The Hostages

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S1 (The Hostages)

When Starsky or Hutch are in danger we feel for them much more than for unknown guest stars who will be here today and gone tomorrow, regardless of whether they survive the episode. Consequently, episodes like this, in which S&H have time to laugh and joke around in between their serious investigations, can often seem less of an intensive experience than, say, last episode. Both this and 'Shoot Out' are about hostages, the difference is that we have to sympathise with unknowns this time as S&H are free to gallivant around the city. They made them young so we feel sorry for them, and Ellie is pregnant, so that's another reason to care, but we don't get to know them, and they are really only a means to get S&H moving. The characters that were interesting got comparatively little screen time - the older woman, Belle Kates, who we find out does care about the girl, and doesn't want any deaths on her conscience; and young Meg, the tough little girl mending her motorized tricycle, or whatever that mini vehicle was.

Belle we find out just enough about to be intrigued by, and to want her to do the right thing. We find out a little of her history, and her weariness of the business, as well as her wish to get some money together to retire on. In the end she does do the right thing, but she doesn't exactly have much choice by the time S&H come storming into her house. At least she shows that she's somewhat relieved not to have to go along with the nastier people in the outfit. She plays along to S&H's plan, so I hope that was taken into account for a more lenient sentence. Sadly, we don't find out what happened to her and whether she got a reduced sentence because of her cooperation, or not. We don't even get a conclusion to the story, as the end scene has nothing to do with the it (except for the weak astrology theme, that couldn't even be called a running gag in the episode it has so little impact), only there to end things in fun, clownish fashion. I wanted to know what Belle or the young couple felt after the event. I was expecting to see Ellie and her husband talking to S&H, maybe they visited for tea, and then they could have had another scene with Meg, too.

Kristy McNichol, who played the child must have made a favourable impression on the producers or casting agents, as she would return a couple of times more ('Little Girl Lost' and 'The Trap'), though not as that character. She continues the tradition of S&H having an instant connection with children, perhaps because of a natural joviality, or deliberately to appeal to a younger audience, though that seems unlikely as the series consistently dealt with adult themes. More likely they just had good chemistry with children, and so young characters continued to be written in. It doesn't seem very wise to ask her if she wanted a ride downtown with them, even though they were police officers, as they could be anyone saying that. Perhaps people were less concerned in those days, but I'd have thought the least they could do would be to phone her parents!

That wasn't the only faux pas they made this episode. Right before meeting the girl, they roll up opposite Ellie's house where they think she's being held, yet they don't disguise their car or do anything to make themselves less conspicuous! Hutch jokes about Starsky's appearance, then Starsky trots up to the house, but if the kidnappers had been in there you can bet they'd be keeping an eye on the street, so Starsky's planned cover of saying he was a plumber wouldn't fit with the bright red sports car! As if that wasn't bad enough, they give their appearances away far too early in the episode, and unnecessarily: Tom comes to pick up the money, they reveal they're cops, then Starsky goes out with him to the armoured van so the kidnapper sees him. Okay, so Hutch isn't seen, even though he comes to the door of the building, so he could get away with the trick to get the kidnapper out of the van at the end of the episode, but it could have been a risky thing to do. Also, after they've watched the van leave from the first stop, they rush back inside leaving the door wide open - not very security conscious!

Huggy makes a very strange appearance, probably the first of his 'street antics' that would become his way in in later seasons, though I think giving him his own locale from which he could work was his best way of being part of the stories. I think they were joking when they talked about him leaving his restaurant business behind, but he does mention his cousin Elijah, who may be the one that shows up in 'Huggy Bear and The Turkey.' Captain Dobey has little to do in this, too, there at the warehouse to make the crack about it being a good job S&H are out of uniform as they look terrible; in a briefing with Mr. Ames; and the end scene with the diet. Dobey's relationship to food is one of the running jokes of the series, but it had no setup in this episode, it just was there. Twice S&H go undercover in alternative outfits: as the money clerks at one of the supermarkets, and at the end when they take on the roles of security guards of the armoured van. Paul Michael Glaser's stunt double (I'll really have to look up his name one of these days), makes one appearance that I noticed, in the fight at the warehouse. And Hutch's distrust of Starsky's taste in food and restaurants is again played out when he takes him to the diner of the astrology-loving girl.

The astrology side of the story wasn't taken seriously, but it did crop up too often for me, such as when they visit Madame Yram's house. Another revisited joke was about odd ladies being attracted to Starsky, probably because he's a bit odd himself. The house they enter looks very much like the one Ezra performed his fake cult in from 'Terror On The Docks,' though it looked more rundown so I'm not certain it was the same one. I wasn't sure if Sweet Alice had been seen before, as she knew S&H, though they do know a lot of people. She was another of those tragic figures, who always plans to go straight, there for S&H to show a bit of kindness to. The line "Two out of three ain't bad" was used again, the most memorable thing about the 'Vampire' episode in Season 2, this time said after Starsky talks of being tall, dark and handsome. And that's about it for the conventions of the series I always look for. It was funny that Ellie looked like Barbara Good of 'The Good Life,' - dungarees and something about her face, especially as she was married to a Tom! But I'm not sure that series had been invented then, so no plagiarism suits for me.

It wasn't a boring or dull episode, it just never went far enough or explored any of the characters. That's fine for this series, it wasn't about deep psychological motivation or delving into issues, but sometimes they did, and those episodes tended to have more going for them. This was a comfortable watch, seeing S&H do what they do, not ever really being threatened, and the villains being fairly petty and small time. There were occasional moments, such as Tom following their plan, bravely insisting on seeing his wife, or Belle showing second thoughts about what she's involved with, but we never went further than the surface. I couldn't even say whether this was in the positive or negative bracket of city life, as it shows prostitutes (off duty), but also rich money companies, with mainly neighbourhoods and shopping malls, so I suppose it was closer to the positive side of city life. There's even the hint of conflict between S&H and Ames, the head of the armoured car company, who shows more concern for his money than for the hostages, but it peters out after that one scene. So not a bad episode to watch, but a weak one to think about.

**

Eye of the Beholder

DVD, TNG S7 (Eye of the Beholder)

Deanna Troi, PI. Or was she? Though it wasn't as confusing, and certainly more substantial than 'Masks,' I was still left confused as to how much of the episode was real, and at what point Troi went off into dreamland. If it was early in the story, when she first went to the tube room, then that would take any of Worf's romantic notions out of real life, even though he's been leading to an approach of Troi on the series. Somehow that seemed incredibly controversial and wrong, seeing two main characters just do such things, even with the scene where Worf almost asks Riker's permission in Ten Forward. That scene was a little off, too, as how can Riker be taking a junior officer out for a drink? Maybe it's only Captains that suffer an inability to fraternise with the lower ranks, as Picard did in 'Lessons,' I don't know.

The thing is, if that part of the story really did happen, and to be fair, being a Brannon Braga special, there's so much paranoia going around that even genuine scenes feel as if anything could happen, (I thought Worf and Riker were going to attack each other!), if that scene happened, and it's difficult to say it didn't, because Troi wasn't present then, at what point did she succumb to her nightmare? Or was that just the last few minutes when she was in her quarters alone (always a bad sign in a Braga episode, especially for Troi - the only thing missing was her looking in a mirror). Yet any scenes featuring Lieutenant Pierce (a suitably inexpressive, vaguely threatening turn from Mark Rolston), had to be in her mind due to the fact of his being dead for eight years. So even as far back as Troi looking through the records and seeing he had joined the Enterprise must have been part of the vision. So Worf never really did go all gooey on her, after all. Right?

If an episode makes you wonder, even after you've seen it before, then it's either ridiculously convoluted, makes little to no sense ('Masks'), or keeps you guessing and wondering, and this one falls into the latter category. It begins with a shocking moment of suicide, and ends with a shocking realisation of grisly murders embedded in the wall - how Braga-esque can you get! I had thought Kwan played a greater part in the story, in flashbacks and log entries, but he's actually only a small on screen presence. I don't know why, but his Napean species made me want to learn more about him and his race, but although the makeup was used again in background shots of other Trek series', we never learnt more about them. The suicide is chilling, not just for the dramatic leap into the 'fire' of the plasma, but that it could be a Starfleet officer who does it. But why was it that particular moment when Kwan felt the empathic suicidal urge if he'd been working on the nacelle tube for a while? With that, and humans having affairs and committing murder, I have to wonder what Uncle Gene would have made of it all!

Not that that matters, and I wouldn't criticise the episode for breaking any rules. On the contrary, it breaks into new territory, both character-wise and location. This could be the one and only time we ever got to visit Utopia Planitia (unless that scene with Dr. Brahms on the Holodeck back in 'Booby Trap' was the same place). Granted, it was in a hallucination or empathic echo, whatever you want to call it, and took place inside the Enterprise with no windows, but the ship was there! Such historical moments in a ship's life, always so rare, make me cherish their brief inclusion, such as the visits to station DS9's past under the Cardassians. We want to see the genesis of these created vessels that we know so well.

I thought Kwan seemed too young to be one of the many people to have worked at Utopia on the Enterprise, but he was a Lieutenant, so it could be his species had a youthful appearance for longer than humans. I loved seeing inside one of the nacelles, and not until 'Enterprise' would we have such a close encounter with that most essential part of a starship (in such stories as 'The Catwalk'). No doubt budgetary concerns were what kept these well-known, but little-seen parts of a ship out of the limelight, but you have to applaud them whenever they took the initiative and grabbed the plasma conduit by the handles to bring us more visual extensions. Another little something that was left to the imagination for the most part was the warp speed enforcement laid down earlier in the season, in 'Force of Nature.' It gets another mention here, but once again Picard is allowed to circumvent the restriction, which makes me wonder if any race or organisation ever really kept to the speed limit, seemingly an impossible thing to enforce.

The Suicide of Lieutenant Daniel Kwan (that sounds like a good title!), may be difficult to question, in terms of the aftermath, because it isn't entirely clear when Troi was acting in reality, so oddities can be explained as being from her vision, but the clues were laid down quite early of the danger she was walking into: we learn that Kwan was partially empathic, so that's an obvious pointer to Deanna; and we get an early suspect in the form of his superior, Lieutenant (there's a lot of Lieutenants in this episode!), Nara, who looks ugly and we hear unpleasant things about. Were those conversations real?

Calloway's line "It's not like Dan to take his own life," got past the script doctors - she sounds pretty stupid saying that, almost equating Kwan's behaviour with something mundane, like 'it's not like Dan to turn up late for work.' I also felt the scene between Data and Geordi on the subject of suicide (did that part really happen? Oh, I'm so confused!), came off a little facile. They talk about how if only Kwan had been able to see his problems as challenges to be overcome, he might have done better than to kill himself, but it smacks of a glibness and superior attitude - 'pull yourself together,' kind of thing. I don't suppose that's what the writer's were looking for, or that the character's really believed that expression, but then, in the future, such things are supposed to be extremely unlikely, so it could be they were struggling even to get a handle on the concept. I did enjoy Data's overly conscious body language, however, I just wish I knew where the episode ended, and Troi's mind began!

***

Masks

DVD, TNG S7 (Masks)

Seeing Data perform his superhuman abilities is a joy, and here we see him mould clay into perfect shapes at incredible speeds. But more impressively we see Brent Spiner perform his abilities, when he's tasked with recreating several personalities from a long-vanished culture. This race's technological interference was both more and less invasive than the one in 'The Inner Light,' and suggests Picard's experiences there were what kept his mind open in this situation - though there's less personal damage, apart from Data experiencing thousands of minds, the ship changes physically around them! This was a concept to be proud of, and one that could have been difficult to pull off. While I felt the production design could have gone further (for instance, the scene in Engineering when it starts to change), as I was watching I thought they should have made cosmetic changes to the actual sets, and then they did, altering a whole deck! It starts slowly with small artefacts appearing around the ship, including in Troi's quarters. When Beverly suggests it was left by a secret admirer, Troi shows no concern that a mystery person may have sneaked into her quarters, which she presumably keeps locked!

The alteration to the ship continues apace, with large Aztec-like stone blocks, jungle creepers and obelisks, until we see a deck completely change before our eyes into an alien temple. They said that deck was clear of people, but I hope they also evacuated the one above, because the temple had quite a ceiling to it. Mind you, Picard and the others weren't affected when it changed so it's likely no one else would have been. If we'd had people trapped inside stone sculptures or in the floor (like 'In Theory'), there would have been a greater fear factor, but as it was it stayed in the realm of the intellectual, with Picard slowly working it out. Spiner's performances as the four or five characters he plays (the grinning Ihat, a Masaka-worshipper, weak old man, frightened child and Masaka), gave him his passport to show off his range, and created a sinister discomfort to his interactions at first, though that isn't played up so he fades away to a shadow sitting in his quarters when he could have been used much more. You only have to look at the superior 'Voyager' episode 'Infinite Regress' to see how much better it could have been if Data had remained the sole focus.

The solution was too easy, and a repeat of Picard's tactic with the Borg in 'The Best of Both Worlds' - send them to sleep. The episode came to nothing, and to Data it was all a dream, so there was no learning experience, we don't find out why this alien library is floating though space, or what any of it really means. For that matter, it was a bit harsh to blast this 67 million year old comet which had travelled across the galaxy. They couldn't have known for sure it had anything to do with the odd happenings. Although it did go pretty far with the design, and the work that must have gone in behind the scenes looks to have been immense, I still would have liked to see more: they tease us with Riker saying the Observation Lounge has turned into a swamp, but I wanted to see it. It is a flawed episode, but even though the story never goes anywhere it looked beautiful, with a series of golden glows taking the place of the usual harsh lighting, and even the sound playing upon the strangeness of the content with panpipes emphasising an ancient and exotic culture. The CG and effects were strong, though the comet didn't look as good as the one in the 'DS9' opening credits, and considering this was created over a year after, they could have done better.

There are questions left unanswered, such as how Data's head closed up without any tampering from Geordi after he'd been giving Data a diagnostic, or how Picard knew Masaka was female when there didn't appear to be any clues. Data could easily have snapped his cranial panel back on when we left that scene, but no explanation for Picard, except his knowledge of ancient cultures. What would have made it more intriguing would have been to make it an actual technological library from an ancient Earth tribe, but that would open up a whole torpedo tube of snakes! If you watch this as an oddity with some excellent production design, and skillful acting from Spiner (I wonder if his voice was digitally altered in some way - most of the time it sounded like he was changing it himself, but as Masaka it sounded manipulated), then you won't be disappointed, and its clear, clean, colourful visuals look fantastic, but don't expect anything more than that.

**

Rajiin

DVD, Enterprise S3 (Rajiin)

The first clunker of the season, but at least it came a few episodes in, it's just a shame it shows up after a good run so we knew the series could do good stories at that point. This time they try and fob us off with a bit of mystery and action (the NX-01 gets boarded again), but can't disguise this is much less satisfying than the first two episodes in particular. They do some things well on 'Enterprise' and I have to commend the computer effects work that continues the trend of brilliance: the ship orbiting a great blue planet, the detailed x-ray bioscans Rajiin takes of Archer and T'Pol, and, most impressively, the Xindi Insectoids and Aquatics who once again are superbly animated, the Insectoids in particular really part of their scenes in a physical way. The series is also good at throwing the cast into bustling and shady alien markets (like in the pilot), with so much to look out for - was that a Targ hanging up? One of those Dabo girl aliens from 'DS9' trying to sell them something as they pass? Other aliens we've seen before? I know it can be taken as laziness that they were reusing masks or props, but I take it as a fun puzzle for those in the know to spot references or familiar races.

The action is done pretty well, though the Xindi Reptilian boarding party, even though it's the first face to face encounter between Archer's crew and their enemies, doesn't generate the same tension as previous raids have. I don't know if that's the Director's fault, or I'm getting used to the scenario, but it felt a little flat, just like when the Remans boarded the Enterprise-E in 'Nemesis' - ironic, considering both aliens were wearing the same uniforms, even if they do look great. In his defence, the direction showed occasional flair - I'm thinking of the moments of Rajiin operating in slow motion as if she's more aware of time and space than the average person, and can achieve incredible acts of agility. My personal favourite, and something that stuck in my head since I first saw it, was the leap off of the Engineering level, twist in midair to land impossibly on her back. Very memorable, though I don't agree with Archer that she herself was particularly memorable.

Rajiin was the problem with the episode, I felt. It was a bit like 'Precious Cargo,' in that if you don't buy the central guest character, the episode, if not falls apart, becomes a lesser experience. She was set up to appear as if a recurring character that would be back at some point, but as far as I remember, she never reappeared, we can only assume she was killed by her Reptilian masters. Although fun to see someone that looked like Seven of Nine at the end (maybe she could have played a young Seven…), we never found out enough about her and she remains an annoyingly unsolved mystery. Was she even part of that time? I ask because the first clue as to the connection to the Temporal Cold War (aside from Future Guy's warning in 'The Expanse'), comes when Phlox reveals the dead Xindi left behind has been engineered. The first thing you think of is the Suliban and their payment for services rendered in the Cold War.

Apart from that there's not much to like in the story. Archer gets some fighting time, but while he beats up the slave trader, he has to be rescued by one of the MACOs in his one-on-one with the Xindi Reptilian, curiously reminiscent of Kirk versus the Gorn! I guess the MACO hadn't been briefed that you don't interfere when the Captain's fighting as it makes him look less tough. For that matter where was Major Hayes? I have to assume he was in on a firefight somewhere else on the ship because we don't see hide nor hair of him, and he should be at the forefront of the MACOs, leading the way. We did see plenty of weaponry as a result of the first human/Reptilian battle netting some new weapons tech. The exploding foam gun wasn't bad, nor was the shockwave blast from the Insectoid gun, but somehow Trek shouldn't be all about the cool weaponry - that shouldn't be the thing that sticks most in your head after watching.

I was irritated by T'Pol again, with her completely losing her cool. I'm not talking about the silly 'bioscan' performed by Rajiin, but her squawking at Trip when he tries to synthesize Trellium D, the substance that should block the anomalies. They should have had some anomaly trouble during the firefight, just to distinguish this episode from future stories when they're protected. There wasn't much to worry us this time, only the repulsive alien merchant and his damp red nasal cavities - an enjoyable moment when Trip tricks him into trading for ordinary condiments which he seemed to think were drugs! Otherwise things were pretty normal, except for a nice bit of continuity that shows Archer is still suffering the effects of his recent transformation in 'Extinction,' - as Phlox notes, you can't get over changing into another life form quickly, a good example of the season dispensing with the reset button. Also very pleasant to hear Cutler's name mentioned, even though she never came back. The dissension in the Xindi council gave their scenes a bit of bite, and taking into account the integrated CG characters they were some of the highlights of the episode. So they now have a bioweapon they're creating as well as the other one. We didn't need a complication like that, and it does smack of trying to artificially draw the story out, but I like the interpersonal wrangling of the council members.

When first writing about this episode 'Star Trek Magazine' called it 'Raijin' and I actually prefer that title. Ra-Jeen sounds like some family connection to Batman villain Ra's Al Ghul, whereas Ry-Jin sounds more alien. I couldn't help but think how 'Star Wars' things were looking, from the alien market full of weirdness to the Xindi storming onto the ship like Darth Vader does in the first film (or Episode IV, whichever you prefer). It was an excellent explosion, though, and they made a right mess of the NX-01 interiors. Shame the story had no more substance than some of the 'Star Wars' prequels. Even the Xindi versus Enterprise ship battle wasn't much cop, and after a couple of pretty energising episodes that began the season, it's worrying they were already starting to buckle.

**

Shoot Out

DVD, Starsky & Hutch S1 (Shoot Out)

No one said 'Starsky & Hutch' had to stick to formulaic police show stories, and even if this one is somewhat formulaic, it's a formula not seen on the series before, and one of those that hints at the breadth of styles they were prepared to play with. This has nothing to do with competition between law enforcement bodies, or experiencing city life, be that the down and dirty streets or the posh and poisoned holes of the richly extravagant. This is in the mould of 'Key Largo' and probably many other similar stories of a group of people being stuck in a room for the duration, throwing together various characters and letting the drama unfold. That's the plan of these kinds of vehicles, anyway. Whether it's successful or not depends on the viability of the characters, the depth of their interactions and the ability to raise the tension levels through the course of their incarceration. Neither of the first two amounted to much, and with no payoff for them, they were merely extraneous pawns to wait out the conclusion with.

Not to say there was no tension, but it was handled sloppily in a way that this still-new series tended to do, much lower down on the scale than 'Pariah,' still the high-water mark for the season. The business with the gun, and Hutch's determination not to give up hope, to plan carefully with whatever was available, like a constrained, and much more cerebral Rambo, gave the story its grit, and his bravery shows through several times, whether warning the hit men he's going through to his partner in the other room, against their orders, in spite of the gun trained on him; or his dangerous action heroics with Theresa causing a diversion with a tray, so he can whip out the hidden gun and shoot the baddies. I envisioned a small tray, rather like the one she carries drinks on, but then she brings out a gong-sized thing! It certainly had the ability to distract, just a shame she was practically standing behind Hutch so the hit men didn't get diverted far!

I liked a lot of things about this episode, mainly thanks to the close directing - head shots of people talking, the rain lashing down outside on the dark, empty streets, and some of the shots used. It was the writing at fault not to give the hostages more of a story to expand them, and a conclusion to see them get something out of the experience, so it had been worthwhile. Like Sammy Grovner, the comic and his girl on the way to Las Vegas, or the old couple who felt nobody would miss them if they didn't get out of this situation; the big, sporty-looking guy, and even Theresa the barmaid. They had moments, but they weren't given a chance to show they'd learned from this brush with death, so the episode becomes treading water. In a good way for Hutch, whose resourcefulness is his asset, but there was little to gather from anyone else. I liked that Vic Monte, the gangland boss, drives in faceless, there's the sound of shooting, and he's driven out faceless, though I'd have liked that to have led into a recurring plot line of this Mr. Big S&H were having trouble with and would eventually meet over the course of several episodes.

Like the end scene, in which, for some reason, I expected to see the people who'd been involved in the hostage situation at Hutch's rather than those nondescript strangers, and which was only an excuse to get Huggy in the story (fine by me), the opening had almost nothing to do with the rest of the episode, beyond setting up that S&H were going out for a meal that night, and to give Starsky something to do since he'd be on his back most of the time, much like the series finale 'Sweet Revenge.' But it was a good opening, with Starsky showing he can act, though I suspected he was not being himself when he throws Hutch against the wall - only just, mind, as we've seen him hot with righteous indignation at a criminal's acts before. Usually the detectives play hard cop, hard cop, but here they do the classic good/bad, and it's all good fun, maybe getting the lightness out of the way before Starsky goes down so dramatically in the shootout. It leads to the only reference to running jokes of the series that I picked up, when they discuss the kind of weird food Starsky eats, as well as one of the few pop references of the episode, this time for famous horror actor Bela Lugosi (or Lugoosi as Starsky erroneously calls him!).

Another reference I picked up was to Western actor Gene Autry, whom Starsky compares himself or his wounds to. There's also a swimming pool seen clearly on screen, yet no one dives into it, mainly because it's only in an establishing shot of the hit men's apartment, so no one went near it. And the biggest and most obvious references come in the end scene when S&H bizarrely dress up as comics to entertain their guests, though unfortunately I'm not up with my American comedy history, so the only one I got for sure was Groucho Marx at the end. I imagine they did the comedy routine because they had that guy (Norman Fell), as the comic, and I believe he was a known face at the time. So I'll give them that it had some connection to the episode it followed. Not much, but some. Captain Dobey doesn't appear, but does get mentioned by Starsky, who compares Hutch's worried shouting of orders to their superior.

The villains made an odd couple; a young, cocky, uneducated type, and an older, refined, learned type. But they didn't plan too well. It wasn't clever to sit in the corner together so that everyone could talk and plot if they wanted to, and Joey should have stayed by the door or something. He was a curious character, not falling into the category of oddness we usually encounter (only Harry Sample, the crook at the beginning, or the Maharaji Jehru, as he'd created himself, did that - like the Ezra guy in 'Terror On The Docks' he was trying to fool the law by taking on a 'higher' persona of cult and mysticism, really a sham, as S&H proved), and in fact the characters inhabiting this story were more real than we usually see, but Joey took pleasure in blowing people away and the power rush, but then shows discomfort with the fact that he might have killed a cop. It doesn't stop him from threatening Hutch later, though. Maybe not the best idea of his associate's to let him drink, but it did seem to make him more relaxed than before.

I suppose what they were going for was a classier kind of episode, to try and keep the direction tight, write some serious character stuff, and build a tension-filled story that led up to an exciting climax. It did end well, but it needed more work if they were to come up with another 'Key Largo.' Having Hutch mainly work alone puts him in a different position, and Starsky shows his care for his partner when he does all he can, though injured, so it was good from their character's perspective, continuing to demonstrate the strong bond of friendship and reliance between each other. But it could have done with something extra to make it a good episode to watch.

**

Thine Own Self

DVD, TNG S7 (Thine Own Self)

Data loses his memory on an alien world. Sometimes the simplest ideas are the best. I'm not going to praise this episode beyond measure or even suggest it's one of the absolute best of the season, but I do like it for being an unconnected tale about Data getting on as a new person with new people, while retaining much of his advanced knowledge, a bit like his time in the past of 'Time's Arrow.' See, it's not even something that had never been done before, but what is done, is done beautifully and simply. I like how trusting and open Garvin and his daughter are, and the way they accept this weird stranger into their home, so different from them. Not the most responsible action to leave one's daughter with a complete stranger, but something about Data's way tends to put those who have trust, at ease with him. Maybe his pacifistic nature (don't say that to the blacksmith after he was slapped into a wall with the flick of Data's wrist), his measured, level tone, and polite bearing. Whatever made them accept him, he has it in spades.

It was just another village set, just another wardrobe of medieval peasant clothes, but I liked all the decoration around this story and had no trouble accepting the reality of Data's situation even though it must have been all filmed on indoor sets. It was bright and good to look at, much like the one in 'Insurrection,' and even though these were aliens with only a couple of lines of face paint to differentiate them from humans, their alienness wasn't the issue, it was all about answering the question of what Data would do if he wandered into a new life, the most advanced machine in an age of misunderstanding. Talur is very forthright and convinced in her view of 'science,' but even though she and her people consider themselves quite advanced, they have superstitions, but they're reflected in different ways. They pooh-pooh demons, yet wholeheartedly put down Data as being a mythical 'iceman' from the mountains - they haven't reached the level of understanding which tells them the more they learn, the more they know they don't know. Starfleet is shown a lot more advanced, not just in technology, but with the whole idea of learning more and exploring the unknown because they know there's so much they don't know!

The little girl wasn't the best child actor on the series, but she did a reasonable job of striking up a friendship with 'Jayden' as Data is named. If I was criticising the episode, and I don't want to harshly, because it's a pleasant tale that doesn't set out to be anything more than an exploration of Data separate from the characters and environment we're used to seeing him in. But if I were, I'd say they could have built up the friendship more, to make the moment when she wants him to show his damaged face, more meaningful and showing her in a braver light (because Data looks at his most sinister in that scene, standing in a dark corner talking out of a hood!). It's the usual kind of result with these stories of a stranger in the midst of villagers - one of them takes a dislike to him (look at the Season 3 episode 'The Ensigns of Command'), and stirs up trouble, thus providing the catalyst for danger and tension. It was never a wise move of the blacksmith and his pal to take on a guy strong enough to lift an anvil without even straining. The attack gave us the biggest uncovering of Data's real, robotic face on the series. Not in the league of 'First Contact,' but very well done all the same, especially considering this was before CGI replacement. Yes, if you look carefully at it you can see it's a prosthetic attachment that's thicker than Spiner's face, but it's done in such an artistic, realistic way that it doesn't take anything away from the mastery of that craft. Whoever did that deserved recognition.

The secondary plot of the episode is totally unconnected, but again, I don't find fault with the episode, because I like watching it, both sides. You just accept it as two stories and enjoy it. And, just like Data's story, it is a situation for Deanna that we don't see very often, so there is a thematic link of that kind. She's had the experience of feeling she's not stretched enough, and, after seeing Beverly taking on bridge duty (a rare moment to see them having a scene practically alone on the bridge), wants to take the bridge officer's test. I really liked how she tied it back to the events of 'Disaster,' in which she was forced to take command, and struggled through the experience. It made the earlier episode a fascinating study in role reversal, but this ambition could have had more impact if she'd come to the decision shortly after that story instead of suddenly springing it on Riker two years later. The episode has an odd feeling running though it, not just because Data isn't Data, or seeing Crusher in the Captain's chair, or even Riker practicing the trombone in his quarters which turns into a bizarre musical conversation with Troi. It's all that, and no Patrick Stewart, not until the last scene in sickbay, at any rate. Where was Stewart? He's not normally so absent unless he's directing!

The actual test Deanna had to go through was rather stressful, but it had its wallop of an impact when we learn the answer is to send someone to their death. It's a shocking moment, and a heartfelt one, too, because, even though we know it's just a holographic Geordi, she's still sending him to die! They don't mention the Kobayashi Maru test by name, the famous no-win scenario, that all starship Captain's have to go through, but they do talk about the possibility of there being no answer, a test to see how the candidate responds to being in that position. I liked that it was a kind of stage on from that test, as if we know about that, but this is something different. Just as hard, but in another way. That the soft Troi could do that shows what steely roots she has in her. There could have been a conflict of interest having Troi ask Riker so informally about taking it, and then him informing her he'd have to judge her, but these people are above favoritism, and they both know it. It also shows how great a First Officer he is, that he can 'play' her like that, retain his distance and frankness as her superior, but also talk to her on her level. He even calls her Imzadi (beloved), but I think it's meant much more in jest or friendship than the serious connotation it used to have. He shows that there was no conflict of interest in the end.

I thought this ended with a scene in which Data says goodbye to the village, or the healthy people he's cured, and returns to the mountains, but it ended fittingly for a pre-warp civilisation, never knowing who the stranger really was, and burying him in the square. One day perhaps, they'll excavate in future generations to see if the legend of the iceman was true, and the myth will persist even though no body can be found. There's a poetic ending for you. I'm putting the villager's trust in the drinking water down to the shamefacedness they experienced after their tempers died down and they realised they'd killed this man, because it's a lot of trusting to do after they were so against him, to then drink water from a well he'd poured a mystery cure into. Maybe they were lazy, and couldn't be bothered to make the two day journey to the nearest river?

***

Cure

DVD, Smallville S7 (Cure)

I love it when they bring a character back, love it! But this was far from a sequel to Season 1's 'Drone' despite the return of Sasha Woodman, one of the least likely meteor freaks I ever expected to see again. I don't think it was the same actress, as her name didn't come up, unless she was uncredited this time, but I was more excited than I had a right to be that they were going to do a return to a previous story, and more especially, one from the golden age of the series, even though 'Drone' was actually one of the weakest episodes of that season. It became about something completely different, the potential for a cure for meteoritus (or whatever), from Dr. Curtis Knox, who… well… turns out to be Jack The Ripper, and lots of other people throughout history (cue 'Star Trek' suing the writers for copying Flint, but it's probably a sci-fi trope so there's no copyright for such ideas!). Knox didn't ring true, he was just a means to an end in getting the story going: he comes from nowhere though he's lived for centuries, he causes some problems, then he goes to who-knows-where thanks to Phil Morris' character, though that guy refuses to tell Clark about his 'crime and punishment' secrets so he could be dodgy. Unless he nipped back to Mars to incarcerate the immortal Dr. when everyone knows all he needed to do was chop his head off - it worked for 'Highlander'!

I wish Morris' Martian/Kryptonian had a name because it's long-winded to refer to him, otherwise. He remains something of an enigma, with Kara now weighing in against him and causing her to part company with Clark for not trusting her. I'm with the Kryptonian, I think she's not to be trusted, and I can believe in the hating match between Jor-el and Zor-el. At the same time we don't know enough about Clark's apparent protector to fully trust him either, and he could just as easily have his own motives. How do we know he wasn't one of the criminals that popped out of the Phantom Zone last season, since that's when he appeared for the first time? Clark did his own zipping about in this episode, dashing to the store to get maple syrup for Lana's pancakes, but wait: he was gone only a second so he'd have had to take longer if he stopped to pay, unless… he didn't pay and grabbed it off the shelf!

That's not the only questionable moment with Clark this time, as he says to Lex how sick he feels that he had to take a life to save him, after Lex gets beaten by Knox. For his part, he buries a clip into the doc, but it just so happens, and this gets both of them off the hook, that Knox is immortal. But would Clark really have killed Knox if he didn't have the 'get out of jail free' card of Knox turning out to be immortal, because that's rather out of character and didn't fit the situation. He could just as easily have flung the guy in another direction so that he didn't end up electrocuted! A bit lazy in the writing, or lacking logic, it still makes Clark look bad. It's back to being a Season 1-type story, (even though the 'Drone' connection soon dries up), thanks to Clark saving Lex, who didn't expect it (and was knocked unconscious as he always used to be!), Lana swanning around the farm, and Chloe worried about being a freak. Oh, wait, that's a new development.

She's put in the same position Clark used to face on a regular basis: not being able to tell someone close about being different. I hated the way that went over and over the same ground in season after season with Chloe or Lana or Chloe and Lana, not being able to forgive Clark for not being honest or able to explain why he did something or said something. This time it's Jimmy on the receiving end of the lack of trust, and he don't like it. Meanwhile Kara's been buttering him up and it takes more steps into the super-soap category it so wants to be. But I liked the majority of the episode, and only the last scene, which dragged on far too long, taking things further than it needed to and saying everything on the nose, ended it with a dip.

One character that's becoming more intriguing is Lana. She's apparently keeping house for Clark, putting flowers on the table, pancakes on his plate, and generally gliding about the place - I imagine she's doing all the housework he might have shunned since Martha left, like cleaning the loo, or hoovering the stairs, but that wouldn't be very dramatic which is why we don't see those scenes. That's what you're supposed to think, at least if you're Clark, because in reality she's not the innocent girl with a quiet life - she's obsessively spying on Lex (possibly from Metropolis where she says she's going to meet Aunt Nell in a rare mention of that character, though it's not clear whether she was in the city or still in Smallville), somehow managing to have rigged cameras all round the Luthor Mansion and grounds, and even able to zoom in on his computer screen, all while under the guise of having a plan to help the meteor freaks that Lex has abused in 33.1. It looks like all that money had gone into surveillance, which smells fishy to me, because Lex is so good at that stuff, he probably already knows about it. He might even have set it up to feed misinformation. I don't know what's going on between them, but it's not going to be pretty.

The casting of Dean Cain as Dr. Knox was great fun, and continues the tradition of featuring actors from past Superman productions in the series - so far we've had the great Christopher Reeve, his Lois (Margot Kidder), and now we have another Supes, this time from 'The New Adventures of Superman,' the cartoonish, silly version of the Man of Steel from the 90s. Not to say Cain wasn't a good actor in the role, and I liked him in this one, too. I hope we haven't seen the last of him, because I'd like to know more about Knox and his past, and understand his history: is he Kryptonian or some other alien, or what? Someone that still hasn't made an appearance since the season opener is Lionel Luthor, whom I continue to await the inclusion of with interest. Will he be involved in the government connection with LuthorCorp? Lois also continues to be conveniently off on assignment for the new Editor of the Planet, but I don't mind as I think it's good to give different people moments in the spotlight at different times.

Jimmy's continued anti-mutant talk hasn't helped Chloe get over her feelings of inadequacy or loneliness at having a power, and now she's even worrying that it could kill her if she uses it again. I liked that her fears are at the heart of the story, but I could have done with some kind of message out of it, like 'fear is what causes problems,' and show her getting over it somehow. That would have given it some inspirational drive, and although the story isn't bad, it was missing something to make it special. But I'm probably thinking back too much to Season 1 and how good some of those episodes were. For a latter-day episode it was pretty good and not full of holes. It must have been the Season 1 reminders that made me first think Knox' wife lying comatose on the bed was Victoria Hardwicke! And I loved the 'Karate Kid' reference of Mr. Miyagi! With Clark and Lex working together in some ways, a villain with meteor freak interests, and a fight in a room of Kryptonite, this had enough nostalgia to bring it back to something of the good old days, even ending with a musical number fitting for the moods of the people, even if, as I mentioned, it goes on longer than necessary.

***