150 lines
6.9 KiB
Plaintext
150 lines
6.9 KiB
Plaintext
WARNING: The following post contains a review of this week's TNG episode,
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"Transfigurations", and as such contains spoilers. The author takes no respon-
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sibility for any spoilage (unless, like my friend Matt, you just got married
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today, in which case all bets are off...)
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Well, that was VERY interesting.
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Not the wedding, though that was fun too. I mean the show. Considering how un-
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impressive the press release looked, and how downright dull the preview last
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week looked, I was quite pleasantly surprised.
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But that can wait. First, here's a synopsis from your friendly neighborhood
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CRT:
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The Enterprise is on a star-charting mission, exploring sectors previously
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unknown to the Federation. They pick up a faint distress call from a nearby
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planet, and find one humanoid, critically injured, under the wreckage of an
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escape pod. They beam him up (after stabilizing him a bit down planetside), and
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somehow, he recovers. Bev refuses to take credit for it, though--it's "John
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Doe", as they call him, who's responsible--his cells are regenerating them-
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selves at an astounding rate, and some of them are mutating. He regains
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consciousness a couple of weeks after having been taken aboard, but doesn't know
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who he is.
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From here on in, things get seriously weird. Somehow, the cell mutations in
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John's body are linked to strange episodes of pain he's experiencing, and those
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in turn are linked to strange energy pulses that come from him. The first
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pulse, which hit Geordi moments after John was discovered, gave Geordi a strong
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boost of confidence with women. Later, though he has no control over his spo-
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radic energy bursts, and they in fact can prove harmful, he can also heal any
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sort of injury, such as O'Brien's dislocated shoulder. The mystery deepens.
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Eventually, (like another 2-3 weeks later) by analyzing some remnants taken
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from John's wrecked pod, Geordi and Data manage to figure out where his home
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planet is, and it's even along their course. By this time, though, John's re-
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gained just enough of his memory to know that he cannot allow himself to go
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home yet. He attempts to steal a shuttle, and accidentally kills Worf. He
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then revives Worf, effortlessly. Meanwhile, another vessel, heading towards the
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Enterprise at Warp 9.72, arrives. On it are people from the planet Zalkon,
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clearly John's home. The captain, Sunad, denounces John as a criminal and de-
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mands that he be turned over to them at once. When Picard, after some delibera-
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tion, refuses, Sunad triggers a weapon which makes everyone on board the Enter-
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prise completely unable to breathe.
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Everyone, that is, except John, whose memory is now completely restored. He
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sends a bolt of energy through the entire ship, releasing everyone, and once on
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the bridge, plucks Sunad off his bridge onto the Enterprise. It seems that John
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is a transitional stage of Zalkonian evolution, and is about to progress beyond
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his physical body. Although those in authority have tried to kill those who
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are about to attain this ability as a threat to the "natural order", John's
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powers have now progressed to the point where he cannot be affected anymore.
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He sends the Zalkonian ship packing, and after bidding a tender farewell to Dr.
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Crusher, departs.
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Well, now. Sound interesting?
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It was.
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First of all, this was a Treknology freak's dream-show. There was a great deal
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of attention paid to Bev's medical techniques (to be honest, I haven't the
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slightest idea if any of it made sense, but hey; I'm an astronomer, not a
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doctor :-) ), and a lot of emphasis on decoding the information on what the team
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salvaged from the wreckage. That second part was really neat, too--after dis-
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covering it was encoded biochemically, they found a star chart, but couldn't
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make heads or tails of it. Then, they used the course corrections on the screen
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to estimate the mass of the stars who deviated the course. They found one was a
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pulsar with a particular period, and located that pulsar. Now THAT'S what I
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call attention to details.
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Another attention to details showed up in Geordi's renewed confidence. Remember
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Christie, the girl he went after at the beginning of "Booby Trap"? It was the
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same girl he went after (and GOT, this time) here. Wonderful job, folks. Now,
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about bringing back Sonia Gomez...
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This show probably did more for Bev's character than the entire first season
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did. As she found herself slowly becoming attracted to John, I actually found
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myself caring about what happened to them both (and with Bev, that's kind of
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rare). Of course, seeing her actually working in Sickbay (which I now have the
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impression is more of a full wing than a single room, which makes loads of
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sense if you're caring for a thousand people) helped, and there was a wonderful
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scene between her and Wesley, where he jibes her a bit about her relationship
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with John. This was one of those few times when I actually thought the two were
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believable as mother and son. Nice work.
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Another nice thing was the time involved in the course of the episode. For
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once, we had a situation where everything didn't occur in the course of a day or
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two. John was on board for nearly two months, I think, and we only saw the
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important bits of his stay. I like it. (It also gave Wesley a chance to get
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comfortable in his new job and uniform, and he seemed such by the time we saw
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him, which was about a month into things.)
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One quick question, to think about once you've seen it: Is what's happening to
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the Zalkonians the same thing that happened to the Organians all those centuries
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ago?
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On the cinematography end, there were a lot of very nice shots of Sickbay, and
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a couple of great views of the shuttle bay.
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It wasn't perfect, of course; the ending seemed a bit rushed (more so than
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usual), for one thing. (And, of course, continuing my crusade: though O'Brien's
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scene was wonderful, it was too short--and GIVE HIM A FIRST NAME!!! There...I
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feel better now.) However, it was very good, and made me forgive them for
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"Menage a Troi".
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Well, it was a long wedding (actually, it was a short wedding, but the reception
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went on for almost six hours), and I'm exhausted. But, before I go, here's some
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ratings for you to chew on:
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Plot: 7.5. Good, but not terribly original, and the ending was a little
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forced.
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Plot Handling: 10. On the other hand, the continuity in this program and the
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way they handled John's growing power worked nicely.
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Characterization: 10. Nice work to Bev and Geordi, and an excellent John.
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Technical: 10. As I said, a Treknophile's dream.
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TOTAL: 9.4. Pretty damned good, methinks.
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NEXT WEEK: A rerun of "Deja Q", but THEN, we all know what's coming........
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Tim Lynch (Cornell's first Astronomy B.A.)
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BITNET: H52Y@CRNLVAX5
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INTERNET: H52Y@VAX5.CIT.CORNELL.EDU
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UUCP: ...!rochester!cornell!vax5.cit.cornell.edu!h52y
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"We are talking the jape of the century lads. We are talking April, May, June,
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July, AND August Fools."
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