The show opens with Captain Picard away from the ship, summoned to an emergency conference. This is the first cycle opening with the tension of the emergency conference and Picard away. From the very first note, we sense that something is wrong: What is the purpose of this emergency conference?
The b-plot is announced in the same moment. The ship has happened upon a capsule of Earth origin. If left to its own devices it will eventually be destroyed, but Data wants to investigate while the ship waits for the captain. So a second cycle of tension is begun: What is the story of the capsule?
Onboard the capsule, Worf and Data find life capsules, many have stopped working but some still contain viable humans. The cycle continues by answering one question: this is some kind of mini-ark ship. But it introduces the obvious question, why are the occupants on board? And further, What should we do with them? We can't leave them to eventually be destroyed, Data concludes, and he brings them back to the Enterprise.
Picard returns to the ship and intends to depart immediately. Whatever happened at the emergency conference, it has prompted decisive action. The captains new heading will take the ship into the Neutral Zone, further heightening the tension. Picard calls for an immediate conference, ratcheting the tension even further.
Picard doesn't wait to disclose his news to the staff. Several outposts and star bases have gone silent along the border to the neutral zone, and the Romulans are the obvious suspects. The stated assumption is that the Romulans are spoiling for a fight, eager to test their military capabilities against the Federation.
In a way, this is the end of the first cycle. The first tension was, What was the purpose of the meeting. And now we have an answer. We went from an uneasy waiting to getting under weigh. The first cycle is complete using the first story beat: Outposts along the neutral zone have gone silent. Now the second cycle begins: What will we find at the neutral zone?
Back on the B-plot, Crusher calls Picard to sick bay to discuss the three capsule survivors. They were frozen after they died, having succumbed to terminal illnesses, but Crusher was able to revive and cure them. Picard is annoyed, first because he knew nothing about them, and second because he is distracted by the coming conflict in the neutral zone. He, Data, and Dr. Crusher discuss the morality of bringing them onboard. They wake up the first survivor, who seems normal, but when she catches sight of Worf, she is overwhelmed and passes out again.
The first B-cycle has completed. We know what's in the capsule, and we've brought the survivors back to life. Now the second cycle begins: what to do with them and who is responsible for them? The story beat is "Thawed out survivors." They have a lot of things to adapt to in the 24th century
While Picard bows out and leaves the problem of the survivors to others, Riker, Crusher, and Data attempt to explain the situation to the people who are nearly 400 years displaced in time. We hear their stories, and learn that they are normal people who left behind normal, if colorful, lives. PIcard sows the seed of further tension with an ominous warning, "Keep them out of my way."
The tension is heightened as we wonder how we are going to deal with these fish-out-of-water characters.
Back on the bridge, Deanna gives us explication about the current Romulan state. They are fascinated with humans and are likely to be "counter-punchers". Back in the lounge, the survivors are busy being colorful, but are beginning to insist on meeting the Captain.
We see that the B-plot is heading for a collision with the A-plot, since Picard is busy right now preparing for an impending conflict. Data re-states the problem, "What are we to do with them?" This is the classic comedic break in the action.
Picard is discussing possibilities with his staff when he is interrupted by one of the survivors. He has a long discussion with them and their feelings of frustration and isolation. He shows patience and instead of doing anything authoritarian, he sends Counselor Troi in to deal with them. One of the survivors is a mother and she is thinking about her children. We get a more personal and more sympathetic view of the survivors situation.
Realistically, while we have increased the tension by making the survivors more relatable, we haven't changed the circumstances of their situation. We add several internal cycles for each of the survivors, giving them small mini-arcs. The mother wants to find her family, The financier realizes that he has no power left in this new time, and the singer just wants to pick up partying. One of our questions is, which of these will actually be able to pick up their lives and carry on.
Back at the A-plot, the Enterprise has reached the first outpost, which they find to be totally destroyed. It wasn't attacked by conventional weapons, according to Worf. It is as if it has been "scooped off the face of the planet". Picard orders them to continue to the second outpost.
The same question hangs over us: What is happening at the neutral zone? We've learned a few things but the tension is only increased.
On the bridge, they begin to pick up signals that the Romulans are in the area. Meanwhile, the financier finds his way to the bridge and disturbs the crew just as the Romulans de-cloak and appear before them. It quickly becomes clear that the Romulans were not responsible for the destruction of Federation Outposts, having lost colonies of their own. During the tense exchange with the condescending Romulan captain, Picard urges them to not start off their relationship with misapprehensions, to which the Romulans respond with an ominous, "Your presence is not wanted. Do you understand my meaning, Captain? We are back.". The episode ends with this hanging in the air, while we transfer the survivors to another ship bound for Earth.
The challenge here is that the central question we've been working on - What happened in the neutral zone - remains unresolved. This is now a 2-parter, except that there is no second episode. This is the season finale, and the next episode after the summer hiatus doesn't address the neutral zone problem at all. The ending feels unsatisfying.
The resolution of the B-plot is equally flimsy. To answer to the question we've been repeating throughout the episode ( What will we do with the survivors), we simply say, "They'll be fine." The way this tension is resolved is not responsive to the beats laid down (the mother finds a distant relative, the financier has no money, the country singer "will be just fine.") And again, this is the season finale of the first season. For a show that needs to bring audiences back next season, this resolution is particularly weak.
This is a recurring problem with TNG. There was an awareness that they needed to include family oriented content to keep primarily female viewers interested, and for the most part they were successful. The colorful secondary characters were there to engage all facets of the audience. The weakness of this approach is that the two plots were almost entirely unrelated to each other, and neither plot was adequately resolved. The B-plot had no real tension, with nothing at stake. The survivors were always going to be shipped back to Earth, and nothing they did could alter that fate. Indeed, that was presented as the best possible outcome for them anyway. As a result, their dialogue was meaningless, and their scenes felt staged and phony.
The other glaring problem with the survivors' story is that it is insufferably preachy, a problem all of Star Trek is prone to. We take these three refugees from 21st C Earth and then laugh at them mercilessly. Riker gets in the first dig, "Well, from what I’ve seen of our guests, there’s not much to redeem them. It makes one wonder how our species survived the twenty-first century.” One is too greedy, overcome with a lust for power. The next is too hedonistic, to the point where it drove him to liver failure. The third is too tied to her family, an outdated concept in the enlightened future.
And we're convinced that none of them really deserve this second chance they've been given. None of them have a justifiable reason for this exceptional measure they've taken. They're all kind of absurd, actually, and the crew are totally justified for not taking them seriously. Why didn't you just leave them, Data? Picard asks at one point. Among a crew of over a thousand, no one could be found to take care of them, listen to their obvious discomfort and begin to help them re-orient to their new situation. In fact, Deanna gets special brownie points for reaching out to help the Mother.
For all of that, it still had interesting elements. For example,
reviving the Romulans as a traditional antagonist was an interesting move
for the series as a whole and this show introduced their menacing ship
design and showed a few Romulans, with their characteristic haughty
condescension, in an initial interaction. We also get a few examples of
Picard's character, as he shows restraint, both to the survivors and to
the provocative Romulans. The writing of individual scenes was entertaining. The vignettes of the Mother finding meaning in her extended family, and of the tense meeting with the Romulans were fun as stand alone short stories. The character of the country playboy was vivid, if a little shallow. But assembling these individual elements into a larger story was poorly supported and the overall storyline failed to deliver.
Its only at the end that you realize that the story had no resolution of either of the central conflicts. It had no discernible theme across either of its plots. The result is a weak story with an unsatisfying ending that leaves audiences questioning, with an uneasy feeling. The Romulan plot was substantial enough that it could have stood on its own, given more time and effort to develop the plot. And the survivors story would have been interesting, interwoven with a less chilling story - about the Ferengi, for example. Throwing the two together is what seemed ill advised.
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