Liaisons

DVD, TNG S7 (Liaisons)

I'm not entirely sure how to take this episode. Is it a comment on some of the other episodes of the series, the ones that feature bland aliens with bland uniforms and bland personalities? Or is it serious about its pretensions to examine human (or technically, Federation), culture to the extreme? On one side of the equation is a rather dull episode with Picard trapped in Khan's crashed hulk on Ceti Alpha V with only a mystery woman for company. If you've seen episodes like 'Waltz' of 'DS9' or even 'Resolutions' of 'Voyager,' this comes across as a rather weak, ponderous plot, its only interest coming from the fact that the woman is a little odd. Will she suddenly go wild and attack the Captain or is she genuinely a dopey female that can't even phaser a piece of equipment out without destroying it? That's the extent of the 'fun' to be had with that story, and while it has the necessary atmosphere, it pales when compared to the trials Worf has to go through (or the strangeness Troi experiences) with the other ambassadors.

Trek has a tradition of painting officials as either eccentric loons or arrogant thorns-in-the-side, right back to 'TOS,' and there have been plenty of examples of such persons visiting in every series - I think of Dr. Bashir way back in Season 1, having to deal with a gaggle of irritating ambassadors, or that one where Neelix gets some important guy drunk. Not an original idea, but usually a fun one. Initially the appearance of the aliens (dull and grey), was a warning sign that this was going to be a dull and grey episode, but we learn by the end that they're dull and grey for a reason - they don't understand simple things like love (isn't it always the way?). While Troi is an expert on chocolatey forms of pleasure, and Worf takes great delight in violently sparring with his charge, Picard probably wasn't too happy when he realised who (or what) had been forcing its kisses on him! Ever the diplomat he's the one that comes out most accepting of the Iyaarans extreme method of learning (they could have just asked), but the others find common ground nicely.

So this isn't a terrible episode, but Picard's side lets it down. I'd have happily sat through eleven hours of Worf fighting his ambassador instead (the brief fight during the Poker game was quite enjoyable, seeing how much steam Worf had to let out), but as a whole the episode is a little bit dull, even if the greyness was a shroud to hide the twist in. I'm not sure if I guessed what was going on the first time round, and it would certainly be more gripping without foreknowledge, but when people go out of a room and someone else comes in you can't help but be a little bit suspicious. The minor quibbles I had in the story such as the ship not looking like it had crashed on the planet, and Picard moving Voval then telling him not to move, were solved by the end - the ship didn't have a proper crash and Voval was fine anyway so it didn't matter that Picard might have damaged his nerves by moving his head!

Seeing Picard doing that wireless transfer of power from his tricorder to the power cel made me realise we have this capability now, which is amazing really. And Eric Pierpoint has been in several episodes of Trek, right up to 'Enterprise.' Another item of note was the dress uniform and the banter between Worf and Riker that kicked the episode off. If the rest of the story had been as witty and knowing as that it would have been a superior episode, but it was fun to see some crew in the 'special occasion' uniform variation, and I don't remember ever seeing Worf don it previously, including his special sash. I'm not sure Worf's reaction to the ambassador was good news from the standpoint of his future career post-DS9, but maybe Klingon ambassadors are encouraged to be aggressive. Then again, that could be the reason his career was apparently so short-lived: there's not even a mention of it in 'Nemesis'! And just to make it clear the freighter was  Terellian, not Talarian, Tellurian, Tamarian, Takarian, Talavian, Talaxian, or even Tarellian…

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