On the edge of UFP space, the Enterprise encounters its old nemesis, the superbeing Q, whose anger at being refused a crew post leads him to hurl the ship into unknown space. There, they encounter a new threat ­ the Borg.
As the ship discovers planet after planet ravaged like those in the Neutral Zone whose destruction was first blamed on the Romulans, Guinan ­ an old foe of Q as well ­ tells Picard of the Borg’s deadly attacks on her people.
Suddenly two Borg beam over from their cubelike ship to drain information from the starship’s computers, ignoring the crew and quickly learning to blunt phaser attacks.
Their vessel then locks on Picard’s ship and slices out a core of the saucer, killing eighteen. A brief skirmish leaves the Borg ship damaged, and Riker takes advantage of the lull to lead an away team over.
What they find is a half-humanoid, half-robotic race living as a group mind intent only on destruction and gaining technology. They also find that the Borg ship is regenerating itself.
Sure enough, the fight resumes and the Enterprise is soon on the brink of defeat, its shields and warp drive gone. Picard admits to a gloating Q that humans can’t yet handle all that the cosmos might yield ­ that he needs Q’s help. Satisfied, the superbeing returns the Enterprise to its own corner of the galaxy ­ and vanishes.
Later a reflective Picard tells Guinan that the near-fatal Borg encounter may have been just the jolt a complacent Federation needed.
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Recurring character Q takes a back seat here to Maurice Hurley’s long-delayed new Federation opponents, the Borg, who were originally envisioned as a season-opening threat (see “The Neutral Zone,”). The new cybernetic race was meant to provide the hard-core danger the Ferengi couldn’t deliver. “If somebody’s interested in gold, they’re not much of an adversary,” Hurley said of the greedy little race. “We can make gold in our replicator.”
Although the Borg began as a race of insects, a concept dropped for budgetary reasons, their relentless mentality survived. Though Guinan was not present at the time, it was the Borg who scattered and virtually killed off her people a century earlier. Perhaps her only prejudice is a hatred of them, expressed in “I, Borg”. This allows us to see that there is a limit to her powers. In this episode Guinan also engages in a defiant, barb-trading standoff with Q that will come back to haunt him later in “Deja Q”. Also, Guinan’s office is seen for the first and only time in TNG’s first five seasons.
Pulling the props, wardrobe, and optical effects together for the Borg’s physical look was a herculean task and a learning experience, to put it mildly. The Borg armature forearm, for example, weighed about forty pounds. Some of their outfits came from the makers of the “steel suits” for Dune and Batman. Because the show went over budget by about $50,000, a planned eighth day of live shooting was dropped, and for a time, according to Rob Bowman, “we didn’t know day to day if we were making a stinker or a winner.”
Meanwhile, it was effects expert Dan Curry’s time to shine, along with associate Ron Moore. They won an Emmy nomination for bringing the Borg ship to life. The models for the ship were built by Starlight Effects from the simple embellishments that Rick Sternbach and Richard James had created based on the description of the cubical ship given in the script.
Making his debut as a stuntman extra as the “baby Borg” was Sam Klatman, the son of Carol Eisner, David Livingston’s secretary. Lycia Naff, who played a three-breasted mutant woman in Total Recall, showed enough comic potential in this show to be written in again in the next episode, but her character was dropped after that appearance.
Picard is nervous enough while preparing his keynote speech for the Federation Archaeology Council. Then in quick order he’s visited by Vash, a mischievous female archaeologist he met on vacation on Risa and then by the pesky superbeing Q.
A spat erupts when Picard finds out that Vash is setting off for an illegal dig and she discovers he never mentioned her to his friends. Q, a secret witness, decides to return the favor Picard did him a year ago by getting the stubborn lovers to admit their feelings for each other ­ in a special simulation of Sherwood Forest, that he creates.
With the couple cast as Robin Hood and Maid Marian and Picard’s senior officers as Merry Men, Q becomes the sheriff of Nottingham. He challenges the captain to risk his crew’s lives for the woman he loves. Picard sets out to rescue Vash, claiming he’d do the same for anyone else.
But “Marian” rejects his rescue, turning him in and agreeing to marry her captor, Sir Guy. Q is delighted until he sees her send a note to the crew for help; he then turns her in as well.
Heads are about to roll when the Merry Men come to the rescue; Picard, a skilled fencer, skewers Sir Guy. The game is over.
Back on the ship, Vash announces she plans to travel through the galaxy with Q. An uneasy Picard admits the two do have much in common ­ just before he kisses Vash good-bye and they promise to meet again.
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Ira Steven Behr, a third-season producer, helped bring back both Q and Vash and jumped on the Robin Hood bandwagon. This outing provided lots of nice comic moments, including the Worf line of the season: “I am not a merry man!” This season having settled the real status of Riker and Troi’s relationship, we now begin to get hints about how Beverly and the captain see each other, following the intoxication of “The Naked Now” and the tease of “Allegiance”.
Director Cliff Bole revealed that the castle set was really a big “cheat” ­ lots of little foreground set pieces were shot through a long lens. The Sherwood Forest scenes were filmed during one day of location shooting in the Descanso Gardens, just northeast of the northeastern L.A. suburb of Glendale. The medieval fighting was not without its problems: Frakes suffered a cut eye when his quarter-staff broke under a broadsword blow just as he turned into it.
Throughout the series, Picard has been shown as Jeffersonian in his interests, which include history, science, and literature as well as archaeology. He is clearly pleased as well as apprehensive about being asked to address the archaeological symposium. Among the delegates can be seen an Algolian, a Bolian, and a Vulcan.
~1:[4,#b],5:[2,#i]@1“The Quality of Life”@2Next Generation episode #135
Production No.: 235
Aired: Week of November 16, 1992
Stardate: 46307.2
Directed by Jonathan Frakes
Written by Naren Shankar
Based upon material by L. D. Scott
GUEST CAST
Dr. Farallon: Ellen Bry
Transporter Chief Kelso: J. Downing
Computer Voice: Majel Barrett
During a status survey of the Tyrus VII-A orbital mining station and its new but lagging technology, center director Farallon unveils her “exocomp”: a problem-solving “smart” computer tool that can make repairs where a living being can’t go, such as inside the station’s troubled power grid.
She wins a delay for Picard’s report deadline in order to make station upgrade repairs by using the units. When one inexplicably fails, a curious Data checks out the “faulty” unit only to realize the exocomp had not malfunctioned, but was instead repairing itself after shutting down at the sign of danger ­ an act of survival that convinces him the “machines” are alive!
The stressed-out Farallon is skeptical but seems vindicated after a shipboard test with a simulated danger that the exocomp apparently doesn’t recognize. Data later repeats the trial run on his own until he discovers the exocomp knew the danger was not real.
But before he can report, Picard and La Forge are trapped in yet another station accident. Recalling his own struggle for rights, Data locks out the transporters and refuses orders to use the exocomps as slaves to rescue them until Riker agrees to request their help. The three units agree and devise their own plan, but one must sacrifice itself in the successful rescue. All are saddened, but Data is satisfied he’s made his point.
Rick Sternbach designed the exocomps, but budget allowed only two to be built; the shots of three included one composited in later, FX supervisor Ron B. Moore said. Amazingly, their every motion was propelled by a puppeteer with control rods who was “painted out” via computer in what had to be some of the series’ most unnoticed effects; the bouncier approach won out over sophisticated motorized robots with jerky motion control, a la the saucers of Batteries Not Included.
Dr. Farallon was named not for the software company but for the islands off the San Francisco Bay area which the company was named for. Beverly’s character gets a unusual twist ­ and a foreshadowing of the commando regimen to come next episode ­ when we learn she is taking bat’telh lessons from Worf; we also hear about her brunette experiment at age thirteen. For prop watchers, the particle fountain miniature is a new model touched up with cheap and quick detail and lighting by computer, while the lateral neon “blinky” units first seen in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan appear in yet another alien lab.
Having never gained approval to keep Geordi’s beard permanently after his brief poker scene in “The Outcast”, LeVar Burton confronted the producers with a request they couldn’t turn down: He wanted it for his wedding!
