Worf Vs. Mickey D In "The Royale"

[Alexander Corrino]

I was watching my favorite TNG episode "The Royale" earlier (don't judge me, I love it) and I know it's probably not wise to think TOO much about the plot, but I always wonder what would have happened if Riker hadn't stopped Worf from interfering with the story when Mickey D appears and picks that fight with the bellboy. I mean we see Worf firing his phaser at a wall at some point in the episode and it doesn't do anything, so it stands to reason that nothing might have happened either if he had fired his phaser at Mickey D - but what if he had tried to physically fight him (which would no doubt have been what he'd have tried next)?

Would he simply have punched through Mickey D? Would Mickey D have disappeared and another Mickey D simply walked through the door all over again? What kind of mechanism would have ensured that the story plays out as intended?

 

[Timo]

Difficult to say indeed. We don't really see any signs that the story would play over and over again: nothing gets repeated as such. And we don't know if things went ahead of schedule when our heroes decided to "play out the finale", or if the finale was fated to play out at that specific time anyway, supposedly soon after Mickey D shoots the bellhop (because Picard and Troi tell us that the shooting happens at the very end of the book, that is, Mickey D makes his one appearance at the very end).

Perhaps the story begins when the audience enters; then concludes; and then sort of stays concluded. Possibly even worse hell for poor Richey than getting the events played out again and again? His diary, such as it is, does not refer to any looping.

If there is no looping, then I wouldn't expect Mickey D to die and then reappear. I might expect him to ignore the heroes when they attempt something that is not part of the programming, just as when they went asking for another exit. Worf might thus hit him on the head repeatedly with one of 'em potted plants or craps tables while he calmly kept on threatening the bellboy and exchanging platitudes with the rest.

How come the story does come to a head right when our heroes arrive, and not, say, decades earlier, though? If the whole cycle is as short as the heroes' visit, I would expect Richey to make explicit mention of it in his farewell message. Perhaps the book involved several "two years later" passages, and Richey had to experience two years of nothing happening until getting to Chapter 6 - and thus died in his sleep ("A horrible way to die!" is one of my favorite Worfisms) somewhere between Chapters 14 and 15, after which the program went on hold until our heroes waltzed in, conveniently for the closing Chapter 16 and the Epilogue?

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Alexander Corrino]

I always assumed the plot was stuck in limbo somewhere because the foreign investors didn't show up. I mean things only start to move plot-wise when Riker, Worf and Data walk up to the reception desk and the Assistant Manager remarks that they have been expecting "a trio of foreign gentlemen". It's a very tricky thing, that whole plot... I have always wondered just what Richey experienced since he indeed only refers to a "hell" he has been put through. I've always wondered just what the poor guy tried to get out of that hotel - I don't think he could since he was the "manager", and the plot of the book probably had the manager inside the hotel at all times. (Not that getting out would have helped much, of course. I don't even want to imagine his horror if he had SOMEHOW made it out of the hotel after YEARS of trying only to discover that the only way for him to was back inside. I love the dark undertone of the Richey part of the episode, it's one big reason why it's my favorite.)

 

[Silvercrest]

I was always under the impression that the story looped, but you're right: nothing refers to that.

Personally, I never thought it made any sense that "concluding the story will let us leave". That hotel wasn't set up as a puzzle or challenge for Col. Richey to solve. It was set up for him as a permanent place to live, no other options, period. If he'd found a loophole of his own and exited, then he'd have died on the surface of the planet. I'm tempted to make the comparison that "animals in a zoo aren't allowed to leave if they solve a puzzle or challenge", but that doesn't work since this wasn't really a zoo.

I'll grant that such a solution is conceivable — but for the characters to simply assume it was true, on no available evidence, is sloppy.

 

[Alexander Corrino]

I was always under the impression that the story looped, but you're right: nothing refers to that.

Personally, I never thought it made any sense that "concluding the story will let us leave". That hotel wasn't set up as a puzzle or challenge for Col. Richey to solve. It was set up for him as a permanent place to live, no other options, period. If he'd found a loophole of his own and exited, then he'd have died on the surface of the planet. I'm tempted to make the comparison that "animals in a zoo aren't allowed to leave if they solve a puzzle or challenge", but that doesn't work since this wasn't really a zoo.

I'll grant that such a solution is conceivable — but for the characters to simply assume it was true, on no available evidence, is sloppy.

Maybe that's why the "foreign investors" probably never showed up and the plot was stuck until Riker, Worf and Data walked in (how convenient, what if the away team had consisted of four or five people and not three??? lol) - I mean the ending of the book leaves the ASSISTANT manager in charge, not the manager (Richey), which is rather odd. So it stands to reason that Richey was never meant to get to the end indeed and that he was just stuck in that hotel while the plot was stuck also.

I've never had a problem with Riker concluding that he needed to buy the place tho - he sees Mickey D leaving because the plot says he leaves. So, when Jean-Luc tells him the plot says that the foreign investors buy and then leave the hotel and leave the Assistant Manager in charge, he simply concludes that buying the hotel will allow him, Worf and Data to leave since the Assistant Manager already assumes they're the "foreign gentlemen". (What if Data hadn't been with them? They would never have managed to win enough money to buy the hotel.)

 

[Timo]

Exactly. The Royale does not necessarily treat Riker, Worf and Data as outsiders at all. It need not consider them kin to Richey, either. Instead, it considers them characters and/or set dressing, and there is no story requirement for those to leave so they can't. But as long as they play the part of a character that does get to walk out as per the book, they can play their part and thus walk out.

Quite possibly those who set up the Royale left long ago, and did not give the hotel any instructions or autonomy by which to cope with outsiders. But why would the foreign investors not be played by three of those DNA-less meat puppets? I can only surmise that some NPCs from the hotel's own cast would eventually have performed the roles, but our heroes got there first.

Which is sort of plausible timeline-wise: the events of the book only concluded recently, with the shooting, and the epilogue can now take place. But it could also be that the book says "Later, the hotel was bought out (but nothing changed)", and our heroes had plenty of leeway to barge in and hasten the events, the Royale itself being perfectly content to define "later" as, say, "sixteen years later" by some criteria unknown to us.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Silvercrest]

hmmm

 

[Orphalesion]

There is a question about the plot of the Royale (the fictional novel I mean) anyway....what was it? What we see doesn't form an arc, even for a trashy novel.
Was the whole book just about the Bellhop winging about how Mickey D doesn't treat the girl he likes right (with some completely unrelated crap about that Texan and that woman at the gaming table)
Were there no scenes that took place anywhere else than the Royale?

And as to the logistics of the illusion:
Why would the aliens create a looping story instead of just using the book to create a scenario?
If the aliens were that advanced, why didn't they use the astronaut's memories and have him relive his best day over and over again or something?
If they weren't that powerful, how did they learn to read English?
Why does it look exactly like a trashy soap opera casino from the 1980s? How did they get all the details just right?

 

[Alexander Corrino]

Which is sort of plausible timeline-wise: the events of the book only concluded recently, with the shooting, and the epilogue can now take place. But it could also be that the book says "Later, the hotel was bought out (but nothing changed)", and our heroes had plenty of leeway to barge in and hasten the events, the Royale itself being perfectly content to define "later" as, say, "sixteen years later" by some criteria unknown to us.

Timo Saloniemi

I'm not so sure that the shooting is the only aspect of the ending anyway - there's still the sub plot that involves that lady and "Texas" who are supposed to conspire to murder her husband - that one hasn't come to an end yet when Riker, Worf and Data win the money to buy the hotel. And the actual main plot of the book seems to be about "a group of compulsive gamblers caught in a web of crime, corruption and deceit", none of which we see in the episode, the hotel bellboy does not appear to be a compusive gambler nor is he part of any group. (I know all this by heart because I sat down a few years ago and actually wrote the "book" Hotel Royale as a fan fic... I'm completely hopeless.) I've always assumed Jean-Luc leaves out some of the less important plot elements when he tells Riker that the book's ending = "a bad love affair ends in a bloody shootout, the hotel gets bought out and life goes on, such as it is". (I mean he's so annoyed by all the terrible dialogue, he probably didn't catch half of what was happening, haha.)

But yeah, Riker, Worf and Data are treated as PART of the story. They can interact with some of the characters, but only those they're SUPPOSED to be interacting with because it's in the book - which is why the bellboy directs them to the front desk when they walk in - they're already being recognized as the foreign investors but the plot can't move on before they haven't registered at the front desk (which is probably a scene in the book).

There is a question about the plot of the Royale (the fictional novel I mean) anyway....what was it? What we see doesn't form an arc, even for a trashy novel.
Was the whole book just about the Bellhop winging about how Mickey D doesn't treat the girl he likes right (with some completely unrelated crap about that Texan and that woman at the gaming table)
Were there no scenes that took place anywhere else than the Royale?

And as to the logistics of the illusion:
Why would the aliens create a looping story instead of just using the book to create a scenario?
If the aliens were that advanced, why didn't they use the astronaut's memories and have him relive his best day over and over again or something?
If they weren't that powerful, how did they learn to read English?
Why does it look exactly like a trashy soap opera casino from the 1980s? How did they get all the details just right?

The book is about far more than just Rita and the bellboy and Mickey D love triangle, as I wrote above, Data summarizes the plot when they're in Richey's hotel room. The hotel was probably chosen as the setting because the book is called Hotel Royale and because most scenes probably take place in there. Not all of them, of course, but since the aliens seem to have made Richey the manager of the hotel (who may or may not have been a character in the book, I've always assumed they simply created the title for Richey and the book only has the Assistant Manager, this would explain why the foreign investors leave the ASSISTANT manager in charge at the end), it stands to reason that they'd limit him to the hotel.

I've always assumed the novel described the hotel's interior. Who knows, maybe there was even a drawing inside, or even several drawings. The exterior was on the cover already IIRC.

 

[Silvercrest]

If the aliens were that advanced, why didn't they use the astronaut's memories and have him relive his best day over and over again or something?

I just took a look on Wikipedia and apparently that was what Tracy Tormé intended: "His original idea was a surreal nightmare about an astronaut stuck forever in his most pleasant memory."

 

[Orphalesion]

The book is about far more than just Rita and the bellboy and Mickey D love triangle, as I wrote above, Data summarizes the plot when they're in Richey's hotel room. The hotel was probably chosen as the setting because the book is called Hotel Royale and because most scenes probably take place in there. Not all of them, of course, but since the aliens seem to have made Richey the manager of the hotel (who may or may not have been a character in the book, I've always assumed they simply created the title for Richey and the book only has the Assistant Manager, this would explain why the foreign investors leave the ASSISTANT manager in charge at the end), it stands to reason that they'd limit him to the hotel.

I've always assumed the novel described the hotel's interior. Who knows, maybe there was even a drawing inside, or even several drawings. The exterior was on the cover already IIRC.

So it might have been a book full of little, vaguely interconnected plots meandering around the Royale? Maybe even some we haven't seen? And the Mickey D. plot just happens to produce the climax?

And I know I'm a bit pedantic by pointing out all those little things, because the obvious, easy answer is that they just used stock costumes and props in order to keep the costs low.
But yeah, illustrations would be the only way they got that perfect of a simulation, and even then it's unlikely. Like did the book explain what blackjack is and how it's played (alright the Texan might have actually explained it to the blonde in the book) did the book explain what alcohol and smoking are? Did the book write the Texan's accent phonetically in a way that would allow aliens to reproduce it exactly?
How did the aliens even know it's pronounced Royale and not Roh-Yah-Leh?

I just took a look on Wikipedia and apparently that was what Tracy Tormé intended: "His original idea was a surreal nightmare about an astronaut stuck forever in his most pleasant memory."

That would have made so much more sense and would have made a much better episode.

 

[Alexander Corrino]

So it might have been a book full of little, vaguely interconnected plots meandering around the Royale? Maybe even some we haven't seen? And the Mickey D. plot just happens to produce the climax?

The book is "told by" Mickey D, as Data puts it - but Mickey D also only appears at the climax of the story. I don't exactly know how this works from a narrative point of view tho, lol.

But yes, I've always viewed it as a book that has interconnected plots that all come together at the hotel. And maybe even some additional connections; the compulsive group of gamblers could definitely be connected to Mickey D - he seems to be a guy everyone is afraid of and I'm willing to bet that "crime, corruption and deceit" are his middle names - who is in turn then connected to Rita and the bellboy part.

 

[Timo]

I just took a look on Wikipedia and apparently that was what Tracy Tormé intended: "His original idea was a surreal nightmare about an astronaut stuck forever in his most pleasant memory."

I gather this just got modified into "his most recent appropriate memory". That is, the aliens did get it all out of Richey's mind, which also provided all the visuals, the rules of blackjack, and the timbre of Mickey D's voice, as imagined by Richey when he read the book.

Possibly the plot of the book got a bit jumbled in the process, too: it's rather likely the aliens couldn't read, and might not be interested in learning. But Richey's mind would provide, even if with minor failings.

Now, the part I have difficulty visualizing is the one where Richey, flung in his spaceship across the galaxy to a fantastic new world, boards the exploratory shuttle in order to get down to that stormy planet - and, thinking there's nowhere near excitement, grabs his pulp novel and stashes it in the pocket of his spacesuit...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Alexander Corrino]

Richey writes that the hotel is "precisely as described in the novel", so I assume the novel went VERY deeply into describing everything.

And the novel was apparently simply aboard the shuttle, not in Richey's space suit. From the way Richey's message sounds he didn't even pay much attention to the book - he refers to it as "the novel we had on board the shuttle". It might even be that he never actually read it before the whole incident, but that's pure speculation on my part, he might as well have read it. Fact is, it definitely wasn't his favorite or anything.

 

[Orphalesion]

Which brings us back to the silly premise; the aliens apparently learned to read English, read that trashy novel and recreated it exactly as it would have been on earth ca 1987, despite not being familiar with our species/culture.
No description can be that detailed.
The novel on the show didn't exactly look like it had 3 times the size of the Lord of the Rings with 99% of it being minute descriptions of floor planks, women's dresses, perms and detailed explanations about how a Texan sounds (preceded by detailed explanations on how standard English sounds and how to pronounce words and names).

 

[Alexander Corrino]

Which brings us back to the silly premise; the aliens apparently learned to read English, read that trashy novel and recreated it exactly as it would have been on earth ca 1987, despite not being familiar with our species/culture.
No description can be that detailed.
The novel on the show didn't exactly look like it had 3 times the size of the Lord of the Rings with 99% of it being minute descriptions of floor planks, women's dresses, perms and detailed explanations about how a Texan sounds (preceded by detailed explanations on how standard English sounds and how to pronounce words and names).

I'd say the aliens probably ran the book through their own version of a universal translator. But yeah, the rest is... left to our imagination as to how it worked. But that's why I said it's better to not think about the plot too much, it causes... confusion. (I always say they should have made this episode into a two-parter that had a LOT more backstory with Richey, maybe even start the episode aboard Richey's ship. It would have made the impact of the whole episode a lot more meaningful than just "Data is gambling, lol". I love the idea and the raw material for the episode, which is yet another reason why it's my favorite. There's a whole other story here, and the fic writer that I am would LOVE to have seen it explored on screen.)

 

[Orphalesion]

I'd say the aliens probably ran the book through their own version of a universal translator. But yeah, the rest is... left to our imagination as to how it worked. But that's why I said it's better to not think about the plot too much, it causes... confusion. (I always say they should have made this episode into a two-parter that had a LOT more backstory with Richey, maybe even start the episode aboard Richey's ship. It would have made the impact of the whole episode a lot more meaningful than just "Data is gambling, lol". I love the idea and the raw material for the episode, which is yet another reason why it's my favorite. There's a whole other story here, and the fic writer that I am would LOVE to have seen it explored on screen.)

If it was a good/better story (to me, I respect that you like it) then I would be able to look past stuff like that. But as, imho, it's a pretty low quality episode, I'm not forgiving.

And yes, it would have been nice to have...something...anything creative in it, than just, as you write "Data is gambling, lol" Personally I'd also add "Lololol trashy novel, how bad is this writing lololol" (which is kinda awkward considering the quality of the writing the episode in general had)
They could have at least make the aliens mix up the Blonde and the Texan (as in having the Blonde behave like a stereotypical Texan guy and the Texan guy behave like a stereotypical "dumb blonde", maybe even switch their voices)

Or in general make it a story where the Aliens misinterpreted everything. Wrong pronunciations, people don't gamble for money, instead they feed a machine tokens so that they can stare at the pretty colours revolving on the roulette table etc.

Or just go with the original concept of the world being drawn fromt he astronaut's most beautiful memory.

 

[Alexander Corrino]

If it was a good/better story (to me, I respect that you like it) then I would be able to look past stuff like that. But as, imho, it's a pretty low quality episode, I'm not forgiving.

I definitely agree that the episode could have been a lot more than it is. But part of me also likes it because it makes me imagine things instead of giving me all the answers. And it always makes me wonder "how would this have turned out if..." - I love it when an episode gives me this kind of creative thinking. Maybe this is also why I had SUCH a blast writing up that Hotel Royale novel as a fic - it was SO MUCH FUN to build it around the plot elements that we know and to connect them. (The biggest challenge was to keep it "badly written" and "cliché" and feature "shallow characters" because that's the way the novel is described - my instincts were always to flesh out the characters more.)

I even like the "Data is gambling, lol" part somehow - partly because it IS funny and partly because I just have a thing for 80s aesthetics and this episode MORE than delivers on that one. I'm also not really much of a sci-fi fan and I love it when other genres come into the mix, which is also the case here. The plot does leave a lot of holes, but for me this only adds to the fascination with the episode. I can totally see why this isn't the case for most other people tho. I totally understand why they aren't as forgiving as I am and expected more from the episode than what we got.

 

[Orphalesion]

Maybe this is also why I had SUCH a blast writing up that Hotel Royale novel as a fic - it was SO MUCH FUN to build it around the plot elements that we know and to connect them. (The biggest challenge was to keep it "badly written" and "cliché" and feature "shallow characters" because that's the way the novel is described - my instincts were always to flesh out the characters more.)

Well, hat off to you. I could have never done that. I don't claim that I'm a master writer, but I just wouldn't have been able to write something like Mickey D :-P
Like, when I was like 12 or something I tried writing Charmed fanfiction, and I just couldn't, because as I tried to stay true to the show (and Charmed was a preeeeeety bad show, even if I didn't realize it back then) it became too shallow for me, so I abandoned it pretty quickly.

I even like the "Data is gambling, lol" part somehow - partly because it IS funny and partly because I just have a thing for 80s aesthetics and this episode MORE than delivers on that one. I'm also not really much of a sci-fi fan and I love it when other genres come into the mix, which is also the case here. The plot does leave a lot of holes, but for me this only adds to the fascination with the episode. I can totally see why this isn't the case for most other people tho.

I understand that, but I'm just on the complete opposite end of the spectrum.When I watch star trek I don't want anything except the 24th century, I don't want any Noir stories set in the 1940s, I don't want any sleazy Las Vegas bars with smarmy lounge singers, I don't want any story about a minority writer struggling in the 1950s, no matter how profound or well told, I don't want Picard prancing around as Robin Hood. I want scifi in all it's many variations, because that's what I chose to watch when I turned on Star Trek

And funny enough, historical TV shows are another favorite genre of mine...but I wouldn't want Madam Walker go to Alpha Centauri to chase Aliens in the next episode of Self Made either. Because when I turn on Self Made, I want historical drama.

But I will say that of the various genre shifts, I think the Royale at least had some potential because it at least was a scifi story...somewhat...

 

[Timo]

Which brings us back to the silly premise; the aliens apparently learned to read English, read that trashy novel and recreated it exactly as it would have been on earth ca 1987, despite not being familiar with our species/culture. No description can be that detailed.

But it need not be. Nobody in the episode actually says or otherwise suggests that the aliens read the novel. If the read Richey instead, they would have gotten the "detailed description" all right: Richey would have clear ideas on how "He swayed across the linoleum like a particularly disgruntled hippopotamus in tuxedo, only the suit seemed even more ill fitting of his muscular body than it would a dominant beast of Africa" should look, sound and smell exactly.

And it probably wouldn't be ca 1987 anyway, but more like "takes place at a nondescript US small if gambling-heavy and mob-run town at an ill defined time"; Richey just would have his own ideas on how the world looked like a tad before he was born. And no doubt those would be in stark contrast with the ideas of the author.

I still don't see the aliens bothering to learn English. Or even exchanging as much as a single word of that language, or any other, with poor Richey. They may have felt sorry for the sole survivor, perhaps even a tad guilty, or then they created the Royale for completely different reasons. But there's no impression of them ever stopping to think. It's not a matter of putting the ant in a suitably decorated jar after stepping on all her sisters. It's a matter of absentmindedly sweeping the one ant off the sidewalk because one doesn't want one's soles gooey with ant mush.

Timo Saloniemi