Jammer's Review
Star Trek: The Next Generation
"The Next Phase"
Air date: 5/18/1992
Written by Ronald D. Moore
Directed by David Carson
Review by Jamahl Epsicokhan
The Enterprise responds to a Romulan ship that has been crippled in a catastrophic accident. La Forge and Ro beam over with an away team, but when they beam back, their transporter patterns are lost in an apparent transporter mishap. The two are declared dead, but they both wake up aboard the Enterprise — where they discover they are invisible to everyone around them and can walk through walls and other objects.
Are they ghosts trapped in purgatory? Please; this is Star Trek, where a ghost has never been encountered that cannot be ascribed to either technology or the presence of an alien life form. In this case, Geordi slowly realizes that they have been phase-shifted outside normal time and space because of experimental top-secret Romulan cloaking technology aboard the crippled Romulan ship (which was crippled because the technology blew up in their faces during testing). The Enterprise crew does not discover this in the course of their investigation, but La Forge and Ro, being invisible, are privy to more information.
Alongside the plot are some welcome character touches. Being the proverbial flies on the wall, Geordi and Ro get to listen in on conversations about themselves by shipmates who believe they are dead. A discussion in a shuttle between Riker and Worf has a certain amount of resonance — without being too earnest to get schmaltzy. Meanwhile, Ro — usually the firebrand — finds the whole situation oddly humbling. At first she believes she's dead, before Geordi is able to win her over with technobabble arguments.
For the most part, "The Next Phase" is content to be an entertaining but slight sci-fi adventure in which two invisible people must figure out how to make themselves visible — while also fending off an attack from an invisible Romulan who himself has been phase-shifted and wants to stop La Forge and Ro from revealing the Romulan cover-up of this experimental technology. Eventually we get a chase through the Enterprise where Ro and La Forge are running through walls and pushing the Romulan intruder through the bulkhead and out into space. Heh.
Of course, the nitpicker in me has to ask exactly what it is about this technology that makes it possible to pass through all objects except, of course, the floors. For some reason (that reason being plot convenience), the laws of physics are only selectively broken, so you can plant your feet on the floor instead of simply sinking straight through to who-knows-where. Maybe the technology is set to not affect the bottoms of one's feet. In which case, Geordi should've just gone around engineering kicking Data in the face instead of leading him around with mysterious energy signatures. So, yes, this is all goofy and absurd, but then many things in Star Trek are absurd, and in this case I'm not inclined to let absurdity get in the way of an amusing adventure yarn with cloaking technology that lets people walk through walls while teaching Ro Laren the virtue of humility.
Previous episode: I, Borg
Next episode: The Inner Light
Season Index
26 comments on this review
I'll give them the "feet/floor" thing--I have never seen any movie or TV show that didn't use that convention. Just have to ignore it, and then it's all good.
Ro thinking they are dead;
Ro shooting Riker;
Geordi leaving clues for Data;
Riker being so moved by Ro's death;
Data's design for the memorial;
Geordi and Ro waving frantically; and
Worf almost seeing them;
The "click" when Data figures it out;
Data's "joy" that Geordi is not dead.
The final scene.
This is one of the best of Trek for me. It had humor, emotion, science (I found the "we're cloaked" to be very effective)--what more could you want? And I like Ro very much, so that helps.
I have to go watch this again--good thing it is saved on my DVR. (And good thing I'm on a break from school!)
Possibly the funniest thing you've ever written, Jammer.
But unlike Jammer I bought into the possibility of the two being dead--when I first watched this I was a kid and wasn't tuned into all the conventions of tv--thankfully!--and could buy into the emotional arc of their story. I liked the use of the Romulans here. The chase was exciting. The ticking clock was exciting. I loved the idea of a New Orleans type memorial service and was so perfectly Data. And the final scene was perfect.
I don't watch Trek for sci fi accuracy so I can't get bothered by Fun with DNA stories or the fact that the two didn't fall through the floor.
Still a fun hour though.
I still think a clever explanation or two can be reached, though it's tricky.
That, and the Romulan is tumbling the wrong way when he's knocked out the window. But that's not enough to keep this from being a 4-star episode.
2 stars at most.
If I may, and if you feel like it, may I ask you to expand on your objections? I'm not quite sure what your objection to the "difference between Geordi and Ro's outlooks" is. And I thought the final scene dealt with Ro's "foolishness" pretty well.
As an aside, you you like the character of Ro?
On another note, I see often that other posters have noticed who the writers of various episodes are--I never do. Maybe I should do that and see if I like more of "RDM"'s work!
I'd definitely suggest you start to pay attention to the writers. They each have different strengths and weaknesses. Once you start identifying writers you will start to anticipate the quality of the story and the type of storyline to come up as soon as you see the writer's name.
Star Trek is rather unique in that you can track several writers over 4 series; many of us have the firm belief that the decline of the series in Voyager and Enterprise had nothing to do with 'franchise fatigue' but with 'writer fatigue', as the same writers were putting out watered down versions of the same scripts they were writing in the TNG era.
Many Star Trek writers have also gone onto success in other shows; you'll find them contributing to such series as Battlestar Galactica, Farscape, CSI, 24, the 4400, and Andromeda.
Thanks for the suggestion, but I think I am going to wait until I watch DS 9 before tracking writers too closely--I don't want my pre-enjoyment to be tainted. (Yes, I have NEVER watched DS 9--I'm so pleased that I have it to look forward to!)
I did look through some of the Voyager episodes and you are so right--I definitely noticed trends in the episodes I most liked and disliked.
I wonder if some ST fan has done a chart of every writer and the episodes they are responsible for? (tried a google but no joy)
For example, here's Ron Moore:
memory-alpha.org/wiki/Ronald_D._Moore
You've never seen DS9? Well, unfortunately you're going to have 2 and a half seasons of "meh" to sit through before it turns into one of the best shows on TV.
I love this episode. And the whole sinking through the floor thing was raised in an episode of Stargate SG1, where they are filming the Stargate rip-off TV show Wormhole X-Treme. The actress asks the writer why if they are out of phase do they not just fall through the floor.
No answer was forthcoming.
And I thought season 2 was very good; season 1 was also better than early TNG and just about any season of Voyager and Enterprise.
It wasn't a device intended for individual espionage - the dialogue reveals that the entire reason the Romulan ship was disabled in the first place is because something went wrong when they were testing the phase cloak for their vessel.
And it wasn't just the bottoms of their feet that are conveniently immune to the cloak's effect. When Ro regains consciousness she's lying on the floor near sickbay. She and Geordi are sitting in the shuttlecraft. The Romulan is sitting in a chair on the enemy ship. And of course they shouldn't be able to breathe or make sound. Even "TOS" did a more credible job of conveying this sort of scenario in "The Tholian Web" - Kirk was at least wearing a spacesuit!
That said it's a fun episode I've always enjoyed. But by no stretch can you explain away the absurd premise with technobabble.
It's a conceit that is required for any hope of the premise; but I also one pondered the same issues with sci-fi that involves a character that can freeze time. Air wouldn't flow into one's mouth, and light wouldn't move into one's eyes.
But anyway, I feel as though they never quite 100% explain how "phasing" works. Perhaps there is some technical explanation that would work. I don't think it was necessary for the episode to explore it though. Great episode.
Good point William on the air...that is a bigger issue. The same issue could have been a problem in DS9's "Extreme Measures", but they threw in dialogue to deal with it.
Was she missed? Not in the least.
Fun episode though. I love Geordi episodes! 3 stars.
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