6x01 Time's Arrow (2)

[6.4/10] The biggest problem with “Time’s Arrow” is that the plot is random, dull, and arbitrary. The Devidians are boring adversaries, with no personality and no motivation other than sustenance. The nature of the threat is unclear. The use of time travel is wonky and plays like a convenient trick rather than a fully-formed part of the narrative. And there’s no real thematic throughline, from destiny to death to simple character development. Everything just sort of happens.

It’s a collage more than a story. Some parts of it are good. Some parts of it are bad. But none of those parts fit together especially well.

And yet, I find myself admiring individual elements of the episode, even if the whole doesn’t quite measure up. The scenes between Picard and Guinan in particular are quite good. As a kid, I didn’t really pick up on the romantic tension between the two characters, but revisiting the show, I appreciate the intimacy between the two of them. The script once again describes their relationship as “beyond friendship” and you feel that here, as Picard risks his return to the future to help someone in need. Some of the effectiveness may simply be putting a pair of stellar performers together and letting them hum, but there’s a knowing warmth the two share, and it becomes one of the true highlights of this outing.

Likewise, I continue to love Jerry Hardin’s outsized take on Mark Twain. Let’s be real, his version of the character is an absolute cheese, but Hardin is so dang committed to the bit! This Twain is more of a caricature than a character, but he’s fun, with his closet-hiding mischief, his desire for the “adventure of a lifetime” and even his desire to defend humanity against invaders from the future. Outside of those Picard/Guinan scenes, he’s the only player here who feels genuinely human in any meaningful way, with faults and wants and evident personality, to the point that he commands the screen and nearly steals the show.

Hell, it’s corny as all get out, but I even like his exchange with Troi. He laments that the future lacks the pleasures of a fine cigar and assumes the Federation subsists on conquest and subjugation. But when Troi explains that humanity abolished poverty and want, turning instead to high-minded ideals of exploration and acceptance, he deems the loss of a quality smokable a fair trade. There’s a solid insight at play, with how we project not only the present, but our view of it, onto our view of the future -- something that Star Trek is certainly guilty of -- while the real possibilities are far more wide-ranging and unpredictable than we’d care to admit.

Unfortunately, not all of the cheesy elements in “Time’s Arrow” work nearly so well. The reveal that the irritating, over-eager bellhop turns out to be Jack London was a bridge too far. Randomly running into one famous writer in the past? Fine. Why not? But just so happening to cross paths with two of them at the same time? Now you’re into pandering coincidence territory. Likewise, I will cop to chuckling a bit at the shtick with Mrs. Carmichael and her demands for the rent. Comic relief is self-justifying. But these routines take up valuable time in an episode that struggled to make its main plot interesting. Shakespeare-reading farces are a luxury this installment can’t afford.

Part of the problem is that the plot “yadda yadda yadda”s over all of the points that don’t really make sense. How are Picard and the other time travelers able to fit in and pay their way in 1800s San Francisco? Bits like the ruse with Mrs. Carmichael and the hilariously dumb rumble with a local policeman gesture toward these problems, but never really provide satisfying answers.

Worse yet, there’s remarkably little consideration of whether/why our heroes need to stop the Devidians. Sure, they’re sucking away life force or some other strange nebulous alien vampire concept, and that provides a solid reason to neutralize them. But there’s zero contemplation about whether hindering the Devidians would be tampering with the past, or if they’re the ones who are tampering with the past, or if this is all pre-ordained anyway since the stable time loop dictates it. Instead we get a ho-hum, “just gotta stop these weird-looking aliens” without any of the moral complexity or thoughtfulness that defines The Next Generation in particular.

Plus the rules for time travel are bizarre. The relationship between when/where someone enters the portal in the past and when/where they end up in the future seems totally arbitrary. This is not the first episode of Star Trek or sci-fi story in general where how time travel works is awfully convenient to the plot, but on top of all the other flaws, it stands out. In particular, there’s a sense of urgency and randomness to when time is a factor and when our heroes can take all the time they need.

Credit where credit is due, though, the second part of “Time’s Arrow” at least finds some clever ways to use its time travel conceit. There's something clockwork, if you’ll pardon the expression, to Data’s head blowing off when trying to stop the Devidians, seeming to seal his demise, only for Geordi to use the head they already found to get Data in ship shape again. In the same way, Picard using Data’s head to send a message warning of the damage torpedoes would cause via the time portal has a certain elegance, even if that threat seems tacked on at the last minute. The stable time loop business retains at least a little inventiveness in how TNG pays the temporal bills that have come due.

If only the creative team behind this season finale/premiere duo had taken more time to work out the narrative and given it more of a spine. To paraphrase Picard himself, then maybe all of this time travel, alien-fighting, and Twain hob-knobbing might mean something. Instead, it’s a half-baked adventure that coasts by on the gimmicks of jumping back and forth in the timeline and running into famous figures, without enough moments like Data considering his apparent mortality or Picard and Guinan cementing their bond to make weight. Star Trek is more than wild sci-fi ideas. It’s friendship and philosophy and deep thinking about the future. “Time’s Arrow” barely scrapes the surface of those notions, and falls short of the promise an idea like “A Federation Yankee in Sam Clemens’ Court” possesses.

(On a personal note, after five straight seasons, I’m going to take a breather before continuing on with my grand rewatch of 1990s Trek. But despite the rocky early seasons, I can’t tell you how enriching it’s been to go back and see one of my formative T.V. shows from childhood through adult eyes. I’m not sure I’d even realized how much of TNG’s perspective and values had helped to shape my own, but in revisiting this series, I’m ever more glad that they did.)