“Too Short a Season”
Story by Michael Michaelian
Teleplay by Michael Michaelian and D.C. Fontana
Directed by Rob Bowman
Season 1, Episode 16
Original air date: February 8, 1988
Star date: 41309.5
Mission summary
On Mordan IV terrorists have taken several hostages, including a Federation ambassador, and demand to negotiate with an elderly Admiral Mark Jameson. Despite (or perhaps because of) his advanced years, Jameson’s qualifications are self-evident: he negotiated a seemingly impossible hostage situation on that very planet forty-five years earlier that made him something of a diplomatic hero. Though Mordan IV eventually plunged into a bloody, forty-year civil war, the past five years have been peaceful. Picard wonders why the current governor, Karnas, can’t seem to handle the situation himself. (Obviously healing a rift as deep as a civil war has a difficulty rating of three, max.)
Jameson and his wife beam aboard and it’s clear Jameson relishes returning to a starship. He delightfully asserts his authority as the senior mission officer, but deflates when Dr. Crusher insists on a medical exam. Jameson has an advanced stage of Iverson’s Disease, which deteriorates the body but leaves the mind intact. He’s wheelchair-bound, but surprises his wife by staggering out of his chair for the first time in four years. Later, on the bridge, he’s able to stand and walk to the con. Everyone is astonished, but the medical results Crusher obtained from Jameson are normal, if two months old.
Later in his quarters, Jameson tries to get frisky with his wife–and doubles down in pain. Mrs. Jameson calls sickbay and Crusher discovers alien chemicals (and no Iverson’s Disease) in Jameson’s body. Released, Jameson confesses to Picard that he obtained not one, but two sets of rejuvenation drugs on Cerebus II (the other intended for his wife). They were supposed to be taken over the course of two years, but when he heard about this mission he took all of it at once–including his wife’s dose. Mrs. Jameson is furious that he would lie to her and take such a dangerous risk, seeing as the drug has a high mortality rate and is rarely shared with outsiders. But Jameson is hiding something else. He contacts Karnas and calls him on the governor’s charade–it’s Karnas, not terrorists, that has taken hostages, and the price for their return seems to be Jameson.
As Jameson de-ages his condition becomes more and more unstable, and Dr. Crusher must tell his wife that he will not survive the ordeal. Jameson seems be all right with this and decides to offer himself to Karnas. He reveals to Picard that forty-five years earlier, it wasn’t his diplomatic excellence that won over the hostage-taker where his predecessors had failed: he simply gave in to the demands and provided them with weapons. To ease his own conscience, he gave the other side weapons, too, thus plunging the world into decades of civil war. Karnas wants revenge, and a combination of guilt and old age convince Jameson to just give it to him.
He beams down to Mordan IV and offers himself to a very skeptical Karnas. Eventually he proves who he is by showing a scar on his arm that had sealed their pact all those years earlier. Karnas watches as Jameson dies in agony before him, cradled by his wife. His revenge sated, Karnas releases the hostages and all’s well that ends well.
Analysis
I hadn’t remembered anything about this episode, and even on re-watch I doubt I’ll retain much by the season’s close. Clayton Rohner does a passable job playing an old man saddled by guilt and selfishness but his makeup is so atrocious I couldn’t believe for a moment this was an old man. I did like Marsha Hunt’s turn as his wife, who consistently calls him on his bullshit excuses yet cares for him dearly, and their scenes together were the strongest of the episode. But ultimately the de-aging plot didn’t have anything to do with the Iran-Contra plot, and so as a whole nothing ever came together.
I’m mostly unsatisfied that Jameson’s character is supposed to be in some way redeemed by the end. The man’s a menace, a stain on the reputation of Starfleet and a danger to any mission he’s assigned to, not to mention an asshole to his wife (I love that he takes her dose and then says “I did it for us!”) . Then he jeopardizes what’s left of the good in his life–his marriage and pending retirement–to get some short-lived machismo points in this final showdown. The fact that these men sealed their corruption with a knife (like MEN) is ludicrous. I have no sympathy for him. His farewell to his wife is sad, but again, in no way related to the diplomatic A-plot that I’m apparently supposed to be invested in. The half-hearted lesson about accepting aging also seems weirdly out of place, mostly because you’ll never know if the alien tiger balm could have worked if he had just followed the package directions. Ultimately “The Counter-Clock Incident” handled that theme with more grace.
In any case, there’s a good reason you don’t negotiate with terrorists: because they will continue to make demands and take hostages. I’m shocked that Picard allowed Jameson to give himself up. The man was dying anyway, so why give Karnas the satisfaction of getting his way? Why not just produce the dead body and say “Sorry, too late”? Then he has no choice but to release the hostages, Jameson dies with some dignity, and you’re not giving other potential terrorists data to support using similar means for less personal ends.
I don’t know if this was cut from the script or something, but did anyone else note the heavy emphasis on Troi looking suspiciously at Jameson and yet never saying or doing anything? The camera repeatedly focuses on her while Jameson speaks, presumably to indicate that she knows something is off about this guy, and yet she never says a word to Picard or Crusher or anybody. How did she get to be on the bridge again?
Lackluster, middling, and meh. I’m actually looking forward to “When the Bough Breaks” just so that I sink my teeth into something worthy of being savaged.
Torie’s Rating: Warp 3 (on a scale of 1-6)
Thread Alert: Nothing says thread alert like a bunch of old men wearing army surplus gear. Reactionaries? Contractors? Paintball fanatics? Whatever it makes you think of, I’m going to guess it’s not “security guards.”
Best Line: JAMESON: Annie… with the golden hair.
MRS. JAMESON: Flatterer. It’s gray now.
JAMESON: I see only the gold.
Trivia/Other Notes: In the original script Jameson survives and reverts to teenagerhood–and does not recognize his wife.
The wheelchair used in production cost $10,000 and didn’t work properly. Rob Bowman had to shoot around it.
Karnas may look familiar–he was Korax in “The Trouble With Tribbles.”
Previous episode: Season 1, Episode 15 – “11001001.”
Next episode: Season 1, Episode 17 – “When the Bough Breaks.”
I suppose a comparison to “The Counter-Clock Incident” is inevitable, but apart from the rejuvenation aspect the two episodes don’t have a whole lot in common. And the TAS episode worked a lot better (except for the “We had a good run, but I don’t want to spend another 50 years with you” thing). This thing just doesn’t work on so many levels. Bad makeup, apparently bad props (how can you spend 10 grand on a fancy wheelchair? Pike’s chair looked cheesy, but it worked!), and for my money a really mediocre performance by the main character. Everyone else does a much better job, much like the character himself, I guess.
I’m also surprised to see D.C. Fontana’s name attached to this project. She usually did better work than this and it’s very odd to see something from her that so de-emphasizes the main crew. They mostly just stand around and react. The whole premise here gets handled much better later on in the first episode with Sarek.
I kept falling asleep through this episode (I had a long day on short sleep), but I got the gist and it’s telling that I couldn’t bring myself to go back and re-re-watch this one.
The guidelines for script writers that I had for TNG around season six specified that episodes had to be about the main characters and how the guest characters affected them, instead of focusing on a new character. This is one of several problems with this episode: We don’t care about Jameson, nor does he give us any reason to. He’s obnoxious, foolhardy, and inconsiderate to his wife–someone who, presumably, has been taking care of him for a long time. This is even more of a credit to her given how annoying he is.
He defines himself by something that happened 40 years in the past, a mistake that he never got over, and he hasn’t accumulated the wisdom you would expect from a man of his years. It’s appropriate then, that he regresses to a young man in his twenties–then dies.
It might have worked better if he’d had some connection to the crew, as an old mentor or Picard’s idol or something. Instead, we just have an uneven story with bad acting and even worse makeup. This episode contributes nothing to TNG or the franchise, except to reinforce the idea that Starfleet admirals suck and Enterprise is being wasted on stupid missions.
Warp 2 from me.
An episode that had vanished from my memory. Reading the synopsis I can see why. Trite moralizing, pointless plotting, and once again the babyboom generation showing that come hell or high water we’re not going to let go of Vietnam. (I swear if we found a way to stop aging today in two hundred years we’d still be argusing Vietnam and the Culture war.)
as to the $10,000 chair remeber that’s an 80’s ten grand chair, but frankly Hollywood runs up big bills very easily.
Agree on the weakness of this episode. One thing they should have explored to counter the moral crap that’s been thrown in our face is an admiral violating the law and federation policy to arm a planet? Up till now it seems humans are morally superior but a starflower admiral arming aliens?? Shouldn’t that get more airtime? Wouldn’t we as an audience relate to a fallible human? Might even be intresting.
Agree with Eugene on the connection aspect. Couldn’t he have a past with the crew or be a famous admiral we’ve heard of? A faceless, nameless admiral I don’t care about in a sort of redemption tale? Blah.
Warp factor 1
I’m always reminded of this dreck-fest when I encounter the Doctor Who reboot show Lazarus (S3, Martha and Ten): bad makeup, cruelty to the long-suffering wife, and the inevitable downfall of the one seeking time beyond his biblically-given 70 years. And it’s always a man, isn’t it, who can’t get beyond his desperate search to turn back the clock? Because, y’know, women never long to be young again.
Or more likely, because there really isn’t a way to make this plot with a woman and have it not be a searing comment on women’s perceived role in society: one day, old and grey, ignored, “respected”, put aside, dismissed. Next day, young and vibrant, chased all over by het men as being desirable, having changed nothing of who she is but the skin clothing her bones.
None of which changes that this was a particularly abysmal take on the “He Must Have Youth!” plot/trope. How the hell did this series last until it got good in the third season?
Actually, I guess they did sort of do this one on TOS, with Mudd’s Women, but it wasn’t as explicitly de-aging – and it did develop into exactly the kind of critique I said it would. So there. :P
;)
So everyone’s pretty much already mined the rather thin vein that is the main plot of this episode; I want to draw attention (through a link-heavy post, yay) to a subtle bit of imagery that’s supposed to be influencing how we view it (even if it isn’t well-developed or well-thought-out).
Okay, in the first scene where Picard sees Karnas’ message, notice those two statues in the shot, facing him? They’re (out-and-out Stargate-quality) statues of the Egyptian falcon-god, Horus (see especially his hieroglyph) — also the god of war and hunting.
Horus, you will recall, was the child of Isis and Osiris, the gods who feature in the Egyptian death-rebirth myth cycle — Isis reassembles and rejuvenates/reanimates her slaughtered & dismembered husband, Osiris, who is mummified from chest down and who has the epithet “He Who is Permanently Benign and Youthful.” So the episode is making an effort to visually prefigure the theme of resurrection/rebirth represented by Jameson/Osiris, who is also the father of the militaristic Mordan IV society.
Coincidence? Maybe, but what planet is it that the Enterprise heads off to after the mission’s over? Why that’s right, Isis Three.
Of course they had no idea how to make this obvious enough to register to the viewers nor detailed enough to have some kind of meaningful relevance. But it’s interesting to pick up on the pattern nonetheless.
This has been bugging me, but I finally recalled (with the help of Google) that Kirk did something similar in “A Private Little War”: giving both sides the same weapons. In that sense, if the writers were familiar with that episode, then this could have been an interesting extrapolation of the long-term consequences of that “solution.” But it doesn’t really try for that.
At last we come to an episode I feel is defensible and lays the groundwork for improvements to come. Not much here that is cringe inducing (other than the rubber agathics), although the pacing is slow and there’s not much development other than the central plot.
This episode could have used a B plot. It might have been useful to juxtapose Wesley’s youth and anxiety to grow up against the opposite stirring in the admiral, “The Boy” serving some useful plot purpose for once, but oddly enough, he never shows up once in the episode.
I too considered this episode to be the book end—part two, if you will—of Kirk’s cold war with the Klingons in “A Private Little War,” and one can easily imagine Kirk returning to Tyree’s world to apologize that his off-the-cuff arms race destroyed a lovely society and promising world.
What makes this episode special?
We finally see that the Almighty Federation and its representatives are capable of grave error, and that some of their magnificent decisions weren’t really so bright after all. This is noteworthy, in a season of smug self-satisfaction and easy morality plays.
Jameson’s calculation is one you could see Kirk make, and as such it is a great commentary on the earlier series. For all that, the admiral—the first we’ve seen—conducts himself with a certain bravery and introspection.
Picard’s shallow moralizing at the end is completely dispensable. And I don’t think we’ll ever again see the captain nearly this passive and submissive in his own wheelhouse.
—
Here’s a question I have: When someone is communicating with the Enterprise from a distance of many light years, exactly what is it Counselor Troi is supposed to be reading? Their inner minds? If her power is largely psychic or psionic, how is it possible for her to read an emotion across such distance? If she’s simply a trained psychologist able to read from posture and expression, like Lightman on “Lie To Me,” why bother with the whole Betazed schtick?
Maybe what we perceive to be a mercurial and undependable magic power is that she is instead simply a charlatan.
It’s interesting that while TOS reserved the ranks of captain and commodores from meddleseome egotists and unhinged megalomaniacs, TNG assigns these qualities to the admiralty, with Jameson among the least offensive in this regard. Compared to ones we’ll see later, Admiral Benjamin Button comes across as at least nominally responsible for his war crimes.
Lemnoc is quite right to compare this to “A Private Little War”. Jameson didn’t quite do the same as Kirk–Kirk supplies weapons to only one side to supposedly balance the weapons already supplied by the Klingons, whereas Jameson supplies weapons to both sides. Jameson’s action is less defensible, though Kirk is hardly better off.
I remember this more fondly than I should. I have a weakness for the sort of ham that the actor playing Jameson serves up. “I see only the gold” indeed.
As etomlins points out @11, what Kirk did was provide weapons to one side to counterbalance what the Klingons were doing for the other side. He’s not happy about it and maybe he doesn’t come off so well from where we sit now, but it was a fairly accurate reflection of the pre-detente Cold War. Jameson seems to have simply been weak and rather feckless. He just caved to terrorists, because he couldn’t think of anything else and then decided to arm the other side, too, as an attempt to balance out what he did. (And how come Starfleet never found out about this?) Kirk would have managed to solve the situation diplomatically (and he could do that sometimes) or rescued the hostages.
There’s also a sense that Kirk would have been genuinely bothered by his actions. Jameson’s “guilt” never feels real. If really felt so awful, why did he never own up to it, even after his career was over? Why was he planning on extending his life? Wouldn’t he have perhaps looked forward to no longer being “tormented” by all this. He’s just upset because it all finally came out.
I agree. Whatever guilty-sounding noises Jameson makes I get that the real reason he dopes himself up with rejuvenation drugs is so that he can play commando and surprise his old enemy with an unexpected show of force. No guilt there! Indeed it feels not like he’s trying to redeem himself but rather that he’s trying to erase the incident by erasing Karnas, thereby effacing his old error but not redeeming himself for it.
@8 Eugene
True, but there are differences between this episode and “A Private Little War” – both within the story and in the context of when the episodes were made.
In Kirk’s case, it had already been established that the Klingons/Communists were arming the other side so we had to do so to keep things fair. (I guess this was Kirk’s reasoning) Opposition to the Vietnam War was already strong in this country but (at that time) one could assume that the majority of Americans still believed in standing up to the Communists wherever and however possible. Additionally, That episode had McCoy giving the moral argument against Kirk’s decision.
As Torie pointed out, this episode was influenced by the headlines and conflicts of its day. (Just as with “A Private Little War”) However. This episode seemed to focus on only one element – Jameson’s deal – then relied on (and poorly handled) an overused sci-fi/fantasy device to fit within the Star Trek universe.
@6 CaitieCait
At least “Mudd’s Women” offered the suggestion that how you feel about yourself can be important. As I said. This time the device was poorly used.
@9 Lemnoc
I’m not sure that having Wesley be the countering ‘B plot’ would have worked. It could have become just the youth / old age conflict without adding to the episode. My take on adding to this story would be to have Troi be the ‘B plot’ to let her make McCoy’s argument. During her early years of service – to her home world, not Star Fleet – she had to use a top-secret document with details about Jameson’s action during the course of an assignment. Therefore, she already knows what he did but she cannot share that information with Picard or anyone else because she is still bound by her oath to protect classified information. She reasons that at least she could talk to Jameson about his actions and present the needed argument. This would change the focus of the episode from what he did to how he deals with the consequences of what he did in the past. Meanwhile, Picard is getting upset with what he sees as Troi’s lack of attention to her duties. This might have given the ‘A plot’ the rounding out that it needed and it might have led to some character growth for Troi.
Wow. This place was busy while I was writing the above. Now I have to see if I still said anything new.
@14 Ludon
Your B Plot would have been interesting, and would have explained Troi’s intense passivity that Torie described in her analysis. My point was simply that at least some member of the ensemble needed something to do in this episode.
We can understand Kirk’s rationalization because we see it unfold. He has personal ties to the society and to Tyree, so we understand he has a stake in the outcome. Still, his “interpretation of the noninterference directive” is like Jameson’s “interpretation of the noninterference directive” fairly dubious and controversial, certainly Spock and McCoy found it so, and certainly one worth revisiting.
And Shatner was a more compelling actor. Jameson struts around, but has no command charisma.
But while TOS was everywhere flavored by the pragmatism of Cold War, TNG was flavored by a more circumspect Glastnost. That’s why I think this episode’s evolving ethos is noteworthy.
Correction: I thought Spock had some commentary on Kirk’s decision, but I see reviewing the episode guide that he was struggling with issues of his own. I must have been thinking of some other of Kirk’s dubious and numerous rationalizations for interfering with some society :-)
Looking at the pictures tied to this week’s featured re-watches has gotten me thinking about Star Trek’s latex nightmares.
As has been pointed out many times in discussions here the look of the original series was influenced by live theater. So I can – in that context – accept the artificial old age of the characters being exaggerated. Additionally, just as the makeup and costumes had to be exaggerated to some degree for the range of viewing distances within the theater, TV picture quality and the lack of color in many cases had to play a part in the look of the series. Even the Enterprise model was painted gray to appear as white on the screen. They had to use so much light to bring out the details in the exposure that a white model would have reflected too much light and burned out all the details.
TV picture quality was much better and color TV was just about universal in the time of TNG, so why continue with the exaggeration in age makeup? My guess is that it was done to make it stand out. (Keeping the old theater tradition) To make the statement “This in important to the story.” Looking at the number of older actors and actresses who appeared pretty much with their own looks, I can see where doing age makeup realistically depicting characters in their 70s, 80s and 90s (with the in-story equivalent being on the high side of a hundred) would not stand out enough from the look of the rest of the talent appearing throughout the series.
Not to be a smartass again, but I’d rather watch “The Deadly Years”. At least it had a point, and poignancy, and focused on characters we cared about, and ( unbelievably ) better old age make up. The only things that excited me the first time around were the presence of Michael Pataki, and the fact that there was an original series pistol phaser displayed on the wall behind him.
I didn’t like this episode the first time it aired, and I don’t care for it now. It’s hard for me to believe now that I was actually defending this series during these first season episodes against it’s hardcore original series detractors ( and I am a hardcore original series fan ). “Give it time”, I said. I guess I just wanted the new series to be good, so I was less critical at the time. Thank god the series got better as it went on.
I guess one could rationalize that Jameson’s makeup is so exaggerated because he’s supposed to be ravaged by disease, not just old age.
Do we really need the de-aging subplot at all, though? It seems like a very little rewriting is needed to jettison it altogether. About all the subplot contributes is a bit of ginned-up suspense (is Jameson going to croak before undertaking the mission or isn’t he?) and a minute or two of admittedly ripe overacting from Michael Pataki (“I WANT THE OLD MAN PICARD!”) until the issue of Jameson’s identity is settled. It didn’t need to be a de-aging drug, though (a drug that by the way can cure a disease thought by the Federation to be incurable–hope they followed up on that!) Just have the character take something else dangerous to try to get himself ready for a confrontation. Amphetamines, cortisone, anything.
Not that we need any more proof that Troi is useless when she’s needed most, but she wasn’t able to tell that Karnas was completely lying? Really? Indeed, when they get the first communication from Karnas about the fictitious terrorists, Troi says that he’s telling the truth.
@20 etomlins
Gets back to my question @9. How is it Troi can sense what this guy is thinking or concealing on a world many days away at Warp 6? Can she sense the emotions of everyone in the universe at any distance?
I agree the two plot points don’t work very well smooshed together.
Jameson committed war crimes that he knowingly hid from Federation authorities. That crime and deception seems to be the larger plot point, at least ‘twould seem that way from the viewpoint of the captain and SF Command. But most of the episode spins out a yarn of the mystery of de-aging in a character we don’t know or care about. And it is this second plot point that garners the captain’s shallow moralizing about the perils of youth, alas! On the larger question, he has nothing to say.
The captain makes some offhand comment about Karnas also bearing some degree of responsibility for a four-decade civil war, but THEN LEAVES HIM IN CHARGE of the planet and its militia. Either this is a planet the Federation should not be interfering in—in which case Starfleet should not be sending in negotiators and hostage rescue teams—or it is a world where the Federation is free to shape or influence outcomes.
if this episode is supposed to be some kind of allegory to Iran-Contra, then Jameson fills the role of Ollie North. And this would be like the White House sending in Col. North as he might be today back into that situation to fix it. Unlikely! But the problem here is Iran-Contra had some kind of geopolitical backdrop, where it was important to American hegemony to negotiate a queasy arms deal.
There is no analog to that in this episode, no stakes, no reason for the Fed to be involved either at the outset or the conclusion. Even if Jameson’s rescue plan had worked, it still would have left Karnas in charge, available to take and kill more hostages until he got what he wanted or was forcibly removed.
The whole arc is as nutty as Jameson’s logic that he had to take a dangerous and likely fatal dose of some alien drug to heroically resolve the situation. And deranged as Starfleet’s logic of sending a fatally diseased, octogenerian cripple in to command an Away Mission.
…still, it’s more coherent than many plots we’ve seen this season….
…Reviewing the opening again, I guess I missed that some Fed Ambassador was among the kidnapped. I guess that does provide the Federation at least some motivation to try to resolve the situation.
Still makes no sense when Picard, learning he’d been lied to by both Jameson and Karnas, didn’t kibosh the mission-as-planned. He was under no directive to facilitate a fraud.
@21 lemnoc: Gets back to my question @9. How is it Troi can sense what this guy is thinking or concealing on a world many days away at Warp 6? Can she sense the emotions of everyone in the universe at any distance?
No one is sure, especially the writers. Maybe that’s why her ability is so useless–and entire sector’s worth of psychic background noise.
Troi….
No rhyme, reason or magical anything on her abilities. Her entire existence is to show her cleavage and act as a “sexy” space cheerleader. Everything else is crap with her character.
Once you internalize that everything else makes sense.
So, I was suppose to be turned on by her? Nyet. Not in this universe or in the Star Trek universe. She always seemed about as exciting as a grade-school teacher after you’ve grown up.
My opinion is yes, you were supposed to be turned on by her. Did it work? I would guess not even close for most viewers. She really served no other purpose after writers d
Sorry smartphone fat fingers…
Writers d
In my posting defense, I’m up late holding an infant so I’ll finish tomorrow on the laptop. Sorry for the crappy posts.
IMHO, Troi served no purpose for 7 years other than some cleavage and to add another woman to the bridge. Maybe as we go through the episodes I’ll change my tune but I can’t think of a single episode focused on her character that points me to why she was there on the bridge of the Federation flagship. She’s either some love interest of a visitor or there for one line an episode where she “kind of” feels something wrong. Nothing anyone else couldn’t figure out and not be an empath. I think we were supposed to be turned on judging by her costumes for 7 years.
Anyways, I can’t wait to get past the first season. I’m sure we all feel this way.
@29 ShameAndFailure
Point taken. Though I can think of at least one episode where Troi was useful. But most of the time, just when her power was needed most, it was conveniently suppressed for one reason or other.
Weirdly, the only character, male or female, who ever remotely radiated some kind of rowwrr-r sex appeal was Ensign Ro. And mostly because she was cast as the Mean Girl®.
The biggest problem with aging makup is that all you can really do (without very expensive CGI anyway) is add layers onto a face, which can look odd. But people’s faces change in different ways as they age – a lot of people’s faces actually shrink in as they get older.
Also, what people get wrong is what happens to hair. The default seems to make it white every time. But you look at elderly people. Their hair can be grey, white, silver, plus other colours. My grandfather died in his late 70s and his hair was mainly gray-white, but he still had patches of hair where the colour hadn’t completely disappeared but looked a very faded red. Heck, my mum is in her mid-60s and she still has a lot of her original hair colour – it’s nothing like completely grey yet (unlike my dad and his white ‘mad professor’ hair!)
I’ve always liked the aging makeup jobs in Citizen Kane, myself. Charles Foster Kane at the very end of his life doesn’t look the most convincing, perhaps, but the progression of years from his youth to late middle age is believable.
I’ve been thinking about the implications of Mark Jameson’s old diplomatic venture, the one in which he traded arms for hostages. Without details it’s hard to guess but it seems sensible to assume that, since the incident happened near the start of his career, Jameson was still a fairly junior officer in the diplomatic corps. How did he get hold of guns, then? To get some idea of how elaborate a real scandal of this sort needs to get, just read up on the Iran-Contra affair (which no doubt was fresh in the minds of the writers.) “Too Short a Season” implies, however, that Jameson was able to fake things up on his own. How could he get hold of large numbers of phasers without involving anyone who could rat him out later? Was he secretly cranking phasers out of the replicator in his quarters?
One of the dodges they used to use in the real Cold War was to take old equipment, shine it up, and hand it to allies. Which is why there are nations that still have, for instance, T-55 and T-62 tanks (I think those are the numbers, been a long time since I did a Warsaw Pact silhouette test!): the Soviets, as they built new gear, would sell/give some of their older stuff to developing nations, win-win all around. They get a more pliable client state, and the client state gets weapons beyond their means.
Which makes me think that old type-1 phaser on the wall may explain how Jameson did it.
The thing is, technology transfer isn’t as simple as just having the weapons, right? Especially if these weapons are really as qualitatively superior as everyone seems to think. You couldn’t drop off several crates of rifles in Parisii and expect the Gallic Wars to have gone differently; the Gauls would run out of bullets, would have no way to fix jams or clean and maintain the weapons, or replace broken parts…
Weapons are technology, and technology depends on a lot of other technology. It only makes sense within a certain technological ecosystem that can support and sustain it (that’s part of why inventions emerge when their “time has come,” why you have two guys racing to the patent office to patent the telephone after ten thousand preceding telephoneless years). The same would have to be true of a gift of phasers. Jameson would’ve had to’ve given these folks phasers and also chargers, and sufficient & reliable power sources to run the phasers, and trained technicians to repair them, and so on, to make any difference whatsoever. Not only would this have been an obvious Prime Directive violation (his own interpretation or not), there’s no possible way it could’ve been done without procurement & training support from Starfleet Central. We’re talking military advisers and all that jazz.
Of course it all makes sense if we assume there’s a vast corrupt Admiralty, right?
Yes and no, though. Phasers seem a fairly solid-state weapon, as a rule: you don’t see people stripping them down to clean them, for instance: there’s a power-port, but they’re a pretty sealed unit. And operation isn’t really that complex: one dial, and a button. Turn the dial, push the button, things disappear from the universe. They even include a nice bright light beam, to show you where you’re aiming (which, yes, has its down side: everyone can see where you’re aiming, and where from).
And the power, we’ve seen, especially with the old style, can be used interchangeably: remember Scott draining the phasers in Galileo 7? So presumably, you can just hook them up to the grid.
Thing is, they’re SUCH a force multiplier as we have not yet seen. Any almost completely untrained person could pick one up, and within a few seconds or having seen one used, be as capable as any mediocre shot who’s had one for years. And by capable I mean “capable of eliminating armoured or flying vehicles”, for instance, as well as making people vanish. This is WAY above what an AK-47 means.
Which means the infrastructure to support them would be minuscule, compared to the Cold War “advisors” who’d always go with the gift of technology: some sort of easy recharge connector, that plugs into the mains.
And with both sides equipped with the same gear, there’s advantage in killing someone to take their weapon, too.
Point is, we don’t know what the technological assistance commitment would need to be, for a solid-state electronic BFG-in-your-hand. I think an argument could be made that it’s very low indeed. Kirk was pretty alarmed by the Klingons merely teaching the natives how to make flintlocks: imagine if they’d just given them disruptors? Easier to train with and to use, easier to maintain, and exponentially more lethal.
What’s more surprising, to me, given the incredible force multiplier that a phaser is, is why the two sides haven’t more or less wiped one another out by now. Remember The Omega Glory? How many hundreds the Coms killed when the Yangs came down from the hills, draining all their power packs with the slaughter? These are absurdly easy weapons to use, and absurdly lethal.
Maybe Jameson hoped for a MAD situation?
On the subject of aging make-up: oftimes less is more. I remember a make up in an older black and white show or movie ( it may have been “The Howling Man” episode of “The Twilight Zone” ) where a character’s face seemed to change on-screen in front of our very eyes. All it was was a subtle application of greasepaint, and a change in the angle or color of lighting. This made the greasepainted on shadows and ridges gradually appear on the actor’s face. Of course, this trick probably wouldn’t have worked on color film, where the change in the color of the lighting would be obvious, but it was very effective.
How good are phasers really, I wonder. I’ve long thought that a company of well-drilled 20th century infantry could probably defeat a Federation force. That’s more a tactical failing, I suppose, but there is also the slowness of the phaser beam. A bullet is much faster than what we see.
@37 etomlins
Well, a phaser can completely disintegrate a person instead of just injuring them. It can be set on wide dispersal to take out multiple targets or used as a delayed explosive, or a power source. It can destroy objects and, my favorite, it can heat up rocks to keep you warm. Plus, it can just be used to stun someone without causing physical or long-term harm, though I’m surprised people didn’t get broken bones or concussions on a regular basis.
But I suppose you meant how good are they on the offensive? I guess not great, but typically the people they’re fighting also have phasers or disrupters. I think phaser rifles worked a little differently?
“It can be set on wide dispersal to take out multiple targets…”
But we only ever saw that in TOS. Seriously, was there ever any incident in TNG-era Trek where the broadband stun option was employed? It was used all the time in TOS but I can’t bring to mind a single instance where it was used from TNG onward.
@ 38 Eugene Actually Eugene the ideal weapon creates sever wounds and does not kill. If you kill an infantryman you’ve taken out one man, if you injure him you take more. You have removed the target from the battlefield;;d as well as those who must transport him and those who must care for him. It’s far harder on an army to have lots of wounded than lots of dead. Phaser Stun is no good because they recover too quickly.
@39 etomlins
I don’t remember this example, but a Google search reveals that phasers on wide beam were discussed as an option in the TNG episode “Power Play,” and wide beams were used to sweep rooms for changelings on DS9.
@40 bobsandiego
the ideal weapon creates sever wounds and does not kill
Damn, I’ve been doing it wrong!
…A wide stun beam was used to knock out an entire city block in A Piece of the Action, and it even had a noninvasive donut hole in the center IIRC….
@ 1 DemetriosX and @ 2 Eugene
It is pretty odd that the episode is about an emotional change within a character we don’t actually know or care about. I’m trying to think of an example where this worked… and coming up short.
@ 4 ShameAndFailure
I wish the episode had dealt more with that angle, but no, he’s just a one-off rogue who is redeemed in the end anyway.
@ 5 CaitieCat
I have been asking myself that question every week.
@ 8 Eugene
Iit would’ve been a lot more interesting if Jameson’s plan was actually sanctioned by the Federation. What if he had done this because they told him to? Because they had lost three diplomats already, because they wanted to come across as victorious, even if it meant giving in?
@ 9 Lemnoc
I think in one of the later Lwaxana episodes she says she constantly hears the din of thoughts around her, but can focus on one person. So maybe when facing off against another ship/planet, she can just turn up the gain and cancel out the noise…
In short, yeah, I have no idea.
@ 12 DemetriosX and @ 13 etomlins
He definitely has no guilt. I don’t even get the impression he’s thought about this incident in 40 years. He’s sorry only that it all came to light.
@ 18 Ludon
“Star Trek’s Latex Nightmares” should be a regular feature here. I have no idea why they made those makeup choices. Why not underdo it with some lines and dark spots, instead of overdo it and make the whole thing look absurd?
@ all re: Troi
She’s supposed to be more than attractive–she’s supposed to be exotic. The hair accessories, the excessive make-up, the unidentifiable accent…
I never liked her and don’t know any women who did, but it seemed she was supposed to be a kind of female counterpart to Riker’s (ENTIRELY THEORETICAL) charm. Whenever they need information from some moderately attractive female, they send Riker. Whenever they need information from some moderately attractive male, they send Troi. No one onboard seems to have ANY problem with taking advantage of her for these purposes.
Sorry, just one more thought re: Troi — if the Betazed can sense the minds of others over light-years, then they must not have ever needed space travel very much, huh? They could just do Betazed SETI and call some cool spacefaring neighbors over to them. Stick that in your Prime Directive and smoke it!
…actually, it would’ve been really cool if TNG had realized or explored this idea. Oh well. I guess the viewscreen beams in telepathy signals as well as audio/video.
After I watched ‘Haven’ I thought about Troi a little bit and I thought, what if she really can’t read people’s minds most of the time, or can’t control it? I was thinking, that, because she’s only half Betazoid, maybe her powers are uncontrollable and rarely work. So most of the time she’s only pretending to know what others are thinking. She’d have to be good at it to fool people who can read minds for most of her life. But it would also then make sense why she went to the federation instead of staying at home–because, at home, she was always at a disadvantage, but on a starship, she wouldn’t be. It also makes her a lot more interesting as a character. Because the interesting thing is, she’s always got this act–she’s pretending to be a different person than she really is, I think. And that might explain it. I know that wouldn’t be true, but it could be. (I haven’t watched any of the TNG episodes after this one, so there might be something later that contradicts this.)
@45 Noelle
For some reason I always figured that Troi was only telepathic with her mother and Riker, maybe some other Betazoids, and that she reinforced her limited empathy with training that made her better able to read people’s body language, but I don’t think that’s supported by any episode and is probably contradicted. They basically used her like a long-range Vulcan mind-meld. Her “pain, pain” scenes in “Encounter at Farpoint” always remind me of Spock making contact with the Horta. “Get that Betazoid some aspirin!”
Hope you’ll keep watching TNG with us… This is going to get better, I promise.
The Admeral is like Benjamin Button like him he ages in reverse unlike him he just reverse aging after being already old and he did not die as a newborn baby instead he died as a teenager .