Troi’s character was thwarted in a number of ways. For one, if she was too perceptive, it would kill a whole bunch of plots. I imagine that’s why they made her an empath and not a full telepath, but even with reading emotions she never said anything the actors didn’t make obvious. “I don’t want you here! Get away from my planet forever and never ever come down here!” “He’s hiding something.” No shit, counselor. The other problem is that they gave all the cool practical psychology stuff away to Guinan. If Troi had even half of Guinan’s scenes of clever interactions with the crew, we’d probably think of her as an exceptional psychologist, but they didn’t.
The character of Troi was such a strange collection of decisions.
In addition to a ship’s doctor, let’s also have a psychologist on board. Okay cool. A show as progressive as TNG was in its day would do something like “Hey we have a psychologist. Taking care of mental health is a thing you’re allowed to do.” Plus, in the Trek future, I can see where a psychologist might perform the roles of a present day Navy chaplain; Trek, especially TNG era Trek, had no use for religion and championed science, reason, philosophy and understanding, and so instead of a ship’s chaplain you’d have a ship’s counselor. Makes sense.
She’s a member of an empathic species who feels the emotions of the people she’s talking to so she’s an extra good counselor. And “logical” Vulcans are always science officers, right? Kind of on the nose but it’s on brand for Trek. Surprised the Klingon on the crew isn’t the weapons officer. Yet. So I guess she’s going to be a recurring character kind of like the ship’s doctor, when characters have personal issues they can go to the counselor to work through them?
The man cast will never have personal issues or conflicts among each other. They are the elite best of the best that humanity has to offer, they’re all pictures of perfect mental health and they work flawlessly as a team. …so why did they bother bringing a therapist on board with them?
She’s going to spend most of her duty day on the bridge sitting next to the Captain Ah, so she can use her empathy skills to aid in negotiations with outside characters, aliens and such, tell if they’re lying or upset or something, giving the Captain an amazing upper hand in pretty much any interpersonal situation.
…Shit I hadn’t thought that through. That does eliminate any plot that relies on deception to work. Well she’ll nearly never say anything actually useful, she’ll just sound smart. Okay…so the character is basically pointless?
She’s going to wear a short dress like Uhura did, but this time she’s going to sit in a chair facing forward with no console in front of it so the camera can always see her legs. Ah, there it is. None of the other two women on the crew are wearing such a uniform though, they’re wearing onesie jammies like the men, the doctor even has that really practical coat. Isn’t that kind of sexist even for the late 80’s?
We’ll have some male extras wearing the same uniform in the background sometimes. …Okay sure. So is this counselor a civilian serving aboard ship? She dresses different than everyone else on the crew, and has a purely personnel support role like the teacher and the barber characters.
No, she’s a commissioned officer, a Lieutenant Commander, fifth in command of the ship after the Captain, the first officer, the chief engineer and the navigator. Okay, is she going to command the ship while her superior officers are away, will she be on watch while the others are relieved, play a part in the chain of command?
Of course not, she’s a woman No, in fact several seasons in she’ll be thrust into that situation and the only enlisted man on the show will have to explain to her that she’s even an officer in the first place, and in one of the movies she makes we’ll have her fly the Enterprise, and she’ll immediately crash it. She’s completely useless as a commanding officer. …Okay…so moving on I see you’ve hired Whoopi Goldberg as a recurring guest star, what’s that character like?
There’s going to be a crew lounge on board with big windows, and she’s going to play the wise bartender, Guinan. Interesting. What does she do?
She’ll dispense sage advice, offer to talk to characters who are vexed by the current situation, act as a sounding board, sometimes re-contextualize their problems so they have a revelation, you know. Bartender stuff. Shouldn’t the ship’s counselor do that kind of thing?
Hey speaking of the counselor, what do you think of this spandex aerobics suit instead of the mini dress?
They really could have done themselves a favor by adding some clear limitations to her abilities.
Proximity required: No sensing through the view screen.
Surface impressions only: Disciplined minds can fool her
Background noise: The more people are around, the harder it is to get a clear read on someone.
The more alien a mind is, the more difficult or painful it is to interact with.
There you go, she can still use her abilities to help the crew, and sometimes to solve problems, but you can also get stuff past her without making her seem oblivious. Then all they have to do is consistently write her as an intelligent and competent member of the crew, and we’re good.
Early on they established she can’t read Ferengi minds. Which actually made her just that much MORE worthless. “We want money! We’re an entire civilization of late stage capitalists. Acquisition!” “I can’t sense anything.”
Her and Riker were the ones chosen to be there for their attractiveness. It was a showbiz rule that at least one female character has to be fuckable and in this case we got a male character too. Too bad the writers created such weak episodes for her, like S2 E1 “Child”. I agree that they didn’t think through her plot spoiling abilities properly. She even senses “a unifying consciousness” from Moriarty, a holodeck character made of literal photons of light… I wonder how much cocaine those writers were doing in the 80s…
Riker, Troy, and Data all came from characters that were supposed to be in ToS: Phase 2.
Riker was originally the character that would learn from and replace Kirk. Troys original character was an alien that had to repress her sex drive. And Data was a Vulcan.
Those characters were first repurposed for the movies, and then repurposed again for NG.
I agree with most of your analysis except for her outfits. Every other woman on the ship wears a standard uniform, no other woman on the ship is vaguely sexualized. We have plenty of opportunity to see that women aren’t just ditzy accessories for men but equals.
It feels weirdly regressive that there can’t be a woman with cleavage on the show else it’s sexist and reductive. Obviously women aren’t just there to be sexualized by men, but some women enjoy it and that’s okay too. Basically you’re slut shaming Deanna.
I like the approach SNW is taking with long lived races. Where Guinan was all calm and wise, Pelia is a quirky ball of energy. Maybe it’s because Guinan is much younger and Pelia knows that there is something significantly worse than death. Boredom.
I think there was an episode of Voyager to that effect; a Q decides to show up on Voyager of all places wanting to kill himself because immortality, omniscience and omnipotence get boring after awhile, and Actual Q is (for some reason) cast as the responsible adult in this situation.
Q showed up on voyager because he knew that Janeway would happily oblige on account of her being a bloodthirsty war criminal, chomping at the bit to extinguish more life in her eternal quest for caffeine
Saying the obvious actually is very useful. Yes, it might seem obvious that they’re angry, hiding something etc., but what if they weren’t and are just really good liars and actors? Troi is there to confirm if they’re honest or not.
Troi’s character was thwarted in a number of ways. For one, if she was too perceptive, it would kill a whole bunch of plots. I imagine that’s why they made her an empath and not a full telepath, but even with reading emotions she never said anything the actors didn’t make obvious. “I don’t want you here! Get away from my planet forever and never ever come down here!” “He’s hiding something.” No shit, counselor. The other problem is that they gave all the cool practical psychology stuff away to Guinan. If Troi had even half of Guinan’s scenes of clever interactions with the crew, we’d probably think of her as an exceptional psychologist, but they didn’t.
The character of Troi was such a strange collection of decisions.
In addition to a ship’s doctor, let’s also have a psychologist on board. Okay cool. A show as progressive as TNG was in its day would do something like “Hey we have a psychologist. Taking care of mental health is a thing you’re allowed to do.” Plus, in the Trek future, I can see where a psychologist might perform the roles of a present day Navy chaplain; Trek, especially TNG era Trek, had no use for religion and championed science, reason, philosophy and understanding, and so instead of a ship’s chaplain you’d have a ship’s counselor. Makes sense.
She’s a member of an empathic species who feels the emotions of the people she’s talking to so she’s an extra good counselor. And “logical” Vulcans are always science officers, right? Kind of on the nose but it’s on brand for Trek. Surprised the Klingon on the crew isn’t the weapons officer. Yet. So I guess she’s going to be a recurring character kind of like the ship’s doctor, when characters have personal issues they can go to the counselor to work through them?
The man cast will never have personal issues or conflicts among each other. They are the elite best of the best that humanity has to offer, they’re all pictures of perfect mental health and they work flawlessly as a team. …so why did they bother bringing a therapist on board with them?
She’s going to spend most of her duty day on the bridge sitting next to the Captain Ah, so she can use her empathy skills to aid in negotiations with outside characters, aliens and such, tell if they’re lying or upset or something, giving the Captain an amazing upper hand in pretty much any interpersonal situation.
…Shit I hadn’t thought that through. That does eliminate any plot that relies on deception to work. Well she’ll nearly never say anything actually useful, she’ll just sound smart. Okay…so the character is basically pointless?
She’s going to wear a short dress like Uhura did, but this time she’s going to sit in a chair facing forward with no console in front of it so the camera can always see her legs. Ah, there it is. None of the other two women on the crew are wearing such a uniform though, they’re wearing onesie jammies like the men, the doctor even has that really practical coat. Isn’t that kind of sexist even for the late 80’s?
We’ll have some male extras wearing the same uniform in the background sometimes. …Okay sure. So is this counselor a civilian serving aboard ship? She dresses different than everyone else on the crew, and has a purely personnel support role like the teacher and the barber characters.
No, she’s a commissioned officer, a Lieutenant Commander, fifth in command of the ship after the Captain, the first officer, the chief engineer and the navigator. Okay, is she going to command the ship while her superior officers are away, will she be on watch while the others are relieved, play a part in the chain of command?
Of course not, she’s a womanNo, in fact several seasons in she’ll be thrust into that situation and the only enlisted man on the show will have to explain to her that she’s even an officer in the first place, and in one of the movies she makes we’ll have her fly the Enterprise, and she’ll immediately crash it. She’s completely useless as a commanding officer. …Okay…so moving on I see you’ve hired Whoopi Goldberg as a recurring guest star, what’s that character like?There’s going to be a crew lounge on board with big windows, and she’s going to play the wise bartender, Guinan. Interesting. What does she do?
She’ll dispense sage advice, offer to talk to characters who are vexed by the current situation, act as a sounding board, sometimes re-contextualize their problems so they have a revelation, you know. Bartender stuff. Shouldn’t the ship’s counselor do that kind of thing?
Hey speaking of the counselor, what do you think of this spandex aerobics suit instead of the mini dress?
They really could have done themselves a favor by adding some clear limitations to her abilities.
There you go, she can still use her abilities to help the crew, and sometimes to solve problems, but you can also get stuff past her without making her seem oblivious. Then all they have to do is consistently write her as an intelligent and competent member of the crew, and we’re good.
Early on they established she can’t read Ferengi minds. Which actually made her just that much MORE worthless. “We want money! We’re an entire civilization of late stage capitalists. Acquisition!” “I can’t sense anything.”
Her and Riker were the ones chosen to be there for their attractiveness. It was a showbiz rule that at least one female character has to be fuckable and in this case we got a male character too. Too bad the writers created such weak episodes for her, like S2 E1 “Child”. I agree that they didn’t think through her plot spoiling abilities properly. She even senses “a unifying consciousness” from Moriarty, a holodeck character made of literal photons of light… I wonder how much cocaine those writers were doing in the 80s…
Riker, Troy, and Data all came from characters that were supposed to be in ToS: Phase 2.
Riker was originally the character that would learn from and replace Kirk. Troys original character was an alien that had to repress her sex drive. And Data was a Vulcan.
Those characters were first repurposed for the movies, and then repurposed again for NG.
I saw an interview with Marina where she said she was only ever given intelligent sounding lines in the episodes where her cleavage was covered up.
Well at least they justified her existence when Barclay showed up. That guy needed an entire therapist all to himself.
I would like to subscribe to your newsletter
Is there a /bestof in Lemmy? This comment deserves to be framed for reframing Troi.
I agree with most of your analysis except for her outfits. Every other woman on the ship wears a standard uniform, no other woman on the ship is vaguely sexualized. We have plenty of opportunity to see that women aren’t just ditzy accessories for men but equals.
It feels weirdly regressive that there can’t be a woman with cleavage on the show else it’s sexist and reductive. Obviously women aren’t just there to be sexualized by men, but some women enjoy it and that’s okay too. Basically you’re slut shaming Deanna.
This is why I hate how everyone is so afraid of “objectification” these days
It doesn’t feel like a victory for gender equality, it feels like a defeat for sex positivity.
I say this as a woman
And yet people shout about Seven of Nine’s catsuits.
I like the approach SNW is taking with long lived races. Where Guinan was all calm and wise, Pelia is a quirky ball of energy. Maybe it’s because Guinan is much younger and Pelia knows that there is something significantly worse than death. Boredom.
I think that’s almost the entirety of why Q was so… Q. When you’re already a god, what’s left to strive for but amusing yourself?
I think there was an episode of Voyager to that effect; a Q decides to show up on Voyager of all places wanting to kill himself because immortality, omniscience and omnipotence get boring after awhile, and Actual Q is (for some reason) cast as the responsible adult in this situation.
Q showed up on voyager because he knew that Janeway would happily oblige on account of her being a bloodthirsty war criminal, chomping at the bit to extinguish more life in her eternal quest for caffeine
Other Q really just had to make himself look like Tuvix and Janeway would’ve killed him instantly
I came here for blood and coffee, and I’m just about out of coffee.
And further supported by the Q Continuum being shown to be full of bored Q who have already seen and done everything.
It’s too late. They’ve seen it all.
They’re max level with BiS gear. Time to start alts!
Q’s final scene was Picard’s Season 2 only redeeming quality. Then Season 3 retconned that too.
The real reason she wasn’t a telepath was because of fans screaming that psychic powers was “validiating psuedoscience!”
ESP was a thing in the original series but back then mainstream science took such things more seriously. Didn’t have skeptics yet.
Saying the obvious actually is very useful. Yes, it might seem obvious that they’re angry, hiding something etc., but what if they weren’t and are just really good liars and actors? Troi is there to confirm if they’re honest or not.