I just finished watching this episode, I find it hillarious the way Picard "Moseys" over to the plaque as the sh...? are hailing him

Sheliak

What does this title mean anyway?

93 years earlier the Artemis, bound for Septimus Minor, goes off course because of a navigational error and just manages to crash land on Tau Cygna. So far, so good. However, the colony's leader, Goshoven, refers to this world as Tau Cygna several times and nothing is ever said about the Artemis losing communication. So you are the captain of a starship which goes off course and you know the name of the star whose planet you are soon going to crash into. Don't you think that it might be a smart idea to send a message letting someone know where you are? And even if the communication equipment wasn't working, why didn't Starfleet send a search party? (In 90 some odd years is it going to be revealed that the Borg didn't capture the USS Lalo in The Best of Both Worlds? They just crashed on some planet and hoped Starfleet would come looking for them?)

When it was mentioned that the evacuation ship had dedicated shuttle pilots, I thought it sounded a little like a suicide mission since hyperonic radiation is supposedly fatal. Will Starfleet equip the pilots with radiation suits or just have coffins standing by?

The colony seems to be built in a rather lifeless area and a big deal is made about the aqueduct bringing water to them. All of this begs the question, why did those pinheads build a city in the desert instead of building it near a good source of water?

In The Big Goodbye Data was familiar with what the Jarada would do, so why did he need to ask Riker how the Sheliak might react?

Why not let Flaherty of the Aries take a crack at trying to understand the Sheliak language? In The Icarus Factor Picard said he knew at least 40 languages and had a gift for understanding.

Picard wants to talk to the Sheliak homeworld, Worf says, "Their home world is quite distant." However Sheliak is another name for the star Beta Lyrae, 800 to 1,300 light years away. The world with humans orbits Tau Cygna, which is a pretty similar name to a star called Tau Cygni (66 to 75 light years away), and as sloppy as Star Trek is with names it could be the same star. If Tau Cygna is Tau Cygni then the approximate distance to Sheliak (Beta Lyrae) is 1,131 to 1,838 light years. (Assuming that I used the right formula in figuring out the third side of a triangle.)

Why do Geordi and O'Brien need to work on fixing the transporter to work through hyperonic radiation? The Sheliak have transporters and they must be able to work in hyperonic radiation since the Sheliak can live in the stuff?

Why did the phaser blast follow the aqueduct? Was this a special kind of water? (Perhaps it was H2 uh 0?)

Why not let Flaherty of the Aries take a crack at trying to understand the Sheliak language? In The Icarus Factor Picard said he knew at least 40 languages and had a gift for understanding.

It's possible that the Aries was still on its long-distance mission mentioned in "The Icarus Factor", and would be too far away to help.

Or perhaps he did and didn't succeed. They can't all be Daniel Jackson, you know.

"Zzzz .. Huh? Oh, umm err, yeah yeah sure ... umm 'Section 2947 Paragraph 87396, Sub-Paragraph 28686, heading 1976, The Shelaik gain all claims to Tau Cygn- ...' whatever ... just sign the bloody thing already!"

The Federation signed a treaty without bothering to go scope out the planets involved? This treaty was recently signed, and the colonists on the planet have been there for "generations". Granted no life should be able to live there, but even a seemingly standard, long range scan of the planet should display a lifeform reading. There are 15,000 people on the planet! They built a huge irrigation tube running all over the place on the surface! But Picard is astonsihed when informed there is life on the planet. Good thing it was just a colony and not some kind of huge dilithium mine!

"It's only going to be a few people? Well sure, bring them all over to my place, it'll be fun!"

Sorry, I missed the character's names in this episode. However, after the public meeting Data and the female colonist (our heroine I suppose) are informed by a couple of high-ups that they are not convinced they should stay and that "there are many others that feel this way" within this 15,000 person colony. Upon hearing this, our heroine offers up her house as a meeting place! She must have one huge house (the camera shots in the episode didn't do it near enough justice!). But, she is really lucky as apparently the higher-ups were just exaggerating. Only about 9-10 people show up (10 of 15,000 doesn't qualify as "many" in my book!).

Q: What do you get when you cross a Transporter, hyperonic radition, and a whiny Lieutenant Commander?
A: Insubordination! (not to mention a waste of turbolift energy & time!)

Towards the end of the episode, after the Sheliak grant Picard his 3 weeks, LaForge comes tromping up to bridge and actually mouths off to the captain! "Captain, we can fix the transporter! Just give me a a few reasearch teams and 15 years!" Oh yes, good showing Mr. Newly-Promoted Lieutenant Commander. I guess Picard is high on his success or something, mouthing off to a commanding officer isn't usually very well recieved. Picard almost tore Kolrami apart for mouthing off about Riker in "Peak Performance". Plus, LaForge rides all the way up to the bridge just to mouth off to Picard: he hops off the lift, performs his "joke", and then hops right back on. Maybe he and Wesley had a bet going?

WHOA...only the 2nd episode of the 3rd season and Crusher is gone!?! Seriously now...she isn't in the episode. That's a nit. (IMHO)

Apparently "DESTROY" has lost it's meaning.

Data informs the girl that he will destroy the aquaduct. He does so by firing at it...the energy beam follows the pipeline up the mountain, thereby neutralizing it. SO...why is it when Data is chit-chatting with the leader afterwards, there is still water coming down the stairs and into the fountain? Magic waters perhaps?

WHY is this episode called "The Ensigns of Commmand"? Data is not an ensign. A better title would be "The Wrath of the Sheliak" or something more ominous. I'm disappointed.

From Merriam-Webster online:

Ensign
2 a : a badge of office, rank, or power; b : EMBLEM, SIGN

Or, in other words, the title refers to Data's attempts to assert authority over the colonists...and, more subtly, questions just how much authority he, Starfleet and/or the Sheliak should have in this situation.

HERBIE HANCOCK ALERT: The "android" that Ard'rian has in her home looks like something out of a Herbie Hancock video.

Having re-watched this episode, it never ceases to amaze me how any Trek episode tries to convey the message of thousands of colonists but only depicts one or two dozen extras and a handful with speaking roles.

Here, a colony's population now at 15,523 had only FOUR individuals of the non-mute type. Even the planet Gaia in DS9's "Children of Time" with a population almost half of Tau Cygna V had almost twice as many mute extras and about twice as many colonists with speaking roles.

In the square, when Data tried to use reverse psychology to frighten the colony to evacuate the planet, they do nothing. Data didn't evoke a single person, not even a child. When Data goes to touch a child and blah blah about how their sacrifices will not go unnoticed and what of the children... the colonists couldn't muster believable reactions. More like they have been starved by Gosheven and to speak aloud will result in their being stoned to death.

If the stars and the guests are going to continue to interact with the extras, the interaction should be two-way. Pay some schmoes the proverbial ten bucks and be done with it. I know Star Trek was created under the directive to be made as inexpensively as possible but yeeeesh!

Am I being too suspicious or is this mission designed to fail? They can't use transporters due to the radiation. They can't have pilots fly the shuttles down because of the radiation. They don't have nearly enough time to get them off the planet even if they remote-pilot the shuttles up and down or put them on automatic (that doesn't add in decontamination for the shuttles and the people, repairs, refueling, and shuttles crashing). The Enterprise seems very unlikely to be able to feed and supply oxygen to 15,523 extra people (if all of them could fit in every nook and cranny of her), even though she's a large ship. Starfleet doesn't appear to be sending extra ships to help out, and even then they'd probably need a bunch of them, since Galaxy-class ships are the biggest ones we see them using. Looks like The Fleet is going to let this bunch get ganked by the Sheliak with just a few formal protests in order to prevent a war.

Also, why are the Sheliak so adamant about getting rid of the colony? I know the planet is in their territory, but they can simply bow to reality and put their own colony far away from the humans. Since the colonists were apparently ignorant of the treaty, and they know about it now, could that treaty not be modified to cede part of the planet to the Federation, and let the Sheliak retain most of it? Couldn't the colonists request permission to become part of the Sheliak Corporate? Why did the Sheliak have to colonize the place in a couple days instead of letting the stinking evacuation be carried out? Does the colony perhaps sit over something valuable to the Sheliak and they don't want to trade for it?

Finally, Gosheven only seems like a stubborn, cruel SOB because the plot demands it. Look at it from the colonists' point of view. These people survived for generations on an irradiated armpit of a world and thrived where they should have died, doing the absolutely impossible without any Federation help. After all those years, the first contact with the Federation is to tell them they have to leave all that they and their families made because of some treaty with an alien race they never met. Then this piece of news is carried by a Starfleet officer who cannot understand their frustration, which just makes the frustration worse. I doubt any of us would shrug and say "OK" in that situation; more likely, we'd tell Data to take a hike, and take our chances with the Sheliak. I don't think he's a jerk so much as a human being. His attitude is a human attitude, the same one that makes some people stay at home when a hurricane is coming. If they were Vulcans, they'd probably have died 90 years earlier, because it's the logical thing to do.

John A Lang: I watched this episode on DVD today, and Dr. Crusher was in it! She was there in Ten Forward in the teaser, and also on the bridge right after the opening credits.

It appears I need Dr. Crusher to check my eyes!

And I bet your eyes would be checking her. Know what I mean? Eh? Eh? Say no more.

Picard invokes the arbitration clause in the treaty, but there is no arbitrable issue. The treaty is clear and unambiguous that the Sheliak may remove alien species at their discretion, and Picard offers no countervailing provision. The Corporate could use a corporate lawyer to avoid getting further bamboozled.

I just realized, since Gosheven apparently tried to take Data out permanently, how did he plan on explaining that to Starfleet? Even if -- for the sake of argument -- G was proven right about the Sheliak (or it was prevented like in the real episode), how would Starfleet have reacted to some right-wing loud mouth politician effectively killing a senior officer?

My point is, just for how long did he really think he was going to keep is a... sorry, butt out of the fire?

The people weren't there when the Federation signed the treaty with the Sheliak (111 years ago).

The Artemis crashed 90 some years ago.

That's in response to the nit from Ryan.

Also, the mission won't be doomed to fail. It's not implied that it will be the Enterprise that transports the colonists, it's the colony ship that Starfleet will be sending in 3 weeks.

Also, the Sheliak probably wanted to colonize the entire planet themselves which is why they wanted ALL humans off the planet.

Dr. Crusher was in the beginning of the episode in Ten Forward.

Bryce, Gosheven was depicted as fairly stubborn and cognitively dissonant, and not wanting to face the realities of his situation.

Maybe it's just the Sheliak being pains in the backsides, or maybe they need all humans off because they're going to terraform the planet to make it more suitable for them (and less for humans).

They wanted all Humans off because it is their planet and they wanted to colonize it. The episode makes it quite clear.

BIG NIT: What part of "You will die" didn't the people understand?

It's not that they didn't understand it- they didn't care. They believed in their own ability to fight off the Sheliak since they knew nothing about their abilities and rejected the treaty.(though they are not very smart if they failed to consider orbital bombardment as a possibility)

John, we all die, its just a matter of when and how...

Even if they did know that they wouldn't have a chance, some people are willing to die for their principles. Dont' believe me, there's many many bytes worth of discussion on those subjects in some other threads that will probably prove that people are willing to die for certain causes.

My problem with this episode was with the casting. The actor who played Gosheven just seemed too young, or something. Some older, wiser, more charismatic figure would have seemed more the type who would engender support from his people. This guy (Grainger Hines?) just seemed too much like some guy at work no one likes anyway, and ends up getting promoted to supervisor, and suddenly the whole staff is suddenly much less enthusiastic about getting up in the morning.

The girl Data befriended just didn't cut it, either, thoiugh I really can't specify as to why.

The Federation signed a treaty without bothering to go scope out the planets involved?

Perhaps the Federation only entered some of the planets closest to Fed territory before coming into conflict with the Sheliak, and was unable to explore the sector.

This treaty was recently signed,

The treaty was a hundred or some-odd years old, not 'recent'.

and the colonists on the planet have been there for "generations". Granted no life should be able to live there, but even a seemingly standard, long range scan of the planet should display a lifeform reading. There are 15,000 people on the planet!

The radiation blocked the sensor readings.

could that treaty not be modified to cede part of the planet to the Federation,

Picard proposed this, the Sheliak weren't interested.

why are the Sheliak so adamant about getting rid of the colony? I know the planet is in their territory, but they can simply bow to reality and put their own colony far away from the humans.

If a group of Canadians enter the US illegally and set up a village, preventing Americans from doing so, should the US simply accept this intrusion and give away some territory to Canada?

Couldn't the colonists request permission to become part of the Sheliak Corporate?

That would have been a good idea, but it sounded like these colonists didn't want to be part of anyone(one said they liked doing things on their own) That idea was done with some colonies near Cardassia, however.

Why did the Sheliak have to colonize the place in a couple days instead of letting the stinking evacuation be carried out

It's their territory and they wanted to stick to the letter of the treaty.

Why do Geordi and O'Brien need to work on fixing the transporter to work through hyperonic radiation? The Sheliak have transporters and they must be able to work in hyperonic radiation since the Sheliak can live in the stuff?

Uh, cause the Sheliak are not especially friendly and not interested in exchanging technology?

Given that voice communication to the surface was not inhibited by the radiation, wouldn't it have made sense for Data to let Captain Picard speak directly to Gosheven or the colonists?

Do combadges lack a basic speakerphone feature? Given his authority and credibility as captain, not to mention his vast skills at diplomacy, it seems Picard would have been far more persuasive than Commander Data in getting them to see reason.

Perhaps the captain wanted to take advantage of the situation to develop Data's people skills!

Wasn't Picard needed to resolve the Sheliak situation?

True, he had to deal with the Sheliak. But couldn't he at least take a few minutes to have a conversation with Gosheven?

After Data initially informed Captain Picard of the situation, Picard asked Worf to contact the Sheliak, and Worf replied that their homeworld was quite distant and it would take some time.

Seems like that would have been a pretty good time for Picard to help Data with a little diplomacy support, especially considering fifteen thousand colonists' lives are at stake?

Of course this would have defeated the point of the story...

When Picard goes to intercept the Shalliak Colony Ship, Picard and Troi beam over, then get beamed back. later we see the Shelliak Ship approaching at warp (I assume they were at warp, the stars were streaking in the background) then only then does the ship come to a stop and stand nose to nose with the Enterprise....so how did Picard and Counselor Bunnysuit beam over? "beam over to a ship at warp light years away? pfft NO problem....whassat? a little radiation??? shoot our transporters are HOSED!"

Chris Diehl: Couldn't the colonists request permission to become part of the Sheliak Corporate?

On paper that sounds like a reasonable Idea but given the attitude we saw of the Shelliak in this episode I cant imagine that would have really worked out well for the colonists:

Picard: Director, the Leader of the colony on Tau Cygna V has refused to leave but instead has conceded to applying for Employee Status within your Corporate.
Director: *long pause* Agreed Picard of the Enterprise, the filthy nasty Human Vermin infesting our planet may join our corporate and live on the planet that is rightfully ours. now go far far away and don't look back Picard of the Enterprise. And do not attempt to contact the vermi---- humans again, take our word for it that they will be fine and will not be exterminated the moment your ship leaves the system.

What a coincidence that the name of the arbitrating aliens are the Grizzelas, which hibernate, much like the Grizzly Bear.
Ugh. Too Earth-centric of the writer.

Why would the colonists continue to call their new home, Tau Cygna V? Wouldn't somebody say, "Let's give it a more personal name like Atari or Vanarro or Saturnopia." Tau Cygnia V is so impersonal.

Too bad they didn't have any type of Intrepid-class / Voyager starships available (or even built) at this time, since those babies can land, and could have picked up colonists.

I noticed the Sheliak ship is a refurbish of Valkris's cargo ship from 'Star Trek III'.

Funniest scene; Picard walks into the transporter room, Geordie tells him things are going bad, and he leaves seconds later saying, "Splendid! Splendid!" In-and-out.
Also got a cool view from the platform-- although it made the transporter room look smaller from that angle.
But to repeat the nit in the Chief's book, how are they beaming that object through hyperonic radiation, if the Enterprise is in space and has left the planet? Bad editing, I suppose.

SHOCKER OF THE WEEK!!!!:
Not only did Wesley not solve the problem, but resident engineering genius, Geordie Laforge, FINALLY failed at a task! It's about time!

It's actually the Grisella, for what it's worth.

Okay, buit it sounds an awful lot like 'Grizzella', and I've always associated Grizzly Bears with that, especially when including hibernating to their characteristics.
Too avoid confusion or my opinion they should have been called something alien-sounding like the Trontosians or Norinians or something.

This is one of the few episodes I can recall that does not start with someone making a log entry of one sort or another.

Thanks to the HD re-release, we can now read the exact text of the Federation tready with the Sheliak.