The Enterprise is exploring the Chroma-key Screen Nebula, er, "dark matter nebula", inside which they believe to be a M-Class planet. As the ship enters and begins exploring the interior of the nebula various odd occurrences happen on the ship with objects being discovered on the floor under where they were placed, Spot gets out of Data's quarters despite the door not being set to open for him/her, random hull-breaches and at the peak of the crisis a crew member phases through a deck's flooring and dies. The crew discovers that inside the nebula are pockets of subspace/damaged space that the ship is randomly encountering as it moves through the nebula, when it intersects one of these pockets it causes a disruption in the solidity of matter. It's been pure chance that one of these pockets has not intersected a torpedo, antimatter pod or some other element of the ship that'd pose a serious hazard. Since it's only possible to detect the distortions when they're practically right on top of them the crew comes up with a plan to pilot the ship using a shuttle as a guide through the pockets. Picard manages to mostly pilot the shuttle, leading the ship, through the nebula before damaging one of the impulse nacelles in a pocket. The shuttle blows up from its damage shortly after Picard is beamed back to the Enterprise and the ship manages to make it the rest of the way out of the nebula safely. But that's all mostly secondary to the real focus of the episode: Data in a relationship. At the beginning of the episode we see Data working with a female officer in the torpedo bay and the two quickly seem to have built something of a friendship. The officer, Jenna, has recently broken up with her boyfriend and Data has been aiding her somewhat through the break-up, mostly by reminding her -at her request- of the reasons she left him in the first place. Jenna is convinced no man is right for her, but after more and more social encounters with Data she seems to develop more of a romantic fondness for him which doesn't entirely go unnoticed by Data. After getting the advice of the rest of the bridge crew Data decides to pursue a romantic relationship with Jenna. Over the course of their relationship Data struggles with some of the details and nuances of being in a relationship given his limited experience with one and the research he's done. Jenna offers him some advice from time to time but after an odd encounter with him in her quarters she realizes that Data cannot provide her with what she needs in a partner, namely he cannot care for her on an emotional level, and she ends the relationship. Data, in his usual manner, is non-pulsed by this development simply stating he'll delete the program he'd written just for Jenna allowing him to be in the relationship. This is an episode I tend to go back and forth on a lot in my thoughts on it. In some ways I like it, in some ways I'm okay with it and in a few ways I don't really like it. But mostly I think I fall on a shrug. The more central focus in the episode is on Jenna and Data's relationship and through it all it's really hard to tell or say who is more in the right during all of it. And I almost land on Jenna being kind of wrong about Data at the end when she breaks up with him. Now, sure, during a scene in her quarters Data behaves very, very, oddly as if everything he "learned" about how to act like a good mate came from 20th-century sitcoms and it's understandable why Jenna was put off by it and requested that Data leave. Data remarks he's trying to do his best to be a good mate, Jenna counters it's artificial and "not him." Data then says, as far as relationships are concerned, there is no "real him." It seems no one advised Data that he should be himself as that's obviously who Jenna fell for and behaving like a Ward Cleaver, or a creepier version of Lore isn't going to do him any favors. At the same time it really does seem like Jenna expects too much from Data, which may be indicative of her love-blindness, as she must know his limitations as an android and his tendency to be literal. But at the end of it all, Jenna accuses Data of being removed of attachment to people. Saying that she doesn't "really matter" to him, which we all know is flat-out wrong. Data has expressed how he processes friendships to us before in a manner that slightly flirts with the other side of the "no emotions" line but we can chalk this up to Data maybe having "some" level of "emotion" to him on some basic, simple, level. Data keeps with him a hologram portrait of Tasha Yar which means something to him and even in "Measure of a Man" he has other belongings he "wants" on some personal level that even he cannot explain. Data may not be able to show the kind of affection and love towards Jenna as a biological person could but clearly he must be capable of "something" otherwise why would he even have friends which in of itself is a level of "love." Jenna's comments seem, well, in the context of the universe she lives in kind of racist. Considering there are alien races out there incapable emotion or at least able to suppress them on some deep level so as to not express them. Does Jenna not think a Vulcan could be a good mate for her? Sure, different strokes, but reading between the lines it almost seems like this is the "message" we're supposed to see, that Data isn't capable of being a mate due to his emotional limitations. When he should be just as capable of it as any Vulcan can be. There are a few nice moments in the episode, particularly a "double date" between Data/Jenna and Miles and Keiko (where in a rare moment we do get a sense of "relationship-iness" from Miles/Keiko as opposed to the two fighting.) But in the end I still land on a "meh" for this episode. There are some good lines in the episode, mostly the comments from the crew when they're counseling Data on whether he should pursue the relationship is fun (Tell me Riker wasn't hoping Data would get some) particularly Picard's "advice." The B-Plot/Crisis-of-the-Week is a bit interesting but a rather small part to the episode. It seems odd that Picard was so insistent on piloting the shuttle himself considering Data could do it and make faster reactions and input course changes faster or that the shuttle could have been controlled remotely. And is it me or is it odd that the Enterprise banks into its turns? The Blu-Ray does offer some gorgeous shots of the ship as it cruises through the nebula. Again, an okay episode but nothing too remarkable. Next week? Season finale and the end of the "Worf's Honor Arc."
Totally forgettable episode (except for one part), with a most annoying co-star. The Jenna part is annoying from the start, and the actress' whiny performance did not help. So she wants everything out of Data as if he were a man, then shows disappointment when he goes about it like a machine. Well....duh. The one awesome part of the episode? The yellowshirt who falls into the floor. Her frozen face stuck in horror, blood trickling from her nose, that was a cool touch. Almost as unsettling as Jenna's whining.
Yep, it's very okay episode, not nearly as good as Data's Day. They also should have done without the token technobabble B-story and just made it a character episode and done a better job with that aspect.
I think there was a mandate that every personal story needs to have a sci-fi element as well. Scotty = Dyson's Sphere. Leah Brahms = "Junior". Worf having trouble with his son = Soliton Wave, etc.
Scotty and Leah Brahms were a little different because they're both engineers, so they were able to connect the character and sci-fi elements pretty seamlessly.
Is this the first episode to have the a/b-plots where one is focused on character while the totally unrelated b-plot is technobabble nonsense? This is the kind of episode that I recall VOY really ran to town with and made it the weakest series, whereas DS9 took that a/b-format and refined it in a way that made the stories more related thematically (the pinnacle IMO being "Treachery, Faith, and the Great River"). While I didn't like, "New Ground", that at least did a better job of bringing the two plots together. With "In Theory", I kept waiting for the technobabble story to somehow play a part in the relationship between Data and Jenna, up the stakes, but it never happens so I never give a crap about any of the stories because there's no real drama.
The ending of the episode, with Data just sitting in a chair petting Spot, is one of the saddest in the series. It brings home that Data is truly lacking down inside, you want him to feel something owing to the breakup, but he feels nothing. Sad.
I wonder how many takes it took for Data to get his line, "... a very passionate kiss in the torpedo bay" out with cracking up. And, yes, Jenna was far too annoying and irrational to have much sympathy for. I assume we're meant to understand that they're incompatible from the beginning, since they went out of their way to show us how disorganized she is. Picard insisting on flying the shuttle himself was an eye roll moment.
In the end when they're almost out of the dangerous nebula, Riker says: "Let's make a run for it..." No Riker, no... What if the entire ship was phased into Dimension Q.
I enjoy the episode because I'm a Data fan, and this episode gets an award from me for "Really Horrific Redshirt Death". My take on Jenna is that she was on the rebound and Data is 'safe'. If you notice in the Miles/Keiko Ten Forward scene, after they do a public display of affection (arm link), Jenna does it to Data. To me, that means it's not Data she wants... it's a relationship. She's not in love with Data, she's in love with the idea of being in love. Thankfully, she has enough sense to stop before she strings Data along too far.
I find this to be a sad episode. It really reinforced how hapless Data was without the emotion chip he was supposed to have. His development was finite, despite considerable improvement over the years. As far as I'm concerned, the emotion chip was designed to "allow" him to develop emotions normally over time, not give him emotions. Again, Trek breaks some new ground by mentioning dark matter, possibly for the first time on US TV in fiction, but it's really kind of an afterthought. RAMA
I was surprised about the mention of dark matter, also. I don't remember hearing of it before the last 10 years or so. No doubt I assumed it was a made-up term back when the episode first aired. Agreed that this episode was a sad one for Data. The last scene really drove that point in case it wasn't obvious before that.
I knew about dark matter, and was surprised they mentioned it in STNG. A few years later, it played a big part in a new Outer Limits episode.
I found the Data-attempt-at-romance story to be very amusing. Jenna was right in describing Data's romantic behavior as artificial and forced. I got some good laughs from Data's behavior, especially his contrived lover's spat with Jenna. That was so absurdly funny. I also remember this episode for the person who was manning the helm when the Enterprise maneuvered around the dark matter. Ensign McKnight was at the helm, steering the ship out of danger. She was the only background recurring TNG crew member that I remember. She was not bad looking either. TOS had some memorable recurring crew members, but not really so with TNG.
Speaking of people manning to conn: I kept looking at ensign Rager because she seemed really familiar. It wasn't until I checked out that Memory Alpha article that I remember she was in Space: Above and Beyond. That show was ahead of its time and cut tragically early.