Star Trek: The Next Generation, S1, E8: "The Battle"

Depending on who you ask, the United States public school system is a huge waste of time, a factory to teach kids how to live life as factory workers, free daycare, a temple to learning, or a place to socialize future citizens. But I know what it really is and it's less cynical than you might expect from me. Sure, I could have been super jaded about the public school system but I was lucky and went to a Satanic elementary school (if you're curious, just search the blog for "Haman" or "Satanic elementary school" or "AC/DC"), so I had a love of learning about the Devil from an early age. Anyway, I believe the public school system (and while I can only truly speak to the United States' version, I'm going to assume it's very much the same concept across other nations and cultures) was the easiest solution to keeping civilization advancing. That probably sounds obvious and you're already in the comment section typing up responses such as "Like, DOI!" and "What a stunning reveleation /sarcasm" and "ur trash 1v1 me". (Believe me, the only correct way to end that sentence was with the punctuation outside of the quotes.)

Listen, I get it! It's a simple concept! But in our modern times when it seems like half of the country thinks education corrupts the youth (which, if you went to Haman Elementary in Santa Clara, California, it certainly fucking did. Long live my Lord and Master!), sometimes simple truths need to be beat like a living horse (that's what the phrase "No use in beating a dead horse" means, right? It means there is use in beating a living horse and we should beat them more. Right?). Or did I mean beat like a drum? You know what? Sometimes I wish I learned more than ritual summonings and secret hand gestures.

What I'm trying to say and which I won't make any clearer with this next statement is that the public school system was the best version of throwing shit at the wall to see what sticks. In this analogy, "shit" is "knowledge" and "wall" is "children." Because the only way to advance civilization and continue to make things better for everybody is to make sure young people are caught up on the story. Sure, a lot of them (and I should probably say "a lot of us" because look at me as an adult: writing a blog about comic books and Star Trek) won't take up the torch to help advance civilization. But that's the thing. You don't know which kid is going to make the connections to establish the next thing that helps civilization mature. At the very least, you know that if you don't throw shit at children, they're never going to have the opportunity to understand exactly where they are in civilization's timeline and how they can make it better going forward. Also, can we sometimes just throw real shit at children because now that idea is in my head and it's not going anywhere?

If we break this system, we are accepting eventual stagnation and a probable decline in the overall levels of satisfaction with life. And as we can see in our modern times, a growing percentage of unimaginative dullards don't fucking care about progress. Education teaches their kids that their parents were unimaginative dullards and so those unimaginative dullards would rather destroy the educational system than maybe look inward and try not to be an unimaginative dullard. And let's not forget about the people who want to destroy the system simply because it uplifts everybody and not just the people who look like they do.

Obviously the public school system doesn't present enough material to create an adult that will truly help drive humanity's balls through civilization's goalposts (help me. I think I have some kind of sickness that makes me speak in analogies, sort of like Lyme Disease but if I were bitten by a conservative talking head). The public school system is just to fire the curiosity of the children so they'll strive to become more educated on their own. And at one time, college was the perfect way to specialize and really get in-depth on the things which really held the child's interest. But, once again, a certain section of the population viewed higher education as a slippery slope to being a decent person and so they've demonized it. One way to make a higher education less possible was to make it less affordable. Although making college less accessible was probably a backlash to college students protesting the government's participation in certain wars which made the government say, "Where are we going to get all the young dead people we'll need for future wars? I mean, they'll only be dead after! We're not into necromancy. Not everybody went to Haman Elementary." Free or affordable college just gives less privileged young people more options than the ones people who don't want things to change want them to have. After all, job providers aren't really as good at providing jobs as they seem to want everybody to think they are. So they need a system which forces people into debt, or convinces them to saddle themselves with a huge mortgage, or hypnotizes them into thinking children are great things to have in their lives so that they'll always need the shitty job they have to pay for their tiny sentient wells where money is thrown.

I wish I was more coherent and less digressive than I am so I could get my point across. But this sometimes happens after I've read two or three comic books by Ann Nocenti. Let me just take a moment to cleanse my aura and I'll try to be more succinct. "Master Satan, please direct my aggression and blood lust into a fine focal point as sharp as the tip of the Lance of Longinus so that I may do your bidding to corrupt His lost lambs and bring them to the beastly reality of this cum-stained world. Thank you my Father. I count the days until I will be welcomed into your embrace of unholy fornication."

In summation, education can only be attained by stacking one block upon the other. You need a system which both teaches the basics of how we got to where we are and also weeds out those that don't fucking give a shit about climbing the pyramid of blocks that's already there to add more to the top. Some people are meant to simply take care of the foundational blocks. Some people will climb partway up and improve the blocks in the middle. But you need a system to find the people who will craft the blocks for the future top of the pyramid. And as an added benefit, the higher one climbs, the better a person they generally become. Sure, you still have many climbers who only see profit in the journey. But some of them do their part as well (granted, not a lot of them. Most of them just want to find a way to keep all the blocks for themselves and establish a toll gate halfway up the pyramid and then convince everybody that the toll gate has always been there and it was never a free climb at all). And you also have people who consider the education gained as a simple corruption of the soul. But fuck those people. They pretend the pyramid doesn't even exist and only want to tear it down anyway.

Now imagine how big this pyramid must be in the 24th Century! It's so big that it allows people to pursue whatever they want to pursue without being shackled to a daily grind just to pay bills. Fucking imagine that, right?! A civilization so prosperous and educated about the nature of reality that nobody in the system feels compelled to force other people to throw their lives away so those people can earn somebody else another buck. What a healthy civilization! Now imagine that civilization butting heads with our 21st Century reality. Imagine how much we'd despise those 24th Century bastards! Don't they care about making another buck?! What are they thinking?! I bet it would end up in a battle just like "The Battle" in this episode!

Yes, we are the Ferengi. And, yes, I'm probably not going to say much about this episode. Picard gets mind-controlled by capitalism and almost destroys socialism. But he doesn't and the Ferengi learn a lesson about greed sometimes being bad which is a really hard lesson for them to swallow due to their big ears (because when they swallow I imagine their ears pop a lot?).

The main thing I learned from this episode is that every great starship captain in the Federation has a tactical maneuver named after them. If you haven't come up with a new innovation for space battles, you're a piece of shit not worthy to captain a Starfleet vessel. And that's all I have to say about that.

Star Trek: The Next Generation, S1, E7: "Justice"

For some reason, this episode is the one I remembered most from my last viewing of the series. And I say "for some reason" because I don't want to admit it's due to the skimpy outfits worn by the men and women who run everywhere and constantly ask the crew of the Enterprise if they're ready to fuck. Every time I see this episode, I wonder how many local syndicates refused to air it. "This week on Star Trek: The Next Generation, the crew of the Enterprise take shore leave on an orgy planet where we learn that Klingons choke each other near to death when they fuck."

We don't actually learn what Klingons do when they fuck; we only learn that Worf proclaims that non-Klingons couldn't handle his passion and his huge spiny cock. Okay, we don't learn about Worf's cock either but you know it's terrifying.

If I was initially confused as to why Netflix chose to rate Star Trek: The Next Generation "sex, fear," then the episode "Justice" cleared up that confusion. The orgy planet Edo invites travelers from across the galaxy to come fuck the entirety of its populace because they have no laws and no standards. Well, actually, they have one law and it's a fucking doozy. It's such a doozy that they don't announce it to the people beaming down to their planet with raging boners.

No wait. I got it wrong. The planet Edo has one punishment: death. Apparently they have a whole bunch of fucking laws that nobody breaks because the punishment is death. It's like Singapore in space but with more sex and less Singapore Slings. You would think more people would have stumbled into this death penalty but I guess most visitors to the planet are too busy getting their asses licked to accidentally break any of the planet's laws. Plus the penalty for breaking a law is like the lottery: only random sections of the planet are being monitored at any one time and you're only convicted if you break a law in an area currently being monitored. That's the whole premise for the planet being so peaceful. Nobody does anything wrong because they might be killed. And yet, what's the difference if the entire planet were constantly monitored instead of certain sections? I guess the difference is the amount of person hours needed for surveillance. It's just more economical.

Being that everybody is almost constantly fucking and fucking isn't against the law, nobody breaks any laws. People also run from one place to the next for some reason that I either missed because I was gawping at the barely covered women's asses and the barely covered men's moose knuckles or which is never explained. I suppose I would run everywhere as well if I was going from one place where I just got fucked to another place where I was going to get fucked again.

This would have been the greatest episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation if only they'd left Wesley Crusher aboard the Enterprise. But instead they decide to bring a minor to a fuck planet because this is the 24th Century and they've jettisoned all of Earth's ancient prudish beliefs and behaviors. The people of Edo aren't sure how humans react to their youth being fucked by adults so they compensate by sending Wesley off with a coterie of Edo teenagers. But instead of going off and getting a handjob in a bush like any other teenager from any century across Earth's history, Wesley decides to teach the Edo kids how to play catch. It's a fucking travesty! For all the reasons modern viewers despise the character of Wesley Crusher, I never see any of them point to this episode where the idiot would rather play catch than get jerked off by five other young people. I was fine with Wesley as a character until this episode where he puts everybody's lives at risk and forces Picard to break the Prime Directive simply because he was too uncomfortable to get a handy.

I've already explained the best parts of this episode (the constant sex) so there really isn't much more to say. Wesley breaks a law by accidentally falling on some mini-greenhouses. He's sentenced to death and Picard has to beam down to the planet and demand they return Wesley unharmed. The people of Edo are all, "Dude. We can't do that. We have a god that's actually a satellite who will fucking destroy you if you break our one law and/or punishment. Whatever. We were just minding our own business licking buttholes and you've messed it all up!" But Picard, wanting to get fucked by Beverly and not by a bunch of random hot people on Edo, risks everybody's life by declaring he will break the Prime Directive to save the young man. The main problem is that the Francis E. Dec God Satellite is judging Picard by Picard's own beliefs. So if Picard breaks the Prime Directive, the God Satellite will have reason to destroy them for not playing fair. But Picard is willing to take that risk. Luckily, Riker pipes up with some sentimental human nonsense about true justice and the God Satellite decides that it was being unfair. It lets them all go and the only stain left over from the entire experience is how little Jean-Luc Picard respects the Federation's Prime Directive. It's almost as if Edo's one law came into conflict with Starfleet's one law and Picard decided neither were worth upholding.

Not that I'm against Picard's decision! I fucking can't stand the way people decide to base everything they believe on some kind of unchanging foundational belief structure. You can't have true justice without treating every individual situation as exactly that: an individual situation with its own set of variables which make it different from every other situation that is somewhat similar to it. Precedents in court decisions simply exist to make future court decisions easier. But they rarely overlap completely and in such a manner as to completely wipe out possible exemptions and extenuating circumstances. Picard was right to challenge both Edo's law and the Prime Directive in this instance. Wesley could not have known about the planet's law because nobody told it to him. Also, Wesley didn't break any law with any intent or malice. It was an absolute accident and for the entire populace of Edo to just shrug that off because that's the way things are and because they're super horny to get back to fucking was unjust. Just as it would have been unjust for Picard to shrug off saving Wesley due to the Prime Directive demanding he obey every stupid law of every stupid planet on which they're guests. And maybe that's why the name of this episode was "Justice." Because Picard and Riker's speech prove that the only true justice is examining the situation at hand and coming to a conclusion based on the variables presented in that situation alone.

The episode should end with Picard taking a huge shit on a Starfleet manual but it doesn't for some reason. Super disappointing.

Star Trek: The Next Generation, S1, E6: "Lonely Among Us"

This episode contains an episode that we never get to see and I'm a little bit upset about it. The Enterprise picks up dignitaries from two races who hate the fuck out of each other. One of them eventually winds up dead and the mystery is left to be solved by Riker at the end of the episode. Maybe it was a crossover episode with The New Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Or maybe the mystery wasn't much of a mystery. The victim was killed by one of the other race's dignitaries and now it was basically just a whole lot of paper work to settle the matter (which is probably why it was funny that Riker was being forced to handle it?). Although it would have been nice to see Riker and Data discuss old episodes of Scooby Doo only to have Data rip the head off of an alien at the end thinking he was unmasking it.

The "two alien species aren't getting along and are giving Picard a headache" plot is a good example of an ST:TNG parallel plot that doesn't really matter which I mentioned in the previous review. Instead of looking at a ST:TNG episode as having a Plot A and a Plot B, we should think of ST:TNG as having Plot What The Crew Was Doing and Plot What Fucking Happens To Them As They Tried To Do The Other Plot. I had never really noticed this aspect of the show until this rewatching of the series and it's a good example of deconstructing a show correctly. What I wanted to initially do was hate the show for not doing the thing I expected the show to do. "Resolve both fucking plots," I scream into my Hamms Beer, clutching my testicles so hard I almost vomit. Then I'd go onto the ST:TNG Reddit and begin pointing out how stupid the writers of the fucking show are because they're too dumb to figure out an ending that satisfies the two parallel plots! But instead, I allowed myself time to think, "Okay. This is a thing which I don't like. Why don't I like it? How does it figure into the show on its own merits and not according to my brain which is thinking up ways to insult the writers' mothers' choice of procreative partner?" Whenever something happens in a book or film that you think is stupid and incorrect, you owe it to the creators of that thing to look at it anew, giving it the benefit of the doubt. The problem with most criticism of art is that the critic thinks they're the smartest motherfucker in the room and anything they initially think is beyond reproach.

In this episode, we learn that there's a planet called Parliament. It's a neutral planet where alien races hold conferences and diplomatic meetings. Hopefully we'll get an episode later that really goes in-depth into how the planet is run. I hope the episode is called "November Fifth" and it ends with the entire planet being blown to bits.

Even though it's probably more interesting, let's forget about Plot What They Were Doing. It's never resolved and just adds a little background entertainment as two different groups of aliens constantly try to murder each other on board (and one of them eventually succeeds and it's treated like a fucking joke! I guess it is kind of funny to have a bunch of cat assholes trying to murder a bunch of snake pricks who also want to see the cat assholes die in a fire). The Plot What Fucking Happens To Them As They Tried To Do The Other Plot happens when they fly too close to a space electrical storm. I don't know if electrical storms can actually take place in space but I also don't know if a fancy man with a penchant for playing dress up can create matter at will, teleport people around the universe, and fall in love with a Starfleet officer so I'm willing to accept it as science fiction fact. What I'm also willing to accept because it's a made up story about humans in space in the future is that the electrical pulses are sentient beings. It makes sense, right? It's like the Enterprise flew too close to a giant space brain and one of the brain's thoughts (maybe a stray thought about how it wouldn't mind fucking that sexy moon which looked like Felicity Kendal's ass) accidentally boarded the Enterprise. That's actually not a great simile unless we also believe that each of our thoughts are individual beings and every thought we ever have exist as members of a giant family that constitute our brains. Because it's more like some mischievous static electricity based teenager hops on board the Enterprise to check it out and then gets stuck as the Enterprise flies off toward Parliament.

This entity fucks up the systems when it begins to panic, realizing the Enterprise has pulled it far from home. It begins trying to learn how to fly the ship itself so it can turn it around and, in doing so, kills Engineer Singh (which means I still don't know who's in charge of the engines and giving all the power they've got). Once everybody realizes what's happening (because the entity takes over Picard and, when the crew can't quite tell what's going on, it tells them directly through Picard), they decide to forgive it and fly it home. Oh, it definitely happens with a lot more drama than that but I think I covered the important bits.

Once they return to the space brain, the crew realize Picard is going to transport himself into space to live with the brain pulse people. Counselor Hotpants is all "What the fuck?" and Doctor MILF is all "What is he doing?" and Future Sunglasses is all "Whoa whoa whoa!" and Angry Face is all "RAAAARRRRRRGGGGHHHH!" and Horny Police Chief is all "I can't let you do this, Captain." But the Captain does it because I don't think he really has a choice. The alien acts like it's Picard's idea to join him but I think Picard is probably screaming obscenities at it in the back of his head. Nobody keeps a close eye on Picard or sedates him so he manages to sneak off and zap himself into space as transporter data.

Almost immediately, Picard regrets it. The teenage electrical pulse abandons him to go fuck off with its mates and Picard's mind is left to bounce around unincorporated for the rest of eternity. Luckily he can still feel feelings as transporter data. Deanna Troi feels his loneliness mere seconds after Riker is all, "I guess the ship is mine! Let's go to Parliament!" (which happens mere seconds after Picard zaps himself into space). And this is when we learn too much about the ship's transporter system.

Apparently the data of anybody beaming out of the transporter gets stored in the computer. That means you can replicate the person at the point they last used the transporter. I don't think you can create a new version of the person willy-nilly! You still need what naive people call "the soul" or something. So they lock onto Picard's loneliness and replicate Picard from his last known data. Which means he doesn't remember the experience of being a space current. Which also means this isn't the real Picard! Maybe I shouldn't say "real". I mean "original." My theory is that the moment Picard transported off of the ship, he was as good as dead. Sure, maybe the Betazoid (Betazed?) could still feel the remnants of his existential loneliness that brought him to the point of committing suicide. But it's essentially not Picard, just brainwave detritus and emotional flotsam. But through replicater and transporter technology along with a final blueprint of Picard's body, the crew of the Enterprise basically clone Picard. Sure, it's Picard with all of his memories and thoughts and feelings. But it's not the original Picard. That one's fucking gone, man.

This theory makes me fucking hate the transporter because now I just see it as a suicide machine that disintegrates the original person and merely clones them on the other end. How would anybody know if the person stepping into the transporter was killed and then cloned on the planet below? Sure, it has all the thoughts and memories and personality of the person who stepped into the transporter so it wouldn't matter to anybody else. But the thoughts and memories of the person who stepped into the transporter end when the system is engaged. It's lights out for the Away Team! Now meet your new Away Team: clones of the original Away Team! And then when they transport back, it's now clones of the clones! Holy fuck, I'm getting sick just thinking about all the fucking death of ego on this ship!

It's too depressing thinking of the transporter as a suicide machine so I'm just going to pretend it works like the show tells me it does. That being said, it doesn't mean original Picard survived this. He definitely died. So from now on, I guess I have to refer to Picard as Picard II.

Star Trek: The Next Generation, S1, E3: "Code of Honor"

"She took her marriage vows seriously but the fire in her pants spoke of greater truths. Would she falter to temptation or maintain her Code of Honor?"

Sometimes I wonder if any conservative political thinkers are fans of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Every aspect of the 24th Century relies on a model that took liberal values of caring for everybody and extending them further and further left. It's as socialist a world as you can get. And with that liberal mindset, we still get episodes like this. I'm not saying that liberals can't make mistakes in their social perspective; I'm saying the exact opposite. Liberals are often blind to the ways in which they support a racist system because they so fervently believe they aren't racist. And while this episode's intent probably isn't the way I'm perceiving it, how can I not see it as a bunch of white people teaching black people how to be civilized?

Well, maybe I'll tell you how later! Maybe!

The story centers around two separate cultures whose values and traditions come into conflict early. Maybe the story is supposed to be analogous to white imperialist explorers imposing their beliefs and traditions on indigenous peoples and we're supposed to judge the crew of the Enterprise by their actions. That is, after all, sort of the basis for the Prime Directive. Explore, study, learn but don't impose your will on others or interfere in any way with their progress. But it's hard to think it's a story about humankind's having learned from their past imperialist failings when the plot revolves around the people of Ligon II being "taught a lesson" by Jean-Luc and his cohorts. Perhaps I should just view the episode as a conflict between Jean-Luc and Lutan, the leader of Ligon II (planetary president, I guess?). It is, after all, Lutan's disregard for his people's own traditions that brings him into conflict with the Federation and not the Federation's disrespect for them.

Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself! Let me just stick to the plot for a moment. The Federation needs a vaccine that only the people of Ligon II can make. Dr. Crusher can't even replicate it in her lab without it degrading. So they need to deal with the people of Ligon II on their terms to secure a trade. The only thing the people of Ligon II seem to want is for the Federation to respect them. Seems easy enough, right?! Well, it's easy to pay lip service to another culture's beliefs and social mores. But when one of them kidnaps your head Security Officer, things become a bit more complicated.

One of the traditions of Ligon II is to kidnap a high ranking member of another tribe to show your prowess in, um, I don't know, social situations? After which, the other person has to plead for the return of this kidnapped person. The person is returned and all is well because the traditions of their social conventions have been met by each party. Jean-Luc understands this because the Enterprise has a full deck of interns researching every race they interact with to figure out how to not offend them. They should probably be paying this staff though because the staff always seem to realize the important stuff too late (see the episode "Justice" for more examples (which I haven't written yet so hold your horses)). Here, they forget to tell Jean-Luc that Lutan is going to kidnap somebody as part of the diplomatic process.

The real trouble comes not because of the kidnapping but because Lutan suddenly refuses to return Tasha Yar, instead deciding to make her his wife. This decision shocks even his own people because he is breaking some serious social taboos. Tash Yar, used to dealing with Rape Gangs, just takes it all in stride. Sure, she wants to kill somebody but doesn't she always want to kill somebody? She's more bloodthirsty than Worf (which is probably a racist comment but then I'm not the one who spent several television seasons making sure the audience understands that Klingons are violent killing machines who almost certainly choke each other near to death when they fuck (again, see commentary on "Justice")). In the end, Lutan's wife, Yareena, challenges Tasha Yar to a fight to the death which is too often par for the course when a guy steps out on his lady. She should challenge Lutan to a fight to the death. What the fuck did Tasha Yar do?!

In this episode, we also learn that Data doesn't know how to tell a joke and his programming allows for slips of the tongue. Maybe his creator added that because when he made Lore, Lore was all, "I'm going to fucking kill all humans!" and his creator was all, "Oh shit. I've got to put some flaws in this machine so I can defend myself against it!"

The fight to the death uses gloves covered in a fast acting poison. To make sure the audience understands the danger to Tasha Yar, Tasha knocks off Yareena's glove. It flies into the crowd, pricking a spectator who dies immediately. But since he never gets a name, we don't have to care about his death. Nobody does. Whatever. Too bad. Presumably, he knew the danger that came with ring-side seats to the bout.

In the end, Tasha Yar pricks Yareena after which she dives on her and they're both transported aboard the Enterprise. I'm no transporter genius (or layman, even) but that seems like a good way to have a serious The Fly transporter accident. How do the two of them not fuse on recombining?! Yareena dies from the poison but Doctor Crusher brings her back from death. It's important that she dies because her death ends the "fight to the death" challenge honorably and with accordance to all laws and Prime Directives. But it also dissolves her marriage to Lutan! And since women on Ligon II hold all material wealth and land rights, Lutan gets nothing in the separation! He loses everything and his second-in-command, who rooted for Yareena during the fight, winds up being her husband and, I guess, planetary president?

Lutan gets his comeuppance just like somebody who overreaches should. Just ask MacBeth about overreaching. Hoo boy, does it never work out! And I guess the people of Ligon II don't really learn a lesson. The white people don't show them anything new or civilized. Maybe my initial reaction to the episode was due to systemic racism influencing my every thought and not that the episode was racist even if it exists in a culture of systemic racism. In a way, I'm glad the producers aired an episode this early in the series that a viewer couldn't help seeing as analogous to white imperialists invading Africa and all the other continents of Earth. The comparison shouldn't be that the Federation was just doing the same old thing. What should be learned was how different the Federation, working within the Prime Directive, acts when encountering other peoples and cultures. They don't merely assume human beliefs and traditions are correct. They treat them as just one option to living that is no better than any other that developed in different ways on far flung planets full of diverse sentient creatures. And I know Jean-Luc Picard seems smug and above everybody else at times but how can you not adore him? He fucking hates children!

The worst part of this episode is when Deanna Troi tricks Tasha Yar into professing that she's flattered by Lutan's attraction to her. Really? She grew up being chased by Rape Gangs and we're supposed to believe that this incident wasn't traumatic but flattering?! I know Tasha Yar wants as much space dick as she can get but not in this situation! She should be fucking angry and pissed and scared. That's all Troi should be feeling from her. But instead, Troi is all, "He's kind of hot, right? And you know what they say about the size of Ligon II dicks, yeah?!" And Tasha is all, "*blush blush crotch overflow error*". It just seems like some tone deaf writing. Although maybe the writer of this episode, Katharyn Powers, didn't realize everybody else was writing all of this Rape Gang shit into her history. She probably skimmed the character portfolio on Tasha Yar, read "She loves to fuck!", and was all, "Oh yeah! Tasha's my girl! Get some mystery space cock, bitch!"