Star Trek: The Next Generation
"The Masterpiece Society"
Air date: 2/10/1992
Teleplay by Adam Belanoff and Michael Piller
Story by James Kahn and Adam Belanoff
Directed by Winrich Kolbe
Review by Jamahl Epsicokhan
The Enterprise makes contact with a human colony that has been willingly isolated for 200 years but may face destruction in six days because of the gravitational forces that will be caused by a passing stellar fragment. The colonists live in a biosphere and have been engineered to be the "perfect" culmination of generations of eugenics. They do not take lightly to talking to outsiders, lest they disturb the delicate balance of their hermetically sealed mini-society.
"The Masterpiece Society" is essentially a Prime Directive episode, with the twist here being that the Prime Directive does not apply because the colonists are humans. The story takes quite a while to get going, and the plot aspects involving the attempt to deflect the stellar fragment away from the colony employ off-the-shelf TNG technobabble and problem-solving procedurals. But there are some decent arguments here. Geordi, for example, disagrees with the very notion of this colony. (He would've been terminated as a defective zygote the moment his blindness was discovered.) This episode tackles questions about the consequences of culture contamination in a way that is uniquely Star Trek. I was most persuaded by the character of Hannah (Dey Young), who sees the opportunities that lie on the other side of the bubble, and wants out.
But as an hour of TV, this is just way too dry. The "relationship" between Troi and colony leader Aaron (John Snyder) and the consequences that ensue are especially unpersuasive, with overwrought love-at-first-sight dialogue that has no emotional credibility. The colony itself comes off as a sterile soundstage. Meanwhile, an undeveloped character played by Ron Canada is basically unnecessary, serving as a mouthpiece of obstinacy without much of a reasoned perspective.
And while Picard (and the story at large, which remains ambivalent) says his place is not to judge this colony's way of life, I will observe that it's frustrating and mystifying to watch people argue in favor of a philosophy that basically stifles free will while making societal evolution impossible — even as it argues that it's doing the opposite. (Hannah at least is willing to stand up and declare her freedom.) But forget about arguing over an idealized philosophy: These people would all have been dead had the Enterprise not intervened, and yet at the end Picard is still wringing his hands over bringing in an imbalance that could destroy what this place originally stood for. Well, I don't think much of what it stood for; this society of unremitting self-important blandness could use some imbalance.
Previous episode: Violations
Next episode: Conundrum
63 comments on this review
Sat, Apr 2, 2011, 4:53pm (UTC -5)
As for the love-at-first-sight dialogue between Aaron and Troi, well he WAS genetically engineered after all. I would assume that everyone on this planet is a perfect flirt - to quote Q, "h
Sat, Apr 2, 2011, 4:54pm (UTC -5)
Sat, Apr 2, 2011, 5:07pm (UTC -5)
I just finished a chapter on the false utopias encountered in Star Trek, and this was one of the episodes they used to illustrate the difference between TOS and TNG. In TOS, Kirk repeatedly comes across a 'perfect' society and overthrows it, claiming the prime directive doesn't apply to a backward society.
In the TNG era, the idea of enforcing your ideals on another culture has fallen out of favor. Whenever Picard encounters such a 'paradise', he gives them a good talking to, and maybe they'll change on their own. It satisfies our current cultural ideals, but it takes more skill to make that an interesting script.
Fri, Apr 15, 2011, 8:43am (UTC -5)
One fascinating aspect of this episode and others like it, to me anyways, is peoples automotic response. I would be not to far off to say that Star Trek fans are liekly majority Liberal. Yet the reponse fans have to these kinds of episodes is a very conservative response. Geordi is making at heart a pro-life argument here.
If you had to say the idea of a genetically engineered "masterpiece society" was going to come from a George Bush type person or a Barack Obama type person, the truth is, the right wing HATES these kinds of ideas. this is a very left thing. And my big secret is that I kind of admire the concept, and found myself sympathizing with the colony leaders. I know post-WWII morals must hate everything that sniffs of eugenics, but I don't think trying eliminate the worst ailments, and producing a rich society that with no crime, and other postives, is somehow worse to the crap we allow in the modern world. Yeah, I am not with Picard and crew on this one.
Fri, Apr 15, 2011, 10:35am (UTC -5)
Treks stance against eugenics has always been sort of cheap and cowardly, painting every application of the technology in a poor light. How much more interesting would it have been to have the dome people be truly advanced, with mental capabilities far superior to conventional humans? Imagine members had wanted to join the Federation, but were not allowed because they were too smart (see DS9) or where members of the Enterprise crew want to join the colony because they believe it is a breakthrough in human evolution? The story doesn't go far enough to place the characters in interesting places (mentally). It kind of assumes that the dome people are misguided and the Federation is the culturally evolved one, which is too bad.
Sun, Sep 25, 2011, 8:02pm (UTC -5)
Also, interesting that two of the most excrutiating guest characters Trek has ever had, Martin here and Ch'Pok in DS9's "Rules Of Engagement" were both played by Ron Canada.
Sun, Oct 9, 2011, 8:32pm (UTC -5)
Also with regard to DS9 they weren't forbidden to join Starfeet because they were "too" smart, but because the Federation did not support eugenics or genetic manipulation, nor did it want to reward those who broke the law, fearing it would encourage others to do the same just to keep up. Which again, harkens back to the experiences earth had with augments.
Tue, Jan 17, 2012, 6:04pm (UTC -5)
I was immediately reminded of Huxley's "A brave new world" when I saw it.
Thu, Jan 26, 2012, 11:57pm (UTC -5)
Fri, Jan 27, 2012, 9:06am (UTC -5)
That episode would have been very different had it been a group of Bajorans who were using Eugenics to advance themselves. And I am guessing since Bajorans are the classic "oppressed minority", Picard would have been far more favourable to their society.
Yes, this episode was handled very timidly, and could have been a great one.
Thu, Jan 31, 2013, 4:59pm (UTC -5)
Sun, Jun 16, 2013, 12:14am (UTC -5)
Sun, Jun 16, 2013, 12:29am (UTC -5)
Fri, Jul 12, 2013, 8:04pm (UTC -5)
And given that those two dozen colonists are genetically engineered, I'm not sure that their future in the Federation will be a particularly bright one.
Wed, Jul 17, 2013, 1:42pm (UTC -5)
Indeed so. Interestingly, the events of the S5 DS9 episode "Doctor Bashir, I Presume" would seem to suggest that the scientists in the S2 TNG episode "Unnatural Selection" were engaged in wholly criminal activity. If we're to believe DS9, Picard should have taken the entire staff of the Darwin facility into custody immediately.
Fri, Jul 19, 2013, 7:44am (UTC -5)
Tue, Jul 23, 2013, 7:39pm (UTC -5)
Anyway, this episode was a mish mesh of old themes and stories from past TNG episodes. The only enjoyable part of it was hearing Troi admit over and over again 'I am a useless counsellor. I am a useless counsellor. I am a useless counsellor ...' And what was with her telling the guy,'Don't say that' She's half Betazoid, it didn't matter whether he said it out loud. She already knew how he felt.
Wed, Jul 24, 2013, 8:13am (UTC -5)
All that said, it is true that the hand-wringing in the episode becomes excessive; at a certain point, claiming that the Enterprise did as much damage to their society as a stellar core fragment is a bit eye-roll-worthy. The episode feels padded out, as if there are not enough conflicts to sustain a whole hour; I feel like this would be more natural as a Twilight Zone half-hour episode. Many scenes eventually involve the same dialogue being repeated again and again. A fuller sense of what this society entails and what they might have that the Enterprise lacks, or vice versa, would have made the impact of the tragedy and/or triumph of Hannah and a few others leaving the colony that much stronger. And the fact that the society is not strong enough to survive the departure of two dozen people needs more vetting within the episode; at least someone should have pointed out that this society is pretty weak if it can't handle those departures at all. And yes, the Troi/Aaron romance was underwhelming. Ultimately, I admired some of what the episode did enough to bring it to 2.5 stars.
Wed, Jul 24, 2013, 3:54pm (UTC -5)
Sun, Feb 9, 2014, 12:28pm (UTC -5)
Mon, Jun 9, 2014, 9:09pm (UTC -5)
Or to put it another way, Spock's maxim of "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few" is quite admirable when he voluntarily sacrifices himself. It is a brutal necessity when Troi must be willing to order a soldier to die in order to save the rest. But it is despicable when a tyrant uses that maxim to suppress and destroy individual rights for the common good. Picard is coming dangerously close to supporting the last option.
Other than that, it was a very interesting episode. It was interesting seeing how everyone came down on their support or disagreement with the society. Obviously LaForge was opposed. But Worf and Riker were also opposed, and they are the usual "barbaric" ones. Troi and Picard are the most supportive, and they tend to be the "enlightened" ones. And yet, the episode seemed to be opposed to the society, with Hannah being the most sympathetic character. So why is that? Well, Picard may have been just been being too cute by half in trying to balance his role as a statesman. And it'd be easy to say Troi was just thinking with her hormones, and thus her support was without thinking. But that'd be too easy...
What makes Troi tick? She's a very underdeveloped character, but never seemed to get an episode to challenge her inner ideals (See Ethics as an example of a character-defining episode for another undeveloped character in Beverly). Troi is just the nice one, the statesman, the peacemaker. But what does she believe?
I keep going back to a line by Riker in The Loss. He called her aristocratic. And maybe that is what she is. And it seems to fit here. She likes order, with everything in its proper place and naturally with her proper place being above others. It makes sense with her upbringing. She does appear to be a member of the nobility, even if her mother overstates it. And even though she assures herself that she is different from her mother, her mother's self assuredness that the universe revolves around her had to have rubbed off of her to some extent. And look at other pieces of evidence:
- She's a therapist. Her entire job is focused around finding troubled people and putting them back to normal. Taking disorder and fixing it. Putting herself in charge of other people's lives.
- She is terrified when she loses her empathic powers. She is now the abnormal one. And she takes it pretty hard. And part of the reason she takes it so hard is because she is now just like everyone else and can't use her special powers to her advantage. She loses her high ranking place.
- She is rather self centered in Night Terrors. Everyone else is dying from lack of dreaming, and she's sitting around complaining about a few little nightmares.
- She eventually takes the bridge officer test after Disaster. It was terrifying to her that the natural order might put her in command (as it did in Disaster) and that she wasn't ready for it. Clearly something had to change.
- She can be very authoritative when she feels she has the right to be. See Suddenly Human, where she as the therapist becomes the expert on the annoying kid. Her solution is to force Picard to bond with him, even though Picard is clearly uncomfortable with the idea and others could conceivably play the parent surrogate role. It didn't matter, this was her area of expertise, so she can push people around to fix this one problem.
I may be stretching it a bit, and I am certainly magnifying a negative aspect of her character beyond its intention. And it's not necessarily all bad. But I do agree with Riker, there is a little aristocratic streak in her (now that I think about it, the weird accent doesn't help matters any). So given that, it makes sense that this ordered society would appeal to her. After all, that's exactly what aristocrats want; an ordered society. And with the obvious nobleman expressing interest in her and her obvious attraction to him, it makes sense that she would lose her objectivity here. It really does seem to fit. So while her quick romance was boring to watch, I think it is a bit understandable. And I think her character here is still realistic for her.
Tue, Jun 10, 2014, 7:48pm (UTC -5)
The linking of Troi with the aristocracy also gives a bit of added heft to "Face of the Enemy." One of the strengths of that episode, and one reason that it functions a *little* like "Ethics" does for Crusher, is that Troi is essentially placed in a position where she uses her ability to read and to manipulate people, long honed to help people solve their problems, as a way of dealing with Toreth. One of the ironies of that episode, too, is that in order to play the part of the Tal Shiar operative, she has to *become* a Tal Shiar-like spy and manipulator, all in order to undermine the ultra-authoritarian Romulan regime represented by the Tal Shiar. By playing into the concept of the entitled, higher-caste Tal Shiar operative, and by playing into Toreth's class resentments, Troi is able to project an image of entitlement which allows her to pass off any errors she makes in her performance as being the result of her contempt for the lower echelons of Romulan society. Part of what makes that episode gripping for me is that Major Rakal is someone with whom Troi might share a little bit, even though she also sympathizes (more strongly) with Toreth.
Sat, Aug 30, 2014, 3:10am (UTC -5)
Funny story: We were just watching this and my wife said what about the Prime Directive? And I said I don't think it applies to humans, which my wife disputed. And then Riker and Picard had a very similar conversation moments later.
Wed, Oct 1, 2014, 10:34pm (UTC -5)
The society itself is puzzling, with questionable internal stability. I also think it wasn't visibly rigid enough - I would have expected a bit more uniformity of dress, with colours of cloth to differentiate professions. (Plus, there is a somewhat implied caste system at work, if some people are bred to be the top dogs, and others are bred for less high-profile jobs. But I guess there was enough holes in this utopia to see it as a dystopia anyway.
Too bad the Enterprise crew can never examine their claims of being "evolved" human beings more closely (Q comes close to do this from the get-go in "Encounter at Farpoint", but Q had to be the bad guy, so he's wrong no matter what). This is TNG, and Roddenberry's utopia has no problems because its blinders block any peripheral vision from coming through.
Wed, Oct 29, 2014, 9:14am (UTC -5)
Tue, Jan 6, 2015, 11:46am (UTC -5)
Masterpiece Society is about selective breeding, which is basically just putting two people together to procreate to encourage desired traits. Selective breeding hasn't been outlawed by the Federation (I think). In this episode, the leader says that "through controlled procreation they can create people without flaws". So while I think the colony is doomed, I don't think it is as ethically egregious as taking your kid in for a for a procedure to manipulate his DNA so he can be smarter.
What I find interesting is that Hannah was bred to be one of the best scientific minds of her generation but great scientists are curious and are always searching for more. So the very traits that they bred in her is the reason why she left.
Mon, Feb 9, 2015, 5:34pm (UTC -5)
What really bothered me about this story was how the whole biodome society is drawn as a strawman. Everything is done to drive the point home that genetic engineering is bad, bad, bad. Not even the people in the colony themselves seem to like it there, apart from that one ridiculous guy who kept grumbling about the intentions of the founders. Even their leader would rather start a relationship with a genetically impure outsider. And Picard and Geordie took every opportunity to talk down on the colony's social order (Yes, Geordie, we all understood the irony that the solution to saving the colony was inspired by VISOR technology. You really didn't have to say it out loud).
I wouldn't want to live in the colony, and I couldn't, since I too have had a severe health condition since birth. But the concept of seeing stability and even stagnation as a social ideal is not that far-fetched. Many cultures in human history have been built around the idea that an ideal society should be balanced out, with everybody assigned their proper place, and no need for any change. Within the Star Trek universe, we have cultures like the Vulcans and the Klingons who, in spite of being space faring races, have remained stagnant and mostly dismissive of any outside influence for centuries. So I find it odd that "the founders"' ideas are presented as utterly absurd. And anyway, this is Star Trek, so shouldn't the crew of the Enterprise be a little more interested in seeking out new life and new civilizations? This is a society built on values which are fundamentally different from those of the Federation, so why don't they at least try to get to know and understand them a bit? Troi is actually the only person on the ship who seems genuinely interested in the colony's culture, which might be due to her own aristocratic background (mind you, aristocracy is also dependent on selective breeding).
The problem is really that we don't get to learn much about the society from the inside. So they have boring piano recitals and their scientific knowledge is far behind that of the Federation (which is no surprise, given that for the last 200 years their scientist could not study anything outside of the walls of the biodome), but wouldn't it be interesting to see some areas in which they are superior to the Federation? You know, something that makes us interested in the survival of the colony as a society?
Given these points, I particularly liked the scene where Aaron gives his "six months" proposition. I fully understand that Hannah and her 23 friends want to get the hell out of this shithole, but apparently this will cause existential problems for the colony's genetic stability (which sounds really stupid - how small is their gene pool? - but let's take Aaron's word for it). Also, these people have had no contact with anything outside their walls for the past 200 years. So Aaron's suggestion to wait six months so they can all figure out how to deal with this new situation is actually quite sensible. I mean, what will happen to the people who leave the colony for the Enterprise? Shouldn't the Federation have some sort of specialists to integrate them into its society, and help them cope with the culture shock? From what we've seen in previous episodes (looking at you, "The Neutral Zone" and "First Contact"), they'll probably be left to their own devices in some guest quarters and then dropped off at the nearest starbase, never to be heard from again, where they would eventually succumb to depression because their skills, which had been regarded as perfect in their colony, are so far behind Federation standards that they'll hardly be qualified to clean space toilets.
The prime directive is probably my favorite Star Trek concept, but it's rarely handled very well. The problem is that usually the actual effects of interference on another culture are not shown, because the ship immediately flies off to its next adventure. One episode where this was done extremely well was Enterprise's "Cogenitor", where Trip and Archer have to learn the hard way that first contact missions can have serious repercussions on the affected parties.
Mon, Feb 9, 2015, 5:36pm (UTC -5)
Wed, Apr 22, 2015, 12:58pm (UTC -5)
I found the colonists genetically pre-determined roles to be an interesting (and frightening) idea, along the lines of "Brave New World." I must question why such a society would even need a leader,however. Everyone's role is clearly defined and the closed colony never faces any significant challenges or threats (until the solar core fragment nears, of course) -- so what purpose does Aaron serve? Where work roles are so clearly defined and the culture is stable, Ursula LeGuin's "The Dispossessed" paints a picture of peaceful and productive anarchy.
Tue, Jul 7, 2015, 1:35pm (UTC -5)
I don't think losing 23 members would doom the colony...what if the Stellar core fragment killed that just that many?
Mon, Aug 10, 2015, 11:35pm (UTC -5)
Dear God, this almost felt as bad as some of the dreck of Season One. Where do I even begin?
Let's start with the Troi-Conor romance, shall we? Trek has always had massive trouble with romance and relationships, but this has got to be the worst example of Trekkian romance, period! Am I honestly supposed to believe that these two people are completely in love? They've known each other for a grand total of a week, most of which they've spent apart! And even if we roll with the idea that Troi is head-over-heels in love with Conor, I have to ask a very simple question - Why? What the hell does Troi see in this guy? He's about as vanilla as.... well, actually, he's not as vanilla as anything; he's the quintessential definition of vanilla. The guy is so bland that he makes Orlando Bloom look like an emotional powerhouse. And, look, I'm sorry but Troi has never struck me as the kind of woman that falls for dull, unappealing, nondescript men.
Then there's Martin, Ron Canada's character. Talk about a complete and total waste of a great actor! Jammer says that the character is "basically unnecessary," but I'll disagree with that. There was a point to this character. That point was to, once again, straw-man conservatives as - well, as Jammer puts it - "mouthpiece(s) of obstinacy without much of a reasoned perspective." I mean, good God, they even have him directly say "this is in direct violation of the intentions of our founders." Why didn't they just have him say "this is wrong because these people might be Democrats and I'm a Republican" for crying out loud! Then, to make matters worse, the writers' straw-man doesn't even make sense by it's own logic because they have the "conservative" as the mouthpiece for the collectivistic society. Um, what?!! If I think about this aspect of the episode anymore my brain might implode.
Next, there's the horrible philosophy "The Masterpiece Society" seems to be pushing. Are we honestly supposed to think it's okay for this colony to completely destroy individual rights in favor of the collective good of the whole? Well, I guess so because.... look at all the nice shrubbery they have as a result! This so-called masterpiece society is despicable! Everyone has their lives planned out for them, there is no individuality and everyone is expected to care about the group at the expense of themselves. Is this reminding anybody of anything here? Isn't there another Star Trek race that does this exact same thing? Don't they do that for the exact same reason these people to it - to obtain perfection? Does anybody know who I'm talking about? Oh, yeah - THE GOD-DAMN BORG!!!! Aren't these the very reasons why we're supposed to abhor the Borg?! At least Genome Colony isn't forcibly assimilating people into it's little collective, but every other aspect of the Borg Collective is on display here and the episode expects us to just cheerfully except it because no culture is better than another. My brain is getting closer to the implosion point!
And, of course, there's the final scene with Picard and Riker discussing the Prime Directive. This scene encapsulates perfectly why the Prime Directive, or at least its application, is garbage. In the end you may have proved just as dangerous to that colony as any core fragment could ever have been? Really, Picard, really?! Quick history lesson for you here, Jean-Luc - that core fragment was going to KILL them. You, on the other hand, inadvertently brought about a slight cultural change. Are you honestly, HONESTLY!, saying that being FUCKING DEAD! is preferable to facing the unknown? Well then, you better put a phaser to your head and pull the trigger before you continue on your mission of seeking out the unknown. That unknown might change your culture, after all! But what's even worse is this line from Picard from earlier in the episode - "They've managed to turn a dubious scientific endeavour into dogma." Pal, that's exactly what you've done with the Prime Directive! You've taken something that was dubious to begin with and elevated it to such a level of dogma that you're actually willing to say that death is preferable to it's violation. The Prime Directive should be something that makes you stop and think about your actions before actually taking action, not something that is to be unquestionably obeyed.
Here's something to mull over. From "For the World is Hollow and I Have Touched the Sky"....
SPOCK: Captain, informing these people they're on a ship may be in violation of the Prime Directive of Starfleet Command.
KIRK: No. The people of Yonada may be changed by the knowledge, but it's better than exterminating them.
SPOCK: Logical, Captain.
And yet, here's Picard arguing the exact opposite. "Shut up, Wesley"? How about "SHUT UP, PICARD!"?
The blandness, the ridiculous romance, the continued belittling of non-liberal viewpoints, the immorality and the Prime Directive rubbish all add up to a 0 out of 10 score for this episode. However, there is one good thing that saves it from that scrapheap. And that is LaForge and Worf having an unapologetic distaste for the ideals of the colony.
1/10
Fri, Sep 25, 2015, 2:19pm (UTC -5)
Unfortunately, the way this is all presented is particularly dry and unengaging, and offers no real advance on eugenics discussions. And the Troi relationship fails to convince. 2.5 stars.
Sun, Sep 25, 2016, 11:50am (UTC -5)
(A little bit of this mismatch is characterization, but it's mostly just a dumb sexual double-standard. I think Starfleet's "real" attitude about relationships with the locals is more closely aligned with how we see Riker getting treated.)
Sun, Sep 25, 2016, 11:53am (UTC -5)
Fri, Sep 30, 2016, 8:49pm (UTC -5)
Also the whole Troi situation in this episode was a little irritating, they made Troi act like a blushing school girl whose fallen head over hills within the first minute of meeting this guy then everytime he's mentioned she smiles like when shes speaking to Picard about him, it's like shes thinking with her heart (Or her ovaries) instead of her brain when judging from past episodes shes usually more analytical than this.
Wed, Jun 7, 2017, 9:11pm (UTC -5)
1. That Trek is pro abortion "pro choice".
2. That the argument this episode gives for genetically selected people being a bad thing is that healthy embryos which have defects are terminated - and who has the right to decide that?
So, straight away, 1 is in massive conflict with 2. Not to mention, 2 is being done for good reasons here (blindness is far more benign than, say, Downs Syndrome). 1 is usually done for selfish reasons - i.e. "I don't want a kid".
But that's not all. If we take the stance that all aborted life is wrong, because that life could have grown to do wonderful things, I hope you all stop masturbating or using any contraception whatsoever. I had a nice wank the other day - and I lost thousands (millions?) of healthy sperm that could have been the next best right wing reviewer, putting the world to rights! That poor sucker will never happen now. WHAT A MONSTER I AM!
Look, the whole logic of this episode is shoddy, because it's doing a one way street rolling of the dice set up—a hit job. AS USUAL. I agree to abortion up to a few weeks (I do mean a few), unlike most righties, but I also believe that when a baby is highly likely to be born with a disability, that should have a special consideration and be at the parents discretion in terms of how to proceed. And that I would extend for much longer than a few weeks. The unborn child is not thinking "Oh, can't wait to become a teacher". It isn't thinking anything at all.
The truth is, this episode, like most of these useless arguments, rely on emotion rather than actual science or what's in the best interest of those involved.
Wed, Jun 7, 2017, 9:13pm (UTC -5)
Wed, Jun 7, 2017, 10:25pm (UTC -5)
Despite the hyperbole I think you make an excellent point about this episode's message being potentially contradictory with other in-universe morals we've been shown.
There is one mitigating factor in favor of the episode, which is that what the colony has done seems dangerously close to what led to the eugenics wars on Earth. While at first glance there are no supermen shown here, at the same time they can't possibly have achieved what they did merely by selecting the preferential fetuses in utero and aborting the others. It smacks of genetically modifying absolutely everyone to eliminate imperfection, and the only reason there are no Khans here is because they didn't design anyone to be like that. But they could have! And the Federation interdiction against genetic engineering isn't just to prevent Khans, but also various other ills including (*SPOILER* as we later hear in "Dr. Bashir, I Presume") a race to modify one's embryo just so that it can compete with everyone else.
So on the one hand I can see the argument that selectively aborting for 'excellence', while perhaps distasteful to many of us, is in principle identical to any type of abortion whatsoever once permitted. From that standpoint, assuming abortion is indeed a thing in the Federation (is it? I don't even know!) then this is a contradiction. However, if, as I suspect, the colony is entirely engineered, then there is a good case against them even though the episode skirts around that fact and doesn't deal with it in an upfront way.
Overall I think the episode's message is confused, and wants to be about 'natural life' whereas in fact its subject matter should have been a lot more specific and given us something better than a straw man argument.
Thu, Jun 8, 2017, 2:12pm (UTC -5)
In the early days at least, it was quite evident that using the VISOR was painful and that few people in the Federation use it and that it's not really a true "cure" for blindness. I wonder if perhaps people still did abort blind babies based on the way that LeVar acts that scene.
That said... aborting babies with physical defects is a different ball game altogether (as DLPB says) than aborting an unwanted baby. As DS9 shows us... unwanted pregnancies still happen. But as a few episodes with clones have shown, you can grow a baby in a maturation chamber I think? I think I'd be against legal abortion if you could transport your fetus through no damage to mom into a maturation chamber and put it up for adoption.
That said, I don't think the episode really goes THERE as much as it goes to the other place (what constitutes babies that are too "defective" to have).
Thu, Jun 8, 2017, 2:21pm (UTC -5)
"That said... aborting babies with physical defects is a different ball game altogether (as DLPB says) than aborting an unwanted baby."
Is it different? Think carefully about how you might define "unwanted" in this context. The people in this society find a baby 'unwanted' when it doesn't conform to the perfection of genome they're interested in. They very likely consider an imperfection in this sense to be a "defect", so what's the real difference then? Maybe you could try to distinguish between someone who doesn't want *any kind of baby* and someone who doesn't want *specific kinds* of baby, but in the end that ends up being a subjective distinction. Certainly in terms of law you couldn't distinguish between selective abortion and elective abortion, and since eugenics is illegal in the Federation it makes me wonder how they would govern such things. Do they allow 'breeding' of human genes but not direct gene engineering? If so that would seem to me to be a distinction that wouldn't really solve the problem of trying to eliminate 'inferiors' from the gene pool, which is exactly what this colony did.
Sat, Jul 15, 2017, 11:14am (UTC -5)
And why not? He regrets that the only way to save them was to irreversibly change them. It's a good look at basically the Heisenberg Effect - it's difficult to passively observe, even more difficult to passively assist - inevitably you alter that which you observe or rescue. He wish there were a way to save them without foisting a change upon them. Picard is pretty forward-thinking here because even though he/they/we personally may think it was a good change, he recognizes that it should have been (in an ideal world) their choice and not his.
Mon, Aug 14, 2017, 1:41pm (UTC -5)
"Certainly in terms of law you couldn't distinguish between selective abortion and elective abortion, and since eugenics is illegal in the Federation it makes me wonder how they would govern such things."
I suspect much like they do now. My wife is a carrier for something that can cause severe birth defects, but usually does not affect girls (being X linked... girls with a defective X are usually fine if they have a normal X).
We wanted to take a maternal blood test to check the baby's sex (science is cool) and then decide if we were going to go the additional step of having an invasive amnio. Surprise! Anti-legal abortion advocates pushed legislation that says we cannot have the blood test because they don't want people have sex selective abortions (this was revoked in mid-2014... too late for me, but you can have it done now). I have 2 little girls and did no further tests (we decided not to have the amnio) but it was a much tougher choice than it needed to be.
We are going to have to, as a society, decide if we want to continue to prevent people from accessing information about their own bodies because of what they might do with it. There are fetal blood cells present in the mother's body. This is a fact. In how many years will I be able to use them to see if my baby has blonde hair.
Mon, Aug 14, 2017, 1:52pm (UTC -5)
There are certainly many cases to be made not only for abortion in the context you describe (I'm happy it turned out ok) but in others. In context of your scenario I see selective abortion as being rather similar to genetic engineering, since in both cases the idea is to prevent births that don't conform to some standard. The standard can be quite rational and humane, but nevertheless while your standard may be reasonable the question remains that if you should be allowed to make the choice based on this standard then why shouldn't others be allowed to make it based on a standard of their choice? You may think that a birth defect would give the new human an undesirable life, but what if someone else thinks that being born with an IQ under, say, 90, would lead to an undesirable life? How do you tell them your standard is correct and theirs is wrong? What if someone believes that being born female at all is an undesirable life? And then of course someone may feel that any life is undesirable and abort in all cases. There is an entire spectrum of reasons people might have for 'selectively' thinking a birth shouldn't happen, and so again my point is that at the end of the day selective abortion would become identical to elective abortion since the standard for selection would be completely arbitrary.
I guess we could envision strict government regulation based on...genetic data? Like a fetus with gene X can be aborted but not gene Y, and this rule would be enforced with no exceptions? But then elective abortion is eliminated altogether. So in the end when individuals want the freedom to choose whether to abort you end up with an inability to prevent eugenics, and when individuals want there to be a ban on unlimited eugenics then would end up losing elective abortion. So I think you're stuck with getting both or neither, which why I'm left wondering what the heck the Federation does to prevent eugenics in the breeding sense. It's not as bad as genetic engineering...but it still feels pretty bad to me.
Wed, Aug 16, 2017, 8:33am (UTC -5)
We are in agreement. The point of my story was that the only way to actually get one and not the other is to hide information from the patient. They let people take the test I mentioned under specific circumstances, but not others. Our case wasn't covered (for a variety of reasons not worth going into).
Other people think that people should be allowed to take the test, but only to identify birth defects. The doctor shouldn't tell you the sex. I feel very uncomfortable with the idea that doctors can withhold results of your own blood tests from you, but there we have it.
But you are 100% right. In old D&D like video games where stats were randomized if you wanted to have different stats you could use an editor or re-roll. Re-rolling likely didn't get you the stats you were looking for EXACTLY, but if you were willing to re-roll enough times you could certainly get closer. Selective abortion, could, in theory be used to re-roll your baby if you were heartless enough.
Tue, Sep 12, 2017, 5:23pm (UTC -5)
Again a genetically engineered perfect society proves to be all too vulnerable. Troi again falls in love with the main guy there sort of as a B plot (like "The Price" from TNG S3, you could see this coming from the first moment). This one's a slow-moving episode that didn't really take off until about 2/3 of the way through, when the engineer lady wants to leave and the colony's continued existence is threatened.
The argument of the colony not being able to survive if a handful of humans leave is vociferously made. The usual solution of having a colony adapt to something new has been seen in Trek episodes before ("The Apple" from TOS S2 comes to mind).
The wooden actors on the alien world is another drawback of this episode. The black dude with his constant warnings was tiresome.
The story about deflecting the fragment with some souped-up tractor beam didn't do it for me. It's pretty basic TNG technobabble stuff. It's an elaborate plot device to get the lady engineer to want to leave the colony, but the idea of effects of contamination of a closed society has been dealt with before -- it didn't feel like anything original here but rather a twist on some usual themes.
1.5 stars for "The Masterpiece Society". It felt a lot like one of those sterile TNG episodes from S1 or S2, with a bit of a twist at the end. Just took too long to develop into the interesting parts, no good guest actors, and the ages-old eugenics idea gets trotted out again.
Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:10pm (UTC -5)
This race of people reminded me of the TOS episode, A Taste of Armageddon. Instead of killing each other in a long drawn out war, the two planets just fought a virtual war, where a computer, most likely a Playstation 3, just calculated probable deaths in some crazed Activision game, then the each planet actually killed those people. For them it was better than actual destruction of the planets infrastructure. Kirk put a stop to that nonsense.
Picard should had just told this Masterpiece Society to either act right, and he would stop the stellar fragment, or just let them die. Apparently they weren't as smart as they thought they were, otherwise they could had stopped the fragment themselves. They were just misguided Earthers. No doubt they are the ones who spawned Khan with their genetics experiments.
Fri, May 18, 2018, 12:21am (UTC -5)
Thu, May 24, 2018, 6:09am (UTC -5)
What happens to any tribal community that is contacted by Western civilisation? What happened in South America when the Spanish arrives? What will happen on Earth if a massively superior alien culture turns up and offers us the universe, and human beings start forming loving and sexual relationships with them?
Why isn't anyone else capable of understanding history?
Thu, Aug 2, 2018, 8:54pm (UTC -5)
And I'm not sure how having a couple of dozen people out of thousands leave your colony is somehow as bad or worse than having everyone destroyed by seismic activity.
Wed, Sep 19, 2018, 4:10pm (UTC -5)
Haven't we been here before with scientists from an isolated society wanting to run away to space?
I concur with the above views and wonder how masterpiece a society it is that lives in a small bubble on an inhospitable world.
Some aspects of this story were missed or ignored when Enterprise was written. Our colonists are from the 22nd century but are shocked at the idea of transporters. Other comments in the show suggest the transporter was invented around the 23 rd century-oops!
Sun, Oct 14, 2018, 9:35am (UTC -5)
Sun, Oct 14, 2018, 4:08pm (UTC -5)
I think they said it was a neutron star fragment. Short of a black hole that would be the densest object in the universe. Not sure about the math (someone who knows this stuff could say) but yeah, ridiculously dense.
Fri, Apr 5, 2019, 11:47pm (UTC -5)
The Masterpiece Society is a great episode. How could you give Remember Me a higher rating? The Nth Degree a higher rating? You gave Time Squared from season 2 a higher rating!!! Those were the WORST episodes!!!
Anyone who doesn't give Redemption the 4 stars it deserves, I can't take anything they say seriously.
Sat, Apr 6, 2019, 12:51am (UTC -5)
Sat, Apr 20, 2019, 11:03am (UTC -5)
Troi feeling shame for having sex? I guess Riker's one night stands were never with other societies as part of his away missions? Troi didn't breach the Prime Directive and only professionalism. I would agree. But riker dodged a bullet from the writers as I don't believe he would be more professional in this regard. After all in the next episode he has sex with Ro, a fellow crew member, who reported to him?? Didn't they know their ranks at that time?
The so called Masterpiece society was lame : a few people leave and 1000s are at risk? Haven't they heard of redundancy?
Wed, May 22, 2019, 11:54pm (UTC -5)
The rigid painting of this society as a result of genetic engineering seems very short sighted and the disgust of Picard and Geordie towards ANY genetic tempering seems a bit childish.
Sat, Jun 1, 2019, 8:05pm (UTC -5)
Thu, Mar 26, 2020, 10:40am (UTC -5)
This was my only problem with it. The idea that destroying some cells with a genetic defect is pre-judging people isn't right to me. It seems more correct to say in their society that Geordie would be born without those and other defects.
>Troi feeling shame for having sex? I guess Riker's one night stands were never with other societies as part of his away missions? Troi didn't breach the Prime Directive and only professionalism.
Riker's sex usually wouldn't potentially undermine their entire society and growth. The only time I can think that was a problem is that odd scene where he pretty much got blackmailed into being raped by alien doctor in the First Contact episode. The society in this episode requires isolation. They were already disturbing that isolation, but out of pure necessity. Troy went way too far past that. It's only not a Prime Directive failure because of the technicality that they are human.
"After all in the next episode he has sex with Ro, a fellow crew member, who reported to him?? Didn't they know their ranks at that time? "
One of the areas were TNG shows its age. Sex with crew members down the chain of command wasn't frowned upon as it should have been.
"The so called Masterpiece society was lame : a few people leave and 1000s are at risk? Haven't they heard of redundancy? "
They address this in the episode. The society is perfectly planned. They do have the redundancy to handle a few unexpected accidental deaths but many more than a few were intrigued by the outsiders with more advanced technology that were different and wanted to leave.
Honestly I think this is a great episode that makes one think about these values. Would you rather a tightly controlled society where everyone's needs are met and everyone has a purpose to fill to help the greater good (probably a not so subtle allegory to communism) or would you rather have a life where things are far more uncertain, where people have far more direction and certainty in life and have to compete with each other, but where that leads to faster growth and advancement at the expense of many not having a fulfilling life? Personally, give me the former.
Sat, May 23, 2020, 4:39pm (UTC -5)
Anyway, what irritates me most about this episode is Martin (Ron Canada's character). I just can't grasp his logic, because he's written as such an obtuse straw man, much like Gosheven from The Ensigns of Command as Jay mentioned earlier, or to a lesser extent Krola the security minister from First Contact. How can someone be written as so oblivious to the situation at hand? Martin and Gosheven give no consideration to their immediate threats, and they're even told, what good are traditions and such if we're all dead? That never stops them. At least Krola has somewhat more understandable, if still quite black and white, motivations.
The bigger problem I have is that we're never told just what makes Martin so worried about people beaming down or someone going to the Enterprise for a few hours or days. He just spouts "throwing off the balance" and "it goes against our founders' wishes." But what balance is being thrown off by this? Is he worried that extra people will deplete the oxygen in the biosphere, or introduce foreign germs that their society has no immunity against? Sure I can understand there being problems if people leave permanently, or stay permanently, but why is he so opposed to any contact/exchange whatsoever? We never learn that, so he just comes off as a nut.
Wed, Aug 5, 2020, 8:58pm (UTC -5)
Next we have Picard and Troi's conversation in the turbolift, where she confesses her lapses in judgement as he thoughtfully and sympathetically listens. Stewart sells the moment with some excellent, wordless closeups.
The next great moment simply occurs when Picard finally decides to beam down to the planet ("I think it's time I go down there and meet their leader" etc). The little sequence has a certain momentous quality to it; like a King finally deigning to visit the rabble and pass judgement. It's a trope (Picard finally beams down to dispense wisdom!) that seemed to fade away after season 1.
Beyond this, I agree with most criticisms voiced by others. Most annoying is the way the episode strawman's the "genetically perfect" society. A better script would have these uber-men questioning the supposed "free will" of Picard's gang, who are all beholden to a bevy of deterministic and indeterministic forces, and who are all themselves the products of a kind of evolutionary "genetic engineering".
A better script would have also logically discussed anti-natalism. If genetic engineering robs an individual of choices and challenges, as Picard argues, then life itself is an imposition without consent. You don't get to dictate what challenges a fetus deserves to face.
The ways genetic screening and engineering helps save lives, and helps avoid suffering and dangerous defects etc should also be brought up. Instead, the society is used to make a far narrower point: to defend the disabled, the impaired and the aborted. Which is fine. But it's a very narrow stance - a product of the 1980s-1990s - which ignores a range of massive ancillary issues.
Didn't Voyager have a similar, better episode on genetic engineering? I can't quite remember.
Wed, Aug 12, 2020, 7:32pm (UTC -5)
"Doctors haven't cured anything in the last 50 years. Like blindness. You go blind, they don't got nothing for you. You go to a doctor, tell him you're blind, he says, "Hey why don't you get this dog to drag your blind butt around."
This society would bore me to death. Everyone is perfect, and nothing ever goes wrong. You are told that according to your genetic profile, you'll make an excellent sanitation engineer. It's what you were bred to do. I doubt you would be allowed to change professions because Martin will tell you that will upset the alignment of the stars or some other nonsense.
Hard to believe with these people's advanced scientific minds, they wouldn't build a few spacecraft to check out what other planets are doing. In 200 years, all they have done was create a few glass domes. How about finding a new planet where you can breathe fresh air?
And once again, Picard disapproves of any female senior staff member from getting a little action unless he is getting some too. Troi and Crusher and never had a relationship with anyone aboard ship, except Troi , who mostly grinds on Riker. He and the Captain do their do off the ship. Both hangout on Risa to get some action. It's no wonder these females hookup with some alien visitor before the first commercial break. Are they even sexually compatible? If you have spots, or a ridge on your forehead, I can't imagine what they got down below. Crusher hooked up with an alien whose body is controlled by a giant maggot. That copulation would totally gross me out. YUCK!!
These people would get along great with that planet that was made up of clones to survive. Both were made up of leaders who were insufferable dictators. Both were isolated and living with issues that were totally unnecessary. When a Starship visited, they all should had jumped onboard and got off the rock they were merely existing on, instead of lying and claiming their way of life was perfect.
Wed, Aug 12, 2020, 8:06pm (UTC -5)
Now that I think about it, this episode is about the counselor falling in love with the president of the Planet of Guidance Counselors.
Tue, Aug 25, 2020, 2:15pm (UTC -5)
And the episode's ultimate conclusion - in the original series, Kirk would have forced them to abandon their wrongful ways and converted them to a more "normal" way of life. I'm sure there's a TOS episode where he ends up getting them to reproduce by having sex instead of some artificial method. But here it's much more nuanced, there's a real ethical question mark left hanging.
There's one really obvious flaw in this story, and it seems quite avoidable to me. The colony scientist. How could someone from a society that is, by her own admission, considerably less technologically advanced, and isolated from human technology by a couple of centuries, have been able to assist Geordi so capably? How could she have the necessary insight and understanding of Federation power systems? She operates the technology in engineering like she's been doing it for years.
And there's an example in this one of something that comes up time and again in Star Trek stories - Geordi or B'Elanna, or Scotty or Data or someone else comes up with a massive scientific technological breakthrough on the spur of the moment. Following a five minute conversation, about Geordi's glasses, the Federation now has the ability to move super-massive objects in space.
It's not clear (or perhaps I've forgotten) how big the colony is, but their leader makes his important pronouncement without the aid of a microphone surrounded by about 30 people. Star Trek does that sort of thing a lot, where a small town seems to stand in for a whole planet sometimes.
I don't really buy the relationship between Troi and the colony leader and it seems to add nothing to the plot. Furthermore the conclusion is real 1940s Hollywood cheese overload. Her dramatic apology to Picard that she's been unprofessional doesn't really wash, either. Riker seems to do that all the time.
Speaking of which - that turbolift journey seems to take a while. Over a century since the invention of the Transporter, isn't it a bit low tech to travel between decks in that fashion?
One nice touch is the piano recital given by the boy in the colony. It's cold and mechanical, intended I think to suggest a lack of warmth and humanity in the society he belongs to.
Anyway - if only because it represents an interesting ethical dilemma with an uncertain outcome that steers away from a predictable formula, I think this is one of the better Series 5 episodes.
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