3x01 Evolution

[7.6/10] I wish I didn’t know the behind-the-scenes goings on of Star Trek: The Next Generation when watching this episode. I wonder how someone uninitiated would respond to this one. How would Crusher’s return feel without knowing the backstage drama? How would the stories and characters feel if you didn’t know what this was the first episode from a new showrunner, who co-wrote the season premiere no less? Would it feel like a sea change in TNG or just a better-than-average episode that still feels of a piece with what came before?

I can’t answer those questions. What I can tell you is that for me, someone who marks Michael Piller taking over the show as the point where it truly started to come into its own, “Evolution” is a breath of fresh air. Undoubtedly, TNG started to find its footing toward the end of season 2, with more consistently good outings and even a couple of great ones. But those first two years were rocky, and while there’s still bumps in the road to come, from here on out, the sailing is much smoother.

I think that’s evident in the show’s third season premiere. The characters are richer. The pacing is better. There’s more than enough incident and excitement to support the hour. If anything, I almost wish this one had additional time to spin its story and more fully flesh out the interesting personal and sci-fi ideas at play. But what we get feels much closer to the show I came to know and love, suggesting that the changes between seasons amounted to much more than just spiffy new collars and more comfortable two-piece uniforms.

The episode starts with the experiments of Dr. Stubbs, a former child prodigy who sees a spatial phenomenon that only occurs every two centuries as his last and best “at bat” to put himself in the pages of history. That makes him an interesting counterpoint to Wesley Crusher, another “wunderkind” whose accidentally-unleashed nanite science project threatens both the experiment and the ship. It also feeds into the worries of a returning Beverly Crusher, who wonders whether and how her son has developed in her absence.

With that setup alone, “Evolution” finds strong, character-based anchors for its story here. Stubbs is a fascinating character. I’ll confess to some residual love for actor Ken Jenkins after his turn as Dr. Kelso on Scrubs, but I think he does a great job here. Stubbs is a little despicable -- haughty, self-aggrandizing, and myopic to the point of endangering the ship. But he also feels very human. Troi probably does a little too much psychological exposition on that front (something that Picard amusingly calls her out on), but you do get the sense that beneath the bravado, Stubbs is desperate and afraid to have squandered his potential and leave no legacy. It gives him layers as a foil and quasi-antagonist here, and makes him more interesting than the usual guest star of the week.

In the same vein, Wesley is more interesting as someone who’s messed up than as the kid genius who can always save the day. Sure, his science project malfunction is a result of him being so advanced that he accidentally jump started a new form of life. But still! I like him going to Guinan and eventually having to confess to the senior staff that he’s the cause of all this trouble. The teenager who has potential but screws up in the way that kids do is way more relatable than the happy-go-lucky prodigy who succeeds where seasoned officers fail.

More to the point, this is a great welcome back for Beverly. A lesser show would have glossed over the time apart from her son. But she too gets a relatable story, one where she wonders if Wesley is having a healthy development or if he’s not having the experiences a young adult should while trying to get ahead of his future. The two most emotionally real scenes in the episode come when Dr. Crusher asks Picard “How is he?” and when Beverly challenges her son on what’s best for him and responds with a typical “How would you know? You weren’t even here!” adolescent response. There’s some great nonverbal acting from Gates McFadden, and the show ties a bow on the storyline at the end.

Beyond the strong character material, this is also a classic sci-fi story. This is yet another instance where the crew of the Enterprise holds true to the “seek out new life” portion of the Starfleet mantra, as they recognize the nanites as potentially living beings. There’s something that seems particularly true to form when Picard refuses to simply neutralize them, even when his ship is under threat. He prefers to wait till the last possible moment to resort to that, because he hews to those ideals, even when it’s inconvenient.

That makes for a great conflict between him and Stubbs. The visiting doctor is more concerned with his own legacy and life’s work than ethics, and is too close-minded to recognize the nanites as anything more than a mechanical infection. Picard, having been through this song and dance with Data, Microbrain, and other unexpected forms of life is more open and firm in his principles. That gives it weight when Stubbs attacks the nanites and Picard is forced to try to broker a fragile peace when they unexpectedly fight back.

In truth, the episode somewhat rushes the resolution there. We breeze past Data letting them take him over pretty quickly, and a Captain’s log basically “yadda yadda yadda”s over the aftermath and fixes. But the scene where Picard talks to the nanites through his second officer, and even Stubbs himself is chastened by the experience and epiphany is Star Trek at its finest.

There’s still flaws as The Next Generation starts yet another new chapter in the series’s run. The stunts are still pretty cheesy -- especially Stubbs’s paroxysms after being attacked by the nanites. The show blows through a few big decision points and Data’s digital mind meld could be considered a quick Treknobabble fix.

Still, the bones of this one (if you’ll pardon the expression) are strong, stronger than a lot of what we’ve seen previously. The tone and pacing is better. The characters are a little richer. The whole production feels closer to modern television than to the style of its 1960s predecessor. To advance and mark its own place in pop culture, Star Trek itself needed to evolve. And while its growth wasn’t as sudden or exponential as Wesley’s science experiment, the results were already paying off early.