Descent: Part II (⭑⭑)

Part two of “Descent”—and, by extension/as a result, the entire two-parter—is a mess on pretty much every level. It began (in the first half or so of part one) as a promising story built out of a couple of intriguing premises that emerged logically from the show’s history, but when all is said and done, what we have is a slapdash stew of half-formed and poorly executed ideas. Not necessarily bad ideas, mind you; many of them were rife with potential. But by failing to really commit to any of them, or even to weave them together in a particularly coherent way, the writers squandered almost all of that potential. That “almost” is important; there is some entertainment value in part two, and the reader will note that I have given the episode two stars, not one. But still, we’ve got a pretty major disappointment on our hands here (not the most auspicious of starts for the show’s seventh and final season).

Let’s start with the Borg. The back story that emerges to fill in the gap between “I, Borg” and this episode is actually pretty compelling. When Hugh’s sense of individuality disseminated through the collective, it crippled them, leaving them in complete disarray. (It is implied that this was limited to some subset of the entire Borg collective; possibly just the one cube? This seemed like good news when the episode originally aired, as it meant that the collective proper still existed out there somewhere, thus leaving open the possibility for more stories featuring the “real” Borg. In hindsight, though, I perhaps feel somewhat differently, given the poor writing choices that those future stories would feature.) Then, as ill chance would have it, Lore stumbled across them, and found them ripe for manipulation into a kind of personal army. Later, Hugh himself rebelled, and now leads an underground contingent in opposition to Lore. Putting aside the large coincidence of Hugh’s ship and Lore crossing paths, I like pretty much all of this. Unfortunately, despite being a two-part episode, “Descent” gives itself almost no time to explore or really do anything with this setup, instead mostly just leaning on it for plot resolution. When Riker and Worf are first brought before Hugh, he makes a show of being all resentful toward the Enterprise folks for the damage wrought by his previous encounter with them (a fairly irrational attitude considering that they gave him a choice at the end of “I, Borg,” and it was he who chose to return to the collective—not to mention the fact that his people were previously bent on forcibly assimilating them), but at the same time, also wants news about his “friend” Geordi. The latter concern comes across as pretty incongruous in the moment, but later this all proves to have been nothing but half-assed setup for a very cliched change-of-heart, show-up-to-save-the-day scene in the episode’s climax. The ensuing dialog, in which Picard observes that Hugh himself seems like a suitable leader for his people in lieu of Lore, and Hugh expresses hope about his little band one day learning to function both individually and as a group, tries to pretend that something narratively and thematically interesting has taken place in the Borg story, but it’s out of nowhere. To the extent that there is actual thematic content, it has merely been sketched in via exposition (i.e. the back story about Hugh’s impact on the collective, and the Borg-in-disarray’s subsequent encounter with Lore.) Also, bizarrely, the episode doesn’t even take a moment to give us a scene between Hugh and Geordi, despite the former’s inquiry after the latter earlier on. Just nothing but wasted potential here.

What the episode does spend a lot of its time on, of course, is Data and Lore—and all of the reservations that I expressed in my review of part one remain relevant to the continuation of that story. The episode tries to make Data’s behavior believable by establishing that his “ethical program” has been disabled (and then also uses this to provide the means by which Picard and company manage to return him to normal in the end). But I have issues with this. First (and least importantly), it’s not at all clear when Lore had an opportunity to do this; certainly, for instance, not before Data freed Crosis from the Enterprise brig and buggered off with him in part one! Second, I’m not necessarily in love with the idea that Data’s ethics are the product of some single “program” in a way that makes it easy to isolate them from the rest of his programming/personality and “turn them off” at will. Third, I have to reiterate my objection that if Data’s very programming has been tampered with by Lore, than he’s not meaningfully Data, so none of the evil shit that he does while under Lore’s influence has any real character significance. And fourth—frankly, I’m not convinced that even having his “ethical program” disabled makes Data’s behavior particularly believable. I mean, Lore’s notions about biological life forms being “obsolete,” and about turning the Borg into fully artificial life forms that are “perfect” like himself and Data, are pure megalomaniacal nonsense. And for Lore himself, that’s fine; he’s always been unhinged, and anyway, I think there’s room to question whether he really believe in this new ideology or is just using it to justify a personal power grab. But for Data? Why would he buy into any of this, even with his ethics “disabled”? He calls it a “higher purpose” and “the greater good”; how’s that, exactly? None of this tracks with who he is in any way. It’s not a case, for instance, of him succumbing (under the influence of Lore’s tampering and emotional manipulation) to temptations that relate to things that he’s genuinely wanted before now; he’s wanted emotions, sure, but he’s also wanted to be more human, not to exterminate biological life forms! He has always striven to perfect himself, not to remake “lesser” beings in his own image! Also, even the characterization of Lore leaves something to be desired, for me. There’s one really good scene where he actually proves himself to be an effective charismatic manipulator (with the Borg who has cut himself off from the others), but for the most part, he’s just sort of over-the-top evil. He was much more interesting the last time we saw him, in “Brothers,” where he was twisted and disturbed, yes, but still clearly motivated by relatable impulses (jealousy, resentment, a need for love, etc.). In this episode, when he says “I love you” to Data at the end, it feels unearned and leaves me a little cold; do you, really, Lore?

Most of the “plot stuff” that gets us from points A to B in the episode is fairly routine, and features still more missed opportunities along the way. The right way, of course, to do a story like this one, would be for Picard and company to extricate themselves from the situation and win Data back to their side by exploiting Lore’s weaknesses, and/or or their own history with Data, in ways that progressed character arcs and dramatized the story’s themes. Instead, they tech up a gizmo to “reactivate Data’s ethical program,” and then Picard points out “gee, Data, it seems like what Lore is up to, and what you’re helping him to do, is wrong!” It’s just boring. Plus, when Picard challenges Data to explain how unethical actions can serve a “greater good”…um, hello? First, this is hardly as cut and dried a thing as he is implying; second, wasn’t he himself just wrestling with this exact question in part one? When Riker reassured him that letting Hugh go had been the moral thing to do, and he replied by wondering whether it may nevertheless not have been the “right” thing to do? But whereas part one of “Descent” briefly has Picard confronting moral complexity and shades of gray, part two has him snapping Data out of his Lore-induced insanity by reminding him of just how simplistic and black-and-white morality (apparently) actually is. Of course, if Data had had any actual reasoning or motivations for joining with Lore, then maybe Picard could have engaged with him in a more substantive way, in a conversation that acknowledged moral complexity and drew on his own internal struggles, and this might have led to a resolution that felt like it actually spoke to character issues for both of them. But this, alas, was not to be. I will grant that the scene in which Geordi, strapped to Data’s experimental treatment chair, is trying to reminisce about experiences they’ve shared while Data is about to destroy his brain, manages to be poignant and affecting—but even here, I wish that something more interesting and personal than the fact that Picard has just triggered his tech gizmo were behind Data’s sudden hesitation and backing off at the last minute.

Meanwhile, there is a subplot happening on board the Enterprise, temporarily commanded by Dr. Crusher, that mostly feels like it belongs in some other episode entirely. With there already being way more going on down on the planet than the episode has time to do any justice to, stuffing this in would have been a terrible idea even if the material in question had been riveting. Giving the doctor a turn in the center seat was a nice enough idea, but if they were going to do it, they for sure should have saved it for some other episode (and, of course, justified it in some more plausible way than via the idiocy of beaming everyone else down to the planet for no reason at the end of part one). Also, this part of the episode has problems of its own. At first, when a Borg ship shows up and she follows Picard’s orders and gets the Enterprise out of there only to find that the Borg don’t even bother giving chase, I can get behind her decision not to run off back through the conduit to Federation space right away. But then, when she goes back to the planet and this time the Borg do pursue, what excuse does she have for not obeying orders? Was it for nothing that the episode made a point of having Picard order her to take the ship to safety? Does disobeying orders never lead to any kind of consequences anymore? Meanwhile, the interactions between the doctor and Ensign Taitt are enjoyable enough, but I could do without the arrogant lieutenant who takes over from her later on (although at least he isn’t depicted as a total ass). And while I guess it’s nice that for once, the show calls back to a new technology established in a prior episode (the metaphasic shielding from “Suspicions”), doing so in a way that once again positions Crusher as sort of obsessively the lone believer in it seems like a weird choice (on top of which, I would rather not have been reminded of that particular prior episode at all). But, whatever; this entire aspect of the episode mostly just feels like a sideshow.

Despite everything, though, the final scene of the episode manages to move me. Geordi visits Data in his quarters, seeming to want to process everything that has just happened between them. This makes good character sense and was an appropriate note to end on, but I also appreciate that the episode doesn’t dwell on it overmuch, since we understand that it wasn’t really Data who did the things that were done to Geordi. But for Data to be ready to destroy the emotion chip, and for Geordi to stop him, is a moment that really works for me. Partly it’s just a joy to have the real Data back, but also, Geordi shows himself to be a pretty amazing friend to our favorite android, and it really hits me emotionally. Then, too, the episode has just taken the step of actually killing Lore off, and is now further establishing that the emotion chip that was originally meant for Data is now in his possession (even if it is damaged, and him reluctant to use it in any case). All of this feels like genuine narrative progress, rather than the all-too-usual complete return to status quo. We didn’t know where this dangling story thread might lead, of course, when the episode originally aired, but looking back on this moment in hindsight (and especially as a big fan, in contrast to many, of most of Generations) only elevates its significance to Data’s story.

“Descent” is not a good episode…but it has enough good moments, and certainly enough interesting ideas, to make it a lamentable missed opportunity rather than an unmitigated travesty. I wish that it were something much better than what it is, and I wish that TNG’s season-spanning cliffhanger/two-parters had not devolved, over the years, from the heights of BOBW and “Redemption” to the likes of this. Not since season two had a season opened with an episode as sub-par as this one! Still, like I said, it does have its moments, at least.