The Perfect Mate

The Perfect Mate is perhaps a misleading title. The emotional depth of this episode is remarkable and the performance of Famke Janssen is outstanding. The deep emotion that must be dealt with is loss. These are emotions familiar to the characters of Next Generation but presented in such a remarkable and different way. I felt that the use of the Ferengi was a little clumsy here. Another plot might have allowed us to spend more time with Famke.

Great depth and thoughtful story. Well done.

Enterprise transports a passenger and 'cargo' to a peace ceremony.

This is reasonably good character based episode that has some problems but just about works thanks to a number of strong performances.

The plot has good and bad points. I think it works as a character study of both Captain Picard and the guest character Kamala. However, the premise is similar to the original series episode 'Elaan of Troyus' and the Ferengi involvement is poorly written.

Star Trek one off romances never usually work for me, but I found this one slightly better than most due to the performances of Patrick Stewart and in particular Famke Janssen. They do as much as they possibly can in the short time given to this story to convince us that Picard might actually love this character. As ever though, I can never truly accept any burgeoning relationship involving a main character and ultimately want it to fail so it does not affect the status quo.

That being said, Kamala's and Picard's situation works well to drive the plot in an interesting direction. If you want to examine it deeply in the context of gender roles you could perceive problems with Kamala's depiction. A contemporary show probably would have written a male empathic metamorph with female starship Captain (or possibly use non-binary characters) just to avert accusations of sexism, but Kamala is written (and Janssen cast) with a 1990s heterosexual male audience in mind. Importantly though, the writing does at least acknowledge her situation is tragic and regardless of her personality reflecting Picard's notion of female desirability, she is presented with certain amount of freedom to choose her own path.

Visually it works well in the scenes between Picard and Kamala. I like the use of mirrors in some shots, the framing of the two in various scenes, the lighting, set design, makeup, and costuming.

As I mentioned briefly earlier it's the Ferengi scenes that really spoil it with their plot contrivances and the generally annoying characterisations.

Most performances are great, particularly Janssen and Stewart.

In this episode Famke Janssen appears as psychic alien beauty who can remake her own personality to suit whatever man she wishes to please. Knowing that she would have to be the focus character of the episode they did a great job with the casting, she more than holds up the episode with her acting.

It is a sort of fun premise too, she looks like a young human woman, but she isn't. She's an entirely different kind of being who simply attracts men like a machine. And as she explains, it's not some kind of subservience, or a role chosen for her, nor is it a vice, or some kind of high. It is her very nature to attract men, as she says like a Vulcan is logical or a Klingon aggressive.

Which leaves men like Riker and Picard feeling very uncomfortable, in a very enjoyable story.

In her first role, Famke matches quiet intensity with Patrick Stewart with ease. The chemistry with these two was superb, as well as Famke's scenes with the other Costars. While the role depended on her beauty, she brought a grace to the show that had me hoping for a future reunion that never occured. The ending gave me the feeling I get when reading the final pages of a fine novel. I felt I was leaving something behind.

She really is the perfect mate, able to sense a man's feelings and mold herself uniquely to him. But she's also been bred for the sole function as a gift in a treaty ceremony. Naturally, questions of bondage crop up, not to mention attracting every man she comes in contact with . To makes this work, you need an actress of magnetic attraction (the alluring Famke Janssen, check)

. . . as well as that Starfleet office who's duty-bound to resist her appeal. This is a Picard episode if ever there was one, and it's a great character study that focuses on the man and not the Prime Directive-citing Captain we're used to. Their scenes together are amusing and warm, heartfelt and melancholic. The guy's restraint is a testament to his oath of diplomacy.

8/10