[7.8/10] It’s been said that listening to a podcast where the hosts can’t remember the name of someone or something you know is the closest you’ll ever feel to being a ghost. Well, watching “The Next Phase” may be the second closest. Famed Trek writer Ronald D. Moore turns Geordi and Ro into phantoms (pardon me, “phased and cloaked” individuals) who have to try desperately to alert their comrades to the fact that they’re still alive and can be returned to the land of the living.
Talk about stakes! As I’ve said many times, Star Trek is often at its best when it’s in problem solving mode. But this episode creates a unique dynamic, where LaForge and Laren are able to use their invisible, incorporeal status to eavesdrop and figure out how they became that way, and even how to fix it, but the same conditions mean they can’t communicate that solution to the people they trust or warn them of a Romulan destruction plot. You feel the frustration of the unlikely pair, frantically trying to get Data, or Picard, or anyone to realize they’re there and figure out how to bring them back.
Moore and director David Carson play that tension for all it’s worth. There are close calls with the Enterprise nearly going to warp which would, unbeknownst to the crew, destroy the ship and everyone aboard. It would also take away Ro and Geordi’s best chance to take on substance again. Stacking those two risks together, and making the duo little more than witnesses to the close calls, turns this one into a nailbiter.
Granted, you have to turn off your brain a bit for “The Next Phase”. Why don’t Geordi and Ro drop through the floor? How is it that their fellow phased Romulan could seemingly sit in a chair? If they’re both cloaked, why can they see one another? Did they really not eat or sleep for two days, and if so, how come they never seemed weak or tired? The answer to these questions is, “It’s just a show, and you should really just relax.” But it’s not necessarily one of the more clockwork sci-fi plots in Star Trek history.
That said, the episode plays by its own rules. While the “floors solid/walls permeable” divide doesn’t make much sense, it forces Ro and Geordi to hitch rides on turbolifts and shuttle crafts to get where they’re going. The concept of the Romulans working on “phase shift” technology to go with their cloaking tech, research the Klingons abandoned after failed experiments, puts a nice fig leaf on how all of this happened. And there’s a simple, but solid principle with our heroes leaving “chroniton particles” everywhere they go and being resolidified by “anyon particles”. The episode plays fair with its setups and payoffs on that front, so that however implausible the core concept is, the solution works on its own terms.
More than the sci-fi wooliness, what sets this episode apart (and many Moore scripts apart) is that it focuses on the characters amid all the high-concept wildness taking place. In a nod to someone who appears later in the season, Ro and Geordi get to spy on their own funerals. The heart of the episode, and the texture of it, come in the fond recollections of other crewmembers and in the conversations about how to honor the passing of their colleagues.
I love the running gag of Riker committing to offer a eulogy for Ro, to her chagrin and consternation, especially when she never learns what he’s going to say. As with the podcast example, it puts the audience in the same position, wondering what words the commander might offer given his...complicated history with her. At the same time, Picard’s recollection of the first time he met Geordi -- a small vignette to the young engineer’s commitment and dedication -- provides such warmth amid tense moments. It’s these little touches that elevate The Next Generation to the upper echelons of sci-fi shows, drawing out those connections between characters that add shading beyond the crisis of the week.
In the same vein, it’s heartening to hear Data and Worf speak fondly of their fallen comrade. Worf believes that Geordi earned an honored place in the afterlife for perishing in the line of duty for a good cause. Data takes his celebratory attitude to heart, deciding on a New Orleans Jazz Funeral to celebrate the life of his extraordinary colleague and friend when more traditional rituals, both human and Bajoran, seem wrong for the occasion. Baked into the outlandish escapades here is a legitimate contemplation of how to honor those who’ve passed and say goodbye in a way that fits them and comforts us.
I don’t mind telling you that it warmed my cold dead heart to hear Data describe Geordi as his best friend and wax rhapsodic (for an android, at least) about how Geordi treated Data as the person he aspired to be and accepted him for who he was. I nearly got misty when Geordi resolidified and walked over to put his hand on Data’s shoulder, a tribute to their bond and to the friend who saved his life. The connection between Geordi and Data is a side dish in “The Next Phase”, but an important one, that adds a touching element to the proceedings.
A bigger focus is on the idea of the afterlife in general. One of the neat things about this episode is that Ro believes she and Geordi died in the initial transporter accident, while Geordi believes this is yet another scientific anomaly to figure out. Along their journey here, they debate Bajoran religious beliefs, hear Klingon views of eternity, and embrace the humility of the unknown. This adds a spiritual bent to TNG that isn’t always a firm part of a mostly secular humanist-type show, forcing the pair to contemplate what comes after this life. Their debates and conversations are believable, particularly when they’re a world away from the lives they knew.
It’s cathartic, then, when they’re able to get through to Data using a Romulan disruptor and pull themselves back into the land of the living. The show earns that moment, both because the problem-solving skill it took to get there didn’t come easy, but because those philosophical conversations about death and friendship add meaning to Geordi and Ro’s return. A good story needs a little of each, and “The Next Phase” delivers it.
But it also delivers the tension that comes before the catharsis. One Star Trek screenwriter described the crew of the Enterprise as the Chicago Bulls, and it can feel that way sometimes. There’s no problem too big, no ethical dilemma too thorny, that our heroes can’t talk it out. When you scratch those lines of communication, make it so the best and brightest can neither see nor hear each other, you create an irritation and a want, in both the characters and the audience, to be able to connect again and solve the problem. Ronald D. Moore and the rest of the creative team mine that frustration for all it’s worth, and pay it off in our heroes glorious, heart-warming return.
Superb episode! I really start to like Ro and it‘s nice to see a bit of her development. Has to be pretty strange to be in the situation Geordi and Ro are.. Other crew members, the captain, your friends.. Talking about you as if you were dead, not knowing you are there and receive every single word. And you have no possibility to make them clear you are there. Terrifying.
Other than that the plot is really well executed. For a brief moment you get the soothing feeling that maybe one day the Romulans and the Federation could get well with each other, but.. Oh well. :D The „interactions“ between Geordi and Data are pretty entertaining, especially the scene when Data follows every single step of Geordi but fails to get it quite right. I think I was more happy than Ro and Geordi when Data finally got the right trace. Very entertaining!
I have never liked Ro's character, didn't then, don't now. She grates on my nerves almost as much as Major Kiera on DS9. I say almost simply coz Ro isn't a major player as Kiera unfortunately was.
Shout by FinFanBlockedParent2020-01-27T19:36:40Z
Michel Forbes was in more episodes then I remembered. Her character really had potential. It's an entertaining enough episode but it has the serious logical error: how come they don't fall through the floor, can sit on chairs and in one occasion on the bridge Ro even touches a panel when otherwise they pass through bulkheads, people and furniture. There isn't even much logic about it as to when they move through an object and when they don't. Just writers convienience. One has to be willing to accept certain things in order for a story to work.
The idea of the Romulans having that kind of technology in the future would have meant a power shift of epic proportions. Like with many other stories the nature of the episodic story telling made this disapear without comment.