3x25 Transfigurations

[5.8/10] The central concept of “Transfigurations” is a neat one. The notion of a species evolving beyond the need for their physical bodies in real time, the societal resistance and fear for that sort of change, the sense of a great evolution happening but one that is unknown and therefore scary, has a great deal worth exploring. There’s no reason why a good Star Trek episode couldn’t make hay from that sort of idea, and many have.

The problem, or at least one of the problems, of “Transfigurations” is that it doesn’t bother to really explore any of this until the last five minutes of the episode. Instead, it roots everything in an unexciting mystery, where the answer is much cooler than the path the show takes to get there. It also wraps that story around a guest character who is supposed to be our conduit for this mystery and transition, but who’s too uninteresting to carry the weight the episode needs him to.

The episode kicks off with the discovery of an alien survivor in a crashed escape pod. It takes some extraordinary interventions and remarkable natural recovery, but the Enterprise team brings this “John Doe” back to life and helps to cure all that ails him, except his amnesia. As he recovers, he begins not only ingratiating himself to the crew, but displaying peculiar powers that can heal or, when uncontrolled, hurt those around him.

The biggest issue with this setup is that John just isn’t a very interesting character. In one scene, Beverly describes him as being preternaturally charming, to the point of intrigue, a perception shared not just by her, but reportedly everyone in sickbay. That just doesn’t hold up to when we actually see John on screen. No offense to performer Mark LaMura, but his John has all the personality of a wet rag. There’s nothing that grabs you about his presence or manner with others, creating a disconnect between what’s told and what’s shown that the episode never fully overcomes.

He’s ultimately just too bland a personality to build an episode around. The weight of his presence is supposed to be elevated by his unknown past and his magic healing powers. But there’s not enough good breadcrumbs to make that past worthy of wonder, and the abilities and energy flashes play as more cheesy than exciting. “Transfigurations” seems to want to cast John as some sort of Messianic figure, but can’t capture the gravitas or intrigue necessary to pull that off.

It doesn’t help that the stories spurred by his presence go absolutely nowhere. Initially, I thought this might have been some kind of body switch episode, given John’s early interactions with Geordi. The episode opens with our favorite chief engineer finding himself unlucky in love again due to his inability to relax around a girl he likes, only to find his confidence after a nervous system linkage with John to help save the alien. I kept waiting for the reveal that they had some kind of mind meld, or something along those lines, perhaps with some unintended consequences for Geordi.

But nope, what we see is pretty much what we get. There’s no real story, it’s just that Geordi was anxious around his crush, then he wasn’t. They kiss a lot -- the end. There’s a faint coda where Geordi thanks John for giving him that confidence and John responds about helping him find something that was already there, but it’s a weirdly simple tale for something the episode spends a surprising amount of time on. I forget whether the show sticks with Geordi’s newfound ability to relate to the opposite sex from here, and there’s at least a few laughs in his romantic coaching from Worf, but either way, it feels like an odd lark of a barely-built subplot.

The same goes for the sort-of romance between Dr. Crusher and John. There’s the hint of Florence Nightingale syndrome going on here -- something Beverley even acknowledges in dialogue -- but it never really goes anywhere. If you squint, you can make out some minor intent to suggest that Beverley’s shining influence is part of why John becomes a benevolent demigod after he unlocks his powers. But the most we get is some cheesy dialogue about Dr. Crusher’s attraction and a little bit of goo goo eyes. It doesn’t work on a scene-to-scene basis, another symptom of John’s overall dullness, and the point of it all is muddled at best.

Even the problem-solving portions of “Transfigurations” are surprisingly rote. Geordi recovered some type of giant organic flash drive from the crash, and it takes his and Data’s collective efforts to decode it. There’s some solid step-by-step efforts to solve the puzzle, but the effort ends up scanning as lifeless plot mechanics rather than an important part of anybody’s journey.

Eventually, with Geordi and Data’s good work, the Enterprise sets course for the origin of John’s pod, creating unspecified but deeply felt reluctance about it from John himself. When they run into a ship filled with John’s countrymen, they turn out to be garden variety, depth free fascists who have deemed John an enemy of the state and want him turned over to them so that he can be executed.

There’s the makings of a classic Captain Picard “Do we follow protocol and respect another culture’s laws or do we do what we think is morally right?” dilemma there, but it’s quickly short-circuited when John completes his metamorphosis and realizes that it’s the destiny of all his people to go through a similar transformation, despite the bog standard “They’re disrupting our society” protests from the opposing leader. It’s all standard issue Star Trek stuff, hastily crammed into the final act of the episode, without enough time or space to fully unpack the implications of what all of this means.

(Spoilers for Star Trek: Discovery, but that show does a better job with the whole “You told us this change was a curse, but it’s really a blessing” idea with Saru than TNG does here.)

And look, I don’t like to slate old T.V. shows for their effects not being up to snuff, but between the cornball “power burst” effects from John’s healing abilities, and the “green man”-esque look when he becomes an energy being makes it really hard to take the grave and awe-filled tones the episode wants to inspire seriously.

As I often say, it’s a shame, because there’s worthwhile material here. A society that fears change, a great metamorphosis that produces a wondrous new form of life, and a selfless figure at the center of it all is fodder for a strong, meaningful story that could be mapped onto a lot of different things. Sadly, “Transfigurations” makes it all thuddingly dull, with undercooked romances galore, a presto-changeo finish that squeezes in the most interesting elements of the episode at the last minute.