3.2 — “The Ensigns of Command”
Plot: Data must convince 15,000 Earth colonists to evacuate the planet Tau Sigma V before the ominous Sheliak arrive to claim their treaty rights to colonize and exterminate any unwanted life forms on the planet. When logical arguments don’t appeal to the colonists, a pretty girl names Ard’rien helps Data change tactics.
Thoughts: D.C. Fontana was the great muse of Spock in TOS. From Melinda Snodgrass, we now have another episode featuring Data and his personal development. Snodgrass practiced briefly as a lawyer at the start of her career, and here, as in episode 2.9, “The Measure of a Man,” argumentation and the interpretation of legal documents plays a critical role in the plot.
I admire this episode for putting forward a plausible conflict situation between the prerogatives of the settlers and the holders of the treaty rights. This feels both topical and considerably weightier than the standard TNG premise we were inured to in first and second season. The episode still is frustratingly simplistic at times. Data’s arguments to the colonists would certainly be enhanced by more information about the Sheliak threat they are facing. Is this really unavailable? I understand that no other crew members can come to the surface, but surely they can back Data up by communicating from the ship–maybe some video of the Sheliak in action would attract attention.
Ard’rien is too much of a Pollyanna for me. Although she professes to believe Data, she seems sanguine about the coming alien invasion that will destroy all of their lives. I would think this would be the cause of terror and widespread panic. By the standards of last season, however, this episode is quite good, if a little talky and slow.
I know TNG is all about finding nonviolent resolution to conflicts. But would this episode not have been better if the Sheliaks had threatened to blow the Enterprise out of the sky? If Picard and Riker had at least considered a military alternative to allowing the colonists to be wiped out? If we had been told more information about the Sheliak’s military capabilities and the history their prior interactions with the Federation? All we hear is there has been no communication for 111 years, which is before the TOS era, when the Federation was reeling from its war with the Romulans and just starting to encounter Klingons. Why have we not heard of this before? The Sheliak look cool, but this episode would have been better if the antagonists were Romulans.
3.5 out of 5 android reflex tests.
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