him. His winning trophy now says ninth place. His memories don't match anyone else's. Was it the concussion he doesn't remember having?  But why would that change Troi's hair? Or Data's painting?

And what concussion results in a live-in Betazoid shrink for a wife?

Worf is dimension hopping, and the commonality when the shifts occur is Geordi. His VISOR is causing quantum leaps, if you will. Captain Riker and Lt. Wesley Crusher at security nod sagely along. Happens all the time.

According to blue-eyed Data, a theory in quantum physics holds that anything that can happen, does happen in alternate realities. (It's true: I read it in an Archie comic.) Worf's shuttle struck a quantum fissure which has put him out of sync.

Belligerent Bajorans attack the Enterprise during a scan of this fissure and the barriers between realities break down. More than 285,000 Enterprises appear in moments (fortunately none of them were occupying the same position). Among all of themselves they find Worf's original shuttle. Worf must head back to the rift and seal it the instant the lightning strikes the Hill Valley Clock Tower.
Then everything will be fine.

But some are not so keen on going back. Desperate to stay somewhere that still has a Federation and ideally FEWER BORG, a war-weary version of Riker fires on the shuttle. The local Captain Riker orders fire on Beardy Riker, and the poor devil's already ruined ship is destroyed. UNSETTLING!

Our Worf makes it back in one piece, and asks Our Troi to dinner. UNSETTLING!

"Parallels" is, to put it mildly, awesomesauce. Humor, terror, action and a radical new concept (assuming you didn't read a lot of comic books growing up.) It's better than any five episodes of Sliders you'd care to name.

Inheritance

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Atrea IV is home to Dr. Juliana Tainer, working with her terse Atrean husband Pran to reliquefy the magma core of their world. Because it's a Tuesday.

She introduces herself to Data: she was Doctor Soong's colleague and wife. Data's already met his father, brother, and grandfather, and now here's his mom. What's next for the foundling from the doomed planet? My votes are: hot sister and flying robot dogs... with capes.

Juliana never changed her name from O'Donnell to avoid her mother's wrath at a secret marriage to an old lunatic. She left Noonien in the jungles of Terlina, which Data reports as the place he died. The news affects her deeply. (Good thing Data doesn't mention Lore killed him, or how Data killed Lore. Could Aunt May's heart take it?)

When she hears about the loss of her grand-daughter Lal, she confesses that she and Noonien lost three prototypes before Lore. (Insert ominous sting music. In the context of the episode, 'lost' sounds like 'died', but later stories reveal it's more like 'lost' as in 'under couch cushions'.) Lore turned out cruel, and they had to de-activate him. She was against making Data, and was so terrified that #5 might turn out rotten that she forced Noonien to abandon him.  She has since tearfully regretted her choice to give him up. (Just not enough to pick up a communicator or mail a letter.)

Data picks up on something strange: Juliana blinks in the same programmable randomization as all Soong-type androids. And in a cave-in, proof arrives when, like Astar, a robot, she can put her arm back on. She was programmed to believe she was the original Juliana, and her external form offers no clues otherwise. She emits life signs to fool scanners, VISORs, and apparently Betazoid empaths. She even has an aging program, like Data's. (It's one of the least popular apps at the app store.)

There's a holographic Soong in her brain. He explains the biological Juliana was injured during the Crystalline Entity attack, and near death by the time they got to Terlina III. He built his most sophisticated android yet and used synaptic scan to make a copy of Juliana's mind. It worked so well that she eventually got dissatisfied and left him. (Somehow he got this message into her brain after she left him? Must have a wireless update feature.)  Soong programmed her with a long life and wanted her to die thinking she's human.

Data's friends support his difficult decision to leave her with that comfortable belief.

Better hope Soong does better work than Roger Corby did back in 'What Are Little Girls Made Of?'

"Inheritance" has some deeply illogical flaws, but works well emotionally. Still, I feel like Data tells his mom a terribly unnecessary lie for the sake of compassion. If the truth was out, Juliana wouldn't need to die, right? Why deny her the benefits of a lengthy android life? Also, nobody better tell Pran: the new husband's not an A.I. fan. If you tell your man: 'But I'm an android!' and his answer isn't to shrug and say 'Nobody's perfect'... maybe you're better off without him.

Force of Nature

*** (3 stars out of 5)

Spot continues to prove a hellacious kitten for everyone but Data. Her attacks on Riker and Worf I understood, they're dog and targ guys. But Geordi's had a cat before and by all accounts SHE is definitely the problem.  A problem with no solution.

In the category of much bigger problems with no solutions, the people of the Hekaras Corridor have scientific evidence that warp drive is ruining space.  Like repeatedly walking across the same stretch of carpet, warp drive is apparently wearing space out. Or maybe something else that makes sense.

Medical transport Fleming and a Ferengi ship had blow outs on this narrow highway thanks to some eco-terrorists leaving mines here. These, uh, 'scientists', I guess you'd call them, Rabal and Serova, have not been able to get the UFP Science Council to listen to them. If warp travel isn't stopped around here, a subspace rift may threaten life on Hekaras II. If warp travel IS stopped, Hekaras II will be effectively unreachable from anywhere interesting.

Serova blows herself up, causing the deadly rift, and thereby proving her theory. Uh, hooray?

Sadly, the Fleming is saved and the problem is temporarily glossed over by saying words that don't mean things.

The Federation Council imposes a warp 5 speed limit on all Starfleet vessels until a solution can be found. The Klingons agree to it, (they're famous for their willingness to relent and abstain) but will anyone else? Picard ponders what damage he might have done in all his years just trying to travel places and meet people.

"We still have time to make it better," Geordi hopes.

I guess Spot is the titular "Force of Nature". Not only a shape-shifter who changes breeds, Spot now changes gender. And seized the best bits of the episode for herself. She's clearly the villain of the piece, subject to the same vengeful rages as her murderous metal master.  And I think we've all learned a little something about the environment. At some point in our lives. (The three stars are for hearts in the right place. And because I really DO love kitties.)