We enter into 2024 and I’ve decided not to wait till 2030 before I can freely start talking about 90s sci fi. Since I’m not watching Dr Who until that terrible retcon is undone I often find myself struggling to find material when it comes to reviewing classic sci fi. Sure, I have some classic serials but I find them a little too formulaic at times that I don’t feel anyone reading this would gett much out of it. So, let’s open up the works of the 90s and start with what I view as the best Star Trek episode of all time.

When I last looked at TNG it was The Measure of a Man, one of the few good episodes in season 2. Darmok is a season 5 episode so much has happened. They booted out the people obsessing with Roddenberry’s view as on review it turned out to be horrible morally and for purposes of drama. The Borg have been introduced and more importantly the classic two parter “Best of Both Worlds” has happened. Basically, this episode is in what is viewed as the best period of TNG.

Darmok has a brilliant premise and theme one that you don’t see much of in major sci fi franchises as it’s not an actiony one, it’s communication. In fact, they openly discuss and talk about trying to avoid conflict and how just simply miss-communicating could cause that.

The issue is that the alien race introduced in this episode, the Tamarians, speak in a way that though the universal translators translate, it still comes out in an illegible way.  While Troy (this is an episode she’s genuinely helpful) detects no hostility things are seemingly agitated when the Tamarian captain stands up holding a knife and says “Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra.” before both he and Picard are beamed to the planet below.

We get an absolutely great episode that shows the strength of TNG and the character of Picard in a story not so much about action but learning to communicate with another race, something that normally in this franchise the Universal translators make a moot point.

The Tamarians you see speak in metaphor, citing similar events from history and legend. We get a scene on the planet as Picard struggles to understand the meaning of the phrases with the Tamarian captain, while also those on the ship try to work out how to try and communicate  so they can rescue the captain.

The ending I would say gives one of the Starfleet captain’s the most legendary of honours I’ve seen in the franchise and it was quite disappointing that this race, until recently, never appeared again in visual media (I’m not going to go hunt through every Star Trek comic to see if they show there) . So I was very happy when a Tamarian became a member of the Lower Decks cast in season 2 and we get their metaphors again, and have a bit of fun with them.

I call this episode the best of Star Trek honestly. While episodes like Balance of Terror or movies like Wrath of Khan have deep tense naval actions. Or shows like DS9 have amazing long-term storytelling and highly memorable characters (hello Garak) This episode shows a sci fi tale with a strong theme and explores it in ways that are thought provoking and enjoyable. To this day when I communicate an intent or feeling on the internet not with words but a clip from YouTube or an animated gif or just simply an image, I call it Darmoking and I feel that’s a very valid thing to do.

Rating: 👍👍👍👍👍