1:[3,#b],4:[2,#i]@1“The Most Toys”@2Next Generation episode #70
Production No.: 170
Aired: Week of May 7, 1990
Stardate: 43872.2
Directed by Timothy Bond
Written by Shari Goodhartz
GUEST CAST
Kivas Fajo: Saul Rubinek
Palor Toff: Nehemiah Persoff
Varria: Jane Daly
Lieutenant O’Brien: Colm Meaney
Data is presumed lost by a shocked crew who watch his shuttlepod blow up while returning from dealer Kivas Fajo’s ship.
Saddened, his shipmates go on to their mission, little knowing that Fajo staged the “disaster” so he could add Data to his prized galaxy-wide collection of stolen one-of-a-kind artifacts.
Fajo’s comic manner hides a cunning side unhindered by ethics or conscience. Determined to break the android’s resistance to being “collected,” he is humiliated when Data won’t “perform” for a friend and rival.
Though Fajo’s assistant, Varria, seems loyal to him, Data senses she feels as trapped as he does. When Fajo finally breaks Data by threatening to kill Varria with a painful, banned disruptor beam, she finally agrees to help the android escape. But Fajo heads them off and kills Varria. Data gets control of the weapon, but Fajo taunts the android because of his directive against killing for no reason.
Meanwhile, the Enterprise officers have been researching Fajo’s record and have guessed the truth regarding Data’s disappearance. As they prepare to rescue him, sensors reveal a weapon being fired ­ a subject Data is surprisingly close-mouthed about, even after Fajo is arrested and his prize stolen collection confiscated.
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An interesting story from a spec script that pushed Data to the brink of murder for a logical reason, “The Most Toys” was struck by tragedy early in the filming. Originally, the actor chosen to play Fajo was well-known little person David Rappaport, star of the series The Wizard and a veteran of many films and guest roles, including two memorable appearances on L.A. Law as a scrappy defense attorney. But Rappaport attempted suicide over the weekend after two days of filming and was hospitalized. Shortly afterward he died as a result of a second attempt. “Of course it left us very sad,” Rick Berman recalled.
Left with unusable footage, the producers huddled, then hired Saul Rubinek and had him into fittings for a new costume by noon on the following Monday, although promotional photos of Rappaport in the role had already been sent out. Considering the short notice, Rubinek, a busy Canadian actor, did a remarkable job of making the quirky role his own. In the expected grief over Data’s loss, Worf has a nice moment when he actually confides to Troi that his assignment at Ops is the second time he’s filled in for a fallen comrade, after Tasha Yar.
This story’s shuttlepod, the Pike, was the first on TNG actually named for a fictional person. Fans of the 1960’s Trek series know that Christopher Pike was James T. Kirk’s predecessor as captain of the original starship Enterprise. He was seen in the first pilot, “The Cage” and again later, in “The Menagerie.”
The Varon-T disruptor appears to be the same prop as one of the smaller weapons Sovak used in “Captain’s Holiday”. When Data fires it just as he is beamed out, we learn the transporter is capable not only of detecting weapons but of shutting them down as well. We also learn that Data has never killed anything. Here we see that the android has added to the mementos revealed during his human rights hearing in “The Measure of a Man”: a deck of poker cards and chips, his violin, and the painting he was working on in “Tin Man”. Fajo’s lapling, a puppet, was built by makeup designer Michael Westmore.
