The Nth Degree

Barclay's back, and he's going big brain and turning all HAL on the crew!

We open on Lieutenant Barclay and Doctor Crusher performing Cyrano de Bergerac... badly. Is the episode about acting badly? Not at all. We swiftly move on from all this acting malarkey to the Argus array, a subspace telescope that has stopped working. What’s the problem? Why it’s an alien probe shaped like a sausage - and its zapped Barclay and started chasing the Enterprise, who is eventually forced to blow it up. And what’s this? Barclay is now acting all super smart and confident. Everyone immediately can tell something is up, but it’s nut until Barclay connects his neural network directly to the ship’s computer that everything starts to go pear shaped. Send in Worf and two disposable security officers to intervene, but Worf is unable to overpower Barclay (Worf 8, Aliens 13) and the Enterprise is whooshed to the centre of the galaxy where they meet friendly ultratech aliens for the Super Happy Ending.

Words

I believe this is the first screenplay that Joe Menosky wrote from his own high concept, since his previous three screenplay credits all started life as somebody else’s idea. And what a screenplay! It’s full of charm, wit, and is wonderfully entertaining despite lacking anything by way of danger. Indeed, one of the most remarkable thing about this story is that it unfolds as a mystery, but the tale weaves itself with such panache that we are spellbound even if we know how it ends, which is a hallmark of excellent writing.

Inspired by Flowers for Algernon, Menosky crafted a wonderful story, creating a brilliant vehicle for Dwight Schultz that is packed full of great moments. I especially love that Barclay not only becomes super-intelligent, he also becomes hopelessly arrogant, a pairing that is the most human and believable aspect of the story. I cannot resist quoting a few extracts from the script, such as this great moment when Barclay exceeds the capabilities of the Enterprise’s computer:

BARCLAY: Tie both consoles into the Enterprise main computer core, utilizing a neural scan interface.

COMPUTER VOICE (a beat): There is no such device on file.

BARCLAY: No problem. Here’s how you build it...

But I love most of all this scene from the final act. The schtick of using obscure words to make something sound alien is not uncommon (I’ve used it myself) but I’ve never seen it pulled off quite as well as in this exchange with the Cytherian:

ALIEN (continuing): Bipedal locomotion. Endoskeletal. Contiguous external integument.

PICARD: I am Jean-Luc Picard, Captain of the Federation Starship Enterprise.

ALIEN (aha!): Hierarchical collective command structure!

PICARD: Who are you?

ALIEN (still describing what it sees): Interrogative.

Picard realizes it's describing him.

PICARD: Yes. I am interrogative... And I would appreciate an explanation...

This isn’t even Menosky’s greatest screenplay contribution to TNG, though - we’ll get to his magnum opus next season.

One unusual aspect of this episode is the length of the teaser - at seven minutes and twenty one seconds, this is the longest teaser in the entirety of TNG, and one of the longest Trek teasers ever.

Michael Piller was pleased with the story, and recalled that Menosky was “really proud to have his name on that show, more so than any other show.” He also praised director Rob Legato, the special effects supervisor who had his directorial debut last season with “Ménage à Troi”, who turned out to have the perfect blend of talents to helm this episode.

Acting Roles

Although this is Dwight Schultz’s show in every sense, this Lieutenant Barclay story provides plenty for the rest of the cast to do, and both Gates McFadden’s Doctor Crusher and Marina Sirtis’ Troi are given more prominence than everyone else except for LeVar Burton as Barclay’s boss.

Sirtis in particular is on fine form here, portraying concern, amusement, and a whole host of very human feelings very well indeed. The more they let her escape from being a hysterical pain magnet, the more Sirtis’ acting problems vanish.

The teaser requires both Gates McFadden and Dwight Schultz to play at acting badly, which is actually quite tricky to do well!

As the icing on the cake - Schultz gets to pull out all the stops as de Bergerac in Act Two, a contrast that works out extremely well on screen. But this is all throwaway stuff next to the core performance of Barclay becoming more and more talented - and arrogant - until he takes over the entire ship. If Barclay is not entirely threatening in his final evolution, he is never less than completely compelling.

And in the continually shifting world of the Enterprise’s lower decks, meet Page Leong as Ensign April Anaya, named as such in the screenplay.

This is her only appearance, and continues the endlessly fruitless attempt to replace Wesley Crusher at the conn this season. Leong actually had a great career, mixing up small movie rolls (she was Spengler’s assistant in Ghostbusters II) with recurring roles (she was on two US daytime soaps) and bit parts (like this one), having started out as a dancer on the TV series Fame.

Also appearing once and once only is Saxon Trainor as Lieutenant JG Linda Larson (also named in the screenplay), brought into prop up engineering in the absence of Wesley.

This was only Trainor’s second role, after appearing in the crime drama Hunter earlier that year. She has had a rather bumpy career almost entirely lacking in recurring roles, with the highlight probably being her excellent performance in the 2014 film Sand Castles. Sci-fi fans may have spotted her in small roles in Sliders and as a whistle-blower for a dodgy genetics lab in The X-Files.

This episode also marks the first appearance of Jim Norton’s holodeck Albert Einstein, which he’ll reprise at the end of season six.

His first role was in 1965’s The Face of Fu Manchu, and his long career is full of small but serious roles in UK, Irish, and US films and TV shows, including a bit part playing a Muggle in one of the Harry Potter films. But Brits cannot fail to recognise him as the bullying Bishop Brennan from Father Ted - an absolutely unforgettable role, especially in the episode this image is taken from! Why does he look so shocked? Father Ted fans know exactly why!

Finally, it’s impossible not to enjoy Kay E. Kuter’s Cytherian head, which is an infinitely charming role and beautifully performed.

Kuter was a veteran of the theatre with a career going back to 1951, when he appeared in a couple of Biblical epics in small roles. They get him back for DS9, and sci-fi fans may also recognise him as Ambassador Enduran, the commander of the fleet in 1984’s The Last Starfighter.

It’s quite the supporting cast considering everyone is vastly overshadowed by Schultz in this story!

Models, Make-up, and Mattes

New models! Firstly, there’s the Argus array, which will pop up again in the final TNG season.

Secondly, and less impressively, the alien probe, which is basically a sausage with a few cracks in it.

There’s some nice work both in terms of make-up and shot composition with the floating Cytherian head too.

But the big SFX moment is when Barclay merges with the Enterprise’s computer. Here’s a panning shot that would be the envy of classic Frankenstein movies!

There’s no post-processing involved here - these are live lasers. The SFX team had used lasers in post before, but this is the first time they did so on the sound stage during recording. This is where having a director who also works in visual effects like Rob Legato is a major asset, as Michael Piller recalled:

Rob suggested it on this episode and it was a wonderful idea – all those beams coming down and hitting his head are all laser beams and mirrors. It's all live, it’s another effect we want to use more of. It’s really weird and allows you to move the camera. If it was laid down in post-production, you wouldn’t be able to. It has a real immediacy and in terms of technical stuff that was a real advancement in terms of using lasers on stage.

Great performances with a brilliant guest star, a wonderful screenplay, and ground-breaking visual effects...? This is one of those rare episodes that manages to do a bit of everything, and does all of it well. Bravo!