A visiting reporter on the Cerritos puts Captain Freeman on edge. 

This one has quite the deep cut that surely only the biggest TNG fans will recall. Remember Season 1 episode Symbiosis where Picard mediates a trade dispute between two neighbouring planets, one of which is the sole supplier of a drug to treat the other’s apparently fatal disease? We return to the planet Ornara years later, where the locals have had to go through cold turkey once their drug supply was cut off.

It’s the background to Captain Freeman’s ‘Project Swing by’ which lets California class ships make second contact visits to worlds, with Ornara first on the list. This momentous occasion is being covered by a reporter, and understandably Freeman wants everything to look as good as possible. But when they visit the planet, no assistance is required, and of far more interest is the feedback from the crew as to what life is really like on the Cerritos.

A list of complaints and observations on poor behaviour is fed back to the Captain, and because her daughter Mariner was last spotted talking to the reporter, you can guess who gets the blame. And because that would be far too easy an explanation, there’s more going on here then meets the eye… but not much more. In fact, it’s very much a one-note story designed to get someone off the ship. It’s fine, but as a story it’s incomplete, leading in to next week’s finale.

Verdict: A middle tier episode that on its own feels like it needs a bit more going on. 5/10

Nick Joy