There's a B-plot. Involving the Crusher kid. Need I say more? He's just a dork. He makes me angry. And his fellow test candidates are equally nerdy. Aren't there regular people applying for Star Fleet? Only briefly in this episode you get the idea that he might be human after all (like when you sense his anxiety and nervousness). While it's perhaps interesting how Star Fleet Academy selects potential students, it's not how I'd imagine it. I mean, they need thousands of ensigns every intake. Ordinary officers' material. People with a solid foundation but there's ample time to form them, to educate them and to bring them up to Star Fleet's standards. But here's a select group of a few. Some of them seem to be wunderkinder. And they are tested rigorously. You don't need to be a future Nobel prize laureate to graduate from Westpoint. That's not what a military organization is looking for (the Quark's boy's application process in DS9 shows a more realistic scenario). Btw: that's pretty much the same test Deanna will have trouble with in a later season when she's about to become a commanding bridge officer in a later season. The interaction between Picard and Wesley and between Worf and Wesley are highlights of the B-plot though.
There's also a strange A-plot (or is that the B-plot?). It's like Kafka's The Trial. Both the book and this A-plot are pretty absurd (or surreal) scenarios. I like the book, I don't like the A-plot. It's really not interesting because the mysterious threat or conspiracy is never really explained to us. It's really only an overture to what is about to happen in a later episode.
And then there is a C-plot with a young runaway. This plot is that unremarkable, I refuse to say anything about it.
All in all, this episode is like a collection of three plots that were all not strong enough to fill a complete episode on their own.
Review by Alexander von LimbergBlockedParent2023-02-26T19:03:44Z— updated 2023-02-28T18:57:07Z
There's a B-plot. Involving the Crusher kid. Need I say more? He's just a dork. He makes me angry. And his fellow test candidates are equally nerdy. Aren't there regular people applying for Star Fleet? Only briefly in this episode you get the idea that he might be human after all (like when you sense his anxiety and nervousness). While it's perhaps interesting how Star Fleet Academy selects potential students, it's not how I'd imagine it. I mean, they need thousands of ensigns every intake. Ordinary officers' material. People with a solid foundation but there's ample time to form them, to educate them and to bring them up to Star Fleet's standards. But here's a select group of a few. Some of them seem to be wunderkinder. And they are tested rigorously. You don't need to be a future Nobel prize laureate to graduate from Westpoint. That's not what a military organization is looking for (the Quark's boy's application process in DS9 shows a more realistic scenario). Btw: that's pretty much the same test Deanna will have trouble with in a later season when she's about to become a commanding bridge officer in a later season. The interaction between Picard and Wesley and between Worf and Wesley are highlights of the B-plot though.
There's also a strange A-plot (or is that the B-plot?). It's like Kafka's The Trial. Both the book and this A-plot are pretty absurd (or surreal) scenarios. I like the book, I don't like the A-plot. It's really not interesting because the mysterious threat or conspiracy is never really explained to us. It's really only an overture to what is about to happen in a later episode.
And then there is a C-plot with a young runaway. This plot is that unremarkable, I refuse to say anything about it.
All in all, this episode is like a collection of three plots that were all not strong enough to fill a complete episode on their own.