TNG Flashback: Where Silence Has Lease

The second episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation's second season was a wholly original script (unlike the season premiere), and yet it seems to me that it might have been impacted by the Writers' Strike in another way. "Where Silence Has Lease" is what's known in the TV industry as a "bottle show," an episode written to save production money by taking place entirely on preexisting sets. It's not unusual to see such episodes around the middle of a TV season; the budget has been blown on early episodes, and pennies need to be saved in anticipation of a big season finale. But for such an episode to occur right after the season started? I wonder if they were in such a rush to get something in front of the cameras that time -- not money -- was the limited resource here.

Passing through an unexplored region, the Enterprise stops to investigate a strange "hole," empty of even the trace elements one finds in interstellar space. The ship winds up drawn into a void where strange events unfold: a phantom Romulan ship attacks; attempts to escape put the Enterprise right back where it started; an empty Federation starship appears, with an impossible internal architecture that frustrates the Away Team that explores it. The weirdness is all revealed to be the scientific testing of a powerful alien with curiosity about the crew. And now he wants to kill half of them to study the concept of death.

There are both good and bad things about this episode.The first act or two are actually rather compelling, as for the first time we really watch the Enterprise crew investigate a scientific mystery in detail -- almost in real time even. The strange occurrences within the void really do have just the right amount of building creepiness, and the speculation about the mystery behind it all is compelling.

But then "Nagilum," the alien behind it all, is revealed. And things get much less interesting after that. I think it's because the effective mystery is replaced by an uneffective jeopardy. You really don't get a sense of the Enterprise crew trying to fight back against Nagilum, and so it's hard to accept that their situation really is hopeless. Instead, Picard almost immediately rolls over to die. Almost literally. He decides the only way out of the situation is to just blow up the Enterprise -- killing all his crew -- rather than stand by and watch half of them be slaughtered. I guess there's some sort of morality exploration in there somewhere about choosing the time and place of your own death, but it doesn't come off in the episode as much more sophisticated than "you can't fire me, I quit."

In its conclusion, the episode completely ignores what feels like an obvious question to me... and one that would have yielded a much more fascinating ending. Once Nagilum realizes the humans mean to kill themselves rather than allow his tests, he releases them from his "laboratory." Picard does not immediately cancel the auto-destruct sequence of the ship, not trusting that Nagilum has really let them go. And that's a totally fair concern, given the illusions we've seen that Nagilum is capable of producing. In fact, the very end of the episode has Nagilum magically appearing on the computer screen in Picard's ready room to trade barbs with him one more time. So I have to ask: if Nagilum has the power to appear and influence things beyond the confines of his interstellar void, and (as we've seen) has the power to create things that aren't real, how can Picard know that his crew has in fact escaped? What if the Enterprise is still stuck in Nagilum's lab, the crew being subjected to other tests, and none of them knows it because they all think they've escaped? I think an ambiguous ending like that could have really helped the episode.

What does help the episode, though, are a number of interesting character moments, and the performances of them by the actors. The before-credits teaser for this episode, in fact, doesn't even introduce the main plot. It involves Riker joining Worf on the holodeck to participate in his "calisthenics program" (the only new set built for the episode). This sequence is introduced without a captain's log. In fact, it's introduced with no explanation of any kind. In a more sophisticated writing technique, the first scene just shows Picard pacing the bridge, then acknowledging to Troi that he's worried. Why, we don't know... but we're then shown (rather than told) when we cut to the holodeck.

This training sequence has nothing to do with the plot. From a certain point of view, it's actually nothing but a mindless excuse for a fight sequence in an otherwise all-talking episode. But it peels back another layer of Klingon culture. It establishes Riker's interest in learning more about that culture (which pays off very soon when he spends an episode serving aboard a Klingon ship). It gives Michael Dorn a chance to really act something different as Worf; he delivers a really physical performance with a lot of animalistic movement. Even if this is all just padding out a short script, it's interesting padding that expands the characters. Well done.

Other observations:

• There's some fantastic music in this episode from Ron Jones. He gives us Klingon music for Worf's training, Romulan music for the brief "battle," all kinds of tension throughout as the crew works to solve their mystery, and a great climax for the auto-destruct countdown's final minute.

• A hallmark of the first season were the high-and-mighty speeches talking about how primitive and horrible 20th-century humans were. This episode again has our heroes looking back in wonder at their dumb ancestors... but at least this time the joke is one the viewing audience can join in on: Picard and Riker marvel at the time that humans thought the world was flat, and that a ship could sail off the edge of it.

• Just as in her first episode, Pulaski spends a lot of her screen time insulting the favorite character of most of the audience, Data. She refers to him as "it," questions his ability to perform basic tasks, and then scolds herself that she "must accept" that he's alive -- but only because his service record says so. It's no way to endear the new character to us. In fact, it's this sort of dehumanizing attitude toward Data that becomes the backbone of one of season 2's best episodes, "The Measure of a Man," and a trademark of that episode's main villainous character.

• The writers continue to make Pulaski be a clone of McCoy from the original series, by having her come up to the bridge for no reason to hang out near the captain and say folksy things. Beverly Crusher rarely hung around on the bridge without a specific reason for being there.

• There's some weird editing in an early scene, in which Troi seems to suddenly vanishes without a trace. Then again, maybe this was intentional. Her chair goes empty apparently so that Pulaski can come sit in it in the next scene.

• Wesley is another character who goes missing without explanation for a big chunk of the episode. In his case, though, there's a very specific (and very transparent) reason for it: the writers needed to get Wesley out and put a redshirt in for Nagilum to kill in a later scene.

• The Enterprise's "sister ship," the Yamato, is introduced in this episode. (Sort of; it isn't really the Yamato.) They give a serial number for the ship that ends in an "E," as the Enterprise ends in a "D." I think that was a bad choice of detail, cheapening the cool legacy of the Enterprise a bit by suggesting that keeping a serial number was not in fact a special thing done just for one ship name. I think the writers may have realized this too; the next time the Yamato appears on the show, they change the serial number to remove the letter.

• At one point, Nagilum uses some sort of power to move Pulaski about like a puppet. It's an unfortunately laughable performance from Diana Muldaur. She sort of pirouettes into the wall with a wide-eyed expression. The moment really called for a stunt to convey some danger, or at least a visual effect of some kind to not leave the poor actress hanging like that.

• The auto-destruct sequence depicted in "11001001" is repeated here almost identically, but with a notable exception. Before, it was a specific plot point that the command had a fixed, unalterable countdown clock. Here, it's a specific plot point that it does have a variable timer.

• Although I criticized how quickly Picard reaches the decision to destroy the Enterprise, it does lead to an interesting scene where Nagilum sends facsimiles of Troi and Data to try to talk him out of it. It's telling of Nagilum's understanding of these people that he sends a very emotional proxy and a very emotionless proxy to Picard. And yet it's simultaneously telling of how little Nagilum understands them, as the two polar opposites speak in the same manner, giving away the ruse.

• In the same scene, Picard gives a rather long and philosophical speech about what humans in general -- and he in particular -- believe to be the nature of the afterlife. I think it's one of the only times in all Star Trek (up until the introduction of the Bajorans) where religion is brought up in a non-critical light.

• Jonathan Frakes nails the comic moment that relaxes the mood after a tense scene, with the line: "Yes, absolutely, I do indeed concur -- wholeheartedly."

I do appreciate the attempt to craft an episode that really is about pure exploration and the scientific method. But the actual execution of the episode is too hit and miss to be a good one. I grade it a middle of the road C.