Overall Rating: 1.5
A bad concoction of hubris, horrible acting, bombastic speechifying and moral corruption utterly seep from the screen in this episode.
Plot Synopsis:
A description of the events in this story can be found at Memory Alpha.
The Skinny:
In the same episode, we've got Riker and Troi serving as the mouthpieces for a philosophical treatise that begins and ends (apparently) with polygamy and pure egalitarianism (taking the form of tribal/communal life) and the supposedly logical Mintakans behaving completely and totally without logic. In their dialogue, we heard the away team go to great pains to present the Mintakans as deeply logical (and of course, what's more logical than open relationships and polygamy...or so you'd believe if you'd listen to Troi). But at the same time, as soon as the Mintakans are confronted with something they don't understand, they go ballistic and prepare for the human sacrifices and holy wars!
The writers cannot have it both ways and maintain intellectual honesty. Because if we're to believe the events of this episode follow logically from its' premise, then the writers must be arguing that religion is the source of all logical failings and conflict...and that, my friends, could not possibly be a more dangerous or historically inaccurate message. History is filled with irrational conflicts over everything from sex to limited resources to conflicting religious ideals...but the mere presence of a belief in a higher being has never once (you heard me!) been the true source of any conflict. How do I know that? Because atheists have never run a country...apart, perhaps, from Soviet Russia and now Communist China...and um...those countries don't exactly have a sterling record of peaceful, purely logical co-relations with their neighbors. Like it or not, my agnostic or atheist readers...every government's peculiar form of authority and morality is informed by an ethical standard that is owed to one religion or another - or it is informed by the needs of the empowered few (dictatorships, cabals, etc)...and none of those governments made war with their enemies simply because the other guy believed in God. Why should we assume, then, that the Mintakans are both logical...and somehow prone to a belief in the supernatural that would lead them to commit heinous crimes? Why should simply believing in a higher power lead IMMEDIATELY to ritual sacrifice? Where is the logic in that?
Incidentally, while I'm tearing this show apart, what is logical about polygamy? The heroic Enterprise crew hears about this culture and they all smile and nod at how impressive it is. Do you know who, here on Earth, likes polygamy? Misogynists. That's right...polygamy has never once been employed in our entire history as a means to greater freedom for one gender...and almost always, it creates significantly lesser sexual and emotional freedoms for women. Of course, the Mintakans' brand of Polygamy is female dominated (Trek writers love doing that, because if they did it the other way, people would see how wrong it was immediately)...but one gender having the sexual power over another is always wrong...no matter who is the oppressor and who is the oppressed. And this is a flimsy cover for an obviously bad idea. Women don't like polygamy! There may be a few out there who think open relationships and multiple partners are great, but they are dwarfed by the men who are impressed with it. And that's as easy to understand as anything you'll see on this blog. Women are biologically programmed to dream for the security, emotional bonding and child-rearing assistance of ONE man...one committed partner. As one philosopher put it, "Men dream of waking up with a different beautiful woman every day...women dream of waking up with the same man." You can't fight reality, no matter how badly you might want to...a female-dominated polygamy simply doesn't work, long term.
Not that a male dominated polygamy is good either...in both arrangements, it's the women who suffer. In one, women are viewed as prized possessions...social standing is gained by the men who can attain many wives, each of whom is there to service some specific need of his. In the other arrangement, women carry the biologically unnatural function of caring for multiple men...men who would become a drain on her resources and her emotional energy. All of which is to say...there is nothing logical or desirable about a society that practices polygamy. Don't believe me? You go ask the victims of Mormon ideology.
Compound this episodes lousy moral foundation with some seriously bad acting on the part of Kathryn Leigh Scott (Nuria) and Ray Wise (Liko) and even the regulars...including (gasp!) Patrick Stewart (who's over-dramatic bellowing about how he will not allow a culture to fall into the dark ages of superstition is as bad a moment as he ever gives us), and you have a recipe for a big steaming pile of s***.
Writing: 1.5
Richard Maning and Hans Beimler combined on this script...but a trained monkey could probably have exceeded both of them.
Acting: 3.0
Sorry Marina...but your performance here was just as bad as the aforemention Stewart and the guest cast. It wasn't all horrid...but there were enough major missteps and incompetent guest actors to bring this episode into the realm of campy-feeling, amateur-hour drek.
Message: 0.0
Atheism is no more logical than mysticism...they're all "isms" and that implies they all are irrational beliefs in things that cannot be proven. There is no evidence that the appearance of belief in one God was the way into darkness for prehistoric man and no evidence that atheism is bringing enlightenment to us now. In fact, I would argue that belief in God has inspired our greatest achievements...INCLUDING our thirst for freedom and the Western belief that all life is sacred.
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