STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - The Early Years -------------------------------------------------- by Marcus Priddey ------------------- How do you know which episodes are good, bad or what unless you have something to comapre them with? The majority of us have seen up to Season Three. Those of us lucky enough to have satellite or cable will have seen up to Season Six and those even more lucky will have seen snippets of Season Seven! (Yes, I'm jealous!) But, back to my point, how do we know that "Tapestry" is the best Q story so far without having stories like "Hide And Q", or "Deja Q" to compare them to, and without which, stories like "Tapestry" wouldn't have developed. So, I think it is time we stopped griping about how wooden Data was or how perfectly smug and well groomed Riker was (still is, I hear some of you say) in those early episodes, and to see them for what they are - good old adventures of the USS Enterprise. For those that have missed some, or maybe all of the early episodes (welcome back to planet Earth) I will try to give an unbiased review of them. We start, of course, with one that we were all waiting for and that is the original ground-breaker which was first broadcast way back in September 1987. I am, as you all know, referring to: Encounter At Farpoint --------------------- (Season 1, Episode 1, CIC Video Cassette 1) Stardate 41153.7. The USS Enterprise is en route to Deneb IV to pass recommendations on the new Farpoint station built there and to unravel its mystery. Lt. Cmdr Data forsees no problem, except he has never snooped before as it is not part of his programming, although, when explained it transpires that he has a sizeable memory to draw upon. Lt. Troi then interrupts, explaining to the Captain that she can sense a powerful mind approaching, and suddenly a huge grid appears before the Enterprise. It registers as a solid or an immensely powerful force field. The Klingon at one of the rear stations reports that reports that shields and deflectors have been raised, when, in a flash of bright light, a 17th century ship captain appears and introduces himself as The Q and orders the Enterprise "To go back whence they came" or to suffer dire consequences. Another flash of light, and Q appears as a 20th century U.S. army officer, to which Picard insists that they have made rapid progress since then, which brings on another change, this time to a 21st century drug-controlled soldier, ostensibly, to show what Q thinks of Picard's "rapid progress". The Security Chief, Yar agrees with the Klingon, Worf, that they shouldn't stand for this as Picard insists that Q should not prosecute and judge what he does not know. This gives Q an idea and he departs the same way he arrived to make preparations. Picard can stand no more of this and decides to see what the newly commissioned Galaxy Class ship can do. He orders the ship away from the grid at Warp 9.2 and increases to 9.3. The grid quickly follows and starts to gain. The Enterprise is pushed beyond the red line to Warp 9.4 and is soon travelling at an extremely risky 9.8. Captain Picard realises that he can not out run Q so he orders Worf, after much objection, to take command of the saucer section of the ship which will separate, carrying the ship's civilians and the majority of the crew to safety whilst the stardrive section is left behind to create a diversion which it does so by firing a photon torpedo spread to blind Q. As soon as Q catches up, Picard, Data, Yar and Troi find themselves in a mid- 21st century post-atomic courtroom with Q as judge and jury. Picard tries to argue that according to convention, Picard and his crew can not be held for their races crimes, which in this case are that Humans are ruthlessly savage. Q, however, counters that as they are in a court of 2079, all such rulings had been abolished in the atomic war. He brings the charges and insist that Picard pleads guilty or he will give the order for the soldiers to shoot Data and Troi. Picard has no choice and pleads guilty but insists that the Human race is no longer savage and asks Q to test them, to prove themselves. Q agrees and makes reference that they will soon face a test at Farpoint. In an instant, Picard and the others are back on the battle bridge of the Enterprise, which, a crewmember insists, has been heading to Deneb IV all the time. Meanwhile on Farpoint, the USS Hood has just dropped off the Enterprise's new First Officer, Cmdr Riker who is to visit Farpoint's administrator, Groppelar Zorn. Riker is impressed with Farpoint station and finds it luxurious. Zorn thanks him and offers him some Earth fruit. Not seeing an apple Riker declines but his eye suddenly falls on a second bowl which he had not noticed before, containing apples. Riker accepts one and leaves. Across the station in the mall, the ship's Doctor, Crusher and her son, Wesley are looking and some bolts of cloth when Riker introduces himself and explains about the magically appearing apples in Zorn's office. Crusher accuses him of trying to curry favour with his new Captain but soon changes her mind when the bolt of cloth she was looking at earlier suddenly has a gold pattern in it, precisely the way she wanted it. As the Doctor and Wesley wander off, Lt. Geordi La Forge reports to Riker that the stardrive section of the Enterprise has arrived and that Riker should beam up immediately. Riker does so, and is given a fairly cold reception by the Captain and is quickly brought up to speed on the Enterprise's "little adventure". As the saucer section is also approaching Riker is ordered to dock the ships manually, with no automation whatsoever. Although Data and Yar look apprehensive, he accomplishes this with ease. Riker is then met by Picard and gives a more warmer welcome to his new post with the guideline that Riker is to stop his Captain from making himself look a fool around children as the Enterprise has families aboard to accompany the crew. Riker is then ordered to lead an away team down to Farpoint and is asked to take the android officer, Data long. After reviewing Data's service history, he goes looking for him. Data is currently occupied escorting the 137 year old Admiral McCoy on a tour of the ship. He still has not lost his phobia of transporters and requests a shuttlecraft. As the USS Hood departs Q appears in the viewscreen and warns the Enterprise to stop wasting time and gives them 24 hours to solve Farpoint's mystery or risk summary judgement. Eleven hours later, still nothing untoward has happened and Picard is about to beam down to the surface with Riker when he asks the ship's counselor to join them. Riker is surprised when he sees that it is Troi, someone he has obviously met before when she greets him telepathically using the word "Imzadi". Although he does not know what went on, Picard is pleased that Riker and Troi have met before and have got to know each others abilities. At Farpoint, Zorn is puzzled why Picard has brought Troi, a half Betazoid to the meetings. Her race is apparently telepathic, but Troi insists that all she can sense is emotions and feelings. Zorn however is not pleased and threatens to offer Farpoint to the Federation's rivals - the Ferengi. Picard warns Zorn however that Zorn might be as tasy as some of the Ferengi's past allies. After beaming back up, Riker goes in search of Data and finds him in the holodeck, a room which uses transporter technology to create all manner of different places, trying, albeit unsuccessfully to whistle "Pop Goes The Weasel". Although Data admits that he is superior in many ways to Humans, he would gladly give it all up to be one of them. A modern day Pinnochio. After collecting Data, Riker takes him and La Forge, Troi and Yar down to investigate Farpoint. In the tunnels below Farpoint, La Forge is examining the walls, the like of which he has never seen or heard of before. Troi lets down her mental guards and is suddenly overpowered with feelings of pain and unhappiness. Back upon the Enterprise, after pestering his mother for a visit to the bridge, Wesley is taken to the bridge and introduced to the Captain who had the unfortunate task of bringing back the body of Wesley's father, Crusher's husband after an away mission they were both on went awry. Wesley is then invited to sit in the Captain's chair and Picard shows him what the various panels control but Wesley has done his homework and shows Picard that he already knows, and when an alarm goes off he announces a perimeter alert. Picard is furious and orders Wesley off the bridge even though it transpires that Wesley was right which Doctor Crusher is quick to point out. The cause of the perimeter alert is a ship which matches nothing in the Federation's records and is twelve times the volume of the Enterprise. After finding their sensors blocked, the unknown fires upon the old Bandi city next to Farpoint station. As a precautionary measure, Picard orders phasers readied in response to which Q appears to gloat that at the first sign of trouble, Picard uses weapons while doing nothing about the injured people on the planet below. Picard proves him wrong by contacting Doctor Crusher who is supervising various emergency medical teams to deal with the casualties. On the planet, Riker orders Troi, La Forge and Yar back to the ship whilst he and Data go in search of Zorn and some answers. They find Zorn in his office cowering, immediately before he is enveloped in an alien transporter beam. Upon beaming back to the Enterprise, Riker requests that he lead an away team over to the unknown ship, an idea which Q heartily approves. Riker lashes at Q who decides to exit. Picard reluctantly agrees, and so the away team find themselves in the alien ship whose tunnels match that of those below Farpoint station. All Troi can sense here is anger and hate directed towards the Bandi. It suddenly occurs to Troi that she can only sense one alien and that the whole vessel is alive. Picard then concludes that maybe Farpoint is an identical creature, and that it too is alive. Q appears again, this time as a Starfleet Captain and insists that this test was far too simple. Picard ignores him and after learning from Zorn that Farpoint is indeed a living creature able to transfer energy into matter, but it was injured and starving, so the Bandi only gave it enough energy to control the creature and make it assume whatever they wanted. Picard orders an energy beam directed at Farpoint and it immediately transforms into a creature to match that of the one orbiting Deneb IV, which itself has transformed. Having passed Q's test, Picard orders Q off his ship, which Q obliges to do but with the promise he will return. Stardate 41174.2. Picard gives the order to "Engage". And the voyages continue... When I first saw this pilot I was gobsmacked. Right from the opening sequence all I could say was, "WOW!". Nice to see they kept the narrative at the start - "These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise..." etc. And what an Enterprise! Very sleek. Another nice piece of continuity was that they used Majel Barrett's voice for the computer (the same person who did the voice in the original series). A nice little touch was bringing McCoy aboard as a considerably older but still irrascible doctor. Onto the main crew, and (at the time) my biggest shock - a KLINGON on the bridge! It appears a lot can happen in 80 years and that the Federation and the Klingon Empire can settle their differences and become allies. Brent Spiner, who plays Data, is good although he plays him a little too Pinnochio-ish. You can practically see the puppeteer's strings. Jean-Luc Picard is an excellent Captain, with a completely different command style to Kirk, but still very effective. He is a thinker and leaves the action to his First Officer, Riker. This is not really a story utilising the Doctor, but what I saw I liked which is more than can be said for her son, Wesley. Ugh! What a horrible, precocious little brat! I wasn't too keen on Troi either but Yar as Chief of Security was good, if a little too trigger happy. Q was brilliantly wicked! How Picard kept his cool, I don't know. I would have had to plead guilty to the charge of being savage - I'd have hit him! (Yeah, okay, I know it's written that way!) On the whole, a nice little pilot. Was it what I was expecting? To be honest, I don't know. I heard some stories, a robot officer, a blind pilot and Klingons in Starfleet but I didn't know what to make of them so it's nice to see that they have written The Next Generation in a way that it can stand alone, and doesn't need to lean on the original Trek if only for continuity factors, like a much older McCoy and the computer voice as I mentioned earlier, and of course, the most important - the Enterprise herself. I would wish the series well, but it is now six years later and The Next Generation has firmly established itself as being a worth successor to Star Trek. End transmission.