‘TIMESCAPE’ (TNG)
Please feel free to comment on my review.
This is one of my favourite episodes in the ‘Star Trek: TNG’ series. It involves time-travel as four of our ‘TNG’ heroes – Picard; Deanna; Data and Geordi rescue the Enterprise from a Romulan Warbird.
‘Timescape’ begins with Riker in sickbay being treated by Beverly Crusher as he has two deep cuts on his forehead. Oh no! It’s not ‘Frame of Mind’ again, is it? Fortunately not! Beverly heals the wounds.
It turns out it wasn’t a game of parrises squares that got Riker injured. Nor was it one of Worf’s calisthenics programs. It turns out Riker was feeding Spot, Data’s cat. And he got injured by that cat.
I found it funny when Riker explains to Beverly how he got injured by Spot, saying he hates cats, although he promised to feed Data’s cat. Beverly loves cats and Riker offers her to feed Spot instead.
Riker eventually gets summoned to the bridge by Worf who tells him the Enterprise has received a distress call from a Romulan vessel. Riker decides to answer the Romulans’ distress call despite risks.
Meanwhile, Picard, Deanna, Data and Geordi are in a runabout returning to the Enterprise. I believe this is the first time that a runabout ships has appeared in ‘TNG’ since they have lately been in ‘DS9’.
It seems the four have been to a conference. I found it funny when each of the four shared stories about what it was like attending that conference. Deanna does a funny impersonation of a scientist.
Picard also intimidates a slow-talking scientist saying that he was hypnotic which was funny to see. Geordi then shares his experience of touching a plasma field at the conference. And then he stops…
No literally. He just stops mid-sentence. Deanna notices this as she sees Geordi, Data and Picard frozen in time. She becomes worried. Soon Geordi resumes talking about touching the plasma field.
It’s almost like nothing ever happened. Deanna becomes even more worried. Geordi notices Deanna’s concern and asks her if something’s wrong. Deanna truthfully informs them she’s not sure.
Geordi checks up on Deanna with a medical tricorder, but finds nothing wrong with her. After Data and Geordi go off to investigate the runabout’s systems, Deanna recalls what happened with Picard.
She begins to think she was probably tired and just seeing things. Eventually however, in the blink of an eye, she finds herself surrounded by Picard, Data and Geordi who tell her she was frozen in time.
Things become serious when they’re heading back to the Enterprise. The runabout encounters pockets of temporal disruptions and they can very peculiar effects on the four which could be lethal.
One of these is when Picard touches a bowl of fruit on the table that is now rotten. He reacts in agony with hand shaking and having long fingernails. His hand seems to have aged for several weeks.
Eventually, when the runabout comes to the Enterprise, they find the ship with a Romulan Warbird frozen in time. Our heroes assume their Enterprise ship had been attacked by the Romulan Warbird.
But as the episode progresses, it turns out to be less of an invasion by the Romulans. This becomes evident since the Romulans were evacuating their warbird and beaming over to the Enterprise ship.
I liked how Picard, Deanna, Data and Geordi solve the mystery by going to the Enterprise and Romulan Warbird ships frozen in time to find out what’s going on. It was fun in seeing them solve it.
This episode features Michael Bofshever who plays an alien in Romulan form. Michael Bofshever had played an engineer aboard the Excelsior in ‘Star Trek VI’ and also played a Bajoran in ‘Star Trek: DS9’.
It transpires that there have been aliens aboard the Romulan Warbird that have been closely connected with time. The Enterprise attempted a power transfer with the Romulans causing trouble.
I liked how Picard, Deanna; Data and Geordi resolved things by setting time back on track and prevented the Enterprise from being blown up in space. They also prevented Beverly Crusher killed.
‘Timescape’ is a great ‘TNG’ episode about time travel. I’m surprised this episode doesn’t get talked about mucy. It features some superb character interaction between Picard, Deanna, Data and Geordi here.
‘Timescape’ (TNG) rating – 10/10
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