Savage Sunday

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S1 (Savage Sunday)

The first thing to notice is that we now have a proper title sequence, mainly of clips from the pilot episode. We didn't get one in that because it would have given away what was going to happen in the episode so it's very strange that they use clips from this episode to fill out the title sequence, and not only that, but the most action-packed moments such as Hutch shouting right in front of the camera and Starsky driving the explosives-packed car, leaping out, and then it being blown sky high. Oddly enough the sequence was edited better in the title than in the actual scene where it's turned from a last-second bail-out to something that seems to be there for humour - Starsky leaps behind a straggly bush (a lot of protection there!), then looks up after a while because it doesn't seem like it's going to blow, and then it does. I can only imagine that was done for safety so that the stunt man (the same guy who played one of Tallman's goons in the pilot and often doubled for Glaser), was nowhere near when the blast went off since it really looks like a boot full of dynamite went up.

Another difference between this and the first episode is that Bay City actually looks inviting, like a place you'd want to hang out. There's no better scene to illustrate this than when Starsky cruises through the streets, the sun sparkling off of his bright red bonnet (the car I mean, he wasn't acting out Little Red Riding Hood), almost like a starship gliding through space, and it feels like a nice, laid-back place that Starsky belongs in rather than a hostile environment which he'd love to escape. This is also true in the way the city is shown or what is shown of it. It's all bright and sunny where the pilot was dark and rainy, with shops and rich people where it was tramps and grime. The city is shown expansively and openly - you can see hills stretching off into the distance and chain-link fences don't hide a long shot. It's no longer claustrophobic and stifling as it could be in the first episode.

We're seeing another side of the city and it feels a lot less like the toilet bowl analogy of the first episode, which was not inviting in the least, except to provide sympathy for S&H. There are still criminals, but they're a pickpocket that takes the wallet of a rich tourist, old people that want to protest their treatment, and the 'salt and pepper' team of the two main villains who visit businesses such as Ted's Fender and Body Workshop, or the grocery store full of products. Like before there are two of them for S&H to fight as if they're the evil version of the goodies. It's also nice to see the basketball hustle which is how S&H progress their investigation. At this point they don't realise the gravity of the situation, but it's a lighthearted scene that shows they know their stuff and how to handle people.

Then there's the old people's home which is about as far removed from the sleazy, seedy locations of the pilot as can be, with 'villains' that rank high on the quirkometer - they did something extreme and set in motion a dangerous situation, but for the best of causes: their desperation to be heard. Otherwise they're such nice people and it's so funny the way they confess their crime while a piano plays quaintly in the background. Huggy's much more like the man we know from other episodes and Captain Dobey has put on a little weight, as well as gaining much more of an attitude, but there's absolutely no difficulty in understanding what he says or what he wants, even though Starsky tries to do so by pulling the 'crackly radio interference' trick, which Dobey saw right through. He feels much more like a boss they've known a long time, who knows them well - as he responds to the old man's compliment of them that he must think a lot of them, he turns it around and says he does think of them a LOT! Right away we have a much more interesting dynamic between him and his men that couldn't have been achieved in the pilot because Dobey had to be under suspicion or it would have been easy to work out who the police villain is that's playing both ends.

Playing both ends is something that comes up again in this one when S&H target an illegal gambling den (though we'd already seen them taking on the bouncers in the title!), and after they've gone, the bookies play along, but also leave a message for the two villains. The two baddies, a hairy Tom Selleck-like white guy and a younger, Eddie Murphy-type black guy aren't in the same league as the hitmen from episode one (though remembering how useless they were at the end maybe they were), and seem like ordinary blokes who don't care about the law and are just out to have some fun in their dull lives. They have friends who are on the right side of the law in terms of having a job, though Ted isn't averse to a bit of faking number plates and repainting a stolen car (he claims cops are weird, but he's pretty weird himself), and we learn that one of the men had been married to a more than open dancing girl. They seem like they could be normal citizens if they only had a bit more ambition in life, but instead they enjoy ripping off others and threatening to kill people - I never got the sense they had serious intent upon S&H though, they don't make a proper job of taking them out in the back alley and go to the trouble of slashing their tyres. Why do that if they were going to kill them?

The camaraderie between S&H is even better in this one with beautiful scenes that would become the norm and define their friendship, occasionally bickering, often teasing, but ultimately their total dependency in a crisis. I'm thinking of the moment when Hutch is getting dinner and we have the running gag of Starsky eating all kinds of crazy stuff with everything on his hotdog or whatever it is, and Hutch having plain. Then a call comes in and Hutch chucks Starsky's meal in the bin much to his dismay on the pretext that Starsky's got to drive so he gets all sulky and it's just a marvellous comedy scene that's true to the situation, but unique to these two characters. This then leads to another running gag when Starsky pleads for Captain Dobey's extra burger - the Captain eats too much and doesn't share, and then that leads to another familiar thing with Starsky taking the burger anyway and Dobey shouting angrily after him!

One of the funniest bits is not the scene itself but the way Starsky operates in it: he's chasing 'Milty,' a dealer, in an unrelated moment from what is about to become their main objective, and the way he runs is laugh out loud funny. I don't know whether this was Paul Michael Glaser's natural way of running or whether he deliberately made his character look funny, but seeing Starsky grabbing the air with his arms and lifting his knees up did make me laugh. Glaser really added so many little ticks and physicality to the character and he seems like he's always full of energy through his gestures and actions, but there's also amusement in the way he does things, like beckoning over Ted and the way he deals with him, or the how he asks the old people why they planned to blow up their car in a way that he's really trying to understand. It's funny, but that's Starsky.

It's also good to see another episode that fits neatly together and builds to a climax - they're forced to bundle Milty into the back of their car when a call comes through about the stolen vehicle. An aside: I think this was after the robbery as that gave them a reason for the car to be wanted as we later find out the old couple never reported their car was stolen. This then starts them on the trail and at this stage they can still joke about what's going on (in terms of us watching, not them doing as they aren't trying to be funny, but seeing them read the rights to Milty as they screech round corners is funny).

Again, the episode is clearly not for children in the way the dancing girl holds nothing back about her marriage to one of the bad guys, and in the way Huggy gives us mixed messages - he's telling his new barmaid (with the very deep voice), he expects her to steal from him a bit, but not a lot. What a strange situation he operates in! It's meant to be funny, and it is, but it's not the sort of message you want the impressionable to take on board. There's also the scene where Starsky interviews the son of the store owner, and openly takes a biscuit off the shelf, rips off the wrapping and eats it without paying! You can understand him doing that in an illegal business, as they came in and bullied the occupants of the shady bar in the last episode, but this was a legitimate store that had just been robbed, the owner hospitalised and the son nursing a bump on the head - you'd think he'd have a bit more propriety!

This is also the scene that features probably the most quirky of the quirky characters this time: the man with the excellent memory who saw the car registration. I felt sure he was in another episode as his face and voice seemed familiar, but I couldn't place him. Hutch gets Starsky out all for the purpose of asking him if he's got a pencil to write down to the reg number and they go through the whole rigmarole of this man getting to the point and then on top of that you learn the man has a pencil and paper anyway! The series excelled at these eccentric caricatures and is another element of its makeup that stopped it from being just another cop show. Not everyone who helps the police is rewarded though: the guy that phones in about the stolen car parked in his car park had his livelihood destroyed - a police bike almost runs him down forcing him into a cartoon-style stand up straight to avoid being winged, then the car can't get past quick enough so he's forced to leap to one side and his little glass cubicle is smashed to smithereens! Another police relations disaster...

I don't know if this was done on purpose and may just be because I've seen the episode a few times and you begin to notice things more since you don't have to take in the story, but when S&H are at Huggy's, Hutch talks about the jokers they're after, and behind him is some kind of slot machine with a big Joker card right behind Hutch's head. Coincidence or a glitch in the Matrix? I also noticed the legendary damage that Glaser used to inflict upon the Torino he hated so much: when the police bike drives past the green Chevy (did he not see it or was he giving S&H room to park?), they screech to a halt and Starsky leaps out slamming his door into the back of the other car without even looking at the paintwork. Granted this wasn't the time to be worried about such things, but you'd expect at least a pained backward glance. But he was off doing his hero thing, and a really heroic moment it is. Is it Starsky that goes simply because he's closest or is he considered a better driver? Once he's gone it looks like Hutch just settles down for a nice rest, but he soon gets his end of the action taking on the baddies and defeating them without his partner's help much to Starsky's apparent disappointment after he'd come rushing back.

One thing that's funny is the way he comes bursting out of the underground car park, the car with dynamite in the back lifting off it's front wheels and slamming hard down again when the rest of the episode people have been saying how any little jolt could set off the explosion! What's less funny is that all these police are supposed to be out looking for the danger car and then when we find out where it is only S&H and a police bike are sent to intercept it, which is why Hutch has to deal with the villains alone. Where were all the other police, did they just give up and go back to what they were doing once they heard the car had been located? Also I was unsure of whether Morton, the black guy, was killed or only wounded. It's fun to spot the pop culture references: Morton says 'faster than a speeding bullet' which is one for Superman, and Robert Redford's also mentioned.

I really wasn't expecting much of this episode. I remembered liking it, but somehow my hopes weren't high that it would hold up for some reason (maybe because I saw it with my cousin and he didn't think much of it so it might have affected my perceptions), but it definitely held up and had a really good balance of action, fun and the running jokes of the series, as well as looking good and moving well. It wasn't without problems - the build up to the time limit wasn't as well done as it could have been and there were unnecessarily slow scenes like the cop waiting by the side of the road - do we need seconds of watching him waiting for S&H? The explosion should have gone off when Starsky leapt out of the car, but you can't fault the explosion. Importantly, it ended well - you think it's going to go out with everyone laughing and smiling, so cliched, but then it ends on Hutch looking like he's thinking 'oh brother' and rolling his eyes and that really is funny!

***

Timescape

DVD, TNG S6 (Timescape)

Just like 'The Inner Light' in the same slot last season this bucks the trend of the second to last episode of a season being a bit weak. This is in fact one of the strongest stories of the season showcasing increasingly inventive effects and a clever time-based story without the usual time travel conventions. It doesn't quite hold up when you think about creating a personal bubble of time around characters (or wristband devices they even have a little drawer for - "Geordi, did you remember to pack those time bubble wristbands, just in case?" "No sir, I was going to leave them this time, thanks for reminding me"), or little details throughout, but if you go along with it and don't think too hard it does make an entertaining tale. It's like a cross between 'Wink of An Eye' from 'TOS' and 'The Next Phase' from last season, with the people moving incredibly slowly so they seem to be stopped still, from the former, and Romulans sneaking around in another phase or timeframe than everyone else, as in the latter.

This time it isn't the Romulans who are the villains, and actually there aren't any villains at all, just concerned parents of little baby beings trapped in the gravity well of the Romulan power source, the quantum singularity, which also caused time-based trouble in 'Visionary' on 'DS9' - the female member of the species does come across as a villain since she tries to prevent Data from stopping the power transfer beam to the Romulan ship, and I assume the male of the species made the ship fire at the Enterprise, but I'm not altogether clear on that point. Does this mean that the various-sized time bubbles in space were created by the Romulan ship and all went back to normal when time was reset or did those bubbles continue to float off and cause havoc?

I think Picard must have been more affected by the bubbles at the start than we realised, as he tells them to pilot the Runabout to meet the Enterprise and to send a message to the ship telling them to meet at the rendezvous point as quickly as possible. Surely the meeting point couldn't have been reached any quicker by them so he should have asked the Enterprise to meet the Runabout sooner, not at the rendezvous point. A bit later Geordi says there's no sign of the Enterprise, not even on long-range scanners, then they navigate round a few bubbles and seconds later there is the ship! I know he mentioned something metallic on sensors, but surely that was on long-range and they shouldn't just bump into the Enterprise right away, should they?

Forgetting about the problems there is so much to enjoy here: for a start we get a Runabout in 'TNG' and unbelievably they show more of the Runabout than the series fro which it was created, 'DS9.' How great it is to be able to see the back room and I can't believe they never bothered to have scenes like that in 'DS9' Runabouts. I'd have loved to know what the name of the ship was, though. It's a really nice family moment with Picard, Geordi, Data and Troi sitting round a dining table talking about the conference they'd been to, although Troi's impression of a Ktarian she met was so weird, like a cross between an Irish accent and a Liverpudlian one, and you can tell she's drawing on the regional accents she'd know about, coming from England. Because the scene is so homely it makes that much more impact when something eerie happens and Geordi and the others freeze as he's in mid-sentence, then carry on as normal a few seconds later. Then when they ask Troi if anything's wrong she says "I'm not sure." Now either she didn't want to sound like an idiot (which is unlikely since outlandish things happen all the time in space), or she really doubted what she'd seen, but I'd have thought her answer would immediately be in the affirmative without any room for doubt!

The unsettling effect is used even better when the freeze happens to Troi - I bet she was relieved that she'd proved she wasn't mad. It works because it's like it happens to us, the audience: Picard's speaking then cuts out in mid-sentence, and like Troi we're bewildered when we see a hand pop up in front of her face. The bowl of fruit's disintegration worked really well, although Picard's hand just made me wonder how he cut those long nails off in such a short time… I bet Data's pinpoint accuracy with a phaser would have been called into use. The creativity doesn't end on the Runabout as we soon get to go the route of 'Wink of An Eye' and walk round corridors of people stood stock still.

When they first beam to the bridge you can tell that some of the shots are locked off and Troi, Picard and Data are inserted in, because of the absolute frozen poise of the other characters. It may not have been ideal to start with the best shots and then have much more of a mix with people trying to hold still. It gives more dynamic three-dimensional shots with the unfrozen characters moving around the set, but the trade-off is that some of the background cast weren't very good at keeping still. The worst one is the woman in the transporter room looking up at the Romulans on the pad - she does a massive wobble, unless that was some kind of time distortion visual flux. Yeah, that was it… Other people were excellent at holding position: Worf, for one, looks like a statue, and the woman in the corridor that Troi nearly bumps into was great until they zoomed the camera right into her face.

I wonder if in the Blu-Ray Remastered version they'll make it so the people really don't move as that would be a major improvement. There is a kind of charm to people desperately trying to stay rigidly still, so I hope these old versions of episodes don't get lost or superseded by newer ones. The idea of having to get around people because they mustn't be moved was a good one, best illustrated when they use the Jefferies tubes to try and travel the ship, but find a group of people blocking their way. But the best effects were saved for last as time goes forward and backward and it can be difficult to work out which people are actually a visual effect and which are really walking backwards, which is saying something.

The reveal that it was nothing to do with a Romulan plot or Romulan experiments leaves the aliens from outside our space-time seeming like a weak, last-minute addition to explain the problem away. They could really have done with fleshing out the race, but as a story the visuals kept us from thinking too much about the problems and good direction from Adam Nimoy, son of Leonard, made this special. The end music reminded me of 'Star Trek: Generations,' but I may have already been thinking along that route since we see the Enterprise explode. And no matter how hard I looked I could not see a beam coming from the deflector array. Maybe it was all due to temporal psychosis?

****

Pilot

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S1 (Pilot)

I came to 'Starsky & Hutch' (or 'Starsky and Hutch' as this episode has it), back in my college days in the early 2000s when it was shown on Channel 5 in the daytime. Before that, I vaguely knew the name and that they were police or detectives of some kind, but apart from the general popular culture drip most people experience that gives us a basic peripheral grasp of most things, I didn't know or care about it. I saw the series erratically and I certainly never saw the first episode, so once I had developed an appreciation for the characters and I happened to see the first season boxed set DVD on sale for a very reasonable price back then, I decided to get a better picture of the series, or at least the beginning of it.

In most drama today a pilot episode is an excuse to show the origin story of the characters, how they meet, setting up plot threads to be picked up in the series proper and generally presenting a picture of how, who and why we should care. Back in the late '70s things weren't quite so carefully planned out, or to say the least, they weren't in cop shows like this. The episode which began it all, aside from being longer than the standard episode length, running to around 70 minutes, doesn't do any of the introducing you might expect, and they had to wait about 29 years for that in the stupid parody film of 2004 in which we were 'treated' to a story of how Starsky and Hutch met - it wasn't worth the wait. It's not particularly jarring, we just meet the characters and they quickly get on with their jobs, but for minor things this could have been an episode shown at any point in the series.

The biggest reason preventing this is that it's made clear the two detectives haven't known Captain Dobey very long as they rely on Huggy Bear their informant (who seems reluctant to help them even though their very lives are at risk which is quite far from the good friend he's portrayed as in most episodes), to tell them if he's a likely suspect to want them dead. Can you imagine them ever thinking Dobey would want them dead in other episodes? No (except maybe in fun), but it's made more acceptable because the character is different since he's played by Richard Ward who went on to be in the fourth season episode 'Huggy Can't Go Home' as an old mentor of Huggy's. He made a good Captain Dobey, but there's a good reason why he wouldn't have worked on an ongoing basis: his voice is fantastic, but once you get over the novelty it can become difficult to follow what he's saying sometimes, whereas you never had that difficulty with Bernie Hamilton - you always knew exactly what his Dobey thought!

The episode opens well, in that full darkness with only the distant lights of the city to provide some perspective, but if, as I did, you come to this episode having seen others before it, you can be forgiven for being confused by Starsky's red-striped tomato, the Gran Torino being driven by some unknown college boy and his girlfriend. The reason it confuses is because as far as I know there's no other episode of the series which features more than one of those cars at the same time (in the story - of course they used more than one from a production standpoint), and the car is so recognisable and iconic that the idea there could be another one is almost impossible to grasp at first! You can almost believe the boy is Starsky, it is dark after all, but you soon realise it isn't. I wonder if the two hitmen who chat about mundane things (not getting to see the end of a John Wayne film), before carrying out cold-blooded murder, inspired the ones in the film 'Pulp Fiction'? Why didn't the hitmen realise it wasn't their targets in the car since they could see and hear what was going on? The answer comes later in the twist that they knew exactly what they were doing and to whom.

So the car gets introduced first, although it isn't the real car. The other characters soon follow, and I like the way that certain things that would become running gags or details in the series are introduced here: Hutch is a fitness freak that eats all kinds of health foods, while Starsky can't comprehend such a diet and snacks on unhealthy stuff. Hutch has his battered old car which is such a contrast to Starsky's slick, shiny motor - that was something I'd actually forgotten and is one of my favourite things of the series, especially when you see in this episode just how Hutch treats it, landing thump on the roof. It was actually quite a good idea in maintaining the shock of the city criminals when they see the two driving around as it gives more credence to the attack that everyone's heard about: they aren't in the Torino so it must have got busted up, but somehow they survived. We also learn Hutch has been married, and one of the main gags which gets two or three outings here is the confusion over which one is Starsky and which is Hutch. And of course there's the rule that if you see a swimming pool one or both of them are sure to end up in it!

I like things that are positive and make you feel better about life, and after not having watched the series for a couple of years I'd forgotten that Bay City is not a nice place to be. It seems derelict in places, rundown, an open sewer, it's openly described as a toilet bowl that the two detectives are stuck in, two bugs that can't get out. This isn't the greatest invitation to a series, I must say, but that's the way it was back then. They later didn't concentrate on the low-life and ugly street views quite so much, revelling in the sunny bay and having a mix of locations, and to be fair, the harsh environment makes us care more about the main characters, especially when they believe it's only each other they can trust. So there was never any need to build up to a bond or show how they got to this point, they just were best mates doing the best job they could and we jump in for the ride.

They describe themselves as hard-nosed cops, not bothering with the convention of good cop, bad cop, and with so many people out there that don't like them, they have good reason to be that way, but even so we do get the occasional glimpse of their soft-heartedness, such as the moment Hutch gives the tramp some money - you can tell these aren't people that get enjoyment from simply going around and beating up the bad guys and getting a thrill from a fight, they are professionals that care about the city and its people. You can't imagine at this point when they're brazenly walking into Fat Rolly's bar and taking over the place, bullying the people and generally putting their foot down, that the series could go from this to the one in the fourth season when they go undercover as eccentric hairdressers, but Season 1 was much more realistic, tough and serious than it became later. The humour was evident even in this episode, but there was a lot more irony than comedy.

Something else that became a staple of the series and begins here are the quirky characters they meet in their day. Whether it's the mortician at the morgue, the pickpocket, Fat Rolly or the girl walking the dog, they all have an off-kilter something about them. I believe Rolly was in at least one other episode, one of the hitmen looked like the guy from 'Quadromania' and the other hitman was a regular background guy I think, but I was confused by Tallman as I had it in my head that he was Stryker, a similar character who also shows up in the first season. Maybe they both had steam rooms or something. Talking of which, that scene was amusing because you could tell from how gingerly Soul and Glaser were moving that they probably didn't have anything on under the towels - they were both positioning themselves so carefully and slowly, very aware of the camera's location. Maybe that was just an impression I got, but it was a strong one.

Another familiar face was the stunt guy that would often double for Glaser and showed up as several minor characters throughout the series as one of Tallman's associates who tells them his boss wants to see them - that scene, as good as it was (the moment they do a full, grinding circle and leave tyre marks on the road is funny), didn't make much sense. Why would the goons chase them through town instead of leaving a message at the station, or were they sent to forcibly bring them in? That wouldn't make sense either because Tallman wanted to show he was on his best behaviour, even offering the protection of his house so he couldn't be accused of coercing witnesses. I love the idea of them all going down to the trial the next day together! It also doesn't make sense that Starsky and Hutch would leap out of their car and run over to the one driven by what they thought were the hitmen because they wouldn't have had time to drag them out of it if they had been the hitmen - they would have been shot as they ran towards the car.

One thing that stood out to me was how different the policing equipment of the day was compared with our own time. Obviously progress happens constantly, but it was slightly jarring to see Starsky pull out a notebook with handwritten details on it, or the book which contained notes on criminals. The chunky radios also stood out. For some reason, for all the times I'd seen this episode as clips in the opening title sequence, I always assumed when he was charging down the stairs he was holding a bomb, but it was actually his radio. At one point, after the swimming pool incident they have to ask the public to phone the police for them. And if you think about it, if Fat Rolly had had a mobile they'd never have been able to piece together the vital clue that their apparent attempted murder was an inside job! I say I watched this episode many times in the opening titles and it does feel that way because so many clips were taken from this episode, but it's interesting that this one doesn't have an opening title sequence itself, although what would become the theme music does come in towards the end.

This wasn't a family series as evidenced by the characters heading to a seedy 'adult' film showing in order to meet Huggy in his one brief scene. Huggy isn't quite the character we know at this point - he seems a bit cool about helping them and then stays as if he enjoys the film, but although it's not one of the better scenes it was at least played for humour, with the old lady in the audience who calmly pours tea from a flask as she watches the 'film'. Unfortunately the scene where he moseys into the theatre is the one used for much of the series in the credits so it's a constant reminder of this scene! There's also a fair bit of violence with shotguns blasting doors, blowing up cars and people being chucked downstairs, but there's nothing gory or completely excessive, certainly by today's standards.

The scene at the end when Hutch bravely stays crouching and firing as a car gets blown up behind him was a scene that showed how professional and effective the duo were, but also how rubbish these supposedly unstoppable hitmen really are in a pinch. The twist in the story that they were never really after the detectives was good, as was the way Tallman speaks about them as if they can't miss, but when it comes down to it, instead of coolly making an escape, they jump on top of a car roof and stay there firing shotguns at a distance. For one thing, a shotgun is a short range weapon, for another a hitman would know that you need to make yourself the smallest target and hide behind the car, and for another they wouldn't panic and go to pieces. Credit to Starsky and Hutch as they somehow manage to shoot them down, but appear to only have winged them as it looks like they're preparing to put cuffs on them!

For the series this was quite a complicated story and is another reason why it surprises if you come to it after having seen a few episodes. I'm not sure why the bad guy needed to go to all this trouble to conceal his association with the college girl, but if he was this obsessed about his public image that he'd break all the rules to cover it up, then it's a good job his career ended. It's not clear whether he was killed by the shotgun blast, but it seems likely. Another thing that doesn't make sense is that the two young people's murder wasn't being investigated because it was assumed it was mistaken identity - now I can imagine police procedures, especially in America, were a lot more lax in those days, but no murder is going to pass without investigation, surely? At least the episode ends in familiar style for the series, a funny scene between the two leads. A good, solid episode, not remarkable, but highly watchable and while I can't really say it set the groundwork it did start things off quite well.

***

Nemesis

DVD, Smallville S6 (Nemesis)

"A lot has happened" - an understatement, to say the least from Martha Kent, in an episode in which she doesn't have a lot of wisdom to impart. It was just that and the bit admitting she doesn't trust Lionel that made sense. That Clark would never give up on anyone was clearly not true as he's been at loggerheads with Lex for a good few episodes, and her belief that no one can change completely was rather a despairing point of view, unworthy of her. Interesting that the events of this episode force Clark to wonder if he's partly to blame for Lex' slide into the dark side, but you'd have to go through the entirety of the series and weigh up how often it was through his own choices and how many times Clark did something that affected him negatively. It isn't Clark's fault, it's Lionel's parenting and ultimately Lex makes his own decisions and is responsible for them. At a time when the characters seem to have become polarised it's really strange to have a story like this which throws doubt into Clark's mind.

Yes, it was a good moment when Lex returns to save his former friend's life, and yes, it was a good moment when Clark talks to Martha about seeing a glimpse of his old friend for a moment, but it's the same thing they did with the Clark and Lana storyline: over the years they kept having to bring it full circle to the 'beginning' again to sustain the story. It became repetitious, boring and fundamentally annoying. They couldn't do the same thing with the Clark and Lex friendship because it's been a steady decline over the seasons - Lex continues to perform more dastardly deeds and Clark got to the point of open hostility with him. Maybe if we were fooled into thinking Lex really wanted to change, the storyline might have mileage, but it's right back to his experiments at the end of the episode, and he refuses to tell Lana she was never pregnant. He once was a sympathetic character ripe for redemption, as portrayed in the first couple of seasons, but soon lost that compelling angle and became pretty two-dimensional as a character, and nothing would make us believe he truly regrets the choices he's made in recent seasons, he's gone too far. It didn't help that Lionel also lost a lot of mystery, and while he's regained some of that with the motive of apparently protecting Clark from Lex, neither of them ever recovered from being stripped down to basics.

It's not that this is a bad episode, the only reason it gets a low mark is because it's not enjoyable to watch. It's so full of machinations, good people making threats or taking bad positions and a general aura of negativity that the potentially fascinating developments can't render the episode a good watch. It did start out poorly with a completely unknown enemy of Lex kidnapping him and holding him hostage. I know Lex has many enemies but the number of times this has happened to him it's become a running joke rather than something to take seriously! She didn't have any depth or the believability factor - if she was such a psycho as to be kicked out of the army or bomb squad or whatever I doubt anyone would have married her. She seemed to be willing to die for no reason and yet had somehow got all the equipment together to rig up explosives throughout these tunnels that no one knew about. Maybe Lionel tipped her off about Project Ares, or the location of the tunnel, not realising the lengths she'd go to. He certainly didn't mind hanging around in them until Lex bumped into him. So Mrs. Keenan (I think that was her name) got no credibility from me, she was purely a device to get Lex and Clark trapped together.

It was a good time to clear the air, a bit like the Season 2 opener when Jonathan Kent was trapped with the reporter Roger Nixon and they came to a bit of an understanding - it ended the same way too, with Lex not holding back on his experiments despite seeming to mend some bridges a bit with Clark. They both saved each other's lives, and some things were cleared up. It was a shame something like the chisel or screwdriver that Lex attacked him with a few episodes ago was brought up and explained away so perfunctorily. Lex just mentions that he noticed the blade was concertinaed and Clark sort of brushes it off. They discuss his 'secret' in basic terms but there's no confiding his true nature (nor could I imagine there being), so it's difficult to tell how much Lex really knows, or thinks he knows, or would admit to thinking he knows! He knows about powers and Clark talks about his exploitation of those who have them, but he never asks Clark outright if he's gifted and they move on. I get that the implement was really for Lana's benefit, but the question of whether Lex knew or not could have been fulfilled much more strongly.

The other major reveal is Lionel's claim to Lana that he forced her to wed Lex, on pain of Clark's death, to protect Clark! It's a beautifully crafted get-out clause - before his position seemed to be that he was on Lex' side, after such a threat against Clark, yet they still didn't openly discuss Clark. Here we learn that he's still trying to protect Clark (and maybe the world), from his son in the most twisted way that only he would conjure up: threaten Lana so she'd marry Lex and thus stay close to him. So she's been a pawn yet again. If there's any manipulating to be done she's looking increasingly like the girl to do it, assuming the mantle of Luthorship wholeheartedly. She takes the briefcase from the police and they allow her to walk all over them on a little technicality; she considers killing Lionel until he gets his story out about being Clark's guardian angel; and she flashes her eyelashes on maximum angelic factor when ramming home the guilt at Lex, knowing full well she never had a baby (not to mention delaying passing on her info on the tunnels until she heard Clark was down there). She's quite scary in a way and it's sad to see such a nice person reduced to a cunning, almost evil persona, even for the right reasons.

That wasn't the only depressing thing, as Chloe also suggests she wouldn't mind if Lex died in the tunnels. This isn't a surprise considering he threatened her last episode and all that he did to her Mum, but it's a sign of how far things have come, so for Clark to even think he could ever be friends with Lex again is monumentally stupid. He and Chloe declared war on the guy last episode and now they're saving each other's lives. It was at least a positive sentiment that Clark can't choose who he saves, which has come up before. Okay, so there's not the happiest of endings, Lex seeing Lana go to Clark rather than come looking for him, plus he must work out that she uncovered the location of the tunnels and he only needs to talk to the officers to find out how long she was in possession of the details before she acted. There seemed to be real guilt on his face when she was going on about the baby and it's complications, but it's hard to believe he ever feels any guilt with all that he's done and it will turn out for the worse when he finds even Lana has betrayed him and has been playing him.

There were other niggles I noticed, such as why the bomb squad and all those authorities didn't just send Chloe away rather than standing around answering her questions so good-naturedly, or why Lana doesn't think about being seen by CCTV when shooting the briefcase's lock off at the mansion. Lex returning to crowbar the fallen rubble off of the trapped Clark (who once again inadvertently 'proves' he has no special powers because he couldn't escape - unless Lex realises his weakness is Kryptonite), was a surprise and I really thought he'd left him and that it would be down to Chloe and Lana to effect the rescue. Now you can never be sure if the intentions of Lex were honourable in a moment of regression to his former self, or whether he needs Clark alive and cynically did the best thing for himself? And that's what helps to make the episode uncomfortable to watch. I don't know why they went for the over-exposed visuals again like in 'Combat,' but perhaps it was to make the polystyrene rocks look real, which it did and certainly gave a different visual style to the underground scenes. I miss the warmth this series once had.

**

Progeny

DVD, Smallville S6 (Progeny)

Some serious retcon action in this one! As soon as I saw Lynda Carter I recognised her, and I never expected to see someone from 'Starsky & Hutch' in a 'Smallville' episode, but it was good to have her as Chloe's Mum. I became a little confused with how much she did or didn't know. The set up was long before meteor freaks were common, in 1995, so it seems Mora Sullivan knew she had a power to control her daughter by the fact that she rubbed her hands raw when told to scrub them until all the ink was off, but she didn't know Chloe was one of the infected back then, she couldn't have because Chloe wasn't, or at least it's been said she became infected because of all the exposure to meteor rocks and other infectees. But she booked herself into a mental institution because she didn't want to hurt her family, not because she had mental problems, is that right? So why did she have mental problems, and needed Lex' drug to become cognisant and then slipped back into a comatose state. Was she tested as far back as '95? Was LutherCorp holding her? I just couldn't work it all out, and then she seems to know Chloe has a power and she can control other people who have powers yet there's never an explanation how she knows all about this stuff. Did Lex fill her in?

He certainly didn't fill anyone else in: we learn Lana's pregnancy was all a falsehood, she was never pregnant and had been injected with something to make it seem that way. If Lex was going to fill anything in, it was going to be a grave for Chloe, but it doesn't quite come to that, although when she was holding the gun on him I thought it was a shotgun so it wasn't quite as impactful to discover it was a smoke grenade - Clark may as well have let him take the blow. Clark's powers got a good airing, with a split second dash to Lex' car to grab Chloe's incriminating button (wow, those police are really useless, I mean how difficult could it have been to find the button? For that matter why did they not even look up when Clark's huge truck roars right off the road, stops and two youngsters get out. Wouldn't they tell them to get lost?), then there was the moment he stops Lex from getting a face full of grenade, as I just mentioned, Clark presumably whisking Chloe away in the moment Lex was knocked to the ground. I wonder if he realised he'd been pushed sideways when he should have fallen backwards if the projectile had hit him? Clark also chucks that guy across the room at the mansion to protect Lana. Actually it was more like a spot of revenge as he didn't need to do it, but said "You shouldn't have done that."

I felt the concept of someone controlling other meteor freak powers was a really good one that didn't get the exploration it needed. I know she needed to hold something that belonged to the person she wanted to control, but I wanted her to be using it with multiple people, using them to get all the inmates out of there. It was one aspect that suffered with all the detail flying around. At least Lex' messing about came back to haunt him this time, or it would have if he knew what had happened: because he threatened Mora into bringing back the escapee from that 'franchise' of 33.1 (as Clark or Chloe called it - it's beginning to sound like a fast food chain!), she gets the guy to find and kill Lex, he then smashes up the mansion, chucking Lana about in the process, which leads Clark to whisk her to the Smallville Medical Centre where an impartial Doctor gives her the news of her non-pregnancy, so now she must suspect Lex has lied to her, and certainly his Doctor Albright did! Valuable lessons he should have learned this episode were: don't do evil stuff because it'll find you out, and the other one would be don't use a phone and drive. You'd think after the number of times he's been in accidents he'd have learned a bit of road sense.

I felt it was all a bit too much, piling altogether one after the other like an unruly traffic crash all these explanations and events. It would have been enough to know Chloe's Mother had a power, or that she was able to be revived and that Chloe was able to talk with her (which did, incidentally, provoke a sweetly sad ending as she sees her Mum slip back into herself), that Lana wasn't pregnant and that Chloe now knows Lex knows she's infected. To have it all there meant Chloe's story was concertinaed into the one episode and it should have played out over several. Saying that, Lynda Carter was good, if not the Mum I imagined Chloe to have - the only time we saw her previously was from behind in a Season 4 or 5 episode when Chloe visits her so they were wise to leave the slot open for a 'name' guest star.

There were some good sequences, but they often didn't go very far: Lex having his car skid off the road was fine, but after we've seen so many over the top car crashes on the series it looked a bit tame. The same could be said for the scene in which Chloe and her Mum try to escape using the super-strong guy to fight for them - it's over almost before it's begun, so it felt a little bit like they were conserving the budget (and I didn't buy that a guard would care about the inmates enough to run into the cell all concerned, so Chloe could get out). I suppose the biggest thing we learn (other than that Chloe keeps a lump of Kryptonite handy for emergencies, unless that was Martha's and she kept it in the kitchen drawer - actually I wondered why she wasn't at home when she was needed, but she did come in eventually), is that the war is about to begin between Lex and his enemies, as Clark says.

They do like their multiple endings so that may have contributed to a feeling of rushing to fit all this stuff in, but the threat against Chloe with both of them fully conscious, not being manipulated by anything or anyone, laid down a line in the sand and infuriating Clark. Only Lana is stuck in the middle, and while he's not prepared to do anything that would hurt her, she's in the same position with him so Lex seems to have all the cards, and his professed love for her a blind. We still don't know what Chloe's power is, but I'm glad it was addressed in some way. It would be nice to see her Mum again (not to mention old Gabe who hasn't been in it for seasons at a time!), and Oliver Queen's apartment, though Star City is beginning to sound like a dumping ground: don't worry, if anything goes wrong we can send people to Star City. Is it some kind of paradise? If so maybe Clark should up sticks and move there, and maybe change the title to 'Starville.'

***

Broken Link

DVD, DS9 S4 (Broken Link)

First off, let us deal with the one bad point of this episode and gratefully acknowledge those in charge that stopped if from going any further: I refer to the awful character of Chalan Aroya, owner of the Celestial Cafe, untrustworthy Bajoran show-off who was introduced in this episode. I can only praise the powers that were, that her introduction did not lead to a recurring role and indeed this was her only appearance on the series. There was a degree of humour from the scene in which Garak calls Odo to his shop on the pretence of an emergency, but in reality it's to set him up with Aroya. It may have been a conspiracy as she seems unsurprised to meet Odo, her purring kitten-like 'charm' oozing right at him a soon as he's in the room. Did she ask Garak to summon Odo or was this the Cardassian's idea, furthering the seeds of friendship that had built up between them, weirdly after Odo had been tortured by him? It's a charming moment when we see Garak's intent, but crucially all the good in the scene comes between those two, with Aroya just getting in the way. If she was that 'friendly' to Odo I can't help but suspect she's that friendly to every male that crosses her path and he had a fortunate escape. Jill Jacobson had been a 'TNG' episode called 'The Royale.' No offence to her, but that was not a good episode. I almost wonder what happened to her in the hiatus period between seasons, but then I remember I'm simply glad she never showed up ever again!

Odo has been pretty well served this season, he wasn't one of the most featured characters, but neither was he one of the least; a steady presence throughout, unlike some characters who had an uneven contribution - look at Kira, or to an even greater degree, Dax. Even Jake had more to do than her in terms of vocal support in episodes. Quark doesn't feature much in this episode, but his season had ended, in a way, with the previous episode. He still gets a great scene with Odo when he wishes him well in all but the words he says. This time Odo's going to his people and intending to return, but that would not always be the case, so this is like a dress rehearsal for the last episode of the series. Talking of dress, I couldn't help noticing Quark was wearing the drab brown wardrobe he tended to sport back in Season 1, and at first I questioned why, but then I realised all his finery was taken by Brunt, even the shirt off his back, so he must have passed on these old clothes to Rom who has now returned them to him - generosity can be beneficial after all, he's learnt!

This finale isn't the most action-packed of closures for a season, especially when you think back to the space battle at the end of Season 2 in 'The Jem'Hadar' and the changeling to changeling fight of 'The Adversary' at the end of Season 3 (and especially not compared with the huge endings of Season 5, 6 and 7). It's more like the end of Season 1 which went out quietly, though this has a sting in the tale, and Gowron's last words which close out the season are perhaps the most understated of the series considering where they led the seasons to come: "There will be war." No ifs, no buts, no maybes, it's a definite challenge, and though the turn of events couldn't exactly have been predicted it set the bar of expectation high. Season 5 would not disappoint, being the best and most consistently excellent season of any Trek series, or any TV series, ever. But what of Season 4? I don't think it's quite the massive step up from Season 3 that it's commonly thought to be. It benefited from a jazzing up, a brightening, an overhaul so that it was certainly better looking than before, but it didn't quite live up to the immediate promise set up in the fantastic opening episode. 'The Way of The Warrior' and 'The Visitor' were never equalled in the rest of the season and the Klingons didn't become the serial menace that might have been anticipated.

That's not to say the season didn't go well as there were plenty of great episodes and Worf was very well integrated into the cast, so much so that by this final episode he's telling Sisko, Dax and Kira how Odo thinks and what he would and wouldn't like! That's a long way from the Klingon who was uncertain about his place in the Federation and traded harsh words with Odo or messed up his investigations early in the season. They came to understand each other thanks to their similarity, and Worf's knowledge of Odo is like a marker at the end of the season, showing he's as much a part of the series as anyone else in the cast. But where does 'Broken Link' sit in the quality of the series? I would say towards the higher end, along with the last few episodes and much of the first half of the season. It deals with Odo's crime against the Founders and brings us back at the last minute to the Klingon problem, while providing many great character scenes. It may not be an adrenaline rush to watch, but there are still plenty of moments to savour.

Seeing a fleet of Jem'Hadar ships surround the Defiant has to be one of those moments, as does pretty much anything involving Garak. I always forget his fight with Worf, perhaps because I associate it with his time as part of the crew in Season 6, but it was a surprise I was pleased to discover. Worf is almost as taken aback as we are and for a moment there it looks like he, the hardest Trek character ever, could be bested by the enigma that is Garak. You can argue that Worf didn't expect the tailor to be such an expert of hand to hand combat, and that he wasn't expecting an attack (he's probably used to people just doing what he says), but the fact remains that Garak gave as good as he got. His intensity of purpose means he will keep trying even when faced with Mr. Worf when anyone else would say 'fair cop' and leave it at that, but he uses all his powers of persuasion to try to appeal to the warrior in Worf and only when that fails does he resort to desperate physical tactics.

Garak gets some cracking stuff that shows him as both a friend to Odo and valuable in his assistance of keeping the Constable's mind active. We get another confirmation that he was a gardener, though I'm not sure we'd ever heard he was stationed on Romulus before. He goes along on the mission ostensibly to learn of survivors from the Cardassian task force that decimated the Founder's previous homeworld, but in reality it's to learn about the fate of Tain, his mentor. Did he conceive of a plan to take out the Founders before he went aboard? It would be hard to believe the idea hadn't crossed his mind, but no doubt many plots circle that deep and devious mind of his, it's just a question of whether those thoughts solidify. Once the Female Changeling had sentenced his entire race to death he wasn't going to hesitate.

It takes a lot to shock Garak, but when she tells him he and his race are all dead, in an uncharacteristically venomous (though still matter of fact), way, it's like he's been dealt a physical blow and almost staggers back. It takes superhuman effort for him to retake control and smile a poisonously polite smile. The Founders rarely give out their plans, even in a general way so it shows how contemptuous she is of the Cardassians that she takes time out to let him know his people's doom. She always planned to carry it out, even when the events of Season 5 gave the Cardassians a stay of execution, she and the Founders would never forget they'd left their home because of them - notice the Founders never rush things. They kept that hate for the Cardassians all through the series, and their sentence on Odo was a process of long thought and discussion. Equally they didn't send Jem'Hadar pouring through the Wormhole at the first opportunity, but stepped back and let the Alpha Quadrant destabilise itself.

Odo's illness (supposedly passed to him by the Vorta Weyoun, a few episodes ago, but never confirmed), suffers in quite the opposite way to his torture by Garak (or the later virus he'd carry) - in those cases he was dried out and desiccating, whereas this is a more natural disease forcing him to melt, unable to retain his shape. I know Kira was only being a good friend when she gave him the criminal activity report to read, but hadn't she and the others just agreed not to disturb Odo? So she goes right along and visits him! Of course she didn't know he'd be stupid enough to try and take on some criminals. He really should have contacted his deputies, but it's a matter of pride with Odo. At least we had one last chance to see the Boslic Captain, she of the purple hair. No doubt the reason she never came back to DS9 was because she thought she might be held accountable for Odo's 'death' as he melted right in front of her and her crew's eyes, a gooey arm pitifully reaching out.

Once again the Starfleet crew head into the Gamma Quadrant and it's a far cry from the nervousness in Season 3 - they've been happy to go off into that quadrant throughout the season. Maybe it's a case of when you feel pain in another part of your body you forget the pain of your first injury? With Klingons on the rampage (albeit in a polite, political way, as seen in 'Rules of Engagement'), the Dominion seemed a less immediate problem, but even so, other expeditions included planetary surveys and tasks which didn't seem all that essential. This time they've got a good reason to venture into Dominion space: their loyalty to Odo and the knowledge that only his own people can help him. The Female Changeling even admits that Odo's crime may be his people's fault for sending him out as an infant. The psychology of the Founders (all that 'bullied becomes bully,' crossed with a desire to seek out new information by casting out their babies), could fill a volume, but through it all you can tell she cares for Odo. He's one of them, and for the first time, perhaps, he realises that, and that's why he submits to their judgement.

The two most powerful results of that judgement are that he is made human (while retaining his recognisable face - a wise move by the writers because the explanation that it was to remind him of his loss worked 'in world' and the real reason would be that it would change his character too much if he had a new face), the other is that Gowron is revealed to be a changeling, explaining his actions over this season. On the first subject there's no point wondering how shapeshifters could make one of their people human. Magic, who knows? It makes me wonder if Odo's insides are all formed by a changeling spy - even his blood could be a changeling coursing though him, learning everything that happens. That's not the case, but it could have been an option. You never know with these shapeshifters - just look at their planet. The new world is practically all an ocean of goo, with only the odd bit of rock for humanoid visitors to perch on. The Vorta probably visit occasionally for instructions, but you can tell the changelings have become purer, intent on their Great Link. I only hope Sisko and Bashir brought some rations down with them as the 'hearing' may have taken several days. At least they wouldn't need water - a cup of shapeshifter goop is very nutritious, I hear…

They weren't afraid to make major and far-reaching changes to characters and this season was full of just such changes: Worf's brother's mind wiped, Kira pregnant and looking out for Gul Dukat's daughter, O'Brien's family returning, Rom leaving the bar, Quark losing his place in Ferengi society and a host of others. I especially love the way Gowron is 'revealed' as a changeling. On paper it's a bit of a limp way to finish a season, with three people talking abut what the Klingon leader's saying, but the way the camera creeps in to Odo's face, and his voice rises with each sentence, to a crescendo of revelation, then cuts out. Excellent directing, acting and writing, and that about sums up the season as a whole.

****

Second Chances

DVD, TNG S6 (Second Chances)

We've seen duplicates before so many times: parallel versions, alternate versions, mirror, android or clone versions, even some from different time periods, but this time it's personal. The reason Riker never got on with his Father is probably the same reason he can't get on with what is essentially a twin brother - they're the John Wayne of the Trek universe and one ship ain't big enough for the both of them. It could also be the fact that they see their own flaws in the other as Worf suggests to Data in a continuation of their personal conversations from the preceding episode. One word to describe this episode is certainly personal - Troi chats openly about things in the past to someone who's almost a stranger.

Why does Tom Riker look practically the same as Will? I suppose they really did make the same decisions over facial hair and even hairstyle - Tom could have chosen to grow his really long or shave to a skinhead. He might have parted it differently or done all kinds of things with his appearance, only Mr. Mot could ever hope to understand his reasoning. It is credible that they would both look so similar, but I can't help feeling this episode should have gone further than reminding us about the Riker/Troi thing and delved into the psychology of being alone for eight years. Tom seems to be practically the same as Will, but I suppose if he'd been a gibbering idiot it would have taken far too much of the story to get to the point where he could be a genuine contender against Will.

So what does the episode consist of? There's not much of a mystery as Tom's origins are swiftly explained. He doesn't have a nefarious ulterior motive as he's still a true blue Starfleet officer. So all that's left to play are the reactions from the crew on seeing a new version of their Commander walking around (which they don't address), and Troi going slightly gooey over him (addressed by her girly chat with Beverly). There's something missing here and the word drama springs to mind. Yes, the two Rikers are almost at each other's throats, but they're too professional to do what you'd expect and have a big fight. I wonder if this was a limitation with the technology of the time or a creative decision? It shouldn't have been a technical problem as Kirk was beating himself up all the time on 'TOS' so I can only assume they wanted to delve into the idea of what two Rikers on the Enterprise would amount to.

Sadly, it's not a lot, with only the scene on the rickety bridge to bring some kind of closure to the pair. But it's a strange moment, not exactly a friendly one, just a realisation that they are both alike, maybe? It's difficult to pin down exactly what's going on, although the poker scene suggested Tom bowing to Will's superiority or station or something. I like that Picard proves such a good mediator again, his conciliatory tone when dealing with Will very wise. I think what's missing is that you never really believe anything bad will come of their actions because they're both proved such straight-up Starfleet officers. Not even the first African American female astronaut guest starring as a Transporter operator, or Levar Burton directing for the first time can save the episode from mediocrity.

As with many aspects of Trek, 'DS9' came along and shook things up a bit and there's certainly a lot more drama in the sequel, 'Defiant,' on that series, but two Rikers should have provided all the necessary drama in this episode. Tom's career took a bit of a dive and he went the way he came, joining the Maquis, sacrificing himself for the cause and ending up in prison from which we never hear from him again. Add to that that Will and Troi do eventually get married and you have to wonder why Tom never returned as this resentful enemy, like Kes on 'Voyager,' to take revenge on the double and his wife who never came to his aid. Stuart Baird might have had more success if he'd gone down that route, an extra double to add to Shinzon and B4 wouldn't have stretched credibility any more than it already was. Maybe Tom was freed and lived out a quiet life away from Starfleet. Either way he started out trapped and apparently ended that way too, so that's a bit negative and makes the character seem a bit of a dead end and this episode an exercise in digging up the past, but not in the best way.

**

Rightful Heir

DVD, TNG S6 (Rightful Heir)

Religion, politics, bat'leth battles, a personal quest for a crewmember and a shipload of Klingons - it feels like a 'DS9' episode, before they'd begun to do that kind of thing. It also sets the stage for Worf to join that series as episodes like this showed how he could fit in. It's quite far removed from the usual 'TNG' stories, delving much deeper into Klingon life and society with clerics and scientists performing experiments and honest talk about the state of the race - they've become decadent and dishonourable, forgetting the noble heritage that we're told has been passed down through hundreds of years. The thing is, the Klingons have rarely shown themselves to be the great people of honour they're always boasting about, and in fact they've been quite the opposite. Only good examples like Worf have weighed the balance in a positive light and much that we think we know about the race is skewed in the wrong direction. This episode was necessary to point out the inconsistencies in Klingon traditions and their actions, but rather than solve the problem, this (like Boreth), is a place of questions. I could imagine these blights on society being addressed in future, but they don't come up nearly as much as you'd think, the race consistently shown to be fighting when in reality their fighting nature seems to be a big part of what has caused their infrastructure to crumble.

Not that the Klingons have ever given in to their people's weaknesses and died out, but they haven't lived the lives they could have lived if they were as honourable as Worf, and it would have been fantastic if Emperor Kahless had ushered in a new era of nobility and self-sacrifice. I'm sure he did change many Klingons, but there's still something missing from even the best men's lives as Worf is proof. I love the notion that Kahless could still come back one day, though the romantic stories and legends (such as the forging of the first bat'leth!), do little to assuage the gap in Worf's faith. I have to say I believed. Not at first - I thought this Kahless was just a large, bumbling fighter, as wide in girth as he was tall and lacking any real substance. Not the way I might have imagined the greatest Klingon warrior of all time, that's for sure. But as he spoke and acted, as he rallied his men's affections and showed such strong belief in himself as Kahless I grew to appreciate the character and he won me over so much that I wished he'd been in other episodes and had crossed over to other series' like Gowron, Kurn, Kang, Kor and Koloth did.

His bat'leth battle against Worf was exciting, though I sensed Worf's hesitance at accepting the validity of the fight as it was basically called off by Kahless by diverting the attention of the assembled watchers, ending the fight early. To begin with it suggests he did this on purpose but as we go on we learn he really believes he is Kahless and this self-belief fostered by his creators is half of what makes him a possible true Kahless. It was still a fast and furious battle and the knife fight was also good, though it would have been better to have seen Gowron put in his place. The leader calls down contempt on this attempt to usurp power, but it's a new era for his people. Sadly it doesn't turn out to be the panacea that was needed - later, in 'DS9,' the Emperor opposes Gowron's actions against the Federation, but it doesn't do much good. It would take a superior warrior to beat the sly Gowron, but it was to happen eventually.

I sometimes find it difficult to keep up on the state of relations between the Klingon leader and Worf since I watch both 'DS9' and 'TNG' and at different times they're friends and enemies, but at least Worf was able to influence him into accepting this version of Kahless. Worf seemed to get a bit mixed up as he suggested the people didn't need a false god, but the Klingons were supposed to have killed all their gods. Does that mean they put up one of their own people on that pedestal to worship in the place of gods? That seems to go against the Klingon way, but then they are full of little self-contradictions like that and in any case the writers didn't want Worf to be too religious since he is a Starfleet officer and that would go against the ideals of the series a bit. They weren't as brave as 'DS9' in putting characters with real, unshakeable faith in the cast so that Worf's beliefs were really a bit of a leap for him.

Riker was another to make a bit of a leap (though not of faith) when he assumes something's wrong because Worf's late for duty. It would have been a bit embarrassing if he'd broken in and found Worf had simply overslept! Picard's excellence as a Captain comes to the fore again when he visits Worf in his quarters to chastise him, but also to give him leave to pursue his personal quest. He's a very understanding leader, though I have to admit I was waiting for a 'Qa'pla' at the end which never came. One big question I had as the episode progressed was why a Federation ship (the flagship, no less), was required to transport Kahless to the homeworld. Surely a Klingon ship would be closer? The answer is given in the episode by none other than Gowron, who claims he didn't want Kahless turning a ship full of Klingons to his side, which is fair enough, and a good enough reason to get the Enterprise in there.

Kahless had been seen once before, way back in the third season of 'TOS,' though again it was a reproduction of the man, not the man himself. It made sense that Klingons of that era would re-imagine Kahless as a superior Klingon that looked like them so the Excalbians probably got their information from the Klingons of the day, which explains the difference in appearance with the pasty-headed version on display here. I like that it was Worf's experiences with the young Klingons whom he rescued from the camp in 'Birthright' that instigates the story, though I'm not sure why his visit to Boreth (a place he returned to after the destruction of the Enterprise), coincided with the fulfilment of the cleric's plan to bring Kahless back. Perhaps they took advantage of his presence and the fact that he had links to Gowron and the High Council as the quickest route to acceptance for their clone, and it worked: without Worf he may never have become Emperor. That also explains why Koroth didn't want Worf to leave. I was surprised when I realised Koroth was played by the same actor that would later play the strong-willed Captain Keogh in 'DS9' as they're such different people. That's acting!

It's sad Worf doesn't find his faith strengthened, as even Data seems to have been more successful in that area - his leap of faith was to believe he was a person and not just a machine. I don't think the real Kahless would be very happy with the cleric's assertion that it doesn't matter about him, it's just his words that mattered, especially if he really does come back one day. Gowron cares only for his own power, however and demonstrates that again. I suppose the positive side is that he keeps order in the Empire and at least he sees the wisdom of accepting this Kahless as a figurehead Emperor. If only we could have seen how Kahless settled into the role and the troubles he faced. It would make a good book.

***

Body Parts

DVD, DS9 S4 (Body Parts)

It was all Rom's fault, if he hadn't got Quark to put his body on the Ferengi Futures Exchange he wouldn't have had to cancel the contract and lose everything, while realising what he really had: good friends. It may have been beneficial for Quark to go through this ordeal because it takes him to rock bottom so that he knows what his base is. He thought it was his devotion to Ferengi tradition and the Rules of Acquisition, but once he's become an outcast Ferengi with Brunt taking everything he had, his patrons and friends on the station rally round to get the bar going again in one of the warmest happy endings to an episode ever, and one I'd completely forgotten! Now Quark knows that it is the people around him (he's a people person he says in one episode), and doing business that are the two things that matter more to him than his peers. Even though he'd like to think of himself as a great Ferengi businessman he does have a heart and though he's always fought his unconventional upbringing and the fact that his family are about as un-Ferengi as can be, he is one of them, as much as he'd like it to be otherwise.

Jeffrey Combs excels himself on his third appearance as Brunt, and fifth Trek episode in total - filming of this episode ran back to back with 'To The Death' and his expert portrayal of Vorta Weyoun, but without the screen credit no one could guess they were played by the same man. Everything about them is different: their walk, talk, body shape, face, attitude, voice, everything. It's a tribute to Combs that he could accomplish such a variety of nuances to separate the two aliens, helped ably by the makeup. For the first time Brunt becomes a personal enemy of Quark - previously it was just business, but Brunt's become so disgusted by Quark's entire family that his bullying nature compels him to hurt Quark.

It makes me question whether Brunt set up the whole thing in the first place, maybe bribing Dr. Orpax to lie about Quark's condition, and the Doctor later regretting his actions. A Ferengi doctor must be a thing to behold: how could they be trusted since they would put their own welfare above their patients? Since Brunt has the money to spare it's all worth it to him, though the business does give the lie to 'TNG' episode 'Suspicions' and the Federation's gullible acceptance of 'Ferengi Death Rituals' which don't permit the body to be messed with in autopsy since it's going to be 'buried.' There's certainly no burial as they claimed back then, unless they were referring to being buried within another Ferengi's collection of vacuum desiccated remains! We actually heard about this custom back in Season 2, but why didn't the Nagus sell his supposedly deceased form in Season 1? Surely it would have sold for a huge amount - he wasn't dead, that's why.

A season without the Grand Nagus and his snorting, choking laugh is a season incomplete, and in the same way that we got Shakaar as head of the Bajorans instead of Kai Winn, we did at least get Gint, the first Grand Nagus, instead of Zek. Except it wasn't really him, it was Rom as Gint in Quark's dream (getting in some early practice for the future, whether he knew it or not). I wonder why Avery Brooks chose not to give the dream sequence a different visual style from the rest of the episode. It could have been a Holosuite program as there's no surreal mistiness or weird camera angles, and it's almost as if he deliberately chose not to have any dream-like devices to stop it being a cliche, but I feel it was necessary to demonstrate that this wasn't another scene in the episode, even if Quark really had gone to the Divine Treasury. Not that I'm criticising Avery's direction, although it did seem a bit held back, not drawing attention to itself, much like the way he plays Sisko, though in that case the Captain's inner power sometimes erupts to the detriment of his enemies.

I can't help but love the Ferengi episodes, even if they are over the top. I'm so used to their style of comedy that I don't even see it that way, and it's so refreshing - Garrett Wang's complaint that they weren't allowed to emote in 'Voyager' seems to have been completely disregarded in 'DS9' and Quark's one of the absolute best characters for that, his eyes as wide as Gowron's in several scenes. I like the way Bashir comes along and just tosses his message from Dr. Orpax in there, that Quark doesn't have Dorek syndrome whatever that means, and yet it's the lifting of Quark's death sentence! Another fun Bashir scene is when he's sitting opposite Miles, telling him that his baby's going to have to come to term inside Kira's womb: an Englishman and an Irishman in a room watched over by an American (sounds like the set up for a joke), as Sisko stands there doing his duty as a Captain and standing by his man in a crisis. O'Brien's face is more expressive than Quark's, which is hard to beat in this episode, but he does a massive Spock eyebrow and his whole face seems able to rise and fall like waves on a sandy beach.

Season 4 has been one for huge changes in 'DS9' and the wider Trek universe. The biggie was the Klingons returning to enmity with the Federation, then the Cardassians became friends and the Dominion didn't prove quite as much the immediate threat they seemed at the end of Season 3. On a more personal level, Worf joined DS9, tried to kill his brother and then wiped his mind, Kira became almost friends with Dukat ending up being the guardian of the child he never knew he had and bringing her to the station. So many things happened this season and in these final two episodes the trend didn't change - now Quark isn't considered a Ferengi and the O'Brien baby is inside Kira. They weren't afraid to make radical changes, far more than any other Trek series which is another reason why 'DS9' is the greatest and most satisfying I've ever seen.

It's been good to have Keiko and Molly back on the station, her scenes with Kira were especially realistic, the sense of loss so evident in her demeanour. Kira's brought into a whirlwind of new experiences, though she doesn't realise yet what she's let herself in for - she might not be so upbeat about the situation if she did! The moment Miles and Keiko try and force each other into being the one to ask Kira to stay with them is quite funny as they're so worried about imposing on her, yet feel responsible for her now and possessive. I think Kira will regret allowing little Molly permission to play in her room at any time, as immediately she's said that the girl's onto her bed in a flash. Auntie Nerys needs her peace and quiet.

All this and Garak too? It must be a dream. Even Morn gets a better role this time, Garak getting quite uptight with the lumbering barfly, literally throwing his new trousers into Morn's arms in irritation. Morn's also along later carrying a chair for Captain Sisko and immediately swipes his usual spot, though how he's going to be able to swivel on a chair, I don't know. At least with the bar empty you can see the yellow and red glowing mural at its best. When Quark goes to ask Garak to kill him the Cardassian takes on all the snakelike tendencies of his people, moving slowly towards Quark, his eyes hypnotically fixed on him, only blinking once like a lizard. He should set up a little kiosk in his shop just for assassin hire (or gardening), though as soon as Quark asked him to make it a surprise (in a hilarious sequence where he counts off his problems with each form of death that's been suggested - the best one was probably that nerve gas smelt bad!), I thought 'he's going to regret that' because until death comes he's going to be terrified at every moment.

The episode is a real coming together of the recurring cast and I think Season 4 was the beginning of this trend where multiple characters who weren't the headliners would be a major part of stories. Just look at the cast list of this one - it features the O'Brien family, Rom, Garak and Brunt, something that would become a lot more common in Season 5 and onwards. I wonder if the Gint makeup Max Grodenchik wore was actually Zek's modified for him or a new mould? Although the foreground is the foremost thing on our minds, the background is populated by some interesting aliens: the tall green man carrying furniture into Quark's that Sisko stops (when Quark has a knee-jerk reaction and asks for a storage fee proving his instincts are still and always will be Ferengi), is the same alien that the adolescent Jem'Hadar fought as a hologram in Season 3 (also directed by Brooks). The long-faced alien can also be seen coming in the doorway at one point and a mouse-faced Yridian is seen leaving the bar on another occasion. We hear of Cousin Gaila again (the one with the moon), and another relative to add to the list is Uncle Gorad, who Quark presumably still owes money to since he gave back Brunt's latinum.

I felt the dream could be interpreted as a bit of a jab at the Ten Commandments as Gint says rules don't matter, even if they're written on stone, they're just suggestions, but the Ferengi themselves are an entire race that is against those rules, proving they are there for the good, since Ferengi are purely selfish, lustful and greedy to the detriment of all others - we're not supposed to take their culture as a genuine alternative to the Federation, but a warning to our time because the Ferengi are 20th/21st Century humans, that's what's always been said. Plus this was coming from Quark's psyche and as Gint said he was just looking for a reason to break the rules.

On the Runabout front we get the USS Volga joining the cast, so there are apparently four Runabouts on the station now. Where do they keep the extra one, attached to a docking pylon or is there room in one of the launch bays for an extra ship? Once again Kira's taking a Runabout into the Gamma Quadrant for nothing more important than a botanical survey! Does she have a death wish or something? And Bashir hasn't learned from his previous experience as he goes along for the ride too, though this time he didn't discover an alien race that needed him to cure them. I'd forgotten how great the ending for this episode was, it really goes out on a happy note, perhaps in preparation for the more devastating finale to come, but I'd still like to know how Garak had planned to dispatch Quark, 'The Synthehol King' from this universe. I guess we'll never know.

****

Combat

DVD, Smallville S6 (Combat)

A swirling cacophony flows over the episode, mainly at the end, where strange emotions and events play together, uncertainty clouding much of it, but this cacophonic style is true of the whole episode - it's a load of bright lights, loud noise and unreality, so it's fitting that the subject was basically wrestling. Every sci-fi/fantasy series has to have a wrestling episode. I don't know why, but previous examples include the Rock appearing in 'Star Trek: Voyager,' Big Show in 'Star Trek: Enterprise' and now we have Kane in 'Smallville.' And Ashley, but I'd never heard of her. It makes sense for wrestlers to be in these things because they're acting all the time in their profession so as long as it's a macho story about fighting then they fit right in.

The title might better have served the content if it had been called 'Anger' as 'Combat' sounds too detached from the fiery rage Clark's gone through now that he's been forced to accept Lana and Lex are married. The story is really much more about this and his guilt for feeling that way, than fighting (and for killing Titan, the ex-Phantom Zoner played by Kane). I have no idea if Titan was an established character or one they created for the series, but in either case he wasn't a character, more of a catalyst for Clark to get over his frustration and move on to the next level, which is that it's occurred to him that Lana may have been coerced into making her decision. It's a bit of a leap, and a fanciful one at that, and I can already imagine the scepticism he'll be treated with whenever he airs this particular idea.

On Lana's side she also goes through a tough time of it, refusing to completely embrace her marriage with the excuse she hasn't caught up with it all yet, which then leads to her baby having complications. Is this something to do with Lex? In jealousy did he give her something that would induce early birth so they could get on with married life or was the baby fine and he just got that new doctor, Dr. Allbright, to remove it without Lana knowing and just say it went wrong? Why does he shed a tear when he throws the baby's picture into the fire (along with Lana's medical records from the other doctor, Dr. Langstrom whom he killed last episode and which he'd promised to get for her), is it because he genuinely lost a baby he wanted, is it because his experiment's gone wrong, or is it because he's sorry for Lana? Is the baby in fact alive and well and destined to grow up in secret? All these questionable outcomes could be true, it's difficult to tell.

Lois Lane makes it back to the series after a break and immediately gets into a cage fight, first with some female fighter (who was pretty useless it must be said), then against Clark. It's kind of embarrassing the way the writers use her sometimes and demeans the character, and also she's completely on the outside as usual. Unless she was actually conscious and witnessed some of Clark's fight with Kane, sorry, Titan… But that's not even hinted at. The underground fight club with its internet output gave the budget a bit of relief as it meant they didn't have the screaming crowd associated with wrestling. It was sickening to have this internet site where people could vote on whether Titan's 'krypto' opponent (as Chloe called them), would live or die.

The episode was loud, brash and full on visually, though not mentally, with only the talk between Clark and Martha at the end to breathe some goodness and worthiness into a basic thumping episode. Clark feels remorse over killing Titan and worries he'll have to kill all the other Zoners he thinks must be out there, his Mother reassuring him that the difference between them is that he feels sorry for what happened whereas Titan would have killed without thought. Then again he looked like he would do most things without thought. The Belle Reve angle didn't add much and the irritating cowboy host looked like he should have been one of the patients, not an employee. It's also terrible security that he could get patients out, have them killed and then get them back in their cells. Belle Reve should really be investigated, big time! There was a reminder of Green Arrow and the lads fighting against Lex' plans by infiltrating the various facilities which is good to know, but what Lex has in store remains to be seen. We were due a duff episode and this fitted the bill.

**

The Quickening

DVD, DS9 S4 (The Quickening)

Just what was so important about a planet survey mission that Kira felt she had to go into the Gamma Quadrant to do it? Was it really worth the risk of running into the Jem'Hadar? Couldn't they have sent a probe to do the job? Coming off the back of 'To The Death' where they'd formed a short term alliance with the Jem'Hadar it might have been argued they didn't feel as much at risk, but it was made clear at the end that it was a one time only arrangement not to be repeated, and Kira spends a week hiding in a nebula rather than let patrolling Jem'Hadar ships know she's there. That raises another point: what did she do in that Runabout for a week? They should have shown us a montage of her doing push-ups, jogging a circuit round the ship (a good excuse to finally show the back end of the Runabout which they never got around to do doing on 'DS9'), reading Odo's criminal activity reports, listening to Bajoran music, and looking bored. Or maybe the nebula was so fascinating it took up all her time running scientific surveys? Except Kira isn't the science whizz, Dax is, so maybe their positions should have been reversed?

It's nice to see Dax let her hair down with Bashir, acting as his interpreter, reassuring him when he's beating himself up, and puncturing his bubble of arrogance when needed. Kira wouldn't have had the finesse to do all that. We see some of the enthusiastic first season Bashir coming through as he eagerly sets up shop to beat the terrible blight of the Dominion, but by the end he's been able to accept the slap in the face that showed his own mistake of believing he could do what no one else could and learned from it, another in a line of stories which slapped down his boisterous, happy-go-lucky attitude and tempered it with experience and a dash of wisdom so that it's fascinating to see his journey through the series, slowly becoming less ardent, but not losing his caring nature.

Rene Auberjonois did some of his best directorial work on this episode, my favourite shot being 'The Lion King' moment when Trevean holds up the baby, free of the blight thanks to Bashir, the camera sweeping over the throng and across to the Doctor who watches from a distance, standing in the breach of a massive wall as if he's bridged the gap, however small he may look compared with that thick construct, it only takes two hands to reach either side and bridge it, and that's what he did by saving the unborn children of the Teplans. I also love the way the episode ends with Bashir not ready to give up on the population still suffering and destined to die from the blight, he works late into the night (you can tell it's night by the subdued lighting and that no one walks past the Infirmary), the camera and us pulling back to leave him to it.

Towards the end of the episode I could imagine this being a story used to write his character out if they'd wanted to - rather like they did with Kai Opaka they could have had Bashir permanently set up on the planet to spend the rest of his days trying to cure the horrible disease and helping the people. The blight again brings out the true nature of the Dominion, just in case we were beginning to feel comfortable with them - a disease genetically engineered to make them suffer and die, and even worse, to be exacerbated by the emissions of technology so that advancement by the Teplans or assistance by other races would only make things worse - now that's cruel. Perhaps the most intense moment of the episode comes as Bashir's patients become affected by his equipment - one cries out, then another and another, until they're all writhing in pain, the lesions on their bodies rippling and pulsating with agony. They cry for Trevean to save them, those that can move run from the room and Bashir stands in the midst of the chaos horrified at his own conceited self-belief crashing down around him.

The effect of the blight being achieved by CGI is quite a fascinating step on the journey towards the digital medium that was slowly sweeping through television, and 'DS9' is one of those that benefited from the growing trend, just as 'Voyager' would take things even further. But the latter series could sometimes use CGI too much before it had reached its peak, the three-dimensional planetscapes seen in the last seasons didn't compare with many of the matte landscapes painted, this episode an excellent proof of how good they could be: we see various parts of the village at different times of day, well integrated into the real landscape in which extras are walking or a little girl runs up to the house to announce the arrival of Bashir. The mattes aren't the only thing that enhance the episode, the production values in general seemed particularly high, with large, detailed indoor and outdoor sets and so many extras!

I did feel some of them overdid it a bit - the man that walks round Bashir and Dax when they first arrive, pointing continuously; the man in the background that scrambles away when Bashir beams down alone - he's sitting on a broken structure and climbs away as if shocked by the transporter or Bashir. There's even a guy that spits in Bashir's path, the good doctor careful to look down at where he's putting his feet! If the extras got more attention than they deserved, at least the guest cast were not wanting in that regard either - Ekoria was such a good character, believable and someone we cared about because of her implicit trust in Bashir and kind, simple ways. Trevean wasn't so likeable, but that only made Bashir's achievement at the end shine the brighter that he could change the older man's perceptions. Bashir may have been bigheaded, he may have been thoughtless and arrogant, but he also knew that he'd been those things and learned valuable lessons. It helped that he did actually save the future of those people, so his confidence wasn't destroyed, it was simply knocked healthily.

The scene at the beginning with Quark in trouble for his merchandising scheme was really only an excuse to get the other actors into the episode, but it made sense not to have a B-story to cut to since the main plot was engrossing enough and insular, Bashir's isolation from home and from the people around him might have played oddly off of a jolly Quark story back on the station. I'd like one of those mugs Worf furiously tipped and I'd have loved to see the entire Quark advert they were going to come up with until Auberjonois shortened it to a jingle, but I've got absolutely no complaints about his direction, he did a very good job. There was never a moment I didn't believe I wasn't on an alien planet and Bashir's struggle was amply projected onto the screen.

****

Suspicions

DVD, TNG S6 (Suspicions)

Beverly Crusher is Poirot. How nice to have a Dr. Crusher episode at last. Her starring roles are pretty uncommon, especially ones that aren't about Wesley or Picard. It was difficult to buy the premise of her as a scientific diplomat - she's shown a lot of interest in science, yes, but diplomacy? If you can get past that this has some points of interest (as Holmes might say), for putting several aliens together in common purpose, with Beverly there to facilitate. We haven't seen many Vulcans on the series, and this time it was a reverse of Sarek and his human wife: a Vulcan female with a human husband. She's obviously a lot less squeamish about physical contact than most of her people since she doesn't even flinch when he puts his arm around her. For his part he looked like he'd embraced the Vulcan culture as he's wearing their clothing. He's probably about the same age as her, possibly even younger since she might be older than she looks considering the lengthier Vulcan lifespan, which is a nice touch.

The other scientists in the group are equally interesting as far as we get to know them, but sadly none of the characters are really fleshed out, merely acting as suspects in the failure of the experiment. Jo'Bril, the green and blue-skinned Takaran was a good design, but being played by James Horan he was sure to be the villain, since usually his characters are (not sure if you can count Future Guy from 'Enterprise' in that or not). I didn't understand his plan to use the metaphasic shielding as a weapon. It's shielding, right, how can that be used as a weapon? Actually I well remember being surprised by the turn at the end as Beverly goes all 'action doctor,' burning a hole in the guy, yet still he comes forward. It's such a shame she didn't have time to change the setting to stun as she'll have no proof he was the culprit all along.

A Ferengi scientist sounds like the beginning of a joke, but for once one of the Troll-like ones wanted respect and acceptance from his peers rather than profit, making him a nobler Ferengi than we usually see. Was this the influence of 'DS9' which had by now begun to develop the race? One development that proved the family of Dr. Reyga were pulling a fast one was in the death rituals of the Ferengi. On 'DS9' we learn they vacuum desiccate the remains and sell them off as collectables! I think they made up this whole thing about death rituals to make sure his body wasn't mucked about with in any way in case value was lost. The other surprise was in seeing Kurak, a Klingon scientist - as Crusher points out they probably aren't highly regarded by their people (Tricia O'Neill got a lot more respect playing Captain Garrett of the Enterprise-C). But again, we don't get to know her or find out anything about her role in Klingon society, so it was a bit of a wasted opportunity.

The device of telling most of the story in retrospect to Guinan (in one of her few and far late series appearances), was good, but you'd think by now they'd know her well enough to suspect she was leading them along when she says outrageous things. Also, it wasn't one of her better appearances and didn't have the punch her messages usually have, though at least she ended the episode on a high. The dry subject matter, especially after focusing so heavily on Riker in the previous episode where anything could happen, does drag the story down a bit, mainly consisting of Beverly going round talking to people without a great sense of urgency. She gets laid out against a bulkhead by the Klingon scientist, but the tech talk and slow pace, not to mention the unimpressive visuals of the shuttle hurtling into the star don't do it any favours. I was looking forward to this, but I think that was because when you don't know who's responsible it keeps you guessing and the ending is exciting and leaves you thinking well of the episode. If you know what's going to happen there's not enough to grip you, or enough of the nice character moments such as Riker giving Crusher friendly advice and Nurse Ogawa illicitly helping her out.

**

Frame of Mind

DVD, TNG S6 (Frame of Mind)

At what point Riker was in reality, I'm not sure, but if I understand correctly, everything we see until he wakes up on the bed, hooked up to some instrument was fantasy, cooked up in his brain by Mr. Suna (I thought they said Son'a when it was first spoken), assuming that was his real name. So the viewer's first inclination to believe this isn't reality, soon confirmed when shown he's acting in a play, was actually more correct than they realised. I enjoy these sleights of hand with reality and fiction, one of Brannon Braga's specialities, and I'm invested in this particular episode more than I might have been as it was one of those few that I tuned in for on TV in the 90s and was once again impressed by.

Jonathan Frakes shows he can act as well as any of the crew by playing an actor, playing someone who isn't acting, and playing his normal character. As always with these uncertain reality episodes I'm a little suspicious when they've apparently got back to real reality, so it wasn't so much of a surprise that when Riker thinks he's been rescued, in a sequence where he's literally propelled along by Mr. Data's superior strength, as well as Mr. Worf's not inconsiderable power, it proved false. It's close enough to the end that you think it could be real, but he's fooled again. Even when we've definitely returned, the lighting back to normal, no scary angles or discordant music, Deanna and Picard looking on concerned, I can't help but wonder: is he really out of it? Is reality real?

I couldn't agree with Troi's suggestion it's good to have fun with our 'dark side' - presumably if it's the dark side then it's evil and terrible, not the sort of thing you want to have fun with. I suppose she means in the way of enjoying the thrill of a good scare rather than running amok with a blade, but I can't say I approve of horror films in general. Saying that, this does have a sinister feeling of horror throughout, but it's the psychological kind rather than the visual. That guard was massive - he'd have to be for Riker to look up to him but because of the lack of detail in the set it was difficult to judge scale so it makes Riker look smaller, rather than Mavek seeming larger than average. They'd done the reality within a reality before with Riker in 'Future Imperfect' but I think it's more successful here because it's impossible to tell which bits are real. Because none of it is.

Susanna Thompson returned to 'TNG' after being in 'The Next Phase' last season, long before she took on her best known role as the Borg Queen, and it has to be said, she's a rather insignificant character, especially since she turned out to be an invention of Riker's mind. Still, it's a good spoon moment, predating 'The Matrix' by a number of years! David Selburg as Dr. Syrus was a familiar face, usually chosen for his reassuring voice, he'd been in 'TNG' already and would go on to 'Voyager' and 'Enterprise' too, though he's not so easy to spot with the wig and forehead in this one. All very interesting, but let me ask you something. Is this really a review or is it all in your head?

****