The High Ground

DVD, TNG S3 (The High Ground)

I complete the set at last! This was the only episode never to be shown on BBC TV (as far as I'm aware) due to the Ireland reference, so I never saw it, and it was the only one left, until today. My impressions were quite good - it had a surprising opening, it was an episode for Beverly Crusher and it had the dimensional shifter as a concept, so combining all these positives should have made a really good episode, but it didn't work as well as it could. It doesn't quite dig deep enough into the issues or the ideas. Terrorism is rare in the Star Trek universe (leaving 'DS9' aside), because most people are above such things in the 24th Century, and its random danger was suitably apparent from the brazen attack on the Enterprise. Those dimensional shifters could have made for an even more exciting sequence, but they aren't used that much, though their sudden appearances do surprise.

Picard gets to be a bit more proactive (a sign of what the Captain's role would develop into in the films), but Beverly's connection with the leader of the terrorists didn't ring true, I didn't believe she would become sympathetic to him, but I suppose it was her desire to help and cure that influenced her. She never actually joined the cause of course, but she was willing to try to talk the Captain into aiding these people. The Rutians police uniforms were brilliant and the town set impressive, though probably a shopping complex or public building in real life. There's a small taste of the way Picard and Crusher used to get on, with her questioning his orders and him getting annoyed, and I would love to know what things she was going to tell him "in case we don't get out of here..." were! Also I wonder why the rebels base was so easy to beam into, and if it was that easy why didn't they do it earlier?

After 'DS9', seeing a more simplistic examination of terrorism doesn't work so well, but for being Dr. Crusher's first proper episode since she returned, and for the few action scenes, it's certainly worth a watch.

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