"Out of character moments" in TNG ?

I agree, my post was just a poor attempt at humor.

 

Although there's a lot of things I liked about the episode, especially at the time when it was about as cutting edge on doing a gay story as Trek ever got, I found Riker to be out of character in The Outcast in how he was willing to commit to a serious relationship with Soren so quickly. That didn't seem like the commitment phobic Riker who couldn't commit to Troi despite them obviously being soul mates or whatever.
I didn't mind the attempted rescue. It was illegal, and possibly it was out of character for Riker to again go that far against regulations, but it was the moral thing to do.
I think the episode would've worked better with someone else as the romantic lead, such as Geordie.

 

Not Geordi! All his attempts on relationships were so awkward!

 

I always found it out of character that everyone was so accepting of calling Barclay 'Broccoli'. Especially when they were called out on it and still didn't seem all that contrite. Wesley and Riker had their moments of jerkassery, but I'd always had the impression that was either unintentional by the writers or meant to be one-off occurrences of temper. Having it be part of their characterisation that they'd keep up a campaign of immature (and not even particularly clever) name-calling for months is weird.

It was just odd to see that Picard and Data were the only ones who went 'Seriously? I know he's frustrating, but how old are you people?'

 

The TNG bridge crew could be a bitchy little clique from time to time. Things like "Broccoli", and their whiny reactions to having a new captain "be mean to them" (Read: Orders them to do their jobs) in Chain of Command.

 

True, I have to take it back. Scotty's been the same way in some TOS episodes. I think one reason we get this notion is because after LaForge reacts, and Scotty reacts, the background music plays the "guilty" music, cuing us that Geordi went too far or something.

Good one.The Enterprise crew is supposed to be the best of the best and suddenly they become argumentive, demotivated and outright whiny.

Although I do get their having their having to adjust to a demanding superior (it can be a pain) so on that, I think they were normal. Still, they've done it to others themselves .

The ironic thing is, Jellico was right. To a certain extent anyway. If he listened to the crew, Picard might not have been rescued, and that system would have been invaded.

 

Yeah that always rubbed me the wrong way. And I guess it was somewhat out of character, at least for Riker. Teenagers can be jerks so I could see that for Wesley.

 

Yeah, everyone in that episode really handled things badly. I mean, Geordi even proceeded to barge in on Barclay's holodeck program without announcing himself (not the time with Riker and Troi, this is before that, when he's in there on his personal time).

The episode's heart was in the right place - I love the scene in Ten Forward where Barclay basically describes social anxiety in a way that hits the nail on the head, but I have to figure that, particularly since attitudes regarding people with severe introversion and social anxiety haven't really made much if any progress even now, twenty-five or so years later, it's not surprising that they screwed this up.

Doesn't mean I'm any happier about it, of course, but I at least figure that's where they were coming from and what they were trying to do.

On a related subject, there's also the fact that in 'Realm of Fear,' Barclay is clearly having a panic attack about the transporter, even sweating and breathing hard, and not even BEVERLY, the DOCTOR, pays him any attention or notices what's going on.

 

I agree, and look how they treated Dr. Pulaski. Not too welcoming.

 

Okay, I've got one. In "The Neutral Zone," when they thaw out those refugees from the 20th century, nobody seems to worry too much about helping them cope with such a traumatic transition, not even Troi.

Granted, Picard is dealing with a crisis and has other things on his mind, and Troi eventually gets around to counselling the sad housewife, but for most of the episode the entire crew basically treats these poor people as nuisances they don't have time to deal with and leave them to fend for themselves.

(Hell, Picard even objects to reviving them in the first place.)

Troi, in particular, should have been much more pro-active here. She should have been on hand to help the refugees cope right from the beginning. I mean, you don't have to be an empath to realize that these people are going to have trouble adjusting emotionally to their situation

"Well, you've been frozen in suspended animation for three hundred years and everyone and everything you knew is ancient history now . . . but I'm sure you don't need any counselling or anything, right?"

 

"The Neutral Zone" is a good example. Riker has no interest at all in a spaceship floating past him and is content to let it fly into destruction. Picard is genuinely annoyed that Data recovered people in stasis. "They were already dead."

Watching it, I just kept thinking "who are these people?"

Apparently the script was a first draft and the writer's strike prevented a second.

How about in "Where Silence Has Lease?" Worf wasn't terribly defined yet, so they have him go all Wolverine psycho on Riker while in their Danger Room session.

 

Crusher telling Wesley to "Shut Up!" in Datalore. Even when dealing with a walking malpractice suit of a doctor, or bickering with the EMH while Borg are breaking into Sickbay, she was never that snappy again.

Not complaining mind. Its one of the highlights of the first season.

 

How about in TNG "Parallels". Geordie died and none of his 'friends' reacted in any way. They just kind of shrug it off. Apparently Alt.Geordie wasn't well liked.

Is it out-of-character if they're from a parallel Universe?

 

Datalore has been cited already for a few reasons, but for me the biggest is the complete idiocy of the bridge crew.

They find a perfect copy of Data, and not long afterwards Data starts acting suspicious. No one seems to care much at all, and when Wesley mentions it everyone flips on him, acting like he's the jerk. It's only because it's an early episode, but it all plays pretty terribly in hindsight.

 

I agree. It's pretty bad when the most compassionate person on the ship is the emotionless android. What the hell does that say for the emotion having people? Not good.
And as you say it's an early episode, but Picard turns into such a archeology and history buff later on, you'd think he'd be at least a little interested to getting first hand information from eyewitnesses of the era. And they don't know what a "homemaker" is and think it's construction work?

 

That's because Picard saw "Space Seed" and knew better than to thaw out people from the late 20th century.

 

At least in some parallel universes (e.g. the mirror universe) they are different personalities, so I'd see them essentially as different characters. Perhaps it would be wise to do so, too, for parallel realities that are a lot 'closer' to our own, because where would you have to draw the dividing line? It's easy to see the Rikers in the 2 universes with the chocolate cake and the yellow cake as essentially the same person (if there are no other differences), but is the Riker that has been captain for 4 years after Picards still the same person? Or the desparate Borg-infested Alpha Quadrant Riker? At the very least, I'd argue that Thomas Riker (whom one could interpret as an alt-universe Riker, in the sense that it 'is' Riker until a certain branching point in history) is a different person ...

 

These points you bring up bothered me as well. It was like the whole crew couldn't be bothered by these people. Yes, they were preparing for an important and possibly dangerous mission, but that was not the fault of the people that were brought out of cryogenics.

 

Indeed! I agree. An interesting thought exercise. And I was thinking about Thomas Riker the other day and the potential consequences of his actions. Apparently Riker has the potential to go rogue! I can't imagine Thomas Rikers actions making Will Riker look very good to those in Starfleet command. I can see Starfleet asking some serious questions of William Riker. In fact, I could have seen that hurting his career and preventing him from getting a command of his own, not that he wanted one (At the time).

Of course everything seemed to work out fine for Will Riker so...

Ah and how could we forget epic-beard Riker from the Borg-infested Universe. He's the Season five Rick from "TWD" vs. Season one Rick. I see him as the same person just more raw, feral and as you said, desperate. I don't know if I would classify him as a different person though; unlike a Mirror Universe counterpart whose whole life is completely different from childhood on up, epic beard Rikers life was, presumably, the same up until the fall of the Federation. And I could see that being the case for just about everyone, minor differences in choice wouldn't likely affect someones personality but the larger the change or differences, the greater the potential is for alternate possibilities that would affect other choices, etc... Butterfly effect.

God do I love science fiction.

 

To be fair, Riker does go rogue in INS and technically he's insubordinate in 'The Pegasus'