Sfdebris.net

https://sfdebris.com/videos/startrek/t146.php

I think that the main reason why Chuck was irritated by the episode is because it's quite disjointed.

The main plot of the episode, which is treated as very serious, gets sidelined until the end when it gets fixed easily, while the rest of the episode feels more like filler where you could have replaced the characters and dialogue and not change that much. It's like when they wrote the episode they forgot about that until the last 10-15 minutes when it becomes more serious.

And worse, Worf and K'Ehleyr's subplot/development, which occupies most of the episode, doesn't have any effect on the main plot's resolution, if anything, it's the goddamn poker game from the teaser that provides the solution to the episode.

If I had to go with what Chuck's problem was? This episode by it self is filler. The best piece is the very end with the line he highlighted. "Comfortable Chair".
It may as well be a script they picked up cheap and used it because the rest of the writing staff had come up empty.
That said so much of it is used again. Khey'lar, the idea that the only one that can handle a klingon is a klingon. And even Worf's being between two worlds. He spent much of his life reading about his own people and wanting to be a good klingon. He does not know how to relax and party with them.
So like many others. This episode is a seed which more fleshed out ideas grew.

Those old TNG uniforms really do look shitty don't they? Seemingly they could not settle on what admirals looked like back then, ranging from gold braid to looking like a reject from classic Battlestar Galactica as this one does. And the horrible, rigid material that was used. Often the guys look as if their boobs are just as big as the women.

Patrick Stewart said he was living out of a suitcase when he started working on that show, and I just think season 1 is an overall nightmare just alone considering how good the show ended up.

... b v

I spent the review wondering what part of the episode could have caused the meltdown in the description, until Chuck finally explains at the end... there was no part. Nothing stood out. That was the problem.

Total mediocrity is probably the worst thing for any critic or reviewer to deal with. It leaves them struggling to say anything other than "yep, stuff happened."

Yeah Chuck has captured my memory of this episode very well. If I were to describe the outline it sounds really interesting, one of the first big episodes to explore how relations with the Klingons changed, K'Ehleyr's inner turmoil is a neat twist on a recurring Trek trope, and the final solution to the puzzle is really good. But as an episode all that stuff just... sits there, spinning, waiting to happen. Once you know that stuff is there and where it is all the in between and presentation just... exists. It's so BLAH without having anything actually WRONG with it.

I'm surprised by the lack of comment on the weirdness of the Klingons sending out a ship with its crew in cold sleep a mere 75 years before TNG - well into the TOS era, when we know quite well the Klingon Empire had warp drive. (And if we didn't know that we could deduce it without reference to anything outside the episode, as there'd be no reason for the ship's crew to believe they were "still at war with the Federation" if they had launched from a pre-FTL civilization.)

Why would they do that? Even if warp drives were scarce at the time of launch, why not wait a few years (or even decades) until a warp drive-equipped ship became available? The cold sleep ship took 75 years to reach its destination, and presumably would need another 75 to return; a warp-capable ship would be back with the goods sooner even if it had to wait almost the full 150 before starting the trip. It is baffling.

Lt Commander Deanna Troi...

You know, given the outfit that she wore from episode 2 until season 6, and given that they retconned her empathic ability to just sense emotion and not experience it, I figured they had also retconned her rank or even the fact that she was a Starfleet officer. Until Ensign Ro pointed out in season 5 "Disaster" that Troi held the rank of Lt Commander, I had completely forgotten that Troi was an actual commissioned officer. And if I recall the reactions to Ro's statement, even those remaining on the Bridge had no knowledge that Troi was even an officer.

A new Star Trek episode and a meltdown? I'll pull up a chair, open a cold one and a snack, and enjoy.