I was a monster at work this year. When we finish this next cycle I might do some math for the sake of concrete evidence, but the ratio of editorial that I worked on (I mean wrote or edited from raw copy, not proofed, since four of us proofread everything each month) to total editorial was kind of preposterous. Perhaps that'll decline a bit this year - couldn't say as I'd be sorry - but I'm pretty pleased with my output overall and the contribution that I did make. Excelsior!

-Z

3-16 "The Offspring"

New advances in positronic mapping (or whatever) give Data the opportunity to realize a long-nurtured dream: building a robot buddy and fighting crime! No, of course not, this is the terribly earnest "Data builds a daughter, learns about stuff" episode. It's a really good concept - even if less than 1% of the audience believes that Lal will still be on board next week rather than be botnapped by Starfleet or suffer a fatal hemorrhage of the spastic Star Trek robot brain, the episode isn't about her, it's about how everyone reacts to her.

Data (VO): And it is interesting to note that as I observe Lal learning about her world, I share her experience, almost as though I am learning things over again.
Audience (off): Juh-duhhhh!

I appreciate their unforced lip service toward the idea that Lal is choosing his/her gender and also species, even if Troi's blase "A friend for Worf" when seeing the "Klingon male" is one of the most asinine things I've ever heard, even from her. Because of course he would love a fresh-out-the-lab robot pretending to be Klingon even more than he already loves the famous original wonderbot. Troi's casual, cheerful acceptance of the idea is characteristic of most of the staff - Deanna, Guinan, Wesley and Beverly are all supportive and pleasantly intrigued by the idea. (Worf isn't in this episode, Riker has all of one scene in which Lal freaks him smooth out, and Geordi (you know, Data's best friend in the world) gets straight-up mugged for screen time this week. I think he'd be pleased?) The exception? Jean-Luc "This Is Going Pear-Shaped Before My Very Eyes" Picard, who is somehow the only person on board who gets instantly what a huge goddamned deal robot procreation might actually be.

Except, I suspect, for Data himself - the "my programming does not allow me to feel 'proud'" android papa seems just a shade too innocently persistent in his ongoing attempts to get Starfleet to define its position and refute their arguments in seeming confusion at the inherent double standards. And since Picard is almost always the Atticus Finch of the future, it's pretty awesome to watch him in the early stages of the proceedings as he grinds his teeth through the "Yes, of course you have rights, I just wish you'd stop trying to exercise them" compulsories.

Then Admiral Grumpford rolls up to be the snotty obstructionist villain, so Picard is able to resume his customary firebrand for justice role and the episode loses whatever interest it had generated. They even blow past the question I initially thought they were aiming for: Starfleet's fall-back "She's coming with us, see? Nyah!" argument is that the galaxy's two (known) extant sentient androids shouldn't be in the same place anyway in case the ship blows up - an argument that gets ignored in favor of another appeal to emotional maundering about the importance of parenting, when I for one would have liked to hear Haftel's response to a deadpan "Perhaps you are correct. I will begin building another 50 immediately." The antagonist is won over by exposure to the crew's gee-whizzery (drink!) but it doesn't matter since Data Jr. dies of it being almost the end of the episode, and everyone goes back to what they were doing. And credits.

There are some nice character touches here and there, but despite not having a ton of plot it feels very rushed: some crew reaction beyond "Neat!" would have added some depth; Picard announces he's going to fight Starfleet all the way to the Ultimate Court but not only are there no consequences to his career, there's no battle - he doesn't even finish his declaration of righteousness before Lal's brain cloud kicks in.

Plus, much of the episode depends on the title character, and big chunks of her scripting and intentionally wooden delivery just fall flat for me; plus any genuinely good work she and Spiner do (like the scene in their quarters when they discuss trying to be a better conscious being for its own sake) is more than offset by the grossly overbearing "now you feel amused! NOW YOU ARE SAD!" score and her aphasic death scene. Overall, they did better in "Measure of a Man" and will do better again (if I remember right) in "Data's Day."

By the way: "[badoop] Doctor Crusher to Ensign Crusher - aren't you supposed to be getting a haircut, Wesley?" Wow. So many things are wrong with that scenario.

3-17 "Sins of the Father”
Remember “The Emissary”? Been a while since we had a Klingon episode, hain’t it? And of course this one opens the door to the entire rest of that civilization’s (technically speaking) arc, enabling the finale to season four and in turn Sela, Kahless, an unsatisfying B-plot in Generations and much of the back half of DS9, comprising many, many rich and wonderful moments and also the stupid Romulan prison planet of Birthright II. The problem, as VS and Dave have expounded upon at length, is that Klingon society as presented to us doesn’t make a damn bit of sense – a “warrior civilization” in which virtually every person spends every minute of every day chest-thumping belligerently or toasting one another’s heroic meatheadery could not possibly be one of the quadrant’s major players, given that any scientist, even one whose Power Point presentations started with “Awesome Military Applications” before even naming the product (which would, natch, be named something like the HonorStorm BloodVictory Violence Grakkh Billion), will almost certainly be shot or stabbed or ritually eaten on suspicion of being a pussy. Just to be safe. You kinda have to just swallow hard and mutter something about “ruling caste of testosterites but also richly developed system of merchants and scholars and craftsmen who happen never to be on camera” and try to enjoy what you get. Which, currently, involves…

…Tony “Woooooooooooo!” Todd as Commander Kurn, continuing the ill-defined Klingon Exchange Program by rolling up to the Enterprise to fill its #2 slot while Riker stands around watching (this makes even less sense than the previous iterations of the program, but at least there are no Benzites) and making up for the ship’s relative lack of slave-driving martinets who, while deliberately civil and correct, might decide to reinstitute flogging at any minute. Before he even says a word, Kurn pivots his entire frame so that he can face Riker directly, the better to pronounce “You are relieved” and immediately pivot back to face Picard. He’s dismissive and deliberately provocative from the word “baKhp!” (or whatever) and he spends the first act stomping around doing some just-passable fish out of water comedy [Sidebar: Of course Picard carries a few cases of prime Caspian Sea caviar for special occasions. Ofcourse he does] and climbing up everybody’s back – except for, notably, Worf, whom he treats with honeyed and hilarious condescension (watch the senior staff at the captain’s dinner display their expertise in Not Helping) until finally revealing that he’s deliberately testing Worf’s spine before deciding whether or not to bring him inside: Kurn is secretly the younger son of Mogh, who has just been formally declared a traitor to the Empire as a collaborator for aiding the Romulans during the Khitomer massacre – meaning Worf and the next six generations will be officially dishonored unless he challenges the verdict, which will result either in exoneration or death.

Heavy.

Worf immediately throws down the space gauntlet (seriously, no pause to consider at all), taking Kurn as his second but commanding him to keep his parentage secret (one wonders how thoroughly that information could be suppressed for a fairly high-ranking military officer, but it turns out later that it’s not entirely a secret anyway) and accepting a lift from Picard, who insists on taking the ship along to Q’onos, where the highest echelons of government spend the day standing around in the dark waiting for an excuse to bloviate wheezily about honor. (I rather like K’mpec, but come on.) Our heroes then split up: while the crew consults the space books and Worf gets quietly encouraged to scarper, Kurn is waylaid and nonfatally shanked. So now Worf needs a new second – William Riker’s time to shine, right? Nope. Aware that shenanigans are afoot, Worf picks not his beefy bro but his strategic thinker of a captain.

Thanks to the crew’s research and Picard’s quick-witted tenacity, it is privately revealed that the Klingons recently discovered the traitor’s identity, but it was the father of influential council member Duras – so they agreed to blame Mogh, whose only son (as far as the council knew) was in Starfleet and had no reason to care. Now they’re in a jam, since they need the powerful Duras family’s support but having the Feds blow the whistle could be disastrous for everybody… so Worf steps up and agrees to be ritually dishonored in exchange for the Empire’s stability, his life, and his brother’s uncompromised identity. Because in the final analysis, he is – as is often commented – the Klingon we know who actually does care about the big abstract nouns, and is in certain ways the best example of the civilization he so rarely encounters.

3-18 “Allegiance”
That, mes amis, is a great goddamn teaser. In a shade over two minutes, the captain is beamed out of his quarters into a mysterious holding pen (four beds, two other silent occupants, no cell reception) and replaced with a doppelganger who acts as though nothing’s amiss – and there’s even time for an exposition gun that’ll go off in Act IV.

The Cell
JP meets his cellmates – a sulky milquetoast philosopher, a fluttery Starfleet cadet, a bellicose space demon biker – and sets about trying to figure out how to escape and what their unseen captors’ deal might be while trying to preserve a fragile peace among the captives.

The Ship
JP blows off the scheduled mission in order to fly the ship very slowly into a pulsar while crashing the senior staff poker game, macking suavely (and successfully) on Beverly, earning this episode a million space points by leading Ten Forward in a chorus of ”Heart of Oak” and cheerfully insisting to his progressively more skeeved out crew that everything’s totally chill and by the way are my orders upsetting you at all hmmm?

The episode cuts back and forth between stories, managing to build a little tension in both although far more on the ship, where Riker calls a senior staff meeting to compare notes on the captain and then, in a beautifully shot pair of scenes, warns Picard privately that he will remove him if need be and then does mutiny once everybody hears Data object that Picard’s last order will destroy the ship. Riker belays the order, Picard tells Worf to remove the commander, Worf deliberately settles into parade rest and Riker moves the ship to safety. Meanwhile, Picard does a quick drawing room scene fingering Ensign Dingus as the plant based on her inexplicable knowledge of classified info from the teaser. The aliens reveal themselves and smugly explain that their own superiority prevents them from understanding stupid loser concepts like authority and morality, so they’re experimenting on lesser beings; though of course they’ll have to get fresh subjects now that these have been compromised… and our heroes trap them in a force field after exchanging a series of meaningful looks and casual boops on various panels (I’m unconvinced of the utility of a containment field which requires inputs from three separate bridge stations, but maybe it’s the Dramatic Reversal Array). Picard, lounging angrily in his chair, does a little fronting and releases them, they disappear, and the episode ends with the Sprightly Tootles of Unintended Romantic Entanglements (stupid tootles). It’s a skillfully done episode, and though it doesn’t do any of the universe-building of the last one or have lasting character implications like the one before it’s solid midseason filler with enough nice touches to make it thoroughly worthwhile.

3-19 “Captain’s Holiday”
From the “art imitates life” file: on TV, as in fact, the validity of someone else’s plans for recreation is a direct function of how entertaining those plans would be for the listener. It’s too damn bad if the captain genuinely would be spiritually refreshed by attending an astrophysics conference; Bev and Riker think that sounds boring, so off to the sexy beach he must be sent. [Sidebar: Bill’s jovial determination to badger his captain into taking a vacation is a bit endearing; his manic, inexorable glee at the prospect of getting his captain laid is… well, I don’t know what to make of that.] There’s a lot of “woop woop woop!” comedy stylin’s in the first couple of acts as Picard grumps around Space Club Med trying to read Ulysses while being hit on by various lovelies (the “Get Up on This” statue Riker duped him into buying is actually pretty amusing), and then the rest of the episode he basically stars in “The Old Indiana Jones Chronicles” – deciphering maps, searching scenic wildernesses for legendary treasure, dodging and duping and punching rival fortune hunters, grouchily flirting with Marion (Vash)… it has no B-plot or other crewmembers (which doesn’t leave much to recap), and it really isn’t what you’d consider Star Trek, but it’s surprisingly fun nonetheless in the vein of cheery, cheesy fluff that should leave the viewer smiling (and Riker on KP duty for a couple of weeks). Your mileage may vary if you don’t like Jennifer Hetrick; I really enjoyed her, here and in the terminally silly “Qpid” – she’s my favorite of Jean-Luc’s various paramours.

3-20 “Tin Man”
Ten minutes in, Picard thoughtfully provides this recap of events in progress:

“Then… it’s a race. An alien intelligence, a new life form representing a technology far beyond either the Romulans or ourselves. The Romulans will certainly take whatever measures are required to secure this creature for study.”

Except an organic life form isn’t technology; if, say, your tribe and the next tribe over both found out about a single elephant that was about to fall off a cliff, would you commit yourself to a deadly race against time in the hopes of being able to capture and ride the elephant?

It’s not fair to hold it against this episode that the “living ship” thing made way more sense on “Farscape,” since that show came later, but I’m not convinced it makes a good McGuffin here – like a number of its kindred plot movers it’s believable as a desirable object for the science nerds of Starfleet but not really for anyone else.

Of course, most of the episode is about Harry Groener being the latest representative of the Federation’s crack team of uniquely qualified specialists who are also pissy, irritable douches. I can certainly be brought to sympathize with the idea of someone who was fully telepathic from birth having trouble adjusting to life among sentient beings, but I would think that before reaching middle age you would have broken yourself of the habit of interrupting people in order to complete their sentences for them.

About the only compliment I can pay this week’s installment goes to Data seeking reassurance about his sentience from the super-telepath – his sidelong glance and elaborately casual supposition that Tam can’t read his mind because “perhaps there is nothing to read; nothing more than mechanisms and algorithmic responses” is pretty endearing.

In the end, the Romulans are either destroyed or repulsed [Sidebar: if your episode could replace its Romulans with any other race down to the Ferengi without altering the plot at all, perhaps you shouldn’t be using the Romulans], the Enterprise is returned to normal and weird ship and guest star disappear, hopefully forever so we don’t have to waste any more time looking at them.

After a fairly solid weekend of swapping CDs in and out, I have the Thunder Child back up to almost 1900 tracks. That includes various archives going back to my second ever computer, all the way back to the Couch era (pre-Tarman) - and does not include anything by Guns N' Roses, Motley Crue or REM. A deal's a deal.

I am frankly a little nervous about tomorrow: our entire production staff, including several longtime contributors, is meeting for breakfast (which sounds like a really fun idea) but also a pitch meeting. I've never been to one of those - I wasn't inside on the big consolidation plan - so I have no baseline to know what to expect, and I'm by nature more inclined to be reactive; I don't really spend time thinking about what we the office could/should be doing differently, you know? And I'm afraid that if there's like a roundtable litany of people sharing their visions for future avenues of editorial development, I'm going to be the guy who swallows uncomfortably a couple of times and says, "This canteloupe is really juicy."

-Z

There are apparently shenanigans afoot at station KINB - something about it not technically being "The Spy" anymore because what used to be that station has been forced to go online only for some (probably financial) reason - but whatever's been playing at 105.3 FM, I like it. I still have an abysmal identification percentage on their playlist, but the occasional strike is utterly thrilling: Spoon's "The Underdog"? The Hives' magnum opus "Walk Idiot Walk"? Fucking "Not If You Were the Last Junkie on Earth" by The Dandy Warhols? I had forgotten that song even existed! Nobody wants to be caught supporting The Man at the expense of the little guys whose dedication and energy made the station happen in the first place, especially if in so doing you also identify as the come-lately who doesn't remember X back when it was really cool.

On the other hand, they played "Italian Leather Sofa"! I'm not made of stone!

-Z

Why yes, I would love some Fiesta Bowl. Hit it!

So guess who had a total of five posts in 2010, the last being in goddamn June, and who also has two thumbs? This guy! I won't swear that's going to change instanter and permanently, since nobody likes reading posts consisting solely of apologies about not posting more often (cf. Rob and Elliot) - but I genuinely enjoy reading back through this mini-archive, so I'll say hi to futureSteve and thank you all (if any) for your continued attention (if any).

Bam! That's how you like to see it - Landry 6-for-6 and a TD right in the chops. That drive might be more demoralizing for the UConn defense than a single 75-yard bomb, because you can't mentally write it off as a single mistake; you just got worked repeatedly all the way down the field. 7-0 Sooners.

The Mechanic might not be good, but VS and I are damn sure going to be there. We both love Jason Statham, and frankly, we've been looking for an excuse for cheese fries and beer at the Warren. If this new movie hadn't been announced, we might have slunk (slinked?) in for Season of the Witch.

Uh. Nice stop, but it shouldn't have come to that. Quinton should have drawn a flag for interference.

By the way, if you're keeping score, I believe that Kansas State got straight-up mugged at the end of the Pinstripe Bowl. I had a conversation at work the next day with a guy who thought it was sad but justified based on the rules, which only makes me think that it's a shitty rule that's been inconsistently enforced throughout the season, and that if the exact same scenario had played out in the first half rather than the last two minutes it wouldn't have been flagged at all. I believe the officials were, consciously or not, expecting something excessive from the player headed for the end zone, and pulled the flags as soon as he twitched - Hillborn's salute wasn't insulting or self-aggrandizing, it was a reaction to doing something great at a clutch moment. Punishing him for it when similar and more effusive celebrations draw no responses or warnings seems cheap at best.

Nice adjustment by DeMarco to bounce outside for the short score. Landry is still perfect, and it's 14-0.

And now it's not. David Ubben on ESPN's Big 12 blog said a couple of days ago that OU's biggest threat wouldn't be Todman or their own lack of intensity, but turnovers - that the Sooners *would* win an error-free game, but might find a way to lose if they started helping UConn along the way. Let's please not make that happen, okay? 14-7.

Blogging on a laptop is especially convenient as it allows for more flexibility of position and location, but having a kitten sharing the couch with you has something of an opposite effect. Fortunately, Ace the Cat-Hound is keeping herself distracted at the moment by a clothespin. (She is the world's greatest detective who is also a 3-month old kitten.)

Should be more but Landry overthrew a wide-open Stills, and then the O-line stood down for a jump offsides... that didn't get called. Oops. Field goal makes it 17-7.

Ace was one of the biggest alterations to our household in 2010; she's been a very sweet kitty so far on balance. We got her from the Central OK Humane Society the week before Thanksgiving - they had a surprising number of young cats, including an orange tabby that we scored lower for being insufficiently feminine, an ocelot-looking critter that lost some points for climbing up onto my shoulder to perch and carving a chunk out of my neck when refusing to come down, and one older cat that we ruled ineligible for being a panther. We had looked a couple of times at the tiny gray-and-white tuxedo sharing a cage with her buff-colored brothers but were still vacillating when a pudgy ginger kid in glasses hauled her out to pet her and I suddenly found my nostrils flaring and had to restrain myself from yelling "Hey, get your damn hands off my cat!" So we signed some papers and got her microchipped, tried unsuccessfully to convince her that the world wasn't ending on the drive home and got her moved in. So far she's climbed the Christmas tree a couple of times, had her claws trimmed twice for free because the ladies at Petco think she's the cutest thing evar, and about doubled in size. Her last round of shots is set for Wednesday, after which she'll probably disown me for inflicting a vet visit on her. In the meantime, sometimes she is a rumblecat.

And the score is now 20-10 after a pair of field goals. That's halftime, with a closer score than is at all justified.

In other news, the lady of the house successfully submitted her completed tenure dossier (woot). I, meanwhile, closed out 2010 with continued employment, at six years and counting at the left hand of my beloved boss. We converted our five individual community magazines into one metro-wide publication, which is getting rave reviews from readers, and on the interpersonal tip her elder daughter (my favorite of the four) graduated and got an apartment, while the rest of the family just moved to a new (different, not freshly built) house in Prague, a 45-minute commute.

Aw, baby! I didn't mean earlier that long bombs to a wide-open Kenney aren't awesome; you know I love you! 27-10.

Make that 34-10, as the pick-sixes taketh away and then giveth back.

And bloody hell, would I like to get a patch thrown onto our kick coverage. Razzer-frackin' 34-17.

I'm also still employed despite the extra load of helping put together a coffee table book of photographs of Oklahoma children with their thoughts on life and the future - one of our occasional freelancers and a highly deft writer in her own right did the actual work, traveling thousands of miles to take the pictures and conduct interviews, but I put in more than a few hours coordinating her schedule, communicating with the parents of the kids and keeping track of the progress and lack thereof. It was a hell of a project - we didn't make our initial deadline for completion, but on the other hand it wound up being almost 300 pages instead of its original projected 200 - and I am both proud of the results and elated to have it in the rearview mirror.

Did you hear them say Broyles has puked three times on the sidelines in the second half and is still in there taking receptions over the middle? Damn, son. He's had a hell of a year, and I'm really really glad his contribution to this game won't be remembered as a long return that he fumbled but as this tiptoe TD snag - that was choice. 41-20.

ESPN is trying to segue into talking about the national championship, having apparently lost interest in this game that's happening now. I won't be liveblogging that matchup, but I'll probably watch, and right now I predict Oregon will win it - Auburn's been pretty consistent, but the Ducks are more explosive.

And why the hell wouldn't you close it out with another INT return off a deflected ball? Nice work, Tony Jefferson. 48-20.

It seems nicely fitting to finish the game by stuffing their star running back on 4th and goal - congrats to the 2010 Fiesta Bowl champion Sooners - 48-20 - and a hale and happy 2011 to all of you. Huzzah!

-Z

3-11 "The Hunted"
This is, in earnest truth, the fourth time I have watched this episode in an attempt to chronicle it. Four. I just can't come to grips with the damned thing for some reason.

If you're just in the mood to make "The Enterprise vs. Captain America," I suppose it's not the worst idea for a plot ever. Plus, if you make Space Steve Rogers a member of a team of super-soldiers who've been remanded to a gulag for being too dangerous, you can do a whole "what price victory?" morality play thing about war and its veterans. So far, so good, right?

I actually rather like the conversations between Troi and Data and Danar about his conditioning, and Jeff McCarthy does all right with some of his grimly sardonic dialogue. Picard doesn't get much screentime, but his poorly concealed disgust with James Cromwell and the situation is also good enough that I can almost overlook my lingering doubts about the copout ending. [Sidebar: "You did this to them, you're obligated to deal with it" is solid, but Picard's justification for simply leaving is his premise that the supers won't kill anybody if they're not provoked. That is a shitty, shitty basis for deciding that everything's okay now; a heavily armed segment of the population who won't shoot you as long as you do what they say seems... less than ideal. "You are dangerous; they are only victims" does not hold much water, since the end of that sentence is "who are currently aiming several guns at your head and are extremely upset." The government was wrong to exile them, and they had to take extreme measures to escape and gain a position from which negotiations were even possible. Got it. But how certain are you that they're all (however many of them there are) as idealistic and sincere in their desire to peacefully reintegrate into society as the only one you've seen, considering that one twitchy cop or a single exile who's not as gosh-darned wonderful as Danar will mean a riot by berserker metahuman killing machines? The Feds live in a super-wonderland of social equality; the flipside of that is a tendency toward smuggery when dealing with less advanced races, and saying "I have decided that you're bad people for not having fixed your society already; enjoy your military coup that will probably kill you all before we've left the system" seems a bridge too fucking far.]

Anyway, the primary problem is that there is, or should be, differentiation between "genetically enhanced badass" and "magic." Roga pilots a stolen vessel with cunning and craft? Excellent. Has technoblood that makes him invisible to sensors? Okay, Angosia seems fairly technologically advanced. Takes out a couple dozen Fed security guys? We've been trained to buy that. Sneaks around the ship hiding and blowing shit up? Golden. But it is straight-up inconceivable that this guy who has never seen a Federation starship can reprogram its systems faster than *Data* can compensate and figure out what he's doing. And whoever wrote the scene wherein Danar escapes the transporter beam unharmed by "shoving" should still be writhing in shame today.

It's not entirely terrible, but the bad parts are revoltingly bad, and it's a severe comedown from the show's recent dizzying excellence.

3-12 "The High Ground"
It's entirely terrible. Viewers' lists of the worst episodes ever tend to contain mostly camp or outright idiocy or both, but there should also be a special punitive remembrance for those episodes that are unpardonably boring, like "Force of Nature" and this stack of crap.

Beverly gets kidnapped while visiting Space Northern Ireland and preached at for like eleven years by the SIRA's wild-haired leader, who rules with an iron monotone and devastating charisn'tma, and presumably enforces his will under threat of unleashing his bottomless vortex of blandery upon his scrappy subjects. The rest of the cast sits around and moans about how Terrorism Is Bad. That's seriously about it. Except for the dumb bits: Seamus O'Finn spends his spare time sketching so Bev can get a mild case of Stockholm Syndrome, Worf gets shot on the bridge (again), Picard gets kidnapped off the bridge (again), the combined forces of law and order mount a rescue infiltration consisting of like three guys for no reason. [Sidebar: this is far from the only occurence, but it never fails to crack me up when some random guy from some random planet that isn't even part of the Federation cites centuries-old American historical figures in his conversations.] It's a leaden, thuddingly earnest episode designed to accomplish nothing but preach, and it isn't even good at that.

Oh, and earlier I said viewers' lists because writers have their own lists of terrible episodes: Ron Moore called this one an abomination.

3-13 "Deja Q"
Whee!
The ship is orbiting a planet of fish-faced guys who are all "boo hoo, our moon is about to fall out of the sky and kill us all!" (Majora's Mask reference [here]). But just as we're trying to get worked up into caring about that, John de Lancie appears and announces that he's been expelled from the Continuum and is now a human seeking sanctuary and an audience for his constant stream of vituperative verbal abuse. (I buy the later claim that his decision was motivated largely by hoping to scam protection off them, but I also believe that even if nothing in the galaxy was out to get him, he still would have shown up looking for attention.) The crew is largely skeptical ("What must I do to convince you people I'm mortal?" "Die.") but with Data's advocacy he pleads his way into a consulting position, which he uses to bitch and moan some more. Some of his old enemies attack the ship, whose crew defends him. Unwillingly moved by their sacrifice and also pissy because being alive is hard, Q steals a shuttlecraft and allows himself to be safely killed. This sorta-selfess (though eminently self-pitying) act nets him his powers back, and though the captain shoots down his idea for celebrating with blackjack and hookers, it's a happy ending for everyone - even Planet Fishhead, and nobody even cared about them to begin with.
I have the impression that there are people out there who don't like John de Lancie. That's the only thing I can think of that might cause you not to like this episode. It is admittedly broad in Corbin Bernsen - sorry, I mean "in spots," but I can't think of a funnier episode in the entire series.
Q: I think I just hurt my back. I'm feeling pain... I don't like it. What's the right thing to say, "ow?"
Geordi & Data: [exchange glances, shrug, in unison] "Ow."
Q: OW!
Plus, there are some nice moments contemplating how weird it would be to suddenly be mortal - sleeping would be pretty fucked up if you'd never done it before - and even genuine pathos as de Lancie nails the self-disgust at discovering what a weasel he is. Check his delivery of "It is a joke. A joke on me, the joke of the universe. The king who would be man." His motivation for suicide may be closer to petulance than nobility, but he was sincere, and that helps earn the cockiness of his triumphant mariachi-backed return to slightly-more-enlightened shenanigans. Great stuff.

3-14 "A Matter of Perspective"
Jaysis. A space lab blows right the hell up and kills the resident mad scientist just as Riker (who was leading an unscheduled checkup on Dr. Splodey) beams back to the Enterprise, leaving him safe and sound and on trial... FOR MURDER! Well, not really, because the instant it is suggested that someone on the planet might have questions about the death of a brilliant scientist, destruction of property, loss of research, etc., Riker dials himself up to HOW DARE THEY?!@?? and breaks off the knob, and when Chief Kragg beams up to arrest him, Picard establishes that Planet Wherever places the burden of proof on the accused and then insists on holding an extradition hearing on the ship. Which makes a kind of sense - if their idea of due process is asking the accused "What rhymes with 'bilty?'" and then calling that a confession, our guys can always just fly away - but it does make you wonder how what transpires differs from the actual trial the Whateverans would immediately have again planetside, as well as why it's necessary to recreate with such fidelity everyone's testimony via the holodeck as opposed to taking statements in the conference room.

Answer? It's a Rashomon show.
Riker: Why would she lie like that? She was lying; you could tell.
Troi: Will, I didn't sense any... deception.
Riker: Then you think that I-
Troi: No, no, of course not, I know you, you don't have to convince me of anything.
Riker: We can't both be telling the truth!
Troi: It is the truth... as each of you remembers it.

Ta da - time-honored storytelling device about the fallibility of eyewitnesses and the malleability of impressions. Except that this isn't "Bad Blood," where Scully might or might not have been moony-eyed about Luke Wilson, or "Tall Tales," questioning Dean's slovenliness v. Sam's overblown sympathy, or even "Catherine Moves On," in which no one but Matthew saw the carafe-smashing Hamburglar. The exchange above about the nature of truth happened in response to Dr. Splodey's widow accusing Riker of attempted rape and battery *like two days ago.* They're taking about events, not impressions open to interpretation, the versions we were shown are sufficiently disparate that there is no way both narrators could be honestly mistaken, and it's insulting to be told otherwise.

The assistant's deposition is secondhand, so I'm okay with its idiocy, and I actually like that we the audience know Riker didn't shoot the reactor because his hands were empty when he materialized on the ship, but they've established that an energy beam came from Riker's location so they have to find an explanation for it. Once Picard starts unfolding the drawing room scene, the recreations of the transpirings and Splodey's nefariousness isn't bad, even if Kragg's instant unquestioning acceptance of what he's shown by the Federation computer is a little pat. But despite the title and all the havering about viewpoints, the episode's conceit is a failure, because there is no subjectivity to the truth presented - Splodey blew himself up, Riker was Johnny Whiteknight the whole time, and Widow Splodey threw herself at a passing hunk, got shot down, and so accused him publicly of trying to rape her. Dames, right?

3-15 "Yesterday's Enterprise"
Where do you start, man? Of course you all know the episode; it's routinely, if not universally, hailed as top ten (or 5, or 3, or in multiple polls #1) so rehashing the plot is probably unnecessary. And it's not because of the (relatively) giant space battle or the time travel or the concept of the Elseworlds universe [Sidebar: TNG never made it into the ISS universe in canon, though Diane Duane's Dark Mirror is awfully good apart from the dolphins, so it's cool to see that they did an alternate universe this well] - it's the superlative detail of that universe (we talked for like an hour afterward about the intuitiveness of the variations) (although I would have enjoyed seeing Guinan sans floppy hat) and the strength of characterization.

Captain Garrett is the target I think Kate Mulgrew was aiming at years from now, Chris McDonald (staunchly though I despise him on Bruce Campbell's behalf) does solid work as a guy who's by turns an amiable meathead during his whirlwind romance and a straight-backed de facto leader angrily insisting on doing right by his crew and the memory of his captain. And speaking of anger, I normally disdain yelly Frakes but here he radiates believable frustration: he knows the war is going badly, but presumably not how badly, and his ship (Starfleet's finest) is wasting time dithering about the prospect of throwing away a potentially valuable resource. I'd consider Frakes one of the standouts here, along with a colder, flintier Stewart and the surprise Most Improved Performance of the Series contender Denise Crosby. (If the Enterprise never had a Troi, Tasha wouldn't get capped by Armus.) She didn't magically become a world-class thespian during her hiatus - her early readings are a little flat - but the romance is mostly good and her slightly shell-shocked determination in the last two acts is epic. VS has talked before about loving Yar during the show's original run because the concept of a woman succeeding unapologetically in a position of physicality and power was thrilling; she was a better role model than she was a character. I thought about that repeatedly during this episode, and it made me even more proud of how Crosby knocked this line out of the park:

I've always known the risks that come with a Starfleet uniform. If I am to die in one, I'd like my death to count for something.

Shame we're talking about a time-traveling quasi-alternate universe; this Tasha Yar is exactly the character they should have given us all along.

Only fragments here remain, of the hasty slurry notes I took at the time, for VS and I were by God watching Kevin Costner: Prince of Thieves - which I had never before seen - and drinking. Drinking! So as a review it's so incomplete as to be nonexistent, but since everyone else already saw it eons ago there's no need. I will say that I was really surprised at the camerawork; some shots look like they're trying to make a Serious! Epic! and then some sequences seem to have been filmed by an uncredited (and clearly mischievous) Sam Raimi. Basically: too long, kinda boring, woefully miscast in many roles, tragically lacking in heroism. Your title dude makes a couple of rousing speeches about freedom, but in terms of actual deeds is just about as heroic as Azim.

VS: Morgan Freeman is, I think, a better Moorish Sidekick For Some Reason than Djaq from the BBC series.
Z: But Lucy Armitage might have been my favorite character, and so far this Marian is awful. Well, no, that's not true, it was Gisborne.
VS: My favorite was Harold Lloyd.
...
Z: I... Harry Lloyd?
VS: Oh. Yes, of course. Sorry, that's not who I meant at all.
Z: I think some of my synapses fused trying to encompass that mentally.
VS: That sounds awesome; I would watch that. Wouldn't you?
Z: Harold Lloyd and the BBC cast, moving in sped-up silent black-and-white, fucking up tramps from Hell to breakfast!

I am sincerely charmed by the part where Alan Rickman is appearing in his own separate movie that abuts but does not overlap the other: while everyone else slogs along in hamhanded drama, he's sneering his way through a (vastly superior) wacky comedy.

VS: It's unrelated, but I have a question because I'm drunk. Why do racehorses have such stupid names? Like "Blue Poker II" and "Mine That Bird." Those are not good names for things!
Z: As opposed to what, "Frank the Horse"?
VS: Yes! Yes. If I ever have a Derby-running entrant, I shall name him "Frank the Horse." Even if she's a girl.
Z: That might actually be... [google google] Yup. Sorry, that's taken.
VS: What? By whom?
Z: [slow turn and stare]
VS: [gleeful] God damn, I'm funny.

Stabbing pain in the left temple, sclera a color not unlike raw steak. We got March's issue out on time, but the mothfucker damn near got me first.

-Z

P.S. Title refers to where February can hum.

P.P.S. "Mothfucker" was a typo, but I decided I like it.

Netflix recommends: Dante's Inferno (2010)
"Traveling beyond death to rescue his love, Beatrice, from evil Lucifer, Dante enters the nine circles of hell, battling the vicious demons and monsters he encounters in this spectacular animated retelling of Dante Alighieri's classic morality tale."

I... what... So many things are wrong with that sentence!

-Z

3-6 "Booby Trap"
Aw, man! I wanted to like this episode so much! Its strengths are hella strong: Picard's breathy awe while touring the relic is irresistible, the Peril of the Week and the ramp up to its reveal are excellently done and the resulting tension is believable and gripping. Focus on that plot and use your core characters to work out a solution together and you're looking at a potential all-time classic... but that's not what they did. Instead, we're given a bolted-on romantic subplot and asked to believe that the best allocation of Enterprise resources is to have the Chief Engineer spend two hours talking to himself/a holo-babe while the rest of the Engineering department and the staff Boy Genius and Wonderbot do nothing, nothing and read someone's diary/nothing, respectively.

And what a subplot - poor LeVar Burton does his damnedest, but while Cheerfully Insouciant Geordi and Grimly Focused Problem-Solvin' Geordi are entertaining and compelling to watch, In the Mood for Love Geordi is, frankly, a little close to goddamn skeevy for my taste. Hundreds of people are about to die in a fairly awful manner, which could possibly mean this might not be the time to get your swerve on. I'd tell you to keep it in your space pants even if you weren't trying to score with the computer, you jackass.

I'm also not wild about techy tech techmeister Geordi LaForge being the guy pushing "the human factor" rather than technology as the ultimate solution. That would have fit better coming from Riker (or Lee Adama), plus your script loses a thousand points apiece for the lines "it's so simple it might even work" and "The answer lies in our own computer: the mind - the best piece of engineering we'll ever need."

Credit where it's due: by this point they're actually managing to write genuine-sounding, character-driven dialogue that's deliberately funny. This is one of my favorite comedic scenes in the series:

After establishing that Picard delighted in playing with model ships as a child and Riker doesn't know what the hell he's talking about, they enter the transporter room where Worf and Data are waiting to beam over.
JP: It is exactly as they left it, Number One: [turns expectantly to W&D] in the bottle.
[Awkward pause while no one pipes up to share his geeky joy]
JP: Ship in the- oh, good Lord; didn't anybody here build ships in bottles when they were boys?
Worf: [flexing very slightly] I did not play with toys.
Data: [mildly] I was never a boy.
JP: [sighs, drooping]
O'Brien: I did, sir.
JP: Thank you, Mr. O'Brien. Proceed.
[they beam away; Riker stares flatly at Miles]
O'Brien: I did! I really did! Ships in bottles? Great fun.

Hee hee hee. Suck it, Bill.

3-7 "The Enemy"
Great opener. Starts in medias res, and the exposition rain is heavy but quick: there's doin's a-transpirin' on Planet Craphole, Riker, Worf and Geordi beam down and inform one another that conditions are for shit and they've got a brief transporter window, they quickly discover a blowed-up Romulan craft(!) with a survivor(!!) but Geordi falls in a hole and the others have to beam back without him. Teaser. [Sidebar: What is that, twice in a shade over two seasons? You'd think away team classes would cover Not Falling in Holes, along with Primitive Taboos and You and Hey, Don't Eat That.]

A Plot: Geordi LaForge as Survivorman, phaser-forging pitons out of rocks, losing the ability to see through his visor, slowly forging an unlikely relationship with the other survivor so they can both find a way to be rescued. Though it has the most screentime, it's by far the weakest of the three, since Geordi vs. Wild is boring, Bochra is pretty flat and their dialogue is kinda godawful. ("I never lie when I've got sand in my shoes, Commodore"? WTF?) I do like one line for its It's a Big Galaxy overtones: when Geordi admits that he was born blind, Bochra responds immediately with a genuinely befuddled "And your parents let you live?"

B Plot: Jean-Luc Picard as hard-nosed diplomat, sparring with chilly politeness against the great Andreas Katsulas as Tomolok, feeling one another out faux-casually and fronting on one another like mad. Excellent, but we already knew JP vs. a competently written Romulan would be.

C Plot: The first survivor. Kicks ass, because I absolutely would not have expected it on this show (at least not the resolution), and not only is it entirely true to the characters of everyone involved, it actually improves them all, adding depth and resonance to Picard and Worf and even Beverly Goddamn Crusher, who is doing her best work so far by far tonight. The Romulan they brought aboard in the teaser is dying, but Bev finds a blood donor who can keep him alive... but it's Worf, and he flatly refuses. And there they stand, each so bone-certain that they're right that neither can get their heads around the other's position. They can't even acknowledge that there *is* a dilemma; the other person's just being obstinately ridiculous.

In the first scene onboard, Bev wryly chides Worf for ordering a guard in Sickbay, and it's one line but it's so... her: "He's not going anywhere, Lieutenant." There's no internal conflict about security concerns at all, personal or political - her mental flowchart goes "if wounded, then treat wounded." And she can only barely process that anyone might feel differently; when she calls Worf in to ask for a transfusion it's hardly even a request, because she takes his cooperation for granted just as hers would be. When he doesn't immediately jump for joy while rolling up his space sleeve, the first thing she says is a reassuring "There's absolutely no risk to you." It's not that she doesn't get it; in her mind there's no it to get.

Worf, meanwhile, has a mental subroutine just for Romulans:
10 "Fuck them"
20 GOTO 10
And in a nice choice, his antipathy here feels equally endemic to Crusher's empathy because he plays it so matter-of-factly; she says "You are the only one who can save his life!" and he doesn't bluster or speechify, he stands up and says "Then he will die." Then he leaves. Crusher later calls him back to make him watch the guy fading out, and Worf responds by essentially saying "Yup. Looks like he's dying all right." And in one of their all-time great scenes together, Picard explains why he should give the transfusion, Worf carefully announces that he'll obey an order to do it, Picard says it's not an order but an urgent plea, and Worf says no.

And the Romulan dies on the table.

Team Craphole's timing is perfect and Bochra's presence saves the day, and there's a "We did it by working together, yay!" tag, but the first survivor is still dead, as a direct result of Worf's inaction - which almost started a war. That's some heavy shit. I do wish they'd made room for a final scene with Worf and Crusher, but I suppose it makes sense that they wouldn't be in any hurry to see each other soon.

What else - Troi senses deception (thanks for coming out, D) and Frakes does a nice job with Riker's frustration at having left a man behind, and has a great scene trying to get Worf to see the bigger picture. Oh, and stick a pin in Wesley being the one to have a flash of inspiration and finding a way to track a missing crewman; I'll come back to it in a few episodes.

3-8 "The Price"
Say that you, as a showrunner/writer/creative executive of some type for a TV series, find yourself saddled through means beyond your control with multiple show elements that are noticeably weaker than the others, but which you are contractually unable to excise. Do you parcel them out across the season and dilute the quality of multiple episodes, or combine them and get your worst elements out of the way, resulting in crappier episodes but (hopefully) fewer of them? If you gots to have a Deanna episode and a Ferengi episode, you might as well shove them together to make this pile of ass, right? But what can you make Deanna do with her starring role? I smell romance!

Presenting Devonani Rahl, goddamn man about space town, who's so goddamn manly that when he's introduced, even though he's in the same room as everyone else, it's with an offscreen "And I'm Devonani Rahl" followed by a reverse shot to reveal a guy they had probably intended to be a Poor Man's Alec Baldwin gazing with seductive intensity at the leading lady while a backup dancer strokes his arm possessively, like we're suddenly in an ad for Drakkar Noir or some shit. Of course, they cast Matt McCoy, who became forever etched in the cultural consciousness as George Costanza's computer-selling nemesis Lloyd "Serenity Now" Braun, but even without that mental association he's a total failure in this role.

The main overall plot isn't the worst story hook, viz. a dirtwater planet discovers a natural resource and is unapologetic about wanting to cash in, inviting a bunch of more advanced societies to put in a bid on buying it from them. But nearly everything about the execution is unbearably clunky...

1. Rahl immediately becomes Troi's romantic interest, and I mean immediately; ostensibly because his secret empathy powers give them a deep spiritual connection, but because they're two actors who aren't very good at this we're left with the impression that their first few scenes together got cut for time and we're coming in halfway through their flirtation. Two minutes into their first conversation...
Rahl: I sent her [the backup dancer] home.
Troi: Why?
Rahl: You know why.
Troi: Weren't you getting along?
Rahl: Don't do that.
Troi: What?
Rahl: Don't do... 'Counselor Troi.'
Troi: Was I?
Rahl: Yes you were.

Wow. I would understand if you needed a break there, in the face of such raw chemistry. How could any space lady be expected to withstand his unyielding torrent of goddamn smoove? Their passion threatens to erupt into flames at any minute during their scenes... after all, that's what happens when you rub two pieces of wood together. [Sidebar: OH SNAP!]

2. The Federation's rep opines that the Ferengi aren't the real threat, then heaps praise on Riker as a natural negotiation savant when Bill identifies the one to watch... except that there are only four bidders, so Riker had a 50-50 shot and managed to pick the one who isn't a marblemouthed "alien" in a dumb-looking purple robe & headpiece. Clap clap. Considering that the Fed's guy has to have it explained to him that stable wormholes are unheard of - to which he warily responds "Are you saying this may not be what it seems?" - it probably isn't that great a loss when he gets nobbled by the Ferengi. Way to do your homework there, champ. And it's all handwaving anyway as an excuse to have Riker be the guy at the table instead of the trained diplomat Jean-Luc Picard, because that's supposed to add more drama to the dick-measuring between Riker and Rahl over the wormhole/Troi/the last Oreo in the bag.

3. The episode never explains why the stable wormhole is such a big damn deal under the circumstances, anyway. Presumably the Feds value its potential for scientific research or whatever, but the threat of losing the rights to it isn't presented as someone else finding some space gold on the other side, it's "Can you imagine the Ferengi charging a toll for its use?" Who cares about having a shortcut to the ass-end of nowhere?

4. The climactic standoff with the Ferengi is exposed as a fraud when Troi senses that Goss is lying about his willingness to... oh, something stupid, it hardly matters what, because Betazoids can't read Ferengi. God dammit.

I enjoyed exactly one thing about this episode: the back-and-forth about the Ferengi crashing the summit and demanding chairs. But even that one snicker was immediately crushed down by two more superfluous punchlines. Boo.

3-9 "The Vengeance Factor"
The Enterprise crew runs across some bush-league space pirates and decide, mostly for the sake of ridding the neighborhood of a sporadic nuisance, to negotiate their reassimilation into their former society, which is reasonably stable and enlightened. While Picard visibly keeps a lid on his frustration at herding space cats, Riker strikes up a friendship-cum-romance with the queen's aide... who, it turns out, is the sole survivor of a once-prominent but supposedly-wiped-out clan who artifically prolonged her own life in order to stalk and exterminate the entirety of the rival clan, terminating (zing!) with the attempted murder of the locked-in-negotiation space pirate captain, thus forcing Riker to shoot her in front of everybody. Ain't that always the way?

The thing is, while this episode isn't a series benchmark or anything, it's still pretty good filler, and a tremendous improvement over the last installment - starting with it not being intensely stupid. The concept of researching, designing and tailoring a killer virus that's only fatal to a specific .0001% of the population (Crusher's estimate) seems pretty counterproductive, and the Feds only save the day because the computer is magic this week [Xander, zoom in on that guy in the background!] but the script is way less cluelessly clunky, and everybody seems more committed as a result. They get decent guest performances out of the warmly crusty sovereign and the boisterous KISS Army ruffians who are vociferously uninterested in becoming farmers and living by your rules, man but who might be willing to be talked into it, and a pretty excellent turn by Uta, who seems genuinely conflicted about her affection for Riker and her inability to capitalize on it.

The regulars do some nice work, too - in fact, there's a lot of casual unspoken teamwork in this episode. Worf grunts and strains and announces a door is stuck, then Data casually slides it open, but while the big guy presumably adds it to a mental list nobody feels the need to make a big deal of it. Pinned down by laser fire, Riker identifies some nearby metal, Data recites its boiling point, Geordi nods "setting 7 oughta do it," Riker counts down, and without another word Worf sprays some covering fire while the other three phaser the metal into a cloud of steam, thus allowing them to fake a beam-out and reverse the ambush. When a body is discovered, Riker calls for Bev while a thug casually starts looting his comrade's corpse. She beams down, Riker heaves the dude off and immediately turns his back to kneel by the body with Crusher, leaving the guy to rear up in angry protest... but Worf has already silently stepped between them. Their awareness of one another and of their roles feels a lot crisper and more competent than usual, and the show's flow is the better for it.

"But," you say, "they're showcasing this flash and polish in overwhelming a bunch of rejects from an off-Broadway 'Mad Max' musical." Granted. Consider how many times over the course of the series they couldn't even say that much.

Speaking of pleasant surprises, Frakes turns in an unusually solid performance, including believable consternation and concern when the dame he's romancing starts freaking out about pleasing him rather than enjoying herself, as well as a grim standoff when he reluctantly shoots the woman, shoots her again, pleads with her to stop, and then vaporizes her, after which - in a marvelous authorial decision - he shuts it down. No histrionics, no husky-voiced speech about the futility of violence, he just stares flatly into space, politely but finally deflecting the captain's suggestion that he take some shore leave and ending the episode... empty.

3-10 "The Defector"
This episode, I believe, is a series benchmark; one of their finest efforts in exploring the larger arena outside "Here's the Enterprise and here's what the Enterprise is looking at this week." Not that they didn't do some outstanding, thought-provoking work within that narrower focus, but I'm particularly fond of the imperial-level interactions that provide the framework for all the smaller missions.

Anyway: Picard is pulled away from the Holodeck where he was coaching Data through Henry V (love it) by a Romulan shuttle fleeing into Fed space, pursued by a Warbird which scarpers when challenged. The lone occupant (played by the mostly excellent James Sloyan) identifies himself as a clerk and warns the captain about a secret battle station that's about to go online in the Neutral Zone, and which they must destroy before the Romulans launch an overwhelming surprise attack. The problem is that the Feds will risk starting a war if they charge in and are wrong, the pursuers seem to have let the shuttle go, and the clerk doesn't inspire much confidence - what with announcing himself a defector but not a traitor, refusing to provide any information other than data about the secret base, destroying his own craft to stop the Enterprise from studying it and generally acting like a dick to everybody for not doing what he says without asking questions. So do you trust him and hope to prevent a war, or assume he's a spy and risk a devastating first strike? And "you" of course means "Captain Picard," since there are no other Fed ships nearby. [Sidebar: How big is Starfleet - that is, the number of ships of the line that could be useful in a situation like this? Seems like you'd keep at least a few designated early responders in the area of the Neutral Zone, wouldn't you?] The episode really hammers that feeling of isolation - every third scene seems to end with JP staring grimly at nothing while the wheels turn in his head, and there's even some nice use of time delay by which he keeps getting transmissions from Starfleet reminding him that he's in dangerous (space) waters and should try to make the right call, but that it's all on him; he can't even talk directly with the Admiral who is giving him such helpful tips because it's a series of recordings.

It's also worth pointing out, though the episode doesn't make it explicit, that while they might expose the secret base and maybe even destroy it, if they do go to Nelvana III the Enterprise stands a good chance of getting blown the fuck up whether it's a trap or not. When Picard mutters to himself about it being "a black matter for the king who sent them," he's not just being melodramatic; they're genuinely in some deep brown.

So while the captain ponders and the crew waits, Data drops into Ten Forward to chat with the surly bastard who touched off the whole thing. And Sloyan starts to really work it here - sighing that "I thought it [the view] would bring me some comfort... but these are not my stars," he starts musing about all that he's left behind. And when Data tries to cheer him up with a trip to Holo-Romulus, it brings his situation into focus:
"I no longer live here. Turn it off. [vwoosh to the empty grid] This... this is my home now, my future. I have sacrificed everything; it must not be in vain. Arrange a meeting between myself and Captain Picard. Tell him... Admiral Jarok wants to see him."

Dun dun dun!

Jarok still tries to hold out on them, but Picard is having none of it ("You already betrayed your people, Admiral! You made your choices, sir; you're a traitor!") and Jarok eventually admits that the birth of his daughter inspired him to try to prevent a war he felt would be disastrous for the Empire. ("She will grow up believing that her father is a traitor. But she will grow up.") He rolls over entirely, and they jet for Nelvana III...

...which is deserted save for a cloaked satellite broadcasting dummy frequencies. It was all a trap, but not only for the Federation; the Romulans were testing Jarok's loyalty. And now Tomalak (woo, Tomalak!) and his two Warbirds have the Enterprise over a space barrel...

...but in the last and greatest reveal of the episode, four Klingon ships decloak - Picard brought backup. Awesome, awesome moment, and not a cheat since there was some persiflage earlier about Worf taking a call from a Klingon cruiser. Everybody holsters and goes home, but it's not a happy ending - Jarok, realizing that his defection accomplished nothing, takes a suicide pill and leaves a note for his family in the hopes that it can be delivered... someday.

Great plot, great characterization, the sort of strategic maneuvering you could expect from professionals who do this for a living, even some great continuity from "The Enemy" - this one's a success on every axis and an all-time classic.