Disaster

OK, now how did those three young children get Pickard out of the turbo lift?

In this episode the Enterprise hit some big quantum disturbance and the ship is badly damaged. Power and communications are knocked out and no one knows if there is life support on other levels of the ship. Now the crew, which are marooned on different parts of the ship, have problems they must face in order to save the ship and keep alive.

Counselor Trio is the the highest ranking officer on the bridge and will have to face a dilemma about sacrificing others to save a few. Captain Picard is along in an elevator with three needy kids. Doctor Crusher and Geordi are in a section that is leaking radiation. Riker and Data will try to gain control of the ship by interfacing Data's electronics to the ship's computer. And Worf is in hot water when Keiko goes into labor in a different part of the powerless ship.

There are many things going on in this episode. In fact perhaps too much - as some interesting situations had to be squeezed in order to return to another part of the story. Some situations were entertaining, like having Trio making hard decisions which was against given advise. Some were less interesting as in the Crusher and Geordi problem. But overall this episode held the viewers attention as we were right in the middle of each person's conundrum. Good watch.

Among the "Goofs" in the reviews of this episode, one writer claims that Troi would be "out ranked" because she has a "psychologist". However, in the episode, itself, O'Brien has a line of dialogue which speak directly to this issue. He states very clearly - to Ro, in fact - that Counselor Troi "carries the rank of Lieutenant Commander", thereby outranking Ensign Ro.

Enterprise is badly damaged with crew members trapped in various sections of the ship.

This is a very enjoyable episode with some nice irony and great character moments.

'Disaster' does what it says on the tin and pays homage to the disaster movie genre. Any fans of movies like 'The Poseidon Adventure' and 'Towering Inferno' should appreciate its story. The suspense does not work as well as it does in those movies because we know everything will work out for the show's characters and the production values in Star Trek are much lower.

Where it succeeds for me is in two areas. Firstly, I get a real sense of the size of the Enterprise. It depicts that getting from the bridge to engineering or Ten Forward is a huge undertaking without the help of technology. At the same time it portrays how much technology is relied upon and how insignificant people can feel when out of their depth in certain situations.

Secondly, the character situations are very entertaining. My favourite scenes involve Captain Picard in the turbolift, Counsellor Troi on the bridge, and most of all, for its comic value, Lieutenant Worf in Ten Forward. The irony of putting most characters in situations where they are highly uncomfortable works wonderfully.

Visually it is excellent, particularly in the scenes involving Riker and Data.

All cast members are excellent especially Patrick Stewart, Michael Dorn, Michelle Forbes and Marina Sirtis.

'Disaster' is by no means a yawner; there is a lot going on here. The ship is broken, the crew is separated throughout the decks and systems go haywire left and right - it's just one crisis piled onto another. And even though there are tense moments, there are also little bits of humor here and there.

It works because the characters (and their players) work well together, even outside of routine. Picard's not good with kids, but he's forced to adapt; Worf isn't a doctor, but Keiko's having that baby regardless; and Troi isn't used to a leadership role, but rank forces her to man the bridge (nice use of Ro as her aggressive adviser). Even the subtle image of the Enterprise adrift, with no power is eerie (we never see the model without its lights on; was not ready for that).

Out of catastrophe, a great episode emerges.

8/10