Star Trek: The Next Generation 2.8 (A Matter of Honor)

Cast:
Colm Meaney (Miles O’Brien)
Laura Drake(Vekma)
Peter Parros (Tactics Officer)
Brian Thompson(Klag)
Christopher Collins(Captain Kargan)
John Putch(Ensign Mendon)

Writers: Burton Armus, Gregory Amos, Wanda M. Haight

As I was saying, I was watching this rubbish show known as Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 2.  Then I watched this episode, and it literally turned everything on it’s head.  So far the episodes have been dull, childish, unoriginal, badly written drivel.  This one is literally the opposite.  It is interesting, adult (in one moment perhaps more adult than they would get away with today) and the plot, whilst simple, actually makes sense.

It is literally like watching a different show.  The Klingons, who have only really featured in one episode of this show before this, come across as a very real race.  No silliness, just characters that come across, as Riker described them, “brave and unique” – if a little slow to grasp the obvious, in the case of their Captain.

The adult moments both come in the dinner scene.  As Riker eats with the Klingons, it is suggested that if he finds their food too hard to eat one of the females could breast feed him, and he even suggests a threesome later with two Klingon women.  It is funny, but not in a silly slapstick way.  It shows adults with a real sense of humour, and as such – especially for this show – it is very refreshing.

It is nice not to be aboard a ship with such clean lines as the Enterprise.  The design of the Klingon ship is much like we are used to, but it is nice to spend some time there.  You do start to warm to the Klingon characters (even though the Captain is a bit of a twit).

Even the stuff on the Enterprise is quite good.  Oddly, both Geordi and Deanna do not appear at all (and the episode is so interesting you don’t really notice that they are not there).  The opening scene (where Riker and Picard talk about the inter species exchange program) is just like a normal conversation between two adults.  And that’s why this episode works so well – all of the characters are believable, even Mendon (although I think Worf was quite close to beating the crap out of him at one point).

Luckily, this upturn is not limited to just this episode, and there are some more decent ones on the way quite soon.

Crew Deaths: 0
Total Crew Deaths So Far: 5
Score: 8.5/10