The Pegasus

In this TNG story the Enterprise has a guest Admiral Terry O'Quinn who back in the day was Will Riker's first commanding officer on Ensign Riker's first assignment in StarFleet.

The ship Pegasus on which they served was reported lost with all but seven members of the crew including O'Quinn and Jonathan Frakes. The Pegasus was conducting experiments that Frakes knows about but is under orders not to talk about it. Patrick Stewart is left in the dark.

They do find the abandoned Pegasus in a most dangerous and tragic situation in an asteroid belt. The Romulans are also skulking around to see what StarFleet is up to.

A lot of pressure is on Commander Riker and he bares up well though things get testy with him and Captain Picard.

It's a good episode about mixed loyalties and knowing what is the right thing to do. That perspective can change with age.

Season 7 was a disappointment, to put it mildly.

However, it did have a tiny amount of excellent episodes (including the two part finale) and this is easily one of them.

It's a terrible shame that most of the rest of season 7's episodes weren't up to the very high standards of this one. But the past is the past, and all we can do is learn from it.

The problem with episodes revolving around a Big Secret is that they usually don't pack quite the same punch on subsequent viewings. Nevertheless, this is a well-done story that provides a glimpse into the dark side of the Federation and lays the groundwork (albeit indirectly) for a deeper examination of that topic in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

One of the highlights of the episode is seeing Riker get yelled at, separately, by both Picard and the admiral. Any viewer who's ever been caught in the crossfire between their boss and the boss' boss will certainly relate.

While I'm generally not into nitpicks, this one is too good to pass up: In one scene, Riker and the admiral are discussing the Big Secret in Ten-Forward (a.k.a. the ship's bar), making sure to emphasize that nobody must find out about it...within earshot of at least a dozen people. As the kids say these days, LOL.

Admiral Pressman (Terry O'Quinn) has come aboard the Enterprise and taken temporary command. It seems that he has a mission for the crew and it's all rather secret. For Riker, it's an interesting and unwanted reunion, as he served with Pressman long ago on the Pegasus--a ship that was destroyed during their time together. The mission, surprisingly, is to try to recover the ship...but it's supposed to have been destroyed. This isn't the end to the weirdness of the mission, as there are quite a few details that Pressman won't tell anyone and he's ordered Riker to keep silence! What they heck is going on here?!

I liked this episode of "Star Trek: The Next Generation" a lot because all too often the humans in the show are so annoyingly noble and inhuman because of their extreme niceness! Here, Pressman and others are sneaky, incredibly dishonest and ignore Federation peace treaties--just the sort of tricky stuff I love to see. Well worth seeing.

Thoroughly absorbing from beginning to end, 'The Pegasus' makes terrific use of conflict; Riker opposes his former commanding officer (Terry O'Quinn), and Picard stands by as the ultimate judge. There's also the big question looming overhead: what was the "experiment" that led to a mutiny and the loss of a ship in deep space? The moving parts of this are all well-coordinated and O'Quinn plays a good villain (in a long line of sociopathic admirals). Levar Burton also deserves credit in the director's chair for the episode's staging, but the primary appeal is to see what sorts of skeletons could possibly be in Will Riker's closet; and it's a fascinating excavation.

9/10