Where's Troi?
- Thread starter DJCarlos
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Actors have to be paid on a show regardless, however if you don't use them in an episode it saves a little $$$ to be spent on effects, costumes, what ever you need for that episode.
Shows which sucha large main cast don't always use every main character in an episode. There will be epiosdes that you may not see Geordi, or Doctor Crusher ect. Noting that Gates was not present for most of season 2
There are some shows that you only see a person for a scene and thats it. It depends mostly on the script, who does the episode focus on and do you need everyone.
It was explained that Troi was at Starbase G6 for a visit home in the episode "Hide and Q" according to Picard's log entry. She returned in time for the episode "Haven" and then disappeared again, returning from a conference in the episode "Skin of Evil."
Off-screen reason, according to Memory Alpha:
Which I've heard Sirtis say at a convention and that Crosby's departure was the thing that made the producers reconsider removing Troi.
It does also depend on how many episodes each actor is contracted for: they're not necessarily hired for every single episode but might rather be for (say) sixteen episodes a season. If their appearances are dispersed, it creates the impression that the characters are always around without having to actually show them.
Furthermore, sometimes not having a character can avoid a plot distraction. For example, we got in ``Encounter at Farpoint'' some hints that Troi's empathic senses could catch some sense of Q's power. We get to ``Hide and Q'', where Riker's given Q powers. Does Troi have telepathic contact with Riker? Does she sense his emotions? Is this a story thread we can solve neatly? Let's just leave Troi out of the episode, then, and avoid the inconvenience.
I have the Q scripts put out by Pocket Books and the draft in the collection for "Hide and Q" does have Troi. I don't have it handy to check to see what role she played, but iirc her lines were just dispersed to other characters in the aired version. Something that I think points to some of the writing problems in the first few seasons and, to some extant, into the rest of the series where the characters don't have a unique enough voice and you can just exchange one character for another in a scene and the scene doesn't change at all.
You might argue that Deanna had more reason for personal leaves during the first season than later in the show. She had a courtship cut short just before marriage, for one thing.
And if you go through TNG S1 in stardate order, "Hide and Q" is part of the post-traumatic period of "Haven" and not vice versa...
Timo Saloniemi
And if you go through TNG S1 in stardate order, "Hide and Q" is part of the post-traumatic period of "Haven" and not vice versa...
Timo Saloniemi
Ah, I misremembered which can first. Thanks.
No, you didn't. "Hide and Q" aired first, and for all purposes is listed as being earlier in the TNG chronology. Unless one goes by the stardate order, that is (and ignores the couple of contradictions regarding Tasha Yar's lifespan). I just happen to like that order in general...
Timo Saloniemi
Timo Saloniemi
Indeed, I think I noticed while the series was on the air that in a typical season, each main character below Picard and Riker was absent for something like three or four episodes a season.
She also didn't appear in Datalore.
galloping wha? 0_o
probably the same place where other characters go when they're not in the episode. the time-out corner.
thats a new one for me
adding to my vocabulary now.Similar threads
