By 
Title: Home Soil
Airdate: 2/22/1988
Plot Summary
The Enterprise makes a visit to a terraforming station but the leader of the scientists is acting very suspicious and doesn’t want them there. They decide to investigate. The rest of the scientists seem pleasant enough and nothing seems to be amiss, until one of the scientists is brutally killed by an automated drilling laser. As they search for the killer, they discover a new life form buried deep within the soil, one made of a silicon base, rather than carbon. They bring the tiny crystal creature to the Enterprise to study it, only for it to start multiplying and getting into the computers.
It turns out the terraformers were unknowingly destroying the habitat of these new lifeforms and they have declared war. Can Picard come up with a peaceful resolution?
Make It So
Picard gets rapidly more and more impatient with Mandl, until finally he just stops his bullshit in its tracks and basically forces a confession of sorts out of him.
Number 1
Troi wants to get info from Luisa so she sics sexy Riker on her. Damn Riker, she’s crying and he wants to show her “something beautiful.” Oh he meant the alien. Sure he did.
Fully Functional
Laser drills are no match for our android.
Today Is A Good Day To Die
Worf works with Geordi and Data on studying the crystals and muses “But is it life?” The computer answers and he tells it to shut the fuck up.
Phase Inducers
Geordi scans the new lifeform with his visor which helps identify the crystal as a lifeform. He’s darn near frantic when Data is dodging lasers and he can’t get through the door.
Counselor Cleavage
Troi is all over Mandl’s alarm. For once she is seeing things that aren’t always that obvious to others. He was a cranky bastard sure, but alarmed and panicked I would not have guessed. Though I admit that suspecting he was hiding something didn’t require betazed powers.
She is able to sense that poor guy is in trouble but it doesn’t help him not get smoked by a laser.
Dancing Doctor
Crusher does her best to save Malencon but to no avail. She does work with Data, Geordi, Picard, and Wesley to use the scientific method to determine whether or not the crystals are a new form of inorganic life form.
Security Chief Dead Meat
Yar beams up Malencon and opens comms and stuff.
Shut Up, Wesley
Wesley stands with everyone else and looks just as puzzled as everyone else.
Canon Maker
Terraforming is a thing and it looks like the federation is doing it the old fashioned way. Genesis waves have clearly been abandoned.
Canon Breaker
As I state below, they are pretty good with the science on this one, but I have to wonder how the micro brains are solar/light powered if they generally stay buried below the surface. True they do mention that they were just at the level where light reached the water but I remain skeptical.
When Riker goes into the lab and Picard hits him up on the intercom, he taps his badge. This leads me into a general complaint I have with comms, so I might was well do it here instead of pointing out the inconsistencies every time. Many many times in the show, a person will get buzzed on the ship and they’ll simply respond. “Riker here.” That sort of thing. Sometimes they tap their badges. Sometimes early in the show, they’ll go to a wall panel in the corridor and tap a control. The point is that onboard ship, comms are all over the place on how they work and I’m just going to point it out here and be done with it. It’s just as bad in DS9 and Voyager.
The crew is shocked to have found a life form that’s silicon based. The Horta are a bit insulted.
A Little Bloody Nose
That poor scientist got smoked. Lots of microbrains were killed first so that’s what you get.
Technobabble
The crew employs the scientific method rather well in this one. They figure out that the micro brain is getting energy from somewhere yet no power is being drained from their systems. Recalling some of the elements they found, it’s likely using light as an energy source. Good stuff in general for this.
Please Repeat Your Communications
“Ugly bags of mostly water!” – The micro brain’s fairly accurate description of humans.
Library Computer
“Micro brain” is Q’s favorite insult for Worf.
I Know That Guy:
Carolyne Barry nee Shelyne plays another chief Engineer. Or maybe just an engineer. I mention it because she was the metron way back in Arena.
Gerard Prendergast as Bjorn Bensen. I mostly remember him from Bachelor Party. He was out of acting by 1997.
Elizabeth Kapu’uwalani Lindsey plays Luisa Kim. She’s done a few things but is more known as an anthropologist.
Mario Roccuzzo played Arthur Malencon. He did a lot but pretty much fell out of acting by 1990.
Finally Walter Gotell plays Kurt Mandl. He’s most known for playing the KGB general Anatol Gogol in various James Bond movies, mostly during the Roger Moore era.
What It Means To Be Human – Review
This is a pretty good TOS episode that got transferred to TNG. In fact they already did with the Horta. A lifeform that isn’t life as we know it kills to survive. Both are silicon. The Horta to preserve her eggs and the microbrain to prevent extinction in general, though the same thing would’ve happened with the Horta.
The better parts about this episode is that there is a mystery to it. Picard immediately suspects one of the terraformers is a murderer and why not? Once they figure out that the microbrain can take over some of the ships systems, it’s clear that’s what happened to the drill. At that point, Picard switches to Kirk mode, first trying to subdue the thing, and then making peace.
The terraformers claim they didn’t know. I understand some of their arguments, if you aren’t in the business of looking for life, why would you find it. What tipped it over the top for me was when Benson talked about geometric shapes appearing in the sand. Dude, really? You see a trapezoid and you aren’t a little bit curious?
Picard’s reaction when he mentions the patterns in the sand is just priceless.
I also like that almost everyone contributes in some way. Only Yar and Wesley (the boy?!) don’t have much to add. Yar is understandable, she’s in security, not science. Wesley just being there basically to look impressed is much better use of him.
In the end, they make peace, quarantine the planet, and go on their way. It’s a very TOS first season type of episode. While that limits any surprises, the original was a good story and this one puts just enough spin on telling it to make it interesting again.
The post Trek On: HOME SOIL appeared first on Last Movie Outpost.
