Jammer's Review

I strongly disagree with the three-star-rating for the season opener "evolution". Wesley's school experiment lets two nanobots with allegedly only the simplest of capabilities "interact". They "escape" and - whoosh - they evolve to a "civilization" in no time. I simply couldn't suspend disbelief in this ridiculous premise and found myself extremely annoyed at the beginning of third season. If not for the somewhat redeeming storyline about Dr. Stubbs, this would have gotten a "half-star-rating" (max) in my book. Fortunately the season *really* picked up later on.

The third season of TNG was like the beginning of a fresh start. Seriously. The opening scenes on the premier season-three episode "Evolutions", while not exceptional in any sense, conveys to the audience that this is the start of something better.

Crusher is back, the crew look much more professional and more comfortable in their new uniforms, and in a strange sense the whole show looks so, so, soo.. much more mature than the feeling you constantly got with the first season, and mostly (some exceptions, I surpose) the second season as well. Even the Enterprise exterior shots look like brilliant FX shots for late-80s-early-90s.

Mark my words, Michael Piller helped save this show from the abyss of cancellation that be-felled the original show in my opinion. I can't believe that another season like the second season would have sufficed to warrant a fourth chance. There were too many poor episodes in the last year in my opinion. However punctuated in-between those poor episodes you had episodes like "The Measure of a Man", "Q-Who" and "Peak Performance", too name the very best in my opinion. "Shades of Grey" was the worst possible way you could end any season. Dear God; why use that as the season finale - better yet - why make it at all? It was awful and I'm absolutely sure that had I been alive to see TNG at this time I would have worried or perhaps even given up on a series that seemed to be surviving for dear life (i.e. TOS third season, regarded by fans as awful generally) much beyond that point.

This season was a marvellous revival. It was also the first season I purchased of TNG on DVD (I hadn't seen any episodes of TNG apart from the The Best of Both Worlds - I collected the DVD'S and watched that way). It actually the PERFECT season of the show to introduce newcomers. If this was ever the case for any reading this - I strongly recommend you DO NOT give them the first season of the show because in all frankness it could be a fatal turn-off. The second is probably an OK start-point but there are still too many cheesy and god-awful episodes to get through, that again, could be a turn-off for potential newcomers to the series. I recommend the third simply because nearly every single episode is AT LEAST tolerable and the majority are good in any case.

Let me put it this way: If a newcomer cannot get into TNG in the third season then they probably won't understand, enjoy, appreciate or be a overall fan of TNG. The season has a whole group of episodes of a standalone adventure nature that are generally all good in different senses. The climax is brilliant as well. I myself was most certainly compelled to get the fourth season and the rest was just a matter of time and money. I saved up in anticipation for the next season up to the finale - and in honesty was kinda sad it was over when it was over in "All Good Things' (Although four films did follow for TNG). THEN I got the first season, and finally the second. Strange I know. But in my opinion this is trully the best way to watch the series for any newcomers.

By watching the more adult, mature and enjoyable episodes of the third season and later, you then look at those first two seasons from a more thoughtful and fulfilling perspective. In my opinion you get more out of the first two seasons by watched Seasons 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 in that order first. I did - I consider myself a pretty big fan of the series now and I love all the series (overall) and appreciate everything.

Please Note: I have to say second-season finale "Shades of Grey" is truly, totally, absolutely the only episode in the whole series I would recommend ditching and missing altogether - it shouldn't exist and I am pretty sure everyone who has seen the episode ONCE (and only once in my case) will agree with me on that.

As a life long baseball fan, the episode makes me smile everytime.

Interesting points, Matthew Burns. Thank you.

Essentially a rehash of "Home Soil", except that they are artificial rather than natural...

While I understand Jammer's point that if one cannot appreciate this episode, with its myriad typical-to-TNG elements, one cannot appreciate TNG; still, I think that it's possible to appreciate stories such as the ones that make up this episode without particularly liking the way they are used here. Of episodes preceding this one, I prefer other versions of computer-malfunction stories ("Contagion"), Wesley's-uncertainty-about-his-future stories ("Coming of Age"), and scientists' vanity gets in the way of considering unusual life form stories ("Home Soil").

I think this episode plays well for most of its running time, but I find the ending disappointing. The episode's big lost opportunity is on the character level. The setup of the Wesley-Dr. Stubbs story, along with the strain in the dynamic between the Crusher mother and son, is rather touching. Dr. Stubbs is a tragic figure and a person who might well be Wesley in his future, if he neglects his personal connections to spend all his time as a wunderkind. Dr. Stubbs' identity is so tied up with his scientific pursuits that he endangers everyone around him because his ego has (nearly) totally overwhelmed his compassion for others and even his sense of self-preservation. Wesley runs the risk of the same thing happening to him. When he figures out that it’s probably his scientific project that has gone awry and is threatening the ship, he doesn’t come forward and tell anyone about it, for fear of the recriminations and humiliation that would result. Even after he tells Guinan that he will tell, he talks to Stubbs some more and continues doing experiments until Beverly finally pushes him and he snaps and is a child again for a second -- telling his mother that he's screwed up really badly and needs her help. That moment is fairly well done (though Wheaton and McFadden aren't the strongest of the cast, I do buy them as mother and son).

However, after this point that story thread is very nearly dropped entirely. Wesley has nothing more to do of consequence in the story, and in the last scene he has somehow gotten a circle of friends and maybe a girlfriend, off-screen. Uh, how? Meanwhile, Stubbs has suddenly become apologetic about destroying a bunch of the nanites. It’s not clear whether this is because he recognizes the wrongness of his actions or just that it’s more convenient to play along with the nanites now that it’s possible to talk to them. It’s not really that I mind either story—Stubbs coming to his senses and realizing that there are more important things than his personal success, or Stubbs as tragic character who is unable to live in a world where he views himself as a failure—but the episode has to pick a direction.

I complain, I suppose, because I think the character work early in the episode is good—Stubbs feels real to me, and his dialogue with Wesley about the difficulty of living up to one’s potential and the tragedy of peaking early are well written and acted and relatable to people on whom great expectations and hopes were placed early in life. It also resonates with Wesley’s later failure in “The First Duty” and “Journey’s End” to succeed in his Starfleet Academy dreams (though I guess going with the Traveler constitutes a happy, successful end for Wes). Similarly, the ideas behind the mother/son conflict are interesting and well worth exploring upon Beverly’s return to the ship—Wesley should be, and seems to be, feeling a mixture of resentment that his mother left, resentment that his mother is back, being happy at her return after having missed her, feeling her intruding on his life without her, and so on, but this is something that doesn’t get much resolution besides the brief moment of Wesley seeming to need her again once he confesses his nanites screwup. (I did like Beverly and Picard’s mature conversation about Wesley, which re-establishes the Picard/Crusher bond without being overly showy and feeling natural.)

On that level, it’s particularly strange that Wesley’s basically becoming a God/creator to a species that has already apparently advanced beyond humans goes uncommented upon by him or his mother or Picard or Stubbs or the nanites themselves. Certainly, “accidental creator of an intelligent species” is going to get Wesley into the history books even if multiple ship-saviour hasn’t, and in an episode that starts off about the difficulty dealing with having peaked young it’s an odd oversight.

The nanites stuff itself is Trekkian in the good sense; communication and peace are achievable if the crew tries hard enough, though force will be brought up if necessary. The implications of the nanites are not really examined at length, however, and this makes at least the second time that a crew member accidentally created a new artificial intelligence (after Moriarty). These people should be more careful, maybe?

As Matthew Burns stated above, this episode does have a notable difference in tone from season two which immediately feels right in some ways, despite this story being (to me) one of the weaker season three outings. This is a bit like “The Child” in that sense—that episode was a mediocre show but the incidental dialogue and characterization and the smoothness of the character introductions indicated a real step up from season one. Since season three is even better than season two, it makes sense that “Evolution” is a better episode than “The Child,” though not really a particularly good one. Then again, TNG doesn’t have a very good track record with season premieres—there are only two (BOBW2 and Redemption 2) out of seven that I’d actually describe as good.

2.5 stars, all considered.