why did this have to happen to our beloved legacy Archive

15

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

The Most Toys“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.

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28

Star Trek Into Dimness

Star Trek Into DarknessAfter 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.

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20

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Shades of Gray”

“Shades of Gray”
Teleplay by Maurice Hurley and Richard Manning & Hans Beimler
Story by Maurice Hurley
Directed by Rob Bowman

Season 2, Episode 22
Original air date: July 17, 1989
Star date: 42976.1

Mission summary

Riker and La Forge are exploring Dagobah when Riker gets a scratch on his leg. *tension music* He think it’s just a flesh wound, but La Forge asks for an emergency beam-out anyway. Unsurprisingly, the transporter’s biofilters detect something low-budget within Riker and just to be on the safe side, O’Brien decides not to beam him up until Pulaski can unnecessarily risk exposure by beaming down herself. She looks at him, sees it’s a flesh wound, and they beam up. Efficiency! But by now Riker’s leg is numb…

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23

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Up the Long Ladder”

“Up the Long Ladder”
Written by Melinda M. Snodgrass
Directed by Winrich Kolbe

Season 2, Episode 18
Original air date: May 22, 1989
Star date: 42823.2

Mission summary

This episode begins with an S.O.S. This is your only warning.

The strange signal, whose nature Riker instantly guesses despite it taking Starfleet a month, is a call for help used by Earthlings over three hundred years ago. Even though the distress call’s a month old no one has bothered to check it out yet, which winds up having been a strangely prescient move. Alas, Picard decides to save humanity’s “lost sheep,” in between healing some lepers and turning water into synthehol. Worf wants out of this episode and collapses to the floor of the bridge, thereby cementing his role as the most sensible person on this godforsaken boat.

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28

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

“The Royale”
Written by Keith Mills
Directed by Cliff Bole

Season 2, Episode 12
Original air date: March 27, 1989
Star date: 42625.4

Mission summary

A Klingon cruiser alerts Enterprise to some strange debris orbiting around Theta 8, an unmapped, poisonous ball of nitrogen and methane. They beam a chunk of the debris over and it’s a panel from a 21st-century spaceship, with the American flag and NASA’s logo emblazoned on it. But we’re too far from home! How can this be?

PICARD: We’ve got ourselves a puzzle, Number One.

Do we? Must we? Can’t we just tape the pieces together, pat ourselves on the back, then maybe dissolve it in acid over a live flame?

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29

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Where Silence Has Lease”

“Where Silence Has Lease”
Written by Jack B. Sowards
Directed by Winrich Kolbe

Season 2, Episode 2
Original air date: November 28, 1988
Star date: 42193.6

Mission summary

Worf invites Riker to the Klingon’s ultraviolent “calisthenics program,” a lengthy and pointless opening sequence that winds up being the most exciting part of these 44 minutes. The actual plot1 begins2 when the crew stumbles upon a “black void,” or what Data calls “nothing”: no sensor readings, no life signs, just a “hole in space.” This threatens to be interesting but it’s actually just Act I of an absurdist tragicomedy featuring a bridge with no exit.

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37

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

“Justice”
Teleplay by Worley Thorne
Story by Ralph Willis and Worley Thorne
Directed by James L. Conway

Season 1, Episode 8
Original air date: November 9, 1987
Star date: 41255.6

Mission summary

After settling some colonists in the Strnad solar system, the Enterprise comes across a Eden-like M-class planet called Edo in the adjoining star system. A small away team has been down to make contact, and the locals are party animals. LaForge describes the Edo as “wild in some ways, actually puritanical in others. Neat as pins, ultra-lawful, and make love at the drop of a hat.” While Riker’s already got his bag packed, Picard thinks there must be some negatives. He allows a small party–including Wesley Crusher, for some reason–to beam down to test the place’s suitability for shore leave, but warns that they should “just hope it’s not too good to be true.”

Right on cue, the sensors start to go crazy–it’s reading that something else is in orbit around Edo, but no one can see it. Oh well. Nothing worth getting in the way of hot sex, right?

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42

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “Code of Honor”

“Code of Honor”
Written by Katharyn Powers and Michael Baron
Directed by Russ Mayberry; Les Landau (uncredited)

Season 1, Episode 4
Original air date:  October 12, 1987
Star date: 41235.25

Mission summary

A devastating plague threatens millions of Federation lives and only one planet seems to have abundant supplies of the vaccine: Ligon II. The Ligonians, who are all black, are described as “proud,” “structured,” “ritualistic,” and “honor-based,” because I guess positive adjectives are supposed to make their African tribal vibe seem less racist.

Picard greets the leader, Lutan, and his first officer equivalent, Hagon, aboard the Enterprise. Lutan is immediately taken by Lt. Yar because on their planet “it is the duty of women only to own the land, and the duty of men to protect and rule it.” Picard gifts them some pottery and they get a tour of the Enterprise, then Yar gives them an aikido demonstration as a way to show off both the holodeck and her own physical skills. All seems to be going well, as Lutan appears both pleased by Picard and willing to negotiate for the vaccine. He politely says his goodbyes, but just as he’s beaming out he abruptly snatches Lt. Yar and transports her with them to the surface.

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38

Star Trek: The Next Generation Re-Watch: “The Naked Now”

“The Naked Now”
Written by J. Michael Bingham (D.C. Fontana), story by John D.F. Black (“The Naked Time”) and J. Michael Bingham
Directed by Paul Lynch

Season 1, Episode 3
Original air date: October 5, 1987
Star date: 41209.2

Mission summary

After receiving bizarre messages from the S.S. Tsiolkovsky, a science ship studying a collapsing star, Enterprise races at warp 7 to investigate. They make brief contact with what sounds like the Tsiolkovsky’s phone sex operator just before someone blows an emergency hatch on the ship, killing everyone on board.

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44

Re-watching Star Trek V: The Final Frontier

Star Trek V: The Final Frontier

Screenplay by: David Loughery
Story by: William Shatner & Harve Bennett & David Loughery
Produced by: Harve Bennett
Directed by: William Shatner

Release date: June 9, 1989
Stardate: 8454.1

Mission Summary

Shore leave at Yosemite Park is cut short by a hostage situation on the planet Nimbus III, where a Vulcan named Sybok has taken three ambassadors hostage. The Enterprise is dispatched to resolve the situation, and they find that Sybok is Spock’s fully Vulcan half-brother. He has a unique ability to purge a person’s pain, a neat trick that both Spock and McCoy take him up on (Kirk refuses, saying his pain makes him human). Unfortunately, Sybok also happens to be a raving cultist in search of god at the planet Sha Ka Ree in the center of the universe. Meanwhile, a Klingon named Klaa is in pursuit of Kirk, for personal glory and because the movie needed explosions.

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