Q Who

Omnipotent being Q does Starfleet a favour by warning them of their new arch enemy - the hive-minded robotic Borg. Q catapults the Enterprise towards a giant cube-shaped Borg vessel. Here, the Enterprise can investigate the hibernating Borg before their ultimate invasion into Federation space two seasons later. Recall: At the beginning of the entire Next Generation show, we are shown that Klingons stop being the Federation's (Starfleet's) mortal foe. A Klingon even serves aboard Starfleet's flagship, the Enterprise. As a result, there seems to be no more reason for Starfleet to be organised as a military hierarchy. Vessels could explore space independently from now on. Klingons pose no more threat to unaffiliated travellers. As a result, it remains unanswered as to why Starfleet does not disband into independent starships. We are told in the later Star Trek show 'Voyager' that the Borg are e.g. Not interested in attacking weak species, such as the many Kazon sects. Therefore dissolving would have been a (another) solution to surviving the Borg. Admirals go home. Really, it's you admirals the Borg seem to want. --- Search "Trek Greenspace" on Google Play Books and join my Star Trek Fan Project!

As all Trek fans know, "Q Who" is the episode that introduced the Borg, arguably the greatest antagonist the Federation ever faced. Besides it's significance in the development of the Trek franchise, the ep boasts some pretty memorable lines, mostly delivered by Q (played by John de Lancie).

Unfortunately the episode is also flawed by several scenes (totaling about five minutes) devoted to introducing Ensign Sonya Gomez, a meaningless throwaway character. Perhaps the producers were auditioning the character for a larger role but if so nothing ever came of it.

The episode is also flawed by the showrunner's bizarre decision to have Picard stop in the middle of the battle with the Borg to leave the bridge and have a conference. The whole thing comes off as a joke on corporate culture in the Eighties.

Interestingly, "Q Who" was first shown on May 6, 1989 which is about six weeks after the beginning of the long-running Dilbert cartoon series. Ridiculing Eighties corporate culture was the original driving force of the Dilbert series. Given that Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert is a science fiction fan, it is highly likely he saw this ep and found it as ridiculous as many other Trek fans did.

"Q Who" is one of the ten most important episodes in the "Next Generations" series, and one of the top twenty in the development of the franchise, but for itself, as a dramatic production, I cannot rate this ep any higher than '7' on the IMDb scale.

he may have been cocky, sarcastic, amusing etc. but he was right:they were not ready. But he also did us a hidden favor.The Borg were apparently coming anyway and now we know what we'd be up against, or at least know that they are out there. in my opinion it was more than a "kick in our complacency". this episode had at least one other interesting feature.

I found myself disagreeing with the protagonists. Picard said it was "not smugness not arrogance!", but that's what it seemed like to me. OK I'd seen the other Borg episodes before this one so I KNEW they weren't ready. I realize that I am giving a lower rating than my comment might indicate but there is some really dull and ultimately pointless stuff in the episode before Q shows up. it is unfortunate that the "dealings" were never explained. The ending is great! 3 of 5 stars. And what happened to the Borg not having a single leader.

The episode starts with a nice misdirect in the form of Ensign Gomez, a clumsy proto-Barclay who is new to the ship. You expect the episode to be about someone integrating into the crew, but instead Q shows up.

While we never really got to know who or what Guinan was, her interactions with Q are always fun and she was interesting and 'powerful' in a different way. Here she is used mostly to deliver exposé, which works really well. Whoopi might be a terrible person but she did a fine job here.

The Borg themselves are fantastic. Sure, they are somewhat derivative of the Daleks and Cybermen from Doctor Who, but they transcend both. Some people think they represent the threat of Communism, with their lack of individuality. In the episode itself they are ironically called the ultimate consumers, who absorb who and what they want.

Their design is fantastic, with their weird ship and their odd implants. Having seen Voyager it is easy to forget how menacing they originally were, especially because they methodically study the Enterprise and practically ignore the crew - even when they're boarded! Now humans have become the new life that is sought out.

Q returns, abducting Picard and demanding to be given a place on board the Enterprise's crew. When Picard turns his request down, Q angrily throws the Enterprise into an uncharted area of the galaxy where they discover a terrifying new adversary - the cybernetically augmented threat known as the Borg.

And here's where TNG really got started, delivering a new threat to the Enterprise unlike anything seen before and really pushing the show forward in terms of production. A great story with the always welcome return of de Lancie as everyone's favourite god of mischief (Loki who?) plus Goldberg's Guinan is also given much more to do than offer cryptic advice. One of the strongest episodes of the whole show so far.