The Dauphin

I think that this episode is receiving a fairly low rating just because it revolves around most people's least favorite "The Next Generation" character, Wesley. Well, it's not one of the best TNG episodes, but it's definitely one of its better ones. It has a few unexpected, genuinely funny comedic twists and a light and entertaining romance story. I was actually impressed by the youngest actors' performances in this one, and the script is fairly solid.

I think that its rating might also be suffering because it follows one of the best Next Generation episodes of all time ("The Measure of a Man"). But it's well worth seeing. In comparing it to another episode that also featured Wesley fairly heavily, it's not the ridiculous, crushing bore that "The Naked Now" was.

Enterprise transports an important passenger and Wesley becomes romantically involved with her.

I found this to be one of the weakest entries in the second series mainly due to the lack of chemistry in the romance and the terrible visuals. It does have some saving graces that make it just about watchable, such as Guinan's contribution to the final scene and the unintentional humour generated by some of the effects and physical performances.

The story is a fairly uninspired teenage romance doomed to failure with some reasonable themes around parental attachment and protectiveness. I did not care for the relationship at all, as it is one of those typically bad 'they're in love because they are' type situations. Romances rarely work on episodic television as there is only 45 minutes to get you invested and the ingredients to make it work are not possible in such as short space of time unless its particularly cleverly written and well acted. For me a screen couple either have to go through something meaningful together from which the love develops or the actors need sizzling chemistry from the moment they share the screen. Neither of this happens in 'The Dauphin'.

As a romance, it is nowhere near as bad as it is an attempt at a creature concept. The visuals are truly horrible, with costumes and camp physical performance that would look bad in the original series. In addition to this the general visuals are awkward and poorly choreographed. The fight scenes, the entry of the security team and Wesley's first sight of his love interest are but a few examples of unintended comedy.

The less said about the scenes where Wesley seeks romantic advice from the crew members the better as most of it is pretty cringe-worthy, particularly Riker who comes across as creepy as ever when trying to be amorous.

Performances are generally decent. Will Wheaton is solid, but is no romantic lead and likewise Jamie Hubbard. Paddi Edwards does well with some quite poor material, as does Michael Dorn. The standout performer is easily Caryn Johnson as Guinan in two scenes, but mostly so in the final sequence where she is effortlessly natural.

This TNG story involves the Enterprise on a mission to bring back Jaimie Hubbard the teen princess of a divided world to assume her thrown now that she has reached her majority. The princess arrives accompanied by her maid/protector/duena and it seems to be taken from the story of Mary Stuart when she arrives in Scotland from France.

The companion is played by Paddi Edwards who protects Hubbard from all but official contact. That's not pleasing to Hubbard as she's spotted Wil Wheaton who is close to her age. As for Wesley Crusher his hormones are kicking in.

Needless to say Hubbard is not what she seems and neither is the duena who can summon up some fierce powers in protecting her charge.

Nice to see Wesley growing up even though first female attraction for him is not quite what he imagined it to be.

I'm sure many found this charming. For me, it was just so so. If it weren't for the implications of the young woman's presence, it wouldn't be all that gratifying. The Enterprise acts as envoy to take a teenaged girl (or so we think) along with her guardian to hopefully settle hostilities on a couple warring planets. Wesley Crusher sees her and it's lights out. Suddenly, his work begins to suffer and he seeks advice on how to woo her. The funniest is Worf who explains Klingon mating rituals. Wesley is flabbergasted. Meanwhile, the guardian tells Picard to keep Wesley away from the young woman. She has big fish to fry and doesn't need distractions. This character is a shape-shifter and is able to take on the presence of an enormous creature or a silly looking bear-like thing. The young woman has the same powers and so any dalliance with Wesley is compromised. There is a touching scene where he shows her some of the holodeck projections from other celestial locales and they have a nice moment together. We still know where this is going. A pleasant episode and a bit of development for Wesley's character. Worth seeing, certainly.

I'm going to lean positive on this one and go with a 7/10. There's coming of age stuff going on that would have worked well for me in 1991 when I was roughly the same age as Wesley, but of course now it all seems a bit creaky...but I'd be an old miser to take the show to task TOO hard on that. Obviously it's a bumpy landing back to earth after last week, but that was an extraordinary episode.

Negatives are all fairly obvious. It's a bit nondescript. The teenage crush thing is a bit frivolous and it does dominate most of the episode, so maybe I'm high on something to give a 7 but I liked a lot of the surrounding stuff.