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.

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