My One Summer Mission

Episode Notes: ( Fasten your seatbelts, it's going to be a bumpy night. )

Overall Reaction: Oh, boy.

Okay, so, I wrote a thirty page paper on queer representation (or lack thereof) in Star Trek when I was in college, and I watched a lot of episodes from the spin-offs for it. One of these was "The Host." I...did not have a lot of great things to say about it. (I didn't have a lot of great things to say about "The Outcast" as an example of queer representation on TV either, but I suspect than when I eventually rewatch it, I will have a lot of great things to say about Riker's constant willingness to step out of his comfort zone. I really do love that about him even if sometimes it leads to him allowing his doctor pal to insert her space lobster boyfriend into his abdomen.)

This episode is probably the prime example of media "pushing its boundaries" in a way that frankly just puts a giant neon sign on those boundaries that says "BOUNDARIES HERE APPROACH WITH CAUTION." It defines limits that the viewer may never have thought were there by being so limited in its imagination.

An illustrative anecdote: when I finally had to watch High School Musical, also for a college course, I was struck by the song "Stick to the Status Quo." In it, the school queen bee watches in panic as her carefully constructed social order seems to be crumbling. Students, inspired by the basketball player and the brainiac who are daring to sing on stage, begin to share their freakiest confessions. And I thought, as I watched this scene, "Wait. You mean I am supposed to be ashamed of being the kind of crazy reprobate who both likes to do homework and to groove to my tunes? That is something I am supposed to feel bad about and that people will reject me for? This is the outer bounds of socially unacceptable behavior?" It made difference so tame and then patted itself on the back for its willingness to celebrate "doing your own thing," all the while sending the subtextual message that even these tiny transgressions against the status quo would be noticed and policed and shutting off the possibility of bigger, unimaginable transgressions.

In my Starfleet, the Starfleet of my dreams, the one I was taught to expect, it would never have occurred to me that gender and sexuality would still be so rigid in the 24th century. "Perhaps, someday, our ability to love won't be so limited," Beverly says -- referring, in theory, to her inability to cope with Odan's changeable physical form -- and I had sort of thought that that someday might have come already in Star Trek. However the episode tries to frame Beverly's conflict, however reasonable that internal conflict might be, what we see is her able, bizarrely, to accept her love when he is temporarily in the body of one of her closest friends, but unable to fathom the idea of being with a woman, because her ability to love is too limited. I see her saying that Star Trek isn't ready for me.

I have no doubt that this episode was well-meaning. But I want more than well-meaning, or I want nothing at all. I can work with nothing; not enough is just depressing.



Finally, I'm never ever ever going to win this fight with sci fi shows but...it's not okay to sleep with your friend's body when he isn't home? Also now I'm never going to be able to get rid of the mental image of Riker and Crusher macking on each other, so. Thanks for that.


Star Rating: **, for some good scenes and Picard hugs; ZERO, for at all satisfying queer content

Quote of a Different Episode:

SPOCK: Her attitude when she approaches you is profoundly different than when she contacts us. Her appearance is soft, gentle. Her voice is melodic, pleasing. I do not totally understand the emotion, but it obviously exists. The Companion loves you.
COCHRANE: Do you know what you're saying? For all these years, I've let something as alien as that crawl around inside me, into my mind, my feelings.
KIRK: What are you complaining about? It kept you alive.
COCHRANE: That thing fed on me. It used me. It's disgusting.
MCCOY: There's nothing disgusting about it. It's just another life form, that's all. You get used to those things.
COCHRANE: You're as bad as it is.
SPOCK: Your highly emotional reaction is most illogical. Your relationship with the Companion has for one hundred and fifty years been emotionally satisfying, eminently practical, and totally harmless. It may indeed have been quite beneficial.
COCHRANE: Is this what the future holds? Men who have no notion of decency or morality? Maybe I'm a hundred and fifty years out of style, but I'm not going to be fodder for any inhuman monster.
SPOCK: Fascinating. A totally parochial attitude.

This scene from the Original Series episode "Metamorphosis" completely reinforces the gender binary, but, still. This is the Starfleet that I want to imagine. What a totally parochial attitude, Beverly.

Episode Notes: ( This got long, but it's not my fault Deanna's boyfriend is hilariously creepy. )

Overall Reaction: Okay, I am sorry, but I hate Deanna's boyfriend so much. SO. MUCH. Here is a list of things he does that I hate:

1) Doesn't blink.
2) Messes up Deanna's hair and grabs her neck possessively when he has only known her for ten minutes. Says "Much better" when she meets his exacting standards.
3) "Conformity is not my style." Go fuck yourself.
4) "Must've been a nice day." You're a cocky motherfucker.
5) "Your other men." Ugh.
6) Unapologetically uses his empathic abilities to possibly unethical ends and then shames Deanna for using hers to ensure the security of the crew. And excuses himself by saying, "Well, I gained an advantage by using it with you," which does nothing to allay my feeling that he mind whammied her somehow.
7) Is a total dick in negotiation and can't keep the personal and the professional separate. Sometimes I complain that Riker can be a bit controlling of Deanna, but here he was nothing but considerate of her feelings while her new boyfriend tried desperately to use their relationship to his advantage and to start a cockfight with Riker.
8) Asked Deanna to run away with him to be his conscience. Yeah, that's a tempting offer for any woman. Especially a professional counselor! GET A THERAPIST, YOU DOUCHE.

I'm also confused as to why there seemed to be foot fetish porn in the middle of the episode, but I can't blame him for that.

So, that's the thing. Who cared what else was happening in this episode? All I could concentrate on was how much he made my skin crawl.

And I felt bad for the Ferengi who got stranded 80 lightyears from their home in a tiny shuttlecraft, for the record.

Star Rating: **

Quote of the Episode:
"I'm Captain Picard of the Enterprise; I am serving as host for these proceedings."
"Good. Then see to it we get some chairs."
"Let me explain..."
"Fine, fine, just have your Klingon servant get us some chairs!"
"I'm in charge of security!"
"Then who gets the chairs?" (Picard, Ferengi delegate Daimon Goss, and Worf, engaged in the fine art of negotiation)

Dammit, my computer shut itself down for updates and I hadn't saved my notes on this episode.

Oh well, now we'll never know what it was about.



Okay, okay:

Overall Reaction: Hahahahahahahaha, person who plays Julian, you have a completely inappropriate amount of fun with this episode. "I am... as you would say... FIT... AS A... FIDDLE?" All that eye-rolling! Priceless!

I actually didn't call the ending to this, but that was more because I was a moron than anything. I definitely suspected the woman of being Vantika -- at least until the crew did -- but when she was acquitted, I was all, "Is it the annoyingly smug Starfleet security officer? Oh please, oh please."

Of course, he'd never interacted with Vantika in any way, least of all while he was still living. >.<

This post has become one big catalogue of my fail and I'm ending it now.

Star Rating: **

Quote of the Episode: I'm going to go with the fit as a fiddle one.

Episode Notes: ( She's just a simple country doctor. )

Overall Reaction: Of all my "TOS did it better" episodes, this is the most "TOS did it better" of the bunch. (Other, of course, than "The Naked Now".) People must have aged at an unnecessarily accelerated rate dozens of times in TOS, including the good old country doctor they seem so intent on modeling Pulaski after. Honestly, how many aging diseases can there be? We've already got the adrenaline-cured one (how had I forgotten that Chekov's fear preserved him? really, Chekov?) and whatever's affecting Jack.

That aside, who didn't call that the creepy, telepathic, unnaturally sexually mature children were the source of the problem?

The thesis of this episode appeared to be "genetic engineering: a terrifying and terrible thing."

Star Rating: **

Quote of the Episode:
"God knows I'm not one to discourage input, but I would appreciate it if you'd let me finish my sentences once in a while." (Picard, stone cold fox)

Overall Reaction: Once I recover the files from my old laptop, I might discover that I had dozens of humorous asides to share about this episode, but none of the notes I have on hand dealt with minutiae, only with general themes that could be incorporated into this comment. To whit:

+ Wow, good call on not letting the Ferengi be the major villains of the series, PTB. They are seriously silly.
+ Aaaaand I think I get where the criticisms of possible antisemitism in their portrayal come from.
+ I liked Picard's bluff. Hot.

ETA: I did have a few random notes! The salient points were: (a) oh boy, the Ferengi are sexist, too!, (b) Picard's little S1 outbursts of French patriotism are super cute, and (c) one of the things I like best about Picard is what a good delegator he is, always willing to take input from his crew (and just as willing to shut them down if they're being dumbasses).

Star Rating: **

Quote of the Episode:
"Apologies, Captain. I seem to have reached an odd... functional impass. I am, uh, stuck." (Data, his battle with a Chinese finger trap providing the highlight of the episode -- AS PER USH)