1.17 — “When the Bough Breaks”
Plot: The legendary planet of Aldea (legendary to whom?) is the setting for this week’s adventure. The Enterprise gets there by following energy patterns like a trail of breadcrumbs–or are they notes from the Pied Piper?–because thar be children thieves on this planet. David Bowie’s Goblin King does not make an appearance (spoiler).
Thoughts: This is an odd-feeling episode. They seem to be borrowing tropes from the fantasy genre at the beginning. Then Troi says “I sense thousands of minds, very close,” and I think, close in an interstellar sense? You’re (at best) still tens of thousands of kilometers away from the surface of the planet, right?
The Aldeans… just seem a little cheap to me. There is no effort made to make them seem alien in their appearance, clothes, custom, or manner. They just look like more upper-middle-class white people. The whole planet seems to consist of three indoor rooms.
I like that they make it seem like our custom of having parents be so possessive and attached to their children is deviant, and selfish. Picard sputters indignantly, searching for words to justify our narrowmindedness. I don’t see how the seven or so child actors that the show could afford to have (two of whom were Wil Wheaton’s younger siblings) would have been able to easily repopulate the planet. They skirt right past the ugly mechanics of that issue.
I was afraid that the episode would end with the children teaching the Aldeans that they can’t force children to love them, and that they should collectively suicide as a species, rather than be such big meanies. Instead, we have Dr. Crusher easily solve the planet’s population problem, despite the fact that the Aldeans are supposed to be vastly more scientifically advanced. So–we get an unrealistic, oversimplified pat ending, but not the treacly, oversentimental ending I was dreading. Small win.
There was that really cool model shot of the computer, however. I suddenly felt like I wasn’t watching Trek anymore. They really stretched the aesthetic of the show. More of that, please.
Someone quoted on Wikipedia says that this episode is chock full of cliches. Well, that’s true. Specifically, I seem to recall a lot of recent stories that involve utopian societies controlled by benevolent computers that somehow mess everything up (“11001001,” “Justice”). But, this was basically an entertaining episode, that held my attention, although the pace gets a little slow. Grade: Pass.
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