{"id":5931,"date":"2015-05-04T02:30:17","date_gmt":"2015-05-04T02:30:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/222-Shades-of-Gray"},"modified":"2015-05-04T02:30:17","modified_gmt":"2015-05-04T02:30:17","slug":"222-shades-of-gray","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/relivethemajesty.com\/index.php\/2015\/05\/04\/222-shades-of-gray\/","title":{"rendered":"2.22 — \u201cShades of Gray\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"\n \n

2.22 — \u201cShades of Gray\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Plot:<\/strong> While surveying a planet, Riker gets infected by a purple tree thorn. A microorganism contained in the thorn invades his nervous system, threatening to fatally interfere with the neural activity of his brain. Dr. Pulaski and Troi keep him alive by stimulating his memories of past episodes of the series. The steamy memories kill him faster, but the scary, stressful memories might kill the microorganism. \u201cHeyy… It\u2019s not nice in here! How do I get out?\u201d My memories of Seasons One and Two might do the same thing to me (rim shot!). We are treated to 21 different episode clips from prior episodes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Thoughts:<\/strong> The notorious \u201cShades of Gray.\u201d I don\u2019t know if people who watch the show really consider this episode notorious, since I originally gave up watching TNG after \u201cSkin of Evil,\u201d but IMDB readers rate this episode very poorly, an order of magnitude worse than any other episode of the series, as can be seen on this graph: http:\/\/graphtv.kevinformatics.com\/tt0092455<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I don\u2019t dispute that the episode is bad, but I was prepared for it to be worse. I was happy to see the crew actually exploring a planet, if only momentarily. This is the 48th episode of TNG, and it feels like this has only happened about five times over the course of the series. Almost every episode of TNG so far has been a bottle show, or nearly so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Why would you send the chief engineer on this away team? And on the second trip no one but Data and Geordi? They made a big stink at the beginning of the series about how the ship has a larger crew than the original Enterprise<\/em>, but it\u2019s not true. No one is on this ship except the 8 principals, O\u2019Brien, Guinan, and occasionally a few wordless people who stand in the background of sick bay or the bridge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Data and Geordi should reexamine their technique for handling dangerous biological samples. It\u2019s easy to snark, but small stuff like this reveals the lack of attention to detail that is characteristic of the series at this point in time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The score for this episode is actually pretty good. Less so the endless scenes in sick bay with Pulaski and Troi requiring them to be weepy and fretful. Pulaski at least makes the scenes work. Ironically, although it is Riker who is dying in this episode, it is Pulaski (and executive producer\/teleplay writer Maurice Hurley) who would not survive it. This is their last episode in the series.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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If I measure \u201cShades of Gray\u201d against its ambition, it doesn\u2019t look too bad, because the ambition for this episode was very small. For better or worse, it is not my least favorite episode of the season. The editing of the clips was okay, and I don\u2019t mind a little nostalgia. Can\u2019t find much to recommend about it, though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Torie Atkinson of The Viewscreen is less charitable, and is worth quoting at length (http:\/\/www.theviewscreen.com\/shades-of-gray\/<\/a>):<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The writers had no interest in shaping Riker to be anything other than a lame Kirk substitute. I honestly can\u2019t get past the manly coma. What would be so awful about him being scared to die? He lies there talking to Troi, saying nothing. You know what that scene (which they took the time to shoot!) would be good for? Allowing Troi to do her job! Counsel him! In his time of need! But no, he has to set an \u201cexample\u201d to\u2026who? Pulaski? Who does he think is watching him? Then he passes out, and his life is flashing before his eyes, and the great moments of the past two years were lots of fighting and bagging guest stars. They had to do a clip show, fine. But why not use this opportunity to show us something about Riker? \u00a0Didn\u2019t it strike anyone as odd that on the brink of death Riker doesn\u2019t remember any of his crippling daddy issues? Are there really no turning points in his life, no moments that he would think back and, had he made a different choice, would not have wound up where he is? Not even the token scene from his childhood or his teen years? What about cutting the scenes to leave some open questions, like what if he hadn\u2019t come on the Enterprise<\/em> during Farpoint? Or what if he had taken that command and left everyone? What if he had tried to rekindle his relationship with Troi? Instead, you get into his head and there\u2019s nothing there. It\u2019s a bunch of pointless struggles and forced sexytimes that, when all put together like that, draw your mind to the inevitable conclusion that show was never, ever going to succeed with this creative team. They just needed something on the screen to shove out the door, and they didn\u2019t care what it was, which has been the theme since the beginning. Weak stories, terrible acting, lifeless characters, bad jokes\u2013in a way, it\u2019s the perfect endcap to a dreadful two seasons.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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(Me again.) This was episode 48 of 178 of TNG, and the final episode of Season Two. We are 27% of the way through TNG. We are also 21% of the way through the whole canon of televised Star Trek (episode 149 of 725). Giving us credit for starting with the unaired TOS pilot, this is our 150th Star Trek episode thread (not counting movies or fan films). Go us!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Warp 2 of 6. \u00a0We’ll take a couple of weeks off, then onwards to Season Three. I’ll post season retrospective threads next week.<\/p>\n\n\n

http:\/\/en.memory-alpha.org\/wiki\/Shades_of_Gray<\/a>