3.15 — “Yesterday’s Enterprise”
Plot: The Enterprise NCC 1701-C‘s arrival out of a temporal rift from 22 years in the past sends the current Enterprise abruptly into an alternate dimension, where the Federation is at war with the Klingon Empire, and Tasha Yar is still the security chief in her fourth year of service (there being less opportunity to fraternize with psychopathic tar monsters in this timeline, presumably). Guinan alone senses the change, and reveals to Picard what has happened. It seems the NCC 1701-C’s escape into the future saved a portion of its crew at the expense of failing to avert an intergalactic war. Picard is forced to ask, do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few? (Personally, I feel that Star Trek III has the better side of that argument.)
Thoughts: “Yesterday’s Enterprise” is brilliant in broad strokes; a little less so in its details. It’s a great world-building episode. My number one question: what happened to the NCC 1701-B? I want to know (but I’m not going to cheat by reading Wikipedia). The time travel device is most exciting because it is used to create a greater sense of continuity than we have ever had before between the world of Kirk and Spock and this new Enterprise with a Klingon officer on the bridge.
The inspiration for “Yesterday’s Enterprise” came from a script submitted by a fan of the show, after new producer Michael Piller opened up a submission process early in the production of Third Season. Piller also hired true fans like Ronald D Moore to work on the show, who expanded on the original premise. It makes a lot of difference.
Piller’s willingness to bring Tasha Yar back demonstrates that he’s ready to respond to criticism and make TNG into the show the fans want to watch. She gets a death with meaning. Better yet, her death gives the show meaning. Now we know that Gene Roddenberry’s plummy utopian future didn’t just come about with the stroke of a pen–it was born of sacrifice (by the crew of a ship named Enterprise), and it is fragile. Instead of being preordained, a peaceful future becomes something we can achieve by making the right choices, staying vigilant, and maintaining them. Bam! The Enterprise has a purpose. Remember wondering during First Season what the ship was even doing out there? Now Guinan tells us why: “This is not a ship of war. This a ship of peace.”
Alas, I hate to disagree with Dara Korra’ti, but I still don’t think that Denise Crosby is a great actor. The quality of the guest actors playing Castillo and especially Captain Garrett mostly made up for this. Still, when Crosby is playing crucial scenes against Castillo, Guinan, and PIcard, I am mostly thinking “I see what they are going for here” and not “I believe in this character and her situation.”
About the possibility of war with the Klingons–I guess the Organian Peace Treaty didn’t hold up? Maybe it expired, or the Organians ascended to another plane of existence. I have trouble believing that the Klingon Empire could really defeat the Federation. Perhaps this because the Klingons were originally conceived as a surrogate for the USSR, and I am culturally chauvinistic.
The explanation that peace between the Federation and the Klingon Empire came about through the creation of a debt of honor based on a selfless Federation sacrifice seems like a perfectly elegant, reasonable explanation to me, consistent with both with prior episodes and broad franchise themes, for something that has always been a head-scratcher until now. Good work, writers! This should provide a platform for more good Klingon-centered episodes in the future.
The other hero here is director David Carson, who on the strength of his direction of this episode was invited back to direct the premiere episode of DS9 in 1993 and the film Star Trek: Generations (1994). Under his guidance, the new lighting plot and camera angles used to create the parallel Enterprise look fantastic. Although the look was moody and interesting, I couldn’t help thinking the dim light was impractical. No way Picard would just sit in the dark to read in his ready room! If this was done week in and week out, however, we’d just go with it. The contrast between the light and the dark also perfectly illustrates what the episode is about.
Originally the finale of the episode was supposed to be more of a bloodbath, which almost all the main characters in the alternate dimension meeting a nasty end. Too bad we didn’t get more of that–TNG is better off being a bit dangerous, and who wouldn’t want to see Wesley get decapitated? Sorry, Wil Wheaton. sunny jim says you look good in your regular uniform.
Some details, they don’t make sense. How does Guinan know the things she knows? Even given what she knows, why would she tell Tasha that her death was meaningless? Where did the temporal rift come from? Part of what makes this episode great, however, is that it is willing to blow past these questions and dare to dream big.
“Yesterday’s Enterprise” may not be perfect, but I’m rounding up. 5 out of 5 glasses of prune juice–a warrior’s drink.
http://en.memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Yesterday%27s_Enterprise
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