This episode was written and shot within a very compressed time frame even for television. Revisions to scenes, necessitating relearning dialogue, came in more than once or twice a day (not that unusual for TNG at the time; when I visited the soundstage a few weeks later, nooks and crannies of the place were still strewn with Goldberg's cue cards for the episode). Unless Frakes was inclined to sit and watch the finished episodes - and fans are often supprised by the actors who never do - he may never have read the script through with sufficient focus to completely get the logic of it.
And to be fair, good as it is in many ways the script has some logical weaknesses - at least, according to Michael Piller. He once observed that the part of the story that never really worked for him was that at base Picard decided to send the "C" back to certain destruction on the say-so of his ship's bartender.
And to be fair, good as it is in many ways the script has some logical weaknesses - at least, according to Michael Piller. He once observed that the part of the story that never really worked for him was that at base Picard decided to send the "C" back to certain destruction on the say-so of his ship's bartender.
