Cerritos continues closing holes in space and encounters a purple Enterprise which they send back to its original universe – minus Data’s head. Shades of the Next Generation episode, they discover his head while reconnoitering a crash site on a pre-warp planet to ensure no evidence of the Enterprise was left behind to contaminate the culture. Plus, time on the planet passes way faster than off.

Yes, Brent Spiner voices Data, which is a delight.

Trying something new is always commendable and generally should be encouraged. In this episode, alas, the experimentation fails and we get the worst episode of the season. The unfortunate tone of this episode is different from any other I recall. Hopefully it’s not one they’ll repeat.

It kicks off with another incident involving the season-long arc about the inter-universe fissures they keep closing. This time, Mariner neglects to repeat her observation that the holes are artificially created, but I still surmise that the show is building toward the finale only three episodes away. Perhaps after planting that seed – in the Klingon farming episode, no less – the writers want to be more coy/subtle about it until the big reveal.

There’s a (fine?) line between embodying contradictions and acting out of character. In this installment, we get a whole lot of the latter. Tendi and T’Lyn are both up for the Chief Science Officer position and we suddenly see Tendi getting uncharacteristically hostile toward T’Lyn. One good note: T’Lyn is perfectly in-character in desiring camaraderie and not knowing exactly how to go about achieving it. But Tendi is off-key and grows more so due to self-inflicted sleep deprivation.

Boimler and Rutherford cross the line from silly/whimsical to stupid, which neither normally is. Boimler’s preoccupation with facial hair continues, and Rutherford – apparently catching the same bug – now sports a full, albeit short, beard as well. Boimler has also found an irresistible drink recipe on his contraband padd from his alternate-universe counterpart and brought cocktails to the transporter room.

Thanks to Dr. T’Ana, the away team members now look like orange-skinned Andorians. Mariner labels their assignment an undercover “Girl Mission” which makes it sound like there should be something unusual or noteworthy about a team just happening to consist only of women. Before beaming them down, Boimler promises he’ll beam them up in, from his perspective, literally a couple seconds because that will give them a couple weeks to accomplish their job planetside.

Naturally Boimler and Rutherford spill their drinks all over the transporter console. It promptly short circuits and becomes nonfunctional. Which begs several questions. Why can’t they simply go to any other transporter room on the ship? Why can they find/get nothing better than their uniform tops to wipe up the mess? And why does that inexplicably not work? Even if the material doesn’t absorb the spill, it should at least swipe it off the surface. But it doesn’t, leaving them to lick away the remnants of the drink. (Huh??) Bad calls all around.

This delay gives Mariner, T’Lyn and Tendi nearly a year on the planet. Mariner regresses to loose-cannon Mariner and gets arrested several times while trying to emulate Picard’s “Inner Light” experience. Tendi really wants the Science Officer job and feels incredibly competitive toward T’Lyn. The Orion does manage to reactivate Data’s head, which makes for some amusement. Meanwhile T’Lyn only wants to deepen her friendship with the others and is wildly successful at agriculture, windmills, and hair care products – the last of which is particularly funny.

What aren’t funny: the double entendres that add nothing to the show and actually detract from it. They are jarring and don’t match the tone of the rest of the episode or the series overall even if the title does warn us what’s coming.

Captain Freeman continues to act like a captain, and a good one, which is a welcome contrast to everyone else at the moment. She also decides, after a discussion with Data and pondering his input, to appoint both T’Lyn and Tendi as Science Officer because they are an excellent team, which is also good.

Verdict: On the heels of one of the strongest episodes, we get the weakest. 5/10

Rigel Ailur

http://www.BluetrixBooks.com