Comment Stream

Re: ENT S2: The Crossing

Too many instances of idiocy where obvious alien body snatching is occurring but the other crew members just don't seem to realize it. The most pivotal being Tucker escaping the catwalk knocking ppl over and Mayweather continuing to try to convince him that "it's not safe out there sir" instead of stopping the clearly alien-invaded Tucker from opening the hatch exposing the whole crew.

This is a sign of lazy writing. Instead of having the aliens at least understand they need to be more discrete and less "alien-ish" or some story point that has the crew not able to realize a body-snatching situation, they just make the crew act stupidly.

Too much of this kind of stuff in Enterprise and Voyager for my taste. The viewer shouldn't be that much smarter than the crew. Possibly one of the reasons I hold those two series in the bottom tier of the 5

Re: DS9 S4: Rejoined

Like the social commentary & breaking new ground (and sort of bucking the social norms of early 90s American society). But, honestly, why does Jadzia Dax have to act like an irrational teenager all the time AFTER season 1. The first season presented Jadzia Dax as a contemplative, extremely mature, and analytical being that rejected trigger-happy emotional responses. For some reason, starting around the time we had the "field dosan" episode, Jadzia has been a rather irrational, impertinent, non-thoughtful, overly-emotional, lust-driven teenager.

Don't get me wrong, I like the character overall. But there are these moments where the audience is subjected to Jadzia Dax's annoying irrationality. This is one of those episodes. The idea of damning every future host of the Dax symbiont because of "muh feelings" not only violates the established analytical and mature nature of the character, but it also violates the entire cannon of people in the 24th century being able to consider more then their own selfish drives and motivations.

And there's the rub. There's nothing driving this consideration to "damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead" attitude of Dax other than hair-trigger emotion & feelings. And you know what? This is the last time we even hear about this former lover. The relationship is so inconsequential that Dax has completely and utterly moved on but a week later never seeming affected by this again particularly since DS9 is the first ST series to feature a solidly continuous storyline.

Despite this, due to the social implications of the episode and the always-good acting from Terry Farrell as well as my ability to ignore whichever writer is responsible for constantly making Dax an petulant child, I give this ep 3/5

Re: VOY S6: Live Fast and Prosper

Contrived annoyances make the 2/4 generous IMO but understandable for reasons given in Jammer's review. There were so many contrivances in this episode. More than usual for Voyager. I think there were like 4 I can remember off the top of my head that would've stopped the narrative from progressing at all.

When a story has 4 contrived scenes that would've collapsed the entire narrative without them, it's plumb BAD writing. But the episode is salvaged from being a completely annoying waste by some happy surprises that cut through the truly annoying contrivances.

Re: TNG S3: A Matter of Perspective

Great episode. Solid review.

Just one thing annoys the shit out of me. Rape isn't a fookin "matter of perspective". They should've downgraded that shit and left out the "rapey" part. It's very unlikely that the objective truth could exist with those two perspectives being honest. You don't just invent a man grabbing and holding on to you trying to force kiss you. Either Riker is a douchebag / near rapist or Apgar's wife is a liar.

Should've just removed the rapey portion of the wife's testimony. It didn't add to Data and Geordi's investigation anyway. It just made a strange point that Riker may have behaved in a way that the wife mistook for forceful physicality... or something? Riker's character shouldn't be in that kind of position at all especially with someone's wife. If the wife threw herself at Riker (like in his version), Troy should've sensed deception on Manua but she explicitly stated she didn't. Just made a jarring portion that I can't get passed every time I see it.

Re: TNG S3: The Price

I like this episode okay. Just a little thin on the "Riker's so good at this negotiation thing" considering he could've destroyed Ral in 1 sentence at the end when the Ferengi attacked the wormhole:

"Excuse me, Premier, I have to go and protect the wormhole which is under attack right now. You should consider what the Crisaleans could do about this if it happened under their watch..."

Drops mic... walks out...

Re: TNG S2: The Dauphin

The first episode I uncritically liked Wesley Crusher. When Riker was wooing Guinan in a way that no woman in reality would possibly endure, he's like "nah I'm good". Well done Wes.

Re: DS9 S5: Apocalypse Rising

I love this episode but the biggest problem which I never see pointed out is the timing of the event that moves into Act III namely when Sisko is discovered by Martok.

The entire setup of the devices is ready to go and Sisko is literally about to activate it which would've caused everyone to see the Martok changeling. But when his fake name is called by Gowron, he just stops and walks up to Gowron to be discovered. It makes no sense at all. It's not like anyone knows what this guy looks like off the top of their head. So a little confusion about where the guy Gowron called ensues just before Martok is exposed.

Why Sisko stops and decides to walk up to Gowron can only be explained by accepting that the plot needed to move forward as written in the script which is a big problem for me. instead, they should've had Sisko's fake name called while Odo was dealing with getting the final device into place. This isn't the first episode in which poorly directed / timed events made me go "uh... what?"

That's a lot of writing to cover what is basically a minor annoyance. 3 stars seems fair.

Re: TNG S2: The Child

Not to critique your critique, but the episode aired in 1988. I'm really not seeing where (judging from the perspective that this aired in 1988) "the sci-fi themes are familiar". Having written the review nearly 20 years later, I'm not sure it's a valid critique.

Re: TNG S1: The Neutral Zone

Agreed on this episode. Except I wouldn't even call the 20th century survivors reactions to their situation "obvious". More like "oblivious". Especially sir Offenhaus who is told by a space ship captain that they are in a dangerous situation and thinks his 400 year old stocks from a non-existent nation state are more pertinent. Worse yet, no one even thinks to ask if there is such a thing as a nation state... or a phone for that matter! Nearly 400 years into the future and Offenhaus absurdly asks to make a phone call!