The Defector - great episode

[Corran Horn]

One of my favorites in terms of TNG and all of Trek, actually.

So many great moments:

• "tell him...Admiral Jarok wants to see him."
• The Romulan shuttle blowing up outside the window right when Geordi's talking about popping the hood and looking at Romulan technology.
• "You have already betrayed your people, Admiral!"
• "There comes a time in a man's life that you cannot know... when he looks down at the first smile of his baby girl and realizes he must change the world for her... for all children."
• "I expected more than an idle threat."/"Then you shall have it. Mr. Worf..." and the Birds of Prey decloak. Gives me chills...and then, "Are you prepared to die today, Tomalak?"

The ending with the Birds of Prey is one of my favorite sequences in TNG...it's only slightly telegraphed earlier in the episode when Picard mentions he wants to talk to Worf in his ready room, but we never find out why until the end. Calling in the Klingons for backup is the kind of ballsy move that wasn't seen enough out of Starfleet in TNG.

Anybody else love this episode?

 

[Wingsley]

I do not understand why this ep doesn't receive more praise from fans.

It is clearly one of the best dramatic stories of TNG, if not all of TREK, I agree.

Even though it arrived just as the Cold War was ending, it was every bit as brilliant as "A Taste of Armageddon". I think that confrontation between Picard and Tomalak is posted somewhere on YouTube, BTW.

There are only two very minor things about "The Defector" that irk me. One, the way Picard talks to Data makes it sound like the Romulan cloaking device technology is some recent thing and the Federation has never dappled in it, completely ignoring "The Enterprise Incident". I thought that contradiction was bad form, and could've been avoided with slightly different dialogue between Data and Picard in that scene. The other thing that bothered me was the use of Birds of Prey as the Klingon ships. I've never been a fan of them, and would've preferred they use K'T'ingas or some other ships instead. Two Warbirds up against one Galaxy-class and three birds-of-prey? Nah. Tomalak wins that one. Two Warbirds against a Galaxy-class and three K'T'ingas, now that's an even match!

All that aside, James Sloyan and Andreas Katsulas steal the show. I was kind of surprised by that. They broke one of TNG's anal-retentive rules by "walking off the transporter and into our lives", and with grand wit and style, no less. They clearly had some of the best lines in the whole TNG series, movies included.

 

[JustKate]

Oh, I love this episode. It's suspenseful, it's at times touching, it's at times inspiring, it talks about big issues but in an entertaining way, it's well acted...

It's just great.

 

[RobertScorpio]

One of my favorites in terms of TNG and all of Trek, actually.

So many great moments:

• "tell him...Admiral Jarok wants to see him."
• The Romulan shuttle blowing up outside the window right when Geordi's talking about popping the hood and looking at Romulan technology.
• "You have already betrayed your people, Admiral!"
• "There comes a time in a man's life that you cannot know... when he looks down at the first smile of his baby girl and realizes he must change the world for her... for all children."
• "I expected more than an idle threat."/"Then you shall have it. Mr. Worf..." and the Birds of Prey decloak. Gives me chills...and then, "Are you prepared to die today, Tomalak?"

The ending with the Birds of Prey is one of my favorite sequences in TNG...it's only slightly telegraphed earlier in the episode when Picard mentions he wants to talk to Worf in his ready room, but we never find out why until the end. Calling in the Klingons for backup is the kind of ballsy move that wasn't seen enough out of Starfleet in TNG.

Anybody else love this episode?

This is one of my favorites..and is in my top ten TNG episodes of all time...

Rob

 

[StarryEyed]

I agree that this episode is very underrated and should be considered an elite episode.

I disagree with Wingsley about the BOP. Those are the Klingon's equivalent of the Defiant. It packs a big punch in a small package. The Romulans might have been victorious in that fight but it would have been a costly battle - and a major incident. They were hoping for a political victory here. The potential for the Enterprise's (and Jarok's) survival here was way too high. Not to mention the sentiment a total Romulan victory would have generated in the Klingon Empire - the proud and honorable starships of the Federation and the Klingon Empire falling while exposing Romulan subterfuge and cowardice. It would be a disaster to the Romulans.

As Picard said, "It's always a chess game with them."

The Romulans made a ploy here and they lost. It was much more sensible for them to take that loss than risk a war with the Federation AND the the Klingons. Just look at Tomolak's response: "I look forward to our next encounter, Captian Picard."

A chess game.

 

[Canuck69]

One of my favorites in terms of TNG and all of Trek, actually.

So many great moments:

• "tell him...Admiral Jarok wants to see him."
• The Romulan shuttle blowing up outside the window right when Geordi's talking about popping the hood and looking at Romulan technology.
• "You have already betrayed your people, Admiral!"
• "There comes a time in a man's life that you cannot know... when he looks down at the first smile of his baby girl and realizes he must change the world for her... for all children."
• "I expected more than an idle threat."/"Then you shall have it. Mr. Worf..." and the Birds of Prey decloak. Gives me chills...and then, "Are you prepared to die today, Tomalak?"

The ending with the Birds of Prey is one of my favorite sequences in TNG...it's only slightly telegraphed earlier in the episode when Picard mentions he wants to talk to Worf in his ready room, but we never find out why until the end. Calling in the Klingons for backup is the kind of ballsy move that wasn't seen enough out of Starfleet in TNG.

Anybody else love this episode?

I agree these moments are all great. I love, love, love the last one when the Birds of Prey decloak. And Picards cocky "Are you prepared to die today?" was so awesome. A rare frak you moment that was simple and effective. It reminds me of the time he "outs" Ardra in "Devils Due". So cocky, with every right to be.

 

[Unicron]

Plus, they were the giant BOPs.

I definitely agree this is one of the best, along with "The Enemy." I really wish this is how the Romulans were consistently and more frequently used, because it was great to see them as both manipulative and openly threatening badasses.

 

[MikeH92467]

This is one of my favorites. The Romulans being willing to casually sacrifice one of their greatest war heroes on the long shot chance to gain a strategic advantage is an incredibly cold blooded and ruthless maneuver. I guess they figured they had plenty more military geniuses to take his place and one Admiral wasn't too high a price for a big win or maybe the Tal Shiar had sniffed out his reservations about his course in life.

Picard showed his true brilliance here. After showing the sheer courage and personal strength needed to gain the respect of the Klingons then being able to think far ahead enough ahead to thwart the Romulan gambit.

This is an episode that hits on all cylinders.

 

[PTRACER]

I really like this one as well. Shame he killed himself at the end.

 

[BolianAuthor]

One of my favorites in terms of TNG and all of Trek, actually.

So many great moments:

• "tell him...Admiral Jarok wants to see him."
• The Romulan shuttle blowing up outside the window right when Geordi's talking about popping the hood and looking at Romulan technology.
• "You have already betrayed your people, Admiral!"
• "There comes a time in a man's life that you cannot know... when he looks down at the first smile of his baby girl and realizes he must change the world for her... for all children."
• "I expected more than an idle threat."/"Then you shall have it. Mr. Worf..." and the Birds of Prey decloak. Gives me chills...and then, "Are you prepared to die today, Tomalak?"

The ending with the Birds of Prey is one of my favorite sequences in TNG...it's only slightly telegraphed earlier in the episode when Picard mentions he wants to talk to Worf in his ready room, but we never find out why until the end. Calling in the Klingons for backup is the kind of ballsy move that wasn't seen enough out of Starfleet in TNG.

Anybody else love this episode?

This is indeed one of the very best TNG episodes, and one of the very best episodes of ANY Star Trek series. It has a solid story, and is dramatic and emotionally gripping. One of my top favorites.

 

[BolianAuthor]

I do not understand why this ep doesn't receive more praise from fans.

It is clearly one of the best dramatic stories of TNG, if not all of TREK, I agree.

Even though it arrived just as the Cold War was ending, it was every bit as brilliant as "A Taste of Armageddon". I think that confrontation between Picard and Tomalak is posted somewhere on YouTube, BTW.

There are only two very minor things about "The Defector" that irk me. One, the way Picard talks to Data makes it sound like the Romulan cloaking device technology is some recent thing and the Federation has never dappled in it, completely ignoring "The Enterprise Incident". I thought that contradiction was bad form, and could've been avoided with slightly different dialogue between Data and Picard in that scene. The other thing that bothered me was the use of Birds of Prey as the Klingon ships. I've never been a fan of them, and would've preferred they use K'T'ingas or some other ships instead. Two Warbirds up against one Galaxy-class and three birds-of-prey? Nah. Tomalak wins that one. Two Warbirds against a Galaxy-class and three K'T'ingas, now that's an even match!

All that aside, James Sloyan and Andreas Katsulas steal the show. I was kind of surprised by that. They broke one of TNG's anal-retentive rules by "walking off the transporter and into our lives", and with grand wit and style, no less. They clearly had some of the best lines in the whole TNG series, movies included.

The point about the cloaking technology is not really applicable, because of one thing you're overlooking...

By TNG's time, the UFP has only had a very few encounters with the Romulans, since the Tomed Incident. We can assume that during that time, there was some kind of "cold war", during which Romulan cloaking technology, amongst other things, had advanced greatly.

Picard's lack of understanding was natural, because he/we had no way of knowing just how good their cloaking tech had become by this point.

EDIT: And bear in mind, this is before they figured out that they could use a tachyon detection net, to find the cloaked ships.

 

[DWF]

It's an awesome and something of a sequel of sorts to Balance Of Terror, it carried some of the same themes that the Romulans and the Federation could easily be friends. The shuttle's destruction was incredible since you can see the reflection of it on the conference room table. And I LOVED how the Klingons were used to help save the day, that was a pleasant surprise at the time. All in all it was an ep. that worked in just about every way, it had interesting characters such as Jarok, great visual effects and a great storyline.

 

[Anwar]

Wonderful entry by Ron Moore into the Trekverse. He really left his mark with this episode.

And hell yes, this was a great ep. Real good use of the Romulans as more than just generic adversaries, and showed that Trek averted that "monoculture" thing when it wanted to.

 

[RobertScorpio]

I do not understand why this ep doesn't receive more praise from fans.

It is clearly one of the best dramatic stories of TNG, if not all of TREK, I agree.

Even though it arrived just as the Cold War was ending, it was every bit as brilliant as "A Taste of Armageddon". I think that confrontation between Picard and Tomalak is posted somewhere on YouTube, BTW.

There are only two very minor things about "The Defector" that irk me. One, the way Picard talks to Data makes it sound like the Romulan cloaking device technology is some recent thing and the Federation has never dappled in it, completely ignoring "The Enterprise Incident". I thought that contradiction was bad form, and could've been avoided with slightly different dialogue between Data and Picard in that scene. The other thing that bothered me was the use of Birds of Prey as the Klingon ships. I've never been a fan of them, and would've preferred they use K'T'ingas or some other ships instead. Two Warbirds up against one Galaxy-class and three birds-of-prey? Nah. Tomalak wins that one. Two Warbirds against a Galaxy-class and three K'T'ingas, now that's an even match!

All that aside, James Sloyan and Andreas Katsulas steal the show. I was kind of surprised by that. They broke one of TNG's anal-retentive rules by "walking off the transporter and into our lives", and with grand wit and style, no less. They clearly had some of the best lines in the whole TNG series, movies included.

The point about the cloaking technology is not really applicable, because of one thing you're overlooking...

By TNG's time, the UFP has only had a very few encounters with the Romulans, since the Tomed Incident. We can assume that during that time, there was some kind of "cold war", during which Romulan cloaking technology, amongst other things, had advanced greatly.

Picard's lack of understanding was natural, because he/we had no way of knowing just how good their cloaking tech had become by this point.

EDIT: And bear in mind, this is before they figured out that they could use a tachyon detection net, to find the cloaked ships.

and, more importantly, what star trek fans don't get sometimes, is that the tech stuff is really just filler here..what the cloak can and can not do isn't really what this episode is about..hopefully that is not lost on some of our fans, but....you never know..

Rob

 

[Unicron]

It's also clear from "The Neutral Zone" that the warbird was a very powerful vessel, easily on par with the Galaxy or Vor'Cha, and that the Romulans hadn't been ignoring things during their isolation.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

It's a pity that Sela (Redemption II, I think) said that her father was a Romulan *general*. I think it would have been interesting if it had been Jarok. I don't remember him saying how old his daughter was... in any case, we were left to assume that Sela's father was an ultra patriotic Romulan who executed Tasha for daring to escape the Romulan state, but if it had been Jarok (who is obviously not such an orthodox Romulan), maybe he was mainly motivated by just protecting his daughter. Am I making any sense?

 

[BolianAuthor]

It's a pity that Sela (Redemption II, I think) said that her father was a Romulan *general*. I think it would have been interesting if it had been Jarok. I don't remember him saying how old his daughter was... in any case, we were left to assume that Sela's father was an ultra patriotic Romulan who executed Tasha for daring to escape the Romulan state, but if it had been Jarok (who is obviously not such an orthodox Romulan), maybe he was mainly motivated by just protecting his daughter. Am I making any sense?

Sounds like an idea for a short fanfic.

 

[teacherkarl]

I just re-watched this episode recently as I'm going though all of Trek. It's even better now than I remember. Incredibly dramatic, with one of the best guest-starring roles ever by James Sloyan. And Picard's move at the end with the unveiling of the Klingon BOP's absolutely sealed the deal. One of the best TNG episodes, really going together will with "The Enemy" from earlier in the season.

 

[Unicron]

S3 was when TNG really picked up some strength and started to shine. The first two seasons were a bit shaky in some respects, but the third and fourth contain some real gems.

 

[Jonesy]

S3 was when TNG really picked up some strength and started to shine. The first two seasons were a bit shaky in some respects, but the third and fourth contain some real gems.

There's a lot to like about the third season of the show. When I am in the mood to watch TNG, I'm (mostly) thinking about pulling a disk from the third year. I think it is particularly cool that this episode is brought up. I find "The Defector" to be one of those shows that is solid throughout.