All Good Things...

[selenak]

And thus I come to an end with my TNG rewatch reviews, with a couple of Q episodes, appropriately enough, and a distinct pang in the heart. Curse it, now I'm missing the crew of the Enterprise D all over again. As Scotty says to Picard in Relics, it's like falling in love for the first time; not that you don't love again later, but that specific type of infatuation remains unique. And for me, it didn't happen with the original Enterprise gang, fond of them and their adventures as I am; it happened with the next Generation: they're what made me a fan for the very first time in my life, and I find I am still vulnerable to their charms.

(DS9 is different because with DS9, there is no nostalgia in the love as there never was a period of separation, and no defensiveness. It always bewilders me when I hear DS9 referred to as the red-headed stepchild of ST shows (surely that's Enterprise?), because I haven't met anyone who actually watched DS9 from beginning to end and didn't agree with me that of all the Star Treks, it's the best written, the pinnacle of Treks, its awesomeness beyond debate. Well, perhaps not some hardcore TOS only folk, but they usually haven't watched it, either. So DS9 and me, we're married. Wouldn't want to change that for the world. But TNG was my first love.)



Q-Pid, like Captain's Holiday, is another Ira Steven Behr penned comedy episode, and for my money his best one on TNG before he moved on to become a DS9 head honcho and gave me my beloved Quark & his family, and the Rules of Aquisition. I remember at the time it was first broadcast there were some grumblings about it being too silly, but I just loved it. Upon rewatching, I still do. Much like the DS9 episode Our Man Bashir is actually my favourite James Bond story (weeeellll, I mighhhhhhht make an exception for Casino Royale now), Q-Pid is my favourite Robin Hood tale. Do any of the others have Worf declare: "Sir, I protest. I am not a merry man!" (Truer words were never spoken.) Do they have Vash refuse to play the noble damsel in distress role and instead change Marian's storyline so she agrees to marry Guy of Gisborne and takes Robin prisoner with his own sword? Most importantly, do they have Picard besieged by the two main tricksters in his life at the same time and winning sword fights because he's not from Nottingham? THEY DO NOT.

Things noticed upon rewatching: the Beverly-Vash encounter at breakfeast is well-played, as it avoids two obvious stalwarts in such situations - neither do the two hate each other on sight, nor do they become soulmates later on, though they get on well enough. They take each other's measure, and then Vash makes Picard really uncomfortable by asking Beverly to give her a tour through the ship. (As andrastewhite said re: School Reunion and the Sarah Jane and Rose talk about the Doctor's TARDIS love scene, never mind the missus and the ex arguing, the missus and the ex getting along and exchanging stories about you, that's every man's real nightmare.) Vash's encounter with Riker (and his really bad chat-up lines) gives us the interesting revelation that Picard isn't above doing little impressions/parodies of his Number One on vacation. What the Vash scenes before Q ever shows up also illustrate is both why Vash/Picard as a fling works and why it would never work as a long term relationship. Once Q does show up, of course, the whole scene becomes a gold mine for anyone interested in subtext. And honestly, I'm not sure how you can interpret lines like "she's found a vulnerability in you I've been looking for for years" or "if I had known sooner, I'd have shown up as a woman", not to mention Picard admitting in the final scene that Vash and Q are very similar, sans slash googles. Mind you, in a recent story by alara_r I really liked that Picard gets to observe, re: the last line, that this was stupid, that if Q had shown up as a woman and behaved in exactly the same way he did at Farpoint, it would not have made any difference. IMO the reason why Picard is willing to get intimate (to a degree) with Vash while Q in this episode gets a "I don't want your advice, your presents, or for that matter, you!" outburst isn't a question of gender or trust (he's not surprised when he finds out that Vash's main reason for coming to the Enterprise is that she plans on an illegal digging), but the fact that Vash doesn't have superpowers, which means there is no question of powerplay or control in the relationship. Arguments with Vash don't lead to the whole crew getting endangered. (Well, in this episode they do, but that's not Vash's fault but due to the fact Q doesn't like to hear "I don't want you" any more than he did in Q-Who?. Though the Robin Hood scenario is positively benign when compared to being flung into Borg space, despite entailing some nasty moments. A question for fanfic is whether Q would have let the executions carried out if Riker & Co. hadn't staged a classic rescue.)

Lastly: early on, when Picard says he has to work on his speech for the archaeology conference, and Q retorts "yes, I've read it; it's dull, plodding and pedantic, much like yourself", you see this gets to Picard in a way all of Q's usual sneers about the inferiority of humanity don't. Moral: if you really want to undermine a Starfleet Captain's confidence, tell him he's bad at his most cherished hobby.





Back when True Q was broadcast, I read a scatching review that summed it up as "Mary Sue on board the Enterprise". While I can see where the idea comes from - young woman gets to intern on the Enterprise, turns out to be a Q - I don't think Amanda qualifies as a Sue, and that's leaving out my increasing irritation with the designation through the years. She crushes on Riker, but he most definitely doesn't take her serious in this regard. She saves the day, but this means she has to give up what she wanted from life. Which isn't to say True Q is actually a good episode. It's a bit meandering and doesn't appear to know what it wants. A counterpoint to Hide and Q (where Riker had ultimately refused to become a Q)? But Amanda's choices are limited, and it's not like she has a genuine alternative if she doesn't want to let people die; also, she's a one shot character, not a regular. Some kind of coming of age story? An attempt to, after the last comedy outing, emphasize the darker side of Q again, given that one of the alternatives is for him to kill Amanda? Not really done in a convincing way, as he takes that back and alters the choice for Amanda quite quickly. It's also the only episode with Q in it where he's really not there because of humanity and/or Picard, but because of a character the audience has never met before.

All this being said, the episode remains watchable. Beverly-as-mentor is a rare opportunity to watch her act maternally (which she doesn't get to do with Wesley much), and the Q-Picard encounters aren't just quotable as usual but contain one great twist-of-audience-expectations moment; after being informed death is in the cards for Amanda, Picard launches into a scathing speech about the Qs arrogance in judging people and the virtues of humanity in their flawed, non-super state. It's a good one, by itself. And if you're watching it the first time, you probably think this is going to play out as when Picard did this at Farpoint, or during their second encounter. But what happens instead is that once he's finished, Q says fondly and very amused: "Jean-Luc, sometimes I think the only reason I come here is to listen to those wonderful speeches of yours." Which at once undercuts the pathos and cliché.



Tapestry is an episode which I love despite finding one of the central plot points questionable, i.e. the idea that Picard's character as we know it really was that dependent on his early brush with death. A frienid of mine once critisized it as saying that bar brawls are good for you, and restraint is not, and while I think what Ron Moore was going for is more that Picard says to Riker in the final scene, that we're the sum of our experiences and mistakes, it's a possible interpretation of the episode as written. Speaking of the final scene, it's also an attempt at ambiguity in that it leaves it open whether it was a genuine experience with Q or whether Picard's subconscious made it all up while Beverly was trying to revive him, but I don't know a single viewer who didn't believe that this was really Q, not a fragment from Picard's imagination, so said attempt at ambiguity falls flat.

Now, how do I love Tapestry anyway, let me count the ways. As mentioned in an earlier post, the "Welcome to the afterlife, Jean-Luc. You're dead, and I'm God" /"You're not God, because I refuse to believe the afterlife is run by you. The universe is not that badly designed!" scene never fails to cheer me up. What struck me upon rewatching, though, was that for all its witty dialogue, it gets vicious pretty soon because Q summoning up the late Maurice Picard to tell Jean-Luc he's a disappointment and a failure is definitely not played for laughs. It's noticable that you see this affecting Picard, but at this point he still manages not to interact with the illusion; he just asks Q to take it away. And then we get the infamous bar brawl with the Nausicaan resulting in young Picard getting stabbed through the heart, which is something first referenced all the way back in season 2. (Tapestry is a season 6 episode.) At which point two tings happen: a) Picard makes the classic trickster story mistake of expressing a wish - which isn't "I wish this had not happened to me" but "I wish I had been different back then", and of course this means he gets his wish fulfilled in a way he does not want, and b) Picard starts to relax enough around Q to confide in him. Which doesn't mean all defensiveness is gone, let alone the exchange or sarcasms, but he opens up to a remarkable degree. Partly because of pragmatism, I suppose - Q is holding all the cards here and can get him in and out of this visit to the past - but partly there is by now a certain degree of trust. As evidenced that when he makes Q promise that no one but Picard himself will be affected by this whole thing, he actually believes Q will keep his word. Definitely not something that would have happened around Q-Who?.

(In the Voyager episode Death Wish, Janeway says, quoting Q's resumé from her Starfleet briefings, "you've been many things, a game-playing sadist and a bully, and oh, you introduced us to the Borg, thanks ever so much, but one thing you've never been is a liar" (Hence her trusting his word if he gives it.) And if you think about it, that's true. Q never lied to Picard.)

The authorial handwaving of for "we didn't want some young stranger to play Picard in this episode but wanted Patrick to do it" amuses me each time Picard points out he doesn't look like a young cadet and Q says airily "well, to everyone else you do". It makes for some eerie visuals with his two friends, Corin Zweller and Marta Batanides, though. While I very much suspect that the whole subplot with Marta is just an excuse for Ron Moore to get the morning after scene with Q and Picard sharing a bed, what happens here actually works with Picard's hang up on why he, until Attached, never lets his relationship with Bevery get non-platonic (in addition to feeling guilty due to having had feelings for her while Jack Crusher was still alive, I mean). If deciding to have sex with a friend after all immediately leads to the friend deciding that was a big mistake and being depressed about the friendship, you're bound to draw lessons from that.

As for the morning after scene in question: sums up the episode, in a way: Q pretends to be someone he's not, Picard gets defensive, and then Picard relaxes (in Q-Pid, in a similar situation, he got out of bed at once; here he just continues the conversation where he is) and barbed confidences ensue.

Lastly, in the final scene, when we're back on the Enterprise, we have Picard interpreting Q's motive for the whole event - if it was Q - in a positive way, which has to be a first and startles Riker, who takes exception to the term "compassion" and is all "say what? It sounds like he dragged you through hell!" The audience is bound to draw their own conclusions; imo the whole scenario did have some cruelty to it but it settled some of Picard's regrets about his youth, made him more accepting of himself... and of course it's anyone's guess whether it even saved his life, or whether Bevery did. In short, roses from superbeings (and Q actually does deliver literal flowers at one point in this episode) come with thorns, but they are roses.



I tried to be objective this time, I swear. But All Good Things... still makes me swoon as pretty much an ideal example of what a series finale should be. (To wit: one more time present the virtues, themes and quintessential elements of the show in question, provide some kind of emotional resolution, make sense in context with the rest of the show and make us happy we've watched this far.) All Good Things... manages to be both an ensemble story, where no character gets neglected, and a Picard character story; it uses that old Star Trek stalwart, time travel (hey, it's a Ron Moore/Brannon Braga script, so of course there is time travel), in an innovative way that both services the plot and provides character exploration; it manages to use the anything but stellar pilot, Encounter at Farpoint (which I avoided rewatching this time around because I recalled the first rewatching made me cringe, knowing what the show becomes capable of later), and its premises in an excellent way, and it really leaves you on an emotional high note that does not feel enforced or faked.

Thoughts this time around: I had forgotten Picard repeatedly gets referred to as a former Ambassador. Which fits the new canon of the STXI prequel Countdown, where he's the Federation Ambassador on Vulcan, and made me notice something - Archer, Kirk, Janeway (and Riker, but he never was the lead) all end up as Admirals (though Kirk of course does the promotion/demotion thing afterwards). Sisko probably would have too, if he hadn't become a God Prophet instead. Picard is the only starship captain who in looks at his future didn't do the Admiral thing but evidently left Starfleet and became an ambassador instead, and you know, it fits. I can't imagine any of the others doing it, they wouldn't enjoy it (not that Kirk enjoyed being Admiral, either, but the idea of Ambassador Kirk invites hilarious horror scenarios). Picard? So would.

Only once you've watched this several times do you realise how clever the writers handled the problem of not wanting to neglect any of the cast, despite having to use the addendum of two old faces - O'Brien and Tasha Yar - and Q as a guest star as well. Each of the three time periods allows for different emphasis. Crusher, Riker and Geordi aren't in the Farpoint era, but Troi and Worf are (as are Tasha Yar and O'Brien, and man, I always get wobbly at the sight of O'Brien back on the Enterprise instead of on the station; by removing Geordi who is still on Farpoint station, the script even has a good excuse for letting him handle the engineer stuff). Troi is dead in the future era, but Geordi and Beverly Crusher feature prominently, and on lesser scale Riker and Worf. The only one other than Picard who is in all three time periods is Data, and the script uses this to highlight the development Data had through the show from the android who takes everything literally through end of TNG data who is quite adjusted to the ways of humans to future Data who says about his housekeeper "she makes me laugh". We get relationships in motion - in the present era, after talking about his possible Iromatic Syndrome, Picard and Crusher kiss, and it's a kiss somewhere between friendship and love; in the future, they're a divorced couple who is still affectionate but evidently concluded they can't really live with each other. Similarly, in the present Riker gets surprised by the Worf/Troi news; in the future, he confides to the rest of his friends that he always expected to get together again with Deanna, and we can see this and her death has led to an ongoing enstragement with Worf. The relationship most shown in motion is Picard/crew; in the Farpoint era, they're not just literal strangers but he's remote and cyptic towards them; in the present, he has learned to open up emotionally (not just to particular member, to all of them, hence him first having relevant scenes with them individually and then the final scene); in the future, he is not able to control his temper the way he did anymore, and being the oldest and the only one without a current job, he's the most powerless among them, but he trusts them unconditionally and they come through for him big time.

Unexpected moment of heartache among the expected ones: Andreas Katsulas' cameo as sardonic Romulan commander Tomalak. This has nothing to do with his role on TNG, but he was the one and only G'Kar on Babylon 5, and oddly enough seeing him in a different make-up and hearing his voice brought the reality of his death home again.

Of relevance in lieu of current ST events: the three time periods exist parallel, not as a direct continuation of each other, as evidenced by the fact that the way Troi remembers Picard's arrival on the Enterprise is not the way Picard has just experienced it; her memories did not change when the new rebooted altered Farpoint era events took place; similarly, nobody in the future remembers Picard telling them all this happened in the present era, despite of him doing so at the end of the episode. Picard is the only one both shifting between all three time lines and retaining memories of it both during and after the events.

Where Tapestry comes in handy: in order for the audience to understand why Picard suspects Q isn't just messing with him again, or only interested in carrying out the non-existence order from the Continuum, but could actually be trying to help him. Which everyone but Data is sceptical about, and then Data comes up with the immortal line: "You could be right, Sir. Q has always had an interest in you, similarly to that of a master for his beloved pet." (And gets a look from Picard.)

(In the summer after the series finale was first broadcast, I for the first time noticed a difference between American and European audiences when reading protest letters in the relevant magazines about the scene where Q shows Picard the beginning of life on Earth (i.e. the coming together of some amino acids, or rather the lack of same). This was basic geography and biology lessons stuff from school - over here. I hadn't been aware that in some states, it would be seen as an attack on religion.)

Since I complained about the non-use of Beverly elsewhere: her future era scenes as captain of the Pasteur are great, as is the fact she doesn't let Picard undercut her authority, no matter how inadvertendly, and gets an apology from him on that.

Q, summing up TNG from the hostile pov: "For seven years I've watched you worry about Riker's career, listen to Troi's pedantic psycho babble and aid Data in his witless quest for humanity." You have to admire the confidence of an episode which knows the citicism and has it voiced because it simultanously knows it's good enough to refute it. Oh, and we get Moore's tendency for fourth wall breaking again when Q talks about "your trek to the stars".

The three Enterprises from three different eras saving the day is still a great image, despite special effects being more sophisticated today, because of the emotional resonance. And then of course, after one more Q and Picard interlude, we get the very final scene, the poker game, which I just want to draw sparkly hearts around because it sums up the show so perfectly and lets us leave Our Heroes both in a state of emotional resolution and on the brink of a new adventure, which is ST optimism at its best. Yes indeed: "The sky is the limit."

Comments

[siljamus]

I just wanted to let you know that I'm really enjoying these re-watch write up of yours. I don't find myself with a whole lot to add... Just really enjoying reading some quality analysis written from a place of love. Thank you.

[selenak]

You're very welcome, and I'm glad you've continued reading the reviews!