I honestly cannot believe that the episode has, as it stands at the time of this review, a 5.2 grade and more positive reviews than negative ones. There seems to be a culture of sugarcoating old TNG episodes, but even though I adore TNG, I will not take part in euphemisms and lies. This episode is a total train wreck, arguably the worst TNG episode. I always re-watch any title I'm going to review because that seems only fair, and it's usually a fun time, but this was just unbearable.
Plot (SPOILERS)
Desperately needing a vaccine the Enterprise travels to the only world (in the vicinity) that has it and is confronted by the leader of the planet, who is love struck by Yar, kidnaps her, and then allows his first wife to battle her to the death in order to see who truly is the first wife. Picard allows this to happen because of the prime Directive and because he likes Yar's chances. Tar is victorious, her opponent saved by the crew, and the leader of the world gets relegated to the status of second husband.
Good Stuff
..........erm.........the concept of the Prime Directive, while horrible inefficient in a whole plethora of possible scenarios is at least cause for discussion and philosophical debate and that's a good thing. There are some small moments with Wesley, Data and LaForge that are pleasant and a first attempt at character development and backstory building. Patrick Stewart is decent as he always is.
Things I despised
Tasha Yar is unlikeable and Denise Crosby plays her over the top and unconvincing. Over the top acting also applies to the entire bunch of guest stars. Yareena, Yar's opponent is uninteresting and the planet's leader is so over the top you wonder where the hell the writers and director were when they shot this. It's clearly a redundant TOS script. The fight to the death is filmed well and scored well but it is between 2 characters you couldn't possibly care any less about. If both were to die you would chug your beer and doze off.
The Prime Directive makes its grand entrance and immediately we see how flawed it is. It would hypothetically call for whole civilizations to perish when the Federation could easily prevent it, and it leaves no room for when a Starfleet vessel encounters a species with a less than honorable code of conduct. Which means that when your officer is meant to fight to the death or someone is about to be executed for falling into flowers (don't worry, we'll get to that in a later episode) the Directive orders you to let it happen, but of course you won't. The Directive seems to be in place to prevent Starfleet from using its usually vastly superior technology to stand in the way of other civilizations' culture or development, but every single time this creates the problem that OTHER cultures DON'T have a similar Diretive, making the no.1 rule of the Federation comforting on paper but usually pointless in the real world. In the episode "The Drumhead" a prosecutor is shocked by the amount of times Picard has violated the PD but that just shows how imperfect it is. It seems to imply that if the Borg were to assimilate a species the Federation would just shrug and call it a vital aspect of Borg culture that we shouldn't condemn because that's arrogant. Right...
Conclusion
A seriously flawed episode that wasn't meant for TNG highlighting the least interesting character and introducing Starfleet's golden rule that is so flawed you wonder why they even bother to bring it up. They are not meant to aid, destroy, disrupt or affront the customs of other cultures and Star Trek went on to do little else for the rest of its existence, no matter what series or movie. The PD seems reasonable until you leave the shipyards and venture out into space. The acting is over the top, the story is boring, the ending is unsatisfying. I love TNG but this is not worth your time. 2/10. Next!
Plot (SPOILERS)
Desperately needing a vaccine the Enterprise travels to the only world (in the vicinity) that has it and is confronted by the leader of the planet, who is love struck by Yar, kidnaps her, and then allows his first wife to battle her to the death in order to see who truly is the first wife. Picard allows this to happen because of the prime Directive and because he likes Yar's chances. Tar is victorious, her opponent saved by the crew, and the leader of the world gets relegated to the status of second husband.
Good Stuff
..........erm.........the concept of the Prime Directive, while horrible inefficient in a whole plethora of possible scenarios is at least cause for discussion and philosophical debate and that's a good thing. There are some small moments with Wesley, Data and LaForge that are pleasant and a first attempt at character development and backstory building. Patrick Stewart is decent as he always is.
Things I despised
Tasha Yar is unlikeable and Denise Crosby plays her over the top and unconvincing. Over the top acting also applies to the entire bunch of guest stars. Yareena, Yar's opponent is uninteresting and the planet's leader is so over the top you wonder where the hell the writers and director were when they shot this. It's clearly a redundant TOS script. The fight to the death is filmed well and scored well but it is between 2 characters you couldn't possibly care any less about. If both were to die you would chug your beer and doze off.
The Prime Directive makes its grand entrance and immediately we see how flawed it is. It would hypothetically call for whole civilizations to perish when the Federation could easily prevent it, and it leaves no room for when a Starfleet vessel encounters a species with a less than honorable code of conduct. Which means that when your officer is meant to fight to the death or someone is about to be executed for falling into flowers (don't worry, we'll get to that in a later episode) the Directive orders you to let it happen, but of course you won't. The Directive seems to be in place to prevent Starfleet from using its usually vastly superior technology to stand in the way of other civilizations' culture or development, but every single time this creates the problem that OTHER cultures DON'T have a similar Diretive, making the no.1 rule of the Federation comforting on paper but usually pointless in the real world. In the episode "The Drumhead" a prosecutor is shocked by the amount of times Picard has violated the PD but that just shows how imperfect it is. It seems to imply that if the Borg were to assimilate a species the Federation would just shrug and call it a vital aspect of Borg culture that we shouldn't condemn because that's arrogant. Right...
Conclusion
A seriously flawed episode that wasn't meant for TNG highlighting the least interesting character and introducing Starfleet's golden rule that is so flawed you wonder why they even bother to bring it up. They are not meant to aid, destroy, disrupt or affront the customs of other cultures and Star Trek went on to do little else for the rest of its existence, no matter what series or movie. The PD seems reasonable until you leave the shipyards and venture out into space. The acting is over the top, the story is boring, the ending is unsatisfying. I love TNG but this is not worth your time. 2/10. Next!