Disaster - Peak TNG

[Richard S. TaaAGH! *thud*]

By luck of the fact that P+ has never been available here in sunny Vietnam, we have never lost Star Trek from Netflix. None of the movies are available, but TOS, TAS, TNG, DS9, VGR, ENT and now PRO are all available in their entirety.

Now, a little background. I last watched TNG in a marathon somewhere between 2006-2007 and I have not revisited the vast majority in the intervening years. I have at times rewatched some of the 'event' episodes like Yesterday's Enterprise, Relics, The Best of Both Worlds, I Borg, Tapestry and so on, but in almost 20 years (wow) there are vast amounts of TNG episodes that I've only seen once... episodes that honestly I barely remember at all.

So, as of late I've been on a bit of a TNG kick, but I've been deliberately avoiding the above mentioned type of episode. That means no Q, no Borg, no Lore, no Sela... no sequels or 'big' episodes like Reunification. I suppose what you would call the 'nuts and bolts' TNG. The ones that just tell a story already.

Now this has had mixed results, but just tonight I watched the Season 5 episode, Disaster and... I don't know what you guys think of it, but I think it's a TNG masterpiece. It has an A plot (Troi in Command and butting heads with Ro), a B plot (Picard in the turbo lift with the kids), a C plot (Geordi and Crusher putting out a plasma fire), a D plot (Riker and Data) and an E plot (Worf delivering Keiko's baby) and somehow resolves everyone one of them.

Troi grows and so does Ro. Picard is richer and better for his experience and so are the kids and Worf smiles (and gosh he's beautiful when he does). Crusher and Geordi almost get flushed out of an airlock.

The whole thing just rolls along and never feels slow. There’s always something happening and tension rises in each plot as it goes.

I also loved that it avoided the obvious TNG pairings. Worf with Keiko, Riker with Data, Geordi with Crusher, Troi with Ro and Picard with kids. Very good. It brought different things out of each character.

It only struck me towards the end that this was a 'cheap' episode. A bottle episode. No new sets. Very few new guest actors. No other ships. No new shots of the Enterprise... but gosh, I just loved it. My wife likes Star Trek somewhat and can quite easily be coaxed into watching an episode and I wanna watch this again with her when she's back in a few days.

Anyway, I loved it enough to make a thread, which is more than I can say for the last few I watched. A TNG masterpiece IMO. What do you guys think of it?

 

[Admiral Qu'irk]

The Picard subplot is better than from when I'd last rewatched the episode. Haven't seen it lately.

I liked how Troi acknowledged how Ro had a point, but the script went too far out of its way to support Troi - apart from how Troi says "You could have easily been right." in a way that makes Troi herself appear to be unsure of herself (again). And/or as relief, since the containment clock countdown was 1% short of going critical. As always, the outsider (Ro) is written as wrong and the clique (Troi) is right. Apart from her eponymously titled premiere story, of course.

But thanks to treknobabble and plot armor and how the ship being the most important main character as the hauler of big soapboxes by this season, we knew they'd all survive*, **.

It still drives me bonkers how Dr Crusher still told Geordi to take a nice big deep breath and hold it in just before starting the cargo bay decompression procedure. Um, should be exhaling all the way - not inhaling. Plus, Geordi should have been able to have noticed the plasma fire a long time earlier, what with his ability to see microfractures, changes in temperature, etc, due to the VISOR. Zero sign is indicated that his VISOR was malfunctioning, but he asks Crusher "Where?" regarding the hot wall.

Data's outer shell/skin would rightly be nonconductive, but... amperage is the volume and voltage is the pressure applied by the volume. Too much of either would kill humans and anything above spec would quickly wreck circuitry as well. Half a million amps (yet with no voltage or wattage stated) allows Data to make a ton of guesses about his power couplings melting, like when you plug a 1500w space heater into a power strip, left on all day, and then wonder why said power strip starts to get nice and toasty brown and smelly around the coupler where said space heater's plug was put into - not enough insulation and risks a short circuit. Add in how, if a current is strong enough, the amount of relative insulator becomes worthless - how thick is Data's skin? Probably not enough. Seriously, 500000 amps is peanuts if the wattage is 1 (meaning a shocking 0.000002v .) 1000000 watts (aka 1 Megawatt) at 500000 amps means all this stuff involves a puny 2v. Let's up the ante and use 8,675,309 watts - resulting in 17.35v being pushed along. (https://www.rapidtables.com/calc/electric/Amp_to_Volt_Calculator.html)

Or via a response from https://www.quora.com/Imagine-we-have-1-000-000-amps-from-a-2-volt-power-supply-Can-it-shock-you

Yet another fun tangent, lightning is a mere 300v, at 30000a (thus 9,000,000 w or 9 megawatts). For this, wearing new shoes with big thick rubber soles as ground insultation does absolutely zilch for protection - the lightning breaches it like a hungry kid in a candy store.

Data's "tripolymers" just means fancy synthetic plastic. Must be really good stuff to be such a resisting current.

But on the plus side, static electricity is 1000~50000 volts and provides too little amperage (5milliamp appx) to really cause real harm (or power anything for any period of time, unfortunately, unless a static generator were that efficient and one that could power itself via static electricity). But enough amperage would kill regardless, and thus would melt Data too. But this is electricity, involving electronics. I wonder how that works opposite positronics, if at all since electricity revolves around electrons and positronics would evolve around protons, and did I tell you the one about where the proton, electron, and neutron went into a bar and why the neutron got the juice for free? (Cuz it had no charge, snarf snarf...)

* There's a plot twist - the main ship goes boom-boom and the saucer is rescued and now they need a new ship. Time to build new sets halfway through the season! (Well, if it were into the third or fourth season and budget built up and allocated, they could get away with something so massive an endeavor.) Until that and a time machine, there's "Star Trek Generations".​

​

** to be fair, I'm a fan of "Space 1999" and both Bionic TV shows from the 1970s. I should be able to handle the nitpickery in this episode, even though I've nitpicked those as well.​

 

[Richard S. TaaAGH! *thud*]

The Picard subplot is better than from when I'd last rewatched the episode. Haven't seen it lately.

I liked how Troi acknowledged how Ro had a point, but the script went too far out of its way to support Troi - apart from how Troi says "You could have easily been right." in a way that makes Troi herself appear to be unsure of herself (again). And/or as relief, since the containment clock countdown was 1% short of going critical. As always, the outsider (Ro) is written as wrong and the clique (Troi) is right. Apart from her eponymously titled premiere story, of course.

But thanks to treknobabble and plot armor and how the ship being the most important main character as the hauler of big soapboxes by this season, we knew they'd all survive*, **.

It still drives me bonkers how Dr Crusher still told Geordi to take a nice big deep breath and hold it in just before starting the cargo bay decompression procedure. Um, should be exhaling all the way - not inhaling. Plus, Geordi should have been able to have noticed the plasma fire a long time earlier, what with his ability to see microfractures, changes in temperature, etc, due to the VISOR. Zero sign is indicated that his VISOR was malfunctioning, but he asks Crusher "Where?" regarding the hot wall.

Data's outer shell/skin would rightly be nonconductive, but... amperage is the volume and voltage is the pressure applied by the volume. Too much of either would kill humans and anything above spec would quickly wreck circuitry as well. Half a million amps (yet with no voltage or wattage stated) allows Data to make a ton of guesses about his power couplings melting, like when you plug a 1500w space heater into a power strip, left on all day, and then wonder why said power strip starts to get nice and toasty brown and smelly around the coupler where said space heater's plug was put into - not enough insulation and risks a short circuit. Add in how, if a current is strong enough, the amount of relative insulator becomes worthless - how thick is Data's skin? Probably not enough. Seriously, 500000 amps is peanuts if the wattage is 1 (meaning a shocking 0.000002v .) 1000000 watts (aka 1 Megawatt) at 500000 amps means all this stuff involves a puny 2v. Let's up the ante and use 8,675,309 watts - resulting in 17.35v being pushed along. (https://www.rapidtables.com/calc/electric/Amp_to_Volt_Calculator.html)

Or via a response from https://www.quora.com/Imagine-we-have-1-000-000-amps-from-a-2-volt-power-supply-Can-it-shock-you

Yet another fun tangent, lightning is a mere 300v, at 30000a (thus 9,000,000 w or 9 megawatts). For this, wearing new shoes with big thick rubber soles as ground insultation does absolutely zilch for protection - the lightning breaches it like a hungry kid in a candy store.

Data's "tripolymers" just means fancy synthetic plastic. Must be really good stuff to be such a resisting current.

But on the plus side, static electricity is 1000~50000 volts and provides too little amperage (5milliamp appx) to really cause real harm (or power anything for any period of time, unfortunately, unless a static generator were that efficient and one that could power itself via static electricity). But enough amperage would kill regardless, and thus would melt Data too. But this is electricity, involving electronics. I wonder how that works opposite positronics, if at all since electricity revolves around electrons and positronics would evolve around protons, and did I tell you the one about where the proton, electron, and neutron went into a bar and why the neutron got the juice for free? (Cuz it had no charge, snarf snarf...)

* There's a plot twist - the main ship goes boom-boom and the saucer is rescued and now they need a new ship. Time to build new sets halfway through the season! (Well, if it were into the third or fourth season and budget built up and allocated, they could get away with something so massive an endeavor.) Until that and a time machine, there's "Star Trek Generations".​

​

** to be fair, I'm a fan of "Space 1999" and both Bionic TV shows from the 1970s. I should be able to handle the nitpickery in this episode, even though I've nitpicked those as well.​

So… do you like it or not?…

 

[Mutai Sho-Rin]

What do you guys think of it?

This ep gets a lot of hate from some harass fans. Like you, I really liked it in first run and continued to enjoy it when it popped up during TNG reruns. Rascals is another one that is regularly reviled that I really like so don’t miss it either. My justification is that I’m old with adult daughters and episodes with kids are just fun.

 

[Richard S. TaaAGH! *thud*]

This ep gets a lot of hate from some harass fans. Like you, I really liked it in first run and continued to enjoy it when it popped up during TNG reruns. Rascals is another one that is regularly reviled that I really like so don’t miss it either. My justification is that I’m old with adult daughters and episodes with kids are just fun.

Oh… the kids are sort of crap I suppose, but only in the way that kids in 1990s shows usually are. I think Stewart totally invests in it, which helps…

Still, surprised to see the word ‘hate’ there… but it just goes to show what they say about different strokes.

 

[Frightscape One]

I have always really liked "Disaster". As you pointed out, most of the pairings are atypical, and work to their benefit. Also rare for TNG to have so many plots running in the same episode, something DS9 did often and was very good at.

I will say, however, that as much as I really like this one, I think DS9's "STARSHIP DOWN" was a better version. They had the same basic story (ship disaster separates various crew and work against the clock taking care of their issues).

 

[Tosk]

I wanna see the radishes that came out aLL wEirD.

 

[Headless_Hysteria]

It's a very good episode, and one of the best of the fifth season. Not sure who hates this episode, really.

 

[Richard S. TaaAGH! *thud*]

It's really cool coming back to episodes like this, as it's been so long since I've seen them. It's like new Star trek to me. I've most likely forgotten a good 70% of TNG. I remembered Picard in the lift shaft pulling optical cabling out, but all the stuff with Keiko, taking Data's head off (!), Troi in command... that was all totally new to me.

I've only done a few so far. Before this one I watched Silicon Avatar, which... was kind of okay, I really did not expect the Crystalline Entity to die. They started talking to it, but then it just gets murdered and smashed into a thousand pieces.

Bleak.

Also the final scene with Data is so, so cold. He's a bastard in that final scene. He may not have emotions, but he knows how to elicit emotional responses from people and the way he basically says: "your dead son would be fucking ashamed of you"... ouch, Data. Cold. In his own way, he is furious and he deliberately sets out to brutally wound in his words. Youch.

I'll choose another random one tonight I think.

 

[MrPicard]

I believe some of the dislike for "Disaster" comes from the fact that it tries to tell us that Troi sits on the bridge every day without knowing anything about the ship's basic functions (even I know what it means when the antimatter containment field fails and I'm REALLY not a technobabble person) and it uses the whole "we're putting a woman in command and she has no idea what she's doing" trope that, given the context of TNG and its generally not very favorable attitude towards its female characters, comes across as... unfortunate at best. That being said tho, there are far worse TNG episodes.

I'm somewhat meh towards it myself, it doesn't really do anything for me. I relate a lot to Jean-Luc being annoyed by the kids tho. That would be me, too.

 

[Richard S. TaaAGH! *thud*]

I think we do see the contrast in Ro in terms of how a female in the big chair could work. She was wrong but she came to decisions that were smart without aid… Yeah, she was wrong, but captains don’t always get it right.

 

[at Quark's]

As an episode, it's OK.

The only (minor) gripe I have with it (from memory) is the moronic bay design that requires Beverley and Geordi to take a 10m stroll through vacuum before they can repressurize the bay, rather than have both buttons available at the same location.

Or preprogram the computer to repressurize the bay as soon as sensors confirm the fire is out, for that matter.

 

[valkyrie013]

Guess it depends on how old you were when you first watched it?
I was.. 12? so the more "Kiddy" or "Campy" episodes were still good to me, and looking back still are.

 

[Mojochi]

I've always thought it was a good episode. The drama is well played for sure, & I like ensemble stories. If you like the sleepers episodes, & haven't already gotten to it, Timescape works similarly IMHO.

 

[Frightscape One]

I've always thought it was a good episode. The drama is well played for sure, & I like ensemble stories. If you like the sleepers episodes, & haven't already gotten to it, Timescape works similarly IMHO.

Speaking of good ensemble TNG episodes, one of the best uses of the cast was "The Arsenal of Freedom".

Everyone was utilized well, including Troi when she was advising LaForge on the junior bridge officers. Bonus points for showing how well he works as a leader and under pressure. (I've long held the belief this situation was how he got to be the permanent Chief Engineer, a position that is arguably the most important on a starship. Picard was convinced of his ability to lead such an important department... after he got the ship 'back in one piece', of course.)

Add to that pacing of the episode was perfect, we get a few snippets of Riker's backstory, and a cool story/plot/premise, it was a great first credited helming for director Les Landau. (Who ended up directing over 40 episodes across the Berman era.)

 

[Mojochi]

Speaking of good ensemble TNG episodes, one of the best uses of the cast was "The Arsenal of Freedom".

Everyone was utilized well, including Troi when she was advising LaForge on the junior bridge officers. Bonus points for showing how well he works as a leader and under pressure. (I've long held the belief this situation was how he got to be the permanent Chief Engineer, a position that is arguably the most important on a starship. Picard was convinced of his ability to lead such an important department... after he got the ship 'back in one piece', of course.)

Add to that pacing of the episode was perfect, we get a few snippets of Riker's backstory, and a cool story/plot/premise, it was a great first credited helming for director Les Landau. (Who ended up directing over 40 episodes across the Berman era.)

I do also feel like Geordi got his new job because he had a few situations where he'd been down in engineering in season one that also that made him look good. Plus there'd been a revolving door of folks down there that did not.

But you're right. Him showing his leadership in Arsenal of Freedom very well could've tipped the scales too

 

[Ricky Spanish]

Anyway, I loved it enough to make a thread, which is more than I can say for the last few I watched. A TNG masterpiece IMO. What do you guys think of it?

Great episode. Though I've always preferred the smaller, more intimate episodes to the "ALL MY GOD!!! WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!" episodes.

 

[Shikarnov]

I really enjoyed Disaster. It had some magnificent moments that stand out in my mind even without watching it again. "Congratulations. You may now give birth." I love the dynamic between Ro, O'Brien, and Troi. Picard and the kids is cute (and is a great lead-in to Captain Picard Day, lol).

It's in my Top 3 for the fifth season, along with Darmok and The Inner Light.

 

[Mojochi]

Even the Data/Riker bits worked well. The basic premise & intention behind this bottle episode was to use a generic crisis to pair off characters who never get paired off, & in doing that, I believe they were wholly successful. Geordi & Bev were probably the least interesting, but even they didn't hurt the whole that much, IMHO.

I feel the same way about Conundrum. It has its flaws that you need to overlook, but the end result is scenes we were never otherwise going to get, & therefore worthwhile.

 

[Ricky Spanish]

It's in my Top 3 for the fifth season, along with Darmok and The Inner Light.

I think "Power Play" should be in contention for that top 3.