TNG starts climbing out of its rough first-season writing here. Character interactions are still pretty strained compared to the later years, but we get a good hint at the depth of storytelling to come. Picard has his first true "Star Trek dilemma" in this episode, the first of many.
The one element I must seriously question is why the Enterprise visited what appears to be a pre-warp civilization. Given that the Edo seem to have a complete apparent lack of awareness regarding space vessels or interstellar travel, it's unquestionable that the Prime Directive would have forbidden any contact with the planet at all. They somewhat regard the Starfleet team as gods after becoming aware of the ship's position in space near their own god, even.
Starfleet's general prohibition against interference or contact of any kind with civilizations that have yet to develop warp capability is long established at this point—at least as far back as "The Omega Glory" (TOS 2x25), which aired nearly 20 years before "Justice". Ironically, the Prime Directive should have prevented Picard's Prime Directive dilemma from ever cropping up in the first place. In a way, he ended up having to break the Prime Directive in the end because he broke the Prime Directive…
Review by dgwVIP 10BlockedParent2018-08-23T06:33:35Z
TNG starts climbing out of its rough first-season writing here. Character interactions are still pretty strained compared to the later years, but we get a good hint at the depth of storytelling to come. Picard has his first true "Star Trek dilemma" in this episode, the first of many.
The one element I must seriously question is why the Enterprise visited what appears to be a pre-warp civilization. Given that the Edo seem to have a complete apparent lack of awareness regarding space vessels or interstellar travel, it's unquestionable that the Prime Directive would have forbidden any contact with the planet at all. They somewhat regard the Starfleet team as gods after becoming aware of the ship's position in space near their own god, even.
Starfleet's general prohibition against interference or contact of any kind with civilizations that have yet to develop warp capability is long established at this point—at least as far back as "The Omega Glory" (TOS 2x25), which aired nearly 20 years before "Justice". Ironically, the Prime Directive should have prevented Picard's Prime Directive dilemma from ever cropping up in the first place. In a way, he ended up having to break the Prime Directive in the end because he broke the Prime Directive…