Lynch's Spoiler Review: "The Next Phase"
Timothy W. Lynch
offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
Well, if you make an effort to avoid *thinking* about it, it's great fun. As
soon as you do, it starts to lose something.
I don't normally worry much about plot holes, but there are questions here
in vast numbers that needed better treatment. But first, the synop:
The Enterprise assists a critically damaged Romulan vessel, but when Geordi
and Ro beam back with some damaged equipment, something strange happens in
transit. They fail to rematerialize, and no sensors can locate them. The
Romulan ship manages to save itself by ejecting its engine core (with some
help from Riker, Worf and Data), but they continue to need power from the
Enterprise while conducting repairs.
Meanwhile, Ro wakes up in a hallway and heads for sickbay. Oddly, however,
no one seems to notice her, even when she arrives in sickbay and asks people
for help. Then, to her shock, she hears Picard and Beverly talking, and
Beverly expressing dislike for making out death certificates; namely, those
of Ro and Geordi. As she tries to convince them both that not only is she
not dead, but she's right *there*, Picard leaves--and walks right through her
on the way out.
As repairs continue on the Romulan ship, and Data begins preparations for a
memorial service, Ro finds Geordi in engineering, as confused as she.
They're both in the same boat, but at least they seem solid enough to each
other. Ro tells Geordi that she's concluded they're dead, but Geordi refuses
to believe it. He leaves through a bulkhead for transporter room 3, leaving
Ro to "make peace with her former life."
There, he finds Data examining the situation and theorizing that damage to
the Romulan cloaking device may have caused the transporter malfunction,
noting that there is a substantial chroniton field present on the Enterprise.
Ro tries to say goodbye on the bridge, but gets drawn into following a
discussion of the memorial service; at least, until Geordi arrives and
convinces her to join him on the next shuttle to the Romulan ship to check
the situation out.
They board that shuttle, which Data and Worf are piloting. After Geordi and
Ro listen to Data and Worf plan their funerals (an eerie feeling, at best),
they all arrive on the Romulan ship and investigate. Data and Worf find
little, but Geordi and Ro discover two things of note. First, Geordi finds a
molecular phase inverter, which quickly leads him to believe that he and Ro
are both cloaked and "phased", a process which must somehow be reversible.
Second, they hear two Romulans planning to rig a boobytrap via the energy
beam supporting them, which will trigger and destroy the Enterprise when it
goes into warp. They leave to attempt to warn the Enterprise somehow; and a
spectral Romulan gets up and follows them every step of the way.
Data's inspection of all the chroniton fields turns out to correlate with
every place Geordi or Ro have appeared, and Geordi quickly comes to believe
that it's their interactions with normal matter such as the bulkheads that
causes the fields. He begins walking through everything he can to get Data's
attention, just as Ro, on the bridge, is accosted by the Romulan, who demands
she take him to Geordi. Geordi discovers that the anion beams Data uses to
wipe out the chroniton fields help him to solidify--but at this setting, it's
both slight and temporary. En route to Geordi, meanwhile, Ro double-crosses
the Romulan and tries to get away. A long chase ensues, triggering a run of
chroniton fields that Data (and Geordi close behind) follow. Eventually,
Data is none the wiser, but Geordi arrives just in time to save Ro, acciden-
tally knocking the Romulan out through a bulkhead and spinning off into space
in the bargain.
The Romulan ship, repaired enough to get home, leaves, and only the
decontamination procedures used on the chroniton fields prevent the
Enterprise from going into warp. Frantic, Geordi and Ro realize they have to
have a high-intensity anion beam directed at them, and it'll be short
duration enough that it had better be in front of a lot of people. They
proceed to their own wake in Ten-Forward, where with a little judicious
action (including setting the Romulan disruptor on overload, finally), they
manage to induce a high enough anion beam to allow Picard and Data to see
them for a moment. Data orders a highest-power anion beam to flood
Ten-Forward, and Geordi and Ro return to normal. All is well, but Ro finds
herself questioning her earlier skepticism out Bajoran beliefs in an
afterlife.
There, that should do. Now for the commentary.
I'm trying to write this as fast as I can, because I *did* enjoy it a lot,
and the more I think about the show, the more reasons I come up with why I
shouldn't have. :-) It just comes down to a question of believability, and
if you stop to ponder it, this show sets off more suspension-of-disbelief
alarms than I've seen in a very long time. I'll go through them in brief,
and then get to the definite good things.
First, foremost, and utmost, there's this weensy little problem with their
intangibility. Fine; they're intangible. Why, oh *why*, then, is it that:
(1) They can walk on the floor?
(2) They have to take shuttles and turbolifts?
(3) They apparently need to breathe (e.g. the Romulan) and eat (e.g.
Geordi's last remark about not having eaten for two days or so)?
The latter two are not overly big deals, but the first is amazingly so. I
realize that without something like that, you get both incredible plot
complications and incredible budget overruns (after all, as long as people
can walk on the floor the rest is easy :-) ), but even so, it's very
careless. Hell, I'd have been satisfied if there'd just been a quick
exchange on order of "but hey...wait a second, if we're walking through
everything, why can we still stand on the deck?" "Damned if I know."
It doesn't need to be *explained*, merely *acknowledged*. This wasn't, and
it makes Ron Moore look like a fool. (And Ron's done good stuff, so I think
from past experience we know he's NOT a fool.)
A related problem that was most likely just a mistake: Ro very definitely,
and very longingly, *touched* both her chair and her console when she went to
the bridge to say her goodbyes. The camera made a special point of noting
both of those events. No explanation, however, was given. I'm willing to
bet this was just a quick brain-fade on the writer's or director's part, but
that really is the sort of thing that should be caught in the editing stage.
The other plot *problem* I guess I had was with Geordi's tactics in getting
Data's attention. C'mon, Geordi, you can do a *lot* better than that. If
you want to get Data's attention by making things look nonrandom, start
drawing geometric shapes in the wall or on the console. Hell, start
triggering deja vu by drawing the number 3 everywhere if you want to. A
series of pulses, even in a somewhat nonrandom order, aren't likely to set
anything off nearly as much as something like that. Even if you just want
to do pulses, try something like an SOS pattern, or a sequence of prime
numbers. *Something*. I liked the idea, but this made Geordi look a bit
shy of gray matter.
The other thing I disliked a bit wasn't really a plot issue so much as a
padding issue. The entire subsubsubplot with the phased Romulan was almost
entirely out of left-field. There's no reason given for how he got that way
in the first place: there are tons of likely explanations, but you'd think
one of them would be forthcoming. There's no reason given for why he wanted
to follow them to the Enterprise: to stop them from warning the others? to
stop them from returning to normal? to join them? If the last, why not
simply ask for it instead of threatening them? And finally, the chase scene
was really...well, "gratuitous" is the most apt word I can think of for it.
It kept bouncing back and forth between action and slapstick, and as a result
it didn't really work as either for me. I get the impression that this was a
combination of show padding and an excuse to show lots of FX, plus a chase
scene to boot. There really should be better reasons.
The Romulans have been really *interesting* in the past, too, especially
from Ron Moore; "The Defector" is a vivid example. Here they were basically
stock villain XJ-28, except for the fact that they had a cloaking device.
It's depressing.
But enough of the bad; on to the good. The *premise* of the show was a good
one, both in the Interphase device and in Geordi and Ro reacting to their
situation. And character-wise, most of it was very well executed.
Ro, in particular, has really come into her own. I liked her back in "Ensign
Ro", but mostly as a fairly feisty plot device. "Conundrum" improved things
a bit, but this did it a lot more. Yes, she's still acerbic; that's no
problem. She's also vulnerable, and shaped a lot more by her "outdated"
Bajoran traditions than she cares to realize. This said a lot, I think,
about lessons one learns in childhood; even if you end up rejecting them as
foolish as an adult, sometimes they're deeply ingrained enough that you
revert to them when push comes to shove. Her interest in Riker was well
carried off, too; I suspect "Conundrum" may have a few ramifications after
all between the two of them.
Geordi was fairly nice, but somewhat less so. This was probably because he
ended up in a far more technical role, as the genius who figures it all out.
Somebody had to, but it makes him less easily empathized with and somewhat
less interesting to watch. Geordi was competently characterized, certainly,
but there wasn't much new here the way there was for Ro. (His reactions to
Ro's calm acceptance of her "death" were a major exception to that, and a
pleasure.)
Data and Worf were quite good; both reacted about as I'd expect them to for
Geordi's apparent death. Data's unintentional eulogy in the shuttlecraft was
the highlight of his role this week; as I'm about to speak at my own
grandfather's memorial service this weekend, it touched a major nerve. It
was also very touchingly ironic the way he so quietly delivered a very
beautiful summing-up of Geordi's effect on him, yet professed not to know
what to say. Very, very human indeed. As for Worf, the little insight we
had into his beliefs was most intriguing, and seems to fit in fairly well
with the "it is only an empty shell now" attitude most Klingons have towards
the body. (I just *wish* he'd used the words "Black Fleet" once. Just once,
guys, that's all I ask...)
Picard, Riker, Bev, and the random crewmembers were fine, but had
significantly less to do than the others above. (Riker's reaction to the
wake was perfect, though; the only thing that would have been better would
have been to have him admit to having had a hand in planning it, which is
what I expected; it *was* rather New Orleans-ish, after all. :-) ) The
Romulans were...well, they weren't characters so much as plot devices, so
they're not very relevant. The crucial ones were the four I mentioned in
detail, I think.
The directing was fairly typical: no real edge-of-your-seat surprises, but
entertaining enough. (Sort of midrange for David Carson, I guess; he did
"Yesterday's Enterprise", which was expertly done, but also did "Redemption
II", which seemed very rushed and hurried.) The chase scenes, despite being
somewhat gratuitous, *were* fairly fun to watch; I just found myself asking
why afterwards.
The FX were on the whole very good for the phasing, but once or twice things
looked pretty obviously matted. (The first one, with Picard walking through
Ro, is the biggest example.) The best one, far and away, was when Geordi was
pushing his hand into the engineering console with difficulty; especially
given the reflective surface, that looked *incredibly* good to me.
The music was better than usual for Dennis McCarthy, enough so that I thought
it was Jay Chattaway. Good work. :-)
I think that's most of it. A few short takes:
--I think it would have been very interesting to have Geordi note the
parallel between here and "The Most Toys". In TMT, we saw Geordi helping to
arrange the aftermath of Data's apparent death, and here, we saw Data
planning Geordi's own funeral. That's not a combination you see every day,
and it certainly called up images of TMT in my mind.
--"Are you saying I'm some kind of blind ghost with clothes?" Loooooove that
line. :-)
--The final scene with Geordi and Ro was almost perfect. I liked the fact
that they didn't just end on the party, as I thought they might; and Ro's
comments were good. If they'd cut off their laughter five seconds earlier,
it would've been superb; as it is, things went on just slightly too far past
the annoying line. Ah, well, no big deal.
--The subplot with the phased Romulan might have been gratuitous, but that
Romulan *looked* incredibly spectral. Good makeup job there.
Well, that ought to about do it. I wouldn't call this high drama the way "I,
Borg" was by any means, but if you turn most of your mind off, it's a lot of
good fun. That's enough for me most of the time.
So, the numbers:
Plot: 5. Nice concepts, but Swiss Cheese Central.
Plot Handling: 8. Strike the phased Romulan plot and you're done.
Characterization: 9. If Geordi had had more meaty stuff, this'd almost
undoubtedly be a 10.
TOTAL: 7.5, rounding up a bit for good music and FX. Not bad at all.
NEXT WEEK: A rerun of "Violations", so we can all breathe.
Tim Lynch (Cornell's first Astronomy B.A.; one of many Caltech grad students)
BITNET: tlynch@citjuliet
INTERNET: tly...@juliet.caltech.edu
UUCP: ...!ucbvax!tlynch%juliet.ca...@hamlet.caltech.edu
"Are you saying I'm some kind of blind ghost with clothes?"
--Geordi LaForge
--
Copyright 1992, Timothy W. Lynch. All rights reserved, but feel free to ask...
Windsor A. Morgan
>WARNING: This post contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
>had into his beliefs was most intriguing, and seems to fit in fairly well
>with the "it is only an empty shell now" attitude most Klingons have towards
>the body. (I just *wish* he'd used the words "Black Fleet" once. Just once,
>guys, that's all I ask...)
You're not the only one. It would be nice to see John Ford's version
of the Klingons be the "official" version of the Klingons (see Ford's
novel The Final Reflection to understand what we're talking about).
--
'Verily, there be no leader as wise as the Vision!'
Windsor Morgan (wmo...@stsci.edu OR N...@PSUVM.BITNET)
Space Telescope Science Institute
Baltimore, MD 21218
Smiley
:)offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
:)First, foremost, and utmost, there's this weensy little problem with their
:)intangibility. Fine; they're intangible. Why, oh *why*, then, is it that:
:)(1) They can walk on the floor?
:)(2) They have to take shuttles and turbolifts?
My guess with this is that they provide a MUCH quicker form of transportation
than walking (or floating). However, they shouldn't have worked, anyway,
since they should have sorta just stayed still and the shuttle/life mvoed
through them.
:)(3) They apparently need to breathe (e.g. the Romulan) and eat (e.g.
:) Geordi's last remark about not having eaten for two days or so)?
Umm... why would their getting phased cause a disruption of their bodily
functions?
:)The other plot *problem* I guess I had was with Geordi's tactics in getting
:)Data's attention. C'mon, Geordi, you can do a *lot* better than that. If
Agreed... I was waiting for Geordi to start writing "DATA" into the
console. :)
(And I wasn't even TRYING for that pun... :)
:)The other thing I disliked a bit wasn't really a plot issue so much as a
:)padding issue. The entire subsubsubplot with the phased Romulan was almost
:)entirely out of left-field. There's no reason given for how he got that way
They gave a reason, I just don't know how good it was; if he got caught in
the random emissions, why didn't more Romulans?
:)Ro, in particular, has really come into her own. I liked her back in "Ensign
:)Ro", but mostly as a fairly feisty plot device. "Conundrum" improved things
Oh, come on, Tim. We know why you REALLY liked her back then... :)
:)revert to them when push comes to shove. Her interest in Riker was well
:)carried off, too; I suspect "Conundrum" may have a few ramifications after
:)all between the two of them.
One thing that really bothered me was their failure to mention what Riker
was actually going to say about her. If they thought it important enough
to keep mentioning it througout the episode, why didn't they mention it
at the end?
:)Well, that ought to about do it. I wouldn't call this high drama the way "I,
Hey! You forgot about the fact that Worf made a suggestion, and someone
actually listened to it! :)
Everything else I agree with, but it'd be kinda silly to keep saying "I
agree" after each one. :)
--
Josh Laff # #
email to: smi...@uiuc.edu _ _ Hello! I am a signature virus!
(217) 356-6079 |#\_____/#| Join the fun and copy mo*#(*&^!>.
(This is Smiley's signature) \#######/
Mike Garvey
In a prior missive, tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) eloquently
scribed this stuff:
>[...]
>Data's unintentional eulogy in the shuttlecraft was the highlight of
>his role this week [...]
I was in such a happy mood (happy, happy, joy, joy) during this episode that
I honestly expected Data to reprise his "To know him is to love him is to
know him..." line from the episode where Data is taken over by Soong's mentor.
It's becoming fun to do the MST3K bit on TNG now. <grinsky>
Similarly, it's a shame that Whoopi was not in this one, even as a token. It
would have been hilarious just to have Geordi and Ro with her in 10-forward
and for Guinan to take a call from anther crewmember... "Sam?" ROTFL
Sure a lot of it seemed gratuitous but it worked for me. I especially liked
seeing a demonstration of a core-eject sequence rather than paying lip-service
to it like they did during "Cause and Effect." I was bothered by yet another
indication that Worf needs to get with the program and watch Hans and Franz --
Riker (again) had to come and help him lift a fallen beam. Come on, Worf should
be stronger than Riker!
And thank god we didn't see the Romulan's body explode (follow-ups to r.a.s.t)
after being expelled from the ship -- I think Trek has finally done a good
job (seconding "Disaster") to tell us that humanoids don't explode, become
bloated sacks (ahem), etc. when exposed to a vacuum.
I rate this episode very highly for its entertainment value, for its decent
plotlines (eww... personal cloaks, something else for the feds to worry about!)
and for the impecable (for the most part) characterization. Season 5 has
turned the corner for me, with back-to-back winners in "I, Borg" and "The
Next Phase" -- and the rest of the season holds promise, too.
(Wanders off mumbling something about I'll give 1:5 odds that the line: "Are
you saying I'm some kind of blind ghost with clothes?" will make it into
Atsushi's tag, easily)
Be seeing you...
--
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Christopher Scott Stevens
>WARNING: This post contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
breathe when the atmosphere on board the Enterprise was *not* phased were very
troubling. As usual on TNG, they have a good idea, but just can't think it
all the way through.
>A related problem that was most likely just a mistake: Ro very definitely,
>and very longingly, *touched* both her chair and her console when she went to
>the bridge to say her goodbyes. The camera made a special point of noting
>both of those events. No explanation, however, was given.
This, too, disturbed me for a moment, then I came up with a rationalization.
Remember when Geordi talks about it being *more difficult* to put his hand
through the engineering panel? This seems to imply that there is some kind
of sensation involved in moving through objects. As an analogy, I think of
the surface tension of water -- maybe Ro could feel the surface tension and
chose not to put her hand through, in order to make it seem more or a fitting
goodbye and less surreal. I imagine it's pretty disturbing to walk through a
wall. On the other hand, it could be sloppy editing, but I'd like to provide
a possible justification for all you netters to reject or accept as you like.
Chris
Patrick Rannou
I agree that their abilities to stand on the floors and also being able to
breathe when the atmosphere on board the Enterprise was *not* phased were very
troubling. As usual on TNG, they have a good idea, but just can't think it
all the way through.
"Standing on the deck: explains easily:
the gravity coil generators underneath each floor are made of small warp
coils. Since Geordi didn't try to walk through any warp generator, one
could say that the center of a wrap effect (i.e. the insisdes of a coil)
becomes completely solid for someone "phased". Still even then, you would
walk just a few centimeters lower than the floor... unless (and I think
they are) these small coils are so cheap that they are directly
incorporated INTO the floorpanels...
As for breathing air... One could simply say that all *gases*, being highly
energetic forms of matter, more enrgetic than liquid and solid, somehow
always are bi-phased...
You can always explain everything... just imagine it.
>A related problem that was most likely just a mistake: Ro very definitely,
>and very longingly, *touched* both her chair and her console when she went to
>the bridge to say her goodbyes. The camera made a special point of noting
>both of those events. No explanation, however, was given.
This, too, disturbed me for a moment, then I came up with a rationalization.
Remember when Geordi talks about it being *more difficult* to put his hand
through the engineering panel? This seems to imply that there is some kind
of sensation involved in moving through objects. As an analogy, I think of
^^^^^^^^
the surface tension of water -- maybe Ro could feel the surface tension and
chose not to put her hand through, in order to make it seem more or a fitting
goodbye and less surreal. I imagine it's pretty disturbing to walk through a
wall. On the other hand, it could be sloppy editing, but I'd like to provide
a possible justification for all you netters to reject or accept as you like.
Chris
Exactly. They actually FELT the object they passed through. If not, they
would have walked through wall all the time... not just when chasing. I
should think that a phased being cannot breathe if is body stays inside a
solid object. So you try to cross through fast...
That's it. So if there is a sensation, there is some form of "contact". The
same could happen with air. Why not? (plot device! plot device! Go to red alert!)
Christopher Scott Stevens
>In article <1992May22....@leland.Stanford.EDU> cste...@leland.Stanford.EDU (Christopher Scott Stevens) writes:
>> I agree that their abilities to stand on the floors and also being able to
>> breathe when the atmosphere on board the Enterprise was *not* phased were
>> very troubling. As usual on TNG, they have a good idea, but just can't
>> think it all the way through.
>the gravity coil generators underneath each floor are made of small warp
>coils. Since Geordi didn't try to walk through any warp generator, one
>could say that the center of a wrap effect (i.e. the insisdes of a coil)
>becomes completely solid for someone "phased". Still even then, you would
>walk just a few centimeters lower than the floor... unless (and I think
>they are) these small coils are so cheap that they are directly
>incorporated INTO the floorpanels...
>As for breathing air... One could simply say that all *gases*, being highly
>energetic forms of matter, more enrgetic than liquid and solid, somehow
>always are bi-phased...
>You can always explain everything... just imagine it.
This is a nice explanation for what seems like a goof. I hold by my original
statement; they have good ideas on TNG, but they don't examine all of the
ramifications. It wouldn't be necessary to go into a detailed explanation
of exactly why they can breathe and don't go through the floors, but it *is*
necessary for someone as technically-minded as Geordi to *at least* express
a little wonder at why this is happening. I like your explanations, but I
resent the fact that on TNG, we the fans are continually asked to fill in
the holes in their scripts. It's good mental exercise, I guess. :)
Chris
CHAMBERLAND S - BIOLOGY
offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
>Well, if you make an effort to avoid *thinking* about it, it's great fun. As
>soon as you do, it starts to lose something.
>I don't normally worry much about plot holes, but there are questions here
>in vast numbers that needed better treatment. But first, the synop:
>
>The other thing I disliked a bit wasn't really a plot issue so much as a
>padding issue. The entire subsubsubplot with the phased Romulan was almost
>entirely out of left-field. There's no reason given for how he got that way
>in the first place: there are tons of likely explanations, but you'd think
>one of them would be forthcoming. There's no reason given for why he wanted
>to follow them to the Enterprise: to stop them from warning the others? to
>stop them from returning to normal? to join them? If the last, why not
>simply ask for it instead of threatening them? And finally, the chase scene
Well, the Romulan asked "where is the science officer, the one like us",
"the one that has a plan to get back to normal", something like that.
After watching it a second time ( :-)) ) I came to the conclusion than he
simply wanted to get back himself to his normal phase...
What about asking for their help instead of threatening?
Well, he needed to get back to normal, but afterwards, if LaForge and Ro
were allowed to get back to normal phase, they would have told the
Enterprise of the plot to destroy the Enterprise, and about the
phase shifter of whatever...
--
Sylvain Chamberland | "Trust is earned, not given away!"
University of Waterloo | - Worf, Star Trek The Next Generation
Waterloo, Ontario. |
Andrew Pearlman
>WARNING: This post contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
>padding issue. The entire subsubsubplot with the phased Romulan was almost
>entirely out of left-field. There's no reason given for how he got that way
>in the first place: there are tons of likely explanations, but you'd think
>one of them would be forthcoming. There's no reason given for why he wanted
>to follow them to the Enterprise: to stop them from warning the others? to
>stop them from returning to normal? to join them? If the last, why not
>simply ask for it instead of threatening them? And finally, the chase scene
Actually, my impression was that the phased Romulan was the captain of the
Romulan ship. After all, he 'died'. No explanation for how he died, but
considering there isn't any reason for the captain to have died(doesn't
really add anything)... If the Enterprise can make that mistake, why can't
the Romulans?
He also knew that they knew about the phase device and the plot to blow up the
ship. He finally knew that they thought they might know how to get back to
normal.
Hence the need to threaten them into making him normal. They knew too much
and wouldn't help him unless he did something.
Andy Pearlman
Michael Rawdon
>WARNING: This post contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
>intangibility. Fine; they're intangible. Why, oh *why*, then, is it that:
>(1) They can walk on the floor?
>(2) They have to take shuttles and turbolifts?
>(3) They apparently need to breathe (e.g. the Romulan) and eat (e.g.
> Geordi's last remark about not having eaten for two days or so)?
>The latter two are not overly big deals, but the first is amazingly so. I
>realize that without something like that, you get both incredible plot
>complications and incredible budget overruns (after all, as long as people
>can walk on the floor the rest is easy :-) ), but even so, it's very
>careless.
Extremely careless. I don't so much have a problem with them NEEDING to
breathe and eat, but with them being ABLE to breathe.
> Hell, I'd have been satisfied if there'd just been a quick
>exchange on order of "but hey...wait a second, if we're walking through
>everything, why can we still stand on the deck?" "Damned if I know."
>It doesn't need to be *explained*, merely *acknowledged*. This wasn't, and
>it makes Ron Moore look like a fool. (And Ron's done good stuff, so I think
>from past experience we know he's NOT a fool.)
I think that if it's acknowledged, then it needs to be explained. "Well
gee, we can't touch anything, but we can stand on the floor. Maybe we can
manipulate things with our feet? What's different about the floor, or about
walking?"
I had the impression that several things were cut from the episode in editing
(either that or the script editor did a really shoddy job), to wit:
>A related problem that was most likely just a mistake: Ro very definitely,
>and very longingly, *touched* both her chair and her console when she went to
>the bridge to say her goodbyes. The camera made a special point of noting
>both of those events. No explanation, however, was given. I'm willing to
>bet this was just a quick brain-fade on the writer's or director's part, but
>that really is the sort of thing that should be caught in the editing stage.
I had the very strong feeling that we were SUPPOSED to notice it, and that
it was going to lead up to something ("Why can she touch the chair now, but
couldn't a little while ago?"), but that that something was cut, for some
reason.
>The other thing I disliked a bit wasn't really a plot issue so much as a
>padding issue. The entire subsubsubplot with the phased Romulan was almost
>entirely out of left-field. There's no reason given for how he got that way
>in the first place: there are tons of likely explanations, but you'd think
>one of them would be forthcoming. There's no reason given for why he wanted
>to follow them to the Enterprise: to stop them from warning the others? to
>stop them from returning to normal? to join them? If the last, why not
>simply ask for it instead of threatening them?
I had the strong feeling that he wanted to be returned to normal. Why
threaten them? He's a Romulan. :-) (He might also have planned to double-
cross them and leave them phased, so that they couldn't spill the beans
about the experiment.)
However, I got the impression when someone (Data?) mentioned the number of
live bodies on the Romulan ship, from the science officer's reaction, that
he suspected that the remainder had been phased. There may have been several
dozen Romulans so phased, and all that may have been cut from the episode
in editing. Or something.
Maybe this episode is simply TNG's answer to "The Alternative Factor". :-)
> And finally, the chase scene
>was really...well, "gratuitous" is the most apt word I can think of for it.
>It kept bouncing back and forth between action and slapstick, and as a result
>it didn't really work as either for me. I get the impression that this was a
>combination of show padding and an excuse to show lots of FX, plus a chase
>scene to boot. There really should be better reasons.
The only part of the scene I really enjoyed was seeing the Romulan head
into space. Otherwise, I kept wondering why Ro didn't run through a wall
and then make a sharp right turn, and otherwise try to LOSE her pursuer.
It made little sense to me.
>The Romulans have been really *interesting* in the past, too, especially
>from Ron Moore; "The Defector" is a vivid example. Here they were basically
>stock villain XJ-28, except for the fact that they had a cloaking device.
>It's depressing.
Well, they were stock villains in "The Defector" too (except that they had
a cloaking device). It was the individual in that episode which made them
interesting. Any race with a cloaking device would have been acceptable.
>But enough of the bad; on to the good. The *premise* of the show was a good
>one, both in the Interphase device and in Geordi and Ro reacting to their
>situation. And character-wise, most of it was very well executed.
>Ro, in particular, has really come into her own. I liked her back in "Ensign
>Ro", but mostly as a fairly feisty plot device. "Conundrum" improved things
>a bit, but this did it a lot more. Yes, she's still acerbic; that's no
>problem. She's also vulnerable, and shaped a lot more by her "outdated"
>Bajoran traditions than she cares to realize.
Eh. I thought it was a small step forward for her character, but they
didn't do much with it, focusing instead on the main plot. (I got the
impression that a post-recovery exchange between she and Riker was edited
out either before or after filming, as well.
--
Michael Rawdon
raw...@cabrales.cs.wisc.edu
University of Wisconsin Computer Sciences Department, Madison, WI
"Go? Where are we going?"
"Where they went."
"Suppose they went nowhere?"
"Then, this will be your big chance to get away from it all."
- McCoy and Kirk; Star Trek II: The Wrath Of Khan
Kyle Jones
scha...@watserv1.waterloo.edu (CHAMBERLAND S - BIOLOGY) writes:
> Well, he needed to get back to normal, but afterwards, if
> LaForge and Ro were allowed to get back to normal phase, they
> would have told the Enterprise of the plot to destroy the
> Enterprise, and about the phase shifter of whatever...
I wonder what happened to the Romulans after LaForge and Ro
blabbed about the Romulan treachery. The Romulan ship was only
capable of warp 2 with the makeshift engine, so the E could have
easily pursued and gunned them down like the scurvy, two-faced,
backstabbing, sons of rabid terriers that they were. Of course,
Picard probably just shook his wizened fists impotently at the
viewer and muttered "Next time!"
Brian A. Cole
] >the bridge to say her goodbyes. The camera made a special point of noting
] >both of those events. No explanation, however, was given. I'm willing to
] >bet this was just a quick brain-fade on the writer's or director's part, but
] >that really is the sort of thing that should be caught in the editing stage.
]
] I had the very strong feeling that we were SUPPOSED to notice it, and that
] it was going to lead up to something ("Why can she touch the chair now, but
] couldn't a little while ago?"), but that that something was cut, for some
] reason.
Yes, chairs are obviously a "special" as floors are in this episode. Consider
that the first time we saw the phased Romulan he was _sitting_ in a chair on
the romulan ship.
In fact, that caused me to discount the possibility of his being phased, even
though I was looking for phased Romulans. I was dumb, the Ro-at-ops scene
should have tipped me off that chairs share special tangibility properties
with floors. :-)
brian
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ _______ _____ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Brian A. Cole |_ _ | | ___| In my music, I'm trying
t...@cs.wisc.edu | | | |__| |___ to play the truth of what
...!uwvax!cs.wisc.edu!tuc |_| |__________| I am. The reason it's
difficult is because I'm
changing all the time.
--Charles Mingus
Preston F. Crow
>] >and very longingly, *touched* both her chair and her console when she went to
>] >the bridge to say her goodbyes. The camera made a special point of noting
>] >both of those events. No explanation, however, was given.
>Yes, chairs are obviously a "special" as floors are in this episode. Consider
>that the first time we saw the phased Romulan he was _sitting_ in a chair on
>the romulan ship.
First, I thought it was obvious when we first saw the phased Romulan that he
was phased. But as to the chair he was sitting in, who is to say that the
chair wasn't also phased?
Now as for touching things, someone mentioned that LaForge said
something about it being harder to put his hand through the console.
Their point was that there is some sort of surface tension between the
phased people and un-phased objects. That would explain Laren being
able to slide her hand over her chair and console.
As to floors, the explanation that the artificial graivity eminates from
the floor, so there would be no tendency to fall through doesn't hold
phased water. They would have sunk in at least to about their waists as
their upper-bodies kept pulling them down. I think we will have to say
that the surface tension was stronger than we thought. Obviously, they
needed fairly strong interaction with the floor in order to walk or
run.
As to doors, they may have preferred to walk through them when they were
open. I don't recall there ever being a time when they explictly couldn't
go through a door.
I thought it was interesting that a wall blocked the phased disrupter
blast. Clearly there is some interaction between phased and unphased
matter/energy.
As to breathing, drinking, etc: I don't believe that there is an
explanation.
Of course the real explanation was that they were never phased. Jean-Luke
was just feeling mischievious and had them beemed into the holodeck.
--PC
--
Looking for exciting/unusual/dynamic .sig quotes...
Vidiot
<
<Remember when Geordi talks about it being *more difficult* to put his hand
<through the engineering panel? This seems to imply that there is some kind
<of sensation involved in moving through objects. As an analogy, I think of
<the surface tension of water -- maybe Ro could feel the surface tension and
<chose not to put her hand through, in order to make it seem more or a fitting
<goodbye and less surreal. I imagine it's pretty disturbing to walk through a
<wall. On the other hand, it could be sloppy editing, but I'd like to provide
<a possible justification for all you netters to reject or accept as you like.
You forgot that the reason Geordi had trouble putting his hand through the
console was because his hand was just hit with the neutralizing signal.
--
harvard\ att!nicmad\ spool.cs.wisc.edu!astroatc!vidiot!brown
Vidiot ucbvax!uwvax..........!astroatc!vidiot!brown
rutgers/ INTERNET:vidiot!brown%astroa...@spool.cs.wisc.edu
br...@wi.extrel.com
Kyle Jones
> You forgot that the reason Geordi had trouble putting his hand through the
> console was because his hand was just hit with the neutralizing signal.
Of course, if part of Geordi was phased and part wasn't, there
should have been a gout of blood and a good deal of pain to boot.
Another reason TOS is better than TNG. TOS actors were willing
to bleed and scream for us. :-)
Joseph W Reiss
>In article <1992May22....@leland.Stanford.EDU> cste...@leland.Stanford.EDU (Christopher Scott Stevens) writes:
><
><This, too, disturbed me for a moment, then I came up with a rationalization.
><Remember when Geordi talks about it being *more difficult* to put his hand
><through the engineering panel? This seems to imply that there is some kind
><of sensation involved in moving through objects. As an analogy, I think of
><the surface tension of water -- maybe Ro could feel the surface tension and
><chose not to put her hand through, in order to make it seem more or a fitting
><goodbye and less surreal. I imagine it's pretty disturbing to walk through a
><wall. On the other hand, it could be sloppy editing, but I'd like to provide
><a possible justification for all you netters to reject or accept as you like.
>
>You forgot that the reason Geordi had trouble putting his hand through the
>console was because his hand was just hit with the neutralizing signal.
I think his point of emphasis was the *MORE* difficult part. The word
"more" implies that there was some type of sensation present when
passing through objects, and the neutralizing signal just intensified
it.
$.02 from Joe
--
__________ | jre...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
| |___) | """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
\_/OE | \EISS | Deflectors on, red alert. Open a hailing frequency.
`---- | This is the Enterprise. We come in peace. Fire phasers.
Tom Wadlow
In fact, that caused me to discount the possibility of his being phased, even
though I was looking for phased Romulans. I was dumb, the Ro-at-ops scene
should have tipped me off that chairs share special tangibility properties
with floors. :-)
Imagine the poor 24th century physicist who has to explain a field phenomenon
that cloaks people, allows them to fondle and sit in chairs, breathe air
but not eat, walk on floors, but fall through walls, and yet prevents them
from using any of these interactions to signal non-cloaked people of
their presence. Geordi and Ro should have been able to be better
poltergeists than they were, knocking over chairs, blowing in Picard's
ear till he surrendered, thumping out Morse code on the floor panels.
I think somebody had just rented a video of "Ghost" and couldn't decide
who of the TNG cast should be Patrick Swayze, and who should be Demi Moore.
(As for who should play Whoopi Goldberg, well, that was obvious....;-)
--Tom
Christopher Scott Stevens
><
><This, too, disturbed me for a moment, then I came up with a rationalization.
><Remember when Geordi talks about it being *more difficult* to put his hand
><through the engineering panel? This seems to imply that there is some kind
><of sensation involved in moving through objects. As an analogy, I think of
><the surface tension of water -- maybe Ro could feel the surface tension and
><chose not to put her hand through, in order to make it seem more or a fitting
><goodbye and less surreal. I imagine it's pretty disturbing to walk through a
><wall. On the other hand, it could be sloppy editing, but I'd like to provide
><a possible justification for all you netters to reject or accept as you like.
>
>You forgot that the reason Geordi had trouble putting his hand through the
>console was because his hand was just hit with the neutralizing signal.
Actually, I didn't forget. Geordi says it is *more* difficult to put his
hand through after he has been hit with the neutralizing signal. This implies
that there had previously been some degree of difficulty involved, which had
increased as a result of the whatever-the-heck beam. This is the origin of
my "surface tension" argument. Actually, I've just decided that the whole
episode has so many inconsistencies about the phasing thing that it's useless
trying to rationalize them all. I give up. It was fun to watch once but
it won't go down in the book of classic Trek episodes
Chris
Kenton Campbell
> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
> :)WARNING: This post contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
> :)offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
>
> actually listened to it! :)
I noticed this too! For once, Worf actually got to do a security-type action,
and somebody paid attention to it.....amazing!
--
-- Kenton Campbell ----------------------- 01klca...@leo.bsuvc.bsu.edu --
------ Ball State University -----------------------------------------------
Iain Robert Asplin
>In article <33...@vidiot.UUCP> br...@vidiot.UUCP (Vidiot) writes:
>>In article <1992May22....@leland.Stanford.EDU> cste...@leland.Stanford.EDU (Christopher Scott Stevens) writes:
>><
>><This, too, disturbed me for a moment, then I came up with a rationalization.
>><Remember when Geordi talks about it being *more difficult* to put his hand
>><through the engineering panel? This seems to imply that there is some kind
>><of sensation involved in moving through objects. As an analogy, I think of
>><the surface tension of water -- maybe Ro could feel the surface tension and
>><chose not to put her hand through, in order to make it seem more or a fitting
>><goodbye and less surreal. I imagine it's pretty disturbing to walk through a
>><wall. On the other hand, it could be sloppy editing, but I'd like to provide
>><a possible justification for all you netters to reject or accept as you like.
>>
>>You forgot that the reason Geordi had trouble putting his hand through the
>>console was because his hand was just hit with the neutralizing signal.
>
>I think his point of emphasis was the *MORE* difficult part. The word
>"more" implies that there was some type of sensation present when
>passing through objects, and the neutralizing signal just intensified
>it.
>
>$.02 from Joe
$.01 from Steve: There was also that sound effect every time they passed
through things, suggesting they were interacting in some
way with the objects. Also, they left behind traces of
those chronotons every time they touched things, further
suggesting that they did have a small material effect on
unphased matter.
Timothy W. Lynch
>In article <1992May21.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>WARNING: This post contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>>offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
>>The other thing I disliked a bit wasn't really a plot issue so much as a
>>padding issue. The entire subsubsubplot with the phased Romulan was almost
>>entirely out of left-field.
[...]
>Actually, my impression was that the phased Romulan was the captain of the
>Romulan ship. After all, he 'died'.
Hmm. Interesting idea.
>He also knew that they knew about the phase device and the plot to blow up the
>ship. He finally knew that they thought they might know how to get back to
>normal.
>Hence the need to threaten them into making him normal. They knew too much
>and wouldn't help him unless he did something.
I think that's too big a jump of logic for me. "They know the situation,
therefore they won't help me." I don't know about that; if given the choice
of curing all three and leaving all three for dead, I think they'd go for the
latter myself; and Romulans are contemptuous enough about the "weakness" of
humans that I'd bet they'd think the same.
At any rate, we can speculate all we want; but without any sort of mention at
all about *anything* related to this guy except his existence, all we've got is
a plot point out of left field.
Tim Lynch
Timothy W. Lynch
>In <1992May21.0...@cco.caltech.edu> tly...@cco.caltech.edu (Timothy W. Lynch) writes:
>>WARNING: This post contains spoiler information regarding this week's TNG
>>offering, "The Next Phase". Stand clear.
>> Hell, I'd have been satisfied if there'd just been a quick
>>exchange on order of "but hey...wait a second, if we're walking through
>>everything, why can we still stand on the deck?" "Damned if I know."
>>It doesn't need to be *explained*, merely *acknowledged*. This wasn't, and
>>it makes Ron Moore look like a fool. (And Ron's done good stuff, so I think
>>from past experience we know he's NOT a fool.)
>I think that if it's acknowledged, then it needs to be explained.
Nah. They're not omniscient; if they can leave it at it being a mystery,
that's most of the battle. You have a point in that I think there would be
minor problems with not explaining it, but IMO they'd be orders of magnitude
less than what we had.
>I had the impression that several things were cut from the episode in editing
>(either that or the script editor did a really shoddy job),
Could be.
>Maybe this episode is simply TNG's answer to "The Alternative Factor". :-)
Well, I enjoyed it a bit better than *that*. :-)
>>The Romulans have been really *interesting* in the past, too, especially
>>from Ron Moore; "The Defector" is a vivid example. Here they were basically
>>stock villain XJ-28, except for the fact that they had a cloaking device.
>>It's depressing.
>Well, they were stock villains in "The Defector" too (except that they had
>a cloaking device).
I disagree, but we're rather far apart in our attitudes toward Tomalak.
Tomalak's past history and past attitudes made this work a lot better than
random Romulan admiral Q-43 would have done.
>>Ro, in particular, has really come into her own. I liked her back in "Ensign
>>Ro", but mostly as a fairly feisty plot device. "Conundrum" improved things
>>a bit, but this did it a lot more. Yes, she's still acerbic; that's no
>>problem. She's also vulnerable, and shaped a lot more by her "outdated"
>>Bajoran traditions than she cares to realize.
>Eh. I thought it was a small step forward for her character, but they
>didn't do much with it, focusing instead on the main plot.
They did enough to make me quite happy, especially since the main plot was
so hole-ridden. I'll concentrate on this side any day.
>(I got the
>impression that a post-recovery exchange between she and Riker was edited
>out either before or after filming, as well.
That I'd dispute; I got no such impression at all. Why do you think so? Just
the "what was he going to say" dangler?
Tim Lynch
Pat Berry
> I thought it was interesting that a wall blocked the phased disrupter
> blast. Clearly there is some interaction between phased and unphased
> matter/energy.
What makes you think it did? Without being able to see through the
wall, you can't know whether the beam continued on the other side.
Pat Berry p...@berry.Cary.NC.US
Dave Isaacs
>Pat Berry p...@berry.Cary.NC.US
Yes, but what about the fact that Geordi and Ro dived behind a piece of
furniture to shield themselves from the disrupter overload blast. Kind of
futile, isn't it.
Dave
Pat Berry
> Yes, but what about the fact that Geordi and Ro dived behind a piece of
> furniture to shield themselves from the disrupter overload blast. Kind of
> futile, isn't it.
They got down on the floor. What else could they do?
Pat Berry p...@berry.Cary.NC.US
The Crafty Trilobite
>
>Yes, but what about the fact that Geordi and Ro dived behind a piece of
>furniture to shield themselves from the disrupter overload blast. Kind of
>futile, isn't it.
>Dave
Well, as somebody pointed out, they may not have been thinking that clearly.
But also- they could see each other, and the ship, but could not see through
things. So unphased EM energy could affect them normally. So perhaps phased
energy could be stopped by normal matter. In fact, it must be somehow absorbed
by unphased matter because Data picked up doubletalk energy in the normal
matter whenever Geordie & Ro passed through it, and also when the disrupter
exploded into it. In fact, I suggest that the traces they left in matter were
of phased heat energy from their bodies. Right - phased EM energy transforms
into doubletalk energy when it leaves the phasing field. Makes as much sense
as a cloaking device ever did.
Except for one thing: how much use was it for the Romulans to have a
phased ship whose attacks wouldn't even be noticed unless the victim scanned
for the presence of doubletalk energy?
"Captain, I am picking up massive inputs of doubletalk energy in the outer
shields"
"Hmm. There must be a phased Romulan ship inside that asteroid over there,
firing at us.
Mr. Data, feed tripletalk energy [i.e. whatever that stuff was that fixed up
Geordie and Ro] into the phasers. Number One, fire at will."
"Fire"
(asteroid explodes as two objects attempt to occupy the same space/time)
"Hmm, it would seem there _was_ a Romulan there"
Not very helpful. Then again, maybe that explains why the device was not top
priority for Romulan and Federation researchers.
As for why Ro and Geordie could stand on the decks: I suggest that they were in
fact standing on the gravity potentials set up by the artificial gravity
system on the ship. Nobody ever said that phasing rendered things immune to
gravity, only to inertia. This suggestion has the great advantage of being
irrefutable, since we have at present no idea of what gravity is, let alone how
it can be artificially generated.