TNG Rewatch: 6x05 - "Schisms"

Indeed, it seems there was a misattribution but no actual misunderstanding. I do feel that just like Data was programmed to have a mind, Riker and you and I have been programmed to have a mind. We have our hardware, we have our software, and we have the outside input that turns those into a sapient mind suited for operating in the environment of our society. Although I trust that the concepts of "hardware" and "software" are as fuzzily separated in Data as they are in us.

Timo Saloniemi

 

This episode had a great premise despite being too similar to alien abduction accounts from the 1990s.
The only bad thing is that when the crew realize what's going on they're not more terrified about.
The aliens don't look too intimidating. They should have NEVER shown their faces to let the viewer imagine something terrible or more imaginative on their own. And the technology and world in this sub-space realm was lit too good, and looked too much like the interior of an average space ship in ST.
I loved how they ended it with a mystery and threat that these beings might return and that we still don't know what that probe or speeding beam of light was that left the ship.

They should have dialed up the horror aspect of it and made the curiosity of life forms in sub-space more intense. I think the show producers even regretted that they didn't do faster, rapid paced cuts during the final abduction scene and that the being should have been designed differently. They were on a deadline and budget so it was pretty good for what we got.

 

Just wanna say, this is one of those episodes I specifically remember viewing when it aired. I was 12 or 13 at the time, still in the phase of my life where I had to watch Unsolved Mysteries with every light in the house on. This was one of the few Star Trek episodes that freaked the heck right out of me. I still kinda get chills when I rewatch the scene where they reconstruct the scene in the holodeck and I'm 40 years old!

--Alex

 

We've seen a lot of bad stuff happen to crew members over the course of the franchise, but that guy who's dying outside his quarters, & Bev is like "His blood is polymerizing", or whatever, that one gets a high ranking on the creep out scale imho. That actor really sells it, but I'd agree that after seeing the Borg stuff in BoBW, the actual abduction center was a bit tame

 

I re-watched this episode last night and forgot how unnerving it is. It's Fire in the Sky-level nightmare fuel.

 

same! I was into that whole alien abduction craze in the early 90s when Unsolved Mysteries started airing those UFO episodes. I enjoyed the episode at the time, but it took me out of the story. This wasn't an adventure the Enterprise crew was having, this was a show trying to capitalize on a current trend. Introducing the 90s phenomenon of alien abduction into a show that takes place 300 years in the future where everyone travels through the galaxy in spaceships, aliens are everywhere and serve in Starfleet, and our alien heroes have abducted people from their home planets before...it just didn't work for me. I think they could have used the idea of alien abductions and taken it further, or disguised it so it's not so blatant an attempt to hop on the 90s UFO/alien craze. There were other episodes where they were riffing on the aliens-are-amongst-us theme but it was one aspect of the episode, and it was connected to the Prime Directive. Here it was just a one-and-done UFO episode.

Okay...even though I'm critical of it, when Riker and the others, even Worf are describing the examination table in the holodeck, it was definitely creepy and the producers created a very effective scene.

And this predated Fire in the Sky. Interesting. Now that, was a creepy alien-abduction movie. Communion was great, but Fire in the Sky gave the aliens or greys an even more sinister aspect. I also liked how the typical almond shaped, grey alien bodies were revealed to be some kind of space suit.

 

Different strokes for different folks, I suppose. I liked the episodes for the very reason you didn't, it would seem. That's cool. And it's not like Star Trek doesn't have a history of dealing with current ideas. I thought it was great that they were doing an alien abduction episode. Having them be from a weird parallel universe is about the only way they could have pursued the idea, given all the high-tech starfleeet kit on the Enterprise. It worked for me in a big way.

I loved Fire in the Sky too. Loved the idea of the spacesuits.

To be clear, this spoke to me as a 13 year old. At the time I was very interested in the UFO phenomenon and related ideas. But that reached its height during my teenage years. As an adult, I'm pretty sure UFOs are no more real than sasquatch or the Loch Ness Monster. More sober reflection on things like the Fermi Paradox persuades me to be pretty skeptical about it, and I'm sure if I saw the episode for the first time as a jaded adult, it wouldn't have hit me near as hard.

--Alex

 

Something that kept me from getting into Fire in the Sky was that the aliens' actions seemed creepy for the sake of being creepy. Like, the scene where an abductee is checking out the suits and - shock - there's an alien in one! It's an effective scare, sure, but look at if from the alien's perspective. After coming in from EVA or hazardous environment work, I'd think you'd want to strip out of that thing, have a bite to eat, maybe put on an episode of Earth Trek and unwind, not hang yourself on the coat rack just to prank some guy.

 

I was a kid when watching it so it worked in that mind frame I was in. As an adult watching it? Yes, a lot of doesn't make too much sense. Great scare, but like you said, illogical. It's like the alien was just hanging around, waiting around and hoping to scare someone.

Also, these aliens (FitS) are obviously highly advanced, but they're using crude scalpels and metal cutting tools for human study? But for the horror effect and the novelty of making the grey aliens and their methods different from what we've seen or would expect, it was intereting. Credit to the design and effects team.

I shouldn't have said the whole episode took me out. More the premise and TV promo for it. It was like UFO-mania is that big, huh? That's not to say I wasn't excited to see it, and once I watched it, they integrated it well into the ST universe, for the most part.

Tell me about it! I got hooked when I saw Communion at the age of 9 or 10. Right after that Unsolved Mysteries was airing and I was hooked. And slightly scared. I got my parents to buy me "non-fiction" paperbacks written by Budd Hopkins, and Transformations by Whitley Streiber. UFO magazines were plentiful. The 1994 Roswell TV movie was pretty good for the time as well. What a fun time.

Likewise.