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Episode
203
Hero Worship
A Federation starship has been destroyed, and it is all the fault of one little boy. At least the one little boy thinks so. His judgement should be questioned though, since he also thinks he is an android. Oh – and the Enterprise is about to be destroyed or something. Who can save the day? Find out when we put Hero Worship in the Mission Log.
“Data, we’d like you to take charge of this child we recovered and indulge him for awhile.”
“The last time we did this, didn’t Captain Picard get stabbed in the chest.”
“We’re fairly confident that won’t happen this time.”
“It’s just my secondary sub-processor has only just recovered since you shot me with that arrow.”
“Hey, the statute of limitations on being mad about that is long passed.”
“OK, but I reserve the right to stab you in the chest while freaking out in a future episode.”
“Noted.”
You should really get a staff writing job on “ST: Discovery.”
Pre listen thought:
Last week Worf got a kid, this week Data gets a kid.
Riker got a kid earlier in the season. Troi’s already had one. Picard got one last year.
My bet’s on Geordi for next week.
You get a kid, you get a kid and you get a kid.
So many spare kids in the future, enough for everyone.
Hahaha 🙂
omg, I did not even see your post Earl Green…hahaha, I was thinking like you!
Here’s my question: What happened to having families on the Enterprise after Viridian III? I know we didn’t see the Borg assimilate any perfectly groomed urchins on the Enterprise-E. I can’t remember Enterprise kids during Insurrection, although there are some Bak’u kids… or kids thrown into space while Jean-Luc (“I have him now!”) Picard rams the E-E into Shinzon’s gigundous lion fish starship. For that matter, Guinan doesn’t show up again, either. So, did the families finally get smart or what?
ugh, that ridiculous policy of allowing children on ships. Just unfathomable. USS Saratoga at Wolf 359 et al, what a senseless waste. Definitely glossed over the fact that kids would be dying and freaking out in space…
Data got his SECOND kid….lol- Picard got his 3 kids earlier…lol, Riker had one, Crusher had one…lol, Geordi’s next…ahhh poor Geordi, so neglected…
“Well, we’ve got another episode about Data with a tacked on subplot about a nebula with some weird aspect. Who should we give it to?”
“Let’s give it to Patrick.”
“Why? Did he just buy life insurance?”
“No — What?!? No: Because he did the last one.”
“Seems as good a reason as any. Did he have to take a physical?”
“Look, can you just drop that? And where did you get the Bristol board and marker from to write that?”
“I always have it next to me, just in case.”
“Weirdo.”
When Data said, “I’ll delete the appropriate files” or whatever exactly he said (subroutines, maybe?), it may be more along the lines of just uninstalling his “girlfriend driver” or at least removing the soft link /dev/girlfriend/Jenna.Desora from /dev/girlfriend/0 — Or something like that. The point being it may have been more about deactivating her “current girlfriend” status than actually removing memories, experiences, lessons, etc. We don’t really know enough about Data’s OS to know for sure what he meant.
One aspect to note is that the kid’s behavior (lying about the cause of the ship’s destruction) may have been less based on guilt and more on simply fear of getting in trouble. Kids that age don’t have the fully formed emotional awareness to process something like survivor’s guilt and are more likely to lie to avoid expected punishment.
The Federation’s Got Talent! Now THAT’s what the new series should be. OK, I know a few people are gonna kvetch about having yet another episode centered on some random kid we’ve never seen before and will never see again. I know, because I’m one of them. In truth, the young actor did fine, but it’s one of THREE such plots in the fifth season. Enough! Couple of nitpicks: why is it whenever someone is trapped under a huge fallen beam, a) there’s not a huge hole in the ceiling? and b) they don’t just turn down the AG to lift it off? Also — total BS: every control surface reads your DNA? Nopety nope nope. We’ve seen guest stars touch the buttons. Anywho… nice podcast as always. You make my Thursday mornings!
Hey John, thanks for the teeny tiny spaceships shout-out. That plus your McDLT comment made my day!
The Star Trek 50th anniversary article from the International Journal of Jungian Studies mentioned in this week’s episode: http://www.tandfonline.com/…/10.1080/19409052.2016.1209815
The link went a bit wonky on this. But you can remove the dots (and a slash) from the center, and it works.
Or try this one. Hopefully it doesn’t suffer the same problem: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19409052.2016.1209815
They must have a “dramatic moments” class at the Academy. Picard has a window in his ready room that there just so he can dramatically look out.
That comes well after the class on eating stuff on alien planets.
Eat whatever you like, no consequences.
Only if I can wash it down with water that speeds me up so I’m invisible and make mosquito-like sounds. Now… bear in mind… I’m not gonna fix the whole ship like Spock did that one time. I’m just going to be invisible and annoy everyone with mosquito-like sounds. I charge extra for anything beyond that.
I’m happy to report that the Klingon word for “wazoo” is “Sa’Hut.”
Star Trek will never let us down.
That’s almost “Tuchas” backwards. I smell conspiracy.
Maybe you just smell tuchas?
I dunno guys, I liked this one. Of course, for me, it hit really close to home in a way. The way I got into Trek in the first place was I lost my father at a very young age (3). A year later, my widowed mother took the family camping and we ended up getting rained out of our leaky tent. The rental cabin had a TV and the only thing on was TOS. The ep was Amok Time and, for whatever reason, it was the idea of Spock being able to express his grief over killing Kirk (Or at least he thought he did) and yet maintain control that impressed me and some how became the model for me to express mine (I was 4 at the time after all).
So for me… yeah, this one made a lot of sense.
That’s the great thing about a long series like this. Different episodes appeal to different folks
Wow. That’s pretty heavy. I just lost my Dad this year and its been tough and I am a grown 44 year old man. I have wondered how young kids handle this devastating emotional trauma. I guess they reach out for a lifeline, like any of us would do. Thanks for sharing. The detail, you remember the exact episode. I agree the Vulcan way of logic has some appealing aspects to it. C’thia- the mastery of emotion and pure logic, I think is their philosophy…very Zen…Sorry for your loss. Makes perfect sense to me.
A couple more thoughts:
1- Troi has had a couple of really good episodes where she’s been able use her counseling skills.
2- I too was hoping for an Alexander appearance, or a few puppies at least. Perhaps their are different classrooms.
3- I bet Worf would like Timothy’s drawing. Seems very Kingony. http://i1.wp.com/www.tor.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/heroworship3.jpg?resize=475%2C363&type=vertical
4- I agree with the thought that it would have been better to space out these last two episodes.
I haven’t watched this episode in several years but what sticks in my mind is just how well the actor Joshua Harris did as Timmy. The young man just nailed his performance as a Soong-type android. I’m looking forward to revisiting this episode!
That kid went on to play for the Chicago Cubs I think!
“Timothy” Joshua Harris, former Chicago Cub
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c790bc8c0cdcf7d6d4cb8f2df389e36bfa9f89ccff9534e144540711c378099b.jpg
Picard at least resists the urge to shout “Don’t you tell me what to do!” when Data tells him to drop the shields.
Part of trusting your officers at crucial times.
Imagine if Data handled dealing with Timothy in the same way he handled dealing with dating… How horror inducing would it be for Data to go to Alexander, Jeremy Astor, Wesley, or even Worf and be like, “So… how was it to lose a parent (your whole world)”
It’s would have been funny if Data was like, “oh this is another finger trap situation. We sure run into a lot of those.”
Also, if there are so many orphans that are in Starfleet or that get picked up by them, you’d think they could have told that one planet that wanted their kids, “Look, we can’t give you these kids, but we got a whole shipment of kids with dead parents we can give you. Just give us a little time.”
Good call on the planet that needed kids. Seems like a good idea.
Even though John leans kind of hard on the sjw/ social services worker angle I still very much enjoy his commentary.
And the original slogan bit about the McDlt was classic!
The kid imitating Data is great, but a lot of this episode is kind of rough to get through. But this kid was the best kid by far, and we was given several excellent lines. Troi also had a good couple of lines. I wish the whole episode started at 25 minutes in.
In more thing. This episode proves that Data is clearly and obviously sad that he is not human. Case closed.