A Matter of Perspective

The futuristic justice system gets a look in this TNG story where Jonathan Frakes is accused of killing a noted alien scientist seconds before a space station they were both on explodes. In fact the explosion occurs as Commander Riker is being transported from it so that is a close run thing.

Through a little bit of negotiation Patrick Stewart has the trial conducted aboard the Enterprise because it has an asset that the planet doesn't have, the holodeck. Several witnesses including Frakes gives an account of the events in deceased's laboratory which has been reconstructed down to the last detail. One of the things revealed is that the widow of the deceased was playing a futuristic version of the old badger game with Riker as the victim.

Stewart does figure it out in a nice game of show and tell for the authorities. An interesting prospect for the future of the criminal justice system.

Someone else here listed a point by point, numbered list of what's wrong with this episode, and it's wholly covered so I won't go over that again.

Suffice it to say, why was Troi even there? She didn't sense deception from the wife or assistant? Then why didn't they explain why that would be? Could they cover their emotions? Thoughts?

We're left wondering about those two wildly false testimonies. Thank goodness Picard didn't let them haul Riker away! Who knows what would have happened to the man based on the wife and assistant's baloney nonsense.

This is a bad episode. I love Star Trek, but some episodes you have to wonder, just what WERE the writers smoking that week?!

I was on the edge of my seat the whole épisode, Amazing story , I really love the fact that we saw different version different point of view on what happen. A great Idea and plot, smart writting , Amazing solution in the end. Im not going for 10/10 but it was very close, just lacking a bit of emotional to be a Masterpiece, but it is one of the very best episode pf thé first 60 ep , My rating 9.25/10.

A story of a trial that at first seems of dubious integrity and value is elevated by the trial's final moments and conclusions.

Watery soup. Let me start out by saying that I do have fond memories of watching TNG when it first aired but this is the first time I have ever watched each and every episode in the chronological order they were first broadcast. I have to say that so far, I have found most of the stories relating to season three to be somewhat tedious. Sure, there have been highlights here and there, but again and again I find the stories tend to tread old familiar ground. And so it is with this episode. A member of the crew on trial episode with so many twists and turns that I honestly lost interest about 10 minutes in though I forced myself to stay to the end. There are definitely much better episodes of TNG out there. Even in season three there are better episodes, and I can imagine that when I finally complete my survey that this one may feature within the 'Worst Episodes' category.