Why was "Birthright" a Two Parter?

[Supernuke]

I'm just wondering why this is after seeing this episode again recently. Most of the Worf story takes place in the second episode and the first episode is mostly devoted to Data and his dreams. I just don't understand why they had to make it a two parter. Anyone know why?

 

[sonak]

God knows. This was the weakest of all the TNG two-parters and you're right, it's pretty padded to get to two parts in the first place.

 

[Tiberius]

Would have worked much better as two stand alone episodes. First one as Bashir and Data and Geordi investigating his dreams, and the other one with Worf's story.

 

[TV's Frank]

According to Rene Echevarria, who wrote Part II and was interviewed about this in the season 6 wrap-up issue of Cinefantastique: "We broke it as a one-part episode and it took two acts of the script to get Worf down to the prison camp. The end of Act II eventually became the end of Part I. There was basically too much story to tell - and to do it justice, Michael [Piller] said make it a two-parter. With more time on the planet surface we'd be able to build more sets of the compound".

The same article mentions how season six was the season in which they wanted to break some rules anyway. I find that it gives great scope and depth to both stories, Data and Worf. In Part I, both their respective stories inform one another, highlighted in the speech Worf gives to Data to follow his visions and his "father". This advice Worf gives to Data winds up being what Worf himself follows. I like that this two-parter breaks with tradition and is strong on all fronts.

 

[Tiberius]

Maybe if they had put all that data stuff in another episode they wouldn't have needed two acts to get worf to the planet...

 

[DonIago]

I find the whole thing rather forgettable myself, even knowing that Data's dreams figure into another episode. If they were going to do a DS9 crossover I wish they'd had a better story to work with.

 

[Supernuke]

Yeah I really enjoyed the first episode that featured mostly Data, and I really didn't like the Worf story. They seemed so different that it just baffled me why they even related the two stories in the first place.

 

[TV's Frank]

Maybe if they had put all that data stuff in another episode they wouldn't have needed two acts to get worf to the planet...

You misunderstand. In Echeverria's original outline for Worf's story, there was no Data arc at all. The Data story was written separately by Brannon Braga and the two stories were fused by Michael Piller for the reasons they stated above. It simply took two acts for Echevarria to logically get Worf to learn all the info needed, move through the same dilemma of whether to believe what he learned and then head on his way to the prison planet. They needed to give Worf enough character beats and an arc through which to progress and this can't be done in the three minute teaser sequence.

The production costs should also not be dismissed. If the production had to spend a huge amount on new sets being built, such as the prison planet, it really helped to get budget approval if you could show that this set would be used in two episodes.

Besides, what's really the harm in this being a non-traditional two-parter?

 

[SchwEnt]

Another "Birthright" quandary...
Why was this a DS9 crossover?

It has nothing to do with DS9 at all.
Data can get zapped and start having dreams and that has nothing to do with DS9.
Worf can get a hot tip about a Romulan prison camp and go looking for his father without DS9.

If they were gonna do a DS9 crossover, I'd think it would tie in to the DMZ and the Maquis and Cardassians and Ro Laren and Gul Evek and some epic storyline.

Instead..."Birthright"? They blew the only opportunity to do a big crossover two-part eps (aside from the DS9 pilot).

 

[Chensams]

Overall, a very weak episode. I remember being very disappointed when I first watched it. The Data story was pretty boring and I'm a huge Data fan...

 

[M'rk son of Mogh]

Another "Birthright" quandary...
Why was this a DS9 crossover?

Why does it HAVE to be separate? Why do crossovers have to be big, expansive, epic, universe shattering events? They don't, and I thought it worked.

In fact, many of the crossovers with Trek really have been small "just doin' our business" events. Like Tuvok in the mirror universe, McCoy walking down a corridor, Quark directing Riker to the Duras sisters...

For the episode, it was just a station, nothing important, but since they had the set and wanted to use Bashir (originally Dax), then why not?

Despite what others say, Birthright is one of my favourite 2-parters. Worf is my favourite character, and seeing him out of his element and away from Starfleet is always a nice treat. In fact, I'd rather more of that and didn't care as much for the Data stuff. The only thing I really liked about that was the Bashir crossover!

 

[TV's Frank]

In addition about the crossover, Rick Berman was quoted as saying "I don't have a problem with that. I don't think it cross-promotes the show. It's fun for the fans and allows us to expand the STAR TREK universe in STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION. Why not take advantage of it occassionally? I just don't believe in doing it for the sake of doing it. It's expensive and confusing when you have two shows that you're trying to cross-produce."

 

[DonIago]

It would seem that this was a prime case of "doing it for the sake of doing it".

 

[RAMA]

• Michael Piller suggested to break the story into two parts, believing that there was too much story to tell in one episode. He commented, "Because this was season six, the season of taking risks, of not being afraid of doing things Star Trek hadn't done before, I said 'Why not do another two-parter? Why wait until the end of the season or wait for a Spock? If a story justifies being bigger than an hour, let's do it.' I had been very happy with the results of "Chain of Command" and I said to Rick we should do it and he said fine. I also felt, much mistakenly as it turned out to be, that we would be able to save money if we expanded it into two hours by using the sets twice." (Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages)
• When it was decided to expand the episode into two parts, the writing staff faced the challenge of finding a suitable B-plot, focusing on the character of Data. Ronald D. Moore suggested Data having some kind of religious experience. Brannon Braga, building on this, considered the idea of Data having a near-death experience. However, as René Echevarria explained, the idea was considered too similar to "Tapestry". As such the writing staff came up with the idea of Data dreaming. (Captains' Logs: The Unauthorized Complete Trek Voyages)
• This is the only two-part episode with a separate plot (B-plot) that ends within one part (Data's Dream Program). As noted in the Star Trek: The Next Generation Companion, many were disappointed by the lack of a follow-up in the next episode.

 

[Tiberius]

That last point is exactly the reason why I was disappointed in it. If they had simply expanded on Worf's story instead of creating Data's story, it would have been much better.

 

[indolover]

Two parters are meant to boost ratings (or sustain them). There is other reason for cliffhangers. It also was a good opportunity to boost DS9's ratings, especially since season one of DS9 corresponded with season six of TNG.

 

[Brikar99]

I've often felt like this one was a problem where there was too much story for one episode, but not enough for two. Data's plot ends in the first episode, but then the second episode grows extremely repetitive with just Worf. Oh well.

 

[SchwEnt]

Another "Birthright" quandary...
Why was this a DS9 crossover?

Why does it HAVE to be separate? Why do crossovers have to be big, expansive, epic, universe shattering events? They don't, and I thought it worked.

It doesn't HAVE to be expansive and epic (although, why not?). I just thought that since they're bringing DS9 into TNG that it would *involve* DS9 in some way.

But it's Data's adventure in his own head dreaming about Soong and Worf's adventure in the Romulan prison camp. No DS9 in the DS9 crossover.

I do see your point about "business as usual". I see the appeal in just having characters and things existing in the ST universe, not always being central plotpoints.

Then again, these stories and eps are being made with plots to engage and entertain the viewers, so maybe *something* more substantial for DS9 would have been nice rather just "being there".

 

[SAndrews10]

Hey Picard and Crusher had to walk across the promenade and talk about a holosuite program. That was pretty big crossover stuff lol

 

[Cyke101]

Yeah, the execution is off, but I like the overall theme that both Data and Worf seek out their origins (hence the name). That's a nice bit of anthologizing with a common theme not usually found in Trek.