Angel one S1E14

[pazzy]

Hi there,
Been a long time since I logged on, but anyway, I am doing a rewatch of TNG , and just completed "Angel one" [S1E14].

Pretty bad episode, but do we ever get an explanation of where this virus came from ? Wes seemed to pick it up on the holodeck skiing ?

Can really see the difference in quality in Season 1.

Also, do you ever do watch along threads here and have specific episode discussion ?

 

[AntonyF]

Doctor Crusher says "I've isolated the twelve students who were on the Quazulu Eight field trip."

So that is the implied source.

 

[pazzy]

Cheers, missed that one ...

 

[Oddish]

In my opinion, it gets a lot better when you see how the main conflict is resolved, and that it respects the fact that a society's evolution towards gender equality is often a difficult process, laden with setbacks, opposition, and sometimes suffering. Despite 40 years of continuous suffrage work, Susan B. Anthony never got the chance to legally vote.

Compare that to DS9's "Ishka seduces Zek and POOF! Ferengi females go from basically livestock to apparent full equality overnight and with minimal opposition".

One is thought-provoking. The other is a -ing insult to our intelligence.

DS9 made surprisingly few missteps. Indeed, if I was going a "Do you have what it takes to write for DS9?" quiz, it would have about four questions on it (to VOY's 30+). But that was just painful.

 

[cgervasi]

it respects the fact that a society's evolution towards gender equality is often a difficult process, laden with setbacks, opposition, and sometimes suffering.

I never thought of it this way. I always wonder why Riker's speech would have swayed them.

I think this would have worked better if they had cast distinguished gray-haired slightly overweight old ladies as the ruling council, with men in the service roles consisting of tall muscle-men. I could imagine the 70 year-old Beata having distant childhood memories of news of first contact. She wanted to be someone important who would be involved in something like that. When the issue comes up 62 years later while she's the head of state, she has that chance. She convinces Riker wear that skimpy outfit. She conveys it's not that flattering on him as it is on the body-builder interns she works with, but she kind-of likes being the first one to be with a UFP guy since she's the top leader. She thinks the UFP has kind of let their boys get out of control, and she fancies she's doing them a service showing Riker how to be nice. Riker has to thread the needle of being a "jerk" by refusing to be nice in the way she's thinking but not such a jerk so as to create an interstellar incident and blowing the mission of finding survivors from the Odin.

If they did it right it would be intentionally awkward and hard to execute in a way that's not too negative but also not flippant. Even if the swung and missed, though, I think it would have been better than what they went with.

 

[Oddish]

I think this would have worked better if they had cast distinguished gray-haired slightly overweight old ladies as the ruling council, with men in the service roles had tall muscle men.

I think that TNG had still not found its own identity... it wanted to stick with two TOS tropes in this effort:
- The Kirk equivalent (Riker) gets gobs of sex.
- An outlier culture has to adopt Federation norms.

 

[cgervasi]

I think that TNG had still not found its own identity... it wanted to stick with two TOS tropes in this effort:
- The Kirk equivalent (Riker) gets gobs of sex.
- An outlier culture has to adopt Federation norms.

I think that's exactly right where it was still TOS-like, and Riker was like Kirk. At the time, though, I didn't think of it as "TOS-like" because TOS was all there was, and I was thrilled to have new episodes. I was happy the Kirk-like figure was not the captain, to avoid any attempt to recreate Kirk/Spock/Bones. When I first heard about what was going to be called The New Generation, I instantly imagined there would be a knock-off version Spock and the rest of the crew. So I have the unpopular opinion that TNG Season 1 was mostly pretty good.

I don't understand, though, why you say it was about a foreign culture having to adapt to Federation norms. It seems like the beginning of the trope common in TNG and ENT where the crew has to bend over backwards to accommodate foreign practices, even if they are very offensive.

 

[Oddish]

I don't understand, though, why you say it was about a foreign culture having to adapt to Federation norms. It seems like the beginning of the trope common in TNG and ENT where the crew has to bend over backwards to accommodate foreign practices, even if they are very offensive.

That's true. However, remember what was going on on Angel One at the time... many of the men on the planet were starting to demand a more equitable place in society, due to the example of the humans. Mistress Beatta sought to stop this by killing them, but Riker explained to her the real reason why this was happening: her society was evolving, growing toward the equality that was the Federation norm, and that the creation of martyrs would only accelerate the inevitable. Because of this, while Beatta sought to slow the changes, she recognized that she couldn't stop them. So yes, Riker wore a fetish costume and served as boy toy to a head of state... but he also gave A1 society a gentle push in the "right" direction.

Maybe not the same as blowing up a computer and forcing clueless natives into self determination or imposing real war on a society long insulated from it... but not totally dissimilar.