TNG Rewatch: 4x14 "Clues"

This is a good episode but there's plenty to nitpick about it.

For example: "Data, I order you to delete your memories for this event".

And the discrepancy in time only works if the ship really is alone on a deep space mission with nobody in comm distance.

 

It's neither of those things. Those things are kind of "factual" errors. This is something to do with the technicalities of the narrative. I can't properly explain it. I'm worried if I watch the episode again I won't spot what I think the error is again. I've been holding off rewatching it because I know I'll get really frustrated if I don't spot it!

 

The thing that bothers me in this episode is how quickly Picard is cool with allowing the aliens to tamper with the entire crew's brains. What is up with that? He almost takes their side of things.

These aliens are highly dangerous and now they are free to destroy anyone who comes by and the memory wipe doesn't work on. How can Picard allow that?

You might say their tech was so advanced Picard had no choice - but consider that Picard commands Q to stop his hijinks all the time and he could snap them out of existence.

But I do like this episode a lot.

 

This one's a favorite of mine. I always feel so bad for Data, who has everyone thinking he's gone haywire when he's really only following Picard's orders.

 

What problems? Just say everyone was affected except Data. He made sure that none of the crew were in any actual danger, and he also acted to counter any problems that came up. It would fit in with everything that the crew would know about.

 

I feel bad for him as well, as well as angry on his behalf what the heck was with Picard's threat "You do realize you'll most likely be striped down to your wires..." Yikes really? I don't recall any other officers ever being threatened with bodily harm for not being honest with the Captain.

Well Beverly you disobeyed a direct order by preforming an autopsy on the Ferengi, where going to have to strip you down to your nervous system to see what happened.

I'm not sure but I think that might fall under the heading of cruel and unusual.

 

Well, there, it's because the episode had four minutes left to run and it's a story about solving the mystery of the lost day, not about the ethics of accepting a mind-wipe under extraordinary duress. (This is not to say there isn't a really good story to be told about accepting a mind-wipe under extraordinary duress; it's just, that's a full-episode story in itself, not something to work out in the last act of another episode.)

 

I don't think it was so much "threatened with bodily harm" so much as that Starfleet would go to great lengths to find out what had happened. And I sort of doubt they'd go to the lengths of "stripping [Data] to [his] wires" it was probably an empty threat by Picard or, again, hyperbole to say that Starfleet would do anything to discover what would happen.

 

If the entire crew is completely knocked out for an entire day, but Data, then it is fair to say Data is required to take a great deal of action in their rescue, not the least of which would be sending out a distress call. I'm not even sure that the ship could run an entire day without only one conscious person aboard, even if it is Data


I also don't bother much with the problem of the ship's chronometer's being off from the rest of the fleet's, because at the beginning of both setups, Data announces he needs to realign everything to match.

The thing they never really seem to discuss is that in many cases, the "Clues" could not be eliminated, even the 2nd time around. The fake probe telemetry might still be discoverable. They may never be able to erase every possible trace that the ship's chronometer's were tampered with. There'll still likely be evidence that Worf's wrist was repaired, though he could take a pain suppressant. Everyone's biological clocks will still be a dead giveaway, & unless the aliens have some kind of sci-fi magic, Troi's extra sensory episodes might still surface..

The point was never to really eliminate all evidence of what happened, only to eliminate enough that no one will have their curiosity peaked. So basically, they just need to prepare Data to pass off the lie better & then fix Beverly's stupid plants which started the whole domino effect to begin with

 

Picard agreed to it because it was the only alternative to just being destroyed.

And because any action to force them to stop protecting their territory would be a PD violation.

I interpret the line about 'Stripping him down to his wires' was not a threat of execution but rather a statement 'Everybody will assume this is a result of a mechanical malfunction'.

 

These kind of arguments are starting to bug me. Saying that this sort of thing can't happen because it violates the Prime Directive just sounds silly since the franchise violates the bloody thing more times than it has upheld it. It's like arguing that a scene featuring Spock expressing an emotion wouldn't work because as a Vulcan he's not allowed to ever express emotions. We've all seen him express emotions dozens of times just as we've seen crew after crew violate the PD for various reasons.

If these aliens want to remain isolated, why not go a step further by ensuring that no one will come across their space by marking it as off limits? It's obviously a method that works since we never heard from Armus ever again.

 

Isn't it kind of odd that Worf's wrist ached from the break? Seems to me we've been shown that medical technology is very, very advanced int he 24c, especially when it comes to healing broken bones. Why would Worf's wrist ache from the repaired break?

 

I always liked this episode. It has a nice "atmosphere" and aliens that actually "win" against the crew. It's probably bound to happen. Ultimately the point of the episode is survival. Picard wants answers, but Data has to take the evolutionary step to realize when existence is more important than curiosity.

RAMA

 

When the crew violates the PD though it's for something the audience recognizes as a higher moral principle, that doesn't really apply here.

 

Data could easily say something like, "You have been unconscious for approximately 24 hours. Unfortunately I was unable to wake you due to <<insert technobabble here>>."

And yes, it would be hard for Data to keep the ship going if it was carrying out its regular mission, but if all it had to do was sit there and maintain life support, then surely Data could do it. The engine core is largely run by computers anyway, as are most other systems. And even though direct action would need to be taken, how much of that would be after just a day of doing nothing?

 

A distress call would still seem to be in order, if everyone is made to believe the entire crew was incapacitated, sans Data, for a whole day. "I just let you all lay on the floor for the day, until you came to" seems seriously negligent, and wholly suspect. It's not as though he could have known it would be only a day they'd lay unconscious. So, an entire day without taking emergency action, due to the ship's crew being incapacitated is just bad form, and raises more concerns than it solves.

 

Be easy enough to get everyone to go and lay in their beds first, and Data can say that he carried everyone there.

And it could also have a bit, "I detected a <<TECHNOBABBLE>> which made it unsafe to wake you artificially, however my scans indicated that it would dissipate after aprox 24 hours and you would wake naturally, so I let the thing take its course." Add some dialogue as to how he had the computer monitoring everyone's vital signs and he was ready to take action if needed, and it's not so bad.

And I'm sure Data could put a thing in the computer to make it look like he had sent a distress signal, even if he didn't.

 

And now you have an incredibly more elaborate story and set of conditions to pass off than they already had. Faking a distress call in the ship's records, faking medical tricorder readings to indicate a reason to believe they'd be safe for a day unconscious. faking computer records to indicate that the vitals of every crew member had been monitored for a whole day, a very suspicious story about Data taking over 1000 people to their beds by himself, not to mention the scattered reports of minor injuries, which either Data would have to claim he treated, or fake that they never happened, and no one aboard got even the slightest sprain when they all fell unconscious

That's a monumental stretch of imagination if you want people to just move on without invoking the curiosity to investigate. The best lies are the simplest lies. The more elaborate a lie is, the more likely the house of cards will collapse

 

What about the thousands of people who may die because these aliens ambush/kill anyone who happens to see them? There's a moral principle that they shouldn't be allowed to operate like that. Also this race seems advanced enough that the PD does not apply.

The best thing to do would be for Data to disobey Picards orders and reveal the deception after leaving the area, explain everything, and then mark the zone off limits. Eventually they'd be destroyed anyway if the Federation found out ships were being destroyed in the area.

These aliens actions are like First Contact if when Zerphram Cochrane met the Vulcans the human mob pulled them out of their ship and killed them because they want to remain alone in the galaxy. Or like if Who Watches the Watchers ended with Picard photon torpedoing the entire village so that they wouldn't know about humans.

Its beyond the scope of this episode for sure but I think forcible mind wipe is worth a war declaration...

 

It seems all the aliens do is divert incoming vessels past their space unharmed. A problem only came up on the Enterprise because Data was on board and they couldn't effect his memory.