About Author: Torie Atkinson

Website: http://www.torieatkinson.com
Description: Torie Atkinson watches too many movies and plays too many games but never, ever reads enough books.

Posts by Torie Atkinson

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Suddenly Human”

Torie Atkinson

– May 22, 2014 8:00 amPosted in: Featured, TNG Re-Watch

“Suddenly Human”
Teleplay by John Whelpley & Jeri Taylor
Story by Ralph Phillips
Directed by Gabrielle Beaumont

Season 3, Episode 4
Original air date: October 15, 1990
Star date: 44143.7

Mission summary

The Enterprise investigates a Talarian distress call and finds an adrift training ship full of injured teens and children (but no Scoutmaster). Radiation is leaking from the propulsion system and Dr. Crusher beams the five survivors to the Enterprise just in time. Among the survivors, however, is a human boy…

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: bad parenting, daddy issues, forehead ridges, horrible horrible children, picard hates children, troi is useless

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Family”

Torie Atkinson

– January 2, 2014 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

Family “Family”
Written by Ronald D. Moore
Directed by Les Laundau

Season 4, Episode 2
Original air date: October 1, 1990
Star date: 44012.3

Mission summary

The Enterprise is docked above Earth completing some much needed, post-Borg repairs and upgrades, so everyone onboard uses the opportunity to phone home. Picard packs his bags for La Barre, his quaint little French hometown; Worf reluctantly prepares to receive his adoptive parents, the very kind, very Russian Sergey and Helena Rozhenko; and Dr. Crusher picks up an old box of Jack Crusher’s things from storage, including a holographic message he recorded for Wesley shortly after he was born.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: belonging, daddy issues, fully clothed man-wrestling, identity crisis, klingons, parents, troi is useless, wesley's dad, worf identity crisis

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “The Best of Both Worlds”

Torie Atkinson

– August 29, 2013 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“The Best of Both Worlds”
Written by Michael Piller
Directed by Cliff Bole

Season 3, Episode 26
Original air date: June 18, 1990
Star date: 43989.1

Mission summary

The Enterprise investigates a distress signal from Jouret IV, with whom they lost contact 12 hours earlier. When they arrive, not only are there no life signs of the 900 inhabitants, but there are no signs life was ever there at all. What’s left of New Providence, the settlement, is a giant crater. Picard is joined by an Admiral Hanson and young Commander Shelby, who believe that this is an attack by the Borg… an attack that has caught the Federation completely unprepared.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: borg, bureaucracy, handwaving mumblemumble, locutus, picard gets an upgrade, Starfleet is stupid, technobabble, troi earns her paycheck

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Ménage à Troi”

Torie Atkinson

– August 15, 2013 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

Menage a Troi “Ménage à Troi”
Written by Fred Bronson & Susan Sackett
Directed by Robert Legato

Season 3, Episode 24
Original air date: May 28, 1990
Star date: 43930.7

Mission summary

The Enterprise is hosting a trade agreement conference while in orbit around Betazed, which means it’s time for another installment of How I Studiously Avoided Meeting Your Mother starring Lwaxana Troi. Lwaxana seems happy at the chance to further berate her daughter for choosing a career over babies on Betazed, but gets derailed when a Ferengi named DaiMon Tog hits on her in the middle of the reception. For some reason “I would pay handsomely for you” doesn’t work on her, and she spurns him in front of the delegation before storming off. But Tog isn’t superficial–he wants her mind, too. To give him an edge on negotiations.

Riker gets assigned shore leave, so he and Deanna go for a walk down Memory Lane–and also the Huntington Library Botanical Gardens–on Betazed. But their little date is spoiled when Lwaxana and Mr. Homn arrive, and start Meddling. Mr. Homn goes off to pick some berries while Riker, Deanna, and Lwaxana get more and more irritated with one another. Just then, DaiMon Tog beams down! He still has the hots for Mama Troi, and won’t take no for an answer–beaming them all back to his ship.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: ferengis, Lwaxana Troi Daughter of the Fifth House Holder of the Sacred Chalice of Rixx Heir to the Holy Rings of Betazed, Picard acts weird, sexism, shakespeare, troi is useless, wesley and picard are BFFs, wesley saves the day

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “The Most Toys”

Torie Atkinson

– August 1, 2013 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“The Most Toys”
Written by Shari Goodhartz
Directed by Timothy Bond

Season 3, Episode 22
Original air date: May 7, 1990
Star date: 43872.2

Mission summary

There’s a tricyanate contamination on Beta Agni II, and the only cure is ~~more cowbell~~ hytritium, a rare and volatile element that only one man in the universe seems to have: Kivas Fajo, a space trader. On the last transport to the Enterprise, Data uses his thumbprint to confirm the transaction and the datapad zaps him. Fajo’s men (and woman) plant fake Data elements on the transport, launch it out of the shuttle bay, and blow it up. Stunned, the Enterprise crew believe that Data’s been destroyed, but have to high-tail it to Beta Agni II if they want to decontaminate that water supply in time to save the planet.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: androids, emotional women, geordi has a really bad day, handwaving mumblemumble, mysteries, shakespeare, slavery, space shylock, transporter malfunction, were they drunk when they threw this one together?, why did this have to happen to our beloved legacy

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Tin Man”

Torie Atkinson

– July 18, 2013 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

Tin Man “Tin Man”
Written by Dennis Putman Bailey & David Bischoff
Directed by Robert Sheerer

Season 3, Episode 20
Original air date: April 23, 1990
Star date: 43779.3

Mission summary

The Enterprise has an unexpected run-in with Captain DeSoto, who interrupts a really boring charting mission with top secret, ix-nay on the Omulan-Ray implications. He sends over a passenger, a Betazed named Tam Elbrun–“of the Ghorusda disaster,” whatever that means–who is to be the mission specialist of the week. He and Troi have already met, however, back at Betazed University, where she was studying basic visual cues and he was a patient. The mission? Approach a star about to go supernova, currently orbited by what appears to be a living ship that Elbrun has dubbed the “tin man.” Not only that, but they have to get there before the Romulans do, or else.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: being different, belonging, emotion, first contact, living ship, loneliness, mindreading is awful, one day data will be a real boy, pain, romulans, troi is useful

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Allegiance”

Torie Atkinson

– June 20, 2013 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“Allegiance”
Written by Richard Manning & Hans Beimler
Directed by Winrich Kolbe

Season 3, Episode 18
Original air date: March 26, 1990
Star date: 43714.1

Mission summary

Picard’s chillaxin’ in his quarters, reading a book (or rather, sleeping with one) when a probe enters his room, scans him, and beams him away. When Picard awakes, he finds himself in a locked room with two others: a Bolian Starfleet cadet named Mitena Haro, and a milquetoast Mizarian named Kova Tholl.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: alien probes, date night, drinking songs, existentialism, illusions, not everyone loves riker, Picard acts weird, picard moralizing, the tao of picard

Star Trek Into Dimness

Torie Atkinson

– June 10, 2013 10:00 amPosted in: Movies

Star Trek Into Darkness After several busy weeks I finally got around to seeing the new AbramsTrek. I didn’t like the first one because it felt like a lame action movie with a Trek skin grafted over it. This is much, much worse. Warning: this will be a spoiler post, so do not proceed if you have not seen the movie and wish to remain unspoiled.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: angry klingons, diplomacy, emotional Spock, fully clothed man-wrestling, handwaving mumblemumble, kirk is a jerk, loyalty, mind meld, sexism, were they drunk when they threw this one together?, why did this have to happen to our beloved legacy

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “The Offspring”

Torie Atkinson

– April 25, 2013 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“The Offspring”
Written by René Echevarria
Directed by Jonathan Frakes

Season 3, Episode 16
Original air date: March 12, 1990
Star date: 43657.0

Mission summary

Data summons Wesley, La Forge, and Troi to his lab for some Really Big News. After a drumroll, he unveils… a thing! They’re not really sure what it is–it seems to be a Soong-type android in beta–until it calls Data “father” and Data explains that this is his child, Lal.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: android rights, androids, breeding, civil rights, everyone loves riker, fascism, immortality sucks, loneliness, parenting, Starfleet is stupid

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “A Matter of Perspective”

Torie Atkinson

– April 4, 2013 8:00 amPosted in: TNG Re-Watch

“A Matter of Perspective”
Written by Ed Zuckerman
Directed by Cliff Bole

Season 3, Episode 14
Original air date: February 12, 1990
Star date: 43610.4

Mission summary

Data interrupts Picard’s art class to tell him that they’ve arrived at Tenuga IV and also that Picard couldn’t paint his way out of a Rothko. It seems Riker and La Forge conducted a survey of Dr. Apgar’s work on Krieger waves, which they hope will become a new energy source. La Forge says in so many words that Riker surveyed someone just a little too intimately and is in a rush to return. But as he beams back, Dr. Apgar’s science station explodes, and Riker barely makes it home intact.

But his luck isn’t meant to last, because an Inspector Krag beams aboard and arrests Riker… for murder.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: emotional women, fully clothed man-wrestling, handwaving mumblemumble, holodeck, holodreck, mysteries, not everyone loves riker, science!, troi is useless