Say what you will about Westley, But he has touched Ashley Judd.

So? I've touched someone much more beautiful... my wife.

That was a lame response, I understand what Matt meant and am married also.

Not only has he touched her but he has both hugged and kissed her. Sorry for sounding like a loser but I have been enamored with Ms. Judd ever since I saw that episode.

For me Ashley Judd (who could do SO MUCH BETTER than that annoying jerk, Wesley) was the only bright spot in this episode.

I know. This episode is so ridiculous. Who wrote this joke of an episode. Picard playing the game? Worf? Please. And what about Geordi? "Gee. Data must have mulfunctioned after you called him to sickbay right in front of me, Dr. Crusher."

Is it just me, or was the concept of this episode very satirical indeed? These games make *everyone* addicted to them, and they damage the reasoning center... hmmm... writer trying to say something?

I was suprised that Geordi was also affected by this game. When someone puts on the headset and activates it, it shoots a laserlike beam into each eye. This is evidently how the games psycho affects reach the brain. However Geordi does not see with regular eyes. Wouldn't his VISOR filter out this game?

I kept noticing that Data's eyes changed position whenever anyone visited him lying on the table. Crusher shuts him down. His eyes are wide open. Crew comes in. Eyes are wide open. Crew leaves. The next time he's shown, his eyes are half-closed. And shortly afterwards, his eyes are closed all the way. Now, if he's been deactivated, how is it possible for him to move his eyelids? He's completely off! (Sorry if I can't give a point-for-point account...I only first saw this episode a couple days ago!)

Slow acting capacitor closes the eyes?

Mmmmmm...that might actually be a good feature for Data to have. If he's ever deactivated against his will, it would be very helpful to have his eye sensors or cameras or whatever the technobabble term is continue to record the events around him for a short time.

(Either that, or his eyelids operate on the same unsettling principle as those 'She Really Naps!' dolls I used to have as a kid. )

That still doesn't make sense, because if he's been turned off, completely shut down, he wouldn't have recorders, or anything still activated. He'd be turned off! I can understand his eyes remaining open after being turned off, because the mechanism would not be activated to close them...but why the gradual closing? Turned off to me means just that...turned off. Completely nonfunctional systems. Forgive me if I'm ignorant about Data's mechanisms...I'm a recent fan, so if someone could enlighten me as regards the technicalities, I'd appreciate it.

When my video recorder is turned off, the clock keeps running and it can still respond to the remote control. Turned off doesn't always mean completely turned off.

This game seems to be incredibly dull and how exactly are the players supposed to work the controls?

If this cluster is so scientifically important, then why is only one ship being sent to examine it?

Why does Wesley wear his communicator to dinner, but Robin Lefler doesn't? Wesley is just visiting the ship, but Ensign Lefler works there.

Once again the stars in the Ready Room window move, but the stars on the Bridge viewscreen don't.

The Ktarian ship seems to utilize the Tarellian design.

I found it amazing that after days of intensive, chemical brainwashing, Data is able to free them with a few seconds of a flashing light. Considering that the chemical balance of their brains were affected, the crew returned to normal remarkably easily. (Maybe we should try the same thing with drug addicts?) At the very least the crew should be subjected to regular treatments of flashing until the chemical balance of their brains is back to normal.

I understand that the game somehow stimulates the brain to produce pleasure chemicals, but how is it supposed to tell each user what to do? Subliminal messages hidden in those dumb graphics? If so is the message the same to all users or do the Ktarians know who is using what game?

My dad's opinion on this episode was that since the crew was under the influence of a foreign power they would be immediately relieved of duty.

Obviously Picard is a closet video game junkie, that is the only way to explain him using this device.

What do you mean immediately relieved of duty if they were under the influence of a foreign power? Who would relieve them?

How would you explain Worf, Hammer?

No explanation is required for Picard playing the game. It's not like he's the kind of person who will never try anything new, and if someone close to him convinced him to try it, like Beverly or Guinan, he might do so. Worf? Riker could've goaded he into playing it by appealing to his sense of a challenge. The fact that people one would normally not think would try it simply speaks to the addictive power of it, IMO.

But that doesn't explain the FIRST time someone plays the game.

Etana Jol got Riker to play while they were fooling around on Risa. Riker got Troi and his close friends to play it when he returned to the Enterprise.

I've seen this ep many times. The teaser, I've seen once.

Am I the only one who thought it a tad unnecessary?

He explained where and whom he got it from.

Starfleet, Zul.

I think it was necessary in order to show the villain behind the game, CC.

True.

But Riker said he "got it on Risa," and we know that planet... and our first officer.

She also shows up later in the episode, to take over the ship.

Personally, I would've been curious to see how he got hooked on it, and I would consider the teaser necessary exposition.

Apparently the original plot idea was about a TV show which resulted in its fans isolating themselves from the outside world, devoting their lives to this TV show, and privately dressing up in the uniforms of the characters. The plot was rejected as too close to home so they just threw together an episode based on a computer game.

Peter, I think there was an episode of "Pinky and the Brain" which dealt with exactly that - about creating a cult television show with "loyal" fans.

So... is the moral of this present TNG episode that computer games may cause us to do things beyond our control (or under the influence of others)? And that this is more damaging to one's health than overdosing on your favourite TV show or pop music?

How would Starfleet know they were under a foreign power? If Wesley hadn't reactivated Data, how would they know?

Ashley Judd is turning into the queen of chick flicks, with "Someone Like You" and "Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood" under her belt.

But unlike Meg Ryan she has managed to do both chick flicks and thrillers like High Crimes & Double Jeopardy. And unlike many "chick flick" actresses she doesn't mind getting naked on film.

And we're all very grateful for it.

Zul, clearly there is some confusion about the line I wrote. The meaning was that after Data restored them and Starfleet found out what had happened the crew would be relieved of duty.

At the very least, Starfleet would want to make sure there were no long lasting repercussions from the incident. It would be irresponsible of Starfleet to allow the crew of a powerful starship to continue flying around when there might be a possibility that the conditioning to accept another's orders might still be in place. Not to mention the possible repercussions of the addiction to the game.

Who says they weren't given full examinations to determine if the effects of the game were completely undone?

Rene, I understand KAM's point completely now and how Zul may have been confused by his original point.

Yeah, rereading my original line I can see how someone could think I was saying they would be relieved of duty while under the influence which wasn't what I meant, but my sentence wasn't as clear as it should have been.

Just exactly WHEN did Wesley repair Data?
I never saw him do it.
It must have happened when we weren't looking!

FUNNY THOUGHT: It appears the Game (with his impact on higher & rational thought) may have effected the writers of "Star Trek" with its production of episodes with lesser quality in ST:TNG, DS9 & VOY.

GREAT MOMENT: Riker chasing the scantily clad woman around on Risa...that's my boy!

GREAT SCENE: Troi's chocolate eating "ritual". I get the same feeling.

If you drop the "K" & the "N" and add an "I" and swtich a few letters around in the name "Ktarian", you get "ATARI".

(I wonder if the creators had that in mind when writing this episode)

If you drop the "J," "A," "N," & "G" and add an "S" & "O" and switch a few letters around in your name, you get "HAN SOLO."

(I wonder if your parents had that in mind when naming you)

Actually, you're probably mostly right (though your way is more complicated than it needs to be -- why add an I that's already there?) I wouldn't be surprised if the creators simply substituted a K for an A, making Atarian Ktarian.

Oops... you're right. Shouldn't have added the "I".

Actually, I wouldn't mind being Han Solo... just to have Leia in that gold bikini!

Yeah, but you'd be blind while she was wearing it.

Not after the rescue from the Sarlaac. I'd ask her to keep it on until I saw her clearly.

Let's get back on subject....

Why didn't Beverly notice the hypnotic effect of the game before she tried it? I mean, she saw the junkies from "Symbiosis" getting "high" and noticed it.

Riker probably gave it to her the minute he came back from Risa, just as he did Troi. If Crusher was one of the very first to get it (which makes sense, since the smart thing for Riker to do would be to get the command crew under its influence before everyone else), there wouldn't be anyone else under its influence for her to notice.

Curious that Wesley is the only one on board that was interested in the device's operation. You'd thing Geordi, or a few engineers would test it first.

Why? According to Riker, it's just a cool game. If your buddy came back from vacation and said, "Check out this cool thing I got on my trip!", would you do an engineering breakdown on it? Wesley only became suspicious because his mom was acting weird.

And also because everyone on board was so into it.

How lucky Wes was visiting the Enterprise at the right time or else that woman would have taken over Starfleet.

Is it just me, or did her forehead look like Marie Barone's "abstract sculpture?"

I think there is a scene missing, or something to that effect. Watching the scene again, of Wesley forced into the game, and the bridge lights going dark and Data comes onto the bridge flashing those lights to 'cure' the others, I didn't seem him flash the people in the background. I remember crew milling about on the higher deck, at their controls, but I don't remember seeing Data flashing them to 'cure' them. My point here being, once he was done flashing 'the important people', he brought back the lights, and all was well. The scene I think that was missing, those crewmembers in the background jumping Data, since he didn't flash them. I mean, Wesley and Robin did say, apart from themselves and Data, everyone else was into the game. What kept the background crewmembers from fighting Data? Were they duped too much?
.
.
.
.
.
YOu know, I seem to almost ready for the answer, they weren't paid enough, to be said.

YOU really wanna jump Data...

Pay has nothing to with it, existance does come to mind though.

This game is made by Microsoft, right?

I have never heard the answer to this question. I imagine someone here will know:

Was Wil Wheaton fired or did he quit?

Because he came back to do, what, three or four guest shots, I think it may have been the former.

He quit to go to college. Of course, he was also bitter about them screwing him out of a movie role early in the previous season by telling him the first episode was heavy on Wesley when it wasn't.

If Wil Wheaton had been fired do you think the creators would have him back a year later as a guest star? I don't.

By SlinkyJ on Friday, July 18, 2003 - 10:12 pm:
My point here being, once he was done flashing 'the important people', he brought back the lights, and all was well."

Read what you wrote and please tell me you didn't mean it that way... I mean, he is fully functional...

"So? I've touched someone much more beautiful... my wife." - ScottN

Totally off topic and out of the blue, but... Your wife's a lucky woman, ScottN. :-)

I wonder if Picard had a breakdown after this event, like he did after 'The Best of Both Worlds - Part 2'?
I ask this because the Borg erased his personality, controlled his mind, and made him turn against Starfleet. Sound familiar? The Game did this, too (although his personality wasn't erased), as he functioned against his will. So did Picard get very upset about being brainwashed again?

When Riker tells Troy about the game he brought back from Risa, shouldn't her empathic powers let her sense that his intentions in making this offer were anything but benign?

Yeah, probably, but remember what Phil said about Trek in general? It basically had too many ways to avoid problems. This was merely another example of the script convienently forgetting a capability of either the ship or crew members so that a crisis could continue. If Troi could have sensed Riker's intentions from the beginning, as he had been manipulated by the alien woman's charms as well as the psychotropic (or whatever) effects from the game she got him hooked on, it would not have spread and "infected" the crew the way it did, and there would have been no show! But I digress. Of course, they had to let Wesley say the day one last time, didnt they? And he got some pretty fine action with Robin Lefler to boot. Not too shabby!

I remember something else Phil said in the guide, something to the effect of: "Does anyone else find it strange that Picard will play the game but Wesley won't? Because in episodes like "Captain's Holiday", Picard gives the distinct impression that he doesn't like games."

I too, like Steve (see above), wonder how long it took the crew to recover from the "brainwashing" effects of the game the Ktarians used in their attempt to take over Starfleet with. It seems to me that perhaps there would have been some negative aftereffects they would have suffered from after having their minds controlled like that. However, this little debacle, AFAIK, was never referred to again. And wasn't that a Ktarian chocolate puff in "Liasons"? And wasn't Samantha Wildman's husband (and Naomi's father) a Ktarian? What happened to improve the relations between them and the Federation after the events of this episode? And did they ever try this mind-control tactic on any other species of empire in the AQ/BQ?

I wonder about that!

I wonder if Picard had a breakdown after this event, like he did after 'The Best of Both Worlds - Part 2'?

Computer: I'm sorry Captain, I'm afraid I can't do that. Would you like to play a game instead?

Picard: No! No! Noooooooooooooooo! *he smashes a display case*

They release buggy games and we still buy, their DLC costs as much as the game itself and we still buy... and so forth ;)

I've long considered this one of the lamer TNGs. Although, recently I've come to identify very strongly with it and with Wesley's position in it!

After the alien vessel is delivered to Starbase 82,
and the Enterprise moves in tward the screen, you
can see the supports for the model start comming
into view (as a haze) in the upper left hand part
of the screen just before the scene cuts away.

I imagine this part was normaly cropped on the
CRT (picture tube) type televisions of the day,
so it may have gone un-noticed, or was left in
scince it would have been outside of the "safe"*
area of the frames.

*back in the CRT days, the "safe zone" was the
part of picture that television engineers determined would not
be cropped by most TV sets as the tube style sets would crop some bits off of the
edges of the picture. This was to ensure text crawlers,
station ID bugs and other important bits would be displayed properly.

Rene asked, almost a generation ago:

This episode is so ridiculous. Who wrote this joke of an episode?

The story credit was given to Brandon Braga, Susan Sackett (yes, Gene Roddenberry's assistant and maybe paramour) and her writing partner Fred Bronson. Braga gets sole teleplay credit. And, it's one of my least favorite episodes in all of Trek. (I still have yet to see the shows hidden behind the CBS pay wall; the cheapskate in me still has yet to subscribe. )

In the epidode, Troi says something like "I never met a chocolate I didn't like." Breyer's makes a flavor called "Chocolate Truffle" that would knock her socks off. It did just that for me.

Just don't let John A. Lang catch you giving it to her, Adam!

Oh... that didn't come out right...

Don't let him catch you giving her chocolate truffle ice cream.

Awkward.

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quote:

Adam Bomb: Rene asked, almost a generation ago:

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