Ah, the days when a Christmas tree light was the pinnacle of visual technology.
Confession time: my street cred regarding the original series of Star Trek is a bit thin. I actually didn’t watch any of TOS until I was an adult, primarily because it was difficult to find it before the age of television on DVD. When I did, my initial opinions were fairly mixed, and while I like it more and more the older I get, it’s never going to be my favorite, and only a handful of episodes really stand out in my memory. One of the few episodes I do remember is “Devil In The Dark”, where a silicon-based life form lashes out at humans who have inadvertently harmed it.
“Home Soil” reminded me quite a bit of “Devil In The Dark”, and feels like the first time that TNG has explored some harder science fiction concepts. Most of the aliens and cultures we’ve seen on the show so far have been relatable in terms of our own experiences and understanding of humanity. Even the insectoid Jaradan in “The Big Goodbye” were representative of the challenge that anyone faces when trying to learn a new language. But the aliens in “Home Soil” are the first to feel truly, absolutely alien. It’s a bold choice for the series, and while it doesn’t wholly work, it’s a sign that the showrunners were feeling a bit more confident in trying something that was outside of the TOS comfort zone.
The Enterprise swings by Velara III, an inhabitable planet that’s at the beginning of a thirty year terraforming project which will transform it into an awesome vacation spot. The project’s behind schedule, and when Picard (who spends the first five minutes of the episode raving about how awesome terraformers are) gets the cold shoulder from the project leader, he sends Riker and company down to find out what the problem is. They get the full tour, including an unusually long explanation of what terraforming actually is, but before they can check out the gift shop, one of the scientists strolls into a drilling room, the doors shut, and the screaming starts.
The first half of this episode manages to be a detective story in a way that “The Big Goodbye” couldn’t manage. The team member was killed by a malfunctioning laser drill that shot him repeatedly, Data and Geordi come down to investigate, and when Data goes into the room to investigate what happened, the doors slam shut, and this laser drill starts chasing the fortunately nimble android around the room. Data manages to destroy the laser, and he and Geordi spot something unusual at the bottom of one of the mine shafts: a bright light that Geordi suggests is behaving like a life form, despite not being organic. Intrigued, they beam it up to the Enterprise’s science lab.
There’s a lot made of the idea that Picard is having Troi dig into the personal history and background of each of the three surviving terraformers, but nothing really comes from it. They confess that they’d seen some odd patterns, and some strange shit had been happening, but they never considered that this might be a life form trying to communicate. The scenes between Kurt Mandl, the director of the project, and Picard, are entertaining, as two cranky, determined men argue and accuse, but ultimately, it doesn’t mean anything. The Federation assured these terraformers that the planet was lifeless, and they assumed that was the case. It’s understandable, but feels fairly anticlimactic. I kept waiting for it to be revealed that one of the scientists knew they were harming the alien (the crew keep referring to it as a compubrain, but I refuse, because that’s stupid) and chose to proceed, but the investigation into the terraformers just kind of sputtered to an end.
However, I’d be more disappointed about that if it wasn’t for the other half of the episode, which revolves around the exploration of what this new life form actually is. In the lab, the light starts humming, flashes brightly, and splits into two. As it continues to divide and grow, systems on the Enterprise start acting up. The crew figures out that each individual life form is similar to a small computer transistor. While one is fairly innocuous, the more it divides, the more intelligent and powerful it becomes, like a computer constantly getting upgrades. When it first communicates with the crew, it’s a genuinely dramatic moment, even with the cheesy Microsoft Sam style voice. It has impact on multiple levels: yes, this thing is alive; yes, it’s intelligent; and oh, by the way, it’s fucking PISSED.
Slowly, the crew pieces the problem together. The terraformers were siphoning off the high-salinity water that was found underground in order to purify it, and that high-salinity water (with its high conductivity) was acting like a circuit board for this life form’s population. This was killing off millions of the aliens, and in retaliation, they took over the laser drill and murdered one of the colonists. (It’s actually a pretty cool idea that a life form that has evolved to be similar to a computer would have a much easier job communicating with our equipment than with us.) Picard tries to explain the misunderstanding, but the aliens, calling the crew, “Ugly bags of mostly water,” aren’t having it. The crew is forced to lower the light, robbing the aliens of their power source, to get them to stop the assault on the ship. Finally, weakened, the aliens relent, and the Enterprise beams them back down to their home, quarantines the planet, abandons the terraforming project and station, and heads on its way.
I’ve been a bit torn on how I felt about the ending, because from a diplomatic point of view, this could charitably be called disastrous. Humans show up, slaughter millions of an indigenous life form by accident, abduct one of the aliens from the planet, imprison it in the lab, nearly kill it with a lack of light when it defends itself, and finally leave it on the planet and vanish. I think there’s a missed opportunity here. This is a daunting concept. This life form is so alien that they couldn’t even recognize it as a life form, and even their attempt to understand it was hostile, harmful, and brutal. All too often, the Enterprise visits strange new worlds that really aren’t that strange. There’s never a problem that human morality and ingenuity can’t solve. It’s somewhat terrifying to think that there’s life out there so completely and absolutely foreign that the best we can hope for is to not fuck up too much. “Home Soil” is a fascinating episode, but lacks the follow through needed for it to become a genuinely good one.
“Home Soil” reminded me quite a bit of “Devil In The Dark”, and feels like the first time that TNG has explored some harder science fiction concepts. Most of the aliens and cultures we’ve seen on the show so far have been relatable in terms of our own experiences and understanding of humanity. Even the insectoid Jaradan in “The Big Goodbye” were representative of the challenge that anyone faces when trying to learn a new language. But the aliens in “Home Soil” are the first to feel truly, absolutely alien. It’s a bold choice for the series, and while it doesn’t wholly work, it’s a sign that the showrunners were feeling a bit more confident in trying something that was outside of the TOS comfort zone.
The Enterprise swings by Velara III, an inhabitable planet that’s at the beginning of a thirty year terraforming project which will transform it into an awesome vacation spot. The project’s behind schedule, and when Picard (who spends the first five minutes of the episode raving about how awesome terraformers are) gets the cold shoulder from the project leader, he sends Riker and company down to find out what the problem is. They get the full tour, including an unusually long explanation of what terraforming actually is, but before they can check out the gift shop, one of the scientists strolls into a drilling room, the doors shut, and the screaming starts.
The first half of this episode manages to be a detective story in a way that “The Big Goodbye” couldn’t manage. The team member was killed by a malfunctioning laser drill that shot him repeatedly, Data and Geordi come down to investigate, and when Data goes into the room to investigate what happened, the doors slam shut, and this laser drill starts chasing the fortunately nimble android around the room. Data manages to destroy the laser, and he and Geordi spot something unusual at the bottom of one of the mine shafts: a bright light that Geordi suggests is behaving like a life form, despite not being organic. Intrigued, they beam it up to the Enterprise’s science lab.
There’s a lot made of the idea that Picard is having Troi dig into the personal history and background of each of the three surviving terraformers, but nothing really comes from it. They confess that they’d seen some odd patterns, and some strange shit had been happening, but they never considered that this might be a life form trying to communicate. The scenes between Kurt Mandl, the director of the project, and Picard, are entertaining, as two cranky, determined men argue and accuse, but ultimately, it doesn’t mean anything. The Federation assured these terraformers that the planet was lifeless, and they assumed that was the case. It’s understandable, but feels fairly anticlimactic. I kept waiting for it to be revealed that one of the scientists knew they were harming the alien (the crew keep referring to it as a compubrain, but I refuse, because that’s stupid) and chose to proceed, but the investigation into the terraformers just kind of sputtered to an end.
However, I’d be more disappointed about that if it wasn’t for the other half of the episode, which revolves around the exploration of what this new life form actually is. In the lab, the light starts humming, flashes brightly, and splits into two. As it continues to divide and grow, systems on the Enterprise start acting up. The crew figures out that each individual life form is similar to a small computer transistor. While one is fairly innocuous, the more it divides, the more intelligent and powerful it becomes, like a computer constantly getting upgrades. When it first communicates with the crew, it’s a genuinely dramatic moment, even with the cheesy Microsoft Sam style voice. It has impact on multiple levels: yes, this thing is alive; yes, it’s intelligent; and oh, by the way, it’s fucking PISSED.
Slowly, the crew pieces the problem together. The terraformers were siphoning off the high-salinity water that was found underground in order to purify it, and that high-salinity water (with its high conductivity) was acting like a circuit board for this life form’s population. This was killing off millions of the aliens, and in retaliation, they took over the laser drill and murdered one of the colonists. (It’s actually a pretty cool idea that a life form that has evolved to be similar to a computer would have a much easier job communicating with our equipment than with us.) Picard tries to explain the misunderstanding, but the aliens, calling the crew, “Ugly bags of mostly water,” aren’t having it. The crew is forced to lower the light, robbing the aliens of their power source, to get them to stop the assault on the ship. Finally, weakened, the aliens relent, and the Enterprise beams them back down to their home, quarantines the planet, abandons the terraforming project and station, and heads on its way.
I’ve been a bit torn on how I felt about the ending, because from a diplomatic point of view, this could charitably be called disastrous. Humans show up, slaughter millions of an indigenous life form by accident, abduct one of the aliens from the planet, imprison it in the lab, nearly kill it with a lack of light when it defends itself, and finally leave it on the planet and vanish. I think there’s a missed opportunity here. This is a daunting concept. This life form is so alien that they couldn’t even recognize it as a life form, and even their attempt to understand it was hostile, harmful, and brutal. All too often, the Enterprise visits strange new worlds that really aren’t that strange. There’s never a problem that human morality and ingenuity can’t solve. It’s somewhat terrifying to think that there’s life out there so completely and absolutely foreign that the best we can hope for is to not fuck up too much. “Home Soil” is a fascinating episode, but lacks the follow through needed for it to become a genuinely good one.
I've never seen anyone get "eat shit" looks from two directions at once.
The next episode shifts from hard sci-fi to a more approachable slice-of-life episode. “Coming of Age” introduces the two-plot format that TNG will use quite often for its run, and also begins sowing the seeds of its first multi-episode plot thread. I actually came into this not really remembering a thing about the episode, but I remember where the plot about the growing conspiracy in the Federation is going, and I’m kind of excited about that.
We’ll get the Wesley plot out of the way first, because it’s really, REALLY boring. Wesley is taking the entrance exam for Starfleet Academy. He’s pitted against three other students, who I will call The Friend, The Crush, and The Rival, because they’re boring and pointless. He passes the written portion, and even helps The Friend answer a space Rubik’s cube question, but he’s really terrified about the psychological exam. The exam is apparently designed to test a potential cadet’s response to their worst fear. Wesley even sees The Friend come out of his psych test, clearly shaken. Wesley is shown into a room and asked to sit down for the test, and nothing happens. But wait, what’s that? A completely unrelated explosion down the hall, and no one to respond to it but Wesley?
Look, this is dumb. The simulation basically forces Wesley to save one man and leave another behind, and there’s some half-assed suggestion that Wesley is particularly terrified of that possibility because his father died in the line of duty. It’s stupid, especially when I remember a much later episode that shows that Troi is afraid of the exact same thing. It’s a wildly non-specific fear, and one that I have to believe is shared by everyone who would ever think of putting on any uniform. It tells us nothing about Wesley as a character, and an opportunity to flesh out one of the show’s weakest roles is wasted. Wesley doesn’t get into the Academy this year, and the one bright moment is him apologizing to Picard for letting down the crew, and Picard confiding in Wesley that he failed his first entrance exam as well. That moment doesn’t tell us anything more about Wesley, but it tells us something interesting about Picard, and who gives a shit about Wesley anyway?
The other storyline is a bit more interesting, though. Admiral Gregory Quinn, an old friend of Picard’s, beams aboard with Lt. Cmdr. Remmick, who is quickly identified as the Starfleet version of Internal Affairs. Quinn orders Picard and the entire crew to cooperate with Remmick, who quickly begins interrogating the entire senior staff about all of the strange shit that the Enterprise has had to deal with, and trying to get everyone to narc on Picard. Remmick is abrasive, aggressive, and hostile, and manages to piss off everyone on the ship. Finally, Picard storms into Quinn’s office, demanding to know why they’re being investigated. It’s a great moment of righteous fury from Patrick Stewart, who always seems to shine when he gets to puff out his chest and pontificate about the difference between right and wrong. Remmick comes in before Quinn can say much, and informs the admiral that despite his best efforts, he couldn’t find anything wrong with the Enterprise or her crew.
This would be fairly anticlimactic by itself, but to be fair, it’s about what you might expect from the writing in this first season. Instead, Quinn dismisses Remmick, and offers Picard a promotion to admiral and command of Starfleet Academy. He explains that something strange is going on in the Federation. Ships are being redirected without explanation, people he’s known for a long time are acting strange, and he wants Picard close at hand to support him in addressing the possible threat to the Federation. Picard declines, but promises to support Quinn any way he can, and the episode closes with the mystery still very much alive.
Continuing storylines never really gained a strong foothold in TNG, especially in comparison with how much Deep Space Nine was defined by its serialized approach to its plot. But “Coming of Age” is an important step for this show. It demonstrates a sense of long-term investment in the overall story, and begins to help build up the mythology of this world. It doesn’t completely succeed, but it’s an attempt that shows a lot more confidence in the cast, the producers, and the writers, and their ability to handle concepts with more depth and complexity.
A few more things:
Next time, we look at our first Klingon episode with “Heart of Glory”, and Picard and company have to risk their lives as they face a thinly-veiled criticism of the military-industrial complex in “Arsenal of Freedom”. True story: "Arsenal of Freedom" is what Dick Cheney calls his genitals.
- Dietrich Stogner
We’ll get the Wesley plot out of the way first, because it’s really, REALLY boring. Wesley is taking the entrance exam for Starfleet Academy. He’s pitted against three other students, who I will call The Friend, The Crush, and The Rival, because they’re boring and pointless. He passes the written portion, and even helps The Friend answer a space Rubik’s cube question, but he’s really terrified about the psychological exam. The exam is apparently designed to test a potential cadet’s response to their worst fear. Wesley even sees The Friend come out of his psych test, clearly shaken. Wesley is shown into a room and asked to sit down for the test, and nothing happens. But wait, what’s that? A completely unrelated explosion down the hall, and no one to respond to it but Wesley?
Look, this is dumb. The simulation basically forces Wesley to save one man and leave another behind, and there’s some half-assed suggestion that Wesley is particularly terrified of that possibility because his father died in the line of duty. It’s stupid, especially when I remember a much later episode that shows that Troi is afraid of the exact same thing. It’s a wildly non-specific fear, and one that I have to believe is shared by everyone who would ever think of putting on any uniform. It tells us nothing about Wesley as a character, and an opportunity to flesh out one of the show’s weakest roles is wasted. Wesley doesn’t get into the Academy this year, and the one bright moment is him apologizing to Picard for letting down the crew, and Picard confiding in Wesley that he failed his first entrance exam as well. That moment doesn’t tell us anything more about Wesley, but it tells us something interesting about Picard, and who gives a shit about Wesley anyway?
The other storyline is a bit more interesting, though. Admiral Gregory Quinn, an old friend of Picard’s, beams aboard with Lt. Cmdr. Remmick, who is quickly identified as the Starfleet version of Internal Affairs. Quinn orders Picard and the entire crew to cooperate with Remmick, who quickly begins interrogating the entire senior staff about all of the strange shit that the Enterprise has had to deal with, and trying to get everyone to narc on Picard. Remmick is abrasive, aggressive, and hostile, and manages to piss off everyone on the ship. Finally, Picard storms into Quinn’s office, demanding to know why they’re being investigated. It’s a great moment of righteous fury from Patrick Stewart, who always seems to shine when he gets to puff out his chest and pontificate about the difference between right and wrong. Remmick comes in before Quinn can say much, and informs the admiral that despite his best efforts, he couldn’t find anything wrong with the Enterprise or her crew.
This would be fairly anticlimactic by itself, but to be fair, it’s about what you might expect from the writing in this first season. Instead, Quinn dismisses Remmick, and offers Picard a promotion to admiral and command of Starfleet Academy. He explains that something strange is going on in the Federation. Ships are being redirected without explanation, people he’s known for a long time are acting strange, and he wants Picard close at hand to support him in addressing the possible threat to the Federation. Picard declines, but promises to support Quinn any way he can, and the episode closes with the mystery still very much alive.
Continuing storylines never really gained a strong foothold in TNG, especially in comparison with how much Deep Space Nine was defined by its serialized approach to its plot. But “Coming of Age” is an important step for this show. It demonstrates a sense of long-term investment in the overall story, and begins to help build up the mythology of this world. It doesn’t completely succeed, but it’s an attempt that shows a lot more confidence in the cast, the producers, and the writers, and their ability to handle concepts with more depth and complexity.
A few more things:
- I didn’t mention the brief side plot of Wesley’s disgruntled friend failing to get into the Academy exams, and responding to, “My dad will be disappointed in me,” by jacking a shuttlecraft and nearly killing himself. It only exists so that Remmick can see the crew working together to solve a problem, and feels tremendously tacked on. Also, you guys should probably lock up the shuttles. Just saying.
- I don’t really understand why they didn’t use a holodeck to do the psych exam. Maybe the starbase just needed to tear down that room anyway, install some new drapes, and saw an opportunity.
- I would have much preferred “Home Soil” to air before “Datalore”, mostly because I really like the idea that the Crystalline Entity is the uncle of the aliens from Velara III, coming back to fuck some shit up.
Next time, we look at our first Klingon episode with “Heart of Glory”, and Picard and company have to risk their lives as they face a thinly-veiled criticism of the military-industrial complex in “Arsenal of Freedom”. True story: "Arsenal of Freedom" is what Dick Cheney calls his genitals.
- Dietrich Stogner
RSS Feed
