TNG S1 E01-02 - Encounter at Farpoint
September 28, 1987
The long pilot of TNG. Two episodes mushed into one.
"On the maiden mission of the U.S.S. Enterprise (NCC-1701-D), an omnipotent being knows as Q challenges the crew to discover the secret of a mysterious base in an advanced and civilized fashion." ~IMDB
This one will be pretty literal as to what happens in the episode, I plan on being less literal and more objective to how I feel about scenes rather than solely what happened in each scene...practice is the goal, this is the first analysis that I'm writing for this website. It will get better.
And so we begin TNG, with the intro theme.
"Space, the final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship 'Enterprise.' Its continuing mission: to seek out knew life and new civilization, to boldly go where no one has gone, before."
Cool ship.
Opening credits over a starfield.
Stardate 41153.7
Denab IV
solve the mystery of Farpoint Station
Data doesn't know "snoop"
Troi detects a powerful mind,
Q's wall
Picard hates the Red Alert noise
Q in renaissance sailer outfit, speaks old English
Freezes ops Lt Torres who pulls a phaser on Q, stun setting.
Q in mid 1900s military uniform
Q as mid 2000s drugged military
Worf wants to clear the trash
Picard kinda suggests prosecution and judgement
Q leaves,
Worf and Tasha want to fight, Troi thinks its a bad idea, Picard hopes to outrun Q
Picard calls for communication silence, but gives print-out announcements through the ship
Q's wall turns to a ball and chases the Enterprise past it's maximum speed
the ball breaks warp 9.9
call for separation of the ship, Worf wants to take the battle bridge, but gets the saucer.
drive section evacuated
O'Brian first words: All decks acknowledging, sir
Theme plays while separating.
cool turn around for the drive section after separation
after the separation is complete, the torpedoes that were fired before separation, finally detonate...
Ship comes to a stop, and waits a few minutes before the Q-ball arrives, despite its vastly higher speed.
Picard surrenders. Troi very concerned
Then to the fun of the trial. opens with gun fire.....
"The prisoners will all stand." Picard sits down
Mid 21st century style trial
Such a cool entrance for Q as the judge, very dramatic.
Banners are a black eagle on a red field. very fascist
Tasha attacks the bailiff with the gun, whom gets killed, then picard asks if the trial will be fair...after one of the guards was just executed... and then it's totally ignored that the guard was killed, and then the crew (humans) are charged as a barbaric race....
Data takes opening statements by mentioning 2036 and a New United Nations tready, no Earth citizen shall be held accountable for the action of their race.
Court of 2079, United Earth "nonsense" is abolished.
Tasha says the court is unjust, and gets frozen for it...doubling down on the injustices.
Picard calls out the hypocricy and failure to hold to "fair judgement" and no harm to prisoners.
Q continues to be unjust, making threats, forcing a guilty plea
Picard calls for the crew to be tested as the best of humanity
Riker arrives at Farpoint Station from The USS Hood
geothermal energy for the planet
Riker questions the building materials
Groppler Zorn offers fruit, Riker asks for an apple, and they suddenly appear
Zorn scolds thin air...
Will calls out for Dr Crusher, Wesley replies, and then embarasses his mom by saying she doesn't like men...
Will says something is wrong, Bev questions his entheuseasm and then the bolt of cloth changes...
Riker beams up to stardrive section of Enterprise and meets Tasha
deck 14 turbo lift
Picard starts with making Riker uncomfortable, giving him a mystery, and then showing him impossible footage of Q, with quotes rearranged so that court dialogue was on the bridge at Q's intro.
Riker ordered to manually dock the drive section and saucer, but only gives commands, Data or O'Brian to the actual docking. Overly dramatic
Altair III was the dangerous away mission that Riker refused to let Captain DeSoto to beam down
Picard asks Riker to help him look good in front of kids, Picard doesn't like kids.
Geordie's VISOR explanation to Dr Crusher
Geordie says "sens-ORs" or maybe it was senses...
Riker gets to the bridge, asks for Data, but Data was escorting Admiral McCoy
McCoy insults Data, as almost as bad as a Vulcan
USS Hood, Excelsior class
Q's faded head on the viewscreen, Worf reacts with a phaser
Riker and Troi meeting again, "Emzadie"
Zorn questions a Betazoid, threatens to do business with the Ferengi
Deanna feels dispair from something unknown...
Zorn is very frustraited, he's offered so much to Starfleet,
Picard says the Ferengi are like cannibals
Riker asks an Ensign to help him find Data, she shows him the companels, the computer voice is not Majel.
Riker finds Data in the holodeck, in a forest, trying to whistle "Pop Goes the Weasel"
Data: "Marvelous, how easy humans do that..." sounds like Lore..... especially with Data's slight grin..
Data throws a big rock at the wall....
Wesley shows up and falls into the creek on a loose rock. Data pulls him out of the water, and into the air...
Wesley meets Picard again, while soaking wet...Picard doesn't recognize Wes
Wesley asks Bev for a bridge tour, asks if she's afraid of Picard...
Riker doesn't want to be alone with Troi, and sends her off with Geordie and Tasha
Data can't see as well as Geordie
Deanna has closed off her mind to the emotions, when she reopens it, "pain, pain, unhappiness, terrible despair."
Wes shows up in the turbo lift at the bridge, Picard freaks, then is stunned to see Beverly, and is shocked about Wes being her son...
Picard, "I knew your father."
One of my absolute favorite moments in Trek, as a kid, seeing a kid getting to be part of this ship, loved it. Inspirational.
Wesley knows too much. Annoys Picard.
UFO arrives, measures 12x the volume of Enterprise
UFO fires, Picard wants to react, but Worf diffuses by saying that it's firing on the old Bandi city, not on Farpoint Station, as if that's ok.
Riker goes on, tells the others to return, Deanna panics, doesn't want Riker to be hurt...Riker sends them off under orders
Riker and Data watch the city being destroyed, many casualties....
Picard orders Riker to kidnap Zorn
Picard says shoot the UFO, Q shows up and says that savage races never follow their promises, or something...
Picard orders the ship between the UFO and the planet, but there's no control
Riker and Data get blasted, but are ok, covered in dust.
Zorn is crying and afraid...gets captured by the aliens.
Troi feels satisfaction from the UFO that captured Zorn
Q asks Riker to entertain him, to beam over to the UFO
Riker impresses Q
Picard apologizes to Beverly, and compliments Wesley, but he expresses discomfort, and recognizes her potential discomfort because of her husbands death under his command.
Beverly stands strong, and Picard is humbled, asking to be friends.
Away team beams to UFO, finds the same hallways as below the Station.
Troi feels anger and hate from the UFO towards the Bandi city.
Data making some comments, thinks is wrong that he does so much, but Riker tells him to keep "providing narration"....
Zorn being tortured - holy crap that's brutal
Riker and Data phaser the field holding Zorn, UFO gets mad
Q shows up on Enterprise, ship communications gone down, unable to bring back Riker
Picard, desperate, offers to do whatever Q says...Away team plus Zorn returned to Enterprise bridge, by the UFO creature.
Q pushes Picard to be violent, Picard refuses and chooses wisdom and knowledge. And then acts in compassion, giving power to the imprisoned creature on the planet.
UFO changes into space jelly, beautiful. Such a cool model that the prop department created
Such a cool shot of giving the station energy, giving the captured creature power, and setting it free.
Picard calls out the imprisonment of the creature
Beautiful creature
As the two head off together, holding tentacles, so beautiful! and impressive animation!
Deanna: A feeling of great joy, and gratitude. Great joy, and gratitude. From both of them.
Picard to Q: Why, do you use other life forms to be your recreation? And Q responds: If so, you've not provided the best.
Picard instructs Farpoint Station to be rebuilt
Picard, hopefully other adventures will be much more interesting
Credits scoll upward??!?!?