• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Examples of times Troi was used well in the series?

D

DalekJim

Fleet Captain
Fleet Captain
I'm rewatching TNG (Currently midway through S2!) and ... I fucking hate Troi. Nothing wrong with Marina Sirtis' performance but a lot of the time she'll just be there to uselessly state the obvious.

Villain of the Week: I hope Picard gets bummed so hard he dies from severe anal bleeding.

Troi: Captain, I sense..... malice.... in this person.

Yeah, no shit.

She seems to serve only this one purpose. Which is admittedly one more purpose than Uhura had in TOS but it's kinda lame compared to say, Kira Nerys in DS9.

So, are there any great moments people think she had during the run of TNG?
 
It gets better for her. In BOBW, she counsels Riker, in the Bonding, she is useful. She is an effective counselor.
 
We've got a while to wait for it on Blu-Ray, but season 6 - Face of the Enemy, I thought was a great Troi episode and she even gets a bit bad-ass late in the episode!
 
She actually did come into her own as a counselor in time, with the introduction of Barkley, & helping some of the crew through recovery, Picard post-assimilation, & in Chain of Command, or helping Geordi though his Romulan brain washing etc...

Honestly though, outside her occasional benefits as a therapist aboard, I'm hard pressed to find much other benefits from her
 
Technically in the movies category but her scene with Picard in Generations discussing Rene and Robert was pretty good.
 
Troi's only great episode was "Face of the Enemy". The rest were either average or terrible.

Dr Crusher had the same problem. Her only good episode was "Remember Me".
 
She was handy as a plot device to bring mind-affecting issues to the surface, or to give other telepaths someone to relate to.

Other than that, she was good in Disaster, Ménage a Troi, Power Play, Hollow Pursuits.

And she was fun in the connector scenes where she got to be playful, like in the poker scenes or a bunch of the ten forward socialization scenes.
 
Strikes me that it might just been more useful to make her a proper telepath. Have any of the writers discussed why they didn't just do that?
 
I liked some of her roles functioning as first contact advisor or cultural attache or diplomatic officer. You know, aiding Picard in those situations.

I believe the Titan books have her as formal diplomatic officer. She worked well in that role, beyond psychologist counselor.
 
SchwEnt said:
I liked some of her roles functioning as first contact advisor or cultural attache or diplomatic officer. You know, aiding Picard in those situations.
Click to expand...

I agree. I think they used her well in that direction, particularly in season one.

Other examples of when they used Troi well, I think, were at the end of Chain of Command, and Mind's Eye when she's seen counselling members of the main cast.

I also think they used her well in Powerplay. Okay, so she was being taken over again, but so were other members of the crew. FWIW, I think MS acted her socks off in some of those scenes.
 
She had a good part to play in Disaster, she was shown to be inept as a command officer, but she was supposed to be. Also the episode with the cosmic string where she loses her mental abilities.

Plus, I'd like to think that after Deanna hooked up with Worf, that she was "well used" on a nightly basis.

:)
 
SchwEnt said:
I liked some of her roles functioning as first contact advisor or cultural attache or diplomatic officer. You know, aiding Picard in those situations.

I believe the Titan books have her as formal diplomatic officer. She worked well in that role, beyond psychologist counselor.
Click to expand...

I like this premise. It would have made her character a lot stronger if she was introduced as the Diplomatic Officer from the get go. It would validate her presence on the bridge and give her a more important role among the senior staff. Most of what we see Troi do on screen falls more into the diplomatic scope of responsibiliites anyway. There are only a handful of episodes where we see her doing any real counseling.

I see the need for a counselor on a starship but I don't see the need for a counselor to be a member of the senior staff.
 
Having just watched Unnatural Selection as part of the HD rewatch, I have to say she was used incredibly well in this one. Even if she didn't have a major role it was one of the first episodes (along with Skin Of Evil and Loud As A Whisper) where they knew how to write for her.
 
Off the top of my head:
"Disaster"
"Face of the Enemy"
"Dark Page"
"The Loss"
"Best of Both Worlds"

More often than not, there are "good Troi moments" rather than "good Troi episodes"... but she did better in terms of decent screen than say, La Forge and Crusher.
 
I honestly don't find her that great as a counselor, though I did think Dark Page was a good episode for her. She often comes across in counseling situations or in similar type situations as snooty. The way she handled Janet in The Loss even before the loss of her empathic abilities left something to be desired. I'm working on a master's in licensed mental health counseling myself and I find her style to be too confrontational at times and lacking in warmth or empathy.

I think it would have helped if we'd seen her function more as an actual counselor working with the crew rather than what we did see of her. As counselors go, I would have easily have found it more productive to talk to Ezri Dax.

I don't know. It's hard for me to really find good Troi moments I suppose because I really don't like her character much at all.
 
DalekJim said:
I'm rewatching TNG (Currently midway through S2!) and ... I fucking hate Troi.

So, are there any great moments people think she had during the run of TNG?
Click to expand...

The only one I can think of is the episode where she's in her quarters with a skimpy nightie. :)

Other than that, I didn't care much for her character, or at least didn't care for her on the bridge all the time. It made Picard seem less capable as a Captain because it appeared he needed her so much he gave her a chair next to his own.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top