The Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion: Revised Edition

by Larry Nemecek

  Dr. Nel Apgar had been doing research for Starfleet on Krieger waves, a potential new source of energy. Apgar’s wife, Manua, says Riker tried to seduce her, and his assistant backs up her claim that Riker and Dr. Apgar exchanged angry words during Number One’s visit. Other evidence shows that an energy beam that struck Apgar and caused the explosion originated at Riker’s beam-out point.

  That is enough for Tanugan Inspector Krag to extradite Riker. Convinced of his first officer’s innocence, Picard persuades Krag to use the holodeck to re-create the events prior to the explosion.

  Riker is finally vindicated after La Forge, Data, and Wes look into a mysterious periodic energy burst that pulses through the ship. It turns out to be Krieger waves from the lab’s ground-based generator, which is still switched on.

  Actually the researcher had already made his breakthrough but was secretly trying to develop a new weapon he could sell on his own to the highest bidder. Fearing that Riker knew, Apgar aimed to disrupt Number One’s beam-out with the generator—but the waves were deflected back into the lab instead, setting off the explosion. With Apgar’s plot exposed, Krag drops the charges.

  Geordi and Riker confront Tayna (Juli Donald) and Dr. Apgar (Mark Margolis).

  This episode’s major plot device—having an officer accused of murder—recalls Scotty’s dilemma in original Trek’s “Wolf in the Fold,” but the use of the holodeck to re-create the scene of the crime adds an interesting twist. Director Cliff Bole enjoyed what he called “our little trilogy,” another conceptual device that foreshadows episodes to come, including “Cause and Effect” (218), while filming one of the most claustrophobic bottle shows ever.

  After Data’s unintentionally harsh criticism of the captain’s artwork in the show’s teaser, Picard has never been seen painting again. And in a moment that barely keeps the Riker-Troi relationship afloat, the counselor can be seen squeezing Number One’s hand when he is cleared.

  The mention of duranium is a throwback to an original-series episode, “The Menagerie”: here the metal is still said to be an important alloy in starship hulls and interior walls.

  YESTERDAY’S ENTERPRISE

  * * *

  Production No.: 163 Aired: Week of February 19, 1990

  Stardate: 43625.2 Code: ye

  Directed by David Carson

  Teleplay by Ira Steven Behr, Richard Manning, Hans Beimler, and Ronald D. Moore

  Story by Trent Christopher Ganino and Eric A. Stillwell

  GUEST CAST

  Lieutenant Tasha Yar: Denise Crosby

  Captain Rachel Garrett: Tricia O’Neill

  Lieutenant (j.g.) Richard Castillo: Christopher McDonald

  * * *

  A living ghost from the past, the Enterprise, NCC-1701-C, lost with all hands twenty-two years ago, emerges from a temporal rift. In “real” history, that ship answered a Klingon outpost’s distress call, paving the way for the current union of the Federation and the Klingon Empire. By journeying through the temporal rift, the older ship has missed its appointment with destiny and created an alternate time line; in this universe, where Tasha Yar is still alive and well, the Enterprise-C was not destroyed, and the Klingon-Federation detente never occurred. Instead, the two governments are engaged in a decades-old conflict that has claimed the lives of billions.

  Only Guinan detects the changes in history. She tells Picard that the war, his dark and somber battleship, and time itself are “wrong” and that he must return the old Enterprise-C through the temporal rift to meet its intended fate.

  Among the older ship’s officers are Captain Rachel Garrett and helmsman Richard Castillo, who falls in love with Tasha. Picard, to the disbelief of his officers, is finally convinced of the truth of Guinan’s story and prepares to send the Enterprise-C back through the rift. Then Garrett is killed in a Klingon attack; to take her place, Yar (who has learned of her senseless death in the “real” time line) volunteers to go back with the doomed ship; Picard reluctantly grants her permission to do so.

  Attacked by three Klingon ships, the Enterprise-D holds out just long enough to allow its predecessor to enter the temporal rift. History immediately resumes its normal course, a change that goes unnoticed by all—except Guinan.

  In spite of the multitude of writing credits, which suggest a patched-together episode, this show is continually cited as one of TNG’s most popular and most powerful. Yet according to story writer Eric Stillwell, the writing staff didn’t think the show would work because its teleplay was written by committee and rushed to final draft in just three days to meet a pushed-up shooting schedule. This was necessary because Whoopi Goldberg’s and Denise Crosby’s schedules made them unavailable during the original filming window in January.

  “Most of the writers were not very happy with the script,” said Stillwell (a gofer during TNG’s first two seasons and a script coordinator for the next three, listed as a pre-production associate in the credits). “They thought it was going to be horrible, because they don’t like having to write [something] and make it work in three days.”

  The tale actually began as an idea pitched by Trent Christopher Ganino a year earlier, in which the Enterprise-C comes forward in time and, while not changing the future, forces Picard to decide whether or not to reveal their fate to them before sending them back. Among the characters that would not survive to the final draft was Capt. Richard Garrett, whose last name was taken from a pizzeria in Ganino’s hometown, San Jose.

  Later on, Ganino and Stillwell joined forces on another alternate time line story that used material from three original Star Trek episodes. A Vulcan team on an archaeological mission accidentally change history through the Guardian of Forever (“City on the Edge of Forever”) when Surak, the founder of Vulcan’s peaceful, logical way of life (“The Savage Curtain”) is killed. His absence leads to a “new” time line in which the violent Vulcans join with their brethren, the Romulans, in a super empire, wiping out the Klingons and turning on the Federation. After being captured as a spy, Spock’s father, Sarek (“Journey to Babel” and Star Trek III, IV and VI], persuades Picard to let him takes Surak’s place in the past, restoring the time line.

  “We thought it would be really cool that someone from the future would replace someone in the past, and I always thought it was funny that their names were so similar, anyway,” Stillwell said. But after hearing that idea, Michael Piller nixed the use of both Sarek and the Guardian—which he called a “gimmick” from the original series—but urged them to combine the story with Ganino’s Enterprise-C tale, enlarging Tasha’s part and bringing in Guinan. After eight days of brainstorming the eventual story emerged, with a female captain who dies to make room for Tasha’s sacrifice and a more “honorable” death.

  Scenes from an Enterprise that never was: Tasha and Picard (opposite) confront a mysterious intruder from the past; (above) Picard and Garrett confer on how to save history; (below, left) Castillo and Tasha steal some of what little time they have left; while Riker (below, right) is only one of many to die in the alternate timeline.

  After another rewrite the regular staff took over and each wrote an act, with Piller sharpening Guinan’s role in the incident and Ron Moore contributing the Yar-Castillo romance. Moore also stated that time constraints cut his own plans for a longer, bloodier ending for the alternate Enterprise-D, in which Data was electrocuted, Wesley’s head blown off, and so on; of the sequence, only Riker’s death was retained. Piller voluntarily took his name off the credits to meet the stringent Writers Guild credit limit of four names.

  As in original Trek’s “Mirror, Mirror,” little touches are used to subtly point up the differences between the real and alternate universes: the substitution of “military log” for captain’s log, “combat date” for stardate, and the absence of a counselor and a friendly Klingon. On the bridge, steps replaced the side bridge ramps, the captain’s chair was more thronelike, and sidearms were the norm. Other nice touches: Dr. Selar—an allusion to “The Schizoid Man�
�� (131)—is heard being paged, as is Lieutenant Barrett, an homage to Gene Roddenberry’s wife, Majel Barrett.

  Both 1701-C guest stars were already Trek fans. McDonald, whose TV and film roles include Thelma & Louise, was among those in the running in 1986 to be cast as Riker. O’Neil, another TV and film vet, won the Drama Critics Award and Theatre World Award for her Broadway lead in Two by Two and later played a Klingon in “Suspicions” (248). The Narendra outpost honored Moore friend and later science advisor/story editor Naren Shankar. Two TNG firsts here are designer Bob Blackman’s use of the film-era costumes sans shirt, and—finally—Greg Jein’s model of Andy Probert’s Ambassador-class design. Look for the final scene’s blooper when “normal” Geordi wears “alternate” uniform cuffs.

  THE OFFSPRING

  * * *

  Production No.: 164 Aired: Week of March 12, 1990

  Stardate: 43657.0 Code: of

  Directed by Jonathan Frakes

  Written by Rene Echevarria

  GUEST CAST

  Lal: Hallie Todd

  Admiral Haftel: Nicolas Coster

  Lieutenant Ballard: Judyanne Elder

  Ten-Forward Crew: Diane Moser, Hayne Bayle, Maria Leone, and James G. Becker

  Lal as Robot: Leonard John Crowfoot

  * * *

  Data sparks another legal row over the status of androids when he innocently sets out to further his creator’s work. He builds a “child” whom he names Lal—Hindi for “beloved.”

  Troi and the others are delighted when Lal chooses a human female form; her personality soon blooms, despite growing pains. But Picard is not so pleased that she was developed in secret, and has a hard time calling her Data’s “child” even though the elder android duplicated his own neural nets for Lal’s.

  Still, the captain becomes a firm ally of the androids when Admiral Haftel of Starfleet Research insists that Lal should develop in a lab rather than aboard a ship. Despite the protests of Picard, Data, and Lal herself, Haftel perseveres—especially after he finds the new android in Ten-Forward, where Guinan and Data thought she could best study humans.

  But then Lal, who shows she can go beyond Data’s programming by using contractions, grows too quickly when the stress of the fight over her future leads her to develop emotions—a new trait she finds she physically can’t handle.

  Haftel and Data unite to repair the damage to her system, but it is too great. Data, the supposedly unemotional android, bids his dying child good-bye and then tells his grieving shipmates that Lal will always live on in their memories.

  Data and his “daughter,” Lal (Hallie Todd).

  Hallie Todd, who played Joe’s daughter on the Showtime series Brothers, is the real-life daughter of Ann Morgan Gilbert who played next-door neighbor Millie Helper on the old Dick Van Dyke Show. She turned in a charming and poignant performance as Lal, the spark that aided Frakes’s long-sought turn in the director’s chair and made viewers forget that android rights had been addressed only a year earlier in “The Measure of a Man” (135).

  After producer Rick Berman told him he’d “have to go to school” before directing a show, Frakes spent over three hundred hours observing editors, watching other directors, going to the dubbing stage, attending seminars, and reading. “I think the producers were hoping I’d lose interest, but I didn’t,” he once said, and judging by his subsequent directing assignments (“Reunion”/181, “The Drumhead”/195, “Ethics”/216) their reaction to his initial turn in the director’s chair must have been positive. This script was the first TNG sale for Echevarria, who joined the writing staff to season five.

  Daytime viewers may recognize Nicholas Coster from his current role on various daytime soap operas. Leonard John Crowfoot, in an uncredited role as the robot Lai, endured much less anonymity and special makeup during an earlier guest turn on TNG (“Angel One”/115). Once again the Daystrom Institute (“The Measure of a Man”/135) pops up; Haftel is mentioned as working at a Daystrom annex on Galor IV.

  Rob Legato used a rare motion-control camera onstage for the sequence in which the robot Lal is picking holographic self-facade options. This scene includes the first appearance of an Andorian on the series.

  SINS OF THE FATHER

  * * *

  Production No.: 165 Aired: Week of March 19, 1990

  Stardate: 43685.2 Code: sf

  Directed by Les Landau

  Teleplay by Ronald D. Moore and W. Reed Morgan

  Based on a teleplay by Drew Deighan

  GUEST CAST

  K’mpec: Charles Cooper

  Commander Kurn: Tony Todd

  Duras: Patrick Massett

  Kahlest: Thelma Lee

  Transporter Technician: Teddy Davis

  Assassins: B. J. Davis and Chris Doyle

  * * *

  The Enterprise receives a Klingon exchange officer on board who turns out to be the younger brother Worf never knew he had. The officer, Kurn, tells Worf their family name is about to be shamed: their dead father, Mogh, has been branded the traitor behind the Romulan attack at Khitomer that killed thousands and left Worf and Kurn orphans.

  With Picard’s backing, Worf returns to challenge the accusations before the Klingon High Council, even though the penalty for an unsuccessful appeal is death. Shortly after their arrival, however, Kurn is attacked.

  Worf had used his brother as his advocate before the council, so he asks Picard to replace him. Together they locate Worf’s childhood nurse, whose tale forces the revelation of the real truth in a closed-door meeting with aging council leader K’mpec.

  It was the father of Duras, Worf’s accuser, and not Mogh who was the traitor. Worf and Picard are stunned when told that the truth, if exposed, would plunge the Klingon Empire into civil war.

  Wort and Duras (Patrick Massett) face the High Council with Picard.

  K’mpec sadly prepares to carry out the death sentence until Worf, putting his people ahead of himself, agrees to drop the challenge and be publicly branded an outcast and coward—and to live on for another day to clear his father’s name.

  This landmark show gave the Trek audience its first-ever look at the Klingon homeworld, and won art direction Emmys for production designer Richard James and set decorator Jim Mees. Worf’s discommendation amounted to his being branded a coward, one without honor. The withdrawal of his win-or-die Council appeal left him a nonperson in Klingon society. Worf would carry the emotional baggage of this episode through the beginning of the fifth season.

  Perhaps best known as Sergeant Warren in Oliver Stone’s Platoon, actor, playwright, and longtime Trek fan Tony Todd has played many stage, TV and film roles. He auditioned four times for guest spots on TNG before he scored with the part of Kurn, who would return later in the series to help reclaim the family honor in “Redemption” (200) and “Redemption II” (201).

  Veteran actor Charles Cooper brought pride and forbearance to the role of the elder Klingon—traits that, because of a weak script, he was unable to show off in the part of General Korrd in the movie Star Trek V. In uncredited roles are stuntmen B., J. Davis and Chris Doyle as Duras’s assassins.

  The simple Klingonese words and phrases spoken here and in future episodes were all coined by linguist Marc Okrand. They include Qapla’! (success), mev yap (That is enough!), and cha’Dich (literally, second—the ritual defender-supporter). When Kurn and Picard accept Worf’s invitation to join him, they reply, “jllajnes. ghlj get jaghmeyjaj” (I accept with honor. May your enemies run with fear.)

  Curiously, often overlooked is the actual name of Duras’s father, Ja’rod—mentioned only once here and never in succeeding stories. A briefly seen computer display reveals that the Intrepid—another ship renamed for a Constitution-class vessel (from 1968’s “Immunity Syndrome”)—was commanded by Captain Drew Deighan when it reached Khitomer on SD 23859.7—perhaps a descendant of the writer of the spec script this episode sprang from.

  ALLEGIANCE

  * * *

  Production No.:
166 Aired: Week of March 26, 1990

  Stardate: 43714.1 Code: al

  Directed by Winrich Kolbe

  Written by Richard Manning and Hans Beimler

  GUEST CAST

  Kova Tholl: Stephen Markel

  Esoqq: Reiner Schöne

  Cadet Mitena Haro: Jocelyn O’Brien

  Alien No. 1: Jerry Rector

  Alien No. 2: Jeff Rector

  * * *

  Picard is kidnapped and replaced with a double whose actions test the loyalty of the Enterprise crew. Meanwhile, the real captain is trapped with three other hostages in a bizarre cell and must devote his time not only to escaping but to keeping the peace among his cell mates.

  The false Picard arouses suspicion when he orders a close look at a well-known yet dangerous pulsar without telling Riker, joins in the officers’ poker game, leads the crew in a drinking song, and seduces Dr. Crusher.

  The mystery behind his kidnapping is revealed when one of the real Picard’s cell mates, disguised as a Starfleet cadet, mentions a classified mission only Picard’s crew knew about, leading him to finger her as the enemy in their midst. She transforms herself into an energy-being, and is joined by two others of her race. Their captives were being studied for their reactions to authority, like lab rats.

  The captain and the aliens return to the Enterprise just as Riker is leading a “mutiny” against the impostor, who is then transformed into another one of the energy-beings. Picard then gives the energy-beings a taste of their own medicine by trapping them in an energy field. He releases them only after lecturing that their “research” amounts to kidnapping and is immoral.