There have been good episodes of TNG up until now. But I strongly feel like The Defector is our first Hot Damn episode of TNG. It’s not ‘every frame a painting’ good, but it’s a lean 45 minutes of television and it’s gripping. There’s no personal tsuris about–I don’t know–Troi grappling with drug use or Crusher having trouble at home. There’s no lagniappe drama; there’s no small, personal bullshit or character arc that Jarok’s mission folds neatly into.
Again, I kinda freewheel about what I’m going to call “VanVelding’s Starfleet TOE,” which I think I hit on just enough to quiet the voices. I’m not going crazy when I expect the Enterprise to have a home port and to be assigned to the command of an admiral, right?
The book that Derek is referring to is the one, I think, Picard and Wesley talked about in “Samaritan Snare.” It included the work of American philosopher William James.
