- 30-second episode preview (AVI, 2Mb)
- Worf makes ensign Sito accept an unfair challenge.

Synopsis:

While enduring the promotion evaluation process aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise, four junior officers find themselves involved in a top-secret mission.

With crew evaluations underway, tension runs high among four junior officers, Alyssa Ogawa, Sam Lavelle, Sito Jaxa and Taurik. Things get worse when a waiter friend, Ben, approaches the group and tells them Sito and Lavelle are up for the same position. This seems to rattle Sito, who later performs poorly during a drill. Over in Engineering, Taurik shows Geordi a new computer simulation he developed, but Geordi seems annoyed rather than impressed with the young Vulcan's skills. Only Ogawa seems to be breezing through the process, as Beverly tells her she will be recommended for promotion. The friends gather to talk about their progress, and Lavelle speculates that Riker dislikes him. Ben suggests that Lavelle try to talk to the officer like a person, but his attempts to make small talk fail miserably.

Suddenly, Worf detects an escape pod just within Cardassian space, and Picard orders the crew to attempt to transport the passenger to the Enterprise. Geordi and Taurik get to work, and finally, the passenger is transported aboard, but only the senior officers are allowed to see the traveler, prompting speculation among the junior group. In the midst of this, Picard summons Sito, and interrogates her about her involvement in a Starfleet Academy cover-up three years earlier -- an incident she has been trying desperately to live down. Sito is unable to defend herself, and the captain dismisses her.

Meanwhile, Beverly summons Ogawa to Sickbay, where she reveals that the pod's injured passenger is a Cardassian male. She swears Ogawa to secrecy about what she has seen, and Ogawa manages to keep the secret that night when she joins her fellow junior officers for a poker game. Soon, the group's speculation about their mission changes to speculation about their own chances for promotion. Meanwhile, the senior staff also discusses the candidates, and Riker reveals his misgivings about both Sito and Lavelle.

Later, Worf puts Sito to a martial arts test where he promptly blindfolds her and attacks her. Sito immediately rips off her blindfold and tells him this test is unfair, and a pleased Worf reveals that this was actually a way to encourage Sito to stand up for herself when she is unfairly judged. Empowered, she meets with Picard and expresses her feeling that it is unfair that he judge her on something she did three years ago. Picard reveals that the real purpose of the difficult meeting was to test Sito's readiness for a secret mission, and he asks her to join the senior staff at a briefing, where she meets Joret Dal, the injured Cardassian. Picard reveals that they must get Joret, who is a Federation operative, back to Cardassia. The plan is to have Joret pretend to "hijack" a shuttlecraft and have Sito, a Bajoran, pose as his prisoner to get past the border. After Joret is safe, Sito will return to Federation space in an escape pod. Picard tells Sito that she can turn down the dangerous mission, but she agrees to participate.

Sito and Joret set off on the shuttlecraft, and the other junior officers, knowing only the small bits of information that they do, worry intensely about their friend. On the bridge, Lavelle assists in a search for Sito's missing escape pod. He is shocked and saddened when the remains of the vessel are found, and Picard announces that the brave young ensign was lost in the line of duty. His competition removed, Lavelle wins his promotion, but does so with the sad realization of the price that has been paid.

Timothy Lynch's Star Trek: The Next Generation Episode Reviews

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for TNG's "Lower Decks". 
Those not wishing to be privy to every secret of the show should stay well 
away from here.

In brief: If this is the "Voyager" lead-in, I feel more comfortable about 
the series to come. Nice work.

Even without the knowledge that this was a lead-in to the new series, though, 
it was a damn fine show. More (much!) after a synopsis:

Riker and Troi, in Ten-Forward, are bulling through the oh-so-riveting task 
of crew evaluations in preparation for promotion decisions. Meanwhile, at a 
nearby table, four ensigns -- Lavelle, Sito (a Bajoran), Taurik (a Vulcan), 
and Nurse Ogawa -- are sitting before going on duty. Lavelle in particular 
is very concerned about these evaluations, hoping like crazy for a promotion. 
Riker and Troi begin discussing candidates for one shift's Ops position, and 
both Sito's and Lavelle's names come up -- and a waiter, Ben, passes this 
information along to both ensigns, who are somewhat nonplussed.

Later, both Lavelle and Sito participate in a stations drill, where Sito errs 
slightly at tactical by having to change a phaser lock before firing. After 
Riker passes along some advice to her, Picard comes in and quickly orders a 
course change to a system near the Cardassian border, referring to new 
orders. The senior staff retire to a conference, leaving Sito (now at Ops) 
and Lavelle to wonder what's up.

Meanwhile, in Engineering, Taurik talks to Geordi about simulations he's been 
running for a new warp-field configuration that is rumored to be in the 
works. Geordi is intrigued, but tells Taurik that tests on the *real* ship 
are out of the question for the time being. However, he adds, "if you have 
any other ideas for increasing efficiency, don't hesitate to run them by me." 
"Actually," volunteers Taurik, "I do." Geordi makes a hasty exit to join the 
meeting in progress.

After a brief conversation between Ogawa and Dr. Crusher (in which Bev tells 
Ogawa that she's likely to be promoted soon, and the two talk of Ogawa's 
current flame), Sito and Worf talk in Ten-Forward. Sito is incredulous that 
Riker would even *consider* her for the Ops post, given that she's a security 
officer; but her surprise is even greater when Worf reveals that he 
recommended her for the position. She promises to try not to disappoint him.

Lavelle, elsewhere in the room, worries aloud about what Worf and Sito could 
be talking about. He is flat-out shocked, however, when Ben, a civilian, 
greets an entering Riker as "Will". Ben reassures him that Riker's not such 
a bad guy, and that Lavelle just needs to get to know him a little better. 
Lavelle tries to strike up a conversation with Riker, but what little he 
knows (that Riker is Canadian, for instance) turns out to be horribly wrong, 
and he leaves as quickly as he can.

Some time later, the Enterprise has reached the Argaya system and is waiting 
for ... something. They finally detect an escape pod, but 50,000 kilometers 
inside Cardassian space. Both the bridge crew and the Engineering crew 
quickly try to figure out how to retrieve the occupant without crossing the 
border. As Engineering works to beef up the transporter, Taurik attempts to 
ID the lifeform inside, only to have Geordi tell him quickly and sternly 
not to do that again. In sickbay, Beverly is ready to receive the occupant, 
and tells Ogawa that she has to leave now.

Ogawa leaves, and talks to Sito, who's outside standing guard. Neither is 
sure what's going on. As Ogawa leaves, Picard enters -- and gives Sito a 
long, probing look as he proceeds to sickbay. Later, when he leaves, he 
takes Sito with him, much to the chagrin of Lavelle, who exits the turbolift 
they enter. En route to the bridge, Picard confirms that Sito is, in fact, a 
qualified pilot.

In his ready room, however, he takes a very different tone. He refers to her 
candidacy for the Ops position, but says that he has some serious questions 
about her record. At the Academy, she took part in a dangerous, daredevil 
stunt that took the life of a cadet -- and though he is certain she would 
not do that again, he takes great umbrage to her participation in the coverup 
afterwards. He tells her that her unwillingness to come forward with the 
truth raises profound questions about her character -- and when she protests 
that sticking with the unpleasant aftermath of being found out also says 
something about her character, he tells her rather brutally that she's made 
her bed. "As far as I'm concerned," he adds, "you should have been expelled 
for what you did. Frankly, I don't know how you made it on board this ship." 
Sito is dismissed, and leaves as fast as she can.

Some time later, Taurik is assisting Geordi by firing on a shuttlecraft. 
Geordi explains that it's due to a little-known requirement to test hull 
resiliency, which Taurik expresses some skepticism about. He maintains that 
the firing pattern he has used would be consistent with making it look like 
the shuttle fled an attack and was fired on multiple times. Geordi turns to 
Taurik and tells him in no uncertain terms, "It's an amazing *coincidence*," 
with the clear message that he is to treat it as such from that moment on.
Meanwhile, Bev brings Ogawa into sickbay to help with some emergency surgery, 
but tells her that she is *not* to reveal anything of what she sees. She 
agrees, then reacts with shock at seeing the species on the table, as Bev 
walks away to synthesize some *Cardassian* blood...

That evening, there's a poker game -- among the ensigns (and Ben). They all 
talk of the rumors about who and what is in the pod, with Ben saying he heard 
it was Spock and Taurik being strongly skeptical of the idea. Ogawa's flame, 
Powell, had to bow out due to a double-shift assignment.

Meanwhile, in the *senior officers'* poker game, Bev talks about seeing 
Powell in Ten-Forward with another woman and wonders what to tell Ogawa. 
Riker tells Worf that he doesn't think Sito's prepared for Ops, and Worf 
disagrees.

Lavelle then bets as the conversation turns to Sito's dressing-down earlier 
in the day. Sito wonders what she could have said, and if perhaps Picard was 
right, but her friends do their best to convince her that she's a fine 
officer. Lavelle says that Sito is more than prepared for a promotion, and 
glumly adds that he surely won't get it -- "not if it's up to Riker."

Riker, just then, adds that he'll keep thinking about Sito, because he's 
not sure about Lavelle *either*. When asked why, he says that Lavelle's a 
little too eager to please, and seems to be kissing up. Deanna disagrees 
that he's only doing it for the promotion, and tells Riker that he and 
Lavelle are a lot alike.

"What? We're not at all alike!"
"You're bluffing," asserts Bev.

"You think so?" says Lavelle, smirking -- and Ben restates it. As the hand 
continues, Ogawa suggests that Lavelle stop trying so hard to please, saying 
that Riker doesn't need to like him, just respect him. Everyone else 
concurs, and Taurik, having computed the odds on his hand winning, folds.

So does Worf after a bad hand, as Deanna reminds Riker that *Riker* learned 
to play poker on the Potemkin to play with the senior officers, which might 
have been looked on as kissing up. Fortunately, she points out, they didn't 
hold it against him. Riker agrees, and says he'll rethink things about 
Lavelle. Geordi, convinced Riker's bluffing, bets big.

Riker shows his cards -- a full flush. Geordi is rather upset -- "I cannot 
beLIEVE this!" Riker, on the other hand, is generous: "I am your worst 
nightmare."

Ben, on the other hand, bets that Lavelle is bluffing and *wins*, much to 
Lavelle's chagrin. Sito and Ogawa leave for the night. So does Geordi, 
although Riker protests that "you don't have to quit just because I'm 
unbeatable." 

Taurik talks about having inadvertently annoyed Geordi that morning in 
Engineering with his simulations, and wonders if Geordi will hold a grudge; 
Geordi then answers that question inadvertently himself by inviting Taurik to 
help with some late-night work. Taurik leaves, and Lavelle pleads that he 
needs sleep and says goodnight to Ben. Ben leaves, only to head for the 
other game to try to clean *them* out...

The next morning, Worf stops Sito at the end of his mok'bara class to give 
her an unscheduled test for the advanced-level class. The test, however, is 
blatantly unfair, and Sito realizes it after three falls. She refuses to 
continue, and Worf congratulates her for passing by having the courage to 
note that the test was unfair. In fact, he adds, there is no such challenge, 
"but perhaps next time you are judged unfairly, it will not take so many 
bruises for you to protest."

Sito heads for the ready room, there to confront Picard about his actions the 
previous day. She tells him that, with respect, it is not *his* place to 
punish her for the Academy incident, and that he should either judge her on 
her record _now_ or let her transfer off the ship. Picard is impressed by 
her courage, and tells her that he was interested in getting her reactions, 
not for Ops qualification, but for an upcoming mission. He asks her to join 
the senior officers at 0900 for a briefing, and adds that he does know why 
she's on the Enterprise: he *asked* for her.

After Ogawa tells Bev that Powell has asked her to marry him (making Bev 
relieved beyond measure), Sito attends that meeting, only to meet Joret Dal, 
a Cardassian officer who is also a Federation mole. He has given them vital 
information that will help the security of countless planets, and now needs 
to be able to get home. He points out that the border is heavily guarded, 
and that alone he would be unlikely to convince them that he's legitimate, 
even in an apparently-stolen, damaged Federation shuttlecraft. However, he 
might be able to pass as a bounty hunter -- *if* he had a prisoner, 
particularly a Bajoran terrorist. Although the mission is extremely 
dangerous, Sito volunteers. She leaves for sickbay, and Joret observes, "I 
didn't realize she would be so young."

Shortly thereafter, Sito boards the shuttle, cosmetically altered to appear 
brutalized by Joret. She thanks Worf for his confidence in her, and tells 
him she'll see him soon. The shuttle leaves, and Worf stays in the bay, 
watching, for a long time.

As the shuttle approaches the border and the pair make preparations, Joret 
tells Sito that he's doing this, not to be a traitor, but to dissuade the 
Cardassian government from pointless wars. "My people need peace," he adds, 
surprising Sito. A patrol ship approaches...

Meanwhile, Lavelle and the others wonder in Ten-Forward if Sito is on the 
shuttle that left. Lavelle, knowing nothing, speculates as much as he can 
about the occupant and the condition of the shuttle -- but Ogawa and Taurik, 
concerned by what they *do* know, ask him to change the subject.

The Enterprise reaches the rendezvous point and waits for hours, with no sign 
of the escape pod carrying Sito back home. Despite it being a treaty 
violation, they send a probe in to search for the pod. What it finds, 
however, is debris -- and debris consistent with the remains of a pod. When 
they later intercept a Cardassian message reporting the death of a terrorist, 
the truth becomes all too clear. Picard announces the death to the crew, 
lamenting the loss of "the finest example of a Starfleet officer."

In Ten-Forward some time later, Lavelle enters, glum. He's been promoted to 
the Ops position, but now has to wonder if Sito would have gotten it had she 
lived. The others reassure him that he should simply do his best in his new 
assignment, and Ben manages to convince a solitary Worf to join Sito's 
_other_ friends in remembering her as she was.

----------

Whew. That was long. Now I hope I have room left for comments. :-)

Even if I hadn't known in advance that this was in part a setup for 
"Voyager", I think I might have suspected it anyway. When five characters, 
all nonregulars, and three of whom you've never even *seen* before get this 
much and this strong characterization (with only one getting killed off), 
it's a good bet that the goal is to continue with at least some of them. 
Given that TNG has less than a dozen shows to go, it was either move them to 
DS9 or pack 'em up and take 'em to "Voyager", and I'd have bet the latter.

However, if this is the sort of thing we'll get from "Voyager" on a regular 
basis, I've no complaints. If the characterization is always this strong, we 
should be in good shape. (Of course, the same could be said of Troi in "Face 
of the Enemy", or Bev in "Remember Me", and that clearly hasn't been the 
case.) Of the five major characters in the show, only one failed to impress 
me.

That one, not to waste words, was Taurik. His lines and attitude made sense, 
but Alexander Enberg's delivery just did _not_ strike me as being properly 
Vulcan. He seemed almost snide much of the time (albeit in a very 
understated way), which just didn't rub me right. I've known people who 
talked like Taurik, and "Vulcan" isn't the first word that comes to mind when 
I think about them. This strikes me as more of an acting problem than 
anything else -- as I said, his *actions* were fine.

Sito, on the other hand, was among the best of the lot. Clearly, it was 
necessary to build her up more than the others, because we needed to feel her 
death rather keenly, but even so, it WORKED -- more than virtually any other 
character in that position I can recall. I was somewhat underwhelmed by Sito 
back in "The First Duty", but it's easy to be underwhelmed by someone who has 
all of half a dozen lines. Here, she was a *person* -- and what's more, one 
that had clearly been through a lot of pain. Even if Shannon Fill's voice 
suggests "California girl" [no offense intended -- after all, I teach about a 
zillion of same :-) ], everything else about her performance said "young 
Bajoran". I liked her a lot, and I felt a real pang when I realized we'd 
never get to see her again. 

As for the others:

Ogawa came in with some background, since we've seen her around for a while. 
I have a little difficulty believing Bev's head nurse is only an ensign, but 
I'll swallow it for the sake of the show. Her performance was quite nice, 
but I can't help feeling that for the most part she got stuck with some of 
the "filler" scenes, most notably the whole subplot with her fiancee. It was 
cute, but I'd have rather seen something else fill the time. Some of her 
better work, though, came in the poker game (more, _much_ more, about that 
one later) and when Lavelle is speculating about things she already knows 
something about. Ogawa wasn't handled as well as Sito, but she was still 
quite nice.

Lavelle was also pretty strong, though it's my hope that next time we see him 
he'll have grown a bit from the "young Riker" he was here. It was hammered 
in that Lavelle was meant to be a Riker parallel, and to his credit Dan 
Gauthier managed to convey that superbly, but I have a feeling that more than 
another show's worth of that would get old rather fast. Still, he felt like 
someone intent on moving up the career track, as I'm sure many ensigns must 
be. Given what he was there to do, he did well.

Lastly, there's Ben. While I had some suspicions about the character towards 
the end of the show that turned out to be unfounded, I have to say that Ben 
managed to steal virtually every scene he was in. (Must be that grin.) As 
the unofficial "glue" between the junior and senior officers, he served a 
fairly crucial purpose for us; but even so, I got the feeling he didn't much 
care that he was on *The Enterprise [TM]*; he just got a kick out of being on 
a big ship and hanging out with his friends. That's kind of refreshing, and 
I hope that attitude manages to stay with him (within reason).

Story-wise, "Lower Decks" was another example of something I consider both 
pleasant and distressingly rare: storytelling from someone's POV other than 
that of the regular characters. "First Contact" did it a few years ago to 
expert effect, and "Face of the Enemy" did it to an extent -- but for the 
most part we see TNG through the regulars' eyes. That's only natural, but it 
means we never get anyone else's views. Here, we *did*, and in ways that 
brought out some other ideas about the characters we _do_ see every week.

Take Riker, for instance. From _our_ POV, he's the "fun-loving" commander in 
many ways, and he's also far less important (in my experience, anyway) to the 
grand scheme of things than Picard. Not, however, to the ensigns who serve 
on the bridge: there, Riker is the one who'll kick your ass if you screw up, 
the one who is so focused that he "probably sleeps in his uniform", and the 
one who you have to pay attention to if you want to know what's going on. 
Picard is too remote to make an impression (except when you have something 
like Sito's case, when the captain himself is giving you a dressing-down in 
private). Very interesting.

Similarly, we usually see Geordi as more of an underling, though that word's 
a bit too strong. He's the one carrying out Picard's orders, the one who has 
to make things _work_. Not here. Here, we see him as "da boss", at least in 
Taurik's case. He reprimands people who overstep their bounds, at least when 
he's under stress. He has to delegate authority -- and he gets edgy when 
other people try to usurp it. Good Lord, he's a person. :-)

It's a wee bit implausible that the only ensigns who find out much of 
anything about what's going on are all friends -- but then again, that's 
probably not true. There were undoubtedly some low-deck workers in the 
shuttle bay when Joret and Sito left, for instance; and I'd be surprised if 
Bev had been the *only* one in the entire sickbay when Joret was first beamed 
in. What's more, not everyone did find out much; Lavelle knew almost 
nothing (and Ben didn't know anything, which was very good). So, thinking 
about it, I'm not so sure there's much of an implausibility at all.

The actual plot unfolding was standard "get the spy back home" stuff that 
we've seen before, but that's okay; the point was to see it from other 
characters' perspectives, which we did. What's more, we got to see a bit 
more about how people were *chosen* for missions, which is intriguing to say 
the least. More to the point, this wasn't a show that was designed for 
earth-shattering, head-spinning plots; this was one where we needed to get 
into the *people* involved, and too intricate a plot might have proved 
distracting.

Direction-wise, I was remarkably impressed. Between this and "Face of the 
Enemy", I can comfortably forget that Gabrielle Beaumont also did things like 
"Disaster". :-) As I said, the Bev/Ogawa scenes sometimes seemed a little 
on the dull side, but all in all she did a terrific job.

Of course, the highlight in terms of direction was the double-poker sequence. 
I don't think I've laughed that hard in a long, LONG time. Besides showing 
that Lavelle has a ways to go before he'll be Riker-caliber (and showing 
Riker actually *holding* a winning hand for a first!), it was just pretty 
damn funny. Cutting between one game and another the way they did is a 
director's conceit, but when it gets pulled off this well directors can be as 
conceited as they like. :-) (Besides, I absolutely cannot resist Riker's 
line as Geordi leaves: "you don't have to quit just because I'm unbeatable!" 
Hee.) Nice, nice job.

All in all, then, "Lower Decks" was a very strong show. A few short takes, 
then, and I'll be on my way.

-- It may have been poor planning to air this right after "Sub Rosa". When 
Bev talked about how if she were in Ogawa's shoes, "he'd have to do a lot 
more than cancel a date to make me suspicious," my response was "yeah, like 
re-animate my dead grandmother or something." Cheap shot, I know, but 
richly, richly deserved. ;-)

-- I didn't realize ensigns had to share quarters, but I suppose it makes 
sense.

-- In terms of dialogue, I also very much liked Ben's reaction when told 
Riker hated Lavelle: "Why? Did you crash the ship into something?" Heh.

-- I have to wonder about the time-frame question yet again, though. Sito 
was a third-year cadet in "The First Duty". Now, if she was held back a year 
like Wes and has been here for seven months, then three years (as stated) 
makes sense. However, two seasons _doesn't_ make sense as three years and 
never has. Is anybody checking time continuity these days?

That's about it. "Lower Decks" is the first TNG I've really enjoyed since 
"The Pegasus" -- I hope it's the beginning of a run of good ones up through 
the end. (Certainly, next week looks and sounds intriguing.)

So, time to wrap up.

Plot: Basic, but that's all it needed to be. Sound.
Plot Handling: Marvelous. Great change of perspective.
Characterization: Rich. The Bev/Ogawa scenes were a little flat sometimes,
but that's about it.

OVERALL: 9.5. Almost perfect. Keep it up, folks...

NEXT WEEK:

Data ends up on a planet where he's a mystery to everyone - including 
himself.

Tim Lynch (Harvard-Westlake School, Science Dept.)
BITNET: tlynch@citjulie
INTERNET: tlynch@juliet.caltech.edu
UUCP: ...!ucbvax!tlynch%juliet.caltech.edu@hamlet.caltech.edu
"Perhaps next time you are judged unfairly, it will not take so many bruises 
for you to protest."
-- Worf, to Sito
--
Copyright 1994, Timothy W. Lynch. All rights reserved, but feel free to ask...
This article is explicitly prohibited from being used in any off-net
compilation without due attribution and *express written consent of the
author*. Walnut Creek and other CD-ROM distributors, take note.

Related Links:

Where to Watch - Local channels and airtimes.
VHS, Laserdisc and DVD availability.

Cast:

Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard™
Jonathan Frakes as William Thomas Riker™
Brent Spiner as Data™
LeVar Burton as Geordi La Forge™
Michael Dorn as Worf™
Gates McFadden as Beverly Crusher™
Marina Sirtis as Deanna Troi™

Guest Cast:

Patti Yasutake as Ogawa
Shannon Fill as Sito
Dan Gauthier as Lavelle
Alexander Enberg as Taurik
Bruce Beatty as Ben
Don Reilly as Joret

Creative staff: